Your Monday Random-Ass Roundup: They Map. You Decide.

As a reminder: If you’re getting your information from Fox News, you probably aren’t getting any information at all.

Not that CNBC – to name just another major U.S. media outlet – is doing much better covering the news out of Egypt. Alex Pareene of Salon suggests checking out Al-Jazeera, if possible. But if you’re looking for a reliable and knowledgeable source on the civil unrest unfolding in Egypt, it would be tough to do much better than Mona Eltahawy.

And if you’re looking for a particularly random, sometimes-y source of expansive linkage, you should probably keep reading this post.

1. To save you all the time and trouble, you should know Mother Jones is the end-all primer on Egypt, complete with constant updates. (Nicole)

2. For the second year in a row, more U.S. soldiers committed suicide than were killed in Iraq and Afghanistan. (Melissa A)

3. Sady Doyle encourages everyone to send a #DearJohn Tweet in response to mostly GOP-backed bill that would limit drastically the definition of rape and incest in cases eligible for government abortion funding. (Blackink)

4. The AP hides some ideology in a “straight news” report on taxes. (Monica)

5. The honeymoon for new White House press secretary Jay Carney is already over. (Blackink)

6. The official results will be released Feb. 14, but unofficial totals indicate a nearly unanimous vote to split south Sudan from the North. Colorlines asks “now what?” (Nicole)

7. When pressed about including more people of color in his cabinet, Ohio Gov. John Kasich responded that doesn’t need your people. Any of your people. (Monica)

8. Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell has been repealed, but it’s going to take a hot minute to roll it out. There’s also the not-small issue of not providing health benefits for the same-sex partners of servicemembers. (Avon)

9. Marybeth Gasman is skeptical about Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal‘s proposed merger to fold Southern University of New Orleans, a struggling HBCU, into the University of New Orleans, a predominantly white institution. “The proposed merger…will in essence strip SUNO of its historically black nature, which includes a culture that aims to empower African Americans. If the merger took place and the resulting institution was put in the Southern University System, it might be possible to create an integrated institution that is much stronger, but that retains the ethos of a black college.” (Avon)

10. Nineteen of the 20 U.S. metro areas with the highest foreclosure rates are located in three Sunbelt states. (Blackink)

11. It should come as little surprise that Arizona has one of the nation’s worst gun-death rates. “Places that have more guns have more gun violence, and Arizona is very high on that,” said Gary Kleck, a criminologist at Florida State University. (Blackink)

12. Mississippi introduced a proposal to end child homelessness. (Avon)

13. More Bay Area homeowners are suing banks over their foreclosures. (Blackink)

14. If you bother to spend a few seconds on Google, you’ll find that, yes, Detroit does have grocery stores. (Blackink)

15. After 13 years, Mark Bittman is retiring his “Minimalist” column to move to the Times’ opinion pages and focus on larger food policy issues. (Nicole)

16. Susan Jacoby gets real about getting old. (Monica)

17. By making others seem happy, is Facebook making us sad? (Blackink)

18. Bryant Gumbel and Katie Couric impersonate your great auntie, and are thoroughly confused by the Internet.  “What do you…write to it like mail?” (To be fair, this was in 1994.) (Avon)

19. On a lighter note, I am obsessed with “Downtown Abbey” on Masterpiece Theatre.  The Atlantic’s Culture channel reviews the season finale (spoiler alert!), and if you missed it, all the episodes are available for free until February  22 on the PBS website.  Also, NY Mag has some of Maggie Smith’s best lines from the series. (Nicole)

20. ESPN highlights the – mostly unspoken of – negative recruiting tactic of appealing to homophobia among college women’s basketball recruits. (Blackink)

21. Martin Luther King III is looking to buy a stake in the New York Mets — a move that would make him the first black owner in Major League Baseball. (Avon)

As usual, if you’ve got any questions, comments, suggestions or your own interesting link, please don’t hesitate to share with the rest of the class.

Until the next time, have a great week.

Joel

Joel Anderson —blackink —  writes about sports, politics, crime, courts, and other issues far beyond his competence at BuzzFeed. He has worked at media outlets in Texas, Oklahoma, Louisiana and Atlanta and contributed to a number of publications, including The Root and The American Prospect, among many others.