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Whoo! A whole week went by without being able to do a whole lot in terms of regular news postings. As such, we're heavy on the news and light on the opinions for once, instead of the other way around. So, for your week-size helping of news and opinions, follow on, follow on.
Something of interest to us library and literary types - Publishing under a male pseudonym does earn you more respect and attention, less condescension, less hassle, and better satisfaction with the work. I think the Unabashed Feminism department is going to have to investigate why, despite many prominent female figures through time, people still like male names better when it comes to work.
For those aspiring to be illusionists, if you design or do some ones particularly well, you might find that the CIA is interested in your talents.
And for those interested in improving the planet without having to sacrifice good vibrations, meet a vibrating sex toy that generates all its power by hand. Four minutes of cranking, claims the manufacturer, is more than sufficient for thirty minutes of use.
By the way, your local librarians are always there in case you run into a question your search skills can't find a satisfactory answer to, and you can probably work something out with them if you have overdue books. They're also pretty good hands with the decorations.
Last before the news, If you're inclined, there's a research study looking for participants about how furry subculture has changed their lives. The FAQ is a bit sparse, but there is an IRB attached to the project.
Internationally, at current rates, hospital cleaners are worth more to society than bankers. When not "destroying" wealth, bankers were also helping to launder significant amounts of drugs money, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, because they were one of the few liquid assets available. The bankers deny doing so, and it would likely be difficult to trace the money back and prove it, but still, makes you wonder how much money circulates in the above-ground economy that was generated by the below-ground one.
Human rights in China continue to be something dreamed of, instead of reality. At least in Uganda, the United States is agitating for the killing of the bill to criminalize homosexuality. Although, as![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png)
hybridelephant.myopenid.com puts it, it might be better to pass it so as to point out how very un-Christian it is and force the denunciations.
Out in the battlefields, hey, look, software that lets you watch the video feeds of military unmanned aircraft. This is just one of the ways that cheap technology can be used to wage a very successful asymmetric war against a bigger and more expensively-equipped opponent. It may, in fact, be money that makes for victory or stability, because money greases the right wheels and drives wedges in the right places to prevent organized and united oppositions.
At the Copenhagen summit, Senator Inhofe came, deployed his truth squad, fielded questions from a skeptical press, and went home. Effectiveness doesn't seem to have been much above zero.
Actress Julie Newmar, known well for her role in the 60s Batman series with Adam West, alerted authorities to the eBay sale of jewels that belonged to her.
Domestically, the conservative movement continues to tear itself apart over ideological differences, leading to projections swinging in favor of Democratic candidates where a Republican and a Conservative/Tea Partier are in the same race. Not that the national party is doing a whole lot, either - the pervor over trying to stop health care has resulted in the GOP attempting to block a bill that would pay for Iraq and Afghanistan wars. And thus, the pro-war, fund it all, no questions asked party is trying to filibuster a war bill. (They failed.)
The city of Houston has elected their first openly homosexual mayor, the largest city to do so, as the century of the Fruitbat marches on, Portugal is considering letting homosexuals marry, a big issue in the Roman Catholic country, but with a Socialist government, and Washington D.C.'s city council voted to let homosexuals marry as well, but the United States Congress will have to not block it for thirty days before the bill becomes law. On the side opposed to equality for all, Oral Roberts, evangelist and founder of Oral Roberts University, was called to his judgment at 91 years. God only knows what reward he has received. Or what reward the military members who aggressively promote their brand of Christianity to other cadets, other soldiers, and the people they're supposed to be helping to protect or the people agitating to have an atheist council member not seated because the state consitution prohibits those who deny the being of God to have office, despite the clear provision in the federal constitution against religious tests for office, will receive.
A quick aside from one of our resident followers of Ganesha,hybridelephant.myopenid.com, a sequence on the need to contextualize the misuse of the swastika as a recent phenomenon, one contrary to its actual intentions, involving the carving of the phrase "I 卍 Obama", leading to correction of the article by a sixth grader with the correct knowledge. For the opposite attitude, the one that continuees to associate religious symobls with men who were nowhere near that religion (or any other of the nominally peaceful ones), the offense an uneducated student took over the comparison between the cross symbol of Christians and the swastika symbol, with WND helpfully providing the wrong image as context in the middle of trying to paint the person firing religious symbols in direct contravention of school rules as being discriminated unfairly against. (The Liberty Institute person quoted at the end of the article is also wrong. Schools can and do ban religious symbols.) Speaking of the atrocities, someone stole the sign over the gate at Auschwitz, the one proclaiming that work will set you free.
NPR's All Things Considered talks about how the Tea Party movement is harnessing the anger of the populace to promote their message, a message which the Slacktivist indicates contains a healthy does of racism against the President, assuming that he hates America, and that his "Yes We Can" doesn't include all of America, but just the America that is like him, threatening to steamroll everyone else on his way to whatever boogeyman is convenient these days. Worse, the Tea Partiers seem very intent on an unhealthy form of denial of reality, perferring to believe there are monsters out there and investing a lot of effort in combating those imaginary monsters.
It would be far easier to focus on the real monsters, like the ones uncovered in the Kansas City Star's multi-part feature on human trafficking, which implicates Kansas City as a place where a lot of that trafficking takes place. And it's not necessarily sex-trade trafficking. It can also be someone brought over who had their documents seized by their employer, and then were abused or forced to work very long days for little or no pay, possibly with the threat of harm to themselves or their families if they didn't continue in those awful conditions.
In health care, we start with Joe Liberman's declaration that he will filibuster any bill that includes real reform. So, in a spineless attempt to get Joe to please, please, pretty please, stay with the Democrats, Harry Reid caved and removed any mention of any real reform. Thus, things have gotten very bad. So very bad, in fact, that some progressives are now calling for the death of the bill instead of passing the gutted monstrosity. Because, after all, it maintains the for-profit private insurance cabal and provides no competition. And the system as it is kills people who were living the Way-It-Never-Was form of the American Dream - because someone who never worked gets no Social Security, and her husband made too much for public assistance, and thus it eventually became a choice of chemotherapy or food. Food won, as it almost always will.
Leaked documents describing TSA screening procedures from 2008, with images and examples of things and people exempted from screening, and those things and people that get special screening.
And last out, will wonders never cease... John McCain, of all people, is for putting the wall between commercial banking and investment banking back up. Perhaps the Republicans have finally decided that they've got too far in their deregulation frenzies (not that you were much help, Bill Clinton).
In technology, a best man set up the newlywed bed so that when the couple was having sex, it would post to a twitter account, even Facebook people are okay with you falsifying some of your optional data to help protect your privacy, which indicates to me that the new privacy settings aren't, an octopus and a coconut shell, showing the animal kingdom can do the tools and technology thing, too, a reminder that you can have great security and still be hijacked if someone takes over the lower-level protocols feeding your site, a company is selling two robots that will be crafted to be your doppelgangers if you bid high enough to get them, stress is certainly not a modern concept, research continues to indicate the Peter Principle is true, much to all our chagrin, the unlocking of the genetic codes of common cancers, proving there's a lot you can do when you have significant computing resources at your disposal, the possibility that synaesthesia is the result of higher brain functioning, instead of crossed sensory wires at a lower level, and Google's CEO joins the crowds saying "If you have nothing to hide, you shouldn't be concerned about your privacy". Excepting that everyone has something to hide, whether it is their real name or a heinous crime. (Did we mention Google wants to buy Yelp, and thus gather more data unto itself?)
Oh, and there was the almost Earthsize planet orbiting a star much smaller than Sol.
In the opinions, Mr. Lind opens the salvo with a reminder that with a new census comes new gerrymandered districts, ensuring that nobody from an opposition party will ever be elected in the next ten years, when, if they're in power, they'll gerrymander to favor themselves.
Mr. Pett usees one picture about climate change to explain why, even if warming is natural, why people should be concerned about their environment. And why some people will still oppose it.
Last out of opinions, a light take on things - how much television owes to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, for changing it in ways that we still feel today - season-long arcs, strong female characters, witty dialogue, and permanent death for major characters.
Last for tonight, in your VEWPRF fun department, Christmas Tree Light Hero. Because the bar on synchronized light and sound displays had to be raised somehow. Going for one better, forty-five beautiful slow shutter speed pictures, and some very nice landscapes of the Southwestern United States, including the traveling stones.
Something of interest to us library and literary types - Publishing under a male pseudonym does earn you more respect and attention, less condescension, less hassle, and better satisfaction with the work. I think the Unabashed Feminism department is going to have to investigate why, despite many prominent female figures through time, people still like male names better when it comes to work.
For those aspiring to be illusionists, if you design or do some ones particularly well, you might find that the CIA is interested in your talents.
And for those interested in improving the planet without having to sacrifice good vibrations, meet a vibrating sex toy that generates all its power by hand. Four minutes of cranking, claims the manufacturer, is more than sufficient for thirty minutes of use.
By the way, your local librarians are always there in case you run into a question your search skills can't find a satisfactory answer to, and you can probably work something out with them if you have overdue books. They're also pretty good hands with the decorations.
Last before the news, If you're inclined, there's a research study looking for participants about how furry subculture has changed their lives. The FAQ is a bit sparse, but there is an IRB attached to the project.
Internationally, at current rates, hospital cleaners are worth more to society than bankers. When not "destroying" wealth, bankers were also helping to launder significant amounts of drugs money, according to the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, because they were one of the few liquid assets available. The bankers deny doing so, and it would likely be difficult to trace the money back and prove it, but still, makes you wonder how much money circulates in the above-ground economy that was generated by the below-ground one.
Human rights in China continue to be something dreamed of, instead of reality. At least in Uganda, the United States is agitating for the killing of the bill to criminalize homosexuality. Although, as
hybridelephant.myopenid.com puts it, it might be better to pass it so as to point out how very un-Christian it is and force the denunciations.Out in the battlefields, hey, look, software that lets you watch the video feeds of military unmanned aircraft. This is just one of the ways that cheap technology can be used to wage a very successful asymmetric war against a bigger and more expensively-equipped opponent. It may, in fact, be money that makes for victory or stability, because money greases the right wheels and drives wedges in the right places to prevent organized and united oppositions.
At the Copenhagen summit, Senator Inhofe came, deployed his truth squad, fielded questions from a skeptical press, and went home. Effectiveness doesn't seem to have been much above zero.
Actress Julie Newmar, known well for her role in the 60s Batman series with Adam West, alerted authorities to the eBay sale of jewels that belonged to her.
Domestically, the conservative movement continues to tear itself apart over ideological differences, leading to projections swinging in favor of Democratic candidates where a Republican and a Conservative/Tea Partier are in the same race. Not that the national party is doing a whole lot, either - the pervor over trying to stop health care has resulted in the GOP attempting to block a bill that would pay for Iraq and Afghanistan wars. And thus, the pro-war, fund it all, no questions asked party is trying to filibuster a war bill. (They failed.)
The city of Houston has elected their first openly homosexual mayor, the largest city to do so, as the century of the Fruitbat marches on, Portugal is considering letting homosexuals marry, a big issue in the Roman Catholic country, but with a Socialist government, and Washington D.C.'s city council voted to let homosexuals marry as well, but the United States Congress will have to not block it for thirty days before the bill becomes law. On the side opposed to equality for all, Oral Roberts, evangelist and founder of Oral Roberts University, was called to his judgment at 91 years. God only knows what reward he has received. Or what reward the military members who aggressively promote their brand of Christianity to other cadets, other soldiers, and the people they're supposed to be helping to protect or the people agitating to have an atheist council member not seated because the state consitution prohibits those who deny the being of God to have office, despite the clear provision in the federal constitution against religious tests for office, will receive.
A quick aside from one of our resident followers of Ganesha,
hybridelephant.myopenid.com, a sequence on the need to contextualize the misuse of the swastika as a recent phenomenon, one contrary to its actual intentions, involving the carving of the phrase "I 卍 Obama", leading to correction of the article by a sixth grader with the correct knowledge. For the opposite attitude, the one that continuees to associate religious symobls with men who were nowhere near that religion (or any other of the nominally peaceful ones), the offense an uneducated student took over the comparison between the cross symbol of Christians and the swastika symbol, with WND helpfully providing the wrong image as context in the middle of trying to paint the person firing religious symbols in direct contravention of school rules as being discriminated unfairly against. (The Liberty Institute person quoted at the end of the article is also wrong. Schools can and do ban religious symbols.) Speaking of the atrocities, someone stole the sign over the gate at Auschwitz, the one proclaiming that work will set you free.NPR's All Things Considered talks about how the Tea Party movement is harnessing the anger of the populace to promote their message, a message which the Slacktivist indicates contains a healthy does of racism against the President, assuming that he hates America, and that his "Yes We Can" doesn't include all of America, but just the America that is like him, threatening to steamroll everyone else on his way to whatever boogeyman is convenient these days. Worse, the Tea Partiers seem very intent on an unhealthy form of denial of reality, perferring to believe there are monsters out there and investing a lot of effort in combating those imaginary monsters.
It would be far easier to focus on the real monsters, like the ones uncovered in the Kansas City Star's multi-part feature on human trafficking, which implicates Kansas City as a place where a lot of that trafficking takes place. And it's not necessarily sex-trade trafficking. It can also be someone brought over who had their documents seized by their employer, and then were abused or forced to work very long days for little or no pay, possibly with the threat of harm to themselves or their families if they didn't continue in those awful conditions.
In health care, we start with Joe Liberman's declaration that he will filibuster any bill that includes real reform. So, in a spineless attempt to get Joe to please, please, pretty please, stay with the Democrats, Harry Reid caved and removed any mention of any real reform. Thus, things have gotten very bad. So very bad, in fact, that some progressives are now calling for the death of the bill instead of passing the gutted monstrosity. Because, after all, it maintains the for-profit private insurance cabal and provides no competition. And the system as it is kills people who were living the Way-It-Never-Was form of the American Dream - because someone who never worked gets no Social Security, and her husband made too much for public assistance, and thus it eventually became a choice of chemotherapy or food. Food won, as it almost always will.
Leaked documents describing TSA screening procedures from 2008, with images and examples of things and people exempted from screening, and those things and people that get special screening.
And last out, will wonders never cease... John McCain, of all people, is for putting the wall between commercial banking and investment banking back up. Perhaps the Republicans have finally decided that they've got too far in their deregulation frenzies (not that you were much help, Bill Clinton).
In technology, a best man set up the newlywed bed so that when the couple was having sex, it would post to a twitter account, even Facebook people are okay with you falsifying some of your optional data to help protect your privacy, which indicates to me that the new privacy settings aren't, an octopus and a coconut shell, showing the animal kingdom can do the tools and technology thing, too, a reminder that you can have great security and still be hijacked if someone takes over the lower-level protocols feeding your site, a company is selling two robots that will be crafted to be your doppelgangers if you bid high enough to get them, stress is certainly not a modern concept, research continues to indicate the Peter Principle is true, much to all our chagrin, the unlocking of the genetic codes of common cancers, proving there's a lot you can do when you have significant computing resources at your disposal, the possibility that synaesthesia is the result of higher brain functioning, instead of crossed sensory wires at a lower level, and Google's CEO joins the crowds saying "If you have nothing to hide, you shouldn't be concerned about your privacy". Excepting that everyone has something to hide, whether it is their real name or a heinous crime. (Did we mention Google wants to buy Yelp, and thus gather more data unto itself?)
Oh, and there was the almost Earthsize planet orbiting a star much smaller than Sol.
In the opinions, Mr. Lind opens the salvo with a reminder that with a new census comes new gerrymandered districts, ensuring that nobody from an opposition party will ever be elected in the next ten years, when, if they're in power, they'll gerrymander to favor themselves.
Mr. Pett usees one picture about climate change to explain why, even if warming is natural, why people should be concerned about their environment. And why some people will still oppose it.
Last out of opinions, a light take on things - how much television owes to Buffy the Vampire Slayer, for changing it in ways that we still feel today - season-long arcs, strong female characters, witty dialogue, and permanent death for major characters.
Last for tonight, in your VEWPRF fun department, Christmas Tree Light Hero. Because the bar on synchronized light and sound displays had to be raised somehow. Going for one better, forty-five beautiful slow shutter speed pictures, and some very nice landscapes of the Southwestern United States, including the traveling stones.
