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Every person — every educated person, that is — has seen the viral video of a woman on a Westport-bound train berating a conductor.  But the star of the clip wishes you hadn’t according to The New York Daily News.

The paper reports that the video’s subject, Hermon Raju, is seeking a PR firm to help stem the tide of criticism directed at her.

The Daily News says it has obtained a letter sent to one such firm, in which Raju claims there was more to the argument than the video shows.

“The public only knows the two minutes of my dispute that were shown on the video that went viral,” said Raju. “However, there was a lot more to the story than those two minutes.”

“I can honestly say I feel raped by the Internet,” Raju writes, according to the paper.

The video features a woman, Raju arguing with a conductor after being asked to quiet her conversation and stop using profanity.  Raju responds by increasing the volume of her voice, insisting she is not a hooligan and pointing to her degree as a defense.

“[Do you know] how well educated I am?” she asks.

Raju has garnered countless criticism for her behavior on blog posts and even national news; Keith Olbermann and Anderson Cooper have dressed her down on their respective TV shows.

According to the Daily News, no one has taken on Raju as a client.

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North Dakota may not actually be a state. Or so says an 82-year-old Grand Forks resident.

While I realize that most people — myself included — can’t conjure up a single thought about North Dakota outside of a Fargo reference (which mostly takes place in Minnesota anyway), I’m sure there are some theoretical implications to this predicament of questionable statehood.

BBC: “While reading the state constitution, which is 40 years older than he is, John Rolczynski noticed it omitted to mention the executive branch when explaining which new officers need to take the oath supporting the US Constitution.

This, he says, makes the state constitution invalid because it is in conflict with the federal constitution, which requires all officers of the three branches of state government – executive, judicial and legislative – be bound by the oath.” (Read more)

Therein lies the rub.

Fortunately, a politician from the state perhaps known best for giving us Lawrence Welk, wrote a bill clearing this matter up. Having passed North Dakota’s legislature, the amendment of section 4 of article XI of the state constitution, faces voter approval in 2012.

So maybe, just maybe, North Dakota will replace Hawai’i as our 50th state.

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After suffering through countless meals with whiny, crying kids for years, one restaurant will soon ban kids six and under, a decision that’s drawn cheers and boos from the deep divide between parents and non-parents.

The owner of McDain’s Restaurant, an “upscale casual” place in Monroeville, PA, recently told his patrons that the restaurant is “not a place for young children.”

“Their volume can’t be controlled and many, many times they have disturbed other customers,” wrote Mike Vuick, reported the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.

The restaurant, known for steak and crab cakes, has never been exactly kid-friendly. There’s no kids’ menu. It’s connected to a golf course. A good number of the 68 seats are in the bar.

And yet, many parents bring rugrats who can’t sit still, turn off the tears, or stop the urge to throw food. That has puzzled Vuick.

“This is not a kid-oriented place,” he told the Post-Gazette. “There are many child-friendly restaurants that are a lot cheaper to go to.”

His ban highlights a certain irritated zeitgeist about children, often on display against parents who dare bring a loud child near hushed grown-ups, or block a Starbucks aisle with a double-wide stroller.

But Vuick said he doesn’t hate kids. He blames the parents.

“Parents have gradually diminished their cooperation,” he told MSNBC. He said babies can’t be expected to be quiet, preschoolers have “increasingly poor manners,” and parents become offended when a staffer tells them to shush their kid.

“If I had children of these ages I would never contemplate taking them to this place,” he said.

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By Kelsey Williams, SFGate.com

The red region would become “South California” according to Stone’s proposal.

The south will rise! Southern California that is—according to a plan by one Riverside politician.

Riverside County Supervisor Jeff Stone says that he wants as many as 13 counties in Southern California to secede from the state.

CBS Los Angeles reports:

Stone said in a statement late Thursday that Riverside, Imperial, San Diego, Orange, San Bernardino, Kings, Kern, Fresno, Tulare, Inyo, Madera, Mariposa and Mono counties should form the new state of South California.

The new state would therefore encompass almost half of California’s landmass, leaving out the strip of Southern California counties along the coast including Los Angeles, Ventura and Santa Barbara counties.

This is not the first time California has dealt with plans for secession, but until now most of the proposals have come from the rural counties of northern California where counties have tended to get left behind with state funding.

In fact, in 1941, a campaign to create the new state of Jefferson from several counties in northern California and southern Oregon was on the brink of success. The counties, frustrated from their lack of adequate roads and funding put together the movement, and Jefferson looked to be on track to be the 49^th state (Alaska and Hawaii weren’t on board yet).

By December, a “Proclamation of Independence” had been circulated and the residents had even elected a governor. But, on the week the Jefferson statehood movement was to make its national debut, the attacks at Pearl Harbor quashed all plans as residents went to work for the war effort.

Since then, every few years these and other northern counties have mounted several more secession attempts, but none have come quite so close to success as the Jefferson movement.

Now, Stone seems to hope to revive a similar rebellious spirit in the hearts of southland residents.

Stone said that the new state of South California would “allow officials to focus on securing borders, balancing budgets, improving schools and creating a vibrant economy.”

Stone’s proposal comes in the wake of the state budget proposal signed by Gov. Jerry Brown that would reallocate $14 million in 2011-12 vehicle license fee revenue from the new cities of Eastvale, Jurupa Valley, Menifee and Wildomar in Riverside County.

According to Stone, who plans to submit his proposal to the Board of Supervisors on July 12, the new state would have no term limits, only a part-time legislature and limits on property taxes.

Other officials and experts believe the move is more symbolic than anything, and South California is not likely to come to fruition any time soon.

“A secessionist movement? What is this, 1860?” Brown spokesman Gil Duran told The Press-Enterprise.

Riverside County Supervisor Bob Buster called Stone’s proposal a “crazy distraction.”

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Police arrested a Connecticut native for vandalising the theater hosting David Letterman’s ‘Late Show,’ Sunday, reports The New York Daily News.

Police say that James Whittemore, 22 dealt about $2,000 of damage to the lobby of the Ed Sullivan Theater on Broadway, shattering a front door with his foot and upending trash cans. He was arrested around 7 a.m. and charged with burglary and criminal mischief.

Whittemore is an Enfield native, who now lives in Harlem as a singer and actor.  Police say he was drunk at the time of the arrest and was later hospitalized for a cut on his forehead.

Monday’s taping of “The Late Show with David Letterman” will go on as planned, as the doors to the set were padlocked.

David Letterman is familiar with Whittemore’s home state; he is a former resident of New Canaan.