1/ I know some of you think I'm crazy, raving on and on about climate change, but it's here and it's real.
This story from the Times is about the drought affecting California and the West, and because the winter snow so far has been only 20% of normal there is a crisis coming this summer as there are no water reserves. There will be choices - to keep the available water flowing to the cities means there will be no irrigation for the farmers who grow a lot of the country's produce, so this summer there could be shortages and/or much higher prices for vegetables.
You may also note this story has no mention of climate change.......I guess the Times doesn't want to alarm folks.....
Severe Drought Grows Worse in California
By NORIMITSU ONISHI and MALIA WOLLANJAN. 17, 2014
NORDEN, Calif. — Cattle ranchers have had to sell portions of their herd for lack of water. Sacramento and other municipalities have imposed severe water restrictions. Wildfires broke out this week in forests that are usually too wet to ignite. Ski resorts that normally open in December are still closed; at one here in the Sierra Nevada that is open, a bear wandered onto a slope full of skiers last week, apparently not hibernating because of the balmy weather.
On Friday, Gov. Jerry Brown made it official: California is suffering from a drought, perhaps one for the record books. The water shortage has Californians trying to deal with problems that usually arise in midsummer.
With little snow in the forecast, experts are warning that this drought, after one of the driest years on record last year, could be as disruptive as the severe droughts of the 1970s.
Under state law, that would allow the governor to “waive laws or regulations and expedite some funding,” said Jeanine Jones, deputy drought manager for the State Department of Water Resources. “It does not create a new large pot of money for drought response or make federal funding available.”
2/ One of the puzzles we have is why the lower middle class and the working poor in Red states consistently vote for Republicans who merrily proceed to enact policies that screw the people who keep voting them in......the common wisdom is that the right wing expertly use social issues like abortion, gays and welfare queens to manipulate these voters, but Robert Reich in a very good article offers another perspective - they use economic fear as well.
"If the gumment regulates our businesses, we'll close down the plant and you will all lose your jobs".....so you end up with debacles like the West Virginia water spill........
Last week’s massive spill of the toxic chemical MCHM into West Virginia’s Elk River illustrates another benefit to the business class of high unemployment, economic insecurity, and a safety-net shot through with holes. Not only are employees eager to accept whatever job they can get. They are also also unwilling to demand healthy and safe environments.
The spill was the region’s third major chemical accident in five years, coming after two investigations by the federal Chemical Safety Board in the Kanawha Valley, also known as “Chemical Valley,” and repeated recommendations from federal regulators and environmental advocates that the state embrace tougher rules to better safeguard chemicals.
No action was ever taken. State and local officials turned a deaf ear. The storage tank that leaked, owned by Freedom Industries, hadn’t been inspected for decades.
But nobody complained.
Not even now, with the toxins moving down river toward Cincinnati, can the residents of Charleston and the surrounding area be sure their drinking water is safe — partly because the government’s calculation for safe levels is based on a single study by the manufacturer of the toxic chemical, which was never published, and partly because the West Virginia American Water Company, which supplies the drinking water, is a for-profit corporation that may not want to highlight any lingering danger.
The answer isn’t hard to find. As Maya Nye, president of People Concerned About Chemical Safety, a citizen’s group formed after a 2008 explosion and fire killed workers at West Virginia’s Bayer CropScience plant in the state, explained to the New York Times: “We are so desperate for jobs in West Virginia we don’t want to do anything that pushes industry out.”
3/ It's a big weekend for pro football, and of course the Superbowl will be on us in two weeks, so it was amusing to watch how a British sports commentator who usually does rugby could look at a football game.....
The title says NFL, but the game is a college one..... it's still funny....two minutes.....
Anthony Richardson, "Britain's premier sports commentator" according to his YouTube page, takes on America's NFL football in his latest video... or, well, what he thinks is NFL football. It's actually last year's BCS championship match between the University of Alabama and Notre Dame ("Wow, a French team! Good luck to them.")
Mistakes aside, Richardson's enthusiastic commentary kind of makes any sporting event even better. Perhaps he should start streaming a live MST3K-style commentary for big events.
4/ Texting - the new scourge of the roads - some of you may remember the Australian anti drunk driving film from TAC ["Everybody Hurts" was the soundtrack], but this clip from the Welsh police is just as well made and shows what can happen if you text and drive.
It should be shown to every teenager..... especially here in the US!
Very powerful, and some graphic images......four minutes.......
5/ Roger Ailes is the genius behind Fox News, and there is a new biography out about his life and achievements that is a little too accurate for Ailes, and is using all of the right wing media to attack the book......
Roger Ailes’s Permanent Pushback Campaign
JAN. 12, 2014
Roger Ailes, the chairman of Fox News Channel, has little left to accomplish in a remarkable television career. He has made billions for his owners, created an entirely new genre of TV and, in doing so, he has changed the way politics is conducted. His business legacy is secure.
Besides, there are only two audiences that would seem to matter to him — Rupert Murdoch and Fox News viewers — and neither could give a rip what “The Loudest Voice in the Room,” an unauthorized biography of Mr. Ailes by Gabriel Sherman that goes on sale Tuesday, says about their guy.
So why is the consummate P.R. pro, the man who taught both Richard Nixon and Bill O’Reilly to connect with the masses despite their flaws, pushing back on the book and blowing air into it in the process? It would be a very simple matter for Mr. Ailes to tuck in behind Gov. Chris Christie, another Republican accused of being a bully, and let Mr. Sherman sell his own books.
Some of it is reflex, part of the permanent campaign that Mr. Ailes, a former political consultant, has been running all his life. I’ve dealt with Mr. Ailes while covering the news media, and beyond his charms and smarts, he is animated by a belief that just about everyone would like to see him laid low. Even as he has vanquished his opponents, he clings to the role of aggrieved underdog, and Mr. Sherman’s critical book reinforces that worldview.
To those of us who have reported on Fox News, Mr. Sherman’s portrayal of the operation — with its loyalty tests, its culture of fear and reprisals, and its deep involvement in stories it was supposed to be covering — is hardly shocking. But it is not a pretty picture, and Mr. Ailes must know that. He has been calling around to some of the people who show up in the book to apologize and spin, saying Mr. Sherman used accounts of disgruntled ex-employees to distort events.
Allies of Mr. Ailes initiated counter-ops against the book almost as soon as Mr. Sherman began reporting nearly three years ago, with tweets, blog posts and blind items impugning his motives and work. As a career control freak, Mr. Ailes, 73, can’t abide losing custody of his own narrative.
6/ Jimmy Fallon dresses up like Bruce Springsteen and sings a new song dedicated to Governor Chris Christie, but halfway through he's joined by a surprise [?] guest.....
This is a very good three minutes, and note how well Fallon sings.
Not to get too heavy, but "The Boss" is huge in New Jersey and it's a real blow to Christie to have him do this song.....
7/ Of course Fox News is busy defending Chris Christie, and Jon Stewart makes mincemeat of their pathetic arguments in two wonderful minutes.....
(Credit: screen shot, Comedy Central)
What’s there to say in response to Brit Hume of Fox News’ contention that Chris Christie is reeling because of America’s “feminized” culture?
Jon Stewart’s probably got the right idea — unabashed ridicule.
On “The Daily Show” on Tuesday, Stewart set his sights on Hume and Bill O’Reilly’s belief that New Jersey Governor Chris Christie wasn’t a thug or a bully, as some have claimed, but rather a “guy’s guy” who was suffering for being an unapologetic champion of that most-endangered of species: the American male.
8/ "Racism is alive and well in this country" is the point of this story [almost an essay] about a man that grew up in a small Florida town in Polk County and now lives in New York.....
What he says is true - even though the overt signs of prejudice are hidden, what has taken it's place is just as nasty but more subtle.....
There is no great message to this story, I just thought it was well written....
A resident of Lacoochee, Florida, a neighboring town to where Chris Arnade grew up. Photograph: Chris Arnade/2010 Photograph: Guardian
A week after Barack Obama was elected president in 2008, I walked into my old hometown bar in central Florida to hear, "Well if a nigger can be president, then I can have another drink. Give me a whiskey straight up."
Only one day in the town and I thought, "Damn the south."
I had returned home to bury my father, who had spent much of the 1950s and '60s fighting for civil rights in the south. Consequently, my childhood was defined by race. It was why our car was shot at, why threats were made to burn our house down, why some neighbors forbid me to play on their lawn, why I was taunted at school as a "nigger lover".
It was nothing compared to what the blacks in town had to endure. I was just residing in the seam of something much uglier.
It is also why I left as soon as I could, exercising an option few others had. I eventually moved to New York City to work on Wall Street.
In the next 15 years I thought less about race. It is possible to live in the northeast as a white liberal and think little about it, to convince yourself that most of the crude past is behind. Outward signs suggest things are different now: I live in an integrated neighborhood, my kids have friends of all colors, and my old office is diverse compared to what I grew up with. As many point out, America even has a black man (technically bi-racial) as president.
9/ I am midway through reading "Devil In The Grove", about Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Four trial and Lake County's Sheriff McCall and I noticed this story from the Orlando Sentinel from last year, and that they will soon be starting casting for the movie.
The book is incredible, not least because it's about where we live - Mount Dora is in Lake County......I'll visit this again when I finish the book.
Movie in the works to explore notorious Groveland Four case
Film to be based on Pulitzer-winning book 'Devil in the Grove'
(FLORIDA STATE ARCHIVES )
September 21, 2013|By Eloísa Ruano González, Orlando Sentinel
John Griffin was 5 years old in 1949 when the National Guard was called into Groveland to restore order after a 17-year-old white girl accused four black citrus pickers of raping her.
The accusations incited a mob to attack the black neighborhood. Griffin said soldiers piled up sandbags and set up a .50-caliber machine gun. Now 68, he said the south Lake County community of 9,200 has moved beyond the story of the Groveland Four. But residents may be forced to confront the area's racist past once more — this time on the big screen.
Lionsgate, the movie studio behind the smash hit "The Hunger Games," has purchased the screen rights to the Pulitzer Prize-winning book "Devil in the Grove: Thurgood Marshall, the Groveland Boys, and the Dawn of a New America."
"We can't rectify the past," said Griffin, one of two black Groveland City Council members. "We can only look forward to a better livelihood in Groveland."
The book, written by New York author Gilbert King, details a case that exploded into the national spotlight when then-Lake County Sheriff Willis McCall, who had a notorious reputation as a racist, shot and killed one of the citrus workers and wounded a second on the way to a hearing after the U.S. Supreme Court ordered new trials in 1951. McCall said the two handcuffed men attacked him and tried to escape.
10/ We have all heard of viral marketing being key in our ad-saturated society, so the producers of a "possessed baby" movie made an animatronic "devil child" and sent it out into the streets of New York City - it worked, as the video has had 23 million hits on YouTube.......
A clever two minutes.....
11/ I think we know by now the huge global corporations with their myriad attorneys don't have to obey our laws - they find ways around them and if they can't, they buy the politicians who then change the rules.
This is an interesting article about how this actually works......
1. Tax havens and transfer pricing
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Multinational corporations don't have to pay taxes on overseas profits; that is, until they transfer those profits back home. This would make sense, if it weren't for a practice known as"transfer pricing," where a multinational corporation can transfer the profits of a U.S. subsidiary to a subsidiary in, say, the Cayman Islands. There the money sits, allowing corporations to defer taxes on those profits indefinitely. By its own accounting, the U.S. government loses $10 billion to this loophole every year.
12/ Samantha Bee did a one woman segment about the "romance" of Fox News's "The Five on the Daily Show last week.......totally different, and most amusing......
Seven minutes of original comedy......
(Credit: Screenshot, Comedy Central)
Have you been paying attention to Fox News’ conservative panel show “The Five” lately? “The Daily Show’s” Samantha Bee has, and she’s uncovered some hidden context the rest of us were missing.
“The Five” is “so much more than just a panel show,” Bee unveiled in a dramatic monologue. The tragic tale of a doomed romance between “winsome blonde ingenue” Dana Perino and bad boy Gred Gutfield, it’s a love story to rival one of Shakespeare — or Nicholas Sparks.
Watch Bee’s one-woman interpretation of their romance play out here:
13/ You will be seeing a lot of winter sports in February with the Winter Olympics, so here is a preview of the mens figure skating - Jason Brown is 19, and won the US men's free skate 2013 with this performance. I'm not usually a fan of mens figure skating, but this is a WOW......seven minutes of incredible, flawless athleticism......
America, meet Jason Brown.
A 19-year-old from Illinois, Brown earned a spot on the U.S. Olympic figure skating team with a crowd-pleasing performance at the 2014 U.S. Figure Skating Championships in Boston on Sunday. Sporting a long ponytail, the teen skating sensation briefly transformed the competition at TD Garden into a rock concert with an epic performance in his free skate.
"As we've said many times over, Jason does not have the quad jump and some of the jumps that the other competitors have but he has something that is very unique that we have seen and that is an ability to connect with the audience and by extension, the judges," NBC announcer Tom Hammond said before Brown began his free skate.
That brief introduction proved amazingly prescient as Brown brought the crowd to its feet with a stirring performance. His impressive score of 182.61 won the free skate and vaulted him into first place. Brown would ultimately finish in second place behind four-time U.S. figure skating champion Jeremy Abbott but still secure a trip to Sochi for the 2014 Winter Olympics.
14/ We love Costco - decent selection, good prices, lots of wines and they treat their employees well......but want to improve your shopping experience? Read this - it gives their pricing secret codes so you know if you are getting rock bottom deals.......
If you’re like me, you probably love shopping at Costco, hoping to find a great deal on everything from TV’s to bulk diapers. But shopping at the big box megastore can be a bit overwhelming. Did you know there is actually a “Costco Price Tag Code” that can let you know if you’re getting the best deals?
The key to the code is not the dollars but the cents. Those last two digits of the price tell you everything. A price ending in .99 is much different than one ending in .97 or .49. Check it out…
Price ending in .99 – the product is full price
15/ You know we put out fails compilations every month, but here is the opposite - people who were incredibly lucky to avoid injuries or worse in accidents.......four minutes of pure, dumb luck......
Some of these you can't believe how they avoided being killed.....
16/ I had to read this just for the title - "I Fell In Love With a Republican".....it's one woman's story of how relationships work and how love can overcome political differences. It's a nice story......
A photo of the author with her husband
Excerpted from "True Tales of Lust and Love," edited by Anna David, copyright Soft Skull Press.
There’s no other way to tell you this. I just have to say it: I fell in love with a Republican.
Believe me, it gets worse.
I don’t mean he votes Republican, I mean he’s in it up to his eyeballs. The man I love personally called Henry Kissinger to tell him about Richard Nixon’s funeral arrangements. He ran Orrin Hatch’s bid for president and has worked for Rudolph Guiliani and even that poor, dumb bastard Rick Perry. His mother has a framed picture hanging in the house of her arm-in-arm with Robert Dole, autographed with a “Thanks Sharon! Bob.” His father is pastor of an Evangelical church, a man who watches a defective television set built with only one channel. Fox News.
For someone like me, whose earliest memories are of a home with pictures of the pope and JFK hanging side by side on the wall, whose mother was known to say “God is not only Irish but a Democrat,” who comes from a family of self-described “Blue-bellied Yankees,” falling for a West Virginia-bred Republican was like admitting I love Darth Vader.
How could this possibly happen, you ask?
At first it was the usual thing, sex.
Todays video - mainly for guys - Superman vs The Hulk.....
Todays marriage joke
Three friends married women from different parts of the country.
The first man married a woman from the Alabama. He told her that she was to do the dishes and house cleaning.
It took a couple of days, but on the third day, he came home to see a clean house and dishes washed and put away.
The second man married a woman from the California.
He gave his wife orders that she was to do all the cleaning, dishes and the cooking.
The first day he didn't see any results, but the next day he saw it was better. By the third day, he saw his house was clean, the dishes were done, and there was a huge dinner on the table.
The third man married a girl from New York.
He ordered her to keep the house cleaned, dishes washed, lawn mowed, laundry washed, and hot meals on the table for every meal.
He said the first day he didn't see anything, the second day he didn't see anything but by the third day, some of the swelling had gone down and he could see a little out of his left eye, and his arm was healed enough that he could fix himself a sandwich and load the dishwasher.
He still has some difficulty when he pees.
Todays Rodney Dangerfield jokes
My wife only has sex with me for a purpose. Last night she used me to time an egg.
It's tough to stay married. My wife kisses the dog on the lips, yet she won't drink from my glass!
Last night my wife met me at the front door. She was wearing a sexy negligee. The only trouble was, she was coming home.
A girl phoned me and said, 'Come on over. There's nobody home.' I went over. Nobody was home!
A hooker once told me she had a headache.
If it weren't for pickpockets, I'd have no sex life at all.
I was making love to this girl and she started crying I said, 'Are you going to hate yourself in the morning?' She said, 'No, I hate myself now.'
I knew a girl so ugly... they use her in prisons to cure sex offenders.
My wife is such a bad cook, if we leave dental floss in the kitchen the roaches hang themselves.
I'm so ugly I stuck my head out the window and got arrested for mooning.
The other day I came home and a guy was jogging, naked. I asked him, 'Why?' He said, 'Because you came home early.'
My wife's such a bad cook, the dog begs for Alka-Seltzer.
I know I'm not sexy. When I put my underwear on I can hear the Fruit-of-the- Loom guys giggling.
My wife is such a bad cook, in my house we pray after the meal.
My wife likes to talk to me during sex; last night she called me from a hotel.
My family was so poor that if I hadn't been born a boy, I wouldn't have had anything to play with.
It's been a rough day. I got up this morning ... put a shirt on and a button fell off. I picked up my briefcase, and the handle came off. I'm afraid to go to the bathroom.
I was such an ugly kid! ...When I played in the sandbox, the cat kept covering me up.
I could tell my parents hated me. My bath toys were a toaster and radio.
It's tough to stay married. My wife kisses the dog on the lips, yet she won't drink from my glass!
Last night my wife met me at the front door. She was wearing a sexy negligee. The only trouble was, she was coming home.
A girl phoned me and said, 'Come on over. There's nobody home.' I went over. Nobody was home!
A hooker once told me she had a headache.
If it weren't for pickpockets, I'd have no sex life at all.
I was making love to this girl and she started crying I said, 'Are you going to hate yourself in the morning?' She said, 'No, I hate myself now.'
I knew a girl so ugly... they use her in prisons to cure sex offenders.
My wife is such a bad cook, if we leave dental floss in the kitchen the roaches hang themselves.
I'm so ugly I stuck my head out the window and got arrested for mooning.
The other day I came home and a guy was jogging, naked. I asked him, 'Why?' He said, 'Because you came home early.'
My wife's such a bad cook, the dog begs for Alka-Seltzer.
I know I'm not sexy. When I put my underwear on I can hear the Fruit-of-the- Loom guys giggling.
My wife is such a bad cook, in my house we pray after the meal.
My wife likes to talk to me during sex; last night she called me from a hotel.
My family was so poor that if I hadn't been born a boy, I wouldn't have had anything to play with.
It's been a rough day. I got up this morning ... put a shirt on and a button fell off. I picked up my briefcase, and the handle came off. I'm afraid to go to the bathroom.
I was such an ugly kid! ...When I played in the sandbox, the cat kept covering me up.
I could tell my parents hated me. My bath toys were a toaster and radio.
I was such an ugly baby that my mother never breast fed me. She told me that she only liked me as a friend.
I'm so ugly my father carried around a picture of the kid who came with his wallet.
When I was born, the doctor came into the waiting room and said to my father, "I'm sorry. We did everything we could, but he pulled through anyway."
Todays blonde joke
A blonde decides to try horseback riding, even though she has had no
lessons, nor prior experience. She mounts the horse unassisted, and the horse
immediately springs into motion. It gallops along at a steady and rhythmic pace,
but the blonde begins to slide from the saddle.
In terror, she grabs for the horse's mane, but cannot seem to get a
firm grip. She tries to throw her arms around the horse's neck, but she slides down
the horse's side anyway. The horse gallops along, seemingly oblivious to its
slipping rider.
Finally, giving up her frail grip, the blonde attempts to leap away
from the horse and throw herself to safety. Unfortunately, her foot has become entangled in the stirrup, and she is now at the mercy of the horse's pounding hooves as her head is struck against the ground.As her head is battered against the ground, she is mere moments away from unconsciousness, when to her great fortune Frank, the Walmart greeter, sees her dilemma, and unplugs the horse.
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