Johnny Salazar was arrested in Arizona yesterday after he burned his 5-year-old son's hand and wrist with a lighter thinking he was possessed. Of course he did this because he was on America's favorite gonzo drug, bath salts. When will people cut the bath salts out, already?

Few rituals these past couple of years have been more fruitless and illogical than pretending that Barack Obama will pick a new vice presidential candidate for 2012, rested on the notion that such a move would in any way be helpful. Is Joe Biden, in any meaningful sense, a political liability for Barack Obama? Would the switch from one centrist Democrat to another really trick the broad middle of America's electorate into forgetting about our shitty economy?

That cute one you've had your eye on in the subway? She/he totally might have chatted you up, if you'd been reading a real book instead of a goddamned Kindle.

Well-known American artist Edwin Parker "Cy" Twombly, Jr., best known for his large-scale abstract paintings that often looked like scribbles, has died. He was 83.

Within hours of each other, two students died in Ithaca's infamous gorges on Saturday. One student was visiting; the other was a Cornell junior. Both deaths are thought to be accidental.

In your tropical Tuesday media column: phone hacking was nobody's fault, the NYT is selling the Declaration of Independence, Graydon Carter's expensive diet, a legendary rock critic dies, and The Weather Channel's office will kill you.

Today is the first day that gay New Yorkers can apply for a marriage license. Congrats! Too bad the City Clerk's online form for a marriage license still insists on a "bride" and "groom." Um, how is that supposed to work?

Tim Pawlenty, the presidential candidate who tries too hard and ends up making people care even less, has heard in the news that some of his conservative brethren would fancy a government shutdown or two. I can do that! Tim Pawlenty announces in his latest Iowa ad. You want shutdowns? When he was governor of Minnesota, he shut down the government — twice! So vote for Tim Pawlenty, the Government Shutdown Candidate. His federal government will barely even be open, that's how shutdowny he'll make it.

The verdict is in. After a tabloid-monopolizing murder trial, Casey Anthony has been found "not guilty" of killing daughter Caylee in 2008, which is odd, because the trial-by-press was pretty unanimous about her guilt.

Comedy Central announced that it will air a roast of trainwreck Charlie Sheen in September. This is a really dumb idea. Does anyone care about him at all anymore?

If the world is changing forever on 7/8 (newsflash), you may as well spend the night of 7/7 with a free drink in your hand and a free amuse-bouche in your bouche on a sick downtown NYC rooftop in the presence of an ice sculpture and people dressed as they want to be dressed for the rest of time in order to toast Miracle Day. That's what we're going to be doing, anyway.

The most popular user on Google's new social network is the CEO of Facebook, who has 50 percent more followers than the CEO of Google. It's geek humiliation!

A new branch of Duane Reade, the New York City-based drugstore owned by Walgreens, is opening on Wall Street and it is the largest Duane Reade ever built. Thrillingly, its massive size (22,000 square-feet) is matched in elegance and amenities.

Everyone who came of age in the post-cell phone era had a friend whose parents called them every five minutes to "check in" and/or yell at them about cleaning their room. Stop doing that, parents: You're hurting your relationship with your kid.

This past weekend, the New York Post branded the maid who accused Dominique Strauss-Kahn of rape "A HOOKER," based on a single anonymous source, who said it was so. Now, she is suing them for libel. Makes sense.

Presidential pizza man candidate Herman Cain has been having a mini-crisis amid his staffers — nowhere near the calamitous hilarity that's befallen Newt Gingrich, but bad enough for a couple of staffers in important states to quit their posts. What gives? Is the seat padding aboard the Cain Train a bit rough on the buttocks? For now, let's just blame the gays.

Film school is the journalism school of people who can't write. It's a place where kids with vague dreams of "making projects" go to chill out for a few years and learn that you should never call a "film" a "movie." Then they come out and get a shitty job for little money that pays them purely in proximity to power.

As if it weren't enough to ruin driving, drunks have now ruined puppies. DNAInfo reports on the West Village's drunk puppy buying epidemic:

Conservative columnist David Brooks, the New York Times' chief over-the-counter muscle relaxant and civility enforcer, is finally getting upset with his political party as it prepares to plunge the nation into debt default for no real reason. Are you sure you want to do this, David? It's only a "D" credit rating that's looming on the horizon, after all.

A South Korean grocery chain has launched "virtual grocery stores" which let customers buy groceries simply by scanning a code on a poster in the subway. Because what could be a more appetizing place to purchase food than the subway?