Colbert tries to convert Maher

Expanding bike share at no cost to taxpayers?

Bikeshare's social equity problem

From a Bay Area Bike Share op-ed in this morning's Chronicle:

The Bay Area’s bike-share system is poised for dramatic expansion. It will come at no cost to taxpayers, thanks to an innovative public-private partnership led by the Metropolitan Transportation Commission, and is supported by the forward-thinking government leaders of the Bay Area.

Heigh ho, our "forward-thinking" leaders are on the march! It remains to be seen how much this system will end up costing taxpayers.

On the other hand, bike share apparently has problems around the world, and San Francisco's system seems to have a habit of ripping off customers.

Gun craziness in "a pretty typical week"

Scottsdale Gun Club

From the Daily Kos:

Halloween often brings out a little extra gun crazy. In the week ending on October 31st, 27 people accidentally shot themselves. Seventeen kids were accidentally shot, five people accidentally fired their weapons into the homes or property of others, four people accidentally fired guns they were cleaning, three people were accidentally shot at the firing range, and returning to another continuing tradition, two people were accidentally shot at a gun show (the second such accident in three years at the same Idaho venue). There were also five hunting accidents, and six police-involved GunFAILs (resulting in four law enforcement officers shot, along with two bystanders). In other words, a pretty typical week.

But let me tell you about the week’s top crazy. Let’s see. We had a gun selfie injury, a Pennsylvania man shot from over a mile away while walking in his parents’ back yard, a 9-year-old boy shot when an upstairs neighbor accidentally shot himself in the foot in the apartment above, and a Florida man who fired a shotgun in the air during an argument with his girlfriend, only to end up wounding himself in the neck.

We also had a string of three 2-year-olds accidentally shot in a three day period, two of whom fatally shot themselves with guns they found unsecured. The first such incident, incredibly enough, involved a loaded shotgun left on a bedside night table in an in-home daycare. Turn that one over in your mind for a minute.

And from the “maybe you just weren’t cut out for this gun thing” files, we have the Cortez, Colorado woman who, apparently frightened by someone at the front door, accidentally shot herself in the foot with a .45 caliber pistol, then sent a second accidentally discharged round through an interior wall, luckily just missing her sleeping roommate. The capper? She’d already accidentally shot herself in the same foot earlier this year.