Hotel owner tells Hispanic workers to change names.

TAOS, N.M. – Larry Whitten marched into this northern New Mexico town in late July on a mission: resurrect a failing hotel.

The tough-talking former Marine immediately laid down some new rules. Among them, he forbade the Hispanic workers at the run-down, Southwestern adobe-style hotel from speaking Spanish in his presence (he thought they'd be talking about him), and ordered some to Anglicize their names.

No more Martin (Mahr-TEEN). It was plain-old Martin. No more Marcos. Now it would be Mark.

Whitten's management style had worked for him as he's turned around other distressed hotels he bought in recent years across the country.

The 63-year-old Texan, however, wasn't prepared for what followed.

Sit on your hands while reading the article, least you bruise yourself facepalming: believe it or not, it gets even worse.

Bonus: The article is also badly written. It's just the cherry on the fail pile.

Apparently unsatisfied with everything ELSE the Catholic Church has to deal with, Pope Benedict XVI decides to stick his crucifix where it doesn't belong and meddle in the affairs of Anglicans -- by inviting those displeased with Episcopalian acceptance of homosexuals to COME OVER TO THE DARK SIDE join with Rome.

( Text for the link-phobic )

A rather good article, I feel, though its appeal may be to a relatively fairly narrow audience (consisting entirely of people who A. know jack about either CoE or Catholicism, and B. actually care) followed by surprisingly insightful comments:

Is it just me, or does the picture suggest a vampire rising from its coffin? asks riggbeck.

speaking as an excatholic he is welcome to them! although they'll probably find that there are more gay priests in the catholic church rather than in the one they are leaving! observes jamijery.

This is all very interesting and informative, but I'm sorry to say that for 90% of the population, this will have no bearing on their lives. So sayeth NapoleonKaramazov in what I think is a fairly accurate estimation, begging the question "Why, then, is Duende bothering to post this?" Because I am extremely bad at math.

...Snarking aside, some of the comments actually ARE good ones:

This is very similar to Stephen Bates' article yesterday. Again, I fail to see the problem with the Vatican's proposal. A way has been found to allow a number of people who are currently Anglicans - call them Anglo-Catholics, High Church, or whatever - to move to the Catholic Church in a fashion which will make them happier than they currently are. In their absence, people in the Church of England who wish to make more changes in terms of women bishops, gay cleargy, etc, will find it easier to make those changes. Where is the problem in this? Only if you see RC / Anglican relations as some sort of zero-sum game, where the Anglo-Catholics have to be kept locked into the Anglican communion in order to keep the numbers up. --Suleyman

The Catholic Church is seen to be modern. In one breath the Pope has spoken superstision about homosexuality, and in the next, condemned Israel for bulldozing Palistenian homes. Tell them that no-one MAKES homosexuals do what they do. Do you? The idea of fearing anything let alone God seems dubious to most of the previous commenters. Fear isn't the issue regarding the accused. The only criticism about this compromise has come from rash hackers like Lucy Mangan who have distracted from whose own questionable practices, based on personal nuerosis and egocentricities, which bare no relavance to the INCREASINGLY neccessary role of a high profile, NON VIOLENT body in today's society. --GraemeFord

The usual parade of rage-inducing ignorance and thought-inducing conspiracy theories follow. ("There is no such thing as an Anglican church there are only a bunch of jumped up hypocrites who cow-towed to the divorce demands of a fat king. If you are a Christian you either follow true Protestantism or you admit you are a catholic and follow the pope, there can be no half-way house." ...What?)

As for myself, a former member of both churches, I think that is Rome wishes to corral all the bigoted homophobes into the same pen regardless of (basically irrelevant, in this case) differences in doctrine, they have my blessing -- it only makes them that much easier to avoid.

So much RAGE. This creature can't even be considered a human being for what he did.

( LJ Cut for potential triggers )

Facebook Poll: Should Obama be killed?

It's been reported to the Secret Service, which I suspect will lead to OMG!Censorship accusations.

12-Year-Old 'Bride' Dies Giving Birth.

( Snippet under cut. )

_{On a side note, it makes me quite angry that such children are referred to as 'brides' instead of, oh, I don't know, 'victims', maybe?}

Pulled from that ever-flowing font of information, cleolinda's twitter.

Policeman shoots Fire Chief in courtroom over traffic ticket.

I don't even fucking know.

ETA: Apparently I don't know my state acronyms. AR, not AK. The one in the south.

Stranger accused of slapping crying child in store

( For the link-phobic )

Check out the guy's picture. He totally looks like someone who'd do something like this. Poor kid. Poor Mom!

So I got this off the Malaysian news service:

Avoiding masturbation and homosexual activities are among preventive measures one could take against Influenza A (H1N1), according to an eminent practitioner of complimentary therapy.

…

I honestly don’t know what to say. I honestly do not know what to say.

…

He has a blog post explaining it all. Hell, his entire blog looks like that.

…

I bow to stronger minds to parse this further, because I think my mind just broke.

Link below contains graphically described disturbing subject matter.

A new 'feature' from PETA: Ingrid Newkirk's 'unique will'.

I'm hoping assuming it's all a publicity act, as per usual, considering the blatant illegality of large portions of it, but the tastelessness of the whole thing is still quite appalling, even for PETA.

This may come as a shock to some of you, but G. Gordon Liddy is, in fact, an asshat. Today's asshaberdashery: declaring that Obama's pick for the new Supreme Court justice, Sonia Sotomayor, is unfit for the court because she might be menstruating during judicial conferences, which would make her decisions suspect.

I only wish I were kidding.

Well, golly gee whillakers, Mr. Liddy! I never thought about it like that before, but now that you mention it, I guess we womenfolk ought to just let you menfolk make all the decisions for us, since you're obviously all so sane and reasonable.

Unsurprisingly, Jezebel is not impressed. I, personally, would like to hear what Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsberg have to say.

Damn.

( Cut for triggering content )

Apple pulls plug on Baby Shaker game

Apple Inc. pulled a 99-cent iPhone game called "Baby Shaker" from its iTunes store Wednesday after its premise — quiet a crying baby with a vigorous shake — prompted outrage.

According to screen shots posted on several Web sites, "Baby Shaker" displayed black-and-white line drawings of a baby. The iTunes description included the line, "See how long you can endure his or her adorable cries before you just have to find a way to quiet the baby down!"

Maybe I've just lost my sense of humor due to a rash of incidents of guys permanently injuring/killing their girlfriends' babies, mostly by shaking, in Alaska shortly before I left, but seriously, who the hell thought this would be a fun game? I'm appalled, I tell you! Appalled!

First there were corrupt judges sending kids off to boot camps, and then came an eleven-year-old charged as an adult for murdering his dad's pregnant girlfriend. Now it's a middle-aged man hosting beer bashes in his basement for high-schoolers and supplying stripper poles as well.

Steven Russo, 36, accused of hosting teen drinking parties, encouraging pole dancing

Dear state of mine, WHAT THE HELL?!

ETA: Link fixed, sorry about that.

ETA2: I'm sorry about the 'middle-aged', folks. Didn't mean any offense.

You read that right.

The crime drips with brutal irony: a woman decapitated, allegedly by her estranged husband, in the offices of the television network the couple founded with the hope of countering Muslim stereotypes.

Yeah, it appears that the wife had enough of her husband's abuse and filed for divorce. So he cut her head off.

Bonus: Contained in the article is the stupidest statement I've seen in weeks: "I just do not feel it was an honor killing," Sanders (former news director for the station) added. "I think it was domestic abuse that got out of control."

As opposed, of course, to the totally reasonable domestic abuse that goes on all the time. This would be one reason I hate the term "domestic violence/abuse." It sounds so civilized, like a domestic dog. Abuse is abuse; kindly do not slap qualifiers on it.

Pro-life group up in arms over Krispy Kreme's Abortion Doughnuts

The doughnut giant released the following statement yesterday:

'Krispy Kreme Doughnuts, Inc. (NYSE: KKD) is honoring American's sense of pride and freedom of choice on Inauguration Day, by offering a free doughnut of choice [...]

The unfortunate reality of a post Roe v. Wade America is that 'choice' is synonymous with abortion access, and celebration of 'freedom of choice' is a tacit endorsement of abortion rights on demand.

I CANNOT make this shit up, people.

(In unfunnybusiness just to be safe, as the mere mention of abortion tends to bring the unfunny. Also, to me, this is funny in a "OH MY GOD I HAVE GOT TO LAUGH OR I'M GOING TO CRY AND RAGE AND NEVER, EVER BE ABLE TO STOP" way.)

Three Galveston, Texas plainclothes cops mistake a 12 year old black honor student sitting in her own front yard with a white prostitute. They beat her when she fought back, and then arrest her and her father several weeks later for 'assaulting a police officer' when the family filed a lawsuit. Yeah.

The Fark thread.

PETA wants to advertise vegan message on border fence:

While many view the contentious border fence as a government fiasco, an animal rights group sees a rare opportunity.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals plans today to announce an unusual marketing pitch to the U.S. government: Rent us space on the fence for billboards warning illegal border crossers there is more to fear than the Border Patrol.

The billboards, in English and Spanish, would offer the caution: "If the Border Patrol Doesn't Get You, the Chicken and Burgers Will — Go Vegan."

"We think that Mexicans and other immigrants should be warned if they cross into the U.S. they are putting their health at risk by leaving behind a healthier, staple diet of corn tortillas, beans, rice, fruits and vegetables," said Lindsay Rajt, assistant manager of PETA's vegan campaigns.

The Department of Homeland Security is working to meet a deadline to complete 670 miles of fencing and other barriers on the Southwest border by Dec. 31. The fencing operation has run into stiff opposition by landowners fighting government efforts to obtain their land through condemnation.

PETA says its billboards would picture "fit and trim" Mexicans in their own country, where their diet is more in line with the group's mission. Another image on the sign would portray obese American children and adults "gorging on meaty, fat- and cholesterol-packed American food."

*headdesk* *headdesk* *headdesk*

I got it at Feministing, who got it from Bitch who got it from Vegans of Color.

When a 25-year-old Manhattan graduate student who was assaulted Tuesday night got dressed that morning, she probably didn’t anticipate that her T-shirt would provoke four teens into shoving her, pulling out her earphones and spitting in her face.

Then again, with a shirt sporting the slogan, “Obama is my slave,” it may have been wise to consider the possibility.

Now she’s suing the $69 shirt’s designer, Apollo Braun, for “all he’s got,” the designer claims.

The designer says he doesn't like Obama "because he's a Muslim," and that he's moved shirts that say things like, "Jews against Obama," "Obama=Hitler" and "Who Killed Obama?"

I can't decide what fails most: that someone designed this shirt, that someone bought it (for $69!), or that the person who bought it is now trying to sue the designer because, surprise, surprise, it got a poor reception on the streets of New York.

ETA: No, I'm not condoning the attack upon the woman, no matter how offensively racist her shirt was. Questioning her judgment, yeah, but I'm not endorsing the teens who attacked her. Physical violence is also for the fail. Just FYI.

Children drugged, forced to put on sex shows for adults

From the article:

But whether congregants will flock to a place with such a tarnished reputation is far from certain. "You got to decide whether you're willing to forgive those kind of things," Rev. Tim Letsch concedes.