Mystery swirls around George W. Bush ‘Miss me yet?’ billboard

For all of the wonderful things life in the Internet age provides us, there are some notable drawbacks. One of them is that email and popular social media tools like Twitter and Facebook provide powerful launching pads for unchecked rumors and popular myths. Often these rumors and myths are proven false by websites like Snopes.com and FactCheck.org, but not this time.

The Internet has been abuzz with rumors that if you drive down Interstate 35 near the town of Wyoming, Minnesota, you’ll see a billboard bearing the image of a smiling George W. Bush accompanied by the question “Miss me yet?” The online rumors were confirmed by this image:

Many initially thought the picture was a hoax created through Photoshop. But now multiple people have confirmed its existence. The mystery surrounding the billboard quickly morphed from a “Fact or Fiction?” story into a genuine “Whodunit?” Who paid for the ad, and what was their motivation? Are they Obama supporters sarcastically hoping to remind disgruntled liberals about how things were under Bush, or are they Bush supporters sincerely hoping to remind voters of the past administration?

To get some answers, Yahoo! News tracked down Mary McNamara, the general manager at the Minneapolis office of Schubert & Hoey Outdoor Advertising, the company which owns and leases out the billboard space.

“The ad was purchased by a group of small business owners who wish to remain anonymous,” McNamara said. However, McNamara did offer this political bombshell: “Some of the people in the group who paid for this were Obama supporters.”

McNamara told us that the message the group hoped to convey was one of “Hope and change, where is it?” She went on to say that she has yet to receive any negative feedback about the ad, which has been up for about a month, and added that some have even contacted her office offering to donate money to keep it up.

However, not everyone is buying McNamara’s portrayal of the group’s ideological makeup. Cindy Erickson, the chairwoman of the Democratic Party in Chisago County, where the billboard is located, suspects the ad’s funders are conservative activists posing as Obama supporters.

“I don’t have any idea who did it, but my thought was that they’re Tea Party people,” she said. “Regardless, it’s been the subject of many conversations around here.”

via Mystery swirls around George W. Bush ‘Miss me yet?’ billboard – Yahoo! News.

Remembering Bush is gone is such a happy thought… But where, god, where is the satisfaction of ended wars, and the closed Gitmo, and the recovering economy that was supposed to replace him? We waited so patiently. We worked so hard in hope of peace and truth. Reward us.

Thousands of dinosaur footprints uncovered in China

Archaeologists in China have uncovered more than 3,000 dinosaur footprints, state media reported, in an area said to be the world’s largest grouping of fossilised bones belonging to the ancient animals.

The footprints, believed to be more than 100 million years old, were discovered after a three-month excavation at a gully in Zhucheng in the eastern province of Shandong, the Xinhua news agency reported.

The prints range from 10 to 80 centimetres (four to 32 inches) in length, and belonged to at least six different kinds of dinosaurs, including tyrannosaurs, the report said Saturday.

Wang Haijun, a senior engineer at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, said the prints faced the same direction, Xinhua said.

This indicated a possible migration or a panic escape by plant-eating dinosaurs after an attack by predators, Wang added.

Archeologists have found dinosaur fossils at some 30 sites in Zhucheng, known as “dinosaur city.”

The region has seen two major digs since 1964, and experts say the discovery of so many dinosaurs in such a dense area could provide clues on how the animals became extinct millions of years ago.

Plans are being made to set up a fossil park in the area.

via Thousands of dinosaur footprints uncovered in China – Yahoo! News.

Never walk in the fossil park after dark.