Out, damned spot! Fox News caught red-handed, laundering entries on Wikipedia. Keep on scrubbing, Lady MacFox, but those stains belong to you always.
The GOP’s California strategy: winning the 2008 election by undoing California’s winner-take-all electoral system. Once the state goes piecemeal, the Repubs gain at least 20 electoral votes from safe GOP districts.
Arianna Huffington looks at how the media have fawned all over Robert Murray, the co-owner of the mine that collapsed in Utah, instead of examining his responsibility for the 324 safety violations (107 of them considered “significant and substantial”) issued for the mine since 2004.
THE PINK SECTION: Michelangelo Signorile on Merv Griffin’s closeted life. “Merv Griffin was an example of how dangerous the closet can be — and how the closet and power are a combustible combination that adversely affects so many other lives. We should point to his life for GLBT youth and say, ‘Don’t let this happen to you. Don’t let your closet compromise you to the point where you are actively harming your own people, even though you have the power to do so much good.’ ”
THE GREEN SECTION:“Bunny bathrooms” used to study swamp rabbit populations. Great Frith, can’t a rabbit get some privacy to make hraka around here? “Costing about $2 (€1.5) apiece, the long, narrow privies were framed of plywood and covered with unsupported carpeting, mimicking the spongy give of a rotting log or stump. Live traps were set near the fake logs, allowing researchers to authenticate the users as swamp rabbits. The rabbits quickly found the carpeted commodes quite comfortable.”
Baby giraffe born at Santa Rosa wildlife preserve. “Giraffes give birth standing, so the calf dropped six feet to the floor of the barn late Sunday night, a fall that is crucial for the baby’s survival. ‘They need to have that drop to start breathing,’ said Aphrodite Caserta, park spokeswoman.” Quick, somebody slap “Oh noes! Sicks foot drop!” on a photo and launch LOLBabyGiraffes. (Note: the model for this post is not the baby, just a lovable anonymous public-domain giraffe.)
Eating fish may be good for the heart, but not so good for the environment. This Reuters story says, “Conservationists point out that while global fish stocks were getting hammered long before sushi became chic, health trends could add pressure to already vulnerable fisheries,” and also points out: “Fish don’t actually produce omega-3 fatty acids, they capture it from the food chain. And there are plenty of substitutes out there such as walnuts, flaxseed and canola oil, which can provide the same omega-3-related benefits as fish.” I always wonder why that doesn’t get pointed out more often in these “amazing health benefits of fish” stories. As a non-pescetarian, I find it pretty easy to find everything from margarine to bread that’s made with flax oil and loaded with Omega-3. Walnuts are darn tasty in a salad or stir-fry, too.
BOOKS: The third book in Ursula K. Le Guin’s “Annals of the Western Shore” series is out this month. This third installment is called Powers, and it joins Gifts (the first book) and Voices (the second book) in the series. You can read an excerpt from Powers on Powells.com. The offical UKL site has a roundup page for the whole series, with book covers, review quotes and other info. Oh, and while I’m at it, the September issue of Harper’s, which I just got in the mail, reprints a short piece by UKL called “On Serious Literature,” from the July issue of Ansible.
“My Lobotomy”: Ever wonder what life would be like if your creepy parents had an actual lobotomy performed on you to make you a more compliant child? Howard Dully actually lived through this and has written a book about it.
FILM/TV: “The Future is Unwritten,” a documentary about Joe Strummer featuring previously unseen interviews and concert footage, is set for release in US theaters November 2.
Bob Dylan to be played by six different actors, including Christian Bale, Heath Ledger, Richard Gere, and Cate Blanchett, in the new Todd Haynes film I’m Not There. It opens Nov. 21. Says Haynes: “”It’s partly a desire to figure him out and partly a desire to protect something that will always be enigmatic. We want to know where the source of his creative energies comes from, but we don’t want to destroy it.”
Got an email here from Margaret Cho (well, her staff anyway) saying her film Bam Bam and Celeste is now available on DVD. You can find it in Ms. Cho’s online store.
Tories get their knickers in a twist over pottymouth portrayal of Margaret “Fascist Spice” Thatcher. (h/t Norm.)
Headlines that speak for themselves: “Man Punched for Singing Coldplay Song.” Key sentence: “The police were called and blocked the whole street off.” Let it be a lesson …
HEALTH:Chicago invaded by biting mites. My fellow Chicagoans, If you’re itching, it might not just be the usual mosquitos and chiggers. “More a public nuisance than a public health threat, the current mystery mite apparently arrived in the Chicago area sometime in recent weeks. Residents here have seen the worst it has to offer — a rash of irritating wounds that last for days and spread in angry red profusion on exposed necks, shoulders, arms and backs.”
Here are a few examples the article cites for calling Edwards “the real liberal” in the race:
Take global warming: While Clinton spouts happy talk about ethanol and “clean coal,” and Obama focuses on a technocratic proposal to lower the “carbon intensity” of auto fuel, Edwards has a plan that would make the Union of Concerned Scientists proud. “We need an eighty percent reduction in greenhouse emissions by 2050,” the candidate told Rolling Stone in a wide-ranging interview. “You start by capping carbon emissions in America. Beneath the cap, you auction off the right to emit any greenhouse gases. And you use that money –$30 to $40 billion — to transform the way we use energy.”
… Ending deprivation at home — by making it easier for workers to unionize, raising the minimum wage to $9.50, cracking down on predatory lending, and providing matching funds to help low-income Americans save — remains the hallmark of his candidacy. But informed by his travels in Africa, Edwards now proposes spending $5 billion a year to educate 100 million children worldwide, improve drinking water and sanitation in developing countries, and slow the ravages of HIV and AIDS.
… He was the first contender with a plan for universal medical coverage, and his proposal goes further than Obama’s by mandating that every American be provided a health plan. And where Clinton would leave a significant troop presence in Iraq indefinitely, Edwards calls for a complete withdrawal. He has issued the most forceful repudiation of Bush’s “war” on terror, and in July he proposed a tax hike for wealthy investors.
… and the piece points out, once again, the key bit of info I wish I could beam into the brain of every Democratic primary voter:
In head-to-head polling against the likes of Rudy Giuliani and Mitt Romney, Clinton and Obama have managed to post only modest leads. Edwards, by contrast, not only bests every Republican candidate in the race, he trounces them — by an average of twelve points.
The article also makes clear that despite the media’s forced binary “Hillary or Obama?” narrative, Edwards has a real shot at winning Iowa, because he’s quietly done an impressive job of organizing and building support in a state that already likes him. And if Edwards wins Iowa, he’s in the game for sure.
I have, in the kitchen of my own home, concocted the most marvelous refreshment.
Having made some hot tea by the normal infusion method, on a whim I poured the tea over some cubes of frozen water, thus lowering the temperature of the tea and transforming it from a steaming hot beverage into a refreshing chilled one.
I call this invention “tea-upon-ice.”
I find the delightful coolness of of the tea makes all sorts of subtle and wondrous flavors in the beverage apparent, in addition to being more appropriate to the intemperately hot and humid weather of the summer months.
I briefly considered applying for some sort of patent, but then my humanitarian side asserted itself. This idea must belong to the world, I scolded myself, there in the kitchen of my home. Think of the good it will do, the comfort it will bring!
I encourage you all to try it in the kitchens of your own homes. And spread the news!
This is brilliant. Peter Smith at the Huffington Post has a proposal for renaming the new I-35W bridge in Minneapolis that will replace the one that collapsed: “For a while there, back when the Republicans held the White House and both houses of Congress, they were naming things after Ronald Reagan everywhere. Airports. Aircraft carriers. Federal buildings. There was even talk of replacing Roosevelt with Reagan on the dime. Now, with the national landscape cratered with reminders of the apocalypse their public policy has wrought since 1980, maybe it’s time to revisit the concept and start naming American disasters after the people and policies that caused them. Obviously, the new 35W bridge in Minneapolis should be named for The Great Communicator. Infrastructure on the cheap began on his watch.”
Further down on that page, a commenter suggests naming the Ninth Ward of New Orleans “Grover’s Bath Tub,” after Grover Norquist’s infamous remark about wanting to drown the federal government in his bath tub.
From the people who brought you the great African-American voter purge of 2000, you’ll love the sequel: According to this Daily Kos diary, Greg Palast is predicting that the Republicans’ voter purge target for 2008 will be Latinos, and that their cover story will be that they’re just trying to stop illegal immigrants from voting.
If your local newspaper is in need of a progressive columnist (and what local paper isn’t these days, now that Molly Ivins is no longer with us?), David Sirota has an action step for you.
I’ve been wondering this for a while myself: If God didn’t make Adam and Steve, how did they get here?
THE GREEN SECTION: So long, and thanks for all the fish. As of yesterday, the Yangtze river dolphin (also known as the baiji) has been declared officially extinct, ending its 20-million-year history on Planet Earth. The baiji is believed to be the first member of the cetacean category (which includes whales, dolphins, and porpoises) to become extinct due to human activity.
Dr. Sam Turvey, the biologist who led the recent expedition that failed to turn up any surviving specimens of the baiji, spoke movingly: “The loss of such a unique and charismatic species is a shocking tragedy … There is a lot of interest now in the baiji — but it has come too late. Why does no one pay attention to a species until there are none left? We really have to use the baiji as a wake-up call to act immediately to prevent it happening again.”
Meanwhile, scientists have discovered six new animal species in a “lost forest” in the Congo — including one new bat, one new rat, two shrews, and two frogs. (Which sounds like the beginning of an idea for a Dr. Seuss book …) Click through for pictures.
Rare olive ridley turtles are being threatened by Tata Steel, India’s largest corporation, which is planning to build a gigantic port near the endangered turtles’ breeding grounds.
The anti-bottled water movement continues to grow, and Pepsi has agreed to start admitting on its labels that Aquafina is made from tap water. (As is Coca-Cola’s Dasani.)
WEIRD SCIENCE: First it was invisibility. Now it turns out levitation might be possible, according to theoretical physicists at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland.
TECH: The iPhone is a long way off in my future, if at all, because I’m just not interested in signing up with AT&T. But a recycling-friendly aluminum iMac with an internal hard drive you can bump up to 500 GB? I think I just met my next desktop.
Also, I keep reading stories that say the new iMacs come in three configurations — nobody seems to be mentioning the fact that if you order from the Apple site, there are actually four. The Apple Store on the Web shows a top-end version that comes with 2 GB of RAM and a 2.8 GHz processor for $2399. Maybe it’s a Web exclusive sort of thing?
Keith Olbermann and Rachel Maddow say pretty much what I’ve been wanting to say about the Minneapolis bridge collapse story.
I hate to say it, but I feel like we’ve just had a “welcome to the 21st century” kind of moment, and this isn’t going to be the last time this kind of preventable disaster happens.
We’ve had several decades now of Republicans robbing our federal and state governments in order to give huge tax cuts to millionaires and billionaires.
The result is that budgets for things like infrastructure, public transportation, and other necessities of human life get gutted. And we’re left with roads, bridges, and train systems that are aging fast and in dire need of overhauls they’re not getting.
Underneath our cities are pipes that were installed in 1924, like the one that recently exploded in New York, killing one person and injuring 20 others — while we walk around on the surface thinking everything’s fine because Fox News tells us it’s good to keep shrinking the government.
This is from Time magazine by way of Yahoo News, from an eerily prescient article written before the bridge collapse (boldface is my emphasis):
Urban planning experts say America’s older cities are modern-day Pompeiis – within range of volcanoes of infrastructure failures like New York’s. On Wednesday, a pipe, laid in 1924, exploded near Grand Central station, killing one person and injuring 30. Maintaining a sewer system is hardly a sexy political issue, but years of funding neglect and a subsequent lack of maintenance nationwide have left many of the country’s engineering systems unprepared to handle future stresses. “We have an aging infrastructure in this country, and we are not doing enough to maintain it and replace it,” said Sarah Catz, director of the Center for Urban Infrastructure at University of California-Irvine. “What you saw happen in New York will happen in all types of infrastructures.”
The issue is widespread, said Dan LeClair, who teaches city planning at Boston University. “It’s not just pipes,” he said. “It’s bridges, it’s roads, it’s electrical systems, it’s a variety of things that can happen in a man-made environment that can have a disastrous effect.” A recent report by the Urban Land Institute determined that America’s comparatively low investment in various transportation infrastructure – airports, public transit, railway systems, roads and bridges – has created an “emerging crisis.” Of the 30 state transportation planning directors surveyed for the report, 25 said the nation’s transportation infrastructure is incapable of meeting the nation’s needs over the next decade.
Finally, from another story (via Aaron) on the bridge collapse, note this buried lead:
According to the Federal Highway Administration, 75,422 of the approximately 600,000 bridges nationwide in 2006 carried a “structurally deficient” classification.
And as Rachel Maddow points out in the video above, “if you only look at bridges that carry 190,000 cars a day, there are at least 20 that rate worse than that bridge that collapsed.”
Yet another piece about the new B-52’s album, all recorded now with 12 shiny new songs, and just waiting for the right record deal to bring it to the public.
The super-lucky-ducky writer of the piece got to sit around and listen to the new album with Cindy Wilson in her basement, and offers this advance review:
The 12 songs alternately pulse and rock with a thoroughly modern sheen, thanks to in-demand producer Steve Osbourne (KT Tunstall, U2), the signature sound of the band balancing insistent dance-club grooves, and Keith Strickland’s inventive guitar flourishes and goofy pop-culture narratives.
The vocals from Wilson, Fred Schneider and Kate Pierson are playful, sinewy and dynamic. The material is sassy, hooky and kitschy. And the whole thing sounds remarkably like it could be a lost project from sometime in the late ’80s, yet it doesn’t rely on tired retreads or obvious rip-offs from the past.
Standouts from the first listen include “Funplex,” “Juliet of the Spirits,” the anthemic “Hot Corner” and “Let’s Keep This Party Going On.” Overall, there seems to be at least five strong-enough-to-be-hit singles. The rest are well-crafted album cuts with no obvious filler. It could very well become the band’s best-received album of its career – if it’s properly promoted and heard.
The piece also notes:
Since the music exists only as a completed master with no cover art, title or distribution deal, the only way fans can hear the new songs is live on tour, mixed in with the hits. “This summer we’re taking it out on the road, doing about half of [the album], to see the crowd reaction. So far it’s been great, people really like all the new songs.”
I hope they get that distribution deal soon.
(Also, I have to give points to the writer for name-checking both Yoko Ono and Lene Lovich in the piece’s opening paragraph.)
There’s also an interview from Time Out London, with Fred talking about the new album, “our stupid president,” and the Scissor Sisters.
Here’s a very dodgy video of the 2’s performing their new song “Pump” from the forthcoming album. The sound quality is horrendous, and the guitar riff and the drums are about all you can make out — but if you’re a fan, it’s still kind of fun to hear.
And, with the same disclaimers, this is a little snippet of “Juliet of the Spirits.”
I give it 8½ stars.
Finally, The B-52’s news page notes that “Glove Slap” from The Simpsons will be included on the next Simpsons soundtrack, Testify, slated for release September 18.
Clinton came under attack for declining to join former senator John Edwards (N.C.), who is quite popular with bloggers, and Sen. Barack Obama (Ill.) in pledging not to take campaign contributions from Washington lobbyists.
“I think my party, the Democratic Party, the party of the people, ought to say from this day forward we will never take a dime from a Washington lobbyist,” Edwards said to rising applause from the audience of more than 1,000.
Asked whether she would agree with that, Clinton said, “I don’t think, based on my 35 years of fighting for what I believe in, anybody seriously believes I’m going to be influenced by a lobbyist or a particular interest.”
How gullible does she think we are?
Pretty gullible, apparently.
Hey, Hillary — I’m right over here. And yes, I seriously believe that you are going to be not only influenced but flat-out owned by the interests that give you money. Because you simply have not demonstrated the ability to stand up to those interests and win.
And you aren’t willing to take the pledge. It’s a little harder to believe that Edwards and Obama will be bought by lobbyists, given that they’re refusing to take their money.
Just so we’re clear on that.
But wait, to really drive it home, watch the video and listen to the Yearly Kos audience’s reaction when she starts talking that stuff.
Hillary does have a little follow-up in the video that almost saves her — where she says that some of the lobbyists represent not-evil people like nurses and so forth — but that’s kind of a red herring, because the amount of money that nurses’ organizations kick in pales in comparison to what say, big pharma lobbyists can pony up.
And the audience knows it. And now Hillary knows that they know it.
Here’s a quick video of Edwards’ follow-up session at Yearly Kos.
He’s really doing such a great job of delivering the populist message — it seems to me pretty clear that he’s read What’s the Matter with Kansas? and understands how vital it is for the Democrats to restore their place as the party of the people in the minds of American voters. It shouldn’t be necessary, but unfortunately the Republican media machine has effectively managed to switch the parties’ hats for a lot of regular-type Americans, who’ve been bombarded for too many years with Faux News propaganda about “liberal elitists” (who are apparently the only people in the whole country who like the taste of wine and/or cheese. Imagine that! All those wine shops, all those cheese departments in grocery stores across our great land, and apparently liberals are the only ones who ever visit them!)
It’s pretty obvious that the Democratic blogosphere is in love with Edwards. I just hope the not-so-Internetty Democratic voters start waking up to how brilliant he’s being, and that of all the candidates he has the best chance of defeating all Republicansand actually restoring a spine to the Democratic party.
As a sort of spiritual antidote to the horrible Michael Vicks dogfighting story, here’s a lovely poem by Chicago poet Yvonne Zipter (shared here with her permission). It’s from Yvonne’s most recent chapbook, Like Some Bookie God, which came out last year.
A Canine Metaphysics
In his meditative moments —
nose to the air or head resting
on a chew toy — he has, no doubt,
considered sound
and whether it is a sound — a knucklebone, say,
tumbling to the floor tile — if no one
is there to hear. Now,
this morning in April, he wants to run
but ponders, it seems,
how he will know
he’s a greyhound
if I’m not there to see him.
I step out of the house and into my love
of his rubberbandedness.
He is both sling
and shot. A marvel.
The way he inscribes
a loopy L around pergola,
over boardwalks, and behind garage, a dervish
of essentiality, tracing
and retracing this lone letter,
his broad paws like beaters
on the bass drum of lawn.
And each time all his feet
together leave the ground
and he is flying like Pegasus
or a blown kiss, joy climbs my spine
as at the carnival strength test.
And someone somewhere, sitting
in the lotus position, hears the ding.
[space for applause]
As you might guess, Like Some Bookie God is a themed chapbook of poems about life with Zipter’s greyhound companions.
And as I’ve said before, I’ve long thought Yvonne is one of the very best poets in Chicago, and her collection The Patience of Metal from 1990 would be a strong contender for my all-time favorite book of poems by a poet I know personally.
If you read the local LGBT weeklies, you might also know Yvonne as a long-running columnist for The Windy City Times (and before that, Outlines). When I first moved here in the late 80s, Yvonne’s column was a staple of the Chicago queer press. I particularly remember one that carried the headline, “Who’s That Cranky Old Dyke? Why, It’s Me!” (I think it was about growing older.) For some reason that particular headline so amused my former college roommate Ken and myself that it became one of our catchphrases for a while, even though neither of us were dykes, old, or particularly cranky at that phase of our lives.
Here’s a very nice review of Like Some Bookie God from the aforementioned Windy City Times, written by Yasmin Nair. Key quote:
They aren’t listed on the store’s Web site, due to the complexities of small book distribution, but I just spoke with Chelsea at Women and Children First, and she says that anyone interested in ordering the books can call the store at 773-769-9299, or email them at wcfbooks {at symbol} aol.com for instructions on how to order.
And of course if you’re local, you can always just stop by the store.
So I’ve been slammed with work for the last week or so, and I haven’t had a chance to update this count in a full seven days.
During that time, about 350 more Americans have died because they couldn’t afford health care.
That brings the total count to approximately 700 people who have died just since I started keeping track on July 18th.
But I realize that all these numbers I’m tossing around might seem kind of abstract. Almost hypothetical.
I mean, who are these U.S. citizens who are dying every day because our health care system is based on profit instead of, you know, health?
Well, let’s meet one of them. This is from an essay at Newsday.com by an attorney named Jeanne D’Esposito. I found it when I was searching for a source for the statistic that this series is based on. She writes:
Such was the case of my sister, Mary Mascioli, who became one of the more than 18,000 Americans who die each year because they don’t have insurance.
She was only 44 and a widow caring for her disabled son. Last year she went to a local emergency room complaining of shortness of breath and severe swelling in her legs. For the next five weeks, as she lay in a hospital bed too sick to fight for herself, my family and I desperately fought to get her adequate medical care. But her lack of insurance was a wall that we ran into everywhere we turned.
But wait — don’t hospitals have to provide treatment to people in need?
Although laws prohibit hospitals from denying treatment to those without insurance, there’s a limit to what a facility must provide, and most won’t make any effort beyond that.
In my sister’s case, that meant urgently needed treatment would often be delayed for several days. It took more than four days to get her on dialysis after her kidneys failed. By then she was barely conscious.
When her toes turned black from lack of blood supply, the vascular surgeon didn’t come for five days, and, by then, the toes required amputation. Some doctors refused to treat her at all.
We begged hospital personnel to call in other doctors, but, as an uninsured patient, Mary had to wait for the doctors assigned to her. And even after her doctors admitted they could not diagnose what was wrong, administrators refused their repeated requests to have her transferred to an affiliated tertiary care hospital that was better equipped to diagnose and care for such a medically complicated patient.
The transfer was finally approved after her condition became critical, but it was too late. She died two days later.
So. That’s what happened, here in the United States, over the last week.
Hard to tell too much for sure, but it does seem like they’ve gotten the look of it right. And it seems like maybe it’s going to be fairly faithful to the book — fingers crossed anyway.
And also — was that Derek Jacobi? Because that couldn’t be a bad thing. (He doesn’t seem to be listed in the cast on IMDB or Wikipedia, but it sure looks like him.)
I remember when I read the books several years ago I was very amused that the evil blonde villainness is named Coulter. And of course I just mentally pictured Ann Coulter saying and doing all those vile things, and needless to say it worked perfectly.
I’m sure Nicole Kidman will do her best, but it really will be impossible for her to look as natural as Ann would kidnapping children and bossing around a sadistic golden monkey.
Jim over at empty-handed.com finally figured out who this Harry Potter person everyone keeps talking about is.
And he has provided no less than five new books chronicling the adventures of this popular character. The results are pure wizardry! With, um, surgical precision.
And lucky you, I’ve giving you links to the whole five-book series.
As a sort of spiritual antidote to the horrible Michael Vicks dogfighting story, here’s a lovely poem by Chicago poet 