Good week for:
Doing your homework, after Dmitri Krioukov, a UC San Diego physicist, successfully fought a $400 traffic ticket by submitting a four-page paper of equations and graphs titled “The Proof of Innocence,” arguing that the police officer was fooled by an optical illusion.
Burglars, after a poll found that 27 percent of Americans who keep sizable amounts of cash in their homes hide it in their freezers. Eleven percent prefer to stash the cash under their mattresses.
Online journalism, after The Huffington Post won a Pulitzer Prize for national reporting. The award honors veteran journalist David Wood’s 10-part series on the struggles of injured American soldiers returning home from Iraq and Afghanistan.
Bad week for:
Fiction writers, after no fiction Pulitzer was awarded this year for the first time in 35 years, because none of the three finalists received a majority of votes from the judges.
Ted Nugent, the rock ’n’ roller turned gun enthusiast, who said during the NRA convention that President Obama is like a coyote that deserves to be shot, adding that if Obama is re-elected, “I will either be dead or in jail next year.” The Secret Service said it would be asking Nugent for a clarification.
Mohammad Ashan, a Taliban commander, who saw his face on a “wanted” poster and asked Afghan security forces for the $100 finder’s fee. “Yes, that’s me!” he said. “Can I get my reward now?” He was arrested, with no finder’s fee.
