Don't miss #10.....very good....
1/ The always excellent Frank Rich with commentary on how the Democrats have a base problem, which we saw in the Alex Sink/Jolly special election......how do you get the young and minority voters to go and vote? Angry old white people always vote, but how do you motivate everyone else.....
Every week, New York Magazine writer-at-large Frank Rich talks with contributor Eric Benson about the biggest stories in politics and culture. This week: The GOP's victory a Florida special election, Rand Paul's emergence as the big winner at CPAC, and conservative critiques of Obama's appearance on "Between Two Ferns."
Earlier this week, Republican David Jolly beat Democrat Alex Sink in a hotly contested special election for the congressional seat in Florida's 13th district. Republicans are playing up the win as evidence that the Democrats are doomed in November. Democrats are dismissing the results as indicative only of one election in one district. Who is more right?
This race was a bellwether to be sure — not of what’s going to happen in November, but of the true idiocy of our political culture. A ludicrous $12 million in campaign spending was poured into this single district in which fewer than 200,000 people voted. Much of the bloviocracy hyped the race before and after as a battle akin to Ali-Frazier or, perhaps given the Florida setting, Bush vs. Gore, and as a decisive verdict on the political valence of Obamacare. And now both sides are overreading meaning into an election decided by less than 2 percent of the vote (under 4,000 votes) in a race where a third-party Libertarian candidate received almost 5 percent of the vote.
Garin-Hart-Yang polls conducted in the district throughout the campaign found that the Affordable Care Act was “more of a lift than a drag” on the losing Democrat, Alex Sink, rather than the election’s most decisive factor. Whatever. The Democrats are in deep trouble this fall, but not because of any reading of the tea leaves in this single district, and not because the entire country hates Obamacare. The fundamentals are far more basic. As in 2010, the year of the Democrats’ shellacking, older white voters are more likely to go to the polls than young and minority voters.
2/ A very good Bill Maher on his favourite subject - religion, and he is on great form in this five minute "New Rules'........watch this, and you will definitely avoid the new movie "Noah"......
On Friday evening, Bill Maher‘s “New Rules” segment concluded with a lengthy tirade against the arbitrary rules and customs set forth in the Bible, as well as some of the more unbelievable details religious folks still believe to be literally true.
Maher began the monologue by declaring that America is “stupid” because 60 percent of the country reportedly believes the tale of Noah’s ark is literally true. He went on to slam the film Noahas “floating giraffe crap,” but said it “must be doing something right” since it’s been condemned by both Muslims and Christians. And the fact that it might lose a lot of studio money, he joked, “may put it in hot water with the Jews too.”
3/ I know we go on and on about the right wing oligarchs and specifically the Koch Brothers, but they bought the recent election for the Republican in Tampa.....in this five minute segment Rachel Maddow looks at the Koch's campaign for the November elections, and they are starting now.......with infinite money, they have the resources to bury any candidate and have no scruples about lying in their ads. The problem is the stupids see the ads, and make up their minds so when the ads are fact-checked it's too late. Once a conservative has something in their head, facts or counterarguments don't work.....
For any chance to win the House this fall, Democrats have to fight back regardless, and Rachel shows how one campaign is doing it......
Rachel Maddow ended her MSNBC show Tuesday night by reporting the news that Republican David Jolly had defeated DemocratAlex Sink in a special congressional election in Florida. Maddow used the story as a jumping off point to examine the new burst of ads aimed at bolstering Republicans in the 2014 midterms, many of which are being funded by David andCharles Koch.
“Most people competing in normal American political terms have to wait until they’re within a few weeks or months of their election before they start buying tens of millions of dollars of TV time to try to influence that election,” Maddow said. But, “if you are the Koch brothers, say, well then time is money and you’ve got all the money.”
4/ This may be an unusually good year, but there is some decent TV on now......my DVR is getting full every week and since we have rules on when we watch the box in our household it's tough to see it all......
So something has to give, and as this article says it's picking up a good book, going to a movie and reading magazines.....
This story really hit home with me......
Not long ago, a friend at work told me I absolutely, positively must watch “Broad City” on Comedy Central, saying it was a slacker-infused hilarity.
My reaction? Oh no, not another one.
The vast wasteland of television has been replaced by an excess of excellence that is fundamentally altering my media diet and threatening to consume my waking life in the process. I am not alone. Even as alternatives proliferate and people cut the cord, they are continuing to spend ever more time in front of the TV without a trace of embarrassment.
I was never one of those snobby people who would claim to not own a television when the subject came up, but I was generally more a reader than a watcher. That was before the explosion in quality television tipped me over into a viewing frenzy.
Something tangible, and technical, is at work. The addition of ancillary devices onto what had been a dumb box has made us the programming masters of our own universes. Including the cable box — with its video on demand and digital video recorder — and Apple TV, Chromecast, PlayStation, Roku, Wii and Xbox, that universe is constantly expanding. Time-shifting allows not just greater flexibility, but increased consumption. According to Nielsen, Americans watched almost 15 hours of time-shifted television a month in 2013, two more hours a month than the year before.
5/ British commercials are better than ours, and this one for Guinness is amusing.......a sheepdog trial, where the dog attempts to round up some lads and get them into the pub.....two minutes.....
6/ The Idaho Legislature has just passed a bill allowing concealed weapons in colleges, so one Boise Professor has written an essay with a question - "When May I Shoot A Student?"
BOISE, Idaho — TO the chief counsel of the Idaho State Legislature:
In light of the bill permitting guns on our state’s college and university campuses, which is likely to be approved by the state House of Representatives in the coming days, I have a matter of practical concern that I hope you can help with: When may I shoot a student?
I am a biology professor, not a lawyer, and I had never considered bringing a gun to work until now. But since many of my students are likely to be armed, I thought it would be a good idea to even the playing field.
I have had encounters with disgruntled students over the years, some of whom seemed quite upset, but I always assumed that when they reached into their backpacks they were going for a pencil. Since I carry a pen to lecture, I did not feel outgunned; and because there are no working sharpeners in the lecture hall, the most they could get off is a single point.
But now that we’ll all be packing heat, I would like legal instruction in the rules of classroom engagement.
This Young Woman's Story Is an Eye-Opening Account of Black Mental IllnessImage Credit: AP
At present, the harshest penalty available here at Boise State is expulsion, used only for the most heinous crimes, like cheating on Scantron exams. But now that lethal force is an option, I need to know which infractions may be treated as de facto capital crimes.
I assume that if a student shoots first, I am allowed to empty my clip; but given the velocity of firearms, and my aging reflexes, I’d like to be proactive. For example, if I am working out a long equation on the board and several students try to correct me using their laser sights, am I allowed to fire a warning shot?
7/ Meet The Press, a pathetic Sunday "news" show hosted by the slimy David Gregory took a big chance this week.....they interviewed Bill Maher! And he obliged wonderfully....three minutes of a serious Maher.....
NBC’s Meet the Press has seen better days. The longest-running series in American television history is struggling in the ratings. In fact, it came in third last quarter behind ABC’s This Week and CBS’s Face the Nation. Things have gotten so bad, that NBC News President Deborah Turness met with host David Gregory and executive producer Rob Yarin on Thursday to discuss strategies to improve the show’s performance. If Ms. Turness would bother asking a liberal, she would find the problem lies with Gregory.
Well maybe they did listen to liberals considering that on Sunday, the show featured a flattering profile of progressive icon Bill Maher. The Real Time host is never shy about expressing his views and he did not disappoint. Even though he was interviewed by Harry Smith, Maher wasted no time in rebuking ACA critic Gregory:
8/ The F-35 is a new fighter for all services that will eventually cost $1.5 Trillion dollars, but is a flying disaster. Even though it looks pretty cool, it doesn't work and will not ever work properly, but is ferociously defended by politicians and lobbyists......have a look at this eight minute video, and despair at the corruption......
After hundreds of billions of dollars and almost ten years past due, the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter hits another hurdle.
In a report the Government Accountability Office claims the aircraft that is being dubbed the “backbone” of the US military’s future air arsenal may be costing tax payers billions of dollars more in unplanned fixes delaying the already late debut.
The program which will cost the American people approximately $1 trillion to develop, purchase and maintain until the year 2050, has been mismanaged to the point of being called a financial catastrophe.
Lockheed Martin, the company behind the F-35, has to replace almost every jet in the current inventory in which the US has agreed to purchase 2,500 of the fighter planes.
According to the GAO report, the money will go to adding roughly 10 million lines of on-board code to the jet's JSF software.
“It’s as complicated as anything on earth,” said agency expert Michael Sullivan to Wired.com.
“Software providing essential JSF capability has grown in size and complexity, and is taking longer to complete than expected,” the GAO warned.
But that isn’t the only issue to plague the already cursed aircraft.
The mechanical and safety problems persist and JSF program Chief Adm. David Venlet has shied away from setting a firm schedule for the F-35.
The Lockheed Martin creation has been in the works since the early 1990’s and was expected to be in the air by 2010, but officials are now anticipating the official launch to be 2018.
9/ Stephen Colbert is outraged that the President went on "Between Two Ferns" last week, and joins various Fox News anchors in telling Obama how wrong he was......a pretty good one, five minutes of amusement and some great zingers.....
While Fox News is not really a fan of anything related to Barack Obama, the network made it clear that it is especially disappointed by the president’s “Between Two Ferns”appearance with Zach Galifiankis. Stephen Colbert described the reaction as “a firestorm” that happened “everywhere, from Fox News, to later on on Fox News.”
The hilarious, awkward interview went viral, with 13 million shares, and boosted traffic to Healthcare.gov by 40 percent. As Colbert put it, mocking Fox, Obama has “spread a virus” and now everyone is scrambling “to sign up for health care.”
Indeed, Fox is upset because Obama “undermined the authority of the presidency,” said Colbert. “And that is Fox News’ job.”
10/ A two minute video that hits home and really says it all......if you like DDD, you need to watch this even though after digesting the message you may totally give up on politics.....
Talking politics with smart people can be tough.
Fortunately, Above Average released a fool-proof guide to talking politics with your smartest friends -- liberal and conservative -- on Wednesday.
"Politics is the smart person word for yelling about the government," the video explains.
"Smart people are confused, too," it says. "Their knowledge of how the government theoretically works gives them the delusion that they can change how the government actually works. Unfortunately for them, knowledge is not power. Money is. And only rich people can actually change things."
11/ In some ways this is not a nice country - this story illustrates the disturbing practice of solitary confinement in the prison system, and how it is akin to torture. There are more than 80,000 prisoners in this country enduring this.....
You jolt awake from a disturbed sleep, your body dripping with sweat. You don't know how much time has passed — minutes, hours, perhaps even days. But you feel frightened, and your heart is racing. You had a nightmare. You were in a dark, narrow, endless hallway. You were chasing a young man, shouting to him, but no sound came out. You had to warn him of something — you don't know what. He stopped walking and slowly turned around. You noticed his shoes, the tattoos on his arms. He was you — a younger you. His body was filled out, healthy, like yours used to be. His wrists weren't shackled. But you couldn't quite make out his face. You inched closer, squinting. But he had no face at all; there was just a blank blur. He did not recognize you, either. He turned back around and kept walking.
That's when you woke. Now tears are coming down your face. Maybe it wasn't even a nightmare. In fact, you might've not been asleep at all.
This is your existence in "the box." You live in your brain, inside a cage, inside a penitentiary — a prison within a prison within a prison. The cell itself is smaller than 8 feet by 10 feet, about the size of a bathroom. It’s impossible to walk more than a few steps in any direction. You've paced it hundreds of times, counting five tiles per step. You've memorized those dirty, cold tiles: every crack, every imperfect angle. You've studied them backwards, forwards and sideways. Sometimes you watch the cracks deepen, bend, or shift. Occasionally a roach or a mouse scurries past. You like when they do … a life to watch, something to talk to.
Above is a low ceiling. Around you: three concrete walls. The dark grey paint is chipping away, revealing traces of past occupants — the stains of old graffiti, carvings of initials and marks where fingernails once scratched, scraped, dragged and dug. Then there’s the door: a heavy slab of steel. It never opens.
Thus completes the anatomy of the hole in which you dwell, the cage that contains you, the chamber that chokes you.
There is no window; there is no clock. The artificial light is on at all times. You don't know what time it is, what day or month it is. Time can stretch into endless vacuity, collapse abruptly, or warp into itself — a nasty little trick.
You notice that the rusty faucet in the corner is dripping. The rhythm is heinous and quickly becoming unbearable. Drip... Drip…. With each drop, your intestines twist tighter, your chest sinks heavier. It's insufferable. It has to stop. An insect flies by. The buzzing vibrates through your ears, mildly, at first. But within seconds, it intensifies, grips your skull, climbing inside and infecting your brain with rapid reverberations. The insect is inside your head now. It's certain. And still, the dripping water is getting louder and louder. It's deafening. The piercing sound of each drop, the rattling of the bones of your skull — you can't breathe. You yank violently, viciously at your hair, shrieking between stifled gasps.
But no one hears you. No one cares. And you have nowhere to go.
***
This depiction is fictional — but just barely. It's based on detailed accounts from prisoners who were held in isolation, and drawn from psychological studies that document the horrific symptoms that inmates commonly battle when held in solitary confinement — the practice of isolating inmates in closed cells.
12/ Remember Ebony Wilkerson? Car with three kids into the ocean? She is a poster child for black mental illness, and how it's ignored till it's too late, then it's prison......
This Young Woman's Story Is an Eye-Opening Account of Black Mental IllnessImage Credit: AP
Ebony Wilkerson lived in South Carolina before she was imprisoned.
But last Tuesday, the pregnant 32-year-old drove her minivan into the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Daytona Beach, Fla. Her three children were sitting in the backseat, screaming as water rushed in through the windows. No one was hurt, but she's being charged with three counts of attempted murder and child abuse.
This case is beyond horrific, but there's more to the story. According Jessica Harrell, Wilkerson's sister, she had been hospitalized the day before following an alleged domestic dispute with her husband, Lutful Ronjon.
Wilkerson checked herself out of the hospital, but Harrell was still worried about her. So she called the police and told the dispatcher Wilkerson was "still not all there" and had been "talking about Jesus and how there were demons in my house and how I'm trying to control her but I'm trying to keep them safe."
Wilkerson had driven to Florida by this point. When the Daytona Beach police pulled her over, the 32-year-old informed the officer that she was afraid her husband was coming to harm her children: "It was clear during my conversation that Wilkerson was suffering from some form of mental illness," the officer wrote in his report, "but she was lucid." He added that the children were smiling quietly in the backseat and showed no signs of distress. So he let them go.
13/ California is facing an unprecedented drought, and a knock down drag out fight between the Agricultural need for water, and the cities demand for drinking water. But the biggest consumer of water is the growing of cattle feed, mainly alfalfa which is then exported to China. Talk about irony.....
Meat Makes the Planet Thirsty
By JAMES MCWILLIAMSMARCH 7, 2014
AUSTIN, Tex. — CALIFORNIA is experiencing one of its worst droughts on record. Just two and a half years ago, Folsom Lake, a major reservoir outside Sacramento, was at 83 percent capacity. Today it’s down to 36 percent. In January, there was no measurable rain in downtown Los Angeles. Gov. Jerry Brown has declared a state of emergency. President Obama has pledged $183 million in emergency funding. The situation, despite last week’s deluge in Southern California, is dire.
With California producing nearly half of the fruit and vegetables grown in the United States, attention has naturally focused on the water required to grow popular foods such as walnuts, broccoli, lettuce, tomatoes, strawberries, almonds and grapes. These crops are the ones that a recent report in the magazine Mother Jones highlighted as being unexpectedly water intensive. Who knew, for example, that it took 5.4 gallons to produce a head of broccoli, or 3.3 gallons to grow a single tomato? This information about the water footprint of food products — that is, the amount of water required to produce them — is important to understand, especially for a state that dedicates about 80 percent of its water to agriculture.
14/ Movie buffs will appreciate this compilation of movies that never got an Oscar, but should have......there are 13 movies featured, with clips from each one.....I loved the Easy Rider scene.....
When the 2014 Academy Award nominations were announced, the biggest shock was that Inside Llewyn Davis was almost completely shut out despite receiving some of the best reviews of the year. But that might not be such a bad thing.
This may well be due to the film's brilliant subtlety and unremitting darkness, but it's unfair that such a brilliant film should go unrecognized. It turns out, though, that there's a historical precedent for this. Many of the movies that we think of as our nation's most important films were shut out of even a Best Picture nomination in their day because they were either too dark, too weird or too ahead of their time.
Here are 13 classics that were wrongfully ignored before totally showing the Academy up:
15/ The Chainsmokers with "Let Me Take A Selfie".....if you want to totally bemuse your grandkids just mention to them you really liked this video, or use the phrase "that's so Ratchet".....
A fun, funny, and superfastmoving parody of youth culture......but don't overthink it, just enjoy it - it's goofy.....and has hundreds of selfies, including a couple from the Hoff.....
16/ Daniel Ruth is a columnist for the Tampa Bay Tribune, and this is an excellent read about the wholesale corruption in our State government, starting with our unspeakably disgusting criminal Governor Skeletor. It's also full of good zingers.....
Ruth: The best Legislature money can buy
To you, dearly beloved gentle reader, it might appear that today marks the beginning of the Florida Legislature's annual 60-day session in which our dedicated elected public servants gather to make life better for one and all across the state regardless of race, creed, gender or economic status.
Isn't that quaint, in a McGuffey Reader sort of way?
Forgive a pinch of cynicism, but you might be better off regarding the next nine weeks of stupid that are about to commence as more along the lines of "Eight Years a Knave."
RELATED NEWS/ARCHIVE
Gov. Dread Scott will deliver the always riveting State of the State address this morning before an assemblage of the Capitol's feedbag of pols.
Not to worry. If Scott decides to remain in his Naples bunker, the state's Lt. Gov. Whatshisname, R-Judge Crater, can fill in if he is not engaged in his official duty of untangling the governor's paper clips.
Then the House and Senate will get down to the serious business of legislatively napalming the environment, imploding public education, expanding gambling and otherwise pandering to any special interest lobbyist with a bulging checkbook looking for a home.
And what about you, precious reader? You are so very much burnt, crumbling, mold-infested toast.
Todays video - the Selma Hayek table dance scene from one of the most bizarre, violent and fascinating movies of the 90's "From Dusk Till Dawn".....it's being remade as a TV series by the original Director Robert Rodriguez for the El Rey Network [?].
From Dusk till Dawn: The Series is an American horror television series created by Robert Rodriguez. It forms part of the franchise of film, direct-to-video, comic and cult following of From Dusk till Dawn, expanding on the chronicles of the Gecko Brothers: Seth and Richie, The Fuller family, and Santanico Pandemonium.[1] The series premiered on March 11, 2014,[2]on Rodriguez's newly launched channel El Rey.[3] Outside the United States and Latin America, the series is marketed as aNetflix original.[4]
In this supernatural crime series, Seth Gecko and his violent, unpredictable brother, Richard "Richie" Gecko, are wanted by the FBI and Texas Rangers Earl McGraw and Freddie Gonzalez after a bank robbery left several people dead. Heading for the Mexico border, the Geckos encounter former minister Jacob Fuller and his family, whom they take hostage by commandeering the Fuller's RV. Drug lord Don Carlos reroutes them to a strip club populated by vampires that all must fight until dawn in order to survive. The series adds to the tone of the film, with new characters and backstories, while expanding the creatures' Mesoamerican
The original movie was a combo of the horror, vampires and psycho killer genres with a bit of religion thrown in.......classic late night viewing! Enjoy Ms. Hayek, and the snake.....
Todays Marines joke
At a wine merchant's warehouse the regular taster died, and the director
started looking for a new one to hire. He posted a sign at the entrance
to the building... EXPERIENCED WINE TASTER NEEDED -- POSITION STARTS
IMMEDIATELY.
A retired Marine sergeant named “Gunny”, drunk and with a ragged dirty
look and smelling of last night's rounds, strolled by the building and
saw the sign. He went into the building to apply for the position.
Aghast at his appearance, the director wondered how to send him away
but, to be fair, he gave him a glass of wine to taste. The old
"jarhead" held the glass up to his left eye, tilted his head toward
incoming sunlight and studied the contents looking through the glass.
He then took a sip and said, "It's a Southern California Muscat , three
years old, grown on a north slope, matured in steel containers.
Somewhat low-grade but acceptable."
"That's correct," said the boss. Glancing at his assistant he
said..."Another one, please."
The old Marine took the goblet, full of a deep red liquid, stuck his
nose into the glass, sniffed deeply and took a long slow sip....rolling
his eyeballs in a circle, he then looked at the director and said...
"It's a Cabernet Sauvignon, eight years old, south-western slope, oak
barrels, matured at eight degrees. Requires three more years for the
finest results."
"Absolutely correct. A third glass." said the director.
Receiving another glass, again, the Marine eyed the crystal, took in a
little bit of the aroma and sipped very softly.... ''It's a pinot blanc
champagne, very high grade and exclusive,'' said the drunk calmly.
The director was astonished and winked at his assistant to suggest
something.
She left the room and came back in with a wine glass half-full of urine.
The old Sergeant eyed it suspiciously...a color he could not quite recall.
He took a sip, swishing it over his tongue and across his teeth, musing
upward all the while.
"It's a blonde, 26 years old, three months pregnant, and if I don't get
the job, I'll name the father."
Todays retiree jokes
You're getting old when you don't care where your spouse goes, just as long as you don't have to go along.
Statistics show that at the age of seventy, there are five women to every man. Isn't that an ironic time for a guy to get those odds?
Old age is when it takes longer to rest than to get tired.
By the time a man is wise enough to watch his step, he's too old to go anywhere.
Old age is when you have stopped growing at both ends, and have begun to grow in the middle.
Old age is having a choice of two temptations and choosing the one that will get you home earlier.
A man has reached old age when he is cautioned to slow down by his Doctor instead of by the police.
Don't worry about avoiding temptation. As you grow older, it will avoid you.
You're getting old when "getting lucky" means you find your car in the parking lot.
Todays religious joke
She's chatting it up with St. Peter at the Pearly Gates when all of a sudden she hears the most awful, blood curdling screams.
Don't worry about that,' says St. Peter,
'It's only someone having the holes drilled into her shoulder blades for the angel wings.'
The old lady looks a little uncomfortable but carries on with the conversation. A few minutes later, there are more blood curdling screams.'Oh my Goodness,' says the old lady, 'now what is happening?'
'Not to worry,' says St. Peter, 'She's just having her head drilled to fit the halo.'
'I can't do this,' says the old lady, 'I'm going to hell.'
'You can't go to that nasty place,' says St. Peter. 'You'll be raped and forced to do oral sex.
'Maybe so,' says the old lady, but I've already got the holes for that.'
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