Tax Day Freebies and Deals

Yesterday in some misguided celebration of tax day Starbucks offered free coffee for any customers who brought their own mugs, so I guzzled Pike Place Roast from 6:00 AM until well after 11:00 PM. It’s too late for this information to net you any free coffee, dear readers; I offer it only as fair warning to anyone who might be thinking about inviting me to events that have open bars. I mean, free is free.

The Virginia Criminal Code in your pocket

Want to avoid writing an essay for Governor McDonnell? This iPhone app, which displays and indexes the full Virginia Criminal Code, costs just $4.99. Use it to stay apprised of what’s legal and what’s illegal. No word on whether the iPhone app rates crimes for their arrestibility, e.g. takes into account disparate sentencing practices for coke and crack, and the like.

CD of the Week on Out of the Box

Is it too meta for me to be linking to AltDaily? This week’s CD of the week is by David Byrne & Fatboy Slim, which means MGMT’s new album “Congratulations,” which came out on Tuesday, is not CD of the week. I don’t understand. How can this be? WTF? Actually I’m kidding; I bow to Paul Shugrue’s judgment and consider Out of the Box to be one of the fourteen best things about Hampton Roads. On Wednesday I happened to be listening at seven when he started his set with brand-new songs by Band of Horses, LCD Soundsystem, and the National. In truth I haven’t even had a chance to listen to “Congratulations” yet. Perhaps it’s terrible.

Hundreds of Tea Party activists rally in downtown Norfolk

With the tools at my disposal I can’t prove my claim beyond reasonable doubt, but the original headline to this story was “Thousands of Tea Party activists rally in downtown Norfolk.” I’ve tried using the Wayback Machine to retrieve it but to no avail. Do you trust me? The rally was in Town Point Park on Thursday and happened concurrently with dozens of others around the country. The big ones had Sarah Palin and Michelle Bachmann; here in Norfolk we had an old white guy in a baseball cap who said, “I spent three years behind the Iron Curtain; I know what Communism is. We got socialism taking over this country and we need to stop it.”

This man, who may or may not have ever left the country, appears on a video you can watch if you click the link above. He goes on to say he’s not sure if Barack Obama was born in the United States. He doesn’t state whether or not he believes Hawaii is part of the U.S. (It is.) A woman adds that it’s “unconstitutional to redistribute my wealth to pay for your health care and your abortions.” Unfortunately for her I’ve got the “Your Rights” app on my iPhone. Apparently Section 8 of Article 1 of the Constitution (that’s the part that precedes all the amendments) states that “The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States.” (The app is free.) What’s constitutional in America isn’t as debatable as some folks would like to believe. Constitutional means “supported by the Constitution.” I wish I weren’t forced to be so didactic. The Pilot report concludes with the warning that “We are just one step away from total slavery.” Do Tea Partiers always use slavery as an inappropriate and hyperbolic metaphor, or are they only helping us celebrate Confederate History Month?

P.S. I’m disgusted with Obama on at least eight different fronts and will require a truly substantial bribe to vote for him again in 2012, but I wish some ardent birther would speak up in the comments and explain to me how it is that the Obama family knew in 1961 that their secret nefarious plan to sneak a socialist Kenyan baby into the American presidency forty-seven years in the future would succeed. The idea is so ridiculous that it’s declassé for me to engage with it at all, but I truly am curious: was Obama’s father a brilliant and prescient Asimovian psychohistorian? Will someone please explain how the Obama family knew to pay for birth announcements in a Honolulu newspaper ten thousand miles away from their homeland? Let’s figure this out so we can keep history from repeating itself in 2057.

Get away to a national park for free next week

No entrance fee next week for Historic Jamestowne, the Yorktown Battlefield, and the Cape Henry area in Virginia Beach.

Woman sets fire inside Walmart

An unnamed woman was captured last night setting fire to an entire rack of electronic items at a Virginia Beach Walmart. She fled before anyone could apprehend her, which leaves the Pilot powerless to do anything but announce that “If you recognize the woman in the surveillance video posted to the left of this story, you’re urged to call Crime Line at 1-888-LOCK-U-UP.”

The folks who run the Crime Line seem to think our dignity isn’t harmed by our having to peck out numbers that correspond with LOCK-U-UP. These “folks” turn out to be Virginia Beach Crime Solvers, who “encourage members of the community to assist … by overcoming the two key elements that inhibit community involvement: fear and apathy.” Now I don’t want to pick a fight with anyone who’s reading these words, but if you’re reading these words, Virginia Beach Crime Solvers just called you cowardly and lazy. Their sponsors include Budweiser, Avis, and the Golden Corral. If you’re feeling especially cowardly and lazy, rent an Avis, drive to the Golden Corral, drink a lot of Budweiser, and see what happens next.

What’s Obama doing to your taxes?

Taxes are at their lowest in sixty years thanks to Barack Obama’s policies. I realize people will think I support this development just because I’m linking to it, and I don’t, but I want to say that the story referenced here is factual. Taxes for the poorest ninety-eight percent of Americans (i.e. about 294,000,000 people) have gone down since January 2009. If you believe in reality, this is inarguable.

Leo: Your April Horoscope

It’s been over fourteen days since Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has lobbed any public hand grenades at the gay community. To assume he has shed his extreme bigotry like a snakeskin would be naïve; I therefore present you with his detailed April horoscope from Astrologyzone.com, so that we can see ahead of time what’s really going on in his mind. Here we learn that “Any decision [Cuccinelli] will make during the phase of April 18 to May 1 is bound to be ‘off’ and one [he] could easily regret later.” That sounds ominous. I doubt I need to say what I predict will happen during this period. I advise gays to maybe go on a cruise during the two weeks between April 18 and May 1. In the meantime, Ken, “The buzz about you is building! Next month even more will be said about you – all of it very positive.” Your star is rising. All over the world you’re famous, and folks you’ll never even meet have been speaking your name. Not only that, Mars in Leo is making you VERY attractive all month. You’re hot! It’s time to mix and mingle! Your best romantic dates are April 3, 12, 13, 17-18, 21, 22, and especially the last week, April 25-30, with April 30 being the very best.