Roundup: Irish Sea Eagle Edition
- POLITICS: The Senate Judiciary committee has voted 13-3 to authorize subpoenas for documents related to the NSA warrantless surveillance program. That includes three Republicans on the committee voting in favor of the subpeonas: Sens. Arlen Specter (R-PA), Orrin Hatch (R-UT), and Chuck Grassley (R-IA).
- Poland “stuns” other members of the European Union by demanding that the EU voting formula compensate for population losses inflicted on Poland by Germany in World War II. Polish Prime Minister Jaroslaw Kaczynski asserted that the population-based voting system represents his country unfairly: “If Poland had not had to live through the years of 1939-45, Poland would today be looking at the demographics of a country of 66 million.” Poland’s current population is 38 million. The linked article says, “Mr Kaczynski’s outburst seems certain to damage relations with his biggest EU neighbour.”
- Ouch! That cookie jar has teeth: Florida’s Republican Lt. Governor Googles himself, finds information on a progressive wiki that makes him look bad, deletes the information, then lies about doing it, then gets caught red-handed.
- Digby revealed: One of the left blogosphere’s best-loved writers, Digby of Hullabaloo, unmasked herself this week at the Take Back American 2007 conference in Washington. Watch her speech (or read the transcript).
- THE GREEN SECTION: Sea eagles return to Ireland after being hunted to extinction a century ago. Fifteen young white-tailed sea eagles have been brought to Ireland by experts who will condition them for several weeks before releasing them into the wild. Naturalists are thrilled, but sheep farmers are complaining that young lambs may be in danger from the eagles. (Of course, the lambs may be in danger from the farmers as well.)
- Meanwhile, the last forest habitats where orangutans live may be wiped out within 10 years due to illegal logging, according to a new UN report.
- The Independent on the sudden greening of Rupert Murdoch: “In one of the most unexpected conversions since Saul of Tarsus hit the road to Damascus, Rupert Murdoch is turning into a green campaigner. He is making the whole of his worldwide operations carbon neutral and setting out to ‘educate and engage’ his readers and viewers about global warming.” Apparently he’s even bought himself a little hybrid car.
- THE PINK SECTION: Does your hair whorl spin clockwise or counterclockwise? This “Science of Gaydar” article from New York magazine is a fascinating rundown on the various markers that may be genetic indicators of homosexuality.
- Baby steps: Some so-called “ex-gays” and other conservative Christians may be starting to accept that homosexuality is genetic.
- Jessica at Feministing ponders the politics of engagement rings.
- Colombia’s civil union bill for same-sex couples has been stabbed in the back.
- The Condom Pig Kerfuffle: CBS and Fox reject a condom ad not because it contains dumb gender stereotypes, but because it focuses on pregnancy prevention rather than disease prevention.
- FILM: Movie projectionist fired for writing an early negative review of Fantastic Four: Rise of the Silver Surfer for Ain’t It Cool News.
- MUSIC: “Former radio personality” Paul F. has been posting some terrific rarities at The New Wave Time Machine, including a Japanese Icicle Works compilation, Dave Wakeling’s wonderful solo album No Warning, a Lightning Seeds promo, Fred Schneider’s Shake Society album, and the exquisite, clarinet-embellished extended version of “Say Hello, Wave Goodbye” by Soft Cell.
- An interview with Marc Almond. Via Joe My God.
- THE SOCK DRAWER: Scammers attempt to steal Herman Munster’s identity. I’d suggest siccing Spot, or maybe Grandpa, on them.
Tags:
Quite a good assortment of news stories! I’d reply to Kaczynski that likely people would have been lost to immigration if not for the war. But seriously, it’s inappropriate place to raise the topic yet again of German-Nazi war atrocities, but looking East, the Nazis regarded it as Lebensraum (living space) and slave labor, that is, people without the status of fully human, fit only for slavery and colonial exploitation in the manner “savages” were treated in the rest of the colonial world. Rather than making potential allies and collaborators in East Europe, as was done in Western Europe, the Nazis decimated the population and treated them with contemptuous brutality, which only antagonized them to turn against them, and this is one the major reasons the tide eventually turned against the Nazis to lose the war. The gaydar article made me realize that this information about being both more femme and butch likely applies to a lot of trans individuals. Personally, as trans, I feel both urges, and don’t want to renounce being butch, male, masculine to be all femme, female. It’d be nice to see more media images and press on this aspect of glbt gender-sexuality.