It's desperate, it's risky, and it's an eleventh hour guilt-by-association Hail Mary, but panicked Democrats are hoping that a video showing an off-color remark at a political rally yesterday will derail a looming Republican Senate win in Massachusetts. Yesterday some yahoo at a rally for Republican Scott Brown yelled, "Shove a curling iron up her butt!" The comment was a reference to Brown's opponent, Attorney General Martha Coakley, who was criticized for not aggressively pursuing a child rape case in 2005. In the video below, Brown does not say anything in response to the remark, but he appears to smile in response! It's not quite a Macaca moment, but for Democrats, it'll have to do. more ›

The four waterfalls installed by artist Olafur Eliasson and the Public Art fund at various spots on the East River are supposed be taken down on October 13th, but some Brooklyn residents fear that could be too late. In response to mounting concerns that spray from the salty, semi-polluted East River is blowing onto trees and slowly killing them, Judy Stanton, head of the Brooklyn Heights Association, is calling for the falls to be stopped now. She tells the Brooklyn Paper, “I think it’s enough. They’re damaging the local environment and I don’t think it’s worth it to have this question remain: Will the trees come back?” Reporter Sarah Portlock, who has dubbed this whole thing a "tree-bacle," also notes that drivers who park near the falls are returning to find their vehicles coated with oil residue and salt. more ›

How many trees have to die before someone does something about Olafur Eliasson’s waterfalls? Earlier this month the Parks Department and the Public Art Fund admitted that the salty East River spray from the Brooklyn Bridge waterfall was making the leaves on trees at the River Cafe in DUMBO go prematurely brown. Now the Brooklyn Paper reports that the trees at the Brooklyn Heights Promenade are suffering from the same affliction, brought on by the salt slowing photosynthesis. Officials have assured tree-huggers that the spray from what BP calls Eliasson's "four-headed killing machine" doesn't pose any "long-term danger," but the way things are going, it's only a matter of time before some Earth First! activists start climbing up the falls to try and hang protest banners. more ›