Sometimes words just fail me. Even after a tsunami of citizens protesting plans to give their state parks to corporations to build Jack Nicklaus golf courses, now faceless RepubliKKKan Governor 48.9% bureaucrats want to allow private companies to develop campgrounds on even the most pristine public Florida lands.
This amounts to insanity and perfidy of a scale even my cynical self never had nightmares about or even dreamed of.
To emphasize the closing paragraph of the St Petersburg Times editorial, the FL state park system has some of the greatest treasures available to ordinary citizens at modest prices, from Bahia Honda to Long Point at Sebastian Inlet to springs and swamps bulit up for generations for future generations, places my family went to in my childhood which I still treasure.
To allow such development without public notice, hearings, input, virtually in the dead of the night as in backroom deals to benefit contributors to RepubliKKKans provides a prime example of how the Teabagging Party loves democracy and will of the people except when it gets in the way of the law, basic human decency, common sense and preventing private profit off of public resources to the everlasting detriment of the environment.
At short last governor 48.9%, have you and your minions no shame, you carpetbagging piece of shite?
[Displaying contempt for the public and the environment, Gov. Rick Scott's Department of Environmental Protection has provided only scant notice of its plan to turn over portions of up to 56 state parks to private corporations to build and run campgrounds. As early as next week, the department could decide to move forward on four parks, including Honeymoon Island State Park in Pinellas County. Such radical policy changes affecting some of the state's most prized natural assets deserve far more public vetting and consideration.
It appears that DEP's Division of Recreation and Parks learned a lesson earlier this year from state Sen. John Thrasher. When Thrasher, R-St. Augustine, brashly floated a plan to turn over several state parks to build a Jack Nicklaus golf trail, the former House speaker was forced to retreat quickly in the wake of public outrage. The parks division has made no such pronouncement, launching the bold initiative mostly outside the public's view, not unlike how DEP abruptly scuttled conservation land buys at water management districts and forced out their managers.
Earlier this month, the division won approval, 7-2, from DEP's Acquisition and Restoration Council, a little-noticed advisory group, to expedite the planning process to create more private concessions at the 56 state parks. But this is more than privatizing snack bars, canoe rentals or gift shops. It's about turning over portions of state parks to private enterprises to build and run campgrounds, often in environmentally sensitive locations that are already being heavily utilized by day visitors.
At Honeymoon Island, for example, the plan for 45 campsites on 17.5 acres — including electric and water hookups for RVs in an area now designated for picnicking — would add an estimated 300 more people to the park's daily 5,326 visitors. The plan will likely require the relocation of gopher tortoises, the division's proposal acknowledges, and selective cutting of trees, the building of stormwater basins and an archaeological study to ensure no cultural resources are lost. Wastewater from bathhouses and an RV "dump station" will be carted offsite to a treatment facility.
Good luck finding that plan on the division's website. Scant mention of the scheme can be found there even as public hearings begin next week for Honeymoon Island and three others: De Leon Springs, Edward Ball Wakulla Springs and Fanning Springs. It appears the parks division has issued three times as many press releases or advisories about Florida first lady Ann Scott's literacy tour than it has about its plan to privatize portions of up to 56 state parks.
Generations of Floridians and their tax dollars have built one of the best state park systems in the country. DEP's curiously quiet campaign to abruptly change that system is reckless. The parks division should slow down and make its case to the public that swaths of unspoiled public parks should be turned into commercial profit centers filled with RVs.] emphasis added
http://www.tampabay.com/opinion/editorials/article1177581.ece?utm_source=Budget+Campaign&utm_campaign=a22d4ee920-Balance_Sheet5_11_2011&utm_medium=email
Wednesday, June 29, 2011
Red Hot Chili Peppers: "Under the Bridge Downtown"
Red Hot Chili Peppers: "Under the Bridge Downtown"
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Albert Camus: The Rebel
"[Rebellion's] most profound logic is not the logic of destruction; it is the logic of creation … the logic of the rebel is to want to serve justice so as not to add to the injustice of the human condition."
- Albert Camus, The Rebel
- Albert Camus, The Rebel
Random Acts of Pizza: Restoring humanity one slice at a time
[San Francisco (CNN) -- Arranging to have pizzas delivered to a stranger's door is a classic prank.
On the Web, it's charity.
Ashley Qualls found that out recently when she posted an offer on the link-sharing website called Reddit. The Santa Clarita, California, native was feeling especially charitable one day and asked the site's audience of 18.8 million visitors how she could donate to people in need.
"Someone had commented saying, 'Hey, you should take this over to Random Acts of Pizza,' " Qualls said.
Surfing to that section, she found people posting their pleas for free pizza. Members are encouraged to place orders for requests they feel especially moved by.]
http://www.reddit.com/r/Random_Acts_Of_Pizza/
On the Web, it's charity.
Ashley Qualls found that out recently when she posted an offer on the link-sharing website called Reddit. The Santa Clarita, California, native was feeling especially charitable one day and asked the site's audience of 18.8 million visitors how she could donate to people in need.
"Someone had commented saying, 'Hey, you should take this over to Random Acts of Pizza,' " Qualls said.
Surfing to that section, she found people posting their pleas for free pizza. Members are encouraged to place orders for requests they feel especially moved by.]
http://www.reddit.com/r/Random_Acts_Of_Pizza/
Social Justice Rules!!!!!!!!
See, Pastor Jeff, 'tain't just me. Other folks read the same Bible I do, including you. The question then becomes what we as a family at Trinity Lutheran Evangelical Downtown Orlando Church can do to help our brothers and sisters.
We corporately, which does not really include physical action by me, do a great deal of truly awesome stuff.
We and I can do more.
For some reason, my heart lies with migrant workers in a-Merry-Ca picking vegetables like tomatoes for our children's Happy Meals., finding Supreme Irony in fact anti-iimmigrant fervor among Teabagging RepubliKKKans keeps illegals from Georgia so crops will rot in the fields, food prices will rise, because humans will not perform this literally back breaking work given any other reasonable choice.
They tried in Georgia sending people on probation for criminal violations to the fields. It did not work.
Kind of makes you miss slavery or the economic injustice of impoverished people slaving away to provide bounty for rich people.
Suck on that, Americans!
American exceptionalism my ass, more exploitation than national virtue.
And the Bible tells me so.
["The poor will NOT always be with us!"
Thus proclaims a freshly launched Christian campaign to end extreme poverty in this generation. Scott Todd's "58:" project declares that eradicating poverty is not only possible but probable, if the people of the church put their backs into it.
Such audacious optimism is one of the most infectious, exciting qualities of the new evangelicals movement of which Todd is part, and it surged like electricity through his and other presentations at this spring's Q conference, the signature annual gathering of next-generation Christian leaders.
Sure, in some of the quieter, more reflective moments of the three-day event in Portland you could hear acknowledgment of the heavy burden carried by this movement of new-century Jesus followers. These are, after all, the people who accept responsibility to right seemingly every global wrong you can name while restoring the credibility of publicly expressed Christianity in the process. But the workload is exhausting only when they lose connection with their ultimate power source, says Gabe Lyons, the host of Q and an unofficial spokesperson for the movement. These action-takers draw their energy and strength not solely from their fair-trade coffee, entrepreneurial wits, and technological savvy, Lyons says, "but from the cross — from knowing we are living in the way that Jesus demands."]
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2011-06-26-can-social-justice-effort-tame-culture-wars_n.htm
We corporately, which does not really include physical action by me, do a great deal of truly awesome stuff.
We and I can do more.
For some reason, my heart lies with migrant workers in a-Merry-Ca picking vegetables like tomatoes for our children's Happy Meals., finding Supreme Irony in fact anti-iimmigrant fervor among Teabagging RepubliKKKans keeps illegals from Georgia so crops will rot in the fields, food prices will rise, because humans will not perform this literally back breaking work given any other reasonable choice.
They tried in Georgia sending people on probation for criminal violations to the fields. It did not work.
Kind of makes you miss slavery or the economic injustice of impoverished people slaving away to provide bounty for rich people.
Suck on that, Americans!
American exceptionalism my ass, more exploitation than national virtue.
And the Bible tells me so.
["The poor will NOT always be with us!"
Thus proclaims a freshly launched Christian campaign to end extreme poverty in this generation. Scott Todd's "58:" project declares that eradicating poverty is not only possible but probable, if the people of the church put their backs into it.
Such audacious optimism is one of the most infectious, exciting qualities of the new evangelicals movement of which Todd is part, and it surged like electricity through his and other presentations at this spring's Q conference, the signature annual gathering of next-generation Christian leaders.
Sure, in some of the quieter, more reflective moments of the three-day event in Portland you could hear acknowledgment of the heavy burden carried by this movement of new-century Jesus followers. These are, after all, the people who accept responsibility to right seemingly every global wrong you can name while restoring the credibility of publicly expressed Christianity in the process. But the workload is exhausting only when they lose connection with their ultimate power source, says Gabe Lyons, the host of Q and an unofficial spokesperson for the movement. These action-takers draw their energy and strength not solely from their fair-trade coffee, entrepreneurial wits, and technological savvy, Lyons says, "but from the cross — from knowing we are living in the way that Jesus demands."]
http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2011-06-26-can-social-justice-effort-tame-culture-wars_n.htm
Create Your Own Religion Competition
Let's see, what can I come up with?
Do good towards your fellow man? Buddha and Jesus already covered that much better than I could and besides, can't see any profit in that for me, unless of course gullible fools mail me $ in mistaken belief that will get them to paradise. (See Paypal button to the right, and yes, I will spend the cash on beer.)
First united church of the holy afternoon nap?
Dang it, already taken, albeit with sharp observation of the human condition: "The Church Of The Afternoon NapTM believes that religion has been taken much too seriously by the human race. Currently, and for thousands of years, there have been religions, and religious people, who have strenuously and seriously advocated, based upon their religious beliefs, that those members of society that do not share their religious beliefs should be eradicated from the face of the earth. Many religions, over thousands of years, have tried to instill their unproven, and unprovable, beliefs into society as though they were based on a bedrock of fact."
Did the druids trademark their religion, worshiping trees?
No trees immediately out front of my door so maybe I could promote religion of small bushes and shrubbery. Yea, that's the ticket. At least, my marigold won't tell people to kill other people who disagree with it, except of course those insufferable rose horticulturists.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/27/create-your-own-religion_n_885279.html#s299089&title=Modernism
Do good towards your fellow man? Buddha and Jesus already covered that much better than I could and besides, can't see any profit in that for me, unless of course gullible fools mail me $ in mistaken belief that will get them to paradise. (See Paypal button to the right, and yes, I will spend the cash on beer.)
First united church of the holy afternoon nap?
Dang it, already taken, albeit with sharp observation of the human condition: "The Church Of The Afternoon NapTM believes that religion has been taken much too seriously by the human race. Currently, and for thousands of years, there have been religions, and religious people, who have strenuously and seriously advocated, based upon their religious beliefs, that those members of society that do not share their religious beliefs should be eradicated from the face of the earth. Many religions, over thousands of years, have tried to instill their unproven, and unprovable, beliefs into society as though they were based on a bedrock of fact."
Did the druids trademark their religion, worshiping trees?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/06/27/create-your-own-religion_n_885279.html#s299089&title=Modernism
Monday, June 27, 2011
Rory McIlroy: Visits Haiti, Overcomes Self Immolation at the Masters to Win US Open
Amazing, a visit to a fourth world country can give someone-a professional golfer--in this case, one who lived through one of the most heinous collapses in sports history at the Masters in Augusta--a bit of perspective.
[The Northern Ireland youngster got a whole new perspective on life after his fact-finding mission to the hurricane-ravaged nation in his new role as a Unicef ambassador.
McIlroy says the experience helped him for the better when he went to Congressional for the US Open and might have made a difference pre-Augusta.
“I think it had a huge perspective on how I handled myself throughout the tournament last week because it gave me a huge dose of perspective on everything, not just golf but life in general,” said McIlroy.
“There was a nine hole golf course in Port Au Prince and there were 50,000 people living on that course, 50,000 people.
“The night we stayed in Haiti there was a tropical depression and 25 people were killed that night in the floods...
“The conditions people are living in there are terrible. If I can go and see that then it is good for me and it is also good to raise awareness for what is going on out there.”
McIlroy knows the pictures still in his mind from Haiti will stay with him for the rest of his life and they will help him cope with the demands and pressures on a new Major champion.
“I didn’t consciously go there before the US Open as preparation but had I gone there the week before Augusta then the Masters could have been a lot different,” he added.
“It did have a huge impact on my mentality at Congressional. When you land in America after a couple of days in Haiti, you notice how smooth the roads are.
“You notice that they have streetlights, that you can drink a bottle of water. You realise how lucky you are with the life you live and doing what you want to do.
“There are six million people in Haiti who don’t have that kind of opportunity.”] emphasis added
http://www.irishcentral.com/news/Rory-McIlroy-thanks-Haiti-for-humbling-trip-that-changed-his-life--124560719.html
[The Northern Ireland youngster got a whole new perspective on life after his fact-finding mission to the hurricane-ravaged nation in his new role as a Unicef ambassador.
McIlroy says the experience helped him for the better when he went to Congressional for the US Open and might have made a difference pre-Augusta.
“I think it had a huge perspective on how I handled myself throughout the tournament last week because it gave me a huge dose of perspective on everything, not just golf but life in general,” said McIlroy.
“There was a nine hole golf course in Port Au Prince and there were 50,000 people living on that course, 50,000 people.
“The night we stayed in Haiti there was a tropical depression and 25 people were killed that night in the floods...
“The conditions people are living in there are terrible. If I can go and see that then it is good for me and it is also good to raise awareness for what is going on out there.”
McIlroy knows the pictures still in his mind from Haiti will stay with him for the rest of his life and they will help him cope with the demands and pressures on a new Major champion.
“I didn’t consciously go there before the US Open as preparation but had I gone there the week before Augusta then the Masters could have been a lot different,” he added.
“It did have a huge impact on my mentality at Congressional. When you land in America after a couple of days in Haiti, you notice how smooth the roads are.
“You notice that they have streetlights, that you can drink a bottle of water. You realise how lucky you are with the life you live and doing what you want to do.
“There are six million people in Haiti who don’t have that kind of opportunity.”] emphasis added
http://www.irishcentral.com/news/Rory-McIlroy-thanks-Haiti-for-humbling-trip-that-changed-his-life--124560719.html
"Fiscal conservatives" Raised US Debt Ceiling 19 Times During Cheney Administration
Let's repeat that for just a moment, "fiscal conservatives" raised the US debt ceiling 19 times over the 2 terms of the Cheney Administration.
Why does your so called liberal media not report this outrage instead of focusing on Wiener's weener?: "Database searches revealed no demands from the four legislators that debt increases come accompanied by drastic spending cuts, as there are now. In fact, the May 2003 debt limit increase passed the Senate the same day as the $350 billion Bush tax cuts for the wealthy.
When Bush was in office, the current Republican leaders viewed increasing the debt limit as vital to keeping America’s economy running. But with Obama in the White House, it’s nothing more than a political pawn."
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/04/14/158424/republican-leaders-debt-limit-hypocrisy/
Why does your so called liberal media not report this outrage instead of focusing on Wiener's weener?: "Database searches revealed no demands from the four legislators that debt increases come accompanied by drastic spending cuts, as there are now. In fact, the May 2003 debt limit increase passed the Senate the same day as the $350 billion Bush tax cuts for the wealthy.
When Bush was in office, the current Republican leaders viewed increasing the debt limit as vital to keeping America’s economy running. But with Obama in the White House, it’s nothing more than a political pawn."
http://thinkprogress.org/politics/2011/04/14/158424/republican-leaders-debt-limit-hypocrisy/
Sunday, June 26, 2011
Repost: "A food system based on poverty and exploitation will never be sustainable,"
Just in case my most important post of the day got lost in my musical interludes: http://empireofdirt77.blogspot.com/2011/06/eric-schlosser-food-system-based-on.html
Bob Dylan: "Trust Yourself"
You know, it really hurts when I fool myself. Fool me once, shame on you but fool me twice shame on me Gomer Pyle said.
So how can I keep fooling myself that one human can make any difference at all in this big world?
Not absolute sure but, iffen I wake up manana, gots espresso, cinnamon rolls, hope, and naive faith. Guess that will have to do.
Who's been fooling me indeed.
Me.
Didn't never claim to have common sense as almost certain as a toddler stuck a butter knife into 'lectric socket twicet. 99.99999999999% of humans in industrialized nations with electric service to homes only did that oncet.
Eric Clapton: "Why Does Love Have to Be So Sad?"
If 'tweren't so sad at times, was it love? Dang, gots to copyright that. Also my catchphrase: every day a blessing; ever breath a prayer.
Got to Post the Who: "Love Reign O'er Me"
One good Who song deserves another. Used to call the Rolling Stones, ""The best damn rock and roll band in the world," but upon decades of listening--considering song writing and rock operas composed, the best rock bass player EVER, Roger's voice, and the Tasmanian devil, Keith Moon, drumming--now confer the title of best ever rock band upon The Who.
Spare your Beatles paens and hagiography for the boys stopped playing live and you must ask how much of their recorded output came from George Martin.
"That deaf, dumb, blind kid sure plays mean pinball."
The geezers still rocked on their Vegas reunion shows. Did I mention BEST rock bassist ever?
Spare your Beatles paens and hagiography for the boys stopped playing live and you must ask how much of their recorded output came from George Martin.
"That deaf, dumb, blind kid sure plays mean pinball."
The geezers still rocked on their Vegas reunion shows. Did I mention BEST rock bassist ever?
Eric Schlosser: "A food system based on poverty and exploitation will never be sustainable,"
[Well, now Eric Schlosser, author of Fast Food Nation, has weighed in. In The Washington Post, Schlosser makes the argument that foodie critics have gotten the elitism charge backward. Our current industrial food system, he notes, clearly demonstrates "how the few now rule the many."
"The wealthy will always eat well. It is the poor and working people who need a new, sustainable food system more than anyone else. They live in the most polluted neighborhoods. They are exposed to the worst toxic chemicals on the job. They are sold the unhealthiest foods and can least afford the medical problems that result. A food system based on poverty and exploitation will never be sustainable," writes Schlosser.] emphasis added
http://m.boiseweekly.com/boise/the-foodie-elitism-debate-continues/Content?oid=2227006
Even one of the most priveliged people on the planet, Prince Charles, The Prince of Wales, gets it; the fact that any so-called civilized society deserves judgment for how the poorest among that society get treated: [...The world is gradually waking up to the fact that creating sustainable food systems will become paramount in the future because of the enormous challenges now facing food production.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines “sustainability” as “keeping something going continuously.” And the need to “keep things going” for future generations – in other words, for all of you students and your families, whether here at Georgetown or, through the wonders of modern technology, elsewhere across this vast country – is quite frankly the reason I have made the long journey to Washington...
One or two of you may have noticed that over the past thirty years I have been venturing into extremely dangerous territory by speaking about the future of food. I have all the scars to prove it...! Questioning the conventional world view is a risky business. And the only reason I have done so is for the sake of your generation and for the integrity of Nature herself. It is your future that concerns me and that of your grandchildren, and theirs too. That is how far we should be looking ahead. I have no intention of being confronted by my grandchildren, demanding to know why on Earth we didn’t do something about the many problems that existed, when we knew what was going wrong. The threat of that question, the responsibility of it, is precisely why I have gone on challenging the assumptions of our day. And I would urge you to do the same, because we need to face up to asking whether how we produce our food is actually fit for purpose in the very challenging circumstances of the twenty-first century. We simply cannot ignore that question any longer.
Very nearly thirty years ago I began by talking about the issue, but I realized in the end I had to go further. I had to put my concern into action, to demonstrate how else we might do things so that we secure food production for the future, but also, crucially, to take care of the Earth that sustains us. Because if we don’t do that, if we do not work within Nature’s system, then Nature will fail to be the durable, continuously sustaining force she has always been. Only by safeguarding Nature’s resilience can we hope to have a resilient form of food production and ensure food security in the long term.
This is the challenge facing us. We have to maintain a supply of healthy food at affordable prices when there is mounting pressure on nearly every element affecting the process. In some cases we are pushing Nature’s life-support systems so far, they are struggling to cope with what we ask of them. Soils are being depleted, demand for water is growing ever more voracious and the entire system is at the mercy of an increasingly fluctuating price of oil.
Remember that when we talk about agriculture and food production, we are talking about a complex and interrelated system and it is simply not possible to single out just one objective, like maximising production, without also ensuring that the system which delivers those increased yields meets society’s other needs. As Eric has highlighted, these should include the maintenance of public health, the safeguarding of rural employment, the protection of the environment and contributing to overall quality of life.
So I trust that this conference will not shy away from the big questions. Chiefly, how can we create a more sustainable approach to agriculture while recognizing those wider and important social and economic parameters – an approach that is capable of feeding the world with a global population rapidly heading for nine billion? And can we do so amid so many competing demands on land, in an increasingly volatile climate and when levels of the planet’s biodiversity are under such threat or in serious decline?
As I see it, these pressures mean we haven’t much choice in the matter. We are going to have to take some very brave steps. We will have to develop much more sustainable, or durable forms of food production because the way we have done things up to now are no longer as viable as they once appeared to be. The more I talk with people about this issue, the more I realize how vague the general picture remains of the perilous state we are in. So, just to be absolutely clear, I feel I should offer you a quick pen sketch of just some of the evidence that this is so.
Certainly, internationally, food insecurity is a growing problem. There are also many now who consider that global food systems are well on the way to being in crisis. Yield increases for staple food crops are declining. They have dropped from three per cent in the 1960’s to one per cent today – and that is really worrying because, for the first time, that rate is less than the rate of population growth. And all of this, of course, has to be set against the ravages caused by climate change. Already yields are suffering in Africa and India where crops are failing to cope with ever-increasing temperatures and fluctuating rainfall. We all remember the failure of last year’s wheat harvest in Russia and droughts in China. They have caused the cost of food to rocket and, with it, inflation around the world, stoking social discontent in many countries, notably in the Middle East. It is a situation I fear will only become more volatile as we suffer yet more natural disasters…
Set against these threats to yields is the ever-growing demand for food. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates that the demand will rise by seventy per cent between now and 2050. The curve is quite astonishing. The world somehow has to find the means of feeding a staggering 219,000 new mouths every day. That’s about 450 since I started talking! What is more, with incomes rising in places like China and India, there will also be more people wealthy enough to consume more, so the demand for meat and dairy products may well increase yet further. And all that extra livestock will compete for feed more and more with an energy sector that has massively expanded its demand for biofuels. Here in the U.S., I am told, four out of every ten bushels of corn are now grown to fuel motor vehicles.
This is the context we find ourselves in and it is set against the backdrop of a system heavily dependent upon fossil fuels and other forms of diminishing natural capital – mineral fertilizers and so on. Most forms of industrialized agriculture now have an umbilical dependency on oil, natural gas and other non-renewable resources. One study I have read estimates that a person today on a typical Western diet is, in effect, consuming nearly a U.S. gallon of diesel every day! And when you consider that in the past decade the cost of artificial nitrogen fertilizers has gone up fourfold and the cost of potash three times, you start to see how uncomfortable the future could become if we do not wean ourselves off our dependency. And that’s not even counting the impact of higher fuel prices on the other costs of production – transport and processing – all of which are passed on to the consumer. It is indeed a vicious circle.] emphasis added
http://www.princeofwales.gov.uk/speechesandarticles/a_speech_by_hrh_the_prince_of_wales_to_the_future_for_food_c_848967946.html
http://www.facebook.com/CIWonFB?sk=info
[37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’]
Matthew 25:37-43
"The wealthy will always eat well. It is the poor and working people who need a new, sustainable food system more than anyone else. They live in the most polluted neighborhoods. They are exposed to the worst toxic chemicals on the job. They are sold the unhealthiest foods and can least afford the medical problems that result. A food system based on poverty and exploitation will never be sustainable," writes Schlosser.] emphasis added
http://m.boiseweekly.com/boise/the-foodie-elitism-debate-continues/Content?oid=2227006
Even one of the most priveliged people on the planet, Prince Charles, The Prince of Wales, gets it; the fact that any so-called civilized society deserves judgment for how the poorest among that society get treated: [...The world is gradually waking up to the fact that creating sustainable food systems will become paramount in the future because of the enormous challenges now facing food production.
The Oxford English Dictionary defines “sustainability” as “keeping something going continuously.” And the need to “keep things going” for future generations – in other words, for all of you students and your families, whether here at Georgetown or, through the wonders of modern technology, elsewhere across this vast country – is quite frankly the reason I have made the long journey to Washington...
One or two of you may have noticed that over the past thirty years I have been venturing into extremely dangerous territory by speaking about the future of food. I have all the scars to prove it...! Questioning the conventional world view is a risky business. And the only reason I have done so is for the sake of your generation and for the integrity of Nature herself. It is your future that concerns me and that of your grandchildren, and theirs too. That is how far we should be looking ahead. I have no intention of being confronted by my grandchildren, demanding to know why on Earth we didn’t do something about the many problems that existed, when we knew what was going wrong. The threat of that question, the responsibility of it, is precisely why I have gone on challenging the assumptions of our day. And I would urge you to do the same, because we need to face up to asking whether how we produce our food is actually fit for purpose in the very challenging circumstances of the twenty-first century. We simply cannot ignore that question any longer.
Very nearly thirty years ago I began by talking about the issue, but I realized in the end I had to go further. I had to put my concern into action, to demonstrate how else we might do things so that we secure food production for the future, but also, crucially, to take care of the Earth that sustains us. Because if we don’t do that, if we do not work within Nature’s system, then Nature will fail to be the durable, continuously sustaining force she has always been. Only by safeguarding Nature’s resilience can we hope to have a resilient form of food production and ensure food security in the long term.
This is the challenge facing us. We have to maintain a supply of healthy food at affordable prices when there is mounting pressure on nearly every element affecting the process. In some cases we are pushing Nature’s life-support systems so far, they are struggling to cope with what we ask of them. Soils are being depleted, demand for water is growing ever more voracious and the entire system is at the mercy of an increasingly fluctuating price of oil.
Remember that when we talk about agriculture and food production, we are talking about a complex and interrelated system and it is simply not possible to single out just one objective, like maximising production, without also ensuring that the system which delivers those increased yields meets society’s other needs. As Eric has highlighted, these should include the maintenance of public health, the safeguarding of rural employment, the protection of the environment and contributing to overall quality of life.
So I trust that this conference will not shy away from the big questions. Chiefly, how can we create a more sustainable approach to agriculture while recognizing those wider and important social and economic parameters – an approach that is capable of feeding the world with a global population rapidly heading for nine billion? And can we do so amid so many competing demands on land, in an increasingly volatile climate and when levels of the planet’s biodiversity are under such threat or in serious decline?
As I see it, these pressures mean we haven’t much choice in the matter. We are going to have to take some very brave steps. We will have to develop much more sustainable, or durable forms of food production because the way we have done things up to now are no longer as viable as they once appeared to be. The more I talk with people about this issue, the more I realize how vague the general picture remains of the perilous state we are in. So, just to be absolutely clear, I feel I should offer you a quick pen sketch of just some of the evidence that this is so.
Certainly, internationally, food insecurity is a growing problem. There are also many now who consider that global food systems are well on the way to being in crisis. Yield increases for staple food crops are declining. They have dropped from three per cent in the 1960’s to one per cent today – and that is really worrying because, for the first time, that rate is less than the rate of population growth. And all of this, of course, has to be set against the ravages caused by climate change. Already yields are suffering in Africa and India where crops are failing to cope with ever-increasing temperatures and fluctuating rainfall. We all remember the failure of last year’s wheat harvest in Russia and droughts in China. They have caused the cost of food to rocket and, with it, inflation around the world, stoking social discontent in many countries, notably in the Middle East. It is a situation I fear will only become more volatile as we suffer yet more natural disasters…
Set against these threats to yields is the ever-growing demand for food. The United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation estimates that the demand will rise by seventy per cent between now and 2050. The curve is quite astonishing. The world somehow has to find the means of feeding a staggering 219,000 new mouths every day. That’s about 450 since I started talking! What is more, with incomes rising in places like China and India, there will also be more people wealthy enough to consume more, so the demand for meat and dairy products may well increase yet further. And all that extra livestock will compete for feed more and more with an energy sector that has massively expanded its demand for biofuels. Here in the U.S., I am told, four out of every ten bushels of corn are now grown to fuel motor vehicles.
This is the context we find ourselves in and it is set against the backdrop of a system heavily dependent upon fossil fuels and other forms of diminishing natural capital – mineral fertilizers and so on. Most forms of industrialized agriculture now have an umbilical dependency on oil, natural gas and other non-renewable resources. One study I have read estimates that a person today on a typical Western diet is, in effect, consuming nearly a U.S. gallon of diesel every day! And when you consider that in the past decade the cost of artificial nitrogen fertilizers has gone up fourfold and the cost of potash three times, you start to see how uncomfortable the future could become if we do not wean ourselves off our dependency. And that’s not even counting the impact of higher fuel prices on the other costs of production – transport and processing – all of which are passed on to the consumer. It is indeed a vicious circle.] emphasis added
http://www.princeofwales.gov.uk/speechesandarticles/a_speech_by_hrh_the_prince_of_wales_to_the_future_for_food_c_848967946.html
http://www.facebook.com/CIWonFB?sk=info
[37 “Then the righteous will answer him, ‘Lord, when did we see you hungry and feed you, or thirsty and give you something to drink? 38 When did we see you a stranger and invite you in, or needing clothes and clothe you? 39 When did we see you sick or in prison and go to visit you?’
40 “The King will reply, ‘Truly I tell you, whatever you did for one of the least of these brothers and sisters of mine, you did for me.’
41 “Then he will say to those on his left, ‘Depart from me, you who are cursed, into the eternal fire prepared for the devil and his angels. 42 For I was hungry and you gave me nothing to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me nothing to drink, 43 I was a stranger and you did not invite me in, I needed clothes and you did not clothe me, I was sick and in prison and you did not look after me.’]
Matthew 25:37-43
Diets Change for Worse as Food Prices Soar
[(CNN) -- People around the world are changing their diets because of soaring food prices, according to a new study.
The majority of people in most countries surveyed by international aid agency Oxfam said they're no longer eating the same kind of food as they did two years ago, with 39 percent globally blaming rising food costs and another 33 percent citing health reasons.
The poll also shows the effects of globalization on the world diet, with both pasta and pizza ranked among the top three favorite foods in many countries.
"Our diets are changing fast and for too many people it is a change for the worst," said Jeremy Hobbs, Executive Director of Oxfam. "Huge numbers of people, especially in the world's poorest countries, are cutting back on the quantity or quality of the food they eat because of rising food prices."] emphasis added
http://www.wftv.com/health/28242462/detail.html?treets=orlc&tid=26513271874813&tml=orlc_12pm&tmi=orlc_12pm_1_10500506152011&ts=H
The US leads in the world in obesity but the rest of the world is catching up quick; Thanks, McDonalds. Go ahead and sue me. I Super Size Me: 6 1/2 Year Anniversary Special Edition
dare you.
We're #1!!!
[Obesity rates worldwide have doubled in the last three decades even as blood pressure and cholesterol levels have dropped, according to three new studies.
People in Pacific Island nations like American Samoa are the heaviest, one of the studies shows. Among developed countries, Americans are the fattest and the Japanese are the slimmest.
"Being obese is no longer just a Western problem," said Majid Ezzati, a professor of public health at Imperial College London, one of the study's authors.] emphasis added
http://yourlife.usatoday.com/health/story/2011/02/Study-Global-obesity-rates-double-since-1980/43253168/1
The majority of people in most countries surveyed by international aid agency Oxfam said they're no longer eating the same kind of food as they did two years ago, with 39 percent globally blaming rising food costs and another 33 percent citing health reasons.
The poll also shows the effects of globalization on the world diet, with both pasta and pizza ranked among the top three favorite foods in many countries.
"Our diets are changing fast and for too many people it is a change for the worst," said Jeremy Hobbs, Executive Director of Oxfam. "Huge numbers of people, especially in the world's poorest countries, are cutting back on the quantity or quality of the food they eat because of rising food prices."] emphasis added
http://www.wftv.com/health/28242462/detail.html?treets=orlc&tid=26513271874813&tml=orlc_12pm&tmi=orlc_12pm_1_10500506152011&ts=H
The US leads in the world in obesity but the rest of the world is catching up quick; Thanks, McDonalds. Go ahead and sue me. I Super Size Me: 6 1/2 Year Anniversary Special Edition
dare you.We're #1!!!
[Obesity rates worldwide have doubled in the last three decades even as blood pressure and cholesterol levels have dropped, according to three new studies.
People in Pacific Island nations like American Samoa are the heaviest, one of the studies shows. Among developed countries, Americans are the fattest and the Japanese are the slimmest.
"Being obese is no longer just a Western problem," said Majid Ezzati, a professor of public health at Imperial College London, one of the study's authors.] emphasis added
http://yourlife.usatoday.com/health/story/2011/02/Study-Global-obesity-rates-double-since-1980/43253168/1
Saturday, June 25, 2011
Spartan Death Race: Why?
They have a web site and also a quick google showed the Wall Street Journal reported on it, so this must actually happen.
Which of course begs the question Why?
Why don't y'all go build a house for Habitat for Humanity?
Sheesh.
[These men and women could be told to cut a tree stump from the ground, then lug it through muddy trenches covered in barbed wire and up a hiking trail. Or they might be ordered to run up a steep 2,000-foot mountain, memorize a list of American presidents, and run back down to recite the list, knowing that failure means another trip back to the top. Or they might have to eat pound after pound of raw onions. And not only will they have to endure all those chores—or their equivalent, for the race’s challenges are new each year. They’ll do it in a competition that could stretch on for 24, 48, or even 72 hours, with no set finish line and no idea of what might be coming next. And they’ll do it all with the race’s creators taunting them, telling them they don’t have what it takes to stick it out.]
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/06/21/a-marathon-to-make-you-quake.html
Which of course begs the question Why?
Why don't y'all go build a house for Habitat for Humanity?
Sheesh.
[These men and women could be told to cut a tree stump from the ground, then lug it through muddy trenches covered in barbed wire and up a hiking trail. Or they might be ordered to run up a steep 2,000-foot mountain, memorize a list of American presidents, and run back down to recite the list, knowing that failure means another trip back to the top. Or they might have to eat pound after pound of raw onions. And not only will they have to endure all those chores—or their equivalent, for the race’s challenges are new each year. They’ll do it in a competition that could stretch on for 24, 48, or even 72 hours, with no set finish line and no idea of what might be coming next. And they’ll do it all with the race’s creators taunting them, telling them they don’t have what it takes to stick it out.]
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/06/21/a-marathon-to-make-you-quake.html
Pick Your Battles or You Might End Up With 300 lbs Metal Chicken
See, Prince William, you have situations like these t:o worry about. http://thebloggess.com/2011/06/and-thats-why-you-should-learn-to-pick-your-battles/
Thursday, June 23, 2011
LeGone James Jokes
"Today is national LeBron James Day—everyone gets out of work 12 minutes early!
If James was allowed to check out before he finished collecting his salary, why can't we all have a break in our day?"
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/737717-lebron-james-jokes-12-best-lebron-jokes-following-heat-finals-loss/page/12
"Apple has just released the LeBron James iPhone. Only vibrates. No rings."
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/737717-lebron-james-jokes-12-best-lebron-jokes-following-heat-finals-loss/page/9
If James was allowed to check out before he finished collecting his salary, why can't we all have a break in our day?"
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/737717-lebron-james-jokes-12-best-lebron-jokes-following-heat-finals-loss/page/12
"Apple has just released the LeBron James iPhone. Only vibrates. No rings."
http://bleacherreport.com/articles/737717-lebron-james-jokes-12-best-lebron-jokes-following-heat-finals-loss/page/9
Stupid Crook Lessons: Don't smoke pot with your six year old in the car on way to see FL Department of Children and Families
Children learn from what they see.
Even never having spawned myself--and the universe breathes a great sigh of relief--did see Chuck's son come out of the bathroom with an empty toilet paper tube, playing with it like a bong.
Needless to say since this happened in front of the toddler's grandpparents, they made sure to express their displeasure.
Kids learn from what they see. If you smoke crack, they will emulate that. If a husband beats his wife, children learn from that.
My year apart nephews fought savagely in their early teens and their younger female cousins took note of that.
Humans, please take care of images projected before and onto your children; at least, have the decency to try to make their lives better by keeping your sins behind closed doors.
[BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. -- Police in Brevard County arrested a mother after they said she showed up at the Department of Children and Families high on marijuana.
Investigators said Tina Nail smoked pot with her 6-year-old daughter in the car as they drove to meet with DCF officials.
The little girl said she felt dizzy, according to police. She was taken to the hospital.
Police also found prescription drugs in the car.]
http://www.wftv.com/news/28317593/detail.html?treets=orlc&tid=26513271874813&tml=orlc_ent&tmi=orlc_ent_1_11150206232011&ts=H
Even never having spawned myself--and the universe breathes a great sigh of relief--did see Chuck's son come out of the bathroom with an empty toilet paper tube, playing with it like a bong.
Needless to say since this happened in front of the toddler's grandpparents, they made sure to express their displeasure.
Kids learn from what they see. If you smoke crack, they will emulate that. If a husband beats his wife, children learn from that.
My year apart nephews fought savagely in their early teens and their younger female cousins took note of that.
Humans, please take care of images projected before and onto your children; at least, have the decency to try to make their lives better by keeping your sins behind closed doors.
[BREVARD COUNTY, Fla. -- Police in Brevard County arrested a mother after they said she showed up at the Department of Children and Families high on marijuana.
Investigators said Tina Nail smoked pot with her 6-year-old daughter in the car as they drove to meet with DCF officials.
The little girl said she felt dizzy, according to police. She was taken to the hospital.
Police also found prescription drugs in the car.]
http://www.wftv.com/news/28317593/detail.html?treets=orlc&tid=26513271874813&tml=orlc_ent&tmi=orlc_ent_1_11150206232011&ts=H
Tuesday, June 21, 2011
1 Tenth of 1% of Wealthiest Americans Get 10% of the Wealth
[For years, statistics have depicted growing income disparity in the United States, and it has reached levels not seen since the Great Depression. In 2008, the last year for which data are available, for example, the top 0.1 percent of earners took in more than 10 percent of the personal income in the United States, including capital gains, and the top 1 percent took in more than 20 percent. But economists had little idea who these people were. How many were Wall street financiers? Sports stars? Entrepreneurs? Economists could only speculate, and debates over what is fair stalled.
Now a mounting body of economic research indicates that the rise in pay for company executives is a critical feature in the widening income gap.]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/with-executive-pay-rich-pull-away-from-rest-of-america/2011/06/13/AGKG9jaH_story.html
Now a mounting body of economic research indicates that the rise in pay for company executives is a critical feature in the widening income gap.]
http://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/with-executive-pay-rich-pull-away-from-rest-of-america/2011/06/13/AGKG9jaH_story.html
Department of Sick Irony: Charging $ for admission to 11 September 2011 memorial
Proving once again capitalism remains above the law, probity, and common human decency, this comes as proof of a disgusting peculiar American hypocrisy seeking to profit off of tragedy.
Does anyone over the age of 10 fail to realize that "operations" includes hefty salaries for the officers of this corporatiom?
[The National September 11 Memorial & Museum is considering charging $20 cover charge for visitors. The group already has total assets of half a billion and $150 million in cash according to their tax filing.
It is expected that the nonprofit group expects operating costs of $60 million and five million visitors per year when it opens in 2012.
Bill Doyle, whose son died in the World Trade Center attacks, told the New York Post “I don't think they should charge…You can go to almost any memorial in the world outside of New York and not get charged admission.”
Spokesman for the museum Michael Frazier said “While it is our preference not to charge admission to the 9/11 Memorial Museum, we must generate funding for ongoing maintenance and operations.] emphasis added
http://www.irishcentral.com/news/September-11-Memorial-could-charge-20-cover-charge-124154884.html
Does anyone over the age of 10 fail to realize that "operations" includes hefty salaries for the officers of this corporatiom?
[The National September 11 Memorial & Museum is considering charging $20 cover charge for visitors. The group already has total assets of half a billion and $150 million in cash according to their tax filing.
It is expected that the nonprofit group expects operating costs of $60 million and five million visitors per year when it opens in 2012.
Bill Doyle, whose son died in the World Trade Center attacks, told the New York Post “I don't think they should charge…You can go to almost any memorial in the world outside of New York and not get charged admission.”
Spokesman for the museum Michael Frazier said “While it is our preference not to charge admission to the 9/11 Memorial Museum, we must generate funding for ongoing maintenance and operations.] emphasis added
http://www.irishcentral.com/news/September-11-Memorial-could-charge-20-cover-charge-124154884.html
Department of Delicious Irony: Fireworks feud with Guy Fowlkes
Do you think Guy Fowlkes even knew history of Guy Fawkes and the Gunpowder Plot??
Golly, Guy, you jumped the gun by a couple months, but thanks for making me laugh.
Golly, Guy, you jumped the gun by a couple months, but thanks for making me laugh.
Back to My Empire of Dirt
Took a short stay in Orlando vacation, albeit in the hospital as confluence of a few minor medical issues.
6 days of breakfast, dinner, and supper in bed can really renew one's body if not mind while sentenced to watch basic cable.
Nevertheless, thanks to all the caregivers--Cynthia, Alicia, Solange, Marie, Sam and Peter in the ER--too many to name individually but all with more humanity than I can muster as don't really like people, especially sick ones.
People tend to live as humans: whiny, needful, hypocritical and constitutionally unable to listen to reason, which of course does not describe me at all.
But even be it ever such a hovel, there would still be no place like home.
Hang on, it will make a wild ride as have near a week worth of irony, sarcasm, observations, bile, rage and humour stored up to vent forth here, beginning with the city Orlando versus Orlando Food Not Bombs.
Gimme me a freakin' break, Mayor Buddy Dyer, alleged Christian and Democrat.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/os-hackers-attack-sites-for-homeless-20110620,0,988820.story
"Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose."
6 days of breakfast, dinner, and supper in bed can really renew one's body if not mind while sentenced to watch basic cable.
Nevertheless, thanks to all the caregivers--Cynthia, Alicia, Solange, Marie, Sam and Peter in the ER--too many to name individually but all with more humanity than I can muster as don't really like people, especially sick ones.
People tend to live as humans: whiny, needful, hypocritical and constitutionally unable to listen to reason, which of course does not describe me at all.
But even be it ever such a hovel, there would still be no place like home.
Hang on, it will make a wild ride as have near a week worth of irony, sarcasm, observations, bile, rage and humour stored up to vent forth here, beginning with the city Orlando versus Orlando Food Not Bombs.
Gimme me a freakin' break, Mayor Buddy Dyer, alleged Christian and Democrat.
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/os-hackers-attack-sites-for-homeless-20110620,0,988820.story
"Freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose."
"Fathers, Do Not Aggravate Your Children"
Dad, the Bible really does contain this verse; I did not make it up out of thin air.
"Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord."
Ephesians 6:4
Thanks to you and God bless Moms for trying to raise me right.
"Fathers, do not exasperate your children; instead, bring them up in the training and instruction of the Lord."
Ephesians 6:4
Thanks to you and God bless Moms for trying to raise me right.
Sunday, June 12, 2011
U2: "Bad"
Go figure, now that my challenge to myself includes interacting with humans outside my nuclear family, humans really make me mad.
Just tonight during the Heatles losing the NBA championship, my friend born in SC whose words I sort of model in my my dialog with my Jesus and he, Donnie, calls me Dan'el agreed with me on ever' step he needed to take to get unemployment compensation in FL after a job he did well for over six years but demurred because he can not specify his starting date and agreed several times he could do it on his own nevertheless demurred and said his wife who separated from for at least a year ago ought to do it for him.
Brother Donnie, I gots peop' in my own fam' damily to work with to talk with me again rather than trying to talk sense to you when you want your "partner" to wipe your ass rather than to live your life on your own.
#$%^&*()_*%^&*()^%$$%^&*()!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Except for human frailty, individual humans really make me mad.
Just tonight during the Heatles losing the NBA championship, my friend born in SC whose words I sort of model in my my dialog with my Jesus and he, Donnie, calls me Dan'el agreed with me on ever' step he needed to take to get unemployment compensation in FL after a job he did well for over six years but demurred because he can not specify his starting date and agreed several times he could do it on his own nevertheless demurred and said his wife who separated from for at least a year ago ought to do it for him.
Brother Donnie, I gots peop' in my own fam' damily to work with to talk with me again rather than trying to talk sense to you when you want your "partner" to wipe your ass rather than to live your life on your own.
#$%^&*()_*%^&*()^%$$%^&*()!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Except for human frailty, individual humans really make me mad.
12 June 1963 Medgar Evers Murdered
Medgar Evers.
Young humans every where in the world today, before you shoot someone try to remember the sacrifices of those who have gone before, giving up their lives so humans could live free.
Have several recent examples from Orlando, FL, but will add links and add that best any human can do is and will ever remain would have each of us try to make our own corner of the world just a bit better.
A ONE Human Revolution!!!
Tell me, folks, what small, reasonable step can you take to make OUR world better?
Young humans every where in the world today, before you shoot someone try to remember the sacrifices of those who have gone before, giving up their lives so humans could live free.
Have several recent examples from Orlando, FL, but will add links and add that best any human can do is and will ever remain would have each of us try to make our own corner of the world just a bit better.
A ONE Human Revolution!!!
Tell me, folks, what small, reasonable step can you take to make OUR world better?
The Godz: "Gotta Keep Running"
"Because everybody is some kind of junkie."
Seriously, have a cassette tape of this Godz album in a box somewheres. Of course, the ending kind of wears on me.
Nevertheless, it does illustrate for me how folks tend to externalize their own predilection, biases, or deeply held beliefs to ignore what happens to actual humans they see begging on the streets every day, "THE HOMELESS."
And all you Bible junkies, I will debate you any day because Jesus tells me to feed the hungry.
Seriously, have a cassette tape of this Godz album in a box somewheres. Of course, the ending kind of wears on me.
Nevertheless, it does illustrate for me how folks tend to externalize their own predilection, biases, or deeply held beliefs to ignore what happens to actual humans they see begging on the streets every day, "THE HOMELESS."
And all you Bible junkies, I will debate you any day because Jesus tells me to feed the hungry.
Jeff Beck: "Blue Wind"
Ditto for this; the sleeve for this album still has greek letters on it a friend inscribed back in the 70's to enumerate the song order.
Jeff Beck: "Pork Pie Hat...
Sometime my music--gots this on vinyl in the closet--expresses my words better than my mouth can.
Go figure.
Every day a blessing; every breath a prayer.
Go figure.
Every day a blessing; every breath a prayer.
Grateful Dead: "Golden Road to Unlimited Devotion "
This song makes me want to party every day and reminds me of bestest bartender I've ever met who has a psychology degree [Deidre].
"Got laughter in her eyes and dancing in her feet."
"Got laughter in her eyes and dancing in her feet."
Friday, June 10, 2011
Jimi Hendrix: "All along the watchtower"
"There are many here among us
who feel that life is just a joke"
who feel that life is just a joke"
Little Steven and the Disciples of Soul: "Under the Gun."
"In the eleventh hour
whose Name do you call?
...in the eleventh hour
you find out what you're made of
gather your strength
and protect the things you love
we're running "
whose Name do you call?
...in the eleventh hour
you find out what you're made of
gather your strength
and protect the things you love
we're running "
Princess James: "Reality is a fuzzy place for a child prodigy raised, empowered and enabled by the sneaker industry."
Understand I mock because in some sense I love.
Could you expect anything else from a Cubs fan?
Nevertheless seeing Queen James and De Powderpuff Wade yap at referees all game and seeing Dwight Howard called with technicals for merely rolling his eyes at abominable calls, I must mock Der Sternfuhrer for his transparent wet dream of Howard playing in L. A. or N. Y.
[Just Thursday morning at the Heat’s shootaround, someone asked James how he had been spending his time since a costly and dreadful eight-point debacle in Game 4. Why, he had been reading everyone’s columns on the Internet. This inspired a good laugh, but he probably wasn’t joking. From his mid-teens, he’s always seen himself from the outside looking in, as a spectacle within a spectacle. Reality is a fuzzy place for a child prodigy raised, empowered and enabled by the sneaker industry.
As a product of that environment, the need for James to validate his brand with unforgettable performances, with clutch play in championship games, is monumental. And perhaps paralyzing. He had a good game on Thursday night, but it doesn’t matter that James plays with Dwyane Wade(notes) and Bosh. Good isn’t good enough for him. No one’s even sure great covers it for him.
By design, James and his crackerjack marketers wanted the feeding frenzies, wanted the residual of “The Decision” to be the dawning of a generational, global sports icon.] emphasis added
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news;_ylt=AqAS61DRa0IaIJUeqvQYP6K8vLYF?slug=aw-wojnarowski_lebron_james_nba_finals_game5_061011
PS: Let it become known I hereafter resolve to refer to LeBron James as Princess James for Queen some may deem as anti gay slur but princess to me means pure mockery, an evocation of the Disney Princess making/marketing machine.
Could you expect anything else from a Cubs fan?
Nevertheless seeing Queen James and De Powderpuff Wade yap at referees all game and seeing Dwight Howard called with technicals for merely rolling his eyes at abominable calls, I must mock Der Sternfuhrer for his transparent wet dream of Howard playing in L. A. or N. Y.
[Just Thursday morning at the Heat’s shootaround, someone asked James how he had been spending his time since a costly and dreadful eight-point debacle in Game 4. Why, he had been reading everyone’s columns on the Internet. This inspired a good laugh, but he probably wasn’t joking. From his mid-teens, he’s always seen himself from the outside looking in, as a spectacle within a spectacle. Reality is a fuzzy place for a child prodigy raised, empowered and enabled by the sneaker industry.
As a product of that environment, the need for James to validate his brand with unforgettable performances, with clutch play in championship games, is monumental. And perhaps paralyzing. He had a good game on Thursday night, but it doesn’t matter that James plays with Dwyane Wade(notes) and Bosh. Good isn’t good enough for him. No one’s even sure great covers it for him.
By design, James and his crackerjack marketers wanted the feeding frenzies, wanted the residual of “The Decision” to be the dawning of a generational, global sports icon.] emphasis added
http://sports.yahoo.com/nba/news;_ylt=AqAS61DRa0IaIJUeqvQYP6K8vLYF?slug=aw-wojnarowski_lebron_james_nba_finals_game5_061011
PS: Let it become known I hereafter resolve to refer to LeBron James as Princess James for Queen some may deem as anti gay slur but princess to me means pure mockery, an evocation of the Disney Princess making/marketing machine.
Thursday, June 9, 2011
Wheezer: "We Are All On Drugs"
To paraphrase from memory the Godz: "Everybody is some kind of junkie, love junkie, $ junkie, Old Testament junkies wanting to send others to Hell but never examining their own hearts.
Heck, have beome a breath junkie giving praise if I wake up breathing. True, have to bribe myself with just to get out of bed or up off the canvas espresso and condensed milk, yogurt, and raisin bran and beers to drink in the eve cooling in the 'frige'. But at least stopped trying to pour cheap vodka into the hole in my soul and want to live.
That struck me in the Dock Ellis story of a therapist thinking him suicidal because of everything he ingested over the years.
Like Chevy Chase said, "Sometimes you have to do a lot of drugs before you realize reality a pretty neat buzz.
Besides, give me one honest sinner and drug abuser rather than a self righteous con man condemning others and scamming his friends. At least dope fiends and drunks have more remorse than RepubliKKKans.
Every day a blessing; every breath a prayer.
Heck, have beome a breath junkie giving praise if I wake up breathing. True, have to bribe myself with just to get out of bed or up off the canvas espresso and condensed milk, yogurt, and raisin bran and beers to drink in the eve cooling in the 'frige'. But at least stopped trying to pour cheap vodka into the hole in my soul and want to live.
That struck me in the Dock Ellis story of a therapist thinking him suicidal because of everything he ingested over the years.
Like Chevy Chase said, "Sometimes you have to do a lot of drugs before you realize reality a pretty neat buzz.
Besides, give me one honest sinner and drug abuser rather than a self righteous con man condemning others and scamming his friends. At least dope fiends and drunks have more remorse than RepubliKKKans.
Every day a blessing; every breath a prayer.
Charles Barkley: Heatles a bunch of whiners
[When asked if Miami is the worst professional sports town, {Charles} Barkley, who reiterated his admiration of LeBron James and Dwyane Wade, said: "Yeah they have the worst fans. No question. It's not even loud in there. You're at the game and you are like, 'Man this place isn't even loud.' At least when you go to Chicago, it's loud in there, it's crazy down in Dallas but it's not even loud in Miami."
Barkley said he doesn't root against the Heat, but he doesn't root for them. And he believes the Heat fans are upset because he picked the Chicago Bulls to beat the Heat, but Barkley pointed out he wasn't the only one to do that among TNT's commentators.
When the Heat were playing the Bulls in the Eastern Conference finals, Barkley said he liked James and Wade personally, but he called the Heat a "whiny bunch." He didn't back off that charge on Wednesday when he was a guest on "The Waddle & Silvy Show" on ESPN 1000.
"Listen, if the Miami Heat were playing the Washington Generals I would pick the Washington Generals," Barkley said with a chuckle. "It's something about that team that annoys me.
"They just a whiny bunch and I can't root for them."] emphasis added
http://espn.go.com/blog/chicagobulls/post/_/id/5485/barkley-cant-root-for-heat-rips-fans
Barkley said he doesn't root against the Heat, but he doesn't root for them. And he believes the Heat fans are upset because he picked the Chicago Bulls to beat the Heat, but Barkley pointed out he wasn't the only one to do that among TNT's commentators.
When the Heat were playing the Bulls in the Eastern Conference finals, Barkley said he liked James and Wade personally, but he called the Heat a "whiny bunch." He didn't back off that charge on Wednesday when he was a guest on "The Waddle & Silvy Show" on ESPN 1000.
"Listen, if the Miami Heat were playing the Washington Generals I would pick the Washington Generals," Barkley said with a chuckle. "It's something about that team that annoys me.
"They just a whiny bunch and I can't root for them."] emphasis added
http://espn.go.com/blog/chicagobulls/post/_/id/5485/barkley-cant-root-for-heat-rips-fans
Wednesday, June 8, 2011
State and Local Governments Lay Off Workers
[NEW YORK (CNNMoney) -- Don't look to state and local governments to prop up the job market.
To the contrary, this cash-strapped sector is set to go on a record-breaking layoff binge when the new fiscal year starts on July 1.
State and local governments are forecast to shed up to 110,000 jobs in the third quarter, the first time the blood-letting has risen into the triple digits, according to IHS Global Insight.]
http://money.cnn.com/2011/06/05/news/economy/state_local_layoffs/?section=money_latest&utm_source=Budget+Campaign&utm_campaign=b395838a8e-Balance_Sheet5_11_2011&utm_medium=email
To the contrary, this cash-strapped sector is set to go on a record-breaking layoff binge when the new fiscal year starts on July 1.
State and local governments are forecast to shed up to 110,000 jobs in the third quarter, the first time the blood-letting has risen into the triple digits, according to IHS Global Insight.]
http://money.cnn.com/2011/06/05/news/economy/state_local_layoffs/?section=money_latest&utm_source=Budget+Campaign&utm_campaign=b395838a8e-Balance_Sheet5_11_2011&utm_medium=email
Dock Ellis: Pitched a No Hitter, Abused Drugs, Reformed, and Counsels Prisoners
Originally the idea that any human could pitch a no-hitter at any level much less the majors while tripping on LSD as did Dock Ellis interested me the most. To correct that mistake and enlighten anyone bored enough to tarry here, let's just start with the last bit from an article: "The sport of baseball has, since his retirement, more or less shunned him because of who he was. The irony, of course, is that Ellis' one-time problems, which prevented him from being a truly great player, have since revealed him to be something more like a great person.
And baseball, like the rest of us, could use a few more of those."
Dock's line for the no hitter: "he ended with eight walks, one hit batsman and the bases loaded at least twice."
http://www.dallasobserver.com/content/printVersion/286078/
Life imitates baseball.
And baseball, like the rest of us, could use a few more of those."
Dock's line for the no hitter: "he ended with eight walks, one hit batsman and the bases loaded at least twice."
http://www.dallasobserver.com/content/printVersion/286078/
Life imitates baseball.
Tuesday, June 7, 2011
Dwight Howard: "We can always be better and get better"
[When Dwight Howard was a kid, he used to watch old basketball training tapes of Magic Johnson, then run outside and practice those techniques so feverishly, it's like he knew when he started ballin' at age 3 that he was working out for his future in the NBA.
But when Howard had the chance to meet the real Magic at age 15, it took only seven words to make Howard take his workouts even more seriously.
Those words? You'll never make it in the NBA.
That right, when Howard met the man who used to inspire him to play basketball as a kid, Magic Johnson actually told the teenage center that he didn't have what it took to take his game to the ultimate level.
"He said I was too skinny," Howard told me while we kicked back at the Ritz Carlton in downtown Los Angeles. Howard was there to introduce the new "adidas miCoach" fitness game, a product where gamers will learn training techniques from pros like Howard and Josh Smith in order to help them increase their vertical leap, strengthen their core and build muscles using Howard's own tried-and-tested pushup routine so Hall of Famers don't look at you and call you "too skinny..."
Jon Robinson: Why should gamers put down their controllers and stop shooting each other in "Call of Duty" in order to work out with you in "adidas miCoach"?
Dwight Howard: I don't want to say that they have to put those games down just to play this game, but it's important for kids to play "miCoach" for 20 to 30 minutes to help get in shape. A lot of kids are like me -- I'm not going to lie, I sit around with my friends and play "Call of Duty" all the time, but we're just sitting around and being lazy. But if you could put it down for just 20 to 30 minutes a day and train, you can get in shape. We have a problem with that in America. And since we can't get the kids outside anymore, since we can't get adults out to a facility, now we're going into their world, the virtual world, to train them....
Jon Robinson: The "miCoach" game doesn't come out until 2012, but I was just wondering, as a fat, married and unmotivated gamer, how are you going to motivate me to get moving?
Dwight Howard: The first thing is believing in yourself and believing that you can go to another level in training. We can always be better and get better. For myself, I want to get stronger. People say I'm too strong, but I still want to get stronger, and when it comes to basketball, I want to become a better player. I want to become a better shooter and a better post-up player, so I keep working out to get better. If you're looking for motivation to get in shape, I'll just tell you to do it for your kids so they can have someone to look up to. If they see their dad training hard to try and get in great shape, they'll want to do it too] emphasis added
http://espn.go.com/espn/thelife/videogames/blog/_/name/thegamer/id/6632739/dwight-howard-talks-micoach-nba-2k12?utm_source=bleacherreport.com&utm_medium=referral
But when Howard had the chance to meet the real Magic at age 15, it took only seven words to make Howard take his workouts even more seriously.
Those words? You'll never make it in the NBA.
That right, when Howard met the man who used to inspire him to play basketball as a kid, Magic Johnson actually told the teenage center that he didn't have what it took to take his game to the ultimate level.
"He said I was too skinny," Howard told me while we kicked back at the Ritz Carlton in downtown Los Angeles. Howard was there to introduce the new "adidas miCoach" fitness game, a product where gamers will learn training techniques from pros like Howard and Josh Smith in order to help them increase their vertical leap, strengthen their core and build muscles using Howard's own tried-and-tested pushup routine so Hall of Famers don't look at you and call you "too skinny..."
Jon Robinson: Why should gamers put down their controllers and stop shooting each other in "Call of Duty" in order to work out with you in "adidas miCoach"?
Dwight Howard: I don't want to say that they have to put those games down just to play this game, but it's important for kids to play "miCoach" for 20 to 30 minutes to help get in shape. A lot of kids are like me -- I'm not going to lie, I sit around with my friends and play "Call of Duty" all the time, but we're just sitting around and being lazy. But if you could put it down for just 20 to 30 minutes a day and train, you can get in shape. We have a problem with that in America. And since we can't get the kids outside anymore, since we can't get adults out to a facility, now we're going into their world, the virtual world, to train them....
Jon Robinson: The "miCoach" game doesn't come out until 2012, but I was just wondering, as a fat, married and unmotivated gamer, how are you going to motivate me to get moving?
Dwight Howard: The first thing is believing in yourself and believing that you can go to another level in training. We can always be better and get better. For myself, I want to get stronger. People say I'm too strong, but I still want to get stronger, and when it comes to basketball, I want to become a better player. I want to become a better shooter and a better post-up player, so I keep working out to get better. If you're looking for motivation to get in shape, I'll just tell you to do it for your kids so they can have someone to look up to. If they see their dad training hard to try and get in great shape, they'll want to do it too] emphasis added
http://espn.go.com/espn/thelife/videogames/blog/_/name/thegamer/id/6632739/dwight-howard-talks-micoach-nba-2k12?utm_source=bleacherreport.com&utm_medium=referral
Housing Crash: I Saw It Coming
During the run up in housing prices during the Cheney administration, even a lowly computer aided drafter such as myself knew the bubble would burst.
When an acquaintance bought a "condo" for over $200,000 in a complex where I had previously rented one of the small 1 bedroom apartments, knew that she paid too damn much.
Since recent history of the Savings and Loan crisis of the 80's, also brought to you by greedy bankers, even a dummy like me figured out the market valuations highly aberrant to historical trends.
Unfortunately and predictably the bankers testified before Congress they had no clue.
If you believe that, you can buy from me a slightly used Ponzi Scheme Arena
When an acquaintance bought a "condo" for over $200,000 in a complex where I had previously rented one of the small 1 bedroom apartments, knew that she paid too damn much.
Since recent history of the Savings and Loan crisis of the 80's, also brought to you by greedy bankers, even a dummy like me figured out the market valuations highly aberrant to historical trends.
Unfortunately and predictably the bankers testified before Congress they had no clue.
If you believe that, you can buy from me a slightly used Ponzi Scheme Arena
Governor 48.9% Kills Jobs
Mathematically under the Barnum principle, a portion of those who voted for Governor 48.9% believed Rick Scott when he told them he would not cut jobs or take $ from education.
Suckers.
From laid off teachers to prison guards to Department of Children and Families workers to closing the whole Longwood Elementary School, the budget passed by by FL RepubliKKKans and signed by Governor Burns will cost people's jobs.
A society must have tax breaks for the rich, you know. The 8 BILLION Dollars in taxes cut by JEB! during his occupancy of the office of governor of Florida.
[Gov. Rick Scott calls it his "jobs" budget.
But in reality, the $69 billion state spending plan, which takes effect in July, could force thousands of Floridians into the ranks of the unemployed.
Some 4,500 positions in state government will be eliminated; roughly half of those jobs are open, but half have people in them.
There will be significant layoffs for workers in state mental health hospitals, juvenile justice facilities and prisons. And in many cases those jobs losses could carry a heavier impact in small rural communities such as Chattahoochee or DeSoto County, where the state is a major employer.
With an 8 percent cut in education funding, the new budget will result in the loss of thousands of jobs in schools around the state. For instance, Broward County has announced that 1,400 teachers will be laid off in the coming year...
Among the state workers who will be looking for new jobs in the next few months is Barbara Galloway. She currently earns a little more than $29,000 a year as a social services counselor at a Department of Juvenile Justice correctional facility that houses nearly 300 youths in DeSoto County.
Galloway said the workers have been told that the two units comprising the facility will be closed by the end of August, with hers closing by the end of July.
She said the facility employs about 450 workers and is the county's third-largest employer...] emphasis added
http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20110606/ARTICLE/110609789?tc=ar
Putting FL back to work one layoff at a time.
Suckers.
From laid off teachers to prison guards to Department of Children and Families workers to closing the whole Longwood Elementary School, the budget passed by by FL RepubliKKKans and signed by Governor Burns will cost people's jobs.
A society must have tax breaks for the rich, you know. The 8 BILLION Dollars in taxes cut by JEB! during his occupancy of the office of governor of Florida.
[Gov. Rick Scott calls it his "jobs" budget.
But in reality, the $69 billion state spending plan, which takes effect in July, could force thousands of Floridians into the ranks of the unemployed.
Some 4,500 positions in state government will be eliminated; roughly half of those jobs are open, but half have people in them.
There will be significant layoffs for workers in state mental health hospitals, juvenile justice facilities and prisons. And in many cases those jobs losses could carry a heavier impact in small rural communities such as Chattahoochee or DeSoto County, where the state is a major employer.
With an 8 percent cut in education funding, the new budget will result in the loss of thousands of jobs in schools around the state. For instance, Broward County has announced that 1,400 teachers will be laid off in the coming year...
Among the state workers who will be looking for new jobs in the next few months is Barbara Galloway. She currently earns a little more than $29,000 a year as a social services counselor at a Department of Juvenile Justice correctional facility that houses nearly 300 youths in DeSoto County.
Galloway said the workers have been told that the two units comprising the facility will be closed by the end of August, with hers closing by the end of July.
She said the facility employs about 450 workers and is the county's third-largest employer...] emphasis added
http://www.heraldtribune.com/article/20110606/ARTICLE/110609789?tc=ar
Putting FL back to work one layoff at a time.
Like father like son?
RepubliKKKans Hate God
Oh Lord in Heaven, You have showed me other voices crying out in the wilderness who also read their Bible and listen with their hearts.
'Twere a brave new world when we united and organized and advocated with reason and truth rather than gobs of cash spent on 30 second tv ads to fool the rubes.
Exciting times even if a mite bit scary.
Paul Ryan, put down Ayn Rand and read your Bible.
http://swampland.time.com/2011/06/03/paul-ryans-ayn-rand-problem/?xid=huffpo-direct
'Twere a brave new world when we united and organized and advocated with reason and truth rather than gobs of cash spent on 30 second tv ads to fool the rubes.
Exciting times even if a mite bit scary.
Paul Ryan, put down Ayn Rand and read your Bible.
http://swampland.time.com/2011/06/03/paul-ryans-ayn-rand-problem/?xid=huffpo-direct
Monday, June 6, 2011
RepubliKKKans vs. Jesus
Lord, how can these--wait, self edit, try to dream and think and write positively--RepubliKKKan people cut programs that then lead to people, children, elderly, unfortunate brothers and sisters, dying from government budget cuts?
"Thank you for self editing, Daniel," He replied dryly.
Have tried to change my thinking and not judge, You know, Your whole judge not thing..
"I remember. Of course, you yourself always channel your inner Gandhi."
Sarcasm, Lord. from You?
"C'mon, you remember reading Satyagraha in South Africa
where Gandhi wrote to always consider any person on the opposite side of an issue as acting in what they perceive as the good of humanity."
Sure, but...
"Before you judge them, ask yourself if have ever acted in your pure selfishness, stupidity, chosen ignorance, or even baser motives?"
But I believe them, at the very best, self deluded fools if not outright hypocrites.
"You've never acted or spoken hypocritically?" He asked with a raised eyebrow.
Sure, but...
"No buts about it, son; if you judge others then I must judge you."
OK, can I still call Rick Scott governor 48.9%?
"Well, the official tally worked out to that. Just use your sarcasm judiciously."
But that amounts to perhaps the greatest gift Y'all have given me.
"Maybe you have more gifts to discover within yourself, Dan."
"Really, just keep on with patience and peace and truth and reason for they remain all we progressives will ever have."
We? Thank You, Lord.
"Thank you for self editing, Daniel," He replied dryly.
Have tried to change my thinking and not judge, You know, Your whole judge not thing..
"I remember. Of course, you yourself always channel your inner Gandhi."
Sarcasm, Lord. from You?
"C'mon, you remember reading Satyagraha in South Africa
where Gandhi wrote to always consider any person on the opposite side of an issue as acting in what they perceive as the good of humanity."Sure, but...
"Before you judge them, ask yourself if have ever acted in your pure selfishness, stupidity, chosen ignorance, or even baser motives?"
But I believe them, at the very best, self deluded fools if not outright hypocrites.
"You've never acted or spoken hypocritically?" He asked with a raised eyebrow.
Sure, but...
"No buts about it, son; if you judge others then I must judge you."
OK, can I still call Rick Scott governor 48.9%?
"Well, the official tally worked out to that. Just use your sarcasm judiciously."
But that amounts to perhaps the greatest gift Y'all have given me.
"Maybe you have more gifts to discover within yourself, Dan."
"Really, just keep on with patience and peace and truth and reason for they remain all we progressives will ever have."
We? Thank You, Lord.
Saving Medicare
http://dccc.org/pages/mac
Obama? Obama? Obama? Sure hope you listen to DCCC and me on this rather than come up with a Biden brokered grand compromise that cuts Medicare.
The problem lies not with me, diasbled for second time in my life but paid into Medicare for 38 years after staring work busing table at age of 15, but with a for profit medical industrial complex which means costs must inexorably rise to create more profits and Cheney administration tax cuts.
Poor Peruvians to Get a Slice of the Pie
"In his victory speech, he [Ollanta Humala, president elect of Peru] promised that poor Peruvians would share the country's mineral wealth and benefit from its impressive economic growth."
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-13651468
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-latin-america-13651468
Festival for Florida Progress
First hand report from festival for the future of FL.
[Dan,
My camera battery was low, so only a few photos are viewable. (See above.)
There were about 2 to 3 thousand people there. Being spread out over a very wide area and tucked in under very large pavilions, it was hard for me to get an actual count. I met five casual buddies from another progressive organization that I belong to. They seemed impressed by the turnout.
In one section of one pavillion, separate tables were set-up for about 25 different organizations. That was pretty impressive. To be able to pick and choose which ones seem most important to you specifically seems reasonable, and expectations seem focused. A few groups seemed dinky and a few of the biggies seemed to have people who were putting in their time in boredom. Interesting mix!
A dozen "sessions" were offered in smaller break-out groups to teach or train people in certain organizing skills. They read better than what they offered. But, there were probably lots of people who felt that they had to begin somewhere...
I'm glad I went simply because noses were counted and I had to see what's what in Orlando/Central Florida regarding organized resistance to right-wing slave-thinking Republican...dominion.]
WFTV, Orlando, FL, reporting.
[Dan,
My camera battery was low, so only a few photos are viewable. (See above.)
There were about 2 to 3 thousand people there. Being spread out over a very wide area and tucked in under very large pavilions, it was hard for me to get an actual count. I met five casual buddies from another progressive organization that I belong to. They seemed impressed by the turnout.
In one section of one pavillion, separate tables were set-up for about 25 different organizations. That was pretty impressive. To be able to pick and choose which ones seem most important to you specifically seems reasonable, and expectations seem focused. A few groups seemed dinky and a few of the biggies seemed to have people who were putting in their time in boredom. Interesting mix!
A dozen "sessions" were offered in smaller break-out groups to teach or train people in certain organizing skills. They read better than what they offered. But, there were probably lots of people who felt that they had to begin somewhere...
I'm glad I went simply because noses were counted and I had to see what's what in Orlando/Central Florida regarding organized resistance to right-wing slave-thinking Republican...dominion.]
WFTV, Orlando, FL, reporting.
Holy Turning Tables Batman: Homeowners foreclose on Bank of America
[The foreclosure nightmare started when Warren and Maureen Nyerges paid cash for a home owned by Bank of American in the Golden Gate Estates. They never had a mortgage whatsoever. But, the bank fouled it up and wound up issuing a foreclosure through their attorney.]
Read more: http://www.winknews.com/Local-Florida/2011-06-03/Tables-Turn-Deputies-and-movers-show-up-at-bank-to-seize-property-for-homeowner-
Sunday, June 5, 2011
"I Feel Good"
Returning to regularly scheduled outrage manana. Did I spell that aright? Seems easier than spelling tomorrow. God bless spell check for telling me to use 1 "m."
Now spell check, about Space Shuttle Endeavour.
Now spell check, about Space Shuttle Endeavour.
Saturday, June 4, 2011
Nowitzki Saves the Universe from Unholy Trinity of Evil
Dirk Nowitzki saves the universe from the unholy trinity of of evil, Queen James and the heatles.
Al Qaeda Gets it and NRA Doesn't
Spare the Second Amendment crap argument. If one bothers to read it, you will see it says nothing about fully, automatic weapons, large capacity magazines which allow lunatics to inflict great harm on bystanders at a political rally, or 50 caliber sniper rifles capable of breaching an airplane cabin at long range.
[By MATTHEW COLE
June 3, 2011
In a new video message released on the internet Friday, American-born al Qaeda spokesman Adam Gadahn calls on Muslims living in America to carry out deadly one-man terrorist acts using fully automatic weapons purchased at gun shows, and to target major institutions and public figures...
He urges Muslims to pursue attacks with whatever is available. "Let's take America as an example. America is absolutely awash with easily obtainable firearms. You can go down to a gun show at the local convention center and come away with a fully automatic assault rifle, without a background check, and most likely without having to show an identification card. So what are you waiting for?"]
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/al-qaeda-video-buy-automatic-weapons-start-shooting/story?id=13704264
Found, ironically enough, at Suburban Guerrilla
[By MATTHEW COLE
June 3, 2011
In a new video message released on the internet Friday, American-born al Qaeda spokesman Adam Gadahn calls on Muslims living in America to carry out deadly one-man terrorist acts using fully automatic weapons purchased at gun shows, and to target major institutions and public figures...
He urges Muslims to pursue attacks with whatever is available. "Let's take America as an example. America is absolutely awash with easily obtainable firearms. You can go down to a gun show at the local convention center and come away with a fully automatic assault rifle, without a background check, and most likely without having to show an identification card. So what are you waiting for?"]
http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/al-qaeda-video-buy-automatic-weapons-start-shooting/story?id=13704264
Found, ironically enough, at Suburban Guerrilla
Rick Scott Kills Babies
A test that only costs $5 to test a drop of blood will no longer receive funding by the state of FL after a stroke of Governor 48.9%'s veto pen.
[For years, {Heather} Smith has been fighting to have Florida add SCID to the list of genetic diseases newborns are tested for and, this year, lawmakers approved a $2 million start-up plan. However, this week Governor Rick Scott vetoed it.
"Heartbreaking, actually made me sick to my stomach," Smith says of her reaction.
Dr. John Sleasman, a USF professor and an immunologist at All Children's Hospital, also finds the veto hard to understand. "I was a little baffled," he says.
Sleasman says the screening not only saves lives but, in the long run, it would also save the state money. He says if SCID is caught early, a bone marrow transplant can cure a baby. The survival rate is very high. But after three months of age, the risks and costs skyrocket. If an infant is on Medicaid, the state can pay a million dollars for treatment and still not save the infant's life.]
http://www.wtsp.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=194308
[For years, {Heather} Smith has been fighting to have Florida add SCID to the list of genetic diseases newborns are tested for and, this year, lawmakers approved a $2 million start-up plan. However, this week Governor Rick Scott vetoed it.
"Heartbreaking, actually made me sick to my stomach," Smith says of her reaction.
Dr. John Sleasman, a USF professor and an immunologist at All Children's Hospital, also finds the veto hard to understand. "I was a little baffled," he says.
Sleasman says the screening not only saves lives but, in the long run, it would also save the state money. He says if SCID is caught early, a bone marrow transplant can cure a baby. The survival rate is very high. But after three months of age, the risks and costs skyrocket. If an infant is on Medicaid, the state can pay a million dollars for treatment and still not save the infant's life.]
http://www.wtsp.com/news/local/story.aspx?storyid=194308
Toomer's for Tuscaloosa
Toomer's for Tuscaloosa
REPOST: Allison Boyd
NEEDS VOLUNTEERS FOR THE VBS SPORTS CAMP FOR TORNADO VICTIM KIDS IN TUSCALOOSA, AL JUNE 14-17. free place to stay and meal arrangements. please contact me for more information! If you cannot directly volunteer, we are still in need of supplies for the VBS sports camp as well. Email me Allison Boyd ak2178@yahoo.com for more details.
http://www.facebook.com/toomersfortuscaloosa
REPOST: Allison Boyd
NEEDS VOLUNTEERS FOR THE VBS SPORTS CAMP FOR TORNADO VICTIM KIDS IN TUSCALOOSA, AL JUNE 14-17. free place to stay and meal arrangements. please contact me for more information! If you cannot directly volunteer, we are still in need of supplies for the VBS sports camp as well. Email me Allison Boyd ak2178@yahoo.com for more details.
http://www.facebook.com/toomersfortuscaloosa
Friday, June 3, 2011
Grateful Dead: "Playing in the Band"
If a man among you
has no sin upon his hand
then cast a stone at me
for playing in the band
Full of hope and grace is the human face: http://youtu.be/H5ZvNvY3Rpw
has no sin upon his hand
then cast a stone at me
for playing in the band
Full of hope and grace is the human face: http://youtu.be/H5ZvNvY3Rpw
The Bible According to Jim Tressel: Scripture in the am, cheating kids after noon.
[...a story that has long circulated among college coaches and was confirmed to SI by a former colleague of Tressel's from Earle Bruce's staff at Ohio State in the mid-1980s. One of Tressel's duties then was to organize and run the Buckeyes' summer camp. Most of the young players who attended it would never play college football, but a few were top prospects whom Ohio State was recruiting. At the end of camp, attendees bought tickets to a raffle with prizes such as cleats and a jersey. According to his fellow assistant, Tressel rigged the raffle so that the elite prospects won -- a potential violation of NCAA rules. Says the former colleague, who asked not to be identified because he still has ties to the Ohio State community, "In the morning he would read the Bible with another coach. Then, in the afternoon, he would go out and cheat kids who had probably saved up money from mowing lawns to buy those raffle tickets. That's Jim Tressel."]
Read more: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/magazine/05/30/jim.tressel/index.html#ixzz1OE9x4peV
Read more: http://sportsillustrated.cnn.com/2011/magazine/05/30/jim.tressel/index.html#ixzz1OE9x4peV
Dr, Kevorkian Dead at 83: He wanted to live long enough to commit suicide
[Dr. Jack Kevorkian has died at the age of 83, according the Detroit Free Press, who spoke with his lawyer.
Kevorkian died at Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, where he had been hospitalized for about two weeks with kidney and heart problems, attorney Mayer Morganroth told the newspaper.]
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/nationworld/sns-cnn-jack-kervorkian-dead,0,1142188.story
Kevorkian died at Beaumont Hospital in Royal Oak, where he had been hospitalized for about two weeks with kidney and heart problems, attorney Mayer Morganroth told the newspaper.]
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/nationworld/sns-cnn-jack-kervorkian-dead,0,1142188.story
Thursday, June 2, 2011
Wednesday, June 1, 2011
Mahavishnu Orchestra: "Hope" and "Celestial Terrestrial Commuter"
Sorry to mock, Mr. Camping, for ever' human drew adult breath wanted and wants to live forever or until we go to whatever celestial home we wish or gots raised up to believe.
Please any bored or lost on the intertubes person that reads this forgive me my belief and unbelief in my own personal Jesus, not perhaps the Jay-Jay-Jay-Jesus of TV preacher fame but the One who told the parable of the sheep and goats right before the Last Supper and passion and resurrection in the Gospels and daily asks me to examine my thoughts, words, actions, and even grammar and spelling
Gots vinyl in my closet from Mahavishnu Orchestra with something about thin thread between nothing and eternity which amounts to all individual conscience can ever pray to grok.
For me, just trying to make the world better for my nieces and nephews and their progeny--and, girls, do please wait for boys and men lie, and your knight in shining armor remains just a man.
Every day a blessing; every breath a prayer.
Please any bored or lost on the intertubes person that reads this forgive me my belief and unbelief in my own personal Jesus, not perhaps the Jay-Jay-Jay-Jesus of TV preacher fame but the One who told the parable of the sheep and goats right before the Last Supper and passion and resurrection in the Gospels and daily asks me to examine my thoughts, words, actions, and even grammar and spelling
Gots vinyl in my closet from Mahavishnu Orchestra with something about thin thread between nothing and eternity which amounts to all individual conscience can ever pray to grok.
For me, just trying to make the world better for my nieces and nephews and their progeny--and, girls, do please wait for boys and men lie, and your knight in shining armor remains just a man.
Every day a blessing; every breath a prayer.
Feelin' a Bit Brit' Today; Can y'all feel it?
The Kinks, "Victoria"
"I was born, lucky me,
in a land I love
I'm poor but I'm free"
The Kinks, "Village Green Preservation Society"
[We are the Village Green Preservation Society
God save Donald Duck, Vaudeville and Variety
We are the Desperate Dan Appreciation Society
God save strawberry jam and all the different varieties
Preserving the old ways from being abused
Protecting the new ways for me and for you
What more can we do
We are the Draught Beer Preservation Society
God save Mrs. Mopp and good Old Mother Riley
We are the Custard Pie Appreciation Consortium
God save the George Cross and all those who were awarded them
We are the Sherlock Holmes English Speaking Vernacular
Help save Fu Manchu, Moriarty and Dracula
We are the Office Block Persecution Affinity
God save little shops, china cups and virginity
We are the Skyscraper Condemnation Affiliate
God save tudor houses, antique tables and billiards
Preserving the old ways from being abused
Protecting the new ways for me and for you
What more can we do
God save the Village Green.]
"I was born, lucky me,
in a land I love
I'm poor but I'm free"
The Kinks, "Village Green Preservation Society"
[We are the Village Green Preservation Society
God save Donald Duck, Vaudeville and Variety
We are the Desperate Dan Appreciation Society
God save strawberry jam and all the different varieties
Preserving the old ways from being abused
Protecting the new ways for me and for you
What more can we do
We are the Draught Beer Preservation Society
God save Mrs. Mopp and good Old Mother Riley
We are the Custard Pie Appreciation Consortium
God save the George Cross and all those who were awarded them
We are the Sherlock Holmes English Speaking Vernacular
Help save Fu Manchu, Moriarty and Dracula
We are the Office Block Persecution Affinity
God save little shops, china cups and virginity
We are the Skyscraper Condemnation Affiliate
God save tudor houses, antique tables and billiards
Preserving the old ways from being abused
Protecting the new ways for me and for you
What more can we do
God save the Village Green.]
The Eccentric Earl, Michael Onslow, RIP
Michael William Coplestone Dillon Onslow: [It is a measure both of Michael Onslow's courage and tireless sense of duty that within weeks of his death from cancer he was still active in the Lords; his last speech was made only three weeks before he died. Paradoxically, although he served it well, he thought the House of Lords was well past its sell-by date...
The stories about Onslow are legion and, more surprisingly, most are true. He did pursue a bullock down the A3 on horseback and he also acquired an authentically Roman stone testicleto put under his wife's pillow. He inherited the earldom and the family estate in 1971 and confessed himself only too glad that Clandon, the family pile, had passed into the hands of the National Trust: the family had been "slaves to the servants". He was quite content to farm the 800 acres left to him and to attend the House of Lords. He sat loosely to the Conservative cause, once memorably telling the Daily Telegraph that he did not know what Tory policy was "on virtually anything", adding, "And I'd probably disagree with it if I did."
He had a dry wit and a trenchant turn of phrase. Taxed with being liberal on homosexuality on the television programme Have I Got News for You, he remarked that it was fine if the boys got together, less good if the gym master gets involved. Most of what he had to say concealed, robust common sense behind a slightly whimsical way of voicing it. Attacking apartheid, for example, he pointed out that "in Egypt the man in a mud hat on the Nile can dream of being a fat cat, but there is no such dream for a black South African – he cannot aspire to being white."
Michael William Coplestone Dillon Onslow was born on 28 February 1938, the eldest son of the 6th Earl, who had been a more orthodox Conservative, serving as deputy Chief Whip in the House of Lords in the Churchill, Eden and Macmillan administrations. ..
..{A}ny House which has me in it really needs to have its head examined." ...He thought it wrong that he had power over fellow citizens because his forebear had got tight with the Prince Regent, but he was against sending the peers packing when there was no agreement on what was to be put in their place. "If the Government is going to play 'silly monkeys' I'm going to behave like a football hooligan and bitch things up", he said...
{H} claimed, in a Guardian article, "to be a pustule on the rump of the body politic to remind Mr Blair of unfinished business."
Although he could be very funny about his ancestry – the Earldom had been a bribe to secure a previous Onslow's support for the Act of Union with Ireland, his earlier ancestors had been cattle thieves – membership of the House of Lords gave Onslow the confidence to express his views and a platform from which to air them. Beneath the charm and the somewhat raffish appearance lay a good deal of shrewdness and the occasional hint of steel. He could be deeply serious about things that mattered. "My father started his war service in Egypt in 1941 aged 28 and ended it in 1944 when he was captured at the Battle of Villers-Bocage. He had 13 tanks blown up underneath him in that time. I do not think that he ever went to bed sober," he told the Lords when discussing stress in battle. "He died extremely young, at the age of 57. Sometimes I worry and ask myself whether I began to understand him, and the answer is no, I did not..."
Pursuing somewhat Whiggish views, he was critical of racism in the police and army, and he sided with the farm workers' union when he condemned rogue employers who ousted them from their "tied cottages" and promptly sold them on for a large sum as second homes. He argued that Ian Smith's actions in Rhodesia were tantamount to treason.
If at times he took an unfashionable line, it was never without a great deal of knowledge. He fought the Thatcher government's Wild Life and Countryside Bill with a passionate seriousness that left little room for wit...
He attended the House almost to the end, confined to a wheelchair and suffering from cancer. But it did not prevent him from speaking his mind. His final speech was devoted to savaging the Coalition Government's attempt to impose fixed-term parliaments. Suggesting that it had gone "completely doolally over constitutional change", he added that in three decades in the House he had regarded himself as a disloyal Conservative – "and I will go on being a disloyal Conservative. If they are doing something that I believe is as fundamentally wrong as this, I will say so." There could be no better epitaph.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/the-earl-of-onslow-colourful-hereditary-peer-who-advocated-reform-of-the-house-of-lords-2291366.html
The stories about Onslow are legion and, more surprisingly, most are true. He did pursue a bullock down the A3 on horseback and he also acquired an authentically Roman stone testicleto put under his wife's pillow. He inherited the earldom and the family estate in 1971 and confessed himself only too glad that Clandon, the family pile, had passed into the hands of the National Trust: the family had been "slaves to the servants". He was quite content to farm the 800 acres left to him and to attend the House of Lords. He sat loosely to the Conservative cause, once memorably telling the Daily Telegraph that he did not know what Tory policy was "on virtually anything", adding, "And I'd probably disagree with it if I did."
He had a dry wit and a trenchant turn of phrase. Taxed with being liberal on homosexuality on the television programme Have I Got News for You, he remarked that it was fine if the boys got together, less good if the gym master gets involved. Most of what he had to say concealed, robust common sense behind a slightly whimsical way of voicing it. Attacking apartheid, for example, he pointed out that "in Egypt the man in a mud hat on the Nile can dream of being a fat cat, but there is no such dream for a black South African – he cannot aspire to being white."
Michael William Coplestone Dillon Onslow was born on 28 February 1938, the eldest son of the 6th Earl, who had been a more orthodox Conservative, serving as deputy Chief Whip in the House of Lords in the Churchill, Eden and Macmillan administrations. ..
..{A}ny House which has me in it really needs to have its head examined." ...He thought it wrong that he had power over fellow citizens because his forebear had got tight with the Prince Regent, but he was against sending the peers packing when there was no agreement on what was to be put in their place. "If the Government is going to play 'silly monkeys' I'm going to behave like a football hooligan and bitch things up", he said...
{H} claimed, in a Guardian article, "to be a pustule on the rump of the body politic to remind Mr Blair of unfinished business."
Although he could be very funny about his ancestry – the Earldom had been a bribe to secure a previous Onslow's support for the Act of Union with Ireland, his earlier ancestors had been cattle thieves – membership of the House of Lords gave Onslow the confidence to express his views and a platform from which to air them. Beneath the charm and the somewhat raffish appearance lay a good deal of shrewdness and the occasional hint of steel. He could be deeply serious about things that mattered. "My father started his war service in Egypt in 1941 aged 28 and ended it in 1944 when he was captured at the Battle of Villers-Bocage. He had 13 tanks blown up underneath him in that time. I do not think that he ever went to bed sober," he told the Lords when discussing stress in battle. "He died extremely young, at the age of 57. Sometimes I worry and ask myself whether I began to understand him, and the answer is no, I did not..."
Pursuing somewhat Whiggish views, he was critical of racism in the police and army, and he sided with the farm workers' union when he condemned rogue employers who ousted them from their "tied cottages" and promptly sold them on for a large sum as second homes. He argued that Ian Smith's actions in Rhodesia were tantamount to treason.
If at times he took an unfashionable line, it was never without a great deal of knowledge. He fought the Thatcher government's Wild Life and Countryside Bill with a passionate seriousness that left little room for wit...
He attended the House almost to the end, confined to a wheelchair and suffering from cancer. But it did not prevent him from speaking his mind. His final speech was devoted to savaging the Coalition Government's attempt to impose fixed-term parliaments. Suggesting that it had gone "completely doolally over constitutional change", he added that in three decades in the House he had regarded himself as a disloyal Conservative – "and I will go on being a disloyal Conservative. If they are doing something that I believe is as fundamentally wrong as this, I will say so." There could be no better epitaph.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/the-earl-of-onslow-colourful-hereditary-peer-who-advocated-reform-of-the-house-of-lords-2291366.html
Top 10 Pieces of Marriage Advice for Prince William.
- You ain't Henry the 8th. If you divorce her, she gets half of your jewels.
- In the long run, communication counts so shut your bloody mouth.
- You are never right and she is never wrong..
- Never, ever,under any circumstances, win an argument because you will pay in the long run.
- Take off the bloody Beefeater bonnet. Role playing can be fun but that hat gets old fast.
- If you have to be late for supper because of invading France, always call first.
- If she says she just wants a card and single rose for Valentine's Day, also get her jewelry
- No strippers, hookers, or chambermaids. Just think of losing your jewels and just say no.
- If a child has your dad's ears, get an ear reduction immediately.
- Every once in a while, you got to shut up, pretend Kate your mother and do what she says.
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