MISS: Holocaust Hijinks
KSL Newsradio’s Nightside Project debuted a few weeks ago as a five-hour nightly block of refreshingly “edgy” news and snide commentary. Even more refreshing is that it’s coming from the LDS Church-owned station. But just when does edgy cut too close to the “final solution”? When a reporter signs off a segment about a restaurant in India called Hitler’s Cross with this: “I wouldn’t use the soap there.” Morbidly funny, yes, but pretty cheeky considering the parent company’s record of baptizing Jewish Holocaust victims.
HIT: HUD Suckers
Trailing Louisiana Gov. Kathleen Blanco and New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin onto the lectern at a Gulf Coast Reconstruction and Hurricane Preparedness Summit Monday, Housing and Urban Development Assistant Deputy Secretary Rene Oswin laid out a momentous public-housing policy shift for New Orleans. Rather than demolish 5,000 livable public housing units as planned, the federal agency has decided to preserve the units for displaced hurricane victims, Oswin announced. He added that Wal-Mart has agreed to decommission retail outlets in the city’s impoverished areas, and will nurture local businesses in their stead. Exxon and Shell will fork over $8.6 billion from their record profits toward the rebuilding of coastal wetlands, Oswin continued. Only thing is, Oswin is really Andy Bichlbaum, an imposter with the Yes Men, a group of anti-corporate activists. A HUD spokeswoman called the hoax “sick.” But, as one advocate for the reopening of public housing in New Orleans told CNN, “Right now, a lie is better than the truth.”
MISS: Ay Cabela!
Cabela’s, the sporting goods behemoth off Interstate 15 in Lehi, has reportedly surpassed Temple Square as Utah’s No. 1 destination, according to a KCPW radio report, though a Salt Lake Tribune report still puts Cabela’s slightly behind the Mormon Mecca. Anyhow, the average Cabela’s visitor—5 million over the past year—travels 100 miles to visit Cabela’s, KCPW reported. Cabela’s outdraws runners up like Zion National Park and the Salt Lake City Main Library because of its better-than-the-real-thing attractions. The centerpiece is Conservation Mountain, an indoor habitat populated with the stuffed carcasses of once-glorious beasts. Yeah, right next to a display of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse.
