Someone has to bring America’s longest war to an end. The madness has to stop. I dare to hope that it will be soon.
A schism deepens between military leaders and Congress as lawmakers — crucial Democrats among them — challenge Pentagon assertions that progress is picking up in Afghanistan. Full story
What a great idea! Think what a boost it would be to the numerous charities that do a lot of good in this country, but are struggling because of the recession.
Enough funding can literally mean life and death for thousand of Americans who desperately need help.
They want their billionaire peers to pledge 50 percent to charity!
PHOTO: Bill Gates and Warren Buffett, shown in 2004, in Redmond, Wash., are spearheading a drive to get the superrich to donate an extraordinary amount of money to charity.
The worldwide economy is so bad that terrorist are soliciting donations:
Shortly before his death, group's No. 3 leader urged supporters to donate
Egyptian-born al-Qaida commander Mustafa Abu al-Yazid ran the group's operations in Afghanistan and Pakistan. He was killed in a recent drone attack in the Afghanistan-Pakistan border area.
“North Korea's U.N. Ambassador Sin Son Ho told a news conference Tuesday there is "a touch-and-go situation that war may break out at any time" because of South Korean accusations that the North torpedoed the ship and killed 46 sailors.”
BLOG EDITOR’S NOTE: The reason my first post was 2:00 p.m. PST is because my server SUDDENLINK was screwed up all morning and they just fixed it. Just in case you were wondering…
I don’t know what alternative universe this McKay clown lives in. It’s certainly not the real world that the rest of us exist in. When I hear remarks like this, I know BP is not only piling on the propaganda, their executives are clueless or just outright liars that can’t see how ineffective they’ve been.
Excerpt:
“12:28 p.m.: A BP executive said at a hearing Tuesday that his company's underwater spill response has been "pretty effective."
"I understand everyone's frustration with how long this is taking, but the spill response has actually been pretty effective in terms of dealing with it underwater," BP America President Lamar McKay said. "It's unfortunate we can't get it stopped at the source right now; we're doing everything we can to do that."
At the same time, other oil executives acknowledged that none of them are prepared to handle such a situation if it happens to them.”
Sid – a fanged, flying monkey creature with webbed feet – really does have an almost irresistible charm. That may help to explain why he sold for $2,475. “He was one of the favorites at the Duke Auction House, along with the flying cat – all a bit of fun, really,” said Rupert Perry-Warnes, the salesroom manager.
Unicorns and flying kittens auctioned off
NBC’s Dawna Friesen takes a look at some of the weird and wonderful Victorian-era taxidermy creations recently sold in England.
A Golden Retriever, dyed to look like a tiger, plays at the Dahe Pet Civilization Park in Zhengzhou, Henan province June 8, 2010. The park bought theGolden Retriever and four Chow Chows, dyed to resemble pandas, from a pet market in Sichuan as an attempt to attract visitors, local media said.
Some aren't taking chances on a forecast like "sunny with a chance of tar balls," so they're going elsewhere. Full story
In tour of Gulf coast, president strikes optimistic tone
In a newly optimistic tone, President Barack Obama promised Monday that "things are going to return to normal" along the stricken Gulf Coast and the region's fouled waters will be in even better shape than before the catastrophic BP oil spill.
How about this? I had no idea that there was such a thing as a “street-food” movement going on.
I guess it depends on where you live. Humboldt has a mini-fleet of Mexican roach coaches with great food. I wonder if that qualifies them as part of the “movement?”
The innovative grocer sees food-cart vendors as its 'next big thing
By Justin Rohrlich, Minyanville
“Whole Foods Market (WFMI) and its in-house “forager,” Harvindar Singh, are in the beginning stages of developing a new product line called Street Eats.
Street Eats will be rolled out gradually, starting with a handful of Whole Foods
"The street-food movement is very hot right now, and they've got some great products," Singh told the paper.”
Seattle Times staff columnist
This month's Car and Driver magazine, of all places, asks a question that I think I can answer.
"Please," it says, "can't we even discuss a gasoline tax without somebody calling somebody an America-hating socialist?"
And the answer is ... No. We can't.
"You are just another unconscionable liberal who would take us back to the Stone Ages," a reader wrote to me last week after I brought up the treasonous notion of raising taxes on gas.
"I highly detest people like you thinking you know better than I do how I should live!" wrote another.
"It is a good thing people with your mind-set were not counted on to build this country," said another.
There's more, but you get the gist. It's as if I'd ordered my comrades, formerly known as Americans, to herewith go to and fro across our land of plenty only in horse-drawn wagons.
What I'd actually said was we should gradually raise the federal tax on gas by a penny per month, for 10 years. It's a way to use less oil over time, to jump-start alternative energy and to raise money to start paying down the ballooning federal debt.
Successful elsewhere, 'tea party' fails to find traction in California
Photo: Assemblyman Chuck DeVore (R-Irvine) talks to reporters after accompanying family members who voted in the California primary at the Brywood Elementary School in Irvine. DeVore, a "tea party" favorite, lost to Carly Fiorina. (Damian Dovarganes, Associated Press / June 8, 2010)
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Nearly $1 trillion in untapped resources could fundamentally alter economy
Just what we don’t need, another reason to stay in Afghanistan. I say this because I strongly suspect the U.S. is going to want a piece of this mineral payload!
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Photo: A bleak Ghazni Province seems to offer little, but a Pentagon study says it may have among the world’s largest deposits of lithium.
Dave Stancliff/For the Times-Standard
Posted: 06/13/2010 01:30:28 AM PDT
Muslim terrorists' favorite American target is New York. No offense to its residents, but you couldn't pay me to live there. I'm a firm believer in the law of averages and when I heard about yet another terrorist attack, my suspicions were confirmed.
Since 9/11, the city has been a recruitment poster for every Muslim extremist in the world. Faisal Shahzad, 30, a naturalized U.S. citizen from Pakistan, recently left a car bomb in Times Square that didn't go off.
My concern all along has been “sleeper cells” of terrorists in our country. I've often wondered how terrorists get into the U.S. I'm sure some are born here or come into the country legally, and like Shahzad, become U.S. citizens.
I discovered that some terrorists are actually invited into our country because of international politics. Sound crazy? Before I explain, let's define a Presidential Memorandum:
READ THE REST HERE.Wooster Collective points to a remarkable piece of street art, that appeared on the streets of Berlin a few weeks ago. What you see in this photo below, is a creation by an unknown artist, who has created a subtle but effective lenticular image on the slats of a fence. Head-on it doesn’t look like much, but when you move yourself to the left (or right), an image of a face appears.
What are the three types of Presidential memorandums? Who knows? Who cares? You might after reading this Sunday’s AS IT STAND’s column in The Times-Standard:
Presidential Memorandums: or how to stay under the media radar
More prosecutions sought in 17 months than any previous administration
In 17 months in office, President Obama has already outdone every previous president in pursuing leak prosecutions.
“Hired in 2001 by the National Security Agency to help it catch up with the e-mail and cellphone revolution, Thomas A. Drake became convinced that the government’s eavesdroppers were squandering hundreds of millions of dollars on failed programs while ignoring a promising alternative.
He took his concerns everywhere inside the secret world: to his bosses, to the agency’s inspector general, to the Defense Department’s inspector general and to the Congressional intelligence committees. But he felt his message was not getting through.
So he contacted a reporter for The Baltimore Sun.”
Though he is charged under the Espionage Act, Mr. Drake appears to be a classic whistle-blower whose goal was to strengthen the N.S.A.’s ability to catch terrorists, not undermine it.
A flourishing and unregulated industry of pot delivery services is circumventing bans on storefront dispensaries and bringing medical marijuana directly to Californians' homes.
In April, 758 services advertised direct delivery of marijuana to patients on Weedmaps.com, a commercial listing service.
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For San Francisco’s controversial proposed sit/lie law, the inciting incident happened on a Wednesday night in early December in the Haight — an act of violence so brutal it inspired a grass-roots movement.
For the full story, check out Scott James's column on the sit/lie controversy.
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Before long-awaited game, Bradley says, ‘We believe we're going to win’
The last time the USA defeated the powerful English soccer team to win the World Cup Finals was the year I was born; 1950.
PHOTO: U.S. national soccer players, including Jozy Altidore, front, train at Royal Bafokeng Stadium in Rustenburg, South Africa, on Friday.
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“Why does one of the largest newspapers in the country allow its political writer to routinely disrespect the president in a casually insulting way?”
Eric Boehlert asks…
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It's a mystery to me why a convicted pedophile suddenly was transferred from her minimum-security prison in Florida to the cushiest low...
