Arnold Schwarzenegger: Public Pensions and Our Fiscal Future – WSJ.com. “Toughly 80 cents of every government dollar in California goes to employee compensation and benefits”. yikes! Think that’s bad, Ontario has 10 times as much debt per capita.

What collapsing empire looks like – Salon.com. closing library systems? making the 12th grade optional? turning off street lights? Welcome to America.

Tea-Baggers Fall For Fake Onion Story. stupidity knows no bounds.

How to Make an American Job Before It’s Too Late: Andy Grove – Bloomberg. long article about restarting American manufacturing. some surprising ideas (including a trade war) from the co-founder of Intel.

Lara Logan, You Suck — RollingStone.com. Taibbi being Taibbi.

California on verge of system failure’ – The Globe and Mail. oy yoi yoi.

Detroit homes sell for $1 amid mortgage and car industry crisis | The Guardian. Some interesting stuff about community groups that are just tearing down homes without permits to get rid of the blight. Michigan is such a crazy place.

Under-fire Goldman Sachs reveals 90% jump in profits | The Guardian “Goldman revealed a leap in quarterly profits from $1.8bn to $3.5bn and disclosed that it was setting aside $5.49bn to pay its employees”. wtf?!

He’s a Terrorist. Just say it. Terrorist. For F*%k sake!. it turns out that pretty much every news publication took it pretty easy on that guy who flew a plane into an IRS building. via ram.

DAVID SIMON – Vice Magazine. long interview with the creator of The Wire.

Ticketmaster and Live Nation Get Approval To Merge – Media Decoder Blog – NYTimes.com. holy hell. you think ticketmaster is expensive now? just wait.

G.O.P. Senate Victory Stuns Democrats – NYTimes.com. Ted Kennedy’s senate seat went to Republican. Obama needs to start taking people out to the woodshed. Also, it’s times like this i’m so happy i left the US (though Harper almost comes across as fake as this douchebag).

Revelations From The Campaign – 60 Minutes. McCain’s campaign manager explains how stupid Sarah Palin is.

States that allow same sex marriage versus States that allow first cousin marriage. wowee. via wes.

The Way We Live Now – Walk Away From Your Mortgage! – NYTimes.com. about people and companies “strategically defaulting”. via amr.

Sarah Palin Appears on ‘Tonight Show’ – Media Decoder Blog. and reads from William Shatner’s biography.

The 50 Best Protest Signs Of 2009: Pics, Videos, Links, News. youth in asia. oh my.

FiveThirtyEight: Politics Done Right: The New Identity Politics Party. interesting 60 Minutes piece included about the cost of end-of-life care in the US. via ram.

The Jobless Rate for People Like You – Interactive Graphic – NYTimes.com. The worst off: black men ages 15 to 24 without a high school degree: 48.5%. The best off: white women ages 25 to 44 with a college degree: 3.6%

Maine Vote Is Focus of Gay-Marriage Fight – NYTimes.com. i recently had the pleasure of driving through the state of maine. it’s quite nice. as are equal rights.