Weekly Review

By Paul Ford

A warrant was issued for the arrest of Congressman Tom DeLay, who turned himself in and was released on $10,000 bail.¹ It was reported that in 2003 Senator Bill Frist was told (in writing) that a significant amount of HCA, Inc., stock had been added to his blind trust; two weeks later he said he did not believe that he owned any stock in HCA. "I have no control," said Frist. "He could have been more exact," explained Frist's spokesman. ² A 14-year-old Washington boy was charged with sexual harassment after hanging around outside a school homecoming dance dressed as a penis,³ and President George W. Bush nominated his economic advisor Ben Bernanke as chairman of the Federal Reserve Board.⁴ Hurricane Wilma struck Florida and left millions without power,⁵ and tropical storm Alpha caused floods and mudslides in Hispaniola.⁶ In the UK a quarantined parrot died from the H5N1 strain of avian flu. Croatian swans were dying of flu, and pigeons in Australia were under close observation. ^{7 8 9} A Canadian named Gordon Chin was sentenced to 18 months probation for owning cartoon porn, including naked Pokemon images.¹⁰ Babies were up for auction on eBay's Chinese subsidiary, Eachnet. Boys were going for $3,450, while girls cost $1,603.¹¹ In Brooklyn, New York, a man was getting an image entitled "Last Rites" tattooed on his right arm when he passed out and fell onto a counter; glass shards cut his throat and killed him.¹² The Amazon rainforest was being destroyed at double the rate previously estimated.¹³

A panel of researchers called on NASA to think through issues of astronaut sexuality as it plans a trip to Mars. "If there are instances of sexual conflict or infidelity," said a medical anthropologist, "that may lead to a breakdown in crew functioning."¹⁴ William Shatner passed a kidney stone.¹⁵ Scientists released a brown Norway rat on a deserted, rat-free island off of New Zealand in order to find out why rats are so hard to kill. Even though they fitted the rat with a radio collar, used traps and bait, and pursued the rat with sniffer dogs, the rat was not caught for four months. It was finally captured on a nearby island using a trap baited with penguin meat.¹⁶ A two-year-old in Ohio was recovering after he got his arm caught in an electric meat grinder,¹⁷ and a burglar in Spokane, Washington, broke into a house and stole golf clubs, but left a pile of feces arranged in the shape of male genitalia.¹⁸ Lamb and Lynx Gaede, thirteen-year-old twin sisters who perform as the band Prussian Blue, were under criticism for singing songs that praise Rudolph Hess. "We just want to preserve our race," explained Lynx.¹⁹ A Louisiana barber, tired of telling African-American customers that he doesn't know how to cut their hair, put a sign outside of his barbershop that read "whites only."²⁰ Rosa Parks died.²¹ An Oklahoma man, sentenced to 30 years in prison for his role in an armed robbery, asked for three more years of prison time to match Larry Bird's jersey number, 33.²² In the United States 2.3 million people were in prison.²³

A jet crashed in Nigeria, killing all 117 people aboard.²⁴ An Oregon man won $340 million in the Powerball lottery.²⁵ At least seventeen people died in bombings and shootings in Iraq,²⁶ and a poll found that 82 percent of Iraqis oppose the continued presence of foreign troops.²⁷ Saddam Hussein was on trial,²⁸ and President Bush was said to be angry and bitter. "He's like the lion in winter," said a friend.²⁹ An Ohio woman was found guilty of killing her four-year-old son by setting him on fire. She also burned his puppy.³⁰ A video recording was released that showed U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan shouting insults through a loudspeaker after setting alight the corpses of two Taliban fighters. "Wow, look at the blood coming out of the mouth on that one," said a soldier. "Fucking straight death metal."³¹ A Pentagon study found that 28 percent of U.S. troops returning from Iraq require medical or mental health treatment; nearly 20,000 returning soldiers reported nightmares.³² A 93-year-old Florida man driving a Chevy Malibu struck and killed a pedestrian, then drove three miles with the body on his windshield. "Obviously," said a traffic investigator, "he was confused."³³