It is apparently quite common for school districts to request that standardized tests not include certain words that students might find offensive. But New York City’s list of some 50 banned test topics is twice as long as national sensitivity lists, and stands out as “a bizarre case of political correctness run wild,“ says Yoav Gonen in the New York Post. 

Here, a look at some of the blacklisted topics, and why they might have been deemed problematic:

1. Birthdays
Jehovah’s Witnesses don’t celebrate birthdays

2. Dinosaurs
Some students don’t believe in evolution

3. Halloween
Suggests paganism

4. Religious holidays and festivals
Could offend students who don’t celebrate one or more of the holidays

5. TV, celebrities, and video games
To “avoid giving offense or disadvantage any test takers by privileging prior knowledge” like pop culture, Robert Pondiscio at the Core Knowledge Foundation tells the New York Post.

6. Computers in the home
Not all students have computers at home 

Accidentally Occupying Wall Street

John Darkow, copyright 2011 Cagle Cartoons

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$487.25 - Price of a premium ticket to The Book of Mormon bought less than 48 hours before a performance, which eclipses the record set by The Producers in 2001. The musical won nine Tony Awards on Sunday, and its cast album skyrocketed to number three on the Billboard charts. That hasn’t happened in 42 years.

Best Column: The Democrats need more Weiners

Weiner, certainly, doesn’t cower. The liberal Democrat who aspires to be mayor of New York often earns his surname with his partisan rants on the House floor, his campaigns against Clarence Thomas and Glenn Beck, and his opposition to Obama’s tax-cut deal last year.

In general, neither Democrats nor Republicans lack for hotheads. But in this case, Weiner’s brand of politics has some merit. As Republicans push daily to undermine the new law, the Democrats play under Marquess of Queensberry rules, answering the opposition’s often-scurrilous allegations with earnest pleas not to “relitigate” the past. In wishing away the fight, they are losing it.