• Obama told Chinese teenagers about the uncensored Internet, a mediocre collection of re-purposed AP articles and some videos that generally people only like when it’s not available.  [New York Times]
• Over at some United Nations summit, everyone bonded about how much they hate hunger but declined to throw any money at the problem. [AP]
• Starting in January, GM will start giving the US $1 billion per quarter to pay off the company’s debt. [Washington Post]
• Late Friday, when no one was paying attention, Robert Gates whispered in the Supreme Court’s ear that the Pentagon is forbidding the release of those US military-terror suspect photos. [CNN]
• Some Democrats are working on a bill that would compensate everyone whose hours were cut so their companies wouldn’t go out of business immediately. Wonkette Games: what will Democrats and Republicans do to convince everyone on Earth to hate this idea in just a few weeks? [The Hill]
• Palestinians might ask the UN for their own state because they are very frustrated with the US, Israel, and not having their own state. [WSJ]

The worst bands on Earth are very offended that their music has been played at Gitmo as part of actual torture, which, legally-speaking, is somehow different than being playing in your stupid brother’s car like constantly. All your favorites—Trent Reznor, Billy Bragg, Tom Morello, etc. etc.—have joined the National Campaign to Close Guantanamo, some sort of Traveling Wilburys-like superband. “Guantanamo may be Dick Cheney’s idea of America, but it’s not mine. The fact that music I helped create was used in crimes against humanity sickens me — we need to end torture and close Guantanamo now,” said Morello, he of Rage Against the Machine. Oh man, things are about to get so heavy and shit. MORE »

So Liz Cheney and Bill Kristol talked to some bigwigs over at Internet, who have finally agreed to publish KeepAmericaSafe.com! As soon as you can tear yourself away from Michael Steele’s A Man Got To Have A Code blog, your editor at Wonkette implores you to join us on a tour of this latest significant Republican contribution to the Internet. Never ever has there been so much torture in one place. Ha ha, this certainly is not true. But still! Wouldn’t you like to meet today’s Featured Gitmo Detainee? MORE »

A choice bit of news today for terrorists and people who just seem like terrorists: Obama and his legal pals have decided that they will not be giving themselves any more pretend legal authority in order to detain suspicious people indefinitely. It turns out Bush and Cheney did a pretty comprehensive job of back in 2001 rounding up all the authority on Earth and renditioning the shit out of it in Gitmo and Bagram. MORE »

That dreadful scandal-bastion known to some as “the University of Wyoming” is back in the news, because of mean old Dick Cheney: “CHEYENNE, Wyo. — A decision by the University of Wyoming to name a new center for international students for former Vice President Dick Cheney is drawing criticism from people who say Cheney’s support for the Iraq war and harsh interrogation techniques should disqualify him from the distinction.” HA! Dick Cheney, man. A $3.2 million donation from the Cheneys for this so-called “center,” designed to house the very people he despises: Foreigns. The four or five international students at UW should really consider ever walking into this fishy building… something seems a little “Bagram-y” about all of this. [AP via Indecision Forever]

• Obama’s big health care legislation presentation next week will feature such novelties as an explanation of the contents of said health care legislation. [New York Times]
• Supreme Court Justice John Paul Stevens’ hiring of only one clerk for the 2010 Supreme Court regular season has many fans speculating that he could retire after next year. [LA Times]
• Pfizer will be paying $2.3 billion in fines for illegally treating fat cat doctors to rounds of golf (and probably letting them win!) in exchange for promotion of Pfizer products. [AP]
• A new report was released by Physicians for Human Rights that details American doctors’ bad habit of using terror suspects as subjects in impossibly evil torture experiments. [The Guardian]
• The city of Chicago does not even want your dumb 2016 Olympics anymore, International Olympics Committee! This is because the 2016 Olympics happen to be the summer Olympics, which according to facts are the lame kind. [Chicago Tribune]
• Oh holy god, someone found a dead frog in a Pepsi can. This is disgusting, although, if it helps, it could have just been a toad… so… no cause for alarm. [CNN]

Ooh, an interesting interview with Cindy McCain in the latest issue of The New Yorker!… wait… the latest issue of People magazine! We learn a number of things in this feature, “Cindy McCain’s Secret Struggle with Migraines,” most notably that she has a secret struggle with migraines. They are almost as painful as a torture session in the Hanoi Hilton, she claims, in this actual real-life quote: “Torture. Being tied to a chair for four days. I can’t imagine how unbearable that pain must have been, but yeah, I can, because a migraine may come close.” Absolutely. Maybe she should ask her doctor for (= steal) some Percocet or Vicodin, to alleviate the pain? [People]

MORE »

NO, SORRY, WE CANNOT FULLY MOCK THIS TRAGIC PAJAMAS TEEVEE MOVIE: As much as we like to take requests from young conservative portions of the Internet during “Monday Fun Lunch Hour,” this terrible Pajamas TV thing, where their token black guy gets tortured by Nancy Pelosi and Kim Jong Il, is just impossible to finish. The astonishing racism near the middle — haw haw, the yellows can’t pronounce the letter “L,” SO… SO IT SOUNDS LIKE “R” ALL THE TIME INSTEAD! — is decent. And yet. Why is Nancy Pelosi stripping? This is when we turned it off. Thanks anyway! [PJTV via Conor Friedersdorf]

Major discovery in the 2004 CIA inspector general’s report on torture for which ABC News gets sole credit, MUST GIVE THE CREDITS TO ABC NEWS: Dick Cheney is secretly Jesus. This is why he wears the Golden Jesus Halo Crown of the CIA! Also: That second story? It’s Dick Cheney. And we’ll take our $25,000 “Ensign Style,” in three separate checks, to avoid declaring it as income. [ABC News]

• Ken Layne reviews Infinite Jest, or some other book. [Las Vegas Weekly]
• Honestly, there’s really no point in reading something you’ve already been paid to vote against. [Think Progess]
• Convicts need their stimulus checks just as much as the next guy. How else can they afford to have The Club™ surgically installed in their pooper? [RedState]
• Your children will be brainwashed with Mao’s Little Red Book, and then they will coerce you into participating in the Census. [Michelle Malkin]
• The problem with investigating torture is that it might have a “chilling effect” on torture! [Matt Yglesias]