A new study of elections over the past 25 years shows that "the South was the least hospitable place for female congressional candidates." And the most hospitable place for calling losing female congressional candidates "ma'am."

Yesterday, a giant, still under-construction apartment complex in Houston caught on fire. The flames spread quickly, and one unlucky construction worker found himself trapped on a balcony off the building's top floor. A worker at a neighboring office captured his daring escape—he was forced to leap from one floor's balcony to another to escape the heat—before firefighters finally arrived.

Malaysian officials announced on Wednesday that French satellites have captured images of at least 122 "potential objects" from Flight 370 in the southern Indian Ocean. The possible debris, spotted over 154 square miles, ranges in length from three to 72 feet.

A volunteer at an Everglades animal rescue center was just trying to get underwater footage of a croc called Big Boy when his camera became lunch.

Three Secret Service agents on President Obama's Amsterdam trip were sent home after they partied so hard Saturday that one agent ended up passed out drunk in a hotel hallway.

Since I started writing here, most of the questions I've gotten are about the cost of my treatment. I understand people's curiosity; the debate over the price of American health care has essentially hijacked American domestic politics since the passage of the Affordable Care Act.

Two CNN producers were arrested today after trying—and failing miserably—to break into the World Trade Center site for a story about people who were actually able to break in.

[A search and rescue worker paddles through the aftermath of Washington's fatal mudslide looking for survivors. The wet, mile-wide landslide wiped out homes and roads, killing at least 14 people in the process. More than 100 people are still listed as missing. Photo by Elaine Thompson via AP.]

A Florida man hoping for a leisurely day of fishing in his kayak got the ride of his life on Sunday when he accidentally hooked an eleven-foot hammerhead shark.

Soon, we won't even have a virtual reality without Facebook. The ubiquitous social networking/advertising firm just announced it's buying Oculus VR, maker of the much-hyped virtual reality platform Oculus Rift, for $2 billion.

The Office Time Machine, a year-and-a-half labor of love by Joe Sabia, collects every reference in The Office, sorts them by year, and puts them all into video supercuts. This level of obsessive detail has to be seen to be believed.

"The truck's load of corndogs spilled all over the roadway" is a sentence that actually appeared in news reports today, thanks to a driver who flipped his semi truck near Shreveport, La. early this morning.

We're extremely pleased to announce the hiring of a new Gawker columnist, a dog, who will maintain a blog at dog.gawker.com. Please enjoy a dog's first column, "Hey."

A girl, 9, shaves her head in solidarity with a friend who's in chemo, and she gets suspended from school. Another girl, 8, wears t-shirts, jeans and sneakers, and she gets suspended, too. Their institutions have different reasons, but the result is the same: bullshit expectations put on little girls.

You know who still smokes a lot of cigarettes? Poor people. While yuppies are quitting and taking up Pilates and Zumba, the poors just keep puffing away. It's sad. Policy makers are vexed. What other, healthier habits could the very poor pick up?

Sweden. It's all fucking Sweden's fault.

Shep Smith has a photo of me on his phone.

Pro tip: If you want to keep a Hispanic billionaire as the top fundraiser of your embattled Republican gubernatorial re-election campaign in heavily Hispanic Florida, try to keep your gringo staffers from cracking jokes in fake Mexican accents on a ride to Chipotle.

When Kanye West runs out to pick up some Burger King for Kim Kardashian, he does it big. The rapper is reportedly planning to buy his fiancée a 10-piece order of European Burger King franchises to celebrate their wedding.

The dreams of those agorist Bitcoiners who still hoped that their digital currency could evade the taxman are finally dead. The IRS hath spoken. They will treat Bitcoins as property, which means self-employment and capital gains taxes may apply to your stash. Call an accountant for further details, folks.