Why would Rudy Giuliani associate and indicted dealmaker Lev Parnas name his company “Fraud Guarantee”?

Is there a worse name for a company with the stated mission of helping “reduce the risk of fraud”?

Well, Parnas apparently had a reason for the unusual name: Google search results.

When Parnas and Fraud Guarantee co-founder David Correia set up the company, Parnas picked the name so that people Googling the words “Parnas” and “Fraud” would see something positive — Parnas’ business — rather than his long history of legal trouble.

Did you know that "HTML" is a Latin word? It's the translation of the English word "CSS".

Jeopardy Season 16 Premiere, Contestant Intros.

Rolling Stone gives its standard list of the "greatest" 100 rock, blues and country musicians a gentle shuffle and calls the result the "100 Greatest Singers of All Time".

Garfunkel but not Simon, on a list that includes Lou Reed, Iggy Pop and Kurt Cobain? Bono above Joni Mitchell?

I think they make these lists just to piss me off.

Why "product Of USA" shiitakes probably aren't.

[Shiitake mushroom-growing] Logs in China are made of Chinese sawdust and grain, inoculated with Chinese spawn, and loaded onto container vessels for a six- to eight-week trans-Pacific voyage. When the logs arrive in the U.S., they’re distributed across the country. Many of them end up in Kennett Square mushroom grow houses.

“In a week to 10 days, the mushrooms are picked and the logs get thrown away,” said Caputo, who called the mushrooms grown on Chinese logs “inferior.”

Because these mushrooms are harvested in the United States, they meet the USDA’s country-of-origin labeling requirement.

“They’re clearly not U.S. grown,” said Daniel J. Royse, professor emeritus at Penn State who specializes in mushrooms. “The regulations don’t make much sense to me. But the USDA says they’re OK because they’re classified as spawn. The logs actually are colonized substrate, they shouldn’t be allowed. The growers should get together to demand the USDA reevaluate the criteria."

Oh those wily exotic southerners.

Recently, while visiting me in Brooklyn, my mom’s eyes went twinkly as she noticed all the wild pokeweed growing around the neighborhood. A woolgathering reminiscence of her childhood in Texas spilled forth: cooking and eating the onion-infused greens straight from the pan; her stoic anticipation as her mother added vinegar to the last dregs of poke-broth, knocking it back like a shot of whiskey.

She was surprised to find that my New England–bred boyfriend had never heard of the poisonous, towering perennial weed, with its oblong leaves and magenta berries and stalks. Despite the fact that the kudzu-like Phytolacca americana sprouts up all across North America, poke sallet, a dish made from the plant’s slightly-less-toxic leaves, is a regional thing, popular only to Appalachia and the American South. The leaves must be boiled in water three times to cook out their toxins, and, as aficionados will tell you, it’s well worth the extra effort.

Been in NC 23 years. I've never once been served pokeweed. I've never seen pokeweed on a menu. I've never heard of anyone's NC-native granny making pokeweed. I have mowed down many pokeweed plants, though.

Mitch McConnell is gravely concerned about the US withdraw from Syria.

Somehow, he manages to work in three mentions of Obama, two mentions of Democrats, and zero mentions of the guy who is actually responsible for this mess.

I wonder why he'd do something like that?

I bet it's the same reason Senator Burr (R, NC) coughed up this one, on his Facebook page:

The Kurdish members of the Syrian Democratic Forces have been brave and stalwart partners in the fight against ISIS, and we should never abandon those who have fought beside us. ISIS may be debilitated and its territory dismantled, but the threat is not yet destroyed. Turkey’s actions will only empower our common enemy, further destabilizing the region and undermining hard-won gains. President Erdogan should cease his assault and withdraw Turkish troops from northern Syria immediately.

So weird that shit like this just spontaneously happens. If only we could identify a cause.

Here it is: the dumbest thing you will read today.

If Officer Aaron Dean is found guilty of murder, who would ever be a cop?

Dorky X-rated flat-picking chimichanga kilobyte punk-rock microaggression.

All first used in print in the glorious year, 1970.

Perhaps I was premature with this.

Stop your messing around
Better think of your future
Time you straighten right out
Creating problems in town

Stop your fooling around
Time you straighten right out
Better think of your future
Else you’ll wind up in jail