WHACK WEDNESDAY

Kaput: Michelle Bachmann Won’t Run, Nike Dumps Livestrong & Miley & Liam Are Cooked

By Miz J

FACING AN ETHICS PROBE INTO HER EPIC FAIL OF A 2012 Presidential campaign, Michelle “Batshit” Bachmann says she won’t seek reelection to the U.S. House.

PROM KING

Obama Looks Superfly In His High School Prom Photo

By Elizabeth C.

SLOW CLAP FOR JAY CARNEY AND HIS TIME BRETHEN FOR PULLING THIS TRICK OUT OF THEIR HATS ON BEHALF OF the prez: Just when Obama needed a swift kick back to likability now comes release of his 1979 prom photo in which he’s looks superfly.

Obtained “exclusively” by Time, his press secretary’s former employer, the photo shows the Prez tricked out in white jacket, blue tie and shirt, and a short afro. His biggest accessory is his disarming smile. He’s accompanied by best Punahou School bro Greg Orme and his date Kelli Allman (née McCormack), as well as his own date, Megan Hughes, then a student at the Hawaii School for Girls at La Pietra, Time reports.

SLIDING FURTHER DOWN THE SLOPE

DOJ’s Seizure Of AP Phone Records Obama’s Latest Retrenchment of Constitutional Rights

By Elizabeth C.

THE PRESIDENT OF THE ASSOCIATED PRESS IS BLASTING Obama’s Justice Department for its “massive and unprecedented” violation of the wire news service constitutional rights, days after learning that the government had acquired data for about 20 phone lines associated with the agency.

The AP was informed by the DOJ Friday that investigators had accumulated “two months of telephone records — incoming number, outgoing number, and call duration,” according to The Atlantic Weekly. The DOJ is believed to have performed the fishing expedition in an attempt to find out who tipped the news service to a foiled Al-Qaeda bomb plot.

Under Obama, the Department of Justice has waged an unprecedented war against whistleblowers leaking government secrets.

YOU ARE BEING WATCHED

Former FBI Agent: ‘Every Digital Conversation Is Recorded’

WHEN COMMENTATORS POINT OUT THAT AMERICA’S surveillance state exceeds anything that ever existed in Cold War Russia, invariably there’s a chorus of voices asking, “But if I’m not doing anything wrong, why do I care?”

It’s a fair question — just as long as you don’t mind government spies reliving your phone sex, listening in on planning to cop that nickel bag of dope, or drawing conclusions about your rant against the local cable provider.

If you don’t care or don’t understand the concept of privacy, then it won’t matter that every web site you access, every comment you leave on a chat board, is archived.

EARLY WARNING ALARM

Sen. Ron Paul: Militarized Police ‘More Frightening’ Than Boston Bombers

By Elizabeth C.

FORMER PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE RON PAUL says the “unprecedented” militarized manhunt for the Boston Marathon bombers is more terrifying than the pressure-cooker bombing.

“The Boston bombing provided the opportunity for the government to turn what should have been a police investigation into a military-style occupation of an American city,” the Libertarian-leaning Republican said on the Lew Rockwell website, which touts itself as the online news source for itself as conservatives and Tea Partiers. “This unprecedented move should frighten us as much or more than the attack itself.”

Nineteen-year-old Dzhokhar Tsarnaev is charged with using and conspiring to use a weapon of mass destruction for allegedly planting a bomb that killed three and injured hundreds during Boston’s Patriot’s Day holiday. His 26-year-old brother Tamerlan Tsarnaev died during a confrontation with police four days later.

A LIFELINE?

Icelandic High Court Orders Visa To Resume Payments To WikiLeaks

By Elizabeth C.

IN A VICTORY FOR WIKILEAKS, Iceland’s Supreme Court has upheld a lower court ruling that the Visa contractor illegally halted payments to Julian Assange’s independent news organization.

The court ruled that Valitor must resume processing payments on behalf of WikiLeaks within 15 days or else face a fine of $6,830 per day.

Wikileaks hails the court victory as an “important milestone” in its battle against the West’s economic blockade. In December 2010, the organization’s economic lifeline was cut after it released a trove of diplomatic cables providing an unprecedented glimpse into U.S.’s diplomatic relationships around the world.

The U.S. Justice Department launched a criminal investigation of the records dump, which reportedly included a secret grand jury and indictment of Assange.

“This is a victory for free speech,” Assange said in a statement about the ruling. “This is a victory against the rise of economic censorship to crack down against journalists and publishers”

‘JUST WANTS TO BE LOVED’

Dennis Rodman’s Secret Weapons Against North Korea: ‘Peace & Love’

By Elizabeth C.

IF BUZZ BISSINGER WERE WRITING FROM HIS SELF-IMPOSED EXILE as he battles his appetites for sex and expensive leather, no doubt he’d approve of Dennis Rodman’s latest gonzo foray into international diplomacy.

Nearly two months after the former Chicago Bulls and Celebrity Apprentice star returned from what Bissinger labeled a “mondo bizarro” trip to North Korea, Rodman’s announced that he’ll vacation with Kim Jung-Un in August.

“He just wants to be loved,” Rodman said of Jung-Un at a Miami charity gala April 13. “He just wants to sit down and talk. That’s all.”

WORLD’S UNDER NEW MANAGEMENT

Hova Huffs & Puffs, Shouts Out Chief Keef, In ‘Open Letter’ Diss

By Elizabeth C.

OOOH, WATCH OUT BOYS AND GIRLS, JAY-Z’S HAVING A HISSY FIT.

The alpha man ain’t takin’ too kindly to criticism about his five-year anniversary trip to Cuba — a country from which most Americans are embargoed for travel. He takes on his scolds in the track Open Letter released on his website, Life+Times.

But this time, Z’s typical swagger comes off as someone whose feet have long left the ground and is ready for a crash landing. “We almost once started a revolution. You know whenever I’m threatened I start shootin.'”

DOES IT COMPUTE?

Aliens, Bigfoot, Lizard People & Crack: Conspiracy Theory Believers By The Numbers

By Elizabeth C.

WHEN THE RESULTS OF PRESIDENT OBAMA’S JUST-ANNOUNCED BRAIN RESEARCH ARE IN, WE’RE pretty sure one finding will be that humans are hardwired for conspiracy.

Case in point: Public Policy Polling queried 1,247 registered American voters from March 27th to 30th on some of pop culture’s more common conspiracy theories. Fourteen percent of us swear by Big Foot. Four percent of us believe that “lizard people” control our society. (Semantics?) And 14 percent believe that the CIA created the crack cocaine scourge that devastated America’s cities in the 1980s.

The poll found some consensus among the conspiracy-minded: A full 51 percent of us believe John F. Kennedy’s assassination was the work of more than one man.

THE END OF THE WORLD AS WE KNOW IT

David Stockman Will Convince You America Is Doomed (Thanks Politicians!)

By Elizabeth C.

WE’RE INTERRUPTING THE FUN AND GAMES TO POINT OUT THAT Americans are doomed to suffer an inexorably painful crawl into decline.

Exhibit No. A: Former Reagan aide David A. Stockman’s deconstruction of the nation’s impending financial doomsday in an unblinking OpEd piece published in Sunday’s The New York Times.