Do People in DC Know House of Cards Is a TV Show?

Gabrielle Bluestone · 05/01/16 12:04PM

After a weekend of people yelling, “Oh my god it’s Doug Stamper,” Michael Kelly, an actor on a TV show about a fake president, finally asked a group clamoring to take selfies with him at the Thomson/Reuters White House Correspondents Dinner pre-party if any of them knew his real name. One man, after checking his phone—probably for something unrelated—said yes.

Melissa Cronin · 05/01/16 11:58AM

“When you use the phrase ‘I feel like,’ it gives you an out. You’re not stating a fact so much as giving an opinion,” Williams College senior Natasha Pangarkar told The New York Times for a piece on that linguistic curse-hedge, “I feel like.” I feel like 1,400 words is a lot to spend on the phrase, “I feel like.”

Melissa Cronin · 04/30/16 09:28AM

“Manly health! Is there not a kind of charm — a fascinating magic in the words?” wrote Walt Whitman, in an newly-recovered, 47,000-word journalistic ode to “Manly Health and Training,” which is now being published online after 150 years in obscurity. Walt Whitman, the original meninist.

There Is No Smart Bush

Jordan Sargent · 04/29/16 10:03PM

Tonight in the first round of the NBA playoffs, the Miami Heat’s Dwyane Wade made several remarkable shots to force a Game 7 against the Charlotte Hornets. Jeb Bush, who has nothing better to do than tweet about basketball like the rest of us, celebrated the heroic performance by mangling the spelling of Wade’s first name in the exact way a small child might.

Blog Drama: Anonymous Zero Hedge Writers Exposed As Traffic-Hungry Capitalists

J.K. Trotter · 04/29/16 02:50PM

The popular Wall Street blog Zero Hedge, whose motto is a quote from Fight Club and whose editorial output is entertainingly prone to populist conspiracy theorizing, is unique among financial news outlets in that its contributors publish under a single alias, “Tyler Durden,” the name of one of Fight Club’s main characters. The real world identities behind the blog have inspired speculation for years, but today Bloomberg News seems to have finally nailed them down:

I Can't "Deal" With This

Kelly Stout · 04/29/16 02:24PM

On Tuesday night, Donald Trump said, of Hillary Clinton, “The only thing she’s got going for her is the woman’s card, and the beautiful thing is, women don’t like her.”

Orange You Glad Glenn Beck Coated Himself in Cheeto Dust

Andy Cush · 04/29/16 01:34PM

Sitting in a harshly lit anteroom, you watch a doomsday prophet don a pair of dark goggles. He leads three sycophants in some vulgar ceremony, dipping his face into a vessel of synthetic orange powder and instructing the servants to do the same. Is that Cheeto dust? You pinch yourself and flail, desperate to wake up, but this is no nightmare. This is yesterday’s episode of The Glenn Beck Program, hosted by Glenn Beck.

Russian Robber Ring Targets Gay Men Online Because They Can't Go to the Cops

Marina Galperina · 04/29/16 12:35PM

This week, Latvian-based website Meduza reported on a string of violent robberies and blackmail schemes in St. Petersburg targeting gay men who use dating sites and hookup apps. Gay victims of crimes rarely go to the Russian police for fear of being outed or humiliated, and according to the report, this allows the culprits continue to act with impunity.