Author: Andrew Sullivan

And suddenly, fiction becomes fact. Except, of course, that the bomb is a fake one planted by federal agents. In many ways, it's a comforting story – a tale of the government being alert, crafty and successful in finding and trapping a wannabe teenage Jihadist.

A reader writes:

Whom else would we have turned to, for advice on ending the Cold War arms race, if not Sting? He is so pretentious as a given that it's hard to see this song as anything but a reversion to form. I like the riff on Prokofiev, though. And the visuals – vaguely Fritz Lang, vaguely Hitchcock, but with rhythmic gymnastics! And of course wind machines, for Sting's hair.

Another writes:

If you only take one submission for this contest, let it be "Russians", for its preening over an attempt to make moral equivalence look like a brave stand.

Warren McLaren reports on FareShare, a food rescue service that has saved 468 tonnes of food from the landfill:

Using an iPad application developed by staff and volunteers, IT Wire reports that FareShare is now able to alert the kitchen's chefs of what food ingredients have been collected in real time, increasing their capacity to prepare free nutritious meals for charities.

It can get hard to tell them apart at times. But one thing leapt out at me in this story – from the comments section. One FoxNation member wrote:

"HAHAHAHAHAHA OBUMMA – Un-raveled. EPIC FAILURE. IMPEACH it.”

All of which is par for the course, except for that last pronoun. It? Obama is a thing or an animal? Sometimes, the underlying feeling just slips out, doesn't it? I really don't want to believe that the underlying passion among some against the president is racist at its core. And yet, there it is.

Ryan Singel investigates how the ability to text 9-1-1 could increase efficiency for emergency responders:

The last real overhaul of 911 by the FCC came in 2001, when mobile carriers were required to allow 911 to identify the location of callers either through GPS or cell-tower data. … But the 911 system still can’t handle text messages, multimedia messages or streaming video, all of which could be very helpful to first responders. A system that could handle those messages would also allow people to report crimes without being overheard, which could be useful in situations ranging from kidnapping to seeing someone being robbed on the street.

Portland artist Jim Kazanjian once worked as a commercial CGI artist for television, fashion, and game production and now channels that talent into composite photography:

 

(Hat tip: Judy Berman)

A scientist at Serious Eats tests whether it's true that McDonald's hamburgers never age:

Turns out that not only did the regular McDonald's burgers not rot, but the home-ground burgers did not rot either. Samples one through five had shrunk a bit (especially the beef patties), but they showed no signs of decomposition. What does this mean?

It means that there's nothing that strange about a McDonald's burger not rotting. Any burger of the same shape will act the same way.

He adds:

[T]he burger doesn't rot because it's small size and relatively large surface area help it to lose moisture very fast. Without moisture, there's no mold or bacterial growth. Of course, that the meat is pretty much sterile to begin with due to the high cooking temperature helps things along as well. It's not really surprising. Humans have known about this phenomenon for thousands of years. After all, how do you think beef jerky is made?

A reader writes:

My nomination goes to John Mayer's "Waiting on the World to Change." If you don't pay close attention, it sounds like a classic protest song, but if you actually pay attention to the lyrics, it's an ode to doing nothing.

The first verse ends, "They say we stand for nothing / And there's no way we ever could." Setting up for a defiant rebuttal? Not so much. Second verse: "Now we see everything that's going wrong / With the world and those who lead it / We just feel like we don't have the means / To rise above and beat it." So, what is the response of Mr. Mayer and his friends? Chorus: "So we keep waiting / Waiting on the world to change." This is repeated ad nauseam throughout the song.

The song goes on to list off all the woes of society, and concludes that someday this generation will be in charge and that will make everything better. My eyes may be permanently rolled due to this.

Another writes:

By waiting on the world to change instead of trying to actually change the world himself, Mayer's both musically lame and lazy.

Mark T. Mitchell gives thanks and muses:

Those of us who spend most of our days working with ideas that all too often thin into mere abstractions are, I think, in danger of forgetting the full goodness of work even as we struggle to accomplish all that we have to do. Checking items off a to-do list is not the same as laying the foundation of a house. Writing a paper or delivering a lecture can, of course, be satisfying, but there is a unique concreteness, perhaps a less obscure goodness, in building something that occupies space and is useful or beautiful.