There are multiple cases against America's international program of drone assassinations. There is the humanitarian case: the program has killed hundreds of innocent civilians, due to either bad intelligence or a simple lack of caring on the part of US officials. And, for the more heartless... er, hard-nosed pragmatists, there is the diplomatic case: the US is reportedly operating drones in Pakistan with only the flimsiest level of permission.

How can you tell when a presidential campaign is not going so well? A lot of ways, actually, but one way is to listen to the candidate for vice president's pet names for his presidential running mate. If one of those sobriquets is a word normally reserved to describe death, filth, and feces, chances are that you are looking at a rather unsuccessful presidential campaign.

A low-cost airline based out of Southeast Asia has announced plans to introduce specially designated "quiet zones" that will be made available exclusively "for guests age 12 and above."

His magisterial highness the beloved democratic leader KIM JONG-UN today happily ruled over the smiling people's kingdom of the DEMOCRATIC PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF KOREA, where great tributes and praise for the beloved memory of the late heroic kindly leader of the people in perpetuity KIM JONG-IL, father of beloved current leader of the happily satisfied people and animals alike KIM JONG-UN, are routinely the order of the day. In what way was the memory of the highest imperial democratic inspiration KIM JONG-IL praised today, by the industrious citizens of the world, according to the DPRK's official news agency?

On January 23, 2009, shortly after President Obama took office, the U.S. military blew up two houses in Waziristan with missiles fired by drones. These were the first of nearly 300 drone strikes in Pakistan the Obama administration has carried out. Here is what it was like from the other side.

Chevy Chase is an asshole: this is nothing new.

Notable gasbag Newt Gingrich is still making noise, most recently in support of Missouri Senate candidate Todd "legitimate rape" Akin.

Have you ever thought it might be cool to hang out with J. K. Rowling? Because the Harry Potter books shaped your childhood, or your children's childhood, or your parents' childhood (future babies), or because you love hanging out with millionaires, or because you have a fetish for older, soft-spoken white women with a touch of sadness about the eyes?

Not one to let Fiona Apple's a bizarre, rambling statement concerning her recent arrest at a Texas border checkpoint for hash and marijuana possession go unretorted, the Hudspeth County Sheriff's Department Public Information Officer has released his own bizarre, rambling statement, calling Apple out for promising to make him and other department members "fucking famous any time you ask."

Brand new Atlantic Media business publication Quartz has a post up today about the boom in Brazilian cocaine use. Apparently, in the midst of its march toward becoming one of the world's wealthiest nations, Brazil is now also one of the largest consumers of cocaine, snorting 18 percent of the global supply, according to the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. But while we're proud of the Brazilians, America, once again, is the real victor here, with citizens who inhale nearly 37 percent of all the cocaine in the world. One and a half percent of Americans do cocaine, and the average intake per user is 42 grams a year. USA! USA! USA!

Allow us, please, if you will, to direct your attention to this paper on the topic of Can You Believe How Much Motherfucking Money These CEOs Make, And, Even Worse, How They Try to Justify That Shit As If It's All Good. As noted in Gretchen Morgenson's column yesterday, CEOs and the cronies that justify their salaries are, in most cases, full of shit.

Australia's Qantas airline and its cargo handling company Australian Air Express are still unsure how a crocodile managed to escape its cage and wander around the cargo hold of a recent flight from Brisbane to Melbourne.

Does president Obama have a 19-year-old son? Most people would guess, correctly, that no, the most powerful and famous man on the planet does not have an adult son whom you've never seen, and any articles about it are clearly satire. Not Floridians, though. No — Floridians want to know if the Onion article they've been forwarded is real.

Lawyers employed by Kanye West sent out a cease and desist letter yesterday to a number of media outlets effectively confirming the existence of a sex tape featuring their client.

It's been a while since we talked about Ann Romney's Olympics (loser) horse Rafalca, but the noble beast has reentered the political conversation.

Class act Patricia Krentcil — better known as "Tan Mom," because have you seen her? — is looking a lot less like a raisin these days.

By most accounts, Republican candidate Mitt Romney had a very bad week. But that's not how Republican National Committee chairman Reince Priebus sees it.

In another slow box office weekend, Gyllenhaal's End of Watch and Lawrence's House at the End of the Street each brought in $13 million, which means we'll have to wait another full day for the official results of what Box Office Mojo calls "one of the tightest races ever for first place at the box office." How exciting for everyone.

Last Wednesday, Anderson Cooper used parts of deceased Libyan Ambassador Christopher Stevens' diary as a tip for a story on "Anderson Cooper 360." During an interview with John McCain, Cooper said "a source familiar with Ambassador Stevens' thinking told us that in the months before his death he talked about being worried about the never-ending security threats that he was facing in Benghazi and specifically about the rise in Islamic extremism and growing al Qaeda presence." That source, apparently, was Stevens' journal, which CNN discovered amongst the rubble in the U.S. Consulate three days after the attack that killed Stevens.

Remember Rick Perry's presidential campaign? Me neither. But at one time the Texas Governor was the GOP frontrunner. Then, through a combination of gaffe-laden debates and behind-the-scenes disorganization, his campaign imploded. James Carville went so far as to call it "the worst presidential campaign/candidate in American history." In an except from his new book, Texas Tribune reporter Jay Root, who spent months following the Perry campaign, gives an explanation for Perry's cringe-worthy debate performances and general campaign mismanagement: he was just very sleepy.