Here at the Big Bad Blog, we look at the news and wonder what is wrong with America’s right wing legislators.

We can express a modicum of understanding at the decision to starve women of their rights via a cut to the funding of planned parenthood. The Republican party has long been the enemy of the poor, women, and (particularly) abortion. We do not understand it, but we saw it coming.

We are flabbergasted that the state government in Wisconsin would draft a law that would end collective bargaining by employees in the state. Not only is it horrible and unjust, it also seems like poor strategy — the resulting strikes will almost certainly paralyze public services, and it hands relevancy back to unions that were becoming increasingly irrelevant in today’s world. We understand that Republicans are pro-business and anti-union, and that Republican governments look to curtail union rights. But this is monumental in its stupidity.

Finally, we are perplexed by Montana, where the legislature will be voting on whether or not physical laws happen to be true.

At least in the first two instances, the issues are social and a matter of government policy. Passing a legislation saying that the earth’s temperature will not change on the basis of emissions from Montana does not make that true. Emissions either do or do not contribute to global warming (they do), and no amount of legislating will change that.

Photo by Elisabeth Frederickson. Found at Illusion 360.
Webcomic is Sock Puppet Army, by Nick Hamilton.

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	Volunteers at women’s health centres apparently get pelted with small rubber “dog-toy” like fetuses
The Psychology of Conspiracy
	If you need proof that the UK’s libel laws are over-the-top, check out the manner in which criticisms of a person’s behaviour need to be expressed, in order to avoid lawsuits.
As a denizen of the Internet, you are no doubt aware of that annoying quiz in which your own writing is compared to famous authors. But be aware that it is flawed: Input some Lovecraft, and it will identify it as Orwell-like. Input some Orwell, and it will be identified as being similar to Margaret Mitchell.
	Remember a few weeks ago when we linked to scaremongering over methane releases from the BP oil spill? Well, now the scaremongering has gone even more extreme — to doomsday scenarios! Of course, these do not stand up to scrutiny. But excellent scaremongering nonetheless!
Historians say that they have located King Arthur’s table. And here I was thinking that King Arthur was just a myth. Are the stories about Merlin true, too?
	It has been shown everywhere I look on the Internet. Everywhere. But I will still link to it, because I continue to love absolutely everything that Improv Everywhere does.
Need a place to crash for a month? Like museums? Then apply to live at Chicago’s Museum of Science and Industry for a month. Oh, you get paid, too. On the downside, you’ll be expected to write. Scary.

Back in April, the website ThinkGeek created an April Fool’s Day joke — the sale of canned unicorn meat. You have probably seen this if you have the internet. And you probably have the internet.

Now ThinkGeek has been served with a Cease and Desist Order from the National Pork Board, asking them to stop selling unicorn meat using their registered trademark THE OTHER WHITE MEAT.

(by Alejandra Bartoliche)

In the world of bizarre internet turf wars, after astronomer Stuart Robbins showed that astrologer Terry Nazon’s claims about Mayans were inaccurate (with the help of an archaeologist), Ms. Nazon started to impersonate Mr. Robbins on various websites. While posting under the guise of Mr. Robbins, Ms. Nazon posted complaints about others being “anonymous cowards” and “phonies”.

Mashable is reporting some interesting stats regarding the use of Facebook statuses to deal with partners. While the stats are almost certainly incredibly inaccurate (they come from an online survey which exists on a Facebook page for those trying to hook up with strangers through Facebook), it does raise an interesting question: How often (and for what reasons) do people create fraudulent (in which we mean untrue, rather than illegal) updates via social media?