"More than one in six men ages 25 to 54, prime working years, don't have jobs—a total of 10.4 million." That portion of the male population has almost tripled in the past 40 years. What is life like for these unemployed men? Let's hear from a few of them.

We've pulled a few emails from our folder of unpublished "Unemployment Stories." These stories are individual, not definitive. They provide a glimpse into the experience of long-term unemployment during what should be the most lucrative period of a man's career.

No more tears

I'm a 52 year old man and I just celebrated my 6th year of unemployment. 6 years. Can you believe that? I can't. It blows my mind. It would be laughable if it weren't so tragic.

I moved out on my own right after I graduated from college the first time at the age of 22. And, except for an odd month here and there, continued to live on my own for the next 24 years. It was a good run. It's more than what some people get and I am thankful for it. So when I got canned from my last job at age 46, I wasn't terribly concerned or worried. I've been unemployed before. And I always found work again in a short time. And I live in a "right-to-work" state where the boss can fire you for no reason at all. While getting fired is never good, it doesn't carry quite the stigma in right-to-work states that it does in others. Lots of people have been fired here for totally frivolous reasons.

I have 2 Bachelor of Science degrees; one in computer science and one in health care administration. Add to that years of talent, skills and experience in a multitude of different positions. I am the proverbial "Jack-of-all-trades". And don't forget the 24 years of uninterrupted work history. I can do any type of office work, although my goal is to work in a medical office. I was working in a medical office until I got canned. The doctor decided to replace me with my own intern for less money. How's that for a kick in the teeth? And they fired me over the phone. Gutless POS.

Little did I know that some nasty new truths were about to rear their ugly heads. At some point, I passed from being "unemployed" to being "unemployed for too long". And it doesn't take long to pass that threshold. It only takes a couple of weeks. Recruiters have told me that if your employment gap is longer than 3 or 4 weeks, you are now unemployable. Your resume goes right into the trash no matter what it says.

Soon after that, I lost everything. I lost my apartment, my furniture, my savings, my bank accounts, my credit cards and my once pristine credit rating. All gone, never to return. Thankfully for me, my parents are still alive and they love my enough to allow me to move in with them. Otherwise, I'd be living on the streets. Do you know how vile it is to be 52 years old and living with your parents?!! And it's no day at the beach for them to have me here either.

I wrote and re-wrote my resumes more times than I can remember. I applied to every job that I was qualified for, every job that I was over-qualified for, most jobs that I was barely qualified for and some jobs that I wasn't qualified for at all. I applied to every hospital, doctor's office, lab, clinic, nursing home, assisted living facility and hospice within 100 miles. 4 of them thanked me for applying. The rest ignored me completely. It's like I don't even exist. Like I said before, I can do any type of office work. And every business needs someone to answer the phones. And I put together resumes for every industry and sent them out. And never got a single reply. Here's where the second ugly truth came up. You can't be a guy and get a job in fields that are dominated by women. Most doctors may be men but most support people are women. And all administrative assistant/secretarial/clerical jobs are filled by women. You would think women would be understanding about sexism. But I found that women definitely do NOT want a man to intrude into their work environment. And don't try looking for a job in your late 40s and early 50s. Again, unemployable.

The pain and anguish and despair at times was unbearable. Everything that I worked my entire life to achieve is gone. And it's not coming back. I haven't cried in about a year because there are no more tears. I can't even do the things that I used to take for granted. Like getting hungry and deciding to stop at MickeyD's for a burger. People do that all of the time, every day. I did, at least when I felt like it. Now I can't. I don't have any money. I can't get a date. Even if I could meet a single girl, I can't ask her out. I don't have any money. I don't have an apartment to bring her back to. I have nothing. Actually, that's not true. I have 2 parents who love me and a roof over my head and food to eat. I have my tv and my computer. And I am thankful for all of them.

I had a blood test this morning. There's nothing wrong. It's something my mom wants me to do each year as part of a regular check-up. I pray that the results come back with cancer or leukemia or something that will cause my demise. How sick is that? But I pray for the sweet release of death every night. My life ended 6 years ago. Now, I just exist. And I don't want to anymore.

Living the nightmare

I feel my life slipping past my fingertips. Every morning, I walk up trying to pick up the pieces of my self worth and try to understand why I got out of bed today. My partner, getting ready for work, kisses me on the forehead and says "I love you" before stepping out the door. As for me, I sit alone on the bedside trying to gather my thoughts on what I need to do.

I get up and turn on the laptop, checking the mundane posts from Facebook, check emails and then give myself the time block to search job postings. This routine has been going on for nearly 3 years. I have cried myself to sleep worrying over money issues and my health has started to show signs of wear.

My tree of hope has dwindled to a mere stump. The worthlessness I feel has attacked me time and time again; yet, like a zombie, my body functions but has become lifeless. I often think of what has become of me. I know I am not inferior, nor lack a willing mind to learn new things, but still, I'm jobless.

I look in a mirror, my once youthful face gleaming with life- now a lightly tarnished face with light wrinkles and bags over the eyes from the worry and strain from being without work. It's grueling to look at. Dark thoughts of ending it all pop in my head, but are halted by the visions of my love ones.

I glace at my resumes over and over, sending them to various job postings in hopes to get a call back or an email response. Nothing. I have applied to many jobs- from retail to working in an office, nothing but silence comes back.

I am connected with three job agencies and they can't seem to find me anything as well. I am willing to take and try anything. I have eaten a slice of humble pie and am willing to take a job. I get no offers. I cannot understand why I am not getting hired. I cannot understand why it's so hard for people like me, who are good, honest, hard-working people not able to get their foot in the door.

The news states that unemployment is going down. In actuality, unemployment is up, and people who are registered for unemployment are down. I am apart of that crass statistic. I am not collecting unemployment benefits anymore. My funding for that is exhausted and now I am like many other folks scratching and surviving.

Because I am now jobless and been looking for a long while, I am having it harder and harder to make ends meet for basic survival. I have humbly begged for help from friends and family. I am not proud of asking for handouts or even for help. Most of my life, I had fought to be strong and make it on my own and now, I have lost my pride to beg for help.

It sickens me. My life has changed so much that going to a dollar store or a thrift store is lavish. It sickens me that a McDonald's meal has become a luxury. I desire to sleep all day because I don't want to live the nightmare. My partner and I argue about money issues and have been at each other's throats. After our arguments we apologize and understand that we are frustrated with the situation and reconcile. He remarks, "I just wish someone would hire you all ready." I nod in agreement and pull out my sketchbook to draw so I can escape my harsh reality of being unemployed and broke. I have been clinging onto faith that things will get better, and that I will find something soon, but the silence from employers set aside my belief that things will get better.

It frustrates me. It frustrates me to the point of looking at a knife and ending it all. I used to never have such thoughts until this self worthlessness imbedded itself in my brain. I know there are many people out there looking, and I know that there are many people out there just wanting a chance to make it. We never asked for it to be easy, but we just want a chance to make something of ourselves and be given a chance to work. We have so much to offer and employers need to understand that the idea of good core business ideals start with taking care of the people around them.

Businesses need to see potential in people. Sure, some of the people may not have the skills for the job right now, but if you groom them and train them you can cultivate something more than just an employee, but you create loyalty and a person willing to strive for something worth more than their pay check.

Good hard working people have the ability to learn and grow. Now, I am not condemning the idea that schooling is not important but those who do not have a strong educational background still have the ability to strive to become a strong working class. The heart and drive is based on what they are willing to do and work for to achieve goals. This ideal has built foundations of civilizations and cultivated strong leaders.

I know I may not have a strong education, but I have lived long enough to know how to treat people and how to communicate and have the desire to learn but that does not seem to matter anymore. The Employers want the best people to work for them, but to be the best you have to work hard for it. That means taking that chance on those of us who are looking for work and willing to fill those roles you ask and work for you. Give us a chance to build along with you and strive to make something of ourselves. I promise you, the investment you make on people like me will be more than just a pay check. You are crafting a person who can have loyalty to your company, building a person's esteem and pride. You are making your mark in helping someone become something better than when you first came across them. You are building hopes and dreams and creating so much more than you realize.

Though my self-worth in nearly nonexistent, I have a glimmer of hope still telling me to keep pushing forward. It's all I have left. I just want a chance to make it like everyone else. I know others can relate to what I am saying and have thought of similar things I have said, but we have to strive on thinking things will get better. One way or another, it will work out.

Poverty and Lies

On the way down, at first, it's easy to disguise. The breadlines, dusty hordes of migrant workers, squalid city tenements—these old outward symbols are gone, with the poor now masked by cell phones and refrigerators, driving around the suburbs in moribund cars.

It's game of lies, this being hard up. My poverty was a slow grind of boredom and a thousand complicated inconveniences that I successfully hid. It gives new meaning to what W. H. Auden called the "low dishonest decade." I fooled my parents, friends, and girls who never guessed how soul crushing it got. And then last year, after I'd escaped the ragged edge of America's economy, it happened to a friend.

You begin to fake being busy. Projects of various sorts always need doing and never finish. You avoid cost—at the bar and no drink in hand, meeting your friends after the baseball game or concert, etc. You stop snacking and gorge the day's single meal. Then come the mental changes.

A workingman might plan ahead for years of mortgages, vacations, weddings and other life expenses. But when on the way down you stop thinking in years and start thinking in months, then weeks, and then days, which is what Orwell meant when he said poverty "annihilates the future."

And the whole time no one notices. Your friends, like the television people, always talk about the economy. Sometimes your new class is represented via some outraged journalist or politician. But no one notices this great horrible thing that has happened to you. (And you'll never tell.) It's like some bad independent movie where the lighting it all wrong.

All this gives you meanness. Everyone looks to Wall Street for some morally racked banker to jump, for the Department of Justice to finally get the crooks, for the failure to happen again, and meanwhile, you're still on the way down. The cause seems more interesting to America than the sad effect. It's as if not-poor people were emotionally unequipped to handle the poor. At least, that's how it feels, and poverty is very much a matter of feeling.

And there's the good (not a silver lining but a bad thing that makes you a better person.) Poverty's suffering, like most suffering, forces you to empathy. You know, and so you understand, and you see when your friend falls. I learned that at Harvard's bookstore.

It was a part-time no-benefit cashier job, and everyone, the young grads and limping old men, there by way of desperation, knew the score. In a cramped windowless waiting room two hiring girls zigzagged around some 50 of us nervous wrecks for an hour, taking and forgetting names. All you could do was hope they liked the look of you.

At least half of us left without an interview. But the worst part was, out of all those people, no one said a word. We just slunk away, trying to hide our shame. I recall being angry, but I also deeply and sincerely felt for the other applicants. I imagined myself a disguised millionaire who would reveal himself and save them.

After that and a nervous breakdown I began the slow climb back. Living (sort of), I took a temporary part-time job with a non-profit meant to, ironically, help poor people. Of course, no one knew my situation. They were more interested in getting paid, masking their greed with good causes, hardly working with any semblance of the urgency I was living with.

I also volunteered and gratefully took a terrible temp office job. A hard year later I found steady part-time work and a seasonal job. I'm on the way up again, and the first thing I did on my return to the land of the employed was get my friend a job. We never talked about it, his situation, but I like to think of it as a real moment of solidarity. It was by far the best thing I did that year. I felt like I'd saved the world.

Seeing America from the bottom up taught me a few things. I will never think success the mark of intelligence or hard work, nor think luck is made, implying however slightly that back luck is deserved. I will not think all nonprofits altruistic, nor dismiss volunteer street callers and their causes. I will maintain a special hatred for people who buy expensive fruit at Whole Foods. And no longer will I dismiss those nine-to-fivers in dimply-lit cubicles. They are not living lives of quiet desperation, though I know some who are.

[You can read all of our "Unemployment Stories" series here. Photo: Flickr]

From last November, for an Atlanta shop, with a guest appearance by Mastodon guitarist Brent Hinds. Happy Throwback Thursday, everyone!

[via]

Journalist Mark Seal’s long Vanity Fair profile of Wendi Deng, the 45-year-old ex-wife of News Corporation titan Rupert Murdoch, reveals how the couple splintered over Deng’s newfound desire for the company of famous men—and, apparently, her penchant for elder abuse.

In the full profile, currently available through the magazine’s iOS app, Seal recounts a “pattern” of Deng’s “verbal abuse” against her traveling staff that later enveloped her own 82-year-old husband and allegedly became physical:

It allegedly had gotten physical in early 2011, in [the Murdoch’s] triplex on Fifth Avenue in New York. “[Deng] got angry at [Murdoch] and shoved him, and he fell backwards into the piano in the living room and then onto the floor, and he couldn’t get up,” says an individual to whom Rupert confided at the time. “He had to have emergency treatment that night.” The former News Corp. employee in the U.K. adds, “He clearly hurt himself, and he made some excuse that he tripped over something in the office. He made excuses that he wasn’t well. He only talked about what happened later.”

The incident followed another (alleged) outburst at News Corp.’s London headquarters, where staffers observed Deng screaming at her husband, “Fuck you, Rupert! You’re stupid! What are you going to do when I’m gone?”

These revelations aren’t totally suprising. As Gawker reported in 2012, the Murdochs’ ex-nanny, Ying-Shu Hsu, endured a war-zone-like atmosphere while working for Deng, who frequently swore at Hsu, the Murdoch children, and her husband Rupert. Hsu told Gawker that Deng “curse[d] Rupert all the time. A lot of F-words. She’s always yelling, crying.” (Hsu also noted that Deng and Murdoch slept in separate beds.)

Seal ends his profile with another semi-salacious excerpt of the infamous “note” in which Deng confessed her attraction to former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. It turns out she also discussed her feelings toward Google CEO Eric Schmidt, with whom Deng was seen last summer:

In the aforementioned note to herself, Wendi wrote, “Eric fucks Lisa,” presumably referring to Eric Schmidt and Lisa Shields, vice president of media affairs at the Council on Foreign Relations, whom Schmidt reportedly dated. “Lisa will never have my style, grace .... I achieved my purpose of Eric saw me looking so gorgeous and so fantastic and so young, so cool, so chic, so stylish, so funny and he cannot have me. I’m not ever feel sad ... about losing Eric .... Plus he is really really ugly. Unattractive ... and fat. Not stylish at all try to wear hip clothes .... I’m so so soo soooo happy I’m not with him.”

We’ve reached out to News Corp for comment, and will update if we hear back.

[Photo credit: Getty Images]

[Firemen take pictures of the Spanish cargo ship "Luno," which slammed into a jetty in choppy Atlantic Ocean waters and broke in two off southwestern France on Thursday. The ship had been heading to a nearby port to load up with cargo when its engine failed and the rough waves carried it into the jetty. Image via Bob Edme/AP.]

Tonight marks Jay Leno's final episode as host of The Tonight Show, after occupying that position for some 21 non-consecutive years. Many would argue that he stole that job from David Letterman, whom Leno's predecessor, Johnny Carson, had picked for the spot. Many would argue that he then stole it again from Conan O'Brien, who briefly occupied the spot from 2009-2010 when Leno failed to transition his act to prime time.

On a smaller scale, many would have a hard time arguing that Leno isn't a joke thief. He's been accused of ripping off other people's material repeatedly. Yes, theft is something that many a great comedian has been accused of. Yes, it's possible for two people to have the same idea, especially in the medium of mainstream joke-telling, which rewards obvious observations.

But the accusations against Leno are numerous. The sheer volume is damning. Funny that, because Leno himself sued a woman for stealing his jokes for a book in 2006. When the case was finally settled in 2008, Leno had this to say about the deplorable practice:

I thought it was important to make it clear that jokes are protected like any other art form. On behalf of the tremendous and talented group of writers we have at The Tonight Show and many other hardworking comedians, I'm very glad we've been able to stop this practice once and for all.

Haha, yeah right.

In the Las Vegas Review-Journal, writer Christopher Lawrence broke down some of Leno's borrowed bits:

"Jaywalking"? Stolen from Howard Stern. "Headlines"? That's Letterman's "Small Town News." Leno's "Don't Try This at Home"? You might remember it as Letterman's "Stupid Human Tricks." Even the "Green Car Challenge," the Jar Jar Binks of late-night bits, is a watered-down version of "Star in a Reasonably Priced Car," a recurring segment on Britain's "Top Gear," of which Leno is an admitted fan.

Below are a few more specific examples of when what came out of Leno's mouth was identical (or virtually so) to that of someone else.

Mitt Romney

Mitt's joke (February 18, 2010):

As always the games were very inspiring, but by the way, you probably didn't hear the news this morning—late breaking—the gold medal that was won last night by Lindsey Vonn has been stripped. It has been determined that President Obama has been going downhill faster than she has.

Jay's joke (March 1, 2010):

Lindsey Vonn on the show tonight. She was amazing, did you see her! When it comes to going downhill, nobody's faster. Ok, maybe except for NBC.

Former ESPN columnist Shane Igoe

Shane's joke (February 18, 2010):

Tiger a devout follower of Buddhism or Booty-ism? I still say the later.

Jay's joke (March 1, 2010):

[Tiger Woods is] returning to Buddhism… as opposed to what he was practicing before– that was 'Booty-ism.

Conan O'Brien

Conan's joke (March 11, 2008):

Latest show business rumor is that Star Jones has broken up with her husband, Al Reynolds. Yeah, when asked about it, Star said, "It's not the first time I've gotten rid of 200 lbs. in one day."

Jay's joke (March 13, 2008):

Hey congratulations to Star Jones, lost another 170 lbs. Her husband, yeah.

Howard Stern

Howard's joke (November 10, 2003):

Using a chicken to predict the winner of football games.

Jay's joke (October 9, 2009):

Having NFL commentator Terry Bradshaw go up against a chicken in predicting football winners.

On this, Stern said, "This must be a giant Punk'd on me. This guy's ripped off like ten major things from my show. But the chicken thing we did for years." He also has called Leno "insane," "a crook," and, "a backstabbing cumbag."

Red Eye contributor Andy Levy

Andy's joke (May 24, 2011):

Supreme Court orders tens of thousands of California prisoners released. This actually might help the Raiders start selling out their home games again.

Jay's joke (May 26, 2011):

Bad news for the state of California. The Supreme Court decision will force the state to release something like 46,000 convicts because of prison overcrowding. But the good news: it looks like the Oakland Raiders will have more season ticket holders!

Red Eye host Greg Gutfeld

Greg's joke (May 31, 2011):

I think [Anthony Weiner] should resign, CNN will give him a job, it can be Spitzer and Weiner, sounds gross, sounds gross, but it actually could work…

Jay's joke (June 9, 2011):

Well more and more people are now calling for Anthony Weiner to resign, but it's not all bad news: Eliot Spitzer says if Weiner does resign, he can join him on his show and they'll call it Weiner Spitzer.

Rush Limbaugh

Rush's "joke" (July 1, 2010):

"Undocumented Democrats, 'cause that's really what they are. They're undocumented Democrats. They're future Democrat voters, that's why the move is being made, largest voter-registration drive in history…"

Jay's joke (April 2, 2013):

In a groundbreaking move, the Associated Press, the largest news-gathering outlet in the world, will no longer use the term "illegal immigrant." That is out. No longer "illegal immigrant." They'll now use the phrase "undocumented Democrat."

Jimmie Walker

This one is is more alleged then the rest of them, since Leno's thievery is vaguely sourced. Per Walker's 2012 memoir, Dynomite!: Good Times, Bad Times, Our Times, in what must have been the early '90s, Walker proposed a Jeffrey Dahmer joke to Leno's comedy coordinator Jimmy Brogan, who told him not to tell it during his set on the Tonight Show because, "Jay doesn't like Jeffrey Dahmer jokes." During his appearance, Walker told it anyway. Here's how it played out:

The spot came for the Dahmer joke and I did it:

"All this talk about capital punishment, about whether the electric chair is humane, about lethal injections being humane. I have an idea that'll make everybody happy: If you want to get rid of a murderer, you rub barbecue sauce on him and put him in a cell with Jeffrey Dahmer."

Excuse the expression, but the joke killed.

I looked out the corner of my eye at Leno at his desk. He was not laughing. He was not happy.

I finished my shot and walked to the couch. Leno did not shake my hand. He said, "Jimmie Walker. We'll be right back." During the commercial break he told me, "You had to do the Dahmer joke."

"Didn't it kill?"

"That's not the point."

When we came back on the air, we did a couple more jokes and then we finished. Jay was still not over it, saying, "The point is I asked you not to do the line and you did the line."

My point was the funny mattered. Even Branford Marsalis, then the bandleader, came to my dressing room and said my shot was the funniest he had heard on the show to date.

Here's the kicker: A couple weeks later Leno was quoted in a national magazine with a joke about Dahmer. It was my joke! I was shocked. When I called him to talk about it, his staff referred me to Brogan. I have not been on the Tonight Show since.

Writer/musicians Brian Kamerer and Travis Irvine

Kamerer and Irvine's joke (2007):

A jokey jingle for Travis Irvine's campaign for mayor of Bexley, Ohio:

Jay's joke (2009):

The same damn thing. Kamerer wrote about the incident on SplitSider in 2012: Leno played this video in a segment about goofy campaign commercials, without credit or permission. Kamerer and Irvine's video was then blocked on YouTube due to a copyright claim from NBC. Kamerer had to settle for making his own work available through Funny or Die, though it's since been reuploaded to YouTube.

A high school senior is facing suspension for posting a selfie she took with a dead body to Instagram.

Earlier this month, a senior biology class at Clements High School in Limestone, County took a field trip to the University of Alabama Birmingham's biology department, where they learned about the school's anatomical donor program.

The field trip apparently included a trip to the morgue, where students were able to see donated cadavers still covered in their sheets. One student, though, quickly removed a sheet, struck a pose, and took a photo of herself with the cadaver. Then she posted it to Instagram.

As you might imagine, one of her classmates was disturbed by the post and reported it to her sister, who contacted school officials and Huntsville's WHNT. The same classmate also grabbed a screengrab of the selfie.

"We were notified via email this morning from a parent that this incident had occurred," Karen Tucker, the Limestone County School Board Director of Public Relations and Technology, told WHNT. "We are speaking to the University of Alabama Birmingham, they are understandably upset with this incident and we want to preserve our relationship with the university."

The university also released a statement:

"A student was made explicitly aware of these policies and breached them. This kind of disrespect is unacceptable and very disappointing. We will review our processes to ensure this does not happen again."

Officials at Clements High are reportedly still "deciding on the discipline that will occur."

[h/t Daily Dot]

I think Clinton may be weakest AND strongest candidate for '16. Not a great combination for a campaign: http://t.co/k4mjlt886H

— Andrew Sullivan (@sullydish) February 6, 2014

Thousands of images are pouring out of Sochi in the lead-up to the Olympics. And things don't look great. There are unfinished buildings, a lack of winter weather, and an abundance of trash. But don't believe every image you see. Like so much of what gets passed on social media these days, a lot of them aren't exactly what they claim.

1) Is this really a "half-bathroom" in Sochi?

At first glance, this photo of a wall running straight through a toilet in Sochi looks like a hilarious mistake. But the image isn't from Sochi. And there's no way it was a mistake.

The photo is at least 6 months old (and probably much older), though it's not entirely clear what this photo actually depicts. Is it an art project? Is it some foreign bathroom custom Americans wouldn't understand? The only thing that's clear is that it predates the Sochi Olympics by a good stretch.

2) Is this "ice cream in the ass" menu translation for real?

Yes, that "ice cream in the ass" translation is real. But the photo is from at least 2012, and probably not from Sochi. The "ass" is an abbreviation for "assortment." Other variations like "lemonade in the ass[ortment]" and "cakes in the ass[ortment]" keep popping up on social media as well. Funny indeed, but these aren't quite the "lost in translation" moments you were looking for. Move along.

3) Is this brown water coming from a Sochi tap?

Some journalists have reported plumbing problems at some of the hotels in Sochi, and the water may very well be unpotable. But this particular photo isn't from Russia. The image dates to at least August of 2012 and was used to illustrate the fact that tap water in Ukraine was not scoring well on government tests.

4) Is this really the "most judgmental" bathroom in Sochi?

This image of the "most judgmental bathroom ever" keeps popping up as being from Sochi. However, there's no evidence that it's from any Olympic Games facility, or Sochi itself for that matter. The image most recently went viral in December of 2013, where it was shared on dozens of humor sites for its funny juxtaposition.

5) Is this a real "Sudden Gunfire" sign at the Sochi Olympics?

It's not clear where this "Sudden Gunfire" sign might be, but it's most certainly not at the Sochi Olympics. Security is tight, but not so tight that officials need to warn of random bullets.

"Sudden Gunfire" signs are actually fairly common near military facilities around the world, warning people in the area who might hear gunshots that they're [probably] not in danger.

6) Is this a bathroom for the athletes in Sochi?

No, this isn't a communal bathroom intended for the Olympic athletes in Sochi this winter, though it is a bathroom in Russia. Specifically, you can find it at Kazan University in the Volga region. Online jokesters have very clearly just been searching something like "toilets Russia" and posting them as being from the new facilities for the Olympic games. Good for a chucklegoof or two, but not at all accurate.

7) Is this a sign from the Sochi Olympics?

Yes, that "Welcome to Sochi!" sign is real. But it's not a recent photo. According to Reuters it's at least a year old. The image is convenient for people who want to depict the city as particularly unprepared and poverty-stricken. Both of which may be true, but it's not how visitors are being greeted at this Olympics.

8) Are these really dead stray dogs killed by officials in Sochi?

We've blurred out this image, because it's awful. You may have seen it though; piles of dead dogs, alleged to be victims of the city's plan to exterminate strays in the lead-up to the games. Yes, dogs are being killed. But no, that photo you see circulating on Facebook and Twitter is not from Sochi. It's from Ukraine in 2012.

If you want to read about more viral fakes you can read about them here, here and here.

What could make Tim Armstrong a worse boss, at this point? Pouring beers on his employees while they work? Here's a good start: Capital New York reports two female AOL underlings were blamed for the company's shitty new 401k plan.

It all started with an interview on CNBC earlier today:

"As a C.E.O. and as a management team," said Armstrong, "we had to decide, do we pass the $7.1 million of Obamacare costs to our employees? Or do we try to eat as much of that as possible and cut other benefits?"

Armstrong later elaborated on the corporate rationale for giving everyone a worse retirement plan. It turns out, chicks can be expensive!

"Two things that happened in 2012," he said, according to a transcript provided by an AOL employee. "We had two AOL-ers that had distressed babies that were born that we paid a million dollars each to make sure those babies were OK in general. And those are the things that add up into our benefits cost. So when we had the final decision about what benefits to cut because of the increased healthcare costs, we made the decision, and I made the decision, to basically change the 401(k) plan."

I'm sure it would be completely impossible for anyone at AOL to figure out who those women with troubled childbirths might be, right? An AOLer tells Capital NY that "people were just shocked that two particular women would be singled out on a company-wide call"—but given Armstrong's history on conference talks, I guess it could have been worse? Good luck at your conference, Timbo!

Photo: Getty

How screwed-up is this place, really? And how did Sochi get the Olympics in the first place? And where is it, and why should you care? Let our Gawker Explainer® hash it all out.

First of all, what the hell is a Sochi?

Reputed to be Russia's largest resort city, with a population over 300,000, Sochi is located in the Caucasus region on the Eastern* shore of the Black Sea.

When was it founded?

The Russian empire set up a fort there in 1838.

So it's Russian?

Now, yes. But that was part of a process that involved the Russians fighting off local settlers who'd been in the area for thousands of years. Russia won that war in 1864, and many of the natives fled to Turkey. The town got its name in 1896.

And it does what, exactly?

It offers warm waters, green spaces, and spas to Russians, which is kind of a big deal to them. The first resort in the area, in 1909, was called "Caucasian Riviera." (It referred to the nearby mountains, not the whiteness of its patrons. Though they were probably pretty white.)

Where is this place, again?

It's very close to Russia's border with Georgia, with whom the Russians had a major military conflict in 2008, and it's less than 300 miles from Chechnya.

See the red arrow on this map:

That's kind of sketchy territory, right?

Yep. The Caucasus has historically been a hotbed of ethnic conflict and terrorism, and Sochi's been relatively close to a lot of that. Its surrounding environs were originally settled by the Circassian peoples, who were largely wiped out by the Russian empire in the mid-nineteenth century. In fact, some ethnic Circassians—who claim Sochi as their capital city—claim current Olympic competitors will "be skiing on mass graves" of their people.

Though much of the discord goes back centuries, many of the most relevant nearby conflicts came out of the breakup of the Soviet Union in 1991. Sochi is just miles from the border of Abkhazia, a disputed bump of territory between Russia and Georgia whose status contributed to the countries' 2008 war. (The ethnic Abkhazians tend to side with Russia, one of the few nations that have recognized their state, against their longtime Georgian enemies.)

And then, of course, there's Chechnya and its North Caucasus neighborhood, over which the Russians have fought two bloody wars since 1992, and whose majority-Muslim population still sees Russia as a legitimate target for attacks by insurgents and terrorists. After the Sochi games were announced, major terror groups began salivating at the prospect of a high-profile attack to embarrass Russia and focus international attention on their cause.

Why would Russia even propose Sochi, instead of say, St. Petersburg?

The hot popular myth is that Russian President Vladimir Putin picked Sochi by dictate, because he and his former communist cronies summer there. A more considered opinion, offered by Christian Caryl in the New York Review of Books, is that Putin used Sochi—located as it is "on the edge of a war zone"—to prove to everyone how well he has tamed the wild Northern Caucasus: "He believed that presiding over an Olympic miracle in the foothills of the Caucasus Mountains, not far from places that had been battlefields a few years before, would cement his triumph over historical enemies."

It's an interesting read that undeniably holds a grain of truth, but it's largely speculative. And in any case, the city's Olympic aspirations predate Putin. Shortly after the Soviet Union fell, Sochi made a bid for the 2002 Winter Olympics; it didn't make the round of finalists. That process took place in the early 1990's, before Putin had consolidated power in the Russian Federation.

Also, in some ways, it makes sense for Russia to suggest a temperate clime for the Olympics, since much of the country gets a little too cold—and is probably just as vulnerable to terrorists, as major attacks in Moscow and elsewhere have shown.

So was the International Olympic Committee concerned about Sochi at all?

Sure. Terror was a big concern initially: In an early analysis of seven possible host cities by IOC experts, Sochi ranked in the middle in terms of security preparedness, ahead only of cities in Bulgaria and Georgia, and neck-and-neck with the former capital of Kazakhstan. Analysts in a later report also expressed concerns that Sochi promoters were overselling their construction plans:

[T]he Sochi bid presents both an opportunity to create a new "custom-built" winter sports area with state-of-the-art facilities, but also the challenge of a major construction project within a defined period.

But voters were mostly comforted by the Russians' guarantees. They promised that there were already ample lodgings for athletes, visitors, and media. They assured the IOC that construction would be quick. And most of all, they guaranteed safety, describing Sochi's locale with terms like "Ethnic Diversity in A Tranquil Environment." There were "no significant political or social movements which might be in opposition to the Sochi 2014 projects," the Russians said, because Sochi was peaceful, and anyway, we've got so many people with guns.

But the IOC picked Sochi anyway?

Barely. When selection time came in Guatemala City in 2007, the Russian contingent reportedly pulled out all the stops, including "a full-size skating rink in the world's largest airplane" and a speech in English by Vladimir Putin—his first ever in public.

Yet in the first round of voting, Sochi came in second to PyeongChang, South Korea. In the final round, Russia managed to edge the South Koreans, 51 to 47.

That selection process may very well have turned out differently, though, if it had taken place after the Georgia-Russia war of 2008—and the Russian government's more recent freakout about gays and lesbians existing within their borders.

That's it? The vote wasn't, like, decided by corruption?

Well, it might have been. That's always a possibility with Olympic bids. ABC News investigative reporter (and serial error-er) Brian Ross recently reported that the Russian case to IOC voters was helped greatly by "a mysterious Russian businessman, Gafur Rakhimov," whom Ross claims is a major mover in the global heroin trade.

It's true that the Sochi bid contingent thanked Rakhimov "for his 'singled minded work' in getting the votes of some Asian countries, 'without which… it would have been hard for Sochi to count on the victory'":

A Rakhimov spokesman confirmed the businessman's role in lobbying for Sochi with IOC voters, saying "He has great influence." But whether that translates to dirty dealings is unclear. Since the Soviet fall, Russia has long cultivated alliances with its Asian neighbors, especially since America's bungling in their backyard with the Afghanistan war. Moreover, a choice between South Korea and Russia might have looked easier for voters from states like China, who have to consider not pissing off North Korea too much or too often.

One more strike against Brian Ross' theory: It relies heavily on "expert" interviews with Craig Murray, the former U.K. ambassador to Uzbekistan—who, while a dedicated crusader for human rights, has been known to exaggerate and bend the truth.

Is this Winter Olympics really the pooch-screw everyone's making it out to be?

From the standpoint of the reporters covering it, hells yeah. There's the toilet thing:

This may or may not be one of Sochi's infamous loos.

Also, the food and hotels suck, and there's the out-of-control financial corruption. Also, the threat of deadly terror is very very real, if sometimes funnysad.

On the plus side, there are cute wild dogs.

What about the gays and lesbians thing?

This is really important: Russia is a terrible, terrible place for civil liberties in general, and for the rights of LGBT community members in particular. It has been a major issue going into these Olympics, with athletes and journalists who are LGBT or LGBT-friendly fearing persecution and deportation, depending on how heavily Russia chooses to apply its own retrograde, discriminatory laws.

Anything else I should know about the 2014 Winter Olympics?

Yes: Stop making a big fricking deal about the Jamaican bobsled team. They debuted in Calgary in 1988. They got a Disney movie. People who are still fawning over the Jamaican bobsled team are like people who go to Philadelphia and are moved to write to all their friends about cheesesteaks.

[Image by Jim Cooke, photo via Getty]

On Thursday, freelance writer Lisa McIntire's mother received a credit card offer from Bank of America sort of addressed to her daughter. There was one tiny difference, though, in the name; instead of Lisa McIntire, the letter was addressed to a "Lisa Is a Slut McIntire."

McIntire's mother contacted her daughter via text and then sent a series of photos. McIntire, of course, was slightly disturbed and took to Twitter to share the unusual junk mail.

Um. pic.twitter.com/koYjGsoF1m

— Lisa McIntire (@LisaMcIntire) February 6, 2014

It's a credit card offer, apparently? I am still discomfited. pic.twitter.com/h1qGPtB15P

— Lisa McIntire (@LisaMcIntire) February 6, 2014

Hi @BofA_Help. I just received a credit card offer from you that addressed me as “Lisa Is A Slut McIntire.” pic.twitter.com/7OeNZSlNhX

— Lisa McIntire (@LisaMcIntire) February 6, 2014

Hi @BofA_Help. My mom opened this credit card offer addressed to "Lisa Is A Slut McIntire." pic.twitter.com/dobBqe4lMf

— Lisa McIntire (@LisaMcIntire) February 6, 2014

This is the second time in a month that a major company, or its third-party mailer, has sent out offensive junk mail; in January, OfficeMax addressed a letter to "Mike Seay, Daughter Killed in Car Crash, or Current Business."

Benefit concerts make for strange bedfellows. A few hours into Amnesty International's nearly endless show at Brooklyn's Barclays Center last night, a tall man with silver hair named Kerry Max Cook walked onto the stage to talk about the death penalty. Cook served 22 years on death row in Texas for the rape and murder of a 21-year-old woman named Linda Jo Edwards before being released in 1997. During his time in prison the state of Texas executed 144 people. Cook, a prominent anti-death penalty advocate, told his story—on the one hand the obscene horrors of death row, on the other his small measure of good fortune in being able to speak for the executed—smoothly and without the aid of the teleprompter that earlier had tripped up celebrities like Bridget Moynahan, who wore a fedora.

At the end of his speech, Cook introduced his 13-year-old son in the audience. The boy, a visible sign of redemption for a man whose 20s and 30s were completely erased, stood up before 19,000 people and pumped his fist. Then his father stepped back to the microphone and said, "It's my pleasure to introduce the band Cake."

Somewhere in here, amid a succession of activists, random Hollywood creatures and a Spotify spit-out of bands, were wedged Nadya Tolokonnikova and Masha Alyokhina (formerly) of the feminist collective Pussy Riot. The two Russian punks were imprisoned for nearly two years by Vladimir Putin after performing a punk song called "Mother of God, Chase Putin Away" at Moscow's Cathedral Christ of the Savior. The Barclays show was headlined by the Flaming Lips, but "Pussy Riot"—with a special introduction from Madonna—was no doubt the main attraction. Earlier in the day, Amnesty International had held a press conference for the two women in the bowels of the arena.

The organization clearly sees Pussy Riot as both ideologically aligned with its goals and a unique opportunity to amplify its signal, especially among younger people. The de facto logo for the concert—shrewdly timed to coincide with the launch of Putin's Olympic charade in Sochi—was a man with a guitar slung across his torso raising both of his arms (like either Billie Joe Armstrong or, uh, Richard Nixon) and wearing a balaclava, the neon variety of which is the most iconic part of Pussy Riot's unofficial uniform. On the web site of Amnesty USA there is a tile that reads "Take Injustice Personally" and features a photo of protesters in candy-colored balaclavas standing in front of signs that say "FREE PUSSY RIOT."

American activism, at least on a wide scale, is splintered and weak. Pussy Riot, on the other hand, is succinct, strong, daring, and visually compelling. What Occupy Wall Street more or less wasn't—organized, accomplished, media savvy—Pussy Riot is. Nadya and Masha are what Occupy needed: charismatic personalities with identifiable faces. This is, of course, the tension that makes the Occupy movement divisive to this day, even among activists. It has no scalps because that might not have been the point. Pussy Riot's singularity and ambition are positive when viewed through one prism, but negative through another.

Among those that might see it the second way are, well, Pussy Riot. Hours before the concert, anonymous members of the collective posted a letter to Livejournal announcing that Nadya and Masha—who a rapidly increasing number of Americans now know as "Pussy Riot"—are no longer members of the group. Though expressing support for the two, the letter noted that Nadya and Masha have "forgot about the aspirations and ideals of our group — feminism, separatist resistance, fight against authoritarianism and personality cult." They went on further to criticize the benefit show itself, calling it an "extreme contradiction to the very principles of Pussy Riot collective."

"The spectators to our performances are always spontaneous passers by," they wrote. "And we never sell tickets to our 'shows'." When I paused for a second outside of Barclay's on Wednesday night, I was swarmed by scalpers thrusting Ticketmaster printouts at my chest.

Not long after Cake left the stage, Madonna waltzed on, proudly displaying a cane and wearing an airdropped-from-2012 black Comme Des Fuckdown beanie on her head. "Thank you for making 'pussy' a sayable word in my household," she said, displaying an acute lack of self-awareness considering the other word Madonna recently revealed to be acceptable in her family. Among celebrities at least, Madonna was early in her support of Pussy Riot—during a concert in Moscow in 2012 she wore a balaclava and stripped to her bra to reveal "Free Pussy Riot" scrawled on her back. But in Brooklyn she was disinvested and clearly cognizant of the group's commodification, even as she participated in it. While she narrated the struggle that Nadya and Masha had endured, Madonna was interrupted by scattered boos from audience members appalled at the injustice. "Boo," Madonna said drolly. "That is right. Boo." Later, when she said that Pussy Riot "must be commended for their courage and fearlessness," she paused: "That's a 'yay.'"

She eventually brought Nadya and Masha to the stage, along with their translator. Of the two, Nadya is the commanding presence. Masha, shorter and with long, light hair, is withdrawn and seemingly shy, perhaps uncomfortable with becoming a celebrity. Nadya, though, was born for this role. She boomed into the microphone, spitting Russian and pacing across the stage, walking to the lip right in front of the audience to punctuate a point. She looked chic in a long white shirt printed with a large, black cross underneath a black blazer. Madonna was wearing what New York rapper and fashion plate A$AP Rocky wore two years ago; Masha was wearing the sort of outfit you might see him in tomorrow night.

Their speech, molded into English, was perhaps understandably generic. "Freedom is not a given," Nadya said. "It is something we need to fight for and stand for every day." And later: "We demand freedom for all political prisoners." This was the language, too, of the speeches read off by the actors and performers in between sets—before a crowd of 20,000, one has to aim broad. With Nadya and Masha, though, the emotion of their words mattered more than the English dutifully recited by their translator. They ended their moment in a froth and with a scream: "RUSSIA WILL BE FREE-YA."

From where I was sitting, the two were on the stage off my right shoulder, the entire audience off my left. As Nadya and Masha yelled, I couldn't help but notice out of the corner of my eye a vendor walking through the general admission rows in plain view of the stage, carrying a bucket of beer on his head, Budweiser and Bud Light logos easily visible even from several hundred feet away.

Just as inartfully as a man who served 22 years on death row in Texas ceded the stage to Cake, a disembodied voice quickly announced the arrival of Imagine Dragons after Nadya and Masha finished. You probably know their smash hit single "Radioactive," which sounds like what it feels like to force out a turd. The song is "political" in the vaguest sense that it sketches out some sort of brave new post-apocalyptic world. But in its exuberant optimism, the song skips over the revolution itself, if it even considers one. Politically it cuts against Pussy Riot's entire existence, but even with sets by Lauryn Hill and Tegan and Sara still to come, "Radioactive" was positioned as the night's exclamation point.

As anyone who caught Imagine Dragons on the Grammys knows, "Radioactive" is pure testosterone. Half a dozen men bang on all sizes of drums, including a huge taiko one that lead singer Dan Reynolds beats with truly amazing force. This is how we celebrated an "all-female separatist collective" on Wednesday night.

"We count ourselves as being inspired by Pussy Riot," Reynolds said at one point. "Thank you for standing up for human rights. Now, let's have a good time."

[Photo of Tolokonnikova and Alyokhina via Getty, photo of screen inside Barclays Center by Jordan Sargent]

As far as "viral marketing" goes, this is pretty good. To promote its upcoming season, the Walking Dead dressed a bunch of actors as zombies and hid them under a sidewalk grate in Manhattan's Union Square so they could terrify unsuspecting pedestrians.

While it's perhaps not quite as horrifying as the Devil Baby, it's still plenty scary.

[h/t Gothamist]

We receive quite a few stories from Wal-Mart employees about what life is like inside America's largest employer. But this one comes from a remarkable point of view: a longtime Walmart store manager, who vents in detail about how Walmart has systematically screwed employees over two decades.

Like all of our emails from Walmart employees, this one is anonymous, and represents one person's opinion. But the wealth of detail it contains about the company's management policies is remarkable. In particular, he discusses exactly how compensation and benefit policies have changed to the detriment of employees. We've bolded some of the parts we find most notable. Enjoy:

"I was recently on your site and was reading several of the stories from former and current Walmart associates. I would like to give you my experience. I write to you with a new email and will not give my real name; retaliation is alive at Walmart. I've been with Walmart for over twenty years beginning in the early 1990s. I've work at more than 9 walmarts and held various positions. I'm currently a salary assistant store manager and been one for nearly a decade. For most of my career at Walmart I enjoyed coming to work and quite frankly was the happiest before I became a manager. Once I took on the role as a manager I was privy to meetings, emails, and behind the door discussions that a typical associate will never hear. I know that well established companies must change as time progresses to remain competitive. However I'm not oppose to change and welcome it. If anyone was to speak negatively about Walmart back in the 90's I would be a defender of Walmart and I was only a stocker in my early twenties back then. But Walmart was a much different company. I started shortly after Sam Walton's death [ed.-in 1992]. We just began the expansion of super centers and no real international presence. In fact in those days we still had signs in our stores that read 'Buy American.' We would have items flagged that were manufactured in America and brag about the jobs we created by buying American goods. We all know that isn't true now. Before I begin to relay some knowledge you may not be aware of or heard I would like to list to the best of my abilities some of the benefits Walmart has taken away from its associates in the last twenty years.

[Below are some] Benefits that new hires don't receive. Long Term associates keep these benefits *Hence a reason to get rid of them*

• Sunday Premium: 1 1/2 Pay
• Sunday Premium: $1.00 an hour (This replaced the overtime pay for Sunday but this $1.00 was also taken away)
• Profit Sharing: Automatically put 6% of Pay in Profit Sharing Account

In 1997 Walmart changed the policy and put 2% in Profit Sharing and 2% in their new 401-k. They effectively got rid of 2% and never bother to inform associates of this loss. The typical associates had no clue how this would impact them in the long term. This is typical of Walmart executive is to change benefits but spin it as a good thing. Eventually Walmart around 2010 did away with Profit Sharing all together. They now have a 100% match for the first 6% contributed to the 401k. This actually is better however again Walmart know the typical employee can not afford to contribute to the 401k plan. Even though this has helped my 401k balance greatly since I can afford it; I know it doesn't help the many people that work under me at $8.00 an hour.

Full Time: Only had to work 20 hours

Full Time: Only had to work 28 hours (This replaced the 20 hour policy but now any new hires have to work an average of 35 hours for full time status)

90 Day Raises: You use to get a raise after 90 days, they took this one away recently. So now you must work 12 months to get a raise.

Insurance Cost: Maybe not fair to blame Walmart on this one but in early 1990s' I was paying $9.00 per pay period (BiWeekly) for a $300 deductible. Now I pay $150 (Bi Weekly) for a $3500 deductible.

Christmas Bonus: I can't remember the amounts but no more than $200. It doesn't exists for new hires and salary managers don't qualify for it

Long Term and Short Term disability: Can't remember exactly but I know it use to pay around 80% of pay then it was cut to 60% and now it only covers 50%. Oh but the premium went up. So less coverage for more cost

Merit Raises: Store manager use to be able to increase hourly pay but now all pay is controlled by home office

Good Job Pin: This was again another award program. If you got four of them you could turn them in for one free share of Walmart stock. Basically all award programs of monetary value has ended at store level. With the exception of a possible quarterly bonus up to $475 but i never been in a store that got such a large amount.

Pay Cap: Walmart use to keep giving you raises no matter your hourly rate. They now have caps based on position held. I have many associates who have not received a raise in nearly nine years.

I could keep going but basically Walmart has been hacking on its benefit and pay structure for years to save on cost. Their over all view point is that there is little difference in performance and return on investment from a ten year associate and a new hire.

The Old Testament. It's been kinda important to much of human civilization going back a fair stretch. It's also a sham! Your cherished psalms and stories of ritualistic filicide are no longer any match for Israelis with radiocarbon dating equipment, sheeple!

Via Fox News (and hey, if they can admit it):

Archaeologists from Israel's top university have used radiocarbon dating to pinpoint the arrival of domestic camels in the Middle East — and they say the science directly contradicts the Bible's version of events.

Camels are mentioned as pack animals in the biblical stories of Abraham, Joseph and Jacob, Old Testament stories that historians peg to between 2000 and 1500 BC. But Erez Ben-Yosef and Lidar Sapir-Hen of Tel Aviv University's Department of Archaeology and Near Eastern Cultures say camels weren't domesticated in Israel until centuries later, more like 900 BC.

"In addition to challenging the Bible's historicity, this anachronism is direct proof that the text was compiled well after the events it describes," reads a press release announcing the research.

Lay translation: The Old Testament was written down after men had camels as regular pack animals in the Middle East—centuries after the events in it are thought to have happened. Not just the creation and the Adam-Eve-serpent-Fall-of-Man thing: The whole story of the Israelites and whatnot.

How do we know the dating of the camel bones is correct? You don't question an archaeologist like Erez Ben-Yosef, because come on, look at him:

That's him on the right.

Strictly speaking, this study is not incontrovertible evidence that the Bible's all sheer and utter bullflop—just that it's provided to us by guys scraping together a bunch of stories about their peoples of varying degrees of veracity and presenting it to the world as a single, sorta-coherent, sorta-linear text.

That reduces the likelihood that your story collectors are reliable, or honest, or knowledgeable. Kind of like modern-day literalist preachers. But hey, who knows for sure? He works in mysterious ways.

[Photo credit: f9photos/Shutterstock]

"They don't want to see or be seen, only to touch and to be touched in a place where nobody knows them." Jeff Sharlet's long study on the lot of gays in Russia on the eve of the Olympics, "Inside the Iron Closet," is online now. Go, go read.

In the clip above, 2013 Miss Venezuela First Runner-Up Wi May Nava describes the plastic surgery she underwent to compete in pageants (boob and nose jobs). She also talks about the piece of mesh that she has sewn to her tongue so that she can't eat solid foods (this description, btw, took place before she won her runner-up title). We've come so far as a species from The Real World L.A. when Tami had her jaw wired shut for the same effect.

This clip comes from a special that aired in the U.K. last night called Secrets of South America: Extreme Beauty Queens. Nava got her thinspiration from a wispy, direct-to-video horror movie villain of a man named Osmel Sousa, the president of the Miss Venezuela pageant. Sousa is also the host of a reality show, in which women compete to be in the pageant. Key Sousa advice: "If you faint like a beauty queen, get up like one." He said this to a contestant who had fainted for exactly the reason why any aspiring beauty queen faints: because she's fucking hungry.

He also thinks that all feminists are "Ugly Betties" and is surprised when Secrets of South America host Billie JD Porter identifies herself as one. She still seems to find him endearing, regardless.

Considering all the damage that's been done in Afghanistan, to Afghans and to Americans, one dog may not mean all that much in the big scheme of things. But Jesus, a dog. Jesus. He just wants to please somebody.

Via Ernesto Londoño at the Washington Post:

In the annals of prisoner-of-war videos, this seems to be a first. A slightly befuddled-looking Belgian Malinois appears on a tight leash, surrounded by heavily armed, bearded men boasting of their battlefield loot.

Wearing a black protective vest, the dog wags its tail at certain points and appears more confused than terrified as its captors showcase specialized rifles and a global positioning device with a blinking light that they say came attached to the canine.

"Allah gave victory to the mujahideen!" one of the fighters exclaims. "Down with them, down with their spies!"

A spokesman for the military confirms that coalition forces lost a working dog during a firefight in December. [Update: It's now believed he actually belonged to British special forces.] The man holding the dog's chain-link leash also carries a suppressed camo-painted M4 rifle with a telescopic sight, the type Western special operations troops often use on missions.

What will become of the dog? Hopefully he lives a fat and happy life. The Taliban of 2014 may prove less heartless than the Islamic foreigners training in Afghanistan in 2001 and 2002, who evidently practiced deadly chemical agent attacks on captive dogs.

The only thing that's certain, a military-dog trainer told Londoño, is this: "I know for sure the handler is devastated."

Why, Russia? Why are you trying to ruin bears for us?

RadarOnline is reporting that 90-year-old Viacom founder Sumner Redstone paid Bo Dietl, the private investigator and Fox News contributor, to smear Rupert Murdoch after his beloved New York Post went after Redstone in 2008. Because if you want to smear your rival, your best bet is hiring his own employee.