Alissa Quart: 'Middle class' used to denote comfort and security. Not anymore (The Guardian)
Precariousness is not just a working-class thing. In recent interviews, dozens of academics and schoolteachers, administrators, librarians, journalists and even coders have told me they too are falling prey to an unstable new America. I've started to think of this just-scraping-by group as the Middle Precariat.
Henrik Magnusson: 5 Times Censorship Just Made Everything Way Worse (Cracked)
Censorship is tricky: Without it, we as a society run the risk of irreparably scarring Little Jimmy with the sight of a single bare nipple amidst his usual afternoon TV fare of harmless, unending carnage. But if we go too far, we may just make the problem even worse. Like the time ...
Aisha Harris: Someone Calculated the Exact Year Robert De Niro Completely Gave Up on Acting (Slate)
Fact: After decades of onscreen excellence, Robert De Niro has become a cautionary tale for actors everywhere, criticized for consistently phoning it in with increasingly middling and terrible movies. And for some time now, fans have struggled with the swift and steady decline of one of the definitive actors of his generation, wondering how it all went wrong. … Perhaps we may never know the answer as to why it went downhill, but thanks to one guy, we at least now know when, exactly, things took a dark turn: 2002.
A group of raccoons is called a gaze. Raccoons are sociable animals within the family group. They will remain with the family group for a year before venturing off to look for a mate.
Source
Randall was first and correct with:
A gaze of raccoons
Deborah responded:
A group of raccoons is called - a gaze. A gaze of raccoons. Who comes up with this stuff?
TGIF.
Marian replied:
gaze
Dale of Diamondy Springs, Norcali said:
A group of raccoons is called a gaze…Masked Babes…
PS - Finally got my new hot rod computer up and running…Isn't this the same trade show with all of the world attending? Good luck and Sleazy Does It!
DJ Useo answered:
I've seen a lot of Raccoons in my life, & learned they're referred to as a "Gaze".
Go figure...I would call them a bunch.
Don't you think the word Raccoon should have more "o's" & "c's" in it?
Why did the raccoon cross the road? It'd been drinking!
What happens if a raccoon puts on a muskrat fur coat? People start gossiping.
If you cross a raccoon with a goat, what do you get? Arrested!
Joe S replied:
A group of raccoons is called a Racket and individually they are called Racketeers because, and believe me, these guys will steal you blind. Racketeer Raccoon. And they're bold about it too. I know from experience, so watch out, don't trust 'em. Dirty little bastids! Why do you think they wear those little masks? Who do they think they're fooling? Those masks don't hide anything, we know who they are. Actually, they're not really dirty little bastids, they wash every thing they steal before they eat it. They're still little bastids though. Thieving bastids.
mj took the day off.
Lois Of Oregon took the day off.
BttbBob has returned to semi-retired status.
~~~~~
Patriot Act NSA Spying Unconstitutional Section 215 National Security Letters Must End
My name is Marc Perkel and I have decided to announce that I will not comply with the so called "Patriot Act" laws requiring me to disclose information about my customers. If I receive a national security letter I will immediately photograph it, post it online everywhere I can, and then make a video of me burning it. I will then await my arrest. If you want to put me in jail then come get me mother fucker.
CBS begins the night with a FRESH'Angel From Hell', followed by another FRESH'Angel From Hell', then a RERUN'NCIS: The Expendable One', followed by '48 Hours'.
NBC opens the night with a FRESH'2016 US Summer Olympic Trials', followed by a RERUN'American Ninja Warrior'.
Of course, 'SNL' is a RERUN, hosted by Melissa McCarthy, music by Kanye Kardashian.
ABC starts the night with a FRESH'People's List', followed by '20/20: In An Instant'.
The CW offers a RERUN'iHeartRadio (formerly Clear Channel) Summer Pool Party 2016', followed by a RERUN'Whose Line Is It Anyway', then another RERUN'Whose Line Is It Anyway'.
Faux fills the night with LIVE'MLB Baseball', then pads the left coast with local crap.
MY has an old 'Rizzoli & Isles', followed by another old 'Rizzoli & Isles'.
A&E has 'The First 48', 'The First 48: Drugs Kill', followed by a FRESH'The First 48: Bad Company', then another FRESH'The First 48: Bad Company'.
AMC offers the movie 'Open Range', followed by a FRESH'Hell On Wheels', then a FRESH'American West'.
BBC -
[6:00AM] TOP GEAR: A TO Z - SEASON 1 - Episode 1
[7:00AM] TOP GEAR: A TO Z - SEASON 1 - Episode 2
[8:00AM] TOP GEAR: APOCALYPSE
[9:30AM] TOP GEAR - SEASON 23 - Episode 6
[11:00AM] CARS OF THE PEOPLE - SEASON 2 - Episode 1
[12:00PM] CARS OF THE PEOPLE - SEASON 2 - Episode 2
[1:00PM] THIS IS SPINAL TAP (1984)
[3:00PM] THE HITCHHIKER'S GUIDE TO THE GALAXY (2005)
[5:30PM] NATIONAL LAMPOON'S EUROPEAN VACATION (1985)
[7:30PM] ROBIN HOOD: MEN IN TIGHTS (1993)
[10:00PM] NATIONAL LAMPOON'S EUROPEAN VACATION (1985)
[12:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 3 - EPISODE 3-The Survivors
[1:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 3 - EPISODE 4-Who Watches the Watchers
[2:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 3 - EPISODE 5-The Bonding
[3:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 3 - EPISODE 6-Booby Trap
[4:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 3 - EPISODE 7-The Enemy
[5:00AM] STAR TREK: THE NEXT GENERATION - SEASON 3 - EPISODE 8-The Price (ALL TIMES EDT)
Bravo has the movie 'How To Lose A Guy In 10 Days', followed by the movie 'The Holiday'.
Comedy Central has the movie 'Harold & Kumar Go To White Castle', followed by the movie 'Forgetting Sarah Marshall', 'South Park', and another 'South Park'.
FX has the movie 'This Is 40', followed by the movie 'Grown Ups 2', then the movie 'Fast & Furious 6'.
IFC -
[6:00AM] MARON-The Geographic
[6:30AM] THE THREE STOOGES-They Stooge to Conga
[6:55AM] THE THREE STOOGES-Three Dumb Clucks
[7:20AM] THE THREE STOOGES-Three Little Beers
[7:45AM] THE THREE STOOGES-Three Little Sew and Sews
[8:10AM] THE THREE STOOGES-Three Little Twirps
[8:35AM] THE THREE STOOGES-The Three Troubledoers
[9:00AM] THAT '70S SHOW-Gimme Shelter
[9:30AM] THAT '70S SHOW-2120 So. Michigan Avenue
[10:00AM] THAT '70S SHOW-22000 Light Years From Home
[10:30AM] THAT '70S SHOW-Take It or Leave It
[11:00AM] THAT '70S SHOW-Short & Curlies
[11:30AM] THAT '70S SHOW-'Til the Next Goodbye
[12:00PM] THAT '70S SHOW-Bohemian Rhapsody
[12:30PM] BATMAN BEGINS
[3:30PM] WITHOUT A PADDLE
[5:45PM] BRUCE ALMIGHTY
[8:00PM] THE NUTTY PROFESSOR
[10:15PM] NUTTY PROFESSOR II: THE KLUMPS
[12:30AM] THE NUTTY PROFESSOR
[2:45AM] NUTTY PROFESSOR II: THE KLUMPS
[5:00AM] THAT '70S SHOW-Gimme Shelter
[5:30AM] THAT '70S SHOW-2120 So. Michigan Avenue (ALL TIMES EDT)
Sundance -
[6:00AM] Love Lust-Love Lust & Sex Symbols
[6:15AM] Girl With a Pearl Earring
[8:15AM] Australia
[11:45AM] Love Actually
[2:45PM] 21
[5:30PM] Groundhog Day
[8:00PM] Twins
[10:30PM] Turner & Hooch
[1:00AM] Groundhog Day
[3:30AM] Whip It (ALL TIMES EDT)
SyFy has the movie 'Hulk', followed by the movie 'The Incredible Hulk'.
Norman Lear attends the premiere of, "Norman Lear: Just Another Version of You", at the Walter Reade Theater on Thursday, July 7, 2016, in New York.
Photo by Andy Kropa
Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg says she doesn't want to think about the possibility of Donald Trump (R-Grifter) winning the White House, and she predicts the next president - "whoever she will be" - will have a few appointments to make to the Supreme Court.
In an interview Thursday in her court office, the 83-year-old justice and leader of the court's liberal wing said she presumes Democrat Hillary Clinton will be the next president. Asked what if Republican Donald Trump won instead, she said, "I don't want to think about that possibility, but if it should be, then everything is up for grabs."
That includes the future of the high court itself, on which she is the oldest justice. Two justices, Anthony Kennedy and Stephen Breyer, are in their late 70s.
"It's likely that the next president, whoever she will be, will have a few appointments to make," Ginsburg said, smiling.
She didn't sound as though she is preparing to step down soon and shows no signs of slowing down. Ginsburg said she has been catching up on sleep since the court finished its work last week before a busy summer of travel that will take her to Europe and, as is her custom, to see as much opera as she can fit in.
Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck (2L) and Mayor Eric Garcetti (3L) watch as rapper Snoop Dogg addresses the media after leading a peaceful demonstration to police headquarters to promote unity" title="Los Angeles Police Chief Charlie Beck (2L) and Mayor Eric Garcetti (3L) watch as rapper Snoop Dogg addresses the media after leading a peaceful demonstration to police headquarters to promote unity.
AC/DC bassist Cliff Williams has said he plans to retire after the current tour, becoming the latest member of the high-decibel band to bow out and cloud its future.
The Australian-born band plans to close a year and a half of touring on September 30 in Philadelphia with Guns N' Roses legend Axl Rose as their frontman.
Rose joined for a recent European leg after longtime singer Brian Johnson was told by doctors he risked permanent hearing damage if he kept performing.
Malcolm Young, the rhythm guitarist and brother of iconic founder Angus Young, retired before the 2014 "Rock or Bust" album as he suffers dementia.
And drummer Phil Rudd was pushed out after he was arrested on charges of ordering a murder in New Zealand, where he lives.
The U.S. Senate on Thursday approved legislation that would for the first time require food to carry labels listing genetically-modified ingredients, which labeling supporters say could create loopholes for some U.S. crops.
The Senate voted 63-30 for the bill that would display GMO contents with words, pictures or a bar code that can be scanned with smartphones. The U.S. Agriculture Department (USDA) would decide which ingredients would be considered genetically modified.
The measure now goes to the House of Representatives, where it is expected to pass.
The vast majority of corn, soybeans and sugar crops in the United States are produced from genetically-engineered seeds. The domestic sugar market has been strained by rising demand for non-GMO ingredients like cane sugar.
The United States is the world's largest market for foods made with genetically altered ingredients. Many popular processed foods are made with soybeans, corn and other biotech crops whose genetic traits have been manipulated, often to make them resistant to insects and pesticides.
A bunch of grapes in Japan sold for $10,900 Thursday, a record price for the variety in the fruit-obsessed nation where the produce can be a huge status symbol.
Seasonal fruit offerings in Japan routinely attract massive sums from buyers seeking social prestige, or from shop owners wanting to attract customers to "ooh and ahh" over the high-flying edibles.
The buyer of Thursday's bunch of about 30 Ruby Romans -- who paid about $360 per grape -- showed no wrath, promising to dole out samples to a few fortunate patrons.
"These are truly Ruby Roman gems," bidder Takamaru Konishi from western Japan told media.
Even to the untrained eye, the super-sweet grapes -- about as large as a ping pong ball -- stand above their more affordable cousins readily available in supermarkets elsewhere in the world.
The king of fruits in the country is the melon, which serves as a status symbol akin to a vintage wine, and is given as a high-ranking gift. A single pair of melons fetched $12,400 at an auction last year.
Lawyers for Fox News chairman Roger Ailes (R-Rupert's Whore) on Friday asked a judge to halt anchor Gretchen Carlson's "shameless publicity campaign" against her former boss, and send her sexual harassment lawsuit against him to arbitration in accordance with her employment contract.
The request came two days after Carlson sued Ailes in the Superior Court in New Jersey, portraying him as a persistent harasser who demoted her and ultimately forced her from Fox News, her employer since 2005, after she rebuffed his advances. Ailes has forcefully denied Carlson's allegations.
Lawyers for Carlson were not immediately available for comment. The parent of Fox News, 21st Century Fox Inc, late on Wednesday said it had "full confidence" in Ailes and that it had begun an internal review of the matter.
In filings with the federal court in Newark, New Jersey, Ailes' lawyers said Carlson's June 2013 contract with the network had required her to arbitrate any employment disputes.
They accused Carlson of "gamesmanship" for suing only Ailes and not the network as well, calling it a legally improper means to avoid arbitration, and to let her conduct a public "tar and feather" campaign to sully her former boss's reputation.
US singer and songwritter Josh Tillman (Father John Misty) performs during the Alive Festival in Oeiras, on the outskirts of Lisbon, Portugal, 08 July 2016.
Speaker Paul Ryan (R-NRA Whore) is considering how to punish Democrats for last month's House floor sit-in, even as the chamber's top Democrat mocked the GOP threats and didn't rule out reviving the disruptive move to demand gun votes.
"Make my day. Make my day," House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said Thursday of Republican steps toward penalizing Democrats for their nearly 26-hour protest. Asked if Democrats might renew their sit-in, she said, "I'll do what my members want to do."
The two leaders' remarks, in back-to-back news conferences, came as Republicans struggled to resolve internal differences that have imperiled a GOP NRA-written gun and anti-terror bill. It was unclear when the House will consider the measure.
Democrats resumed a different form of protest Thursday, as scores of lawmakers trooped to the House microphone holding photographs of people killed by guns and asked the House to debate legislation tightening background checks for firearms buyers. Their requests were denied.
Democrats read gun victims' names and said each was "a victim of gun violence who never received a moment of silence on the House floor." That was a derisive reference to the moments of silence the House often conducts after mass shootings. Democrats say the House should take concrete action by enacting gun restrictions.
Models present creations from the autumn/winter collection 2016/ 2017 by Italian designer Renato Balestra (R) during the AltaRomaAltaModa fashion week in Rome, 08 July, 2016.
Health officials in Arizona say the largest current measles outbreak in the United States is in part because some workers at a federal immigration detention center refuse to get vaccinated.
Authorities have confirmed 22 measles cases in Arizona since late May. They all stem from the Eloy Detention Center, an Immigration and Customs Enforcement facility managed by the private Corrections Corporation of America.
Pinal County health director Thomas Schryer said the outbreak likely began with a migrant but that detainees have since been vaccinated. Convincing employees to get vaccinated or show proof of immunity has proven much tougher, he said.
"And so they're actually the ones that are passing along the measles among each other and then going out into the community," Schryer said.
In this photo taken on Wednesday, July 6, 2016, a steam locomotive moves a locomotive depot in Moscow, Russia. Moscow's railway museum, which has a collection of 60 engines, cars and other equipment preserved in full working condition, runs steam-hauled tours across the Russian capital.
Photo by Alexander Zemlianichenko
Archeologists have discovered the 1,600-year-old skeleton of an upper-class woman whose skull was intentionally deformed and teeth were encrusted with mineral stones near Mexico's ancient ruins of Teotihuacan.
The woman, between 35 and 40 years old when she died, was buried with 19 jars that served as offerings, the National Anthropology and History Institute said.
Her cranium was elongated by being compressed in a "very extreme" manner, a technique commonly used in the southern part of Mesoamerica, not the central region where she was found, the institute said in a statement.
Although other intentionally deformed skeletons have been found in Teotihuacan, this one -- dubbed "The Woman of Tlailotlacan" after the neighborhood where it was found -- is among those with the most deformations.
Another distinctive feature, showing the woman was a "foreigner" in Teotihuacan, is the two round pyrite stones encrusted in her top front teeth, a technique used in Mayan regions in southern Mexico and Central America.
People look at the giant mechanical spider Kumo Ni created by La Machine production company during its presentation in Nantes, France, July 8, 2016.
Photo by Stephane Mahe
The Top 20 Global Concert Tours ranks artists by average box office gross per city and includes the average ticket price for shows Worldwide. The list is based on data provided to the trade publication Pollstar by concert promoters and venue managers.
1. Beyonce; $5,840,123; $125.18.
2. Bruce Springsteen & The E Street Band; $4,376,833; $110.95.
3. Paul McCartney; $3,230,728; $130.21.
4. Rod Stewart; $1,940,971; $112.58.
5. Justin Bieber; $1,653,204; $99.47.
6. Kenny Chesney; $1,650,409; $68.93.
7. Rihanna; $1,183,646; $89.66.
8. Lionel Richie; $1,097,611; $80.91.
9. Iron Maiden; $1,082,481; $63.57.
10. The Who; $955,024; $89.17.
11. The Cure; $834,365; $56.17.
12. Mumford & Sons; $817,401; $57.40.
13. Carrie Underwood; $725,657; $67.08.
14. Journey / Doobie Brothers; $706,344; $58.98.
15. Dixie Chicks; $694,831; $65.41.
16. Little Mix; $628,335; $49.03.
17. Bryan Adams; $627,826; $66.47.
18. Selena Gomez; $615,820; $66.93.
19. Mariah Carey; $600,222; $68.40.
20. Paul Simon; $590,308; $94.33.
"Little Bear" the cat, foreground, sits in the shade as Sequoia the black bear walks past at the Folsom City Zoo Sanctuary, Thursday, July 7, 2016, in Folsom, Calif. The pair have formed a relationship were zoo keepers have seen them share meals and have seen them sleeping in the shade near each other.
Photo by Rich Pedroncelli
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