The Ledes

Friday, September 27, 2024

The Washington Post's live updates of developments related to Hurricane Helene are here: “Hurricane Helene left one person dead in Florida and two in Georgia as it sped north. One of the biggest storms on record to hit the Gulf Coast, Helene slammed into Florida’s Big Bend area on Thursday night as a Category 4 colossus with winds of up to 140 mph before weakening to Category 1. Catastrophic winds and torrential rain from the storm — which the National Hurricane Center forecast would eventually slow over the Tennessee Valley — were expected to continue Friday across the Southeast and southern Appalachians.”

The Wires
powered by Surfing Waves
The Ledes

Thursday, September 26, 2024

The New York Times:' live updates of Hurricane Helene developments today are here. “Hurricane Helene was barreling through the Gulf of Mexico on Thursday en route to Florida, where residents were bracing for extreme rain, destructive winds and deadly storm surge ahead of the storm’s expected landfall. The storm could intensify to a Category 4, if not higher, before making landfall late Thursday, and forecasters warned Helene’s anticipated large size could make its impacts felt across an extensive area. Areas as distant as Atlanta and the Appalachians are at risk for heavy rains.... Many forecast models show the storm making landfall late Thursday near Florida’s Big Bend Coast, a sparsely populated stretch....” ~~~

     ~~~ The Washington Post has forecasts for some cites in Florida, Georgia, North Carolina & Tennessee that are in or near the probable path of Helene. ~~~

     ~~~ This morning, an MSNBC weatherperson said Tallahassee (which is inland) would experience wind gusts of up to 120 m.p.h. and that the National Weather Service said expected 20-foot storm surges near the coast would be “unsurvivable.”

Help!

To keep the Conversation going, please help me by linking news articles, opinion pieces and other political content in today's Comments section.

Link Code:   <a href="URL">text</a>

OR here's a link generator. The one I had posted died, then Akhilleus found one, but it too bit the dust. He found yet another, which I've linked here, and as of September 23, 2024, it's working.

OR you can always just block, copy and paste to your comment the URL (Web address) of the page you want to link.

Note for Readers. It is not possible for commenters to "throw" their highlighted links to another window. But you can do that yourself. Right-click on the link and a drop-down box will give you choices as to where you want to open the link: in a new tab, new window or new private window.

Thank you to everyone who has been contributing links to articles & other content in the Comments section of each day's "Conversation." If you're missing the comments, you're missing some vital links.

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.”

Washington Post: “An early Titian masterpiece — once looted by Napolean’s troops and a part of royal collections for centuries — caused a stir when it was stolen from the home of a British marquess in 1995. Seven years later, it was found inside an unassuming white and blue plastic bag at a bus stop in southwest London by an art detective, and returned. This week, the oil painting 'The Rest on the Flight into Egypt' sold for more than $22 million at Christie’s. It was a record for the Renaissance artist, whom museums describe as the greatest painter of 16th-century Venice. Ahead of the sale in April, the auction house billed it as 'the most important work by Titian to come to the auction market in more than a generation.'”

Washington Post: The Folger Shakespeare Library in Washington, D.C., which houses the world's largest collection of Shakespeare material, has undergone a major renovation. "The change to the building is pervasive, both subtle and transformational."

Contact Marie

Click on this link to e-mail Marie.

Page Links
Saturday
Jul232011

The Commentariat -- July 24

I've posted an Open Thread for today's Off Times Square. Karen Garcia and I have added our comments on MoDo & Bruni. Update: The Times axed both of my comments, so you'll have to read them here. Garcia's made the cuts.

Boehner Creates a New Crisis. Steve Clemons of The Atlantic: "Reports have emerged that House Speaker Boehner told his caucus that their team needs to 'provide a positive signal on a plan to avert a U.S. default by tomorrow.' That's right, by the time markets in Asia open tomorrow....  Instead of August 2nd being the debt default deadline, Boehner's tactics and now his statement to his own troops have created market expectations that will either be met -- or be disappointed, possibly creating a real sell-off in American treasuries. Perhaps he should have thought about that before he stormed off." ...

... AND at the plush SLS Hotel in Beverly Hills, Clemons rubs shoulders with today's Scott Fitzgerald crowd -- super-rich hipsters who know nothing about Afghanistan, Pakistan, the debt ceiling, the unemployment rate, the end of DADT: "... these folks seem very buffered from the real world, unburdened, lightly taxed if all -- and that is why what Obama and Boehner are wrestling over is so important. We need the burdens in this country -- as well as the opportunities -- much more equally shouldered." ...

CW: Here are two columns I would not normally link, the first because the writer is a British conservative & the second because the writer -- a good reporter -- works for the Huff Post. But if you read these two columns in tandem it's hard not to see how democracy, here and in Britain, has disappeared & moneyed interests have taken complete hold of government:

     ... Conservative Charles Moore of the Telegraph: "The rich run a global system that allows them to accumulate capital and pay the lowest possible price for labour. The freedom that results applies only to them. The many simply have to work harder, in conditions that grow ever more insecure, to enrich the few. Democratic politics, which purports to enrich the many, is actually in the pocket of those bankers, media barons and other moguls who run and own everything.... And when the banks that look after our money take it away, lose it and then, because of government guarantee, are not punished themselves, something much worse happens. It turns out – as the Left always claims – that a system purporting to advance the many has been perverted in order to enrich the few."

     ... Ryan Grim: Boehner's latest plan is to create a "Super Congress" of 6 Republicans & 6 Democrats who would have extraordinary power to craft legislation & "would find it easier to strip the public of popular benefits." (Legislation they created would be subject to straight up-or-down votes in both Houses of the Little Congress.) In case you think President Obama & his veto pen will protect you from Super Congress excesses, Grim reminds us of the Catfood Commission Obama appointed: "Obama has shown himself to be a fan of the commission approach to cutting social programs and entitlements.... The White House made two telling appointments to chair the commission: The first was former Sen. Alan Simpson (R-Wyo.), a well-known and ill-informed critic of Social Security who earned notoriety by suggesting, among other things, that the American government had become 'a milk cow with 310 million tits!' Yet Obama's Democratic appointment was even more indicative of whose interests took priority: former Clinton White House Chief of Staff Erskine Bowles. Bowles is a member of Morgan Stanley's board of directors; an adviser to Carousel Capital, a private equity firm; and a director of Cousins Properties Incorporated...." ...

... Nicholas Kristof: "Forget about Iran. These days,  the most dangerous threat to national security comes from [elected Republican Tea Partiers}. While one danger to national security comes from the risk of default, another comes from overzealous budget cuts — especially in education, at the local, state and national levels." ...

... New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, a billionaire Republican, on raising taxes on the rich. Via Think Progress:

... Dan Balz of the Washington Post is not a brilliant guy, & this analysis is of the "there's blame all around" genre, but his central point is correct: "What the country is watching is a breakdown in governing that could be as corrosive to the political system as the possible financial default looming could be to the economy."

Maureen Dowd compares Rupert Murdoch to the Pope, who according to Taoiseach Enda Kenny attempted "to frustrate an inquiry in a sovereign, democratic republic as little as three years ago, not three decades ago." Here's Kenny's speech:

Frank Bruni: "Michele Bachmann will likely not win the White House, but, in the meantime, she is manna for the pundits."

Peter Beaumont of the Guardian profiles Andes Behring Breivik, the Norwegian terrorist and sees: "a disturbing picture: a Christian fundamentalist with a deep hatred of multiculturalism, of the left and of Muslims, who had written disparagingly of prominent Norwegian politicians." CW: if that description doesn't sound familiar, you haven't been reading the Tea Party News.

Right Wing World *

Yay! A New Conspiracy Theory. Brad Johnson of Think Progress: According to Rush Limbaugh, the heat index is "manufactured by the government to tell you what it feels like when you add the humidity in there." With audio. ...

... CW: I'm guessing Rush has A/C. But a lot of people don't. Marie Diamond of Think Progess: "Budget cuts have forced thousands of poor families to go without air conditioning as a record heat wave sweeps across the country. Many states have been facing budget crises and programs that help needy families pay their electric bills are often the first thing to go.... The [federal] government [which provides aid to states] cut $400 million for low-income energy assistance this year," causing states to cut back at the same time the recession has caused applications for home energy assistance to skyrocket.

* Where even the weather is a government conspiracy.

News Ledes

This Is Insane. Washington Post: "Hours before Asian financial markets were set to open Sunday evening, talks over the federal debt limit were at a standstill and House and Senate leaders were threatening to pursue two different approaches to averting a government default in a messy legislative showdown." ...

... New York Times: "Speaker John A. Boehner said Sunday that the House would prepare its own deficit reduction package if Congress and the White House failed to agree on a bipartisan plan by Sunday afternoon, as lawmakers forged ahead in an increasingly grim standoff over whether to raise the nation’s debt ceiling." CW: this doesn't even make sense. The House can't acti unilaterally. ...

... The Hill: "After a morning meeting at the White House and an evening meeting at the Capitol, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) said he was 'disappointed in the status of negotiations with my Republican colleagues.'" Politico has more on how the leaders' meeting went last night. Here's a sample:

Reid was 'very angry' in the meeting with [Speaker] Boehner and [Senate Minority Leader Mitch] McConnell, according to a Democratic official. Following the meeting, [House Minority Leader Nancy] Pelosi escorted Reid back to her office because she didn’t want the furious majority leader to say anything to the press. Reid is 'adamant' about no short-term extension of the debt ceiling, the official said...

... Washington Post: "Congressional leaders raced Saturday to develop a new strategy for raising the federal debt limit that House Speaker John A. Boehner told his troops would include an ambitious plan to reduce future borrowing by as much as $4 trillion.... Boehner (Ohio) said he is confident lawmakers will avert a historic U.S. default — a possibility just 10 days off." CW: in other words, he's negotiating with himself & will produce a bill that only a Tea Partier could love -- just as he did last week with Duck, Dodge & Dismantle bill. ...

... AP: "House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio, said he wants to announce the outlines of a plan by 4 p.m. EDT Sunday, to assure investors of the nation's financial and political stability before Asian stock markets open Monday."

New York Times: "Hundreds of gay and lesbian couples across New York State began marrying on Sunday — the first taking their vows just after midnight — in the culmination of a long battle in the Legislature and a new milestone for gay rights advocates seeking to legalize same-sex marriage across the nation."

... New York Times: "The Norwegian man charged with attacks in and near Oslo, killing over 90 people, has admitted 'to the facts' of the case, the police and his lawyer said on Sunday, and claims to have acted alone in a strike eerily foretold in a detailed manifesto calling for a Christian war to defend Europe against the threat of Muslim domination. But, acting police chief Sveinung Sponheim told a news conference, 'he is not admitting criminal guilt' and his claim to have acted alone contrasted with 'some of the witness statements,' Reuters reported."

AP: "North Korea's vice foreign minister will visit the United States this week to discuss the next steps needed to resume international negotiations aimed at ridding the communist nation of its nuclear programs, U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Sunday."

Comments Off