Good week, Bad week

Good week for:

Facebook backlashes, after Tommy Jordan of Albemarle, N.C., read his teenage daughter’s expletive-ridden I-hate-my-parents Facebook rant, took his daughter’s laptop outside, and shot it nine times. The YouTube video of the laptop’s destruction generated 24 million views and an outpouring of parental support.

Retroactive justice, after a witchcraft trial held in Germany in 1627 was reopened so that city councilmen could clear defendant Katharina Henot, who was burned at the stake.

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Bribery, after Dohn Community High School in Cincinnati began paying students to come to class. “Our student population is 90 percent poverty,” said school official Ken Furrier. “Money is important to them.”

Bad week for:

Classical beauty, after Italian artist Anna Utopia Giordano photoshopped famous Renaissance paintings such as The Birth of Venus to give the women thinner thighs and tummies, and larger, perkier breasts. Giordano’s point: Standards of beauty change.

Democracy, after a Pew Research Center study found that 1.8 million dead people are still registered to vote in various states, and 2.75 million people are registered to vote in more than one state. Another 51 million aren’t registered and can’t vote.

Congress, after a new Rasmussen poll found that 43 percent of Americans would rather have Congress run by a random selection of people from the phone book than by the current elected legislators. Only 5 percent think Congress is doing a good job.