Recommended Reading
from Bruce
It's a Bruce Double-Header! Yesterday's readings got lost in the mail.
Paul Krugman: Truth and Trumpism (NY Times Column)
Don't fall for the peddlers of centrification or fall for false comparisons.
Alan Walker: Why do some of us, like David Attenborough, live to 90? It's not luck (The Guardian)
The great television presenter and the Queen are celebrating becoming nonagenarians. But there's nothing random about their health and longevity.
Chitra Ramaswamy: What Frozen needs is a lesbian Elsa (The Guardian)
It's not that she's a frosty ice queen who rejects men - but women who love women deserve romance too. And how about co-opting some more Disney LGBT heroines?
Cindy Casares: Sick of Bernie bros? There's a subreddit with your name on it (The Guardian)
In an increasingly divided election season, Enough Sanders Spam welcomes people from all parties, as long as they make fun of Bernie Sanders fans.
Nick Earls: 'Have novellas become the happy medium between a tweet and tome?' (The Guardian)
In an era of endless digital distractions, books have become mountains few readers want to climb. It's time the publishing industry embraces the novella.
Andrew Smith, Assistant Professor of English and Philosophy, Drexel University: Why it's impossible to actually be a vegetarian (Disinformation)
Plants make up the base of every food chain of the food web (also called the food cycle). Plants use available sunlight to convert water from the soil and carbon dioxide from the air into glucose, which gives them the energy they need to live. Unlike plants, animals can't synthesize their own food. They survive by eating plants or other animals. Clearly, animals eat plants. What's not so clear from this picture is that plants also eat animals.
Jasper Rees: A Very Modern Madman (1843)
Why the story of Don Quixote has such a hold on our cultural imagination.
Sam Stein: Why Hillary Clinton Is Uniquely Suited To Take On Donald Trump (Slate)
The king of branding is going to have a hard time changing voters' perceptions of Clinton.
Josh Marshall: This Is Astounding (Talking Points Memo)
To be clear, this will never happen. But the fact that Trump is proposing it shows that when it comes to macro-economics and global economics Trump is a huge ignoramus who shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the Treasury. It's amazing suggestion. Not just stupid but someone who simply knows nothing about how the economy works.
Paul Krugman: "Paul Ryan" and the Trump Fail (NY Times Blog)
And you know what has been really helpful for the few people who didn't get it all wrong? Numbers. If you actually did the math on Ryan's proposals, you saw that he was engaged in a con, which in turn told you a lot about the real state of the GOP - and that, combined with the polls and demographics, at least left you open to the possibility of a Trump nomination.
Marc Dion: Trump-Arpaio: You're Doomed, You Liberal Sissy! (Creators Syndicate)
As Donald Trump jibbers and mugs atop a pile of sissy liberal skulls, the search is on for a running mate. One thing's certain, you're gonna need a cartoon character to match Trump. Three words. "America's Toughest Sheriff."
Lenore Skenazy: The Shoebox Philosopher (Creators Syndicate)
Most people moving to Manhattan don't expect to live in a mansion. But neither are they eager to live in an apartment the size of a 2001 Honda Accord. That's exactly what Felice Cohen did, for four years. Though she recently moved into a 490-square-foot studio - "There's tons of space!" - she squeezed everything she learned about appreciating the small things into a new book, "90 Lessons for Living Large in 90 Square Feet (...or more)."
Amelia Warren Tyagi and Elizabeth Warren: Do Americans Spend Too Much on Luxuries? Nope. (Slate)
Why are we so ready to believe in the myth of overconsumption?
Alison Flood: Scholar claims Shakespeare didn't shorten King Lear - it was his printer (The Guardian)
New book from Sir Brian Vickers claims the revisionist movement that believes the Bard shortened the text himself is mistaken.
Peter James: If Shakespeare was writing today, he'd be a crime writer (The Guardian)
The bestselling author of the Roy Grace mysteries explains how, when he is planning a new villain, the Bard's murderous, manipulative creations are his primary inspiration.
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Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
from Marc Perkel
Patriot Act
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
"TEACH THE CHILDREN WELL…"
"THOSE FUNNY ANTI-SEMITES"
THE REPUGS ARE IN THE TOILET!
SORRY PILGRIM.
"LET'S DROP ACID AND HAVE A PRESIDENTIAL RACE"
NAIL THE CRIMINAL BASTARDS!
MAY PEABODY ROT IN JAIL AND THEN ROT IN HELL!
"BABY BLUE"
STOP LETTING CRIMINALS RUN OUR COUNTRY!
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Mostly sunny and on the cool side.
Los Angeles Tribute
Prince
Stevie Wonder, Faith Evans, Aloe Blacc and Eric Benet paid tribute to Prince with words and music at a public memorial Friday in Los Angeles.
Thousands of Prince fans gathered in front of Los Angeles City Hall for the celebration, where the entertainers performed songs from Prince's vast catalog. Investigators are still trying to determine what caused his unexpected death last month at age 57.
Benet, who is married to Prince's ex-wife Manuela Testolini, sang "Raspberry Beret," Evans performed "I Feel for You" and Blacc sang "Diamonds and Pearls."
Wonder closed the evening with a performance of "Purple Rain."
"What an incredible life, music and legacy that he gave us," Wonder told the crowd. "I think the only thing we can do in the spirit of Prince is to learn to truly love one another and come together. We can't just talk about it we got to be about it."
Prince
75th Birthday Party
USO
Jon Stewart could not help but take a few jabs at Donald Trump while hosting the United Service Organizations' 75th birthday party at the Joint Base Andrews in Maryland on Thursday.
"He'll say whatever he kind of thinks of, whatever comes to his mind, sort of impulsive," Stewart said of Biden. "Sometimes, you might think to yourself, 'That sounds crazy,' or 'Man, that is crazy.' And who would have thought that now, that gets you the Republican nomination."
The joke got a lot of laughs, and Stewart couldn't help but keep going.
"Don't worry, Trump's going to keep you busy," he told the military crowd. "You're going to have to repaint all the planes with 'Trump' in big gold letters."
USO
What Xenophobia Hath Wrought
Airplane Non-Threat
An Ivy League professor said his flight was delayed because a fellow passenger thought the math equations he was writing might be a sign he was a terrorist.
American Airlines confirms that the woman expressed suspicions about University of Pennsylvania economics professor Guido Menzio. She said she was too ill to take the Air Wisconsin-operated flight.
Menzio said he was flying from Philadelphia to Syracuse on Thursday night and was solving a differential equation related to a speech he was set to give at Queen's University in Ontario, Canada. He said the woman sitting next to him passed a note to a flight attendant and the plane headed back to the gate. Menzio, who is Italian and has curly, dark hair, said the pilot then asked for a word and he was questioned by an official.
"I thought they were trying to get clues about her illness," he told The Associated Press in an email. "Instead, they tell me that the woman was concerned that I was a terrorist because I was writing strage things on a pad of paper."
Menzio said he explained what he had been doing and the flight took off soon afterward. He was treated respectfully throughout, he added. But, he said, he was concerned about a delay that a brief conversation or an Internet search could have resolved.
Airplane Non-Threat
Unmasked?
'Man in the Iron Mask'
A 350-year-old French mystery has been unmasked: In his new book, Paul Sonnino, a professor of history at the University of California, Santa Barbara, claims he has uncovered the real identity of the mysterious Man in the Iron Mask.
The Man in the Iron Mask was a prisoner arrested in 1669 and held in the Bastille and other French jails for more than three decades, until his death in 1703. His identity has been an enduring mystery because, throughout his imprisonment, the man's face was hidden by a mask, according to Sonnino. The story was even popularized in the 1998 film "The Man in the Iron Mask," starring Leonardo DiCaprio.
It's a mystery that evaded even famed philosopher Voltaire and writer Alexandre Dumas. Historians have discounted the theory popularized by Voltaire and Dumas that the masked man was the twin brother of Louis XIV, according to Sonnino.
"They [historians] are pretty much in agreement that his name was Eustache Dauger, that he only occasionally wore the mask and that when he did wear a mask, it was velvet, not iron," Sonnino said in a statement. "They are also quite sure that he was a valet. What they have not been able to figure out is whose valet he was, and for what possible reason he was held under tight security for over 30 years."
Through his research, Sonnino determined that Dauger was a valet for the treasurer of Cardinal Mazarin, who was principal minister of France during Louis XIV's early life. Mazarin accumulated a large fortune, and Sonnino believes the valet thought that some of the money was stolen.
'Man in the Iron Mask'
Opens Window
Minnesota
It's been nearly three years since Minnesota opened a path for lawsuits by victims of long-ago childhood sexual abuse.
In that time, more than 800 people have brought abuse claims against churches, the Boy Scouts, schools and a children's theater company. Previously unknown offenders have been exposed. Two Roman Catholic dioceses have filed bankruptcy. Lists of credibly accused priests and thousands of documents have been released. And the heightened scrutiny played a part in the downfall of two bishops.
Minnesota's window, which closes this month, was strongly opposed by the Catholic Church and other institutions that are now fighting to block similar exemptions to the statutes of limitations in Pennsylvania and New York, citing the effects in Minnesota and other states. The Archdiocese of St. Paul and Minneapolis filed for bankruptcy protection last year, and the Duluth diocese followed after a jury found it responsible for $4.8 million of an $8.1 million jury award to just one man.
In St. Paul, the resignations last year of Archbishop John Nienstedt and Auxiliary Bishop Lee Piche came days after the archdiocese was criminally charged with child endangerment over its handling of an abusive priest who ultimately went to prison. The case wasn't from an old claim filed under the new law, but it followed increasing pressure resulting from new disclosures in the lawsuits that the law made possible.
The Archdiocese turned down an interview request with Archbishop-designate Bernard Hebda or other top officials for this story, instead issuing a statement saying the archdiocese is doing everything reasonably possible to prevent the sexual abuse of children.
Minnesota
Egypt Court Recommends Death
Al-Jazeera
An Egyptian court on Saturday recommended the death sentence against six people, including two Al-Jazeera employees, for allegedly passing documents related to national security to Qatar and the Doha-based TV network during the rule of Islamist president Mohammed Morsi.
A verdict on Morsi, ousted by the military in July 2013 after one year in office, and four other defendants in the case, will be announced June 18, according to judge Mohammed Shirin Fahmy. Morsi's co-defendants include two top aides from his one year in office.
The two Al-Jazeera employees - identified by the judge as news producer Alaa Omar Mohammed and news editor Ibrahim Mohammed Hilal - were sentenced in absentia along with Asmaa al-Khateib, who worked for Rasd, a media network widely suspected of links to Morsi's Muslim Brotherhood. The Brotherhood was banned and declared a terrorist group after Morsi's ouster.
Mohammed and Hilal, who are not in Egypt, would be retried in the event of their surrender to Egyptian authorities.
The three other defendants for whom death sentences were recommended Saturday are documentary producer Ahmed Afify, EgyptAir cabin crew member Mohammed Keilany and academic Ahmed Ismail, according to Saturday's verdict.
Al-Jazeera
US Tax Haven In Tatters
Puerto Rico
Strangled by debt and a decade of recession, US territory Puerto Rico is pleading for help from Congress.
But ironically the Congress is partly to blame for the Caribbean island's woes, having helped devise its failed economic strategy of becoming a corporate tax haven, and then allowing that attraction to expire.
The island, which defaulted on a huge bond payment on Monday, is grappling with a massive $70 billion debt and a decade of recession after pursuing for years a growth strategy based on offering tax breaks to investors.
Between 1976 and 2006, Section 936 of the US tax code provided US companies operating in Puerto Rico tax-free income from those operations.
US giants like software maker Microsoft and drug makers Pfizer and Johnson & Johnson were among the companies rushing into Puerto Rico to offset the 35 percent US corporate tax rate, the highest among advanced economies.
Puerto Rico
Sells Off Wildlife
Zimbabwe
Drought-hit Zimbabwe has invited local farmers and private game rangers to buy wild animals as it destocks national game reserves to save fauna from starvation, the wildlife authority said Wednesday.
Parks and wildlife authority spokeswoman Caroline Washaya said it has asked individuals and private game keepers to step in and buy wild animals "in the light of the drought".
She did not have details of the species or numbers of the animals up for sale.
But the cash-strapped country has been battling to reduce its animals - especially elephants - whose population is more than twice what the parks can accomodate.
Zimbabwe has in recent years resorted to exporting elephants to countries such as China in a bid to raise funds and cut the ballooning population.
Zimbabwe
Return In Droves
Starfish
Droves of baby starfish are returning to Oregon and Northern California's shores after a wasting disease decimated whole populations of the creatures over the past two years along the West Coast.
Data collected by Oregon State University researchers shows an unprecedented number of baby starfish, or sea stars, survived the summer and winter of 2015, the Eureka Times Standard reported Saturday.
A similar increase was found at sites just north of Trinidad, California, near Patrick's Point State Park. A baby starfish boom also was noted in the summer of 2014 near Santa Cruz.
A virus killed millions of starfish on the Pacific Coast from Southern California to Alaska by causing them to lose their limbs and eventually disintegrate into slime and piles of tiny bones.
The cause of the massive outbreak remains unclear. Some have hypothesized it to be abnormally warm waters in the Pacific Ocean, which have wreaked havoc on marine ecosystems for the past two years.
Starfish
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