The Ledes

Monday, October 7, 2024

Weather Channel: “H​urricane Milton has rapidly intensified into a Category 3 and hurricane and storm surge watches are now posted along Florida's western Gulf Coast, where the storm poses threats of life-threatening storm surge, destructive winds and flooding rainfall by midweek. 'Milton will be a historic storm for the west coast of Florida,' the National Weather Service in Tampa Bay said in a briefing Monday morning.”

CNN: “This year’s Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine has been awarded to Victor Ambros and Gary Ruvkun for their work on the discovery of microRNA, a fundamental principle governing how gene activity is regulated. Their research revealed how genes give rise to different cells within the human body, a process known as gene regulation. Gene regulation by microRNA – a family of molecules that helps cells control the sort of proteins they make – ... was first revealed by Ambros and Ruvkun. The Nobel Prize committee announced the prestigious honor ... in Sweden on Monday.... Ambros, a professor of natural science at the University of Massachusetts Medical School, conducted the research that earned him the prize at Harvard University. Ruvkun conducted his research at Massachusetts General Hospital, and is a professor of genetics at Harvard Medical School.”

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The Ledes

Sunday, October 6, 2024

New York Times: “Two boys have been arrested and charged in a street attack on David A. Paterson, a former governor of New York, and his stepson, the police said. One boy, who is 12, was charged with second-degree gang assault, and the other, a 13-year-old, was charged with third-degree gang assault, the police said on Saturday night. Both boys, accompanied by their parents, turned themselves in to the police, according to Sean Darcy, a spokesman for Mr. Paterson. A third person, also a minor, went to the police but was not charged in the Friday night attack in Manhattan, according to an internal police report.... Two other people, both adults, were involved in the attack, according to the police. They fled on foot and have not been caught, the police said. The former governor was not believed to have been targeted in the assault....”

Weather Channel: “Tropical Storm Milton, which formed in the Gulf of Mexico on Saturday, is expected to become a hurricane late Sunday or early Monday. The storm is expected to pose a major hurricane threat to Florida by midweek, just over a week after Helene pushed through the region. The National Hurricane Center says that 'there is an increasing risk of life-threatening storm surge and wind impacts for portions of the west coast of the Florida Peninsula beginning late Tuesday or Wednesday.'”

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Public Service Announcement

Washington Post: "Americans can again order free rapid coronavirus tests by mail, the Biden administration announced Thursday. People can request four free at-home tests per household through covidtests.gov. They will begin shipping Monday. The move comes ahead of an expected winter wave of coronavirus cases. The September revival of the free testing program is in line with the Biden administration’s strategy to respond to the coronavirus as part of a broader public health campaign to protect Americans from respiratory viruses, including influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), that surge every fall and winter. But free tests were not mailed during the summer wave, which wastewater surveillance data shows is now receding."

Washington Post: “Comedy news outlet the Onion — reinvigorated by new ownership over this year — is bringing back its once-popular video parodies of cable news. But this time, there’s someone with real news anchor experience in the chair. When the first episodes appear online Monday, former WAMU and MSNBC host Joshua Johnson will be the face of the resurrected 'Onion News Network.' Playing an ONN anchor character named Dwight Richmond, Johnson says he’s bringing a real anchor’s sense of clarity — and self-importance — to the job. 'If ONN is anything, it’s a news organization that is so unaware of its own ridiculousness that it has the confidence of a serial killer,' says Johnson, 44.” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: I'll be darned if I can figured out how to watch ONN. If anybody knows, do tell. Thanks.

Washington Post: “First came the surprising discovery that Earth’s atmosphere is leaking. But for roughly 60 years, the reason remained a mystery. Since the late 1960s, satellites over the poles detected an extremely fast flow of particles escaping into space — at speeds of 20 kilometers per second. Scientists suspected that gravity and the magnetic field alone could not fully explain the stream. There had to be another source creating this leaky faucet. It turns out the mysterious force is a previously undiscovered global electric field, a recent study found. The field is only about the strength of a watch battery — but it’s enough to thrust lighter ions from our atmosphere into space. It’s also generated unlike other electric fields on Earth. This newly discovered aspect of our planet provides clues about the evolution of our atmosphere, perhaps explaining why Earth is habitable. The electric field is 'an agent of chaos,' said Glyn Collinson, a NASA rocket scientist and lead author of the study. 'It undoes gravity.... Without it, Earth would be very different.'”

The New York Times lists Emmy winners. The AP has an overview story here.

New York Times: “Hvaldimir, a beluga whale who had captured the public’s imagination since 2019 after he was spotted wearing a harness seemingly designed for a camera, was found dead on Saturday in Norway, according to a nonprofit that worked to protect the whale.... [Hvaldimir] was wearing a harness that identified it as “equipment” from St. Petersburg. There also appeared to be a camera mount. Some wondered if the whale was on a Russian reconnaissance mission. Russia has never claimed ownership of the whale. If Hvaldimir was a spy, he was an exceptionally friendly one. The whale showed signs of domestication, and was comfortable around people. He remained in busier waters than are typical for belugas....” ~~~

     ~~~ Marie: Oh, Lord, do not let Bobby Kennedy, Jr., near that carcass. ~~~

     ~~~ AP Update: “There’s no evidence that a well-known beluga whale that lived off Norway’s coast and whose harness ignited speculation it was a Russian spy was shot to death last month as claimed by animal rights groups, Norwegian police said Monday.... Police said that the Norwegian Veterinary Institute conducted a preliminary autopsy on the animal, which was become known as 'Hvaldimir,' combining the Norwegian word for whale — hval — and the first name of Russian President Vladimir Putin. 'There are no findings from the autopsy that indicate that Hvaldimir has been shot,' police said in a statement.”

New York Times: Botswana's “President Mokgweetsi Masisi grinned as he lifted the diamond, a 2,492-carat stone that is the biggest diamond unearthed in more than a century and the second-largest ever found, according to the Vancouver-based mining operator Lucara, which owns the mine where it was found. This exceptional discovery could bring back the luster of the natural diamond mining industry, mining companies and experts say. The diamond was discovered in the same relatively small mine in northeastern Botswana that has produced several of the largest such stones in living memory. Such gemstones typically surface as a result of volcanic activity.... The diamond will likely sell in the range of tens of millions of dollars....”

Click on photo to enlarge.

~~~ Guardian: "On a distant reef 16,000km from Paris, surfer Gabriel Medina has given Olympic viewers one of the most memorable images of the Games yet, with an airborne celebration so well poised it looked too good to be true. The Brazilian took off a thundering wave at Teahupo’o in Tahiti on Monday, emerging from a barrelling section before soaring into the air and appearing to settle on a Pacific cloud, pointing to the sky with biblical serenity, his movements mirrored precisely by his surfboard. The shot was taken by Agence France-Presse photographer Jérôme Brouillet, who said “the conditions were perfect, the waves were taller than we expected”. He took the photo while aboard a boat nearby, capturing the surreal image with such accuracy that at first some suspected Photoshop or AI." 

Washington Post: “'Mary Cassatt at Work' is a large and mostly satisfying exhibition devoted to the career of the great American artist beloved for her sensitive and often sentimental views of family life. The 'at work' in the title of the Philadelphia Museum of Art show references the curators’ interest in Cassatt’s pioneering effort to establish herself as a professional artist within a male-dominated field. Throughout the show, which includes some 130 paintings, pastels, prints and drawings, the wall text and the art on view stresses Cassatt’s fixation on art as a career rather than a pastime.... Mary Cassatt at Work is on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art through Sept. 8. philamuseum.org”

New York Times: “Bob Newhart, who died on Thursday at the age of 94, has been such a beloved giant of popular culture for so long that it’s easy to forget how unlikely it was that he became one of the founding fathers of stand-up comedy. Before basically inventing the hit stand-up special, with the 1960 Grammy-winning album 'The Button-Down Mind of Bob Newhart' — that doesn’t even count his pay-per-view event broadcast on Canadian television that some cite as the first filmed special — he was a soft-spoken accountant who had never done a set in a nightclub. That he made a classic with so little preparation is one of the great miracles in the history of comedy.... Bob Newhart holds up. In fact, it’s hard to think of a stand-up from that era who is a better argument against the commonplace idea that comedy does not age well.”

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Jul162013

The Commentariat -- July 17, 2013

Interesting comments yesterday. Mostly.

Roni Rabin & Reed Abelson of the New York Times: "Individuals buying health insurance on their own will see their premiums tumble next year in New York State as changes under the federal health care law take effect, state officials are to announce on Wednesday. State insurance regulators say they have approved rates for 2014 that are at least 50 percent lower on average than those currently available in New York. Beginning in October, individuals in New York City who now pay $1,000 a month or more for coverage will be able to shop for health insurance for as little as $308 monthly. With federal subsidies, the cost will be even lower." CW: people who live in states that refuse to cooperate with the ACA of course will not reap the benefits of the subsidies, though they can buy into insurance through a federally-facilitated exchange. If you're not sure what your state is up to, this site will help. ...

... AND Republicans' reaction to the good news? Catherine Hollander of the National Journal: "The House is set to vote Wednesday on two bills that would delay implementation of key pieces of the 2010 health reform law.... The legislation isn't likely to go anywhere in the Democratic-controlled Senate — and the White House has said it would veto the measures."

Binyamin Appelbaum of the New York Times: "... even after the [Consumer Financial Protection Bureau] opened its doors in July 2011, almost exactly two years ago, its legal authority remained uncertain so long as Republicans prevented the confirmation of a director to lead the agency, as required by law. That barricade collapsed on Tuesday. Republicans agreed to allow the confirmation of Richard Cordray, by a vote of 66 to 34, cementing a new era of expansive federal oversight of companies that lend money to consumers. Senator Elizabeth Warren, the Massachusetts Democrat who conceived the agency when she was a Harvard professor and supervised its creation as an Obama administration official, presided over the 66-to-34 confirmation vote, announcing the results with obvious satisfaction." ...

Here's the most recent reporting on the Senate filibuster deal, which came out somewhat better for Democrats than reported earlier. Jonathan Weisman & Jennifer Steinhauer of the New York Times: "The deal began to take shape during late-night talks on Monday between Democrats and a Republican, John McCain of Arizona, who appeared to bypass his own leadership. They ended with early-morning commitments in the Senate gym. A clear winner was Mr. Obama, who gained a functioning consumer agency created on his watch, resurrected a defunct labor board and secured confirmation of a new E.P.A. chief and a disputed labor secretary. The Senate will also vote Wednesday to confirm Fred P. Hochberg to a new term at the helm of the Export-Import Bank. Democrats withdrew two nominees for the National Labor Relations Board whom the president had appointed during a Senate recess. On Tuesday Mr. Obama nominated as replacements Nancy Schiffer and Kent Hirozawa. Ms. Schiffer retired last year as an associate general counsel at the A.F.L.-C.I.O., and Mr. Hirozawa is the chief counsel to the board's chairman." However, "... the new deal did not put in place any framework for restricting [obstructive] procedural tactics in the future or address the larger question of how to unclog the Senate." ...

... CW: But I'm with the New York Times Editors: "... it's regrettable that Mr. Reid and the Democrats didn't vote to change the rules for this Senate and for a future one controlled by Republicans. They should have stood up for the principle that simple-majority votes should determine confirmation of executive appointments, not a 60-vote threshold that gives minority parties a veto over a president's team and that was unintended by the Constitution." ...

... David Firestone of the New York Times: "... last night John McCain and a group of other mainstream Republican senators completely undercut [Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell's] position, cutting a deal to vote on seven contested nominations without further argument. Mr. McConnell was nowhere to be found in that deal, and in fact voted against it this morning. He voted instead to continue a filibuster against Richard Cordray, nominated to run the Consumer Financial Protection Board, while 17 more sensible Republicans went the other direction.... This afternoon, after voting against the deal, he told reporters how terrific it all was.... And he insisted that Republicans gave up none of their rights.... In fact, Mr. McConnell lost quite a bit of power today." ...

... Ezra Klein: "It's clear now that Reid will change the rules if he believes it necessary. But so too will McConnell. If Republicans retake the Senate in 2014 and the presidency in 2016, there's no way Majority Leader McConnell will permit Democrats to routinely filibuster or otherwise obstruct President Christie's nominees. If they do, he'll throw Reid's words back in their face and make the change Reid threatened to make today." ...

... Jonathan Cohn of The New Republic: "If you score these things the way Washington usually does, this is a huge win for the Democrats. It's also a huge win for their leaders in the Senate -- particularly Harry Reid, who emerged with virtually everything he wanted to achieve.... Still, if this is a win, it's a win in a game that never should have been played." ...

... Sahil Kapur of TPM: "Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) lost big in the filibuster battle that ended Tuesday morning. Senators struck a tentative deal to confirm seven nominees to run federal agencies and departments, in exchange for Democrats agreeing not to nuke the filibuster on executive branch nominations -- for now. But McConnell is still winning the war.... Legislation can continue to be filibustered by Republicans as a matter of course -- sometimes to be thwarted entirely (such as the DREAM Act of 2010 and gun control legislation of 2013) and sometimes to be used as leverage to extract concessions. That remains a huge redefinition of the Senate minority's power that has reached unprecedented heights under McConnell, and which Democrats still have no answer to." ...

Paul Kane of the Washington Post: the "Maverick" is back. If you want to know why, take a look at this WashPo photo, taken yesterday (I guess):

If in fact the House recognized the smart thing, the right thing to do, was to go ahead and send the Senate [immigration] bill to the floor for a vote, I think it would pass tomorrow. We need to just go ahead and get this done. -- President Obama, yesterday, on Telemundo Dallas, sticking it to John Boehner

Like it or not, the Hispanic media perceives that approving or rejecting immigration reform is in the hands of John Boehner. When you listen to local radio stations and even national media, most of us are concentrated on John Boehner. We don't even have a problem pronouncing his name. -- Jorge Ramos, Univision news anchor ...

... John Stanton of BuzzFeed: "Conservatives in Congress have been actively opposing immigration reform in recent months, citing a fear that well-funded primary challengers will take them on if they compromise on the issue -- a line of reasoning that has crystalized into conventional wisdom in Washington. But interviews with operatives, campaign aides, and activists from groups like the Club for Growth and Heritage Action, as well as a review of recent election data, suggests the likelihood of Republicans facing serious primary challenges is not only overstated but probably won't have much of anything to do with immigration." CW: so let's just speculate -- if it ain't about the race, what could it be? Oh. Racism. ...

... Manuel Roig-Franzia & Sari Horwitz of the Washington Post: "Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. strongly condemned 'stand your ground' laws Tuesday, saying the measures 'senselessly expand the concept of self-defense' and may encourage 'violent situations to escalate.' The statutes, which have been enacted in more than 30 states, have become the focus of a complicated national debate over race, crime and culpability since the shooting of Trayvon Martin, an unarmed 17-year-old, by a neighborhood watch volunteer in Sanford, Fla.":

... Scott Powers of the Orlando Sentinel: "The U.S. Department of Justice on Monday afternoon appealed to civil rights groups and community leaders, nationally and in Sanford, for help investigating whether a federal criminal case might be brought against George Zimmerman for the shooting death of Trayvon Martin, one advocate said. The DOJ has also set up a public email address to take in tips on its civil rights investigation." ...

... Over at the Washington Post, racial profiling is totally justified. (And so is sexual harassment.) Tom Scocca of Gawker: "Not every columnist would look at the death of an unarmed 17-year-old black kid, shot after he was racially profiled, as an occasion to write a column about how all black teenagers deserve to be racially profiled. But the Washington Post's Richard Cohen is a very special columnist." ...

... Elspeth Reeve of the Atlantic: "Cohen appears to believe all black men are the same, and that they are violent. Cohen says he's 'tired' of politicians and activists 'who essentially suggest that, for recognizing the reality of urban crime in the United States, I am a racist.' He justifies Zimmerman's assumption that Martin was a criminal by citing statistics about crime in New York [City]. ...

... Um, maybe Geraldo was right, after all. Juror B-37 is very Paula Deen-y. ...

Good for Chuck. Craig Whitlock of the Washington Post: "Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel said Tuesday that he has ordered a 20 percent cut in the number of top brass and senior civilians at the Pentagon by 2019, the latest attempt to shrink the military bureaucracy after years of heady growth. Hagel's directive could force the Pentagon and military command staffs to shed an estimated 3,000 to 5,000 jobs.... He said the personnel cutbacks would happen regardless of whether the White House and Congress are able to sidestep automatic budget reductions that are scheduled to take place in the coming years."

I guess the only way to do that would be for the president to, somehow or other, fire him. -- Sen. Carl Levin (D-Michigan), on how to hold NSA Director James Clapper accountable for lying to Congress (Levin, unfortunately, is not calling on President Obama to can Clapper.)

Sen. Elizabeth Warren explains to CNBC "experts" why Glass-Steagall should be reinstated. Thanks to Julie L. for the link:

... John Cassidy of the New Yorker: "What do these large dollar numbers have in common: $6.5 billion, $5.5 billion, $4.2 billion, and $1.9 billion? They represent the latest quarterly net profits made by too-big-to-fail banks -- in order, JPMorgan Chase, Wells Fargo, Citigroup, and Goldman Sachs, the last of which reported its second-quarter figures before the market opened on Tuesday. Five years after being bailed out by the federal government, the U.S. banking system ... is generating record profits.... One of the many ironies of government's response to the crisis is that it accentuated rather than resolved the too-big-to-fail problem. By encouraging further consolidation in the financial industry..., which guaranteed them access to the Fed's emergency-lending facilities, the government created an élite group of banks that can raise money cheaply, because everybody knows they are backstopped by the taxpayer."

Jill Treanor of the Guardian: "Barclay's and four of its power traders have been ordered to pay a total of $453m (£299m) in fines by the US energy watchdog, which accuses the bank of attempting to manipulate the US electricity market.... First announced last October, the fine by the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) relates to allegations for the two years to December 2008. The FERC told Barclays it had to pay a $435m fine to the US treasury within 30 days; one of its traders must pay a $15m fine, and three other traders $1m each.... The bank must also give up $34.9m in profits which will to be distributed to low-income homeowners in California, Arizona, Oregon and Washington to help them pay their energy bills...." ...

     ... Update: David Sheppard of Reuters: "Barclays will contest a record $453 million fine imposed by a U.S. energy regulator against the British bank and four of its power traders, setting up a likely federal court battle."

Matt Taibbi of Rolling Stone: "David Brooks Wonders Why Men Can't Find Jobs: Comedy Ensues." CW: Yes, pondering the laziness of the non-working poor is a cottage industry for right-wing "thinkers." This isn't the first Brooks has theorized about why those lazy bastards don't get off their asses & participate in the American dream.

AP: "... Edward Snowden could leave the transit zone of a Moscow airport after Russian authorities review his asylum request, his lawyer said Wednesday. President Vladimir Putin said Wednesday that Snowden has been warned against taking any actions that would damage relations between Moscow and Washington." ...

... Dan Murphy of the Christian Science Monitor on why the Snowden Saga is actually newsworthy. "... while he may or may not be a whistleblower with his disclosures about NSA domestic surveillance..., his decision to reveal details about NSA spying on other countries indicates a willingness to go far beyond that. While Greenwald and Snowden said the principal reason for the leaks was preserving US liberty, disclosures about intelligence collection methods in China, Brazil, and Europe have nothing to do with that. What might, in the fullness of time, he decide to disclose next? ... Snowden makes for more than irresistibly great copy. He has information that's vital to the foreign spying programs of the US, and the chances that he can and will use it as bargaining chips with foreign powers are real." Read the whole essay; Murphy does a good job of synthesizing the threat Snowden poses to U.S. security.

When a major university's president tries to secretly curb academic freedom & ban books, ferchissakes, he might be Mitch Daniels. Charles Pierce has the goods on Former Teensy Gov. Hoosier.

Congressional Races

Worth watching:

Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Liz Cheney, the older daughter of former Vice President Dick Cheney, announced Tuesday that she intended to challenge Senator Michael B. Enzi of Wyoming in a Republican primary clash in next year that national and state party officials had hoped to avoid."

Local News

So if you're managing the campaign of Ken Cuccinelli, candidate for Virginia governor, & your guy is down by 4 points in a legitimate poll, what to do? Oh, you could make up your own poll out of whole cloth in which you announce your candidate is 13 points ahead. Yup. This strategy worked wonders for President & Lady Romney.

Lloyd Grove of the Daily Beast interviews the "new" Eliot Spitzer. Amusing, if not convincing on the Newness of Eliot.

Right Wing World

Buy-a-Blogger. Rosey Gray of BuzzFeed: "Several conservative bloggers repeated talking points given to them by a proxy group for the Ukrainian government -- and at least one writer was paid by a representative of the Ukrainian group, according to documents and emails obtained by BuzzFeed."

News Ledes

Reuters: "BP Plc ... asked a U.S. judge on Tuesday to temporarily halt payments from a court-supervised settlement fund for certain claims for damages related to the 2010 Gulf of Mexico oil spill while former FBI director Louis Freeh investigates possible misconduct.... BP had sought an investigation into allegations that a lawyer working for the administrator of the payments had referred claims to a New Orleans law firm in exchange for a share of subsequent settlement payments."

AP: "The Yemen-based branch of al-Qaida confirmed on Wednesday that the group's No. 2 figure, a former Guantanamo Bay prisoner, was killed in a U.S. drone strike. The announcement, posted on militant websites, gave no date for the death of Saudi-born Saeed al-Shihri. The confirmation was significant, however, because al-Shihri had twice before been reported dead but the terror group later denied those reports."

AP: "Gunmen assassinated a prominent Syrian pro-government figure at his home in southern Lebanon on Wednesday in the latest sign of Syria's civil war spilling over into its smaller neighbor, security officials said. Mohammed Darrar Jammo was gunned down, shot nearly 30 times, in the coastal town of Sarafand, a stronghold of the Shiite militant Hezbollah group, the officials said...."

Comments Off

Reader Comments (9)

"In the video announcing her candidacy, Ms. Cheney seemed to acknowledge as much.[criticisms of her swift move from D.C. to Wyoming]. Pre-empting charges of carpetbagging, she noted that her family first came to the state in 1852. Her ancestors, she said, included ranch hands and one county’s first female deputy sheriff."

Well, shucks, that makes all the difference, don't it? Her Pa, when given the job of picking a vice president for Bush II, after deciding he'd be the best choice had to swiftly change his Texas residence (a vice president cannot be from/or live in the same state as the president–-it says so in that thing called the Constitution). Now the daughter, that feisty, prickly, very opinionated mother of many is following in the steps of the man who seized the White House reins and rode roughshod on this country. Poor Mr. Enzi–––and he thought they were friends.

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterPD Pepe

Message to Akhilleus re: yesterday's comments. You were telling us about how you'd rant and rave about the state of affairs and about those that screwed up those state of affairs and I thought, wow, we'd have made a fine pair–-family and friends would shun us like a couple of bad seeds. I, too, ranted and raved especially about Reagan, BushII, women's rights, but it was the subject of religion that forced me to quell my ardor. Two of my sons married Catholic girls, and the oldest one lives with an Italian diva who has kissed the Roman pavement while the Pope gave his blessings. All three are atheists but have been able to deal with the differences. So I have had to learn how to stand my ground without a soap box and let a lot of things go. I no longer feel the need to try and change mindsets as I once did. Maybe it's greater understanding, maybe it's just that I have gotten weary. Whatever the reason, I have learned the art of shutting up. Not an easy thing for people like you and me, my friend.

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterPD Pepe

Re: Chuck Hagel cutting Senior Pentagon staff by 20%: It's past due. We have WAY too many Generals and Admirals relative to the size of our military. In 2010, we had 963 of them (http://blogs.e-rockford.com/applesauce/2012/12/13/wasteful-spending-america-has-963-generals-and-admirals-whose-lavish-perks-cost-us-billions/)
Note that this doesn't include the Reserves.

Another look: http://fabiusmaximus.com/2012/09/09/generals-admirals-43121/

We had more in WWII, but the military was a least 5 times larger. When I was on active duty, we lower grade officers became cynical about the top brass shamelessly angling for a cushy civilian gig after retirement.

We don't need so many nor do we need so many high level civilians. Of course, their congressional allies are going to scream. I say let 'em.

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterBarbarossa

PD,

Yeah. You have to pick your battles.

Living in a blood red state after all those years among godless liberals and 'merica hatin' soshalists has helped refine my approach to forensics. I've always been interested in contrary and even antagonistic points of view. Years ago someone asked me why I made a point of following writers and commentary from right-wing sources. My answer was that I thought it was important to know what the other side was thinking and how they formulated their opinions.

But as time has progressed, the voices I found most instructive and compelling have withered and largely vanished in the scorching conflagration of extremism. Today, even though the occasional rants erupt, it's not as much fun. It's like shooting at dead fish in a barrel. The fish don't care. There's often not much rational thought coming from the right, at least from the sources that are loudest most prevalent, and that renders reasoned discourse an endangered species. It ain't much fun if you're the only one dealing in facts. It's like trying to argue with the TV. Only one side is listening.

Speaking of Rome, I grew up Catholic. I'm not sure what I am now. I don't really qualify as a true atheist because I can't say for sure what's out there and what's not. Like Kant, I recognize that there are things beyond our ability to rationally entertain (metaphysics), and like Hume, I look askance at an empirical system that requires an unwavering belief in something that cannot be proven and which relies on a necessary disregard for the insuperable internal contradictions posed by all religions (the problem of evil, for instance) of which I am aware (maybe Aqua Buddhism is different). I suppose agnostic is the best description. But I can see where a good sense of proportion and an open mind are highly desirable in accommodating cross-cultural engagements whether they be nationalist, political, or religious.

In any event, moderation is a good thing. We picked up a few scars over those years in the wilderness, didn't we? And if anything, that experience should provide us with a sense of balance.

Just not the Fox kind.

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterAkhilleus

On another subject:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/magazine-23166839

Valley fever: An incurable illness in the dust
By Tom Geoghegan BBC News, Avenal, California

This new, frightening llness should be reported by MSM, but it won't.
Six US states and Mexico are affected.
Had to go to the BBC web site to get details.
mae finch
PS Don't miss the map at the bottom!

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered Commentermae finch

Barbarossa,

Rome had a similar general problem.

During the days of the Republic Rome built the greatest professional army in the world and although members of the officer corps came mostly from upper classes, they tended, like Caesar, to be career military men. The Republic gave way to Empire and under Augustus generalships were handed out willy nilly to rich kids and scions of connected families. This cost Rome much more than money.

Early in the first century, one of these political appointees, one Publius Varus, was put in command of several Roman legions by Augustus. Varus was sent to northern Europe to quell some local uprisings in what is now Germany. His ineptness and inexperience resulted in the annihilation of the XVII, XVIII, and XIX legions. They were lost, almost to a man. Augustus was so distraught that those legions were never reconstituted.

Rome suffered a catastrophic loss, not just in men and materiel, but in reputation. The Teutoborg Forest humiliation emboldened many of Rome's enemies who saw that a bloated, bureaucratic army could be beaten. See Gibbon for what comes next.

This isn't to say that all or most of our generals and admirals are modern day Varuses. Just that what happened in the forests of Germany in 9 CE would never have happened to the tough, stripped down professional army of the Republic. It makes sense to ask today's Pentagon, "Quo vadis?"

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterAkhilleus

Furthering the question of political correctness in the face of blatant racism, maybe the progressive force of time will allow us to break the silence. I don't how the kids were chosen, but here's a good video that can restore our hope in humanity regarding the future of race relations in our country.

Raw emotions, honest convictions and true wisdom coming from kids is always refreshing to see, especially once we grow up and discover the ugly realities of power and politics monopolized by self-indulgent, poo-flinging asswipes.

Kids React to Controversial Cheerios Commercial
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VifdBFp5pnw

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered Commentersafari

From the "If you thought that was bad" department:

You get in your car. You decide to go to the store. Maybe Target, maybe Nordstroms. Suddenly you realize that someone, somewhere is keeping track of your movements, what you look at, how long you spend in an aisle, what you buy. Completely weirded out, you put down that DVD of Zero Dark Thirty (ooooh, interested in terrorism, are we? Make a not of that, Ed.) and race for the exit, get in your car and drive away, comforted that you are off the surveillance grid, at least for a while.

Wrong.

In many cities (and more on the way) your license plate is being scanned. Multiple times a day. Law enforcement officials have a record of where you go and when. It doesn't matter if you're doing anything wrong or not. Dallas just purchased a flock of license plate scanners. Cities in New Jersey, California, Minnesota, New York. In Grapevine, TX, pop. 47,000, nearly 15,000 plates are scanned every day. The city has over 2 million plate hits in its database. Records are kept on locations and dots can be connected by anyone with access who thinks they might like to know where you've been.

Weirded out is starting to be the new normal.

The ACLU is not happy. Neither am I.

We know where you went. We saw what you did, part 23

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterAkhilleus

@Mae Finch: Thanks for the info on Valley Fever. PBS News had a bit about that some time ago, but that's the last I've heard of it. Another example of man's blight/fight with our environment.

July 17, 2013 | Unregistered CommenterPD Pepe
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