Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Paul Krugman: Why Hilary Wins (NY Times)
Note to pundits: Maybe she actually deserves it.
Ezra Klein: Donald Trump didn't just destroy himself. Hillary Clinton destroyed him. (Vox)
We aren't used to this kind of victory. We aren't used to candidates winning not so much because of how they performed but because of how they pushed their opponent into performing. But the fact that we aren't used to this kind of victory doesn't make it any less impressive. Hillary Clinton has humbled Donald Trump, and she did it her way.
Denise Minger: "4 Reasons Why Some People Do Well as Vegans (While Others Fail Miserably)" (Authority Nutrition)
When the right genetic (and microbial) elements are in place, vegan diets - supplemented with the requisite vitamin B12 -have a greater chance of meeting a person's nutritional needs. But when issues with vitamin A conversion, gut microbiome makeup, amylase levels or choline requirements enter the picture, the odds of thriving as a vegan start to plummet.
Dan Kois: Tampopo (Slate)
Juzo Itami's classic "noodle Western" will still make you hungry more than 30 years later.
Will Self: The romance delusion (Prospect)
Many have thrown off the God delusion, but another has us in a firmer embrace.
Dennis Drabelle: "Alfred Hitchcock: 'A superb fantasist of fear'" (Washington Post)
I'm a sucker for brief lives. Not people dying young, mind you, but short biographies of prominent artists, thinkers and politicians. Among several fine sets have been Viking Modern Masters, the Penguin Lives (both now defunct) and the American Presidents series, which is nearing completion. The best entries in these series can sharpen our perception of a familiar figure by focusing on the essentials.
Sara Boboltz: Michael Moore Preaches The Hillary Clinton Gospel In 'TrumpLand' (Huffington Post)
But look out for Moore's candidacy in 2020 if President Clinton doesn't deliver.
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took the day off.
took the day off.
has returned to semi-retired status.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
Reader Comment
Lumpy
If we all tweet at Donald Trump enough we can probably get him to check his phone while Hillary's talking
I feel like every mediator of these presidential debates is one second away from yelling "shut the fuck up please!"
"Stop saying bigly" -Trump's advisor whispering from backstage, absent-mindedly stabbing his own arm with a pencil
The reason this is so tense is because the third debate is when the candidates traditionally decide if they're gonna fuck
ppl like "what's with Hilary's pantsuit, she looks like a interplanetary leader from the future"
FUCKING
DUH
DRESS FOR THE JOB YOU WANT
Linda >^..^<
We are all only temporarily able bodied.
Thanks, Linda!
Bonus Links
from Marc Perkel
Patriot Act
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
WHO IN THE HELL WOULD VOTE FOR THIS CROOK?
LIVING IN A WORLD OF TRASH.
THE WAR ON YOUTH.
BLAMING THE VICTIMS!
YOU CAN BANK ON IT!
TRUMP IS A PATSY!
"SO WHAT!"
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Speakers died on my computer. Sigh.
Debuts 'Bad Hombres, Nasty Women'
Weird Al
"Weird Al" Yankovic weighed in on the Trump vs. Clinton battle with his "Bad Hombres, Nasty Women" video on Thursday.
The spoof from the Gregory Brothers uses the candidates' own words mixed with some of Al's political wisdom. "We have so many adversaries overseas/ Can we all agree to be frenemies?" Al croons before the candidates drone on about the economy and ISIS in their Auto-Tuned best.
The title is, of course, a reference to the two phrases uttered by Republican candidate Trump during Wednesday night's final debate, where the real estate mogul warned of "bad hombres" in reference to immigration
For the record, Yankovic is not interested in a spot on the Supreme Court and he wonders if either candidate is willing to end the new Cold War by thumb wrestling Vladimir Putin. "What we really want to know is who should run the show?" he demands while singing in a burning hellscape surrounded by sad monks.
Weird Al
Opera Enthusiast
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Supreme Court Justice and opera enthusiast Ruth Bader Ginsburg is ascending from her court chambers to the stage.
On Nov. 12, Ginsburg will perform the non-singing Duchess of Krakenthorp role in Donizetti's Daughter of the Regiment. The Washington National Opera announced her one-night role in its staging of the show at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. next month.
"While the opera is best known for the vocal acrobatics required of its singers, the high-comedy antics of the non-singing role of the Duchess of Krakenthorp often steal the show," the Opera said in a statement.
The script is being slightly modified to wink at Ginsburg's day job. Ginsburg's performance will sort of be a debut for the 83-year-old, but she has already appeared as an extra in a handful of operas over the years.
Unsurprisingly, the allure of RBG on stage is proving a boon to the opera's business. "We definitely sold a lot of tickets today after our announcement," Washington National Opera spokesperson Michael Solomon told Reuters.
Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Cast As Lando Calrissian
Donald Glover
Donald Glover is headed to a galaxy far, far away.
The actor has been cast as Lando Calrissian in the upcoming youngHan Solo Star Wars spinoff, Starwars.com announced Friday.
Disney and Lucasfilm's untitled Han Solo spin-off is slated for 2018 and is from directors Phil Lord and Chris Miller. Alden Ehrenreich is starring as Solo, playing the role made iconic by Harrison Ford.
Billy Dee Williams first inhabited the role of Calrissian, who made his appearance as the head of Cloud City, a floating city above the planet Bespin, in The Empire Strikes Back. He has a competitive and strained friendship with Solo, having lost the starship Millennium Falcon to the smuggler and future Rebel commander in a card game.
The upcoming film will explore a previously unseen side of Lando, with Lucasfilm saying it will show "his formative years as a scoundrel on the rise in the galaxy's underworld." Sources say the film will show how Lando lost the Millennium Falcon to Han.
Donald Glover
Strike Ends
Jim Beam
Jim Beam ended a nearly weeklong strike at two bourbon distilleries in Kentucky on Friday, toasting a labor settlement that answers the workers' key demand with a commitment to hire more full-time staff.
Union members picketing since last Saturday approved the company's latest contract offer on a 204-19 vote and will resume producing whiskey Monday, said United Food and Commercial Workers union official Tommy Ballard.
The walkout began after workers at Jim Beam distilleries at Clermont and Boston turned down an earlier offer from the world's top bourbon producer. Their main complaint centered not on money, but time with their families.
The union wants more full-time workers hired, rather than a greater reliance on temporary workers to keep up with booming demand. Even with part-timers helping out, many of the union workers said they have been putting in 60 to 80 hours a week producing the classic American whiskey, whose brand is owned by Suntory Holdings Ltd., a Japanese beverage company.
The walkout soured what has been an era of smooth relations between management and labor in Kentucky's whiskey industry, which is enjoying renewed popularity. Kentucky is home to about 95 percent of the world's bourbon production. Both the bourbon and whiskey industries are responding to worldwide sales growth.
Jim Beam
Fails In Parliament
'Turing Bill'
A bill that would have wiped clean the criminal records of thousands of gay men has fallen at its first parliamentary hurdle.
The private member's bill would have pardoned all men living with UK convictions for same-sex offences committed before the law was changed.
There were emotional scenes with one MP fighting back tears during his speech.
The government, which has its own plans for posthumous pardons, "talked out" the bill, which will not now go ahead.
There were shouts of "shame" and "shameful" from angry MPs as the seconds ticked down and proceedings came to an end.
'Turing Bill'
Trump University Trial
T-rump
Donald Trump's (R-Chutzpah) attorneys asked a U.S. judge to bar accusations about his personal conduct that have arisen during the presidential election campaign, which would include allegations of sexual misconduct, from the upcoming civil trial over Trump University.
Students at Trump University claim they were defrauded by its real estate seminars.
Trump, the Republican nominee for president, has faced allegations from women that he inappropriately touched them. Trump denied those accusations.
In a court filing late on Thursday, attorneys for Trump said evidence and statements from the election campaign should be barred from trial because they could unfairly prejudice the jury. The trial is set to begin on Nov. 28.
Evidence including Trump's campaign speeches, tweets, his tax issues and controversy over his personal charity should not be considered by jurors, the filing said. All audio and video recordings publicized during the campaign should also be barred, the filing said, along with evidence about Trump's beauty pageants, casinos and corporate bankruptcies.
T-rump
Scraps Holocaust Survivor Medal
Czech President
Czech President Milos Zeman decided against awarding a state medal to a Holocaust survivor after the man's nephew, a Czech government minister, met exiled Tibetan leader the Dalai Lama against the president's wishes, the minister said on Friday.
The Czech Republic has been engulfed in political furor over the Dalai Lama's meetings this week with Culture Minister Daniel Herman against the wishes of the Chinese government - which sees the Dalai Lama as a separatist - and Zeman, who has strongly pushed for a closer economic relationship with China.
The drive to focus on Chinese investments has met opposition from many corners of the EU member country whose post-communist policy set by the late leader Vaclav Havel strongly promoted human rights. Havel was a friend of the Tibetan monk and Nobel Peace Prize laureate.
Herman confirmed in a text message to Reuters that the president's office had requested he cancel his meeting with the Tibetan monk or his uncle would not be granted an award.
Herman's uncle George Brady, 88, was supposed to receive the honor for his lifelong campaign for Holocaust remembrance at an annual celebration at Prague Castle, the seat of the president, next Friday on Czech state day.
Czech President
Skin Disease Concern
Climate Change
Climate change is bringing certain skin diseases and other illnesses to regions where they were rarely seen before, according to a recent research review.
Dermatologists should keep these changing patterns of skin diseases in mind when making diagnoses, say the authors, who analyzed specific disease shifts in North America.
As the planet warms, many bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites can survive in areas where they haven't been found before, the review team writes.
In the U.S., for example, the incidence of the tick-borne Lyme disease increased from an estimated 10,000 cases in 1995 to 30,000 in 2013, and the area where it occurs keeps expanding from New England north into Canada as the ticks find their preferred habitat expanding.
Another skin-related consequence of climate change is skin cancer: as ozone is depleted, the risk of skin cancer goes up. A two-degree temperature increase could raise skin cancer incidences by 10 percent each year, the authors write.
Climate Change
College Faculty Ends Strike
Pennsylvania
A union representing public college faculty in Pennsylvania ended a three-day strike on Friday after reaching a tentative deal with the state on pay, benefits and working conditions.
Some 5,500 professors and other workers launched the work stoppage before dawn on Wednesday, saying contract talks had reached an impasse after two years.
The new agreement, which ends on June 30, 2018, was announced separately by the State System of Higher Education and by the union, the Association of Pennsylvania State College and University Faculties.
The strike by full-time and part-time faculty affected about 100,000 students at 14 schools, from West Chester University near Philadelphia to California University outside Pittsburgh.
As part of the deal, the union said it accepted a smaller pay increase than it had sought, in exchange for the state dropping most of 249 proposed contract changes it put forward this year.
Pennsylvania
In Memory
Kevin Meaney
Kevin Meaney, a veteran stand-up comedian and actor has died. He was 60. Meaney's agent confirmed that he was found in his home in Forestburgh, NY, and that an autopsy is currently pending.
Meaney was a stand-up comedian for more than 25 years, with his first HBO special airing in 1986, according to his website. Since then, he has appeared on The Tonight Show with Johnny Carson, The Jon Stewart Show, Oprah and Late Night with Conan O'Brien.
He appeared on the 1990 sitcom Uncle Buck as well as the Tom Hanks film Big.
Kevin Meaney
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