Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Ryan Menezes: When Somebody Else's Identity Theft Scam Gets You Arrested (Cracked)
You know what identity theft is. Someone gets your info, somehow uses it to rent a yacht, and boom, your credit is ruined and you never qualify for a Best Buy card again. But it turns out that's hardly the worst thing that can happen when someone impersonates you. Criminal identity theft is regular identify theft's ugly cousin, and involves someone getting caught doing a crime while using your name, and then you get the blame. What happens next? We asked "Karen" about what happened to her. She told us …
Marc Dion: I Ain't Did Nothin' (Creators Syndicate)
President Donald Trump, a pus-filled boil on the American backside, could learn what to expect from a long ago friend of mine who made his living as a professional criminal.
Susan Estrich: The Generational Issue (Creators Syndicate)
I just want to see that this revolution keeps its eye on the real goal: which is not counting how many men we can knock off, but rather how much better we can make things in the workplace. There is a difference between rape and an unwelcome compliment, between sexual assault and a sly look, between penetrating someone and casually touching their arm. If we forget those differences, we may drown in the backlash. And we will have forgotten our own values of fairness.
Mark Shields: Paul Ryan Is No Margaret Chase Smith (Creators Syndicate)
Shortly after Hawaii and Alaska joined the Union and I was still a semi-young wiseguy, smugly sure that a celebrity candidate whose prospective campaign had sparked public interest would become a serious White House challenger, a grizzled political reporter brought me up short with this practical advice: "If a candidate gets measurably louder applause from the crowd when he's introduced to speak than he does when he's finished speaking, that candidate is overrated and will not be a winner."
Mark Shields: Republicans and Patriotism (Creators Syndicate)
The election night words of the long-shot Republican candidate after his upset victory remain with me to this day: "I learned long ago that serving only oneself is a petty and unsatisfying ambition. But serve a cause greater than self-interest and you will know a happiness far more sublime than the fleeting pleasure of fame and fortune." That leader was summoning those within the sound of his voice to self-sacrifice.
Suzanne Moore: Spare me these sob stories about the rugby misogynists (The Guardian)
Misogyny is not a crime, clearly, but spare me the suffering of these rugby legends. For them to be portrayed as victims, now? That is truly unbelievable
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Presenting
Michael Egan
took the day off.
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
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
THE TOP "CUCKOO" FLIES OVER THE NEST.
"YESH!"
LAURA BITES THE DUST!
THE LIARS, THE CHEATERS, THE THIEVES AND THE TRAITORS!
THE HAMMER AND SICKLE OF DEATH!
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Sunny and seasonal - if it was August.
New Cast
'Dancing With The Stars: Athletes'
Mirrorball trophy or Olympic medal?
One of the 10 cast members for the all-athlete season of "Dancing with the Stars" might just snag both for their trophy shelves. The new crop of contestants for "Dancing with the Stars: Athletes? was revealed Friday on "Good Morning America," and it's stacked with fan favorites.
Former Olympic figure skater Tonya Harding, who's been rumored to join for months, leads the cast, alongside newly minted America's sweetheart, Adam Rippon, and NBA superstar Kareem Abdul-Jabbar.
The show's shortened season of just four weeks will also see figure skater Mirai Nagasu, MLB World Series champion Johnny Damon, the Washington NFL team's cornerback Josh Norman, Notre Dame women's basketball star Arike Ogunbowale, luger Chris Mazdzer snowboarder Jamie Anderson, and softball pitcher Jennie Finch compete for reality TV glory.
"Dancing with the Stars: Athletes" kicks off on Monday, April 30, at 8 p.m. on ABC.
'Dancing With The Stars: Athletes'
Deport More Refugees
Ex-Ambassador
As deportations and detentions continue to rock the Vietnamese community in the U.S., the former ambassador to Vietnam has revealed that those "repatriations" were the reason for his October departure.
Writing in the April issue of Foreign Service Journal, Ted Osius said he was instructed to press the Vietnamese government to repatriate more than 8,000 people - most of whom were refugees who had "fled South Vietnam on boats and through the jungle" after the Vietnam War.
"The majority targeted for deportation - sometimes for minor infractions - were war refugees who had sided with the United States, whose loyalty was to the flag of a nation that no longer exists," Osius wrote. "And they were to be 'returned' decades later to a nation ruled by a communist regime with which they had never reconciled. I feared many would become human rights cases, and our government would be culpable."
The former diplomat said a number of the Trump administration's foreign policy decisions didn't sit right with those in the foreign relations field. Among those moves, he said, were the United States' exit from the Trans-Pacific Partnership, its "abdication of responsibility" on climate change, and the travel ban targeting mostly Muslim-majority countries.
"What happened to the nation that welcomed 'your tired, your poor, your huddled masses yearning to breathe free?'" Osius asked.
Ex-Ambassador
Giant Telescope
Hawaii
A key decision on whether to place a $1.4 billion telescope in Hawaii to further astronomy research has been delayed, leaving open the possibility the project may be moved to Spain, a panel said Friday.
The board of governors for the project dubbed the Thirty Meter Telescope International Observatory still wants to build the telescope on its preferred site of Mauna Kea, a mountain in Hawaii.
But an alternative location in Spain's Canary Islands remains under consideration, the board said in a statement after meeting this week to discuss legal and regulatory challenges to the Hawaii telescope plan that could last years.
The 30-meter (98 feet) diameter telescope would be placed on one side of Mauna Kea and is far more advanced than the world's largest current telescopes that measure 10 meters (32 feet) in diameter. The new telescope could potentially allow scientists to make groundbreaking discoveries about black holes, exoplanets, celestial bodies, and even detect indications of life on other planets.
Scientists called it the best site in the world for astronomy, given a stable, dry, and cold, climate, which allows for sharp images. The atmosphere over the mountain also provides favorable conditions for astronomical measurements, according to the TMT website.
Hawaii
Presidential Pardon
Scooter Libby
President-for-now Donald Trump (R-Crooked) on Friday pardoned former Vice President Dick Cheney's onetime Chief of Staff Lewis "Scooter" Libby, who was convicted in 2007 of perjury and obstruction of justice in the investigation of the 2003 leak of CIA operative Valerie Plame's identity.
Resident George W. Bush had already been accused of showing favoritism to someone within his administration when he commuted Libby's sentence, which saved Libby from serving two-and-a-half-years in jail. But pardons go further, restoring some rights that are usually revoked for those with criminal convictions as well as reducing the stigma that comes with the offense.
That's what Cheney wanted for his former aide. But Bush thought Libby didn't deserve a pardon, and Cheney never forgave him.
Here's why, as TIME explained in its Aug. 3, 2009, cover story on the feud.
Scooter Libby
Weakest In 1,600 Years
Gulf Stream
A key current in the planet's ocean circulatory system, including the Atlantic's Gulf Stream, is the weakest in at least 1,600 years ? a decline that could significantly worsen the effects of climate change, according to new research.
Two studies published in the journal Nature this week say the global system of ocean currents known as the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation, or AMOC, has dropped in strength by some 15 percent since the mid-20th century to a record low.
The currents, part of the so-called global ocean conveyor belt, transport warm water from the equator to the North Atlantic, where heat released into the atmosphere warms western Europe. The cooler water then sinks and travels south in the deep ocean to Antarctica, and eventually back up to the equator.
A disruption in the system could have cataclysmic effects on weather patterns, including hurricanes, swings in temperatures and ocean levels, and even survival. The 2004 science fiction film "Day After Tomorrow" addressed catastrophic weather events triggered by a collapse of the AMOC.
The strength of the AMOC strength has plunged in the last 150 years, according to one of the studies by researchers from the University College London and the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts.
Gulf Stream
Secret Payoff
Michigan State
A sexual assault victim of former sports doctor Larry Nassar confronted Michigan State University officials on Friday, alleging the school's interim leader pressured her to accept a payoff to settle her lawsuit without her attorney present.
Kaylee Lorincz spoke during a contentious board of trustees meeting, where interim President John Engler expressed regret over the university's response to another woman's federal lawsuit over the school's handling of rape allegations involving basketball players. Lorincz, who has said Nassar sexually assaulted her when she sought treatment for back pain, said Engler and Carol Viventi, who was hired in February as special counsel to the president, offered her $250,000 when the 18-year-old and her mother were at the school a few weeks ago to sign up to speak at Friday's meeting.
According to Lorincz, Engler said to her, "Right now if I wrote you a check for $250,000 would you take it?"
Lorincz said Engler also told her that Rachael Denhollander, another Nassar victim, had provided him with an amount she would consider to settle with the university. Lorincz said she later asked Denhollander, who told her she had never met with Engler. Denhollender issued a written statement confirming that encounter with Lorincz.
"I felt like I was being bullied into saying something and that if Rachael gave him a settlement amount, it was OK for me to do it, too," Lorincz said in a prepared statement that she read aloud.
Michigan State
Uses Multiple 'Secret' Email Accounts
Pruitt
Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt has used four government email accounts since assuming office, and two Democratic senators are worried the complex setup may have allowed the administrator to dodge demands for public records.
Sens. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) and Tom Carper (D-Del.), both members of a Senate committee with EPA oversight, sent a letter this week to the EPA inspector general asking for an investigation into Pruitt's use of multiple emails. Aside from his standard Pruitt.Scott@epa.gov account, two others were used for scheduling and what the lawmakers call "communicating." The Washington Post notes that a fourth email address, sooners7@epa.gov, is an apparent reference to the University of Oklahoma football team, of which Pruitt is a fan.
"We write to share our deep concern over Administrator Pruitt's reported use of multiple email accounts," the letter, dated April 10, reads. "It is imperative that there be an investigation into whether the agency has properly searched these email addresses for responsive documents in response to Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests."
The lawmakers, both members of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, note that the EPA has received "thousands" of public records requests since Pruitt took over the agency. Journalists and advocacy groups have turned to laws allowing them to request documents that may reveal Pruitt's secretive agenda of dismantling environmental protections and favoring corporate interests. The disclosures have led to substantial news stories, including the public release of Pruitt's schedule and details about a $43,000 soundproof phone booth installed in his office.
An EPA spokesman confirmed the existence of the email accounts to the Post. The agency has complied with all requests, the spokesman said, and when a FOIA request is received, "all accounts are searched before we respond."
Pruitt
Judge Allows
Taped Testimony
The videotaped testimony from a woman who died two years after she was doused in gasoline and set ablaze can be used at her former boyfriend's trial, an Ohio judge ruled Friday.
Franklin County Judge Guy Reece called it an unprecedented situation because officials knew of no other case in which a victim would testify at his or her own murder trial.
Judy Malinowski testified five months before she died last June, expecting that the recording would be played at her former boyfriend's trial.
Malinowski, 33, was hospitalized for almost two years and underwent dozens of surgeries after she was engulfed in flames in 2015 behind a gas station in Gahanna, a Columbus suburb.
Her ex-boyfriend, Michael Slager, was sentenced to 11 years in prison after pleading no contest in 2016 to charges including felonious assault and aggravated arson.
Taped Testimony
Polluter Giveaway
EPA
With little notice, President-for-now Donald Trump (R-Corrupt) ordered the Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday to dramatically overhaul national clean air standards and make it easier for industry to pollute in areas where it's already dangerous to breathe.
The executive order - titled "Promoting Domestic Manufacturing and Job Creation - Policies and Procedures Relating to Implementation of Air Quality Standards" ? reverses an Obama-era decision. The 2015 decision allowed the EPA to intervene in states that fail to meet National Ambient Air Quality Standards, forcing them to adopt federal regulatory plans to reduce ozone emissions that generally come from power plants, refineries and cement factories.
It opens the door to drastic changes in how science is used to set clean air rules, disqualifying huge amounts of peer-reviewed public health research in favor of industry-backed studies in a move that builds on steps EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt has already taken.
The order requires the EPA to speed up reviews of state plans to reduce air pollution, setting a strict 18-month deadline, and complete reviews of all pre-construction permits for industry within a year. Construction permitting is primarily a state-level issue; the language in the order, critics say, appears to be a dog whistle to polluters, suggesting the EPA would pull back on any oversight.
The order instructs the EPA to consider what countries that don't border the United States are doing to reduce pollution, allowing the agency to compare U.S. regulations to those in developing nations like China and India. It also directs Pruitt to allow states to trade pollution permits, a move environmentalists warn could make offsets nearly impossible to track and police.
EPA
In Memory
Milos Forman
Milos Forman, the Oscar-winning director behind One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest and Amadeus, died on Friday night, his agent, Dennis Aspland, confirmed to EW. He was 86.
Forman, born in Caslav, Czechoslovakia, told EW in 1999 about the first film he saw that truly spoke to him - a silent version of a Czech opera. "The curtain went up. You saw the bride start to sing. And at that moment, the whole theater started to sing along," he said. "That's what I thought the movies were about - to sing along. It fascinated me."
The first feature film he made after a batch of documentaries was Black Peter, a 1964 coming-of-age tale about the first few days of a teenager's life as he starts work. It began his exploration of antiestablishment, a theme he would return to. By 1967, he had produced The Firemen's Ball that served as a satire of the government and, in the wake of the Soviet invasion of 1968, he found himself banned from the country for 20 years.
So he came to America. In the years that followed, he would make one of his most celebrated films, One Flew Over the Cuckoo's Nest. Michael Douglas and Saul Zaentz had approached Forman about adapting the Ken Kesey book, and Jack Nicholson would go on to star. The film garnered five Oscar wins - including Forman's first for Best Director - and it would help reunite the filmmaker with his sons.
Forman followed up this film with the movie adaptation of the Broadway musical Hair, the eight-time Oscar-nominated Ragtime, the eight-time Oscar-winning Amadeus, the Colin Firth-led Valmont, and The People vs. Larry Flynt (a film that almost earned Forman his third Best Director Oscar.)
Milos Forman
In Memory
Art Bell
Art Bell, a self-proclaimed expert on the paranormal who hosted a popular syndicated radio show for decades, has died at the age of 72 - on Friday the 13th, appropriately enough.
He started out as a disc jockey but drifted into political talk radio in the 1970s and saw a ratings boost when he veered into the realm of conspiracy theories and the paranormal. He espoused his belief in alien abductions, ghosts, crop circles report - and even that the Hale-Bopp comet that neared the Earth in 1986 was being followed by a UFO.
Soon, his late-night show "Coast to Coast" gained national syndication and allowed him to broadcast from his own Pahrump-based radio station, KNYE 95.1 FM. At the height of his fame, as many as 500 stations carried his show in the U.S. and Canada.
Bell also made cameo appearances (typically as himself) in movies like 2007's "I Know Who Killed Me" and TV shows like "Dark Skies."
In a 1999 interview with Larry King on CNN, Bell displayed the even-keeled tone and that made his out-there theorizing seem so reasonable and inviting.
"People are always demanding proof," he told King at one point. "These are things that are not easily proved."
Art Bell
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