Roscoe's Public Notes

FORT WORTH, Texas – The Texas Supreme Court on Friday threw out a jury award over injuries a 17-year-old girl suffered in an exorcism conducted by members of her old church, ruling that the case unconstitutionally entangled the court in religious matters.

In a 6-3 decision, the justices found that a lower court erred when it said the Pleasant Glade Assembly of God’s First Amendment rights regarding freedom of religion did not prevent the church from being held liable for mental distress triggered by a “hyper-spiritualistic environment.” [...]

(Memphis, TN) – Teamsters General President Jim Hoffa joined hundreds of Teamster members, organizers and FedEx Express mechanics to throw his support behind their efforts to form a union.

During his remarks at Teamsters Local 667 in Memphis, Tennessee, Hoffa called on FedEx to allow these workers to seek representation free from intimidation by management. [...]

PhoneFactor is a WordPress plugin that provides an additional layer of security when logging in to your WordPress site.

It’s a pretty cool system. When you log in to your WordPress blog with PhoneFactor enabled, you receive a phone call asking you to press # to authorize. When you do so, you are logged in. If you do not, then the login attempt fails.

Basically, this means someone needs to get your username, password and phone in order to log in to your WordPress site as you. [...]

[Alex King writes some pretty cool WordPress plugins, and I do tend to be a security geek, but I don't think I'm quite paranoid enough to give this a try. -R]

Everyone remembers iconic pop culture gifts like The Singing Bass and Dancing Flowers. Why do we recall these classic, gimmicky toys so clearly? It’s for the same reason we recall the First World War, The Black Death or The Happening — because they are all human tragedies that could have been avoided.

Buyers looking to round out their evil toy collection should make room on the shelf for Mr. Clock Radio, “The Talking Robotic Clock Radio.” Coughed up by one of the upper levels of Dante’s Inferno and distributed by the otherwise good folks at Geewiz Entertainment, Mr. Clock Radio doesn’t just talk you into grim consciousness, he “performs” for you with 50 variations of soul-crushing banter and music. You can experience it all for yourself here. [...]

[Too, too cute! -R]