Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Alice Ollstein: Their Votes Put The GOP Tax Bill Over The Top In The Senate. Did They Get Rolled? (TPM)
The controversial GOP tax overhaul passed the Senate by a razor-thin margin of 51 votes over the weekend, and the lawmakers who reluctantly put the bill over the top say their votes were secured by promises from President Trump and Republican leadership on an array of related and un-related issues-from health care market stabilization to protection for young immigrants. Today, those promises are on shaky ground.
Ed Kilgore: Susan Collins Wanted to 'Get to Yes' on Tax Bill So Badly She Accepted Promises Written in Vanishing Ink (Daily Intelligencer)
Before the ink was dry on promises made to Senator Susan Collins to secure her vote on the GOP tax bill, it began to vanish.
Doha Madani, Nick Visser, and Dominique Mosbergen: Australia Celebrates As Parliament Approves Same-Sex Marriage (Huffington Post)
Public opinion was on the side of marriage equality.
Willa Frej: Time Names 'The Silence Breakers' As 2017 Person Of The Year (Huffington Post)
They're the women who launched a movement against sexual harassment.
Andrew Tobias: How They Broke Congress
"In the past three days, Republican leaders in the Senate scrambled to corral votes for a tax bill that the Joint Committee on Taxation said would add $1 trillion to the deficit - without holding any meaningful committee hearings. Worse, Republican leaders have been blunt about their motivation: to deliver on their promises to wealthy donors, and down the road, to use the leverage of huge deficits to cut and privatize Medicare and Social Security. Congress no longer works the way it's supposed to." - Norm Ornstein, resident scholar at the conservative American Enterprise Institute
Tom Danehy: Tom tries to figure out if he should have sympathy for Jeff Flake or Sean Miller (Tucson Weekly)
A Guy I Actually Sorta Feel Sorry For: Jeff Flake. Seriously, just imagine that you've spent your entire life doing things the right way (or, at the very least, doing things in what you consider to be the right way). He was born in Snowflake, which is half-named for his great-great-grandfather. (Yes, the other founder was named Snow, so if the one guy had been really stubborn, we could have a Mormon enclave in the White Mountains named Flakesnow.)
Alexis Petridis: The woke Slim Shady - understanding Eminem in the age of Trump (The Guardian)
Marshall Mathers became a megastar by partly tapping into the same disaffected white rage later mobilised by the 'alt-right'. But the rapper has made it clear he doesn't want to share fans with the president. With a new album out soon, can he prosper in an age of conscious protest?
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Presenting
Michael Egan
answered:
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
David E Suggests
Injection Moulding
David
Thanks, Dave!
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Team Coco
CONAN
Gare Galbraith
Final Callback
Reader Comment
Current Events
Linda >^..^<
We are all only temporarily able bodied.
Thanks, Linda!
from Marc Perkel
Marc's Guide to Curing Cancer
So far so good on beating cancer for now. I'm doing fine. At the end of the month I'll be 16 months into an 8 month mean lifespan. And yesterday I went on a 7 mile hike and managed to keep up with the hiking group I was with. So, doing something right.
Still waiting for future test results and should see things headed in the right direction. I can say that it's not likely that anything dire happens in the short term so that means that I should have time to make several more attempts at this. So even if it doesn't work the first time there are a lot of variations to try. So if there's bad news it will help me pick the next radiation target.
I have written a "how to" guide for oncologists to perform the treatment that I got. I'm convinced that I'm definitely onto something and whether it works for me or not isn't the definitive test. I know if other people tried this that it would work for some of them, and if they improve it that it will work for a lot of them.
The guide is quite detailed and any doctor reading this can understand the procedure at every level. I also go into detail as to how it works, how I figured it out, and variations and improvements that could be tried to enhance it. I also introduce new ways to look at the problem. There is a lot of room for improvement and I think that doctors reading it will see what I'm talking about and want to build on it. And it's written so that if you're not a doctor you can still follow it. It also has a personal story revealing that I'm the class clown of cancer support group. I give great interviews and I look pretty hot in a lab coat.
So, feel free to read this and see what I'm talking about. But if any of you want to help then pass this around to both doctors and cancer patients. I need some media coverage. I'm looking for as many eyeballs as possible to read these ideas. Even if this isn't the solution, it's definitely on the right track. After all, I did hike 7 miles yesterday. And this hiking group wasn't moving slow. So if this isn't working then, why am I still here?
I also see curing cancer as more of an engineering problem that a medical problem. So if you are good at solving problems and most of what you know about medicine was watching the Dr. House MD TV show, then you're at the level I was at when I started. So anyone can jump in and be part of the solution.
Here is a link to my guide: Oncologists Guide to Curing Cancer using Abscopal Effect
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST.
NO CLASS.
"DEMOCRATIC SPINELESSNESS."
DEER IN THE HEADLIGHTS!
YET ANOTHER ONE BITES THE DUST!
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Still dry and windy.
MSNBC Rehires
Sam Seder
The Intercept reported Thursday that MSNBC will reverse its decision to end its contract with contributor Sam Seder over a satirical tweet he sent in 2009 that became the focus of a right-wing outrage campaign organized by blogger Mike Cernovich. In a statement, Seder said that he would be accepting their offer to return to the network.
"I appreciate MSNBC's thoughtful reconsideration and willingness to understand the cynical motives of those who intentionally misrepresented my tweet for their own toxic, political purposes," Seder said in a statement to The Intercept. "We are experiencing an important and long overdue moment of empowerment for the victims of sexual assault and of reckoning for their perpetrators. I'm proud that MSNBC and its staff have set a clear example of the need to get it right."
The tweet, which has since been deleted, referenced child rape accusations against Roman Polanski and was meant, Seder said, as a criticism of the director's supporters. Cernovich, best known for spreading the Pizzagate conspiracy last year and his own concerning history of making statements that seem to advocate for sexual assault, found the tweet and started an online crusade to get Seder fired, claiming it promoted rape. On Monday, MSNBC announced it would not be renewing Seder's contract when it expired next year.
That decision resulted in swift criticism of the network from many who took Cernovich's position to be a bad faith interpretation of what was an obviously critical, if in poor taste, comment on the entertainment industry's protection of abusers.
Sam Seder
2018 Winter Olympics
Lindsay Vonn
Skier Lindsey Vonn is ready to go for gold at the upcoming 2018 Winter Olympic games in South Korea, but she won't be there representing President-for-now Donald Trump (R-Crooked).
"I hope to represent the people of the United States, not the president," Vonn said, appearing crestfallen in an interview with CNN on Wednesday. "I take the Olympics very seriously and what they mean and what they represent, what walking under our flag means in the opening ceremony."
Vonn added: "I want to represent our country well. I don't think that there are a lot of people currently in our government that do that."
The 33-year-old skier added that if she were invited to the White House after the Olympics, she would turn down the invitation.
"Absolutely not," she said, smiling and shaking her head.
Lindsay Vonn
Tops $5 Billion At Global Box Office
Warner Bros.
2017 sees Warner Bros. cross the symbolic $5 billion mark at the global box office for the second time in its history. The movie studio largely has "Wonder Woman" to thank for this year's success, proving to be Warner's highest-grossing film of the last 12 months.
Less than a week after Disney, Warner Bros. is the latest studio to confirm grossing more than $5 billion at the global box office. While Disney passes the $5 billion mark for the third consecutive year, Warner Bros. achieves the feat for just the second time it its history.
This year's success is mainly down to five movies, each grossing more than $500 million worldwide, led by "Wonder Woman," which grossed $821 million. The female superhero movie starring Gal Gadot became the studio's biggest hit this year. Director Patty Jenkins was even shortlisted for TIME Magazine's 2017 Person of the Year, alongside political leaders Donald Trump, Xi Jinping and Kim Jong-un, plus the #MeToo movement denouncing sexual harassment which originated on Twitter (which was finally chosen).
Fall hit "It," based on the book by Stephen King, grossed $694 million, ahead of "Justice League" with $570 million (which could still rise since the film is still in theaters), "Kong: Skull Island" ($566 million) and Christopher Nolan's "Dunkirk" ($525 million).
"The Lego Batman Movie," "Annabelle: Creation" and "Blade Runner 2049" also contributed to the studio's achievement, grossing more than $250 million.
Warner Bros.
Headed To Louvre Abu Dhabi
"Salvator Mundi"
"Salvator Mundi," a painting of Christ by Leonardo Da Vinci that recently sold for a record $450 million, is heading to the Louvre Abu Dhabi in a coup for the bold new museum, it announced Wednesday.
The move became possible after a little-known Saudi price reportedly bought the painting last month.
The Louvre Abu Dhabi, the first museum to bear the Louvre name outside France, has been billed as "the first universal museum in the Arab world," in a sign of the oil-rich emirate's global ambitions.
Auction house Christie's has also steadfastly declined to identify the buyer, whose purchase in New York for $450.3 million stunned the art world.
The New York Times on Wednesday, citing documents it reviewed, identified the buyer as Saudi Arabia's Prince Bader bin Abdullah bin Mohammed bin Farhan al-Saud, whose country forbids the official worship of Christ or any other religion except Islam.
"Salvator Mundi"
Your Tax Dollars At Work
Voucher Schools
It was late morning in an artsy cafe, the smell of coffee and baked goods sweetening the air, and Ashley Bishop sat at a table, recalling a time when she was taught that most of secular American society was worthy of contempt.
Growing up in private evangelical Christian schools, Bishop saw the world in extremes, good and evil, heaven and hell. She was taught that to dance was to sin, that gay people were child molesters and that mental illness was a function of satanic influence. Teachers at her schools talked about slavery as black immigration, and instructors called environmentalists "hippie witches."
So when Bishop left school in 2003 and entered the real world at 17, she felt like she was an alien landing on Planet Earth for the first time. Having been cut off from mainstream society, she felt unequipped to handle the job market and develop secular friendships. Lacking shared cultural and historical references, she spent most of her 20s holed up in her bedroom, suffering from crippling social anxiety.
Now, at 31, she has become everything that she was once taught to hate. She shares an apartment with her girlfriend of two years. She sees a therapist and takes medication for depression, a condition born, in part, of her stifling education.
Years later, some of the schools Bishop attended are largely the same, but some have changed in a significant way: Unlike when Bishop was a student, parents are not the only ones paying tuition for these fundamentalist religious schools - so are taxpayers.
Voucher Schools
Both Flub Pearl Harbor Tweets
Donald and Melania
President-for-now Donald Trump (R-Pendejo) appears to have slightly misquoted Franklin D. Roosevelt's famous remarks following the brutal attack on Pearl Harbor in a tweet commemorating the 76th anniversary of the solemn day.
"National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day - 'A day that will live in infamy!' December 7, 1941," Trump tweeted early Thursday.
In one of FDR's best-known speeches following the attack, the 32nd president spoke of "a date which will live in infamy."
Melania Trump also made a small error in her tweet commemorating the attack.
In the now-deleted tweet, the first lady wrote: "Today we honor Pearl Harbor Heroes. 11/7/1941 Thank you to all military for your courage and sacrifice!"
Donald and Melania
Bel-Air Neighborhood
L.A.
A wind-whipped wildfire raged on Wednesday into a wealthy Southern California neighborhood, destroying at least four homes, threatening dozens more and scorching a building at a winery owned by billionaire media mogul Rupert Murdoch (R-Evil Incarnate).
The so-called Skirball Fire, which erupted early on Wednesday as the latest in a rash of major blazes fueled by hot, dry Santa Ana winds, had burned about 150 acres near large estates in the Bel-Air neighborhood of Los Angeles by early afternoon.
Firefighters battled to save multimillion-dollar homes in the path of the flames, which also forced the closure of the San Diego (405) Freeway in both directions, and warned that if the winds picked up again in the evening the situation could become even more dire.
Murdoch's winery, Moraga Vineyards, was evacuated on Wednesday morning as the fire descended on the grounds, a spokeswoman said. Later a structure on the property was seen on fire as a water-dropping helicopter tried to extinguish the flames.
L.A.
Prehistoric Humans Left 60,000 Years Earlier Than Thought
Out of Africa
New archaeological evidence has undermined elements of the so-called "Out of Africa" theory, the widely supported model that maps the migration of the earliest humans from Africa. Scientists now believe humans departed Africa as early as 120,000 years ago-60,000 years earlier than previously thought.
Researchers from the Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, in Jena, Germany, and the University of Hawaii at Manoa, used cutting-edge DNA analysis to date ancient human bones found in Asia. In a report published in the journal Science on Thursday, the researchers reveal that the bones, from southern and central China, date from between 70,000 and 120,000 years ago.
Other recent studies link DNA from all contemporary non-African populations to the "Out of Africa" migration event. Scientists believe that vast numbers of prehistoric humans left the continent in one enormous departure 60,000 years ago.
The new research proposes a new model for early human migration, which builds on the existing theory. Long before the giant migration, small pockets of explorers traveled the world.
This is not the first time new evidence has challenged the traditional "Out of Africa" story. Last month, scientists found marked similarities between a 260,000-year-old Homo erectusskull and that of the modern Homo sapien. The skull, found in China, may mean early human evolution took place outside of Africa.
Out of Africa
Pantone's Color For 2018
"Ultra Violet"
What we have here in 2017 is a heap of chaos and disruption. What we need in 2018? The Pantone Color Institute thinks whatever that might be will come in the deep purple hue of "Ultra Violet," its color of the year revealed Thursday.
The color wasn't chosen because it's regal, though it resembles a majestic shade. It was chosen to evoke a counterculture flair, a grab for originality, ingenuity and visionary thinking, Pantone Vice President Laurie Pressman told the Associated Press ahead of the announcement.
"We are living in complex times," she said. "We're seeing the fear of going forward and how people are reacting to that fear."
Pressman wasn't keen on talking politics. The color, she said, playing out in home design, industrial spaces and products, fashion, art and food, reflects the idea of living not inside the box or outside the box but with no box at all. Specifically, she called the color "that complexity, that marriage, between the passionate red violets and the strong indigo purples."
Ultra Violet leans more to blue than red and that, Pressman said, "speaks to thoughtfulness, a mystical quality, a spiritual quality." There's still a passionate heat from enough red undertones, and a touch of periwinkle, but "it's really the cool that prevails."
"Ultra Violet"
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