National security pundit Glenn Greenwald has an interesting thought experiment in the Guardian today that asks whether Christopher Dorner, the LAPD's suspected "killer cop," should be targeted for drone strike the way other terrorists are in Pakistan and beyond. But while Greenwald's comparisons between foreign and domestic drone attacks work as a fun intellectual pursuit, it's worth noting that, despite what many news outlets are saying, the use of drones in capturing Dorner seems mostly to be a lot of of hype.

The first myth to dispel is that even if drones are being used to hunt—not kill—Dorner, it's not the first time something like this has happened. Quoting an unnamed "senior police source," UK paper the Express reported yesterday that "Dorner has become the first human target for remotely-controlled airborne drones on US soil." Various news outlets ran with the Express story—including Gawker Media's own Gizmodo—but, unfortunately, the Express' claims were inaccurate. As this LA Times article explains, in June 2011, police in North Dakota used a drone to capture three hostile militia members moving about a 3,000-acre farm. Dispatching drones to catch domestic criminals may not be a widely used practice, but it's not unique to the Dorner manhunt.

Secondly, according to one police spokesperson, it turns out that drones may not even be part of the search for Dorner. The Express had reported that the drones being used to find Dorner belonged to US Customs and Border Patrol. But in an interview with Mashable, a US Customs and Border Patrol representative said that's not true:

"Reports that U.S. Customs and Border Protection's unmanned aircraft systems (UAS) are being used are incorrect. CBP UAS are not flying in support of the search," a spokesperson from the U.S. Customs and Border Protection told Mashable via email.

Despite the Border Patrol's denials, an LAPD spokesperson would neither confirm nor deny that drones are being used to capture Dorner, saying in interviews that commenting on potential drones would compromise their investigation. "That would tip off any suspect watching media, right?" he told Mashable.

Dorner, who now has a $1 million reward for his capture hovering over him, is still on the lam and is reportedly using burner cellphones to evade detection.

Americans for Responsible Solutions, the Super PAC founded by former Rep. Gabrielle Giffords and her husband, former astronaut Mark Kelly, has released its first ad called "Let's Get This Done." The ad is narrated by Giffords, who is seen standing by her husband; it also shows pictures of memorials from several recent mass shootings, including the one that nearly killed Giffords.

The copy of the ad itself is fairly short:

We have a problem, where we shop, where we pray, where our children go to school. But there are solutions we can agree on. Even gun owners like us. Take it from me, Congress must act. Let's get this done.

The ad will apparently be shown in the Washington, D.C. television market both before and after President Obama issues the State of the Union Tuesday night. It will also be playing in markets where constituents of Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV), Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) live.

Giffords and Kelly founded Americans for Responsible Solutions in order to get stricter gun control laws passed. President Obama proposed several measures in order to keep guns out of the hands of potential criminals, though it remains unclear whether or not Congress will act on the suggestions. Gun control is expected to be a major topic of the President's State of the Union.

Approaching today, the first anniversary of the death of Whitney Houston, I have been thinking about the way the pop star voiced her displeasure with her career during the last 10 years of her life. She became increasingly irritated by the attention she received, ranting about it in song and on reality TV. She was sick of sharing her amazing gift with the world, a gift that she neglected over time by smoking things like cigarettes, marijuana, and cocaine. She had been one of the most famous, most objectively talented people in the world and she got sick of it.

The human spirit is incredibly adaptable, but sometimes this is to a fault—even the blessed turn jaded. Even those who are deemed superhuman by our cultural standards get bored with it all. It's common. So it was that last week I spent six hours watching some 115 models go through a casting for a New York Fashion Week Event. I have a theory that the stock figure of the perpetually unimpressed, unpleasant fashion-industry type is based in a truth: Constantly surrounded by stunning beauty and opulence, they start to find it dull, and their attitudes sink with their interest level. They are spoiled on greatness and there's nowhere to go from there but down.

My designer hosts were not, themselves, shitty fashion people. But as I sat with them, watching extreme human beauty flow by with assembly-line efficiency, I felt my own spirit souring. It was an inoculation against fabulousness.

We were set up at a table in a big residence loft that had been mostly cleared to make way for the day's sashays. Each model would approach us, hand the designers her book of still modeling work, sign in, and walk across the room and back. It took them an average of eight clomps each way, but this varied depending on the length of stride. Clomp-clomp-clomp-clomp-clomp-clomp-clomp-clomp. Turn. On clomping back, the models would pose for some digital shots. Lulls were few.

Besides looking like stretched out caricatures of the human beings I generally find myself around, the group showed little uniformity. They spanned races certainly and ages, maybe—or possibly some just had just gotten less rest than others the night before. A few wore band shirts: One wore what was probably a novelty AC/DC tee made for children, paired with stonewashed jeans, and had long, greasy-looking hair tucked behind her ears. I wondered if she coordinated her outfit to go with the lack of makeup models are expected to have when they attend go-sees. In any case, she served metalhead realness and walked like she was en route to burn down a Swedish church.

We saw a lot of dumb walks. Walks that bounced, walks that stomped, walks that went pow-pow-pow, walks that changed tempo slightly but noticeably, like a warped disco record. There is a tendency amongst these types to walk with the shoulders tucked way back so that the body leaned; extreme cases of this bore resemblance to a reverse "Smooth Criminal." One girl walked like she had the weight of the world on her shoulders and a universe of determination to overcome it in her crotch. Another's gait felt so determined, I wondered if she was thinking the whole time about sticking her spiked heel through someone's throat. No one fell, but some hobbled and one was so loose-jointed it was though her wild feet were wheels on bent axels. To my inexpert eyes, all of this effort was in vain: The girls who stood up straight and walked confidently, almost normally, stood out the most.

It is rarely appropriate in New York City to stare openly and extendedly at a person, and yet that was the entire purpose of my day. The models, they stared back. I haven't been eye-fucked so hard since I judged a child beauty pageant in 2011—and I've been to the Eagle several times since then. I didn't take their gazes personally. I think they hoped their eyes could seduce me into giving them work. They had no idea that I was a powerless observer, someone who could at most reward their effort by trying to type America's Next Top Model-level descriptions in my Word document.

If I had a female type, it would be voluptuous, thick even, which is to say that not even my hypothetical hetero taste was represented that day. This was not a feast of eye candy, but a tasting menu of rarefied oddities I'm unlikely to ever sample again. One German girl looked like Edith Zimmerman if Edith Zimmerman were Amish and had freakish cheekbones signaling possible emaciation. Another looked like a mincing Moe Tkacik. One looked like Kylie Minogue pinched into a Spitting Image puppet. The man she came with berated her in Russian as she removing her walking heels after her audition. One looked like Megan Fox made of bones and Silly Puddy. One had a haircut that made her look like Z-Man in Beyond the Valley of the Dolls. One from the Caribbean had a pronounced sway that clashed with the sadness in her eyes. She was almost rundown and maybe 16. One girl from Holland looked like a mix of Chris Crocker and Kirsten Dunst. After her slow walk, she let out a subdued laugh—"Huh huh huh huh"—like Beavis or Butt-Head. The most conventionally pretty girl was long, blonde and thin, like a piling fit for a California beach.

I saw Rob Zombie hair, a gym-teacher face, a Tyra Banks flounce, a Naomi Campbell walk. Few of the girls exhibited any personality at all—it was almost disarming when one asked, "How are you?" to the panel judging her. Some refused to shake hands, even. One gave the excuse that she was sick.

Against these unreal interactions, what left an impression were the moments when raw humanity wafted in. One girl had such strong body odor, you could smell her a full eight clomps away. One spent so much time in the bathroom after her audition that she was clearly taking a shit—the overly air-freshened way she left it confirmed as much. Still another removed her tampon and left it unwrapped atop the discarded tissues in the small, open bathroom trashcan.

I could understand how an enterprising person accustomed to this process would think to convert it into a televised competition. But the values espoused by reality shows like America's Next Top Model didn't jibe with actual reality as it played out that day. Personality was barely a factor in casting (only if a girl was supremely unpleasant did it count against her). Also, a model's portfolio or "book" barely mattered—the people holding the casting looked through them all for proof of versatility, but they cast a girl who was "too new" to carry around a bunch of modeling shots of herself. If they liked you, they liked you.

And then, sometimes even if they liked you, it didn't matter—the truly odd specimens were passed over for fear that they wouldn't blend well with the rest of the group. Short hair, in this case, would have clashed too much with the look the designers were going for. If the models had bodies or even body parts (a prominent ass, a full chest) that would not do well with particular outfits, they couldn't be cast either.

There's no guarantee that the girls the designers want and option will be cast ultimately—these models are sent on several go-sees per day by their agencies, as Fashion Week has something like 400 events to fill. Almost everyone gets cast for something, and no one can be double-booked. Just because you want a girl that you see, doesn't mean you can have that girl—the second phase of casting is kind of an inverted audition process in which the designers negotiate with agents.

The first phase seemed exhausting enough. By the fifth hour, I was tired of gazing at beauty, or "beauty" as it is defined by the fashion industry. No matter how special or odd or amazing, every girl started to blend together, one more commodity to be bid on.

I thought about this and how sad it all is, how inhuman this process can seem. "You have to look past that. It's their choice. They're getting paid," one of my hosts explained.

"This is also the part that I hate," he said

Source image from Getty.

An emergency alert interrupted Montana television viewers as they watched the Steve Wilkos Show Monday, and calmly informed them that "dead bodies are rising from their graves."

The (clearly) bogus alert was quickly pulled off air and replaced with an apology from KRTV — the station that broadcast the message — both on air and online reading:

Someone apparently hacked into the Emergency Alert System and announced on KRTV and the CW that "dead bodies are rising from their graves" in several Montana counties.

This message did not originate from KRTV, and there is no emergency.

Our engineers are investigating to determine what happened and if it affected other media outlets.

While several questions remain (Who did this? How? Was it viral marketing for The Walking Dead?) one is definitely clear: the dead of Great Falls, Montana are still dead and plan to stay that way for some time, something I think we can all agree is good news.

John Alleman died as he lived.

For the last year and a half, Alleman served as the unofficial spokesman for the Heart Attack Grill — the infamous hospital-themed Las Vegas eatery that holds the world record for "most calorific burger."

Last week, Alleman, 54, suffered a massive heart attack and was rushed to Sunrise Hospital in Las Vegas, where he remained on life support until he passed away this morning.

According to restaurant owner "Doctor Jon" Basso, Alleman would visit the Heart Attack Grill on a daily basis, and often stood outside for hours trying to convince others to enter.

"I told him if you keep eating like this, it's going to kill ya," Basso told the Las Vegas Sun. "He'd say, 'I just love your place, Jon.' He's the only person I know who was probably at the restaurant more than I."

"Patient John" would in time become the restaurant's mascot, with his caricature on the Grill's menu, and his own clothing line for sale through the restaurant's website.

"John was a fun spirited man who valued laughter above all else," the restaurant wrote on its Facebook page. "He was loved deeply and will be missed."

Alleman is the second Heart Attack Grill spokesman to perish in as many years.

29-year-old Blair River passed away in March of 2011. His cause of death was never officially reported, but Basso said then that River succumbed to flu-related pneumonia.

[images via Facebook]

Georgia State Representative Earnest Smith has a problem with Photoshop. Specifically, he has a problem with it being used to cause an "unknowing person wrongfully to be identified as the person in an obscene depiction." So, along with fellow Democrat Pam Dickerson, he's trying to make such depictions illegal and punishable by a $1,000 fine. Would, say, taking a Georgia state representative's head and photoshopping it over a male porn star's body fall under such a law? Because that's just what Georgia Unfiltered's Andre Walker did last week (see photo above).

The First Amendment to the Constitution of the United States protects all forms of speech, not just spoken word. That's why House Bill 39 is so asinine. It attempts to regulate speech and I doubt it would stand up in a court of law.

Rep. Smith needs to grow some thick skin if he's going to be an elected official. Trust me when I say the altered photograph shown above was not the worst I could have done.

Smith's reaction?

"It's clear we need to do something," he told Savannah Now. "It can be done to anyone at anytime."

Does he have any idea who made the easily traceable image? Nope, not a clue. "I could not venture to give you an answer," he said, when asked if he knew who created the image.

But what about that whole First Amendment freedom of speech thing? As Daily Intelligencer notes, that doesn't apply here because according to Smith, it doesn't apply to words or images when they're mean. Says Smith:

"No one has a right to make fun of anyone. You have a right to speak, but no one has a right to disparage another person. It's not a First Amendment right."

Just so we're all clear: No one has the right to mock Smith or add their own photoshop of the lawmaker in the comments below.

Peter Acworth, CEO of San Francisco fetish-porn giant Kink.com, has made a fortune from BDSM and maintained a surprising respectability while doing it. Just last month brought the Sundance premier of Kink, a James Franco-produced documentary that glorifies Acworth's sprawling, filthy empire. But now we've learned that Acworth was arrested earlier this month for cocaine possession, by police investigating a report that people were shooting firearms inside the company's Mission District headquarters. Leave it to San Francisco to combine gun culture and S&M.

Acworth, 42, was arrested at 8:24 p.m. on February 1st and charged with one count of cocaine possession and one count of delaying arrest, according to Albie Esparaza, a San Francisco Police Department Public-Information Officer. Police were initially sent to Kink.com's massive, $14.5 million studio/dungeon in the old San Francisco Armory at 1800 Mission St. after a concerned citizen reported seeing a video online of men firing guns inside the premises, Esparaza said. Joshua Carlberg, 40, was also arrested and charged with delaying arrest.

"Basically it stemmed from social media," Esparaza said. "Someone posted a video online and this person reported it to the police, and they located an indoor shooting range, sort of a makeshift." Esparaza said police did not find enough evidence for fire-arms-related charges, though the investigation is still open. It's unclear what video spurred the investigation, or what fetish it might have spoken to. One Kink performer I talked to said that for all the weird stuff Kink puts out, he'd never heard of videos involving live firearms. Acworth is typically fastidious about keeping his torture porn this side of the law, the performer said.

The arrest is a rare misstep for Acworth, a Brit who has has built a paradoxical image as a peddler of exotic smut like "Electro Anal Exploration" and "Maitresse Madeline's Small Penis Humiliation POV," with the polish and business acumen of a start-up guy.

"I've always had an intense desire to be tied up, since childhood, so when I discovered bondage pornography around 17, then I felt, I guess I'm kinky, and that's OK," he told the Daily Beast recently. "So I started a business to help people demystify it and help them find their sexuality." Acworth has boasted that Kink has " never shied away from scrutiny," and the company offers public tours of its Armory daily. The S&M mania sparked by 50 Shades of Grey and James Franco's documentary means we'll probably be hearing more about Acworth in the future.

Acworth's arrest may give new ammunition to some San Franciscans who fought Acworth's transformation of the Armory into a sex dungeon back in 2006, but fans and performers need not worry, for now: It appears not to have thrown much of a kink (ahem) in the shooting schedule: The Kink performer I spoke to said he had heard nothing of the arrest, and he was still on schedule for a shoot this week. (Acworth did not immediately respond to an email request for comment; nobody answered the phone at Kink headquarters.)

[Image via AP]

A popular Esquire story released today that claims the Navy SEAL who killed Osama bin Laden is ineligible for health care is apparently wrong about that, according to the military publication Stars and Stripes.

In the wake of the Esquire article's publication, which prompted a wave of media coverage (including here on Gawker), Stars and Stripes reporter Megan McCloskey did some digging and discovered that one of the main cruxes of the piece—that the the SEAL shooter receives no health coverage from the government—is inaccurate. Like other Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, asserts McCloskey, the SEAL is eligible for five years of free medical care upon retirement, a fact Esquire writer Phil Bronstein left out of his piece.

McCloskey called Bronstein, who is also the head of the Center for Investigative Reporting, who told her he omitted the availability of the veteran health benefits because "that's a different story."

The writer, Phil Bronstein, who heads up the Center for Investigative Reporting, stands by the story. He said the assertion that the government gave the SEAL "nothing" in terms of health care is both fair and accurate, because the SEAL didn't know the VA benefits existed.

"No one ever told him that this is available," Bronstein said.

He said there wasn't space in the article to explain that the former SEAL's lack of healthcare was driven by an ignorance of the benefits to which he is entitled.

"That's a different story," Bronstein said in a phone interview with Stars and Stripes about what he omitted from the article.

[Image via AP]

Things aren't sounding so great for the 4,200 passengers stranded aboard the disabled Carnival Triumph cruise ship, which is currently being towed by two boats through the Gulf of Mexico to Mobile, Alabama, one day after a fire disabled the ship's engines. ABC News is now reporting the ship has limited access to running water and power, and there are also reports of passengers using buckets as makeshift toilets.

Brett Nutt, whose wife is aboard the ship, described the conditions to ABC.

"She said there's no running water. They just really got food there to them tonight, and there's no power whatsoever, other than the emergency flasher lights that are on," he said. "She was crying and hysterical."

CNN interviewed Toby Barlow, whose wife is also aboard the Triumph. She told Barlow that "sewage is running down the walls and floors" and described the lines for food as hours long.

According to a statement from the U.S. Coast Guard, there is no air conditioning in the ship's rooms; as a result, all passengers were being forced to sleep in tents on the ship's decks.

There is some good news for the passengers, relatively speaking. For starters, the tow boats arrived earlier tonight, and a Carnival representative told ABC some of the ship's bathrooms are "back online," whatever that means. Passengers will also receive a full refund via a credit for a future trip on Carnival (because surely all passengers are anxious for another cruise voyage soon), plus reimbursement for any expenses.

The bad news? The ship won't arrive in Alabama until Thursday, meaning passengers have another three days to hang out in horrid conditions on a ship being towed through six-foot seas. The only thing worse, it seems, than a vacation on a cruise is a vacation to Acapulco.

[Image via AP]

According to reports from the U.S. Geological Survey, there was a small, 4.9 magnitude earthquake in North Korea late on Monday. The tremor's epicenter was reportedly near North Korea's previous nuclear test sites, where devices were detonated in 2006 and 2009, fueling rumors that the quake was the result of a nuclear explosion. Those rumors have now been confirmed by a United Nations Security Council diplomat, South Korea's Defense Ministry, who are reporting the test yielded an explosion of six to seven kilotons, and the North Korean government.

The Associated Press reports that a U.N. nuclear test monitoring organization initially called the tremor an "unusual seismic event."

"There is a high possibility that North Korea has conducted a nuclear test," said Chi Heoncheol, an earthquake specialist at the institute. Chi said a magnitude 3.9 magnitude earthquake and a magnitude 4.5 earthquake were detected in the North's 2006 and 2009 nuclear tests.

South Korean media quickly described the event as a "man-made earthquake," and the South Korean Defense Ministry raised its alert level.

Not long after the quake was reported, a United Nations Security Council diplomat said the seismic activity was due to a nuclear explosion.

United Nations security council diplomat says there has been a nuclear test in North Korea #BREAKING

— Reuters Top News (@Reuters) February 12, 2013

UPDATE: South Korea's Yonhap News is reporting North Korea gave China advance notice of their plan to detonate a nuclear device earlier today.

UPDATE 2: CNN's Elise Labbott reports that U.S. officials were expecting such a test at "any moment."

US was expecting nuclear test by #NorthKorea.Just this morning, one senior official said "test could come at any moment"

— Elise Labott (@eliselabottcnn) February 12, 2013

UPDATE 3: The South Korean Defense Ministry said the test yielded an explosion of six to seven kilotons.

Corrected: South Korea defense ministry says North Korea quake indicates nuclear blast of six to seven kilotons, not 10 - official #BREAKING

— Reuters Top News (@Reuters) February 12, 2013

And according to Yonhap News, there will be an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting at 9 a.m. Tuesday morning.

UPDATE 4: South Korea has confirmed the nuclear test.

South Korea confims North Korea has conducted its third nuclear test. yhoo.it/YnnA5J

— Yahoo! News (@YahooNews) February 12, 2013

As has North Korea:

North #Korea confirms that it has "successfully" carried out a nuclear test bbc.in/157ZySX #NorthKorea

— BBC Breaking News (@BBCBreaking) February 12, 2013

UPDATE 5: President Obama issued a statement condemning the attacks:

North Korea announced today that it conducted a third nuclear test. This is a highly provocative act that, following its December 12 ballistic missile launch, undermines regional stability, violates North Korea's obligations under numerous United Nations Security Council resolutions, contravenes its commitments under the September 19, 2005 Joint Statement of the Six-Party Talks, and increases the risk of proliferation. North Korea's nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs constitute a threat to U.S. national security and to international peace and security. The United States remains vigilant in the face of North Korean provocations and steadfast in our defense commitments to allies in the region.

These provocations do not make North Korea more secure. Far from achieving its stated goal of becoming a strong and prosperous nation, North Korea has instead increasingly isolated and impoverished its people through its ill-advised pursuit of weapons of mass destruction and their means of delivery.

The danger posed by North Korea's threatening activities warrants further swift and credible action by the international community. The United States will also continue to take steps necessary to defend ourselves and our allies. We will strengthen close coordination with allies and partners and work with our Six-Party partners, the United Nations Security Council, and other UN member states to pursue firm action.

[Image via AP]

After hours of confusion and misreporting as police waited for fire to dissipate and temperatures to cool, authorities confirmed that a charred body was found in the smoldering cabin where a suspect believed to be Christopher Jordan Dorner, the ex-LAPD officer who allegedly killed four people over a weeklong campaign of terror against his former employers, exchanged fire with police over several hours yesterday. A forensics team will conclusively identify the remains, which are assumed to be Dorner's.

Still a mystery: how did the fire that consumed the cabin start? Most accounts shrug their shoulders—"It was unclear how the fire at the cabin began," The New York Times writes—but The Guardian's Paul Owen has marshalled a pile of circumstantial evidence that the San Bernadino County sheriff's department may have started it, including a purported recording of a police scanner in which police can be heard seeming to discuss a plan to burn Dorner out:

All right, Steve, we're gonna go, er, we're gonna go forward with the plan, with, er, with the burn. We want it, er, like we talked about. [...] Seven burners [Update: we're told these refer to tear gas canisters] deployed and we have a fire.

Here's the alleged recording, which journalist Max Blumenthal—who was listening to the scanner and live-tweeting at the time—says is legitimate:

There's also this moment from yesterday's coverage on KCAL TV (note: the clip is from much earlier in the day, well before the police scanner was recorded), in which muffled voices can be heard yelling something that sounds like "We're going to burn him out," and "Burn this motherfucker!"

LAPD referred Owen's questions to the San Bernadino County sheriff's department, which didn't respond. They're going to want to issue a statement soon: conspiracy theorists and professional skeptics are already claiming that the LAPD "pulled a Waco" on Dorner, and it's only going to get worse from here.

You ask: why do I need a GIF of New York Senator Chuck Schumer nodding creepily at last night's State of the Union address? But you misunderstand: it is not the need that creates the GIF, but the GIF that creates the need.

Variably referred to as an "Ewok," a "teddy bear," and a "monkey dog," an impossibly adorable black affenpinscher named Banana Joe brought home the Best In Show title at last night's 137th annual Westminster Kennel Club dog show.

A 5-year-old polyglot ("he speaks German, Dutch, Spanish and English," said co-owner Mieke Cooijmans) from Attleboro, Mass., Joe's win last night was his 86th best-in-show title overall.

"He's won a lot of big shows, but not like this one," said Ernesto Lara, Joe's handler. "He's a very tough little guy. He's just a comedian. He doesn't know his size. He doesn't know he has a fluffy face. He thinks he's Mr. America."

2,721 dogs from 187 breeds participated in the show, but only a handful left the area with a ribbon.

The title of "reserve best in show" was given to an Old English sheepdog aptly named Swagger. Though just 20-months-old, Swagger was a crowd favorite, inspiring shouts of "pick the sheepdog" from audience members.

Other best-in-show runners-up include Jewel the American foxhound; Honor the bichon frise; Oakley the German wirehaired pointer; Adam the smooth fox terrier; and Matisse the Portuguese water dog (who shares his breed with the First Dog, Bo).

But last night belonged to Banana Joe, and it will be a memorable one to say the least: Joe's first Westminster Kennel Club win was also his final dog show.

According to Lara, Joe will soon return to the Netherlands, his place of birth, where he will live out his days being adorable.

[photos via AP]

YouTube superstar Freddie Wong finally gets around to making his own Harlem Shake video — and in traditional Freddie Wong fashion, he brings the whole Harlem Shake house down with him.

(And if there is still life left in the fad after this, surely this version will curb-stomp it.)

[video via Node]

No one will remember a single word from Sen. Marco Rubio's response to the State of the Union last night, lost as they were inside his desert mouth cave. When we think back on Rubio's words, we will hear instead the collective sound of a big group of people smiling at once, or someone eating a banana inside your ear.

[H/T Joe Mande.]

The gun battle and standoff between San Bernadino sheriff's deputies and alleged "killer cop" Christopher Jordan Dorner that dominated yesterday's news was captured by CBS reporter Carter Evans, who was directly outside the now-burned cabin that authorities believe Dorner had holed up in.

Audio of Evans' experience had already been broadcast on KCAL, the Los Angeles CBS affiliate; now, CBS has published video. Evans, who was told to "get the fuck out of here" by the cops, is okay and unharmed.

[CBS]

After all that brouhaha over Ted Nugent — you know, the guy who threatened to kill President Obama — getting invited to the State of the Union by Rep. Steve Stockman (R-TX), the hard-talking, pants-shitting rocker was seldom seen throughout the evening.

But the one photo of Nugent that did make the rounds was publicized not from Stockman's camp, but rather from that of Rep. Earl Blumenauer (D-OR), the congressman who invited Nugent's seatmate — Portland musician Thomas Lauderdale.

Lauderdale, best known for founding the "little orchestra" known as Pink Martini, is the anti-Ted Nugent: A liberal, Occupy-Movement-supporting, openly gay civil rights activist who favors gun control and loves classical music.

But for all their differences, the two did apparently manage to find common ground, and, according to Lauderdale at least, had a pretty pleasant chat.

He wrote in an email to BlueOregon:

I was totally not expecting to be seated next to Ted Nugent at the State of the Union .... but it was incredible. We talked about hunting ... in Texas (where he has lived for the past 10 years) and Michigan (where he grew up). Growing up he was inspired by Dick Dale ... and later by the British Invasion bands of the mid-60s ... The Yardbirds ... The Rolling Stones. He only tours in the summer. I asked him if he did USO tours. He has ... BUT is probably the only celebrity who carried his own machine gun. (Shockingly, I don't have a machine gun of my own.) He thought this year's Grammys were too "bubblegum" and childish. And, of all of his compositions, "Fred Bear" means the most to him ... people ask for it at their funerals, their barmitzvahs, their graduations ... "It doesn't get more "wow" than that," he said. At the end of the night, he shook my hand, and wished me luck. I thought he was a real gentleman.

Unfortunately, the gap-bridging didn't carry over to the night's main event.

Following the President's speech, Nugent took to Twitter to assure his followers that he remained as headstrong as ever. "It deeply pains me to report that the prez is a master scam artist," Nugent wrote. "Didn't believe a word."

Then again, it's unclear if he was even paying attention.

According to Slate's Dave Weigel, the Nuge didn't stand up for anything the president said — not even "our brave men and women in uniform are coming home."

[H/T: The Oregonian, photo via Getty]

Though it's been years since the last book's release, Harry Potter is getting itself a little makeover.

To celebrate the 15th anniversary of the publication of the first book, Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone, Scholastic is releasing a box set of all seven books this September. The books will all feature brand new covers, but only the first cover has been released. The new artwork is by Kazu Kibuishi, author of the graphic novel series Amulet.

"The Harry Potter covers by Mary GrandPré are so fantastic and iconic," said Kibuishi. "When I was asked to submit samples, I initially hesitated because I didn't want to see them reinterpreted! However, I felt that if I were to handle the project, I could bring something to it that many other designers and illustrators probably couldn't, and that was that I was also a writer of my own series of middle grade fiction. As an author myself, I tried to answer the question, 'If I were the author of the books - and they were like my own children - how would I want them to be seen years from now?' When illustrating the covers, I tried to think of classic perennial paperback editions of famous novels and how those illustrations tend to feel. In a way, the project became a tribute to both Harry Potter and the literary classics."

It's hard to believe Harry Potter is 15 years old, huh? Though it seems a little young to me for cosmetic work, no judgement here, we all do what we have to to feel good about ourselves.

[Image via Scholastic]

A man who sought to avoid paying the $2.25 fare a a Manhattan PATH station ended up with some serious prison time after he was caught carrying an illegal weapon.

37-year-old Ruben Sanabria was stopped by Port Authority officers last March after he jumped the 14th Street station's turnstile.

While looking him over, the officers noticed Sanabria was gesturing towards his waistband area and proceeded to search him.

They soon discovered Sanabria was packing a .40-caliber Smith & Wesson loaded with so-called "cop killer bullets."

Sanabria tried to make a run for it, but was quickly apprehended and arrested.

"This defendant illegally carried a loaded semi-automatic firearm into a public transportation system used by thousands of people every day," said Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance. "The officers who apprehended him did so at great personal risk. Preventing gun violence is one of my top priorities as District Attorney, and I will make sure that this Office continues to seek strong sentences for crimes involving firearms."

Sanabria pleaded guilty to criminal possession of a weapon in the second degree, and was sentenced to seven years behind bars.

[photo via Port Authority]

Last night, Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) got cottonmouthed, wiped and licked his lips and finally interrupted his delivery of the GOP response to the State of the Union to bend over and drink some water. By now, you've read someone explaining why this proves Rubio is not presidential material. Or is. Whatever.

Rubio looked goofy. It was funny. Looking goofy isn't really a big deal, though. Liberals spent the last decade cheering the elfin Dennis Kucinich, while conservatives embraced Texas patriot-leprechaun Ron Paul. The goofiest-looking motherfucker in American history was Abraham Lincoln. The guy was made out of seven feet of beard, bones, and hat blocking. Goofiness is a small hurdle for people with ideas. Rubio's speech proved that he doesn't have any.

This was supposed to be Rubio's coming out party. Beltway handicapping figures that Rubio stands a good shot in 2016, so this was a moment for him to evoke big ideas and inspire feelings. He was potentially enough of a savior for the Republican Party that he felt compelled to deny it:

There is only one savior, and it is not me. #Jesus

— Marco Rubio (@marcorubio) February 7, 2013

Two more denials and he could worry less about the Jesus comparisons and more about Caesar.

Rubio needed this speech to live up to the story spun about him, but the "chosen one" narrative has always obscured a weird story. Rubio's ascent to the Senate wasn't so much a matter of destiny as it was a series of lucky breaks. He won in a year of depressed voter turnout. He faced a Democratic opponent, Kendrick Meek, who was, at best, probably the fourth choice of the state Democratic Party (after Alex Sink, Debbie Wasserman Schultz and a handful of third-stringers). Then there was the independent candidate, Charlie Crist, who bowed out of the GOP primary after Rubio posed a strong challenge.

Crist kneecapped himself among Republicans by supporting Obama's 2009 stimulus bill at the moment Florida most needed it but also at the moment that paranoia about Obama was at its zenith. For whatever reason—that he's black, a Democrat, a Yankee—Obama was anathema, and Crist did a deal with him. It didn't matter that Crist was still the state's chief executive and that Obama was someone sitting in Washington. Florida's current governor spent more time running for the office in 2010 against Obama than against Democratic candidate Alex Sink. It didn't matter that it didn't make sense.

Into this mess strode Rubio, first as Crist's primary opponent and then as the GOP nominee. And from the moment it was officially a three-way race between Crist, Rubio, and Meek, plenty of Florida wonks assumed Crist was doomed. Lefties stung by Crist's crippling property tax cuts (Florida has no income tax) bore him no love, and the deal with Obama was a final shove rightward for conservatives. The Tea Party gathered around Rubio, and he was only too happy to smile and pretend to not be scared shitless by people carrying around papier-mâché TREES OF LIBERTY soaked with the POSTER PAINT OF TYRANTS.

Rubio got lucky in other ways. Despite being Speaker of the Florida House when it was among the most corrupt state governments in America, despite thousands of dollars of potentially misused campaign funds being paid out to his family, despite abusing state GOP credit cards, despite being best buddies with a man accused of bribery and misuse of funds, and despite being the sort of "fiscal restraint" wizard who defaulted on a mortgage during the campaign, nothing touched him. No one was paying attention to Kendrick Meek, and the corruption investigation into former Florida Republican Party Chairman Jim Greer overshadowed any interest in Rubio's potential sins with its "Borgia popes" levels of excess. (The Greer saga was still going on as of Tuesday.)

So when Rubio's speech started to falter last night, it was easy for people who follow Florida politics to shrug and say, "What did you expect?" The destiny storyline was always bullshit. Rubio is a career hack who won a deeply paranoid election against two guys who couldn't win, in a state so fucked up that almost no sub-Greer level of venality would be broadly objectionable. And after you strip away the investigations, there's not much left to the man. Rubio's always been described as a kind of visionary or idealist about the party, someone who gets a lumpy throat thinking about America. You can even read a book he wrote sort of on the subject, 100 Innovative Ideas for Florida's Future, which he crowdsourced by conducting town halls ("Idearaisers") around the state. It's atrocious, but more to the point, it's a huge collection of generic GOP boilerplate, vague aspirations, and piddly shit. State budget amendments and energy-based tax incentives! Florida should have, like, a really good university! Let's make it hard for sex offenders to nab kids on MySpace!

All that visionary stuff thrown his way mostly boils down to his way of sounding deeply moved when saying keywords like "freedom" and "America." You saw it last night, where Rubio almost instantly came out of the gate with glistening eyes, already overwhelmed. If you ever saw a Prose Interpretation in a high school forensics tournament, you know exactly what it sounds like: that one girl who always put on a southern accent and read that story about speaking to the flowers like they were her dead daddy and asking, "D'yuh still luv me daddeh? D'yuh still luv Amerca? Sing to me, daddeh, through thuh peregrinatin' cry of that Cooper's Hawk."

It went on in this leadenly tacky way for 2,600 words. Rubio opened by tying the desire of the impoverished to immigrate to America with anti-abortion sentiment, claiming that "America is exceptional because we believe that every life, at every stage, is precious, and that everyone everywhere has a God-given right to go as far as their talents and hard work will take them." America is different from another nations, because our economic engine is driven by creating opportunity every time we de-fund access to birth control.

Most of it could have been 2012 campaign boilerplate. We must lower the farcically loophole-ridden corporate tax rate. Obama hates rich people, and taxing rich people will hurt the middle class more than cutting middle-class services and raising middle-class taxes would, so let's do that instead. Obamacare kills businesses. Obama will destroy Medicare and Social Security. All this could have come from Googling anything Paul Ryan has said in the last nine months. Rubio claimed that Obama "believes [free enterprise is] the cause of our problems," the sort of reductively hacky portrayal of Obama's attitude toward the 2007-8 financial crisis that Ryan was selling. America needs middle class jobs but not regulation, despite the fact that working in regulation is a solidly middle class job. In fact, a great deal of government work is. These are phantom jobs. They don't count, because Marcopaul Ryanubio looked sternly at them and said, "Nuh-uh."

But the real money shot of the night—aside from that silliness about a water bottle—was Rubio declaring, "More government isn't going to help you get ahead. It's going to hold you back. More government isn't going to create more opportunities. It's going to limit them." Minutes later Rubio sang the praises of the federal financial aid that sent him to college, and the Medicare that "provided [his] father the care he needed to battle cancer and ultimately die with dignity. And it pays for the care [his] mother receives now." Okay!

The bottled water moment offered the D.C. commentariat the worst kind of low-hanging fruit, yielding a ton of easy jokes and no actual thinking. "GAFFE BAD," screamed Beltway Twitter, before stalking off on the unbent Frankenstein legs of a creature that just took a lightning bolt to the head. For a political class demanding substance instead of shallow observation, it giddily embraced the latter, even nonsensically. Leaving aside that this was Rubio's big test, his big moment, the unofficial kickoff to his 2016, the man got cottonmouth—big deal. If you insist on hammering him on the basis of "optics," maybe focus on the fact that he spent 10 minutes reading a recycled 2012 Paul Ryan stump speech while threatening to weep at America until it rescued itself.

[Source image via Getty]