Trump ordered that the term Homo sapiens be changed to Hetero sapiens. In history books and on websites, the airplane from which the atomic bomb was dropped on Hiroshima will no longer be identified as the Enola Gay, but rather the Enola Straight. Trump also ordered billionaire Mark Cuban, who supported Kamala Harris in the 2024 election, to change his name to Mark American. If he does not do so, he will be charged with terrorism.   read more

A complaint filed on behalf of several Samoans, some of whom live there and others who live in the United States proper, pointed out that those born in American Samoa are considered U.S. nationals, but not citizens. That means that even when they move to Hawaii or another state, they’re not entitled to vote, hold office or enjoy certain other rights reserved for citizens. Their U.S. passports have a restriction that labels them as U.S. nationals.   read more

Reporters Without Borders has awarded Eritrea last place on its World Press Freedom Index for seven straight years. Of the 223 journalists imprisoned around the world, 23 are in Eritrea. The only press allowed in Eritrea is that which is controlled by the government and even then the journalists are not safe. Thirteen employees of an education ministry radio station were imprisoned for five years without being told why.   read more

YouTube has released statistics on its top 10 how-to searches. The top search isn’t on how to tie a tie or change a tire. It’s on how to kiss. There are plenty of answers—pages and pages of them. Some of the videos break it down further: How to French kiss; how to kiss softly; and how to make out are among the topics. It’s slightly possible that some of the videos are designed less to educate than to titillate.   read more

Ludmila Savchuk, who once worked for the organization that produced the hoaxes, revealed that workers have a quota to write a certain number of items, sometimes involving hoaxes, other times articles describing how terrible conditions are in the European Union. Ukraine is also a target. Other articles praise Russian leaders. A Louisiana chemical hoax was one in a wave of similar attacks last year. Phony news reports tried to scare people of Atlanta into thinking there was an Ebola outbreak.   read more

From federal flood insurance to sand replenishment, the government has poured (or promised to pour) hundreds of billions of tax dollars into helping home and business owners enjoy beachfront property. In Florida alone, the National Flood Insurance Program has guaranteed to cover $484 billion in property. Taxpayers also subsidize beach nourishment, or the placement of new sand on eroded beaches. The federal government spent $787 million from 1995 to 2002 on beach replenishment,   read more

What a person does for a living can tell you a lot about their political persuasions. Who knew flight attendants swing Democratic, while pilots like the GOP? Or that the Democratic Party can count on carpenters for support, but not plumbers? Perhaps it’s a throwback to President Richard Nixon’s White House Plumbers, who searched for leaks to the press.   read more

Alameda is the first county in the nation to make drug manufacturers pay at least a part of the cost of encouraging people to do the right thing and giving them a means to do it. That means setting up collection points, publicizing the locations and disposing of the drugs.   read more

W. Russell Callender took over as acting assistant administrator in charge of the National Ocean Service in November 2014, capping a long career with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). In 2013, Callender was appointed deputy assistant administrator for the National Ocean Service and took over the agency the following year.   read more

“Offshore fracking has been shrouded in secrecy, but this settlement will finally force the government to tell us where oil companies are using this toxic technique,” said plaintiff's attorney Kristen Monsell. “Fracking pollution is a huge threat to marine animals, and the high pressures used to frack offshore wells increase the risk of another devastating oil spill.” Added Sakashita: “The thing that I find shocking is...this is the agency that’s supposed to be regulating offshore drilling."   read more

During the trial, though, Drake’s lawyers contended that the Pentagon’s inspector general destroyed evidence related to the case. That prompted the judge who oversaw the trial, U.S. District Court Judge Richard Bennett, to ask another judge, U.S. Magistrate Judge Stephanie Gallagher, to investigate the accusations. On May 13 she sent a letter to the Justice Department’s Public Integrity Section requesting that they weigh in on the matter. She gave them until June 12 to respond.   read more

The decentralization plan is currently included in the Senate’s version of the $612 billion bill that funds the Pentagon. Contained in section 843, the provision is supposedly intended to speed up the procurement of weapons by giving the commanders of the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines more power to make decisions on weapons purchases, which would be at the expense of the defense secretary. But the White House has made clear its opposition and willingness to veto the legislation.   read more

Sens. Mike Crapo (R-Idaho) and Ron Wyden (D-Oregon) have joined together on legislation that would create a separate disaster account to pay for wildfires. For many years, the agency has raided funds from other programs to finance firefighting efforts. It's expected to happen again this year, particularly due to global warming’s role in extending the fire season—now 80 days longer than 15 years ago. The Widen/Crapo legislation is backed by such diverse groups as the NRA and the Sierra Club.   read more

Instead of paying $30,000 to $50,000 annually in tuition and fees at American private universities, students can attend German institutions for only a few hundred dollars a year. One example is Technical University of Munich, “one of the most highly regarded universities in Europe,” where a U.S. student pays only $120 a semester in fees. The fee includes a ticket that allows free public transportation anywhere in Munich, and student health insurance is less than $90 a month.   read more

The planes managed in just one month to conduct more than a hundred flights in 11 states. The missions targeted both large cities and unincorporated areas, the AP reported. The planes carry high-tech cameras and sometimes even sophisticated equipment that can track cell phones, raising questions of whether this surveillance has violated people’s privacy. The FBI’s air force was in the skies over Baltimore during the recent protests of the death of Freddie Gray in the hands of the police.   read more

Despite recent high-profile police killings of unarmed civilians, there are no official numbers on how often this happens. That question has been left to outsiders, such as The Washington Post, which found nearly 400 people—armed and unarmed—have been killed by police officers so far this year. Justice statisticians also don’t know how many prisoners are locked away in solitary confinement. Nor can the Justice Department say how many non-sexual assaults occur in the prison system.   read more

Wikileaks says the 26 chapters are kept under wraps by corporations that have been given access to what the group calls a “monster trade pact.” Said Wikileaks: “The treaty aims to create a new international legal regime that will allow transnational corporations to bypass domestic courts, evade environmental protections, police the internet on behalf of the content industry, limit the availability of affordable generic medicines, and drastically curtail each country’s legislative sovereignty.”   read more