“It seems like folks these days would rather look at a bloody car accident or a nauseating crime scene than a glorious sunset or a pretty English garden. Shock value used to be what the talentless with low budgets resorted to, like in terrible William Castle movies or those tabloids in grocery stores. You know ‘Oh darling what a lovely evening gown! It just cries out to be photographed on a homeless man buried under garbage in a yucky dumpster.’ But I’m not sure I understand anything about fashion anymore. You know, the piss stains in your Levi’s crotch, or how many rips, and how worn and faded, are now price points!”
–An interview with the awesome photographer James Bidgood.

Coincidence? Irony? Revenge? One more depressing sign that we are bound and determined to destroy the planet? (My money’s on the last one, but you can make a case for any of them.) Anyway, in a story that seems all to familiar (although on a much smaller scale, befitting a much smaller nation), an oil spill is ruining beaches and threatening wildlife in the south of England.

Around 20 barrels of vacuum gas oil escaped from Esso’s Fawley terminal on Sunday, causing a slick that has washed up on two miles of beaches in Southampton Water and The Solent.

There were fears the Hill Head nature reserve could be affected and specialist teams in protective suits were bagging up contaminated shingle at beaches where the spill has washed up.

There is, however, a silver lining for the angry residents of Knifecrime Island.

A spokesman for Esso, whose parent company, ExxonMobile, is American, said yesterday ‘all efforts’ were continuing to clear up the spill.

You can see where this is going. The commenters at the Daily Mail’s site are almost gleeful about the fact that, after weeks of supposed “anti-British rhetoric,” they finally have something they can throw back in America’s face. Which is pretty perfect: We’re all standing around while the shit on our shores laps at our ankles and wondering how to blame someone else. We probably deserve whatever we get.

[Image]

Okay, ladies. Which three of you fucked-up chicks is allegedly sending marriage proposals to The Van Der Sloot, who is behind bars in Peru, after having confessed and unconfessed and reconfessed or something to the murder of Natalee Holloway (and Stephany Tatiana Flores Ramírez!) and is also not that cute? You need to get some counseling, stat.

It’s rough. I mean: “’Who’s he going to dinner with?’ I ask one of his aides. ‘Some French minister,’ the aide tells me. ‘It’s fucking gay.’” Update: We hear Rolling Stone will actually put this up later today; meanwhile lots of people are hosting PDFs, which is not really ethically fair but, well, the Internet! Here we are. Update update! And it’s up!

Attention New York City smokers: You have 8 days left to purchase cigarettes at the what-will-soon-seem-reasonable price of $10. Starting July 1 the state is adding another buck sixty a pack in taxes, which, you know, HOLY SHIT IF ANYTHING IS GOING TO TURN ME INTO A RAVING TEA PARTY LOON IT WILL BE THIS. Seriously, this is going to be a pretty excellent test of “how stupid am I?” If I’m actually pulling out twelve dollars-because you know that’s what it’s going to get rounded up to-for twenty Marlboro Reds (sixty cents a cigarette, if you’re scoring at home; good luck trying to bum an “extra” smoke from anyone ever again) I need to take a long, hard look at my life choices and reconsider my options. You know, the more I think about it, the more I’m sure I’m going to quit (buying cigarettes in New York State). Anyone know how much the PATH costs these days?

Once again, we’re having that magical moment where the world-from the President on down-is up in arms over a scandalous piece of magazine writing that pretty much no one can read. Rolling Stone’s profile of General McChrystal, the top man in Afghanistan, is now big-Drudge-banner, front-page Times news. But the magazine isn’t on stands yet and most likely it won’t be on the website for weeks, as is the top-down military strategy of RS owner Jann Wenner. (This was the bizarre situation we found ourselves in a couple years ago, when the magazine published the world’s most compelling story of Britney Spears’ meltdown.) [UPDATE Bad news! The McChrystal profile that was being hosted as a PDF by Politico has now been taken down, after much yelling by Rolling Stone publicists. Here’s a small, fair-use excerpt.] Oh, and the content? “The amazing thing about it is there’s no complaints from McChrystal or his staff about the administration on any substantive ground,” reports Spencer Ackerman. It’s just a bunch of boys being petty-though he predicts the General will be scolded but not fired. So, two strategies aren’t working: McCrhystal’s press strategy and Rolling Stone’s web strategy. Over at RS, according to outside traffic measures, pageviews are way up-but unique visitors are way down over the course of the year. Lots of photogalleries, you know. UPDATE: Annnnd it’s finally online! Mazel tov to the web people at Rolling Stone.

This already amazing interview with James Murphy of LCD Soundsystem is made inexplicably more awesome by the following bracketed description: “[mimes being on the Internet].” Total winner.

by Lindsay Robertson

34. Tropic Thunder
33. Magnolia
32. The Last Samurai
31. Far and Away
30. Taps
29. Born on the Fourth of July
28. Mission Impossible 3
27. Endless Love
26. All the Right Moves
25. Legend
24. Losin’ It
23. Lions for Lambs
22. Valkrie
21. Jerry Maguire
20. Mission Impossible 2
19. War of the Worlds
18. The Outsiders
17. Knight and Day
16. Austin Powers in Goldmember
15. Collateral
14. Rain Man
13. Young Guns
12. Minority Report
11. Eyes Wide Shut
10. Mission Impossible
9. The Color of Money
8. Interview with the Vampire
7. Days of Thunder
6. Cocktail
5. Risky Business
4. Vanilla Sky
3. A Few Good Men
2. Top Gun
1. The Firm

…WHILE WEARING AN ASCOT. I enjoyed the part where he calls the gay sex “filthy.” You know how you can’t tell if something’s a parody? Yes: this is it.

“When the Karate Kid and his Mom arrive at the airport, their lady driver is holding a sign for ‘Mrs. Packer.’ Mom corrects the lady driver, telling her the name’s ‘Parker.’ Ah, Engrish!”
-The Internet is affirming my refusal to see ‘The Karate Kid’ remake.