The deadly San Bruno natural gas pipeline explosion on Sep. 9, 2010, should have been a wake-up call: The nation’s underground infrastructure is dangerously old and needs to be inspected. 

Just to show all of you that The Thought Cannon doesn’t shy away from the hot topics of the day, I’m going to go ahead and chime in on one of the great questions facing eating persons everywhere: which starch is superior: Tortillas or Bread.

The Los Angeles Times reported yesterday that the Syfy network and Trion Games (Rift)are embarking on that grand quest to create a total artwork for the 21st century: A crossover television series and MMORPG, tentatively titled One World.  The big question is, will users invest in a new intellectual property just because it promises to be the universal world?

Are you afraid of scary things? Roller coasters? The Saw franchise? And do you long to be brave enough to accompany your bad-ass friends on their thrills-and-chills adventures? If your answer to these questions is a timid, Cringer-not-Battlecat yes, then you need to have a plan of slow immersion into the land of terror, a multiple-step program desensitizing you to horror. You need a training bra for the horror experience.

In grand WTF news, Deadline.com is reporting that Lionsgate has optioned pregnancy manual What to Expect When You’re Expecting.  Kirk Jones (Nanny McPhee) directs while Heather Hach (Freaky Friday) and Shauna Cross (Whip It!) co-write.  Aspiring screenwriters, take note!

After a mixed year, blemished by the failures of Caprica and Stargate: Universe, but lifted by late releases Being Human and Face Off, Syfy (or is that SyFy? SYFY? God, why can’t they go back to just Sci-Fi…) has announced their largest original programming release in their history, including fourteen new kinda original shows and over 100 hours of TV movies, according to Deadline.

Reporting with hunched back and squinty eyes, journalist George Monblot wrote in today's Guardian that the nuclear disaster at Fukushima Daiichi power plant has convinced him the nuclear power is not only safe, but the only viable energy source for the future of mankind. His rambling, Industrian Revolution-citing article ignores the real risks of nuclear power, adopts a "you gotta break a few eggs to make an omelette" view of human life, and is painfully ignorant of the fact that sustainable energy policy is still highly dependent on future innovation.

With the release of Google Art Project, millions of people around the world will be able to take a virtual walk through museums they will never be able to set a real foot in.  They will do this while reading about Lindsey Lohan's court appearance and lamenting their disappointment with last night's Top Chef elimination to their Facebook friends.  The most treasured artifacts of our civilization will be consumed instead of appreciated, and the entire notion of artistic reverie will expire like an old version of iTunes.

"We have seen too many cases of cost reduction competition through heightened efficiency jeopardizing safety." Such was the assessment by U.S. Ambassador to Japan J. Thomas Schieffer according to a diplomatic cable written in 2006 and published today by The Telegraph and Wikileaks.

A lot of people wonder how Chinese bird parents raise such stereotypically successful birds. They wonder what these parents do to produce so many flying whizzes and chirping prodigies, what it’s like inside the flock, and whether they could do it too. Well, I can tell them, because I've done it.