Brittany

An aside: stuff.co.nz reveals that this top-20 list was released on Yahoo’s “Buzz blog.” And here’s what Yahoo! had to say about it: “Thanks to our advanced computerised technology, we can catch most of your mistakes and provide you with the correct result.” No, don’t bother checking. We aren’t kidding.

So here’s the list:
1.   Rachel Ray (Rachael Ray)
      Who’d guess?
3.   Scarlett Johanson (Scarlett Johansson)
      Swedish-you can’t expect Americans to get it right.
4.    Wierd Al Yankovic (Weird Al Yankovic)
     Ever since we’ve been seeing the sunlight, Americans seem to be spelling “weird” the more intuitive way.
5.    Evanesence (Evanescence)
      Now that’s a tough one. Even for some of us.
7.   Barbara Streisand (Barbra Streisand) Again, who’d guess?
9.   Jamie Presley (Jaime Pressly)
      Sounds like “Jaim.”
11.  Brittany Spears (Britney Spears)
14.  Eva Mendez (Eva Mendes)
       Mexican and all… OK, no 
       racist comments here.
15.  Jessica Beil (Jessica Biel)
       Why do Americans pronounce “ei” “ee”?
20.  Micheal Jordan (Michael Jordan)
       Duh.

California governor Arnold Schwarzenegger’s veto of a bill that was aimed at protecting Californians from even more Big Brother-style RFID tracking should come as no shock if you understand his penchant for paternalistic power, say the authors of Spychips, which talks about how evil RFID is.

Californians wanted more privacy, so they introduced this bill in the face of startling new developments. US Homeland Security is already testing RFID tags in visitor documents, and is looking for a very powerful form of RFID that could allow law enforcement to “read documents secured in wallets and even in speeding cars,” according to the authors of Spychips. Then Herr Schwarzenegger went ahead and said, in a very strong Austrian accent, “Nein! Dere vill be no such Bill! No Privacy in mein Kalifornian Faterland!”

Well, what can you expect? After all, he comes from a past where he admired Hitler (go find out if you don’t believe us), and from a future where computers control everything. 

In a 1990 U.S. News interview, Schwarzenegger actually did say: “My relationship to power and authority is that I’m all for it. People need somebody to watch over them. Ninety-five per cent of the people in the world need to be told what to do and how to behave.”
Heil der neu Führer!