• We can totally get behind this campaign poster to end all campaign posters, mainly because it’s hilarious. (Hat tip Andrew Sullivan)

• She was just like anyone else. She had a brother, a sister, a family. There wasn’t anything really different about her.
• Sheldon Barnum • The ex-husband of Colleen LaRose, a.k.a. “Jihad Jane,” a middle-aged woman who got tied up in radical Islam and was plotting to kill a cartoonist who depicted the prophet Muhammad on top of a dog. LaRose, who was caught in October, wasn’t shy about telling people she was a Muslim, but she left no hints of her radical leanings anywhere – except online, where her exploits as “Jihad Jane” were everywhere. One day, she disappeared without a trace, leaving her boyfriend, Kurt Gorman, high and dry.“I was upset, worried,” Gorman said. “Maybe something happened to her. You don’t know.” source

• $138 billion in spending shoved through, slowly source

• Carlos Slim is on top this year. But look deeper. Forbes’ billionaires list, a cultural touchstone, usually only focuses on the top of the list, mainly because it makes a good headline. But Forbes has a TON of information about the billionaires on their list. Here are some of our favorite details from doing a little research:

A good year for rebounds

• 1,011 billionaires are on this year’s list, which is way up from last year
• 164 billionaires returned to the list after losing much of their value in 2008
• 89 billionaires came from China, the largest non-U.S. total source

Extremes in rich bastards

• youngest Mark Zuckerberg, who, at 25, has more money than you’ll ever dream of, with assets worth $4 billion. Just think how much he’d be worth if Facebook took the IPO plunge. Or actually, just sulk. source
• oldest Fellow technology maven Walter Haefner is the real-life Mr. Burns at age 99. Except, instead of a nuclear plant, he owns 24 percent of information technology firm Computer Associates. source

• poorest Actually, trick question: There are 75 billionaires on the list with EXACTLY $1 billion in hand.
• leaper Brazilian oil baron Elke Batista wins, jumping $19.5 billion in a single year, to $27 billion.
• stars Oprah’s leaving her TV show soon, but she doesn’t need it; she’s worth $2.4 billion.

Schadenfreude-worthy subject

• Raj Rajaratnam is in big trouble. One of the guys who lost his billionaire club card, Rajaratnam’s hedge fund, Galleon Group, was caught in a major insider-trading scandal, which caused the fund to lose value quickly this past October, and as a result Rajaratnam is no longer a billionaire (and is probably going to prison!). source

• Who seriously thought this was a good idea? JibJab is one thing, but this is seriously the unfunniest thing we’ve ever seen. And we’ve seen a lot of unfunny things in our time.

• We realized we were going to have to throw a lot of it out, pour this liquid gold down the drain, and we were not going to do that. So, me being a chef, we said, ‘Hey, let’s make some cheese!’
• Chef Daniel Angerer • Regarding his decision to turn his fiancee’s breast milk into cheese, because, hey, that’s creepy. The dish is popular with patrons at New York’s Klee Brasserie restaurant, but otherwise incredibly controversial. Experts on a whole suggest it’s a really bad idea to eat it, due to the fact that it can expose others to the mother’s health issues (HIV and hepatitis in particular). Angerer’s fiance, Lori Mason, however, is healthy, which is why they felt it was safe to serve it at a restaurant. source

• No. 1 biking trails’ rank on the
  most-requested Google Maps
  features list (hiking is next)
• 150 number of cities that will
  finally be getting bike trails
  of their own source

• 16 (or more) named storms could pose a threat this season source

• It’s his 70th birthday. Here’s a “Walker, Texas Ranger” clip. OK, the Chuck Norris facts thing is kinda old, but let’s celebrate one of our greatest American fundamentalist Christian resources, a guy who can take on bears or stump for Mike Huckabee. We admit, even as crazy as he is, he’s an important part of our American junk culture. Kudos. source