If you missed it Sunday, the Audi Super Bowl ad is on Youtube, and it’s a hoot. The ad promotes the Audi A3 TDI clean diesel. The main selling point, surprisingly, is not that this car, which won a “Green Car of the Year” award, is good for the planet, but that if you drive it, you won’t be hassled, bullied, and jailed by the “green police.”

The ad tries to work both sides of the street. It attempts to appeal to those who believe SUVs are destroying the planet – and those who resent eco-elitists and busybodies telling them how to live.

The hilarious South Park episode, “Smug Alert” (Season 1o), frames the issue with which the Audi ad execs seem to be wrestling.

In the episode, clouds of smug from ”Toyonda Pius” sales in South Park, George…

Two students at James Madison University in Virginia were charged with felonies for throwing snowballs at a snowplow and an unmarked police car. This is illegal in Harrisonburg, Virginia.

Talk about an over-reaction. Arrested and jailed. For throwing snowballs.

While being a jerk isn’t a crime, there is some safety risk when moving…

Judges in California continue to surprise observers nationwide by repeatedly making rational decisions. At least, rational decisions about the adult film industry in the state. Over the last three months, Los Angeles County judges repeated denied petitions to force porn production companies to use condoms in all of their films.

As I…

Sen. Richard Shelby, who placed holds on over 70 of President Obama’s nominees, has lifted all but three of them. Politico reports:

A spokesman for the senator said Monday that with attention brought to these two concerns, the political maneuver had “accomplished” its goal and was no longer necessary.

Translation: “We were getting…

Few people outside of the DC area are likely to notice, but the recent snowstorm shut down the federal government today. Another big snow is on the way, so the feds are also taking tomorrow off.

The Washington Post reports:

Official estimate [sic] that closing the federal government for a day due…

So the proposed Comcast/NBC merger was met with “skepticism” by Washington politicians. Will Comcast charge for content that was once free? will it ensure that emergency programming gets through? These services and decisions about them are normal offerings that a concerned public expects; a merged entity ignores them at its peril.

The two firms’ CEOs respectively made assurances to lawmakers like 18-term term Chairman Henry Waxman. (Speaking of the lack of choice, this gentleman’s own constitents get to vote for him, but none of the rest of us have any say whatsoever–decade after decade–even though his laws impact us all).

But those assurances about programming aren’t what politicians care about, not really. This proceeding serves to help re-energize the old…