Christ's Concern for Humans

"Christianity is being concerned about your fellow [human], not building a million-dollar church while people are starving right around the corner. Christ was a revolutionary person, out there where it was happening. That's what God is all about, and that's where I get my strength."

- Fannie Lou Hammer 

From Sojourners daily verse and voice.

Woman Sets Man's Crotch on Fire, Literally

[FORT LAUDERDALE —
Only the couple knows how the argument started, but deputies say they know how it ended: The woman set the man's pants on fire.

Fortunately, Sheldon Gonzales wasn't hurt, according to the Broward Sheriff's Office.

But Berlinda Faye Dixon-Newbold is feeling the heat. She's been charged with aggravated assault with intent to commit a felony.

On Tuesday night, Dixon-Newbold, 38, approached her beau, who was sleeping on a couch, and used a lighter to set a small fire at the bottom of his shirt, over the crotch area of his pants, according to a sheriff's report.]
http://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/local/breakingnews/fl-pants-on-fire-brf-20101216,0,5971906.story

"Thousands on HIV drugs desperate amid budget woes"

[PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) -- Cash-strapped states are cutting back on a program that provides free medicine to people with HIV, leaving thousands of patients to wonder where their drugs will come from and stirring fears of a return to the days when an AIDS diagnosis meant certain death.

At least 19 states have taken such steps as capping enrollment, dropping patients, instituting waiting lists, lowering the income ceiling for eligibility, and no longer covering certain drugs or tests.

The AIDS Drug Assistance Program is funded by the federal and state governments and run by the states. It provides free drugs in all 50 states and U.S. territories. But because people are living longer with HIV and the recession has created more demand for the program, states have been unable to keep up...

In nine states, more than 4,500 people with HIV are on ADAP waiting lists or can't get into the program because enrollment is capped, according to the National Alliance of State and Territorial AIDS Directors.

More than 300 people who had coverage were dropped this year, after five states lowered their income eligibility limits to as little as $21,000 per year. Hundreds more face the same fate by February if more states follow through on plans to cut their eligibility, the alliance said.]
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_AIDS_DRUG_FUNDING_FLOL-?SITE=FLPET&SECTION=HOME

Bitchin' Kitchen; "I'm Never Drinking Like that Again"

"The liberal backlash that isn't"

[As one prominent liberal after another cried "betrayal!" over President Obama's tax cut deal last week, I cautioned against reading too much into it: One of the most underappreciated stories of Obama's tenure has been the consistent disconnect between elite liberal opinion about the president and the view of rank-and-file liberals.

That point is more evident than ever today, with the release of a new Washington Post/ABC News poll -- conducted late last week and over the weekend, as the supposed liberal backlash against the deal was at its peak -- that shows Obama's approval rating with liberal Democrats sitting at 87 percent. That's essentially where it's been all year; it represents a statistically microscopic decline from where he stood with liberal Democrats in the last WaPo/ABC survey, taken about six weeks ago. Among all Democrats, Obama's approval rating in the new survey sits at 79 percent -- again, pretty much exactly where it's been all year. As has been the case throughout his presidency, Obama's problem among Democrats -- to the extent he has one at all -- is with self-described moderates and conservatives in the party.]

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/war_room/2010/12/15/obama_liberal_backlash/index.html

The Palin that Couldn't Shoot Straight

[She {Sarah Palin} no doubt expected a backlash from the lily-livered animal rights lobby, but when Sarah Palin bundled a TV crew into the back of a truck and ventured forth into the wilds of Alaska to shoot caribou, the very last people she expected to annoy were the members of America's hunting community.

That, however, is exactly what has come to pass after the self-styled "Mamma Grizzly" allowed her weekend-long trip to the Arctic tundra to be beamed into the nation's living rooms. Not only did this week's show portray field-sports in an ugly light, say critics; it also fuelled scepticism about whether she actually knows one end of a rifle from another.

Ms Palin took no fewer than five shots to hit the beast which wandered on to the hillside where she was eating blueberries with her 72-year-old father, Chuck Snr. However it was her lousy field-craft, rather than wonky shooting, which raised the most questions about whether she really ought to call herself a "lifelong hunter".

The Conservative blogosphere, usually a forum for cheerleading on behalf the Palin cause, was awash yesterday with suggestions that her outdoorsy image is an elaborate charade.

"I turned on Sarah Palin's Alaska and she just shot four maybe even five times at a caribou and missed," noted a typical comment on the Fox News host Sean Hannity's website. "Needless to say I'm not impressed with her ability to handle a firearm let alone aim it and hit."

Among the basic items of protocol blithely ignored by Palin as she set off into the wilderness in a Rambo-style headband was her failure to take practice shots, or check the sights of the rifle, which duly turned out to be off-kilter. She failed to carry her own weapon, relying on her elderly father and his companion, Steve, to lug it around. When a beast eventually wandered into range, Ms Palin left Chuck Snr to load the rifle, and discharge spent bullet casings.

"What a joke," wrote one viewer on Palin's Facebook page. "I was a fan before the show. No one who is a true hunter lets others carry their rifle or can't load their own shells. Sarah, you are a phony."]  emphases added

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/hunter-becomes-the-hunted-as-palin-critics-say-she-cant-shoot-2153973.html





















The Gang That Couldn't Shoot Straight

Mapping America Block by Block

http://projects.nytimes.com/census/2010/explorer?hp

Microsoft Fixes 40 Flaws

[Computerworld - Microsoft today patched 40 vulnerabilities in Windows, Internet Explorer (IE), Office, SharePoint and Exchange, including nine pegged "critical."

Five of the 17 security updates -- Microsoft calls them "bulletins" -- fixed long-standing flaws that could be used by attackers to plant malware on a PC by tricking Windows into thinking a malicious DLL (dynamic link library) was actually a legitimate part of the OS.

Only two of the 17 updates were judged critical, Microsoft's top-most threat ranking in its four-step scoring system. Another 14 were marked "important," the second-highest rating, while the remaining update was labeled "moderate."]
http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9201194/Microsoft_s_holiday_bonus_Fixes_for_40_flaws

Even novice users can run Windows Updates, types guy who tried to make them automatic but still has to do it manually.

Simply click on Windows icon at bottom left, then settings, then control panel, and Updates under Security.

Dad, run 'em; 'tain't too hard

Digital Story of the Nativity: ROFLMAO

Hottest! Pepper!! EVER!!!

[That title {hottest pepper in the world} had been held until just recently by the bhut jolokia, or "ghost chile," which is grown in India.

But the pepper industry was shaken up this month when it was announced that a British chile farmer, Gerald Fowler, crossbred three of the hottest known peppers -- the bhut jolokia, naga morich and Trinidad scorpion -- to create the Naga Viper.

A regular jalapeño measures 2,500 to 8,000 on the Scoville scale, which measures a pepper's heat. The bhut jolokia earned the title of world's hottest pepper at 1,001,304 Scoville units.

The Naga Viper eclipses that, measuring 1,359,000 on the scale, according to researchers at the Warwick University in England.

"I'm sure the pepper is going to be hot," said Walley, who grows about 350 pepper plants in his west Fort Worth back yard. "My favorites are the super-hots. You have to be careful handling them."

Naga Viper

Fowler, of The Chilli Pepper Co., grew the Naga Viper in a greenhouse surrounded by snow in Cumbria, a small county in England.

Fowler posted a note on his website about how he has spent the past two years -- a relatively short time in pepper growth -- working to create this fiery chile, which he describes as "something really special."

"It's painful to eat," Fowler has said. "It numbs your tongue, then burns all the way down. It can last an hour, and you just don't want to talk to anyone or do anything. But it makes you feel great.

"It's hot enough to strip paint."

He believes that the cold England weather may have helped his peppers become even hotter. "When they're grown over here I think they fight back against the harsher climate and produce even more.]

Read more: http://www.star-telegram.com/2010/12/12/2699053/pepper-grower-craves-hottest-chile.html#ixzz18Cz6gznu

13 December, Geminid Meteor Shower and Lunar Eclipse 29 December

[On the evening of 13 and the morning of 14 December, skywatchers across the northern hemisphere will be looking up as the Geminid meteor shower reaches its peak, in one of the best night sky events of the year...


The last total lunar eclipse occurred on Feb. 20, 2008. While there are two total lunar eclipses in 2011, North American skywatchers will have to wait until April 2014 for one as potentially spectacular as the eclipse occurring this month.

For the Western Hemisphere, the eclipse will begin on Dec. 21 at 12:29 a.m. EST (9:29 p.m. PST on Dec. 20) as the moon begins to enter Earth's outer, or penumbral, shadow.  This total lunar eclipse lasts only 72 minutes from start to finish.

Skywatchers will not notice any changes in the moon's appearance until about 45 minutes into the event, when a slight "smudge," or shading, begins to become evident on the upper left portion of the moon's disk.]
http://www.dailygalaxy.com/my_weblog/2010/12/-cosmos-alert-spectacular-meteor-shower-and-total-lunar-eclipse-to-dazzle-december-sky-.html#more

Cheese in Spa-a-a-a-a-a-ace

[If you were launching a spacecraft on a historic voyage, what would you choose as your secret payload? For SpaceX of Hawthorne California, it was this wheel of Le Brouere cheese. The firm launched its Dragon Capsule into low earth orbit on Wednesday and landed it safely - a first for a commercial company - bringing the cheese back to Earth in one piece.

The cheese was stashed in a payload secretly bolted to the spacecraft's floor. You may well ask why, and it turns out to be a tribute to a Monty Python sketch - presumably the one in which John Cleese attempts to buy cheese from a cheese shop that, it transpires, has no cheese.]
http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2010/12/space-matured-cheese.html

Pigs in Space: The End of the Universe and Meaning and Purpose of Life



Pigs Space and Star Wars:

Magic Men Playing LA Clippers Tonight, 11 December

Some pics of the Ponzi Scheme Center in Orlando:

Aretha: "Think (Freedom)"

Reminded by Will Bunch on Attytood of her transcendent career and current pancreatic cancer.  God Bless you, Queen of Soul.

God Bless.

What Would Jesus Buy? True Religion Eau De Toilette?

Oh goody, now I don't have to worry on working on becoming a christian or whether to follow Allah or Buddha, we all can buy True Religion in a bottle.  Available at Dillard's for dullards.

3.4 oz for $79.00

http://www.dillards.com/webapp/wcs/stores/servlet/ProductDisplay?catalogId=301&langId=-1&storeId=301&productId=502553533&Ntk=all&Nty=1&Ntt=03398074&N=1000301&search.x=24&search.y=8&R=03482131

Anarchy in the UK 2010

[The Prince of Wales and his wife Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, reacted with shock as their car was attacked by rampaging students during last night's tuition fees protest in London.

Angry demonstrators targeted the couple as they were driven along Regent Street towards the London Palladium for the annual Royal Variety Performance. Charles and Camilla were seen joking in the foyer with acts including Take That, Kylie Minogue and N-Dubz. Their Rolls-Royce limousine, which had cracked windows and a large white paint stain on a rear panel, was left parked outside.

A witness said the vehicle became separated from its police escort near Oxford Circus and was surrounded by protesters leaving Trafalgar Square. Bottles and dustbins thrown by the crowd struck the limo, and another car carrying members of the royal staff had its windows smashed.]

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/royal-couples-shock-as-students-attack-their-car-2156012.html

Anarchy in the UK--Sex Pistols

On the Other Hand, RepubliKKKans Block Care for US Heroes

At long last RepubliKKKans, have you no decency nor shame?

[Republican senators blocked Democratic legislation on Thursday that sought to provide medical care to rescue workers and others who became ill as a result of breathing in toxic fumes, dust and smoke at the site of the 9/11 World Trade Center attack.

The 9/11 health bill, a version of which was approved by the House of Representatives in September, was among several initiatives that Senate Democrats had hoped to approve before the close of the 111th Congress. Supporters believe this was their last real opportunity to have the bill passed.

The action by the Senate created huge uncertainty over the bill’s future. Its proponents were working on Thursday to salvage the legislation, with one possibility being to have it inserted into a large tax-cut bill that Republicans and Democrats are trying to pass before Congress ends its current session.

But such a move seemed unlikely, since it might complicate passage of the tax package, which includes another provision that Democrats, including President Obama, sought in return for supporting the extension of tax cuts for all income levels that Republicans wanted: a continuation of unemployment benefits for jobless Americans.

In a vote largely along party lines, the Senate rejected a procedural move by Democrats to end debate on the 9/11 health bill and to bring it to a vote; 60 yes votes were needed, but the move received only 57, with 42 votes against.]  emphases added
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/12/10/nyregion/10health.html?_r=2&hp

Silly citizens, Democracy in the US Senate means you need a 60% vote to get even a potty break, much a major piece of legislation to help heroes' health.

"Screw the Middle Class" Sayeth Spiteful Progressive Sloggers

[The above quote is from Jason Leopold a popular member of the liberal online movement — a group of people whose defining feature appears to be an endless, wrenching disgust with presidents of their own party — waging what turned into mwith Shoq, also a liberal, but one who doesn’t wake up every morning consumed with near birther-level rage at Barack Obama.

For folks like Leopold, and Jane Hamsher, and Glenn Greenwald, and the new front-line defender of all things pissed off, Adam Green of PCCC, President Obama will never be liberal enough, and the only thing that matters is that the president provide sufficient amounts of Anger Theater to make the base feel it. Well it turns out, governing is a lot harder than blogging, and sometimes, a president has got to have someplace to send the prisoners before he can close Gitmo, if you know what I mean.

The tax cut compromise has offered the left a perfect opportunity to replace the PUMAs (“party unity my ass” Democrats who wanted Hillary or bust) with COMAs — whose mantra is “compromise, my ass” — and for whom any deal cut with the bad guys is no deal at all. So even if it means every single middle class American’s taxes go up, and the unemployed go over the cliff this Christmas, all that matters is that the president “fought.” In Leopold et.al.’s world, the president should have actually allowed taxes to rise for Americans who are just fighting to stay afloat in this crappy economy, and somehow, after two years of what they themselves say has been failed White House communications (and Jesus, it has been bad…) found a way to convince Americans that the big dip in their paychecks in January is the GOP’s fault.

Good luck with that.] emphasis added

http://blog.reidreport.com/2010/12/why-we-lose-the-lefts-screw-the-middle-class-obama-rage/

Operation In Their Boots

[Operation In Their Boots (OITB) is a unique filmmaking fellowship in which Brave New Foundation commissions five veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan to produce and direct their own documentary films.]  http://www.intheirboots.com/itb/operation-in-their-boots/about-oitb.html


intheirboots.com