Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Mark Morford: Homophobes need (gay) love too (SF Gate)
And then came the headline that surprised exactly no one and delighted a great many, even as it openly terrified countless thousands across the deep south and also Utah and Kansas and pretty much the entire GOP. The poor dears.
BENJY SARLIN: Hillary Boomlet Hits New Gear As 'Texts From Hillary' Explodes (Talking Points Memo)
What a difference four years makes: When she was running for the Democratic presidential nomination, Hillary Clinton was parodied as drab and calculated, especially compared with young and vigorous Barack Obama and winking and fresh-faced Sarah Palin. Now, she's fueling Internet jokes based on her own brand of badass cool.
Paul Krugman: The Empathy Gap (New York Times)
In general, I'm a numbers and concepts guy, not a feelings guy; when I go after someone like Paul Ryan, I emphasize his irresponsibility and dishonesty, not his evident lack of empathy for the less fortunate. Still, there are times - in Ryan's case and more generally for much of his political tribe - when that lack of empathy just takes your breath away.
Paul Krugman: Socialsecuritymedicareandmedicaid Strikes Again (New York Times)
Here's how [the old Social Security bait and switch] works: to make the quite mild financial shortfall of Social Security seem apocalyptic, the writer starts out by talking about Social Security, then starts using numbers that combine SS with the health care programs - programs that are very different in conception, financing, and solutions. And then the writer ends by demanding that we cut Social Security, as opposed to addressing health care costs.
Decca Aitkenhead: "Stella Creasy: 'You can see a perfect storm coming'" (Guardian)
The Labour MP for Walthamstow has made a name by campaigning against payday loans - an example of her traditional approach to fighting for the dispossessed, she says.
DEBORAH SIMMONS: Bill Cosby weighs in on Trayvon Martin case (Washington Times)
"Without a gun, I don't see Mr. Zimmerman approaching Trayvon by himself," Mr. Cosby explained. "The power-of-the-gun mentality had him unafraid to confront someone. Even police call for backup in similar situations. "When you carry a gun, you mean to harm somebody, kill somebody," he said.
Will Layman: "Jazz's Wizard of Wit-and Much More-Dave Frishberg" (PopMatters)
I've lamented before about the lack of humor and lightness in jazz …. How can it be that this music, based in puckish, playful improvisation, is so often somber or self-important? On days when you might want your jazz with some wit and some delight, one sure solution is the music of pianist, songwriter and singer Dave Frishberg.
Scott Burns: "Life: How Much Will You Leave On the Table?" (AssetBuilder)
How would you like to double your retirement spending?
Jim Phillips: Poetry in OU teacher's debut volume sings like a bird (Athens News)
If Ohio University poet Becca Lachman's first book fit into a recognized literary clique, it might be called the neo-confessional Anabaptist school. No such school of poetry exists, more's the pity, but perhaps Lachman's freshman effort, "The Apple Speaks," will help start one.
The Apple Speaks: Poems by Becca J.R. Lachman: Reviewed by Caitlin Mackenzie
We are a people still searching for a place with an ache for home that can never be comforted. We are not always meant to go home, but to find or create our own. This is what the reader discovers in 'The Apple Speak's: the sore muscles of one thoughtfully and intentionally tending new soil.
David Bruce has 42 Kindle books on Amazon.com with 250 anecdotes in each book. Each book is $1, so for $42 you can buy 10,500 anecdotes. Search for "Funniest People," "Coolest People, "Most Interesting People," "Kindest People," "Religious Anecdotes," "Maximum Cool," and "Resist Psychic Death."
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Michelle in AZ
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
BadtotheboneBob
Lighthouse Spiders
Tales of the spider infested lighthouses (not for the squeamish)
This is about the size of the aforementioned spiders I had to deal with on those offshore lighthouses...
Seriously... They were huge and owned the places, I'm tellin' ya, and sorely resented our presence and interruption of their spiderly duties that was eating the bazillion bugs that flocked around the lights. Which, of course, made for big, fat, hideous, ornery spiders that reproduced beyond measure (again, in the bazillions). What attracted all those the bugs, you ask? Seagull crap.
See, after the lights were no longer manned and didn't have anyone to hose off the crap daily, the seagulls used the crib deck to nest, hangout and do what seagulls do frequently and without shame, i.e. crap all over the place. Copiously. We hated them. As much as the spiders, if not more.
If it wasn't for those 'rats with wings' (forgive me, Richard Bach), there'd be no bugs and spiders. Plus, and this no small thing, the lights smelled like... well, you don't want to know... in the hot, summer sun. Now, here's the mystery. How did the spiders get out there on those offshore lights to begin with? Huh? How?
Well, when spiders hatch, they're little tiny things. They spin one long strand and the wind picks them up and off they go on their great spider adventure. Some end up on the lights and the rest is spider heaven, as it were, and misery for the Coastguardsmen that had to maintain the lights periodically. Unless they land in the water, then they're fish food and that's a good thing. I've seen lantern rooms totally filled with web and those damn'd Shelobs just daring us to come up through the hatch into their lair.
If one listened carefully you could hear them chuckling as they slowly moved down towards the open hatch and terrified humans waiting below on the ladder gazing upward in horror. It was awful... The lighthouses on the islands and along the mainland shoreline we worked had spiders, too, but nothing like, and I mean nothing like, those offshore lights... Seriously...
BadtotheboneBob
Thanks, B2tbBob!
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Nearly an inch of rain overnight. Another storm supposed to arrive Friday night.
Unhappy With Walker
John Mellencamp
Liberal rocker John Mellencamp wants Republican Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker to know he supports collective bargaining and union rights and says Walker should be aware of that before using his song "Small Town" on the campaign trail.
Mellencamp's publicist Bob Merlis told The Associated Press on Wednesday that he sent Walker's campaign an email not asking him to stop using the song, but to inform him of Mellencamp's beliefs.
"He's a very liberal person," Merlis said of the singer. "He appeared at the Democratic National Convention in 2004. His wife at the time was a delegate at large. He's very pro-collective bargaining and the fight for a living wage."
Walker faces a June 5 recall election that was motivated over anger related to his proposal passed last year that effectively ended collective bargaining rights for most public workers. Walker embarked Tuesday on a six-city campaign swing across Wisconsin, and Merlis said he read a news story that mentioned he played "Small Town" while in Milwaukee.
John Mellencamp
Declines Induction Into Rock Hall
Axl Rose
There'll be no Guns N' Roses reunion at this weekend's Rock and Roll Hall of Fame ceremony. Axl Rose says he won't attend and is declining his induction into the hall.
The seminal band, which ruled the rock world for years before disbanding in acrimony in 1996, could be considered the headliner among the acts scheduled to be inducted in Cleveland on Saturday.
But in a letter to the hall released Wednesday, Rose said he won't be at the ceremony and would avoid what would have likely been a "complicated or awkward situation."
"I won't be attending The Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame Induction 2012 Ceremony and I respectfully decline my induction as a member of Guns N' Roses to the Rock And Roll Hall Of Fame," he said in the letter. "I strongly request that I not be inducted in absentia and please know that no one is authorized nor may anyone be permitted to accept any induction for me or speak on my behalf."
Axl Rose
$15 Million To Join "The X Factor"
Britney Spears
Britney Spears has reached an agreement to serve as a judge on Simon Cowell's "The X Factor" -- and the payday is really something to sing about.
The "Womanizer" singer will collect $15 million overall for the gig -- approximately $13 million to judge music-industry aspirants alongside Cowell and record executive L.A. Reid, and the rest as a bonus for performing on the show, an individual with knowledge of the deal told TheWrap.
The deal has been agreed upon, but has not yet been signed. Spears is still under a conservatorship following her mid-2000s breakdown, with her father, Jamie Spears, serving as her guardian.
Though Spears won't be getting exactly what she was hoping for, the singer's payday does compare favorably to her soon-to-be peers in the music-competition arena: Christina Aguilera is raking in upwards of $10 million to mentor the current second season of NBC's "The Voice." And Spears' "X Factor" predecessor, Paula Abdul received a relatively paltry $2.5 million to judge on the first season.
Britney Spears
Dyngus Day Giggles
Anderson Cooper
CNN's Anderson Cooper says he was calling his giggling fit "stupid" during a segment on Dyngus Day - not the holiday itself.
Cooper laughed through his Dyngus Day report Tuesday, which was featured during the "RidicuList" segment on "Anderson Cooper 360."
Dyngus Day is a Polish-American, day-after-Easter tradition celebrating the end of Lent. It features people playfully sprinkling each other with water and swatting one another with pussy willows to show their amorous interest.
The segment prompted organizers of Dyngus Day celebrations in Buffalo to invite Cooper to attend next year's events.
Anderson Cooper
Trivia Question from Sunday, 18 March, 2012
Another name for Dingus (Dyngus) Day is ____?____
Easter Monday (the day after Easter) Source
Added To Jazz Fest Lineup
Jimmy Buffet
Jimmy Buffett will replace Pearl Jam singer and guitarist Eddie Vedder in the May 3 lineup at the New Orleans Jazz and Heritage Festival.
Vedder canceled when he postponed his 15-city U.S. solo tour because of nerve damage in his right arm stemming from a back injury earlier this year.
Buffet is a Jazz Fest veteran who has built an empire based largely on such Caribbean-flavored rock hits as "Wasting Away Again In Margaritaville." He first performed at Jazz fest in 1989.
This time, Buffet will leave his rock band behind and sing and play acoustic guitar with Mac McAnally, a Mississippi native named the Country Music Association's Musician of the Year for the past four years in a row.
Jimmy Buffet
Explodes At Mel "Sugar Tits" Gibson
Joe Eszterhas
Hollywood screenwriter Joe Eszterhas is accusing Mel "Sugar Tits" Gibson, his recent collaborator on a movie about Jewish revolt, of "hating Jews" and using him to deflect his anti-Semitic reputation.
In an explosive nine-page letter to Gibson obtained by TheWrap, the screenwriter wrote that the director of "The Passion of the Christ" never intended to make the movie about Jewish heroism, called "The Maccabees."
Instead, Eszterhas said, Gibson announced the project "in an attempt to deflect continuing charges of anti-Semitism which have dogged you, charges which have crippled your career."
He added: "I've come to the conclusion that the reason you won't make 'The Maccabees' is the ugliest possible one. You hate Jews."
"You continually called Jews 'Hebes' and 'oven-dodgers' and 'Jewboys.' It seemed that most times when we discussed someone, you asked 'He's a Hebe, isn't he?' You said most 'gatekeepers' of American companies were 'Hebes' who 'controlled their bosses.'"
"You said the Holocaust was 'mostly a lot of horseshit.' You said the Torah made reference to the sacrifice of Christian babies and infants. When I told you that you were confusing the Torah with The Protocols of the Elders of Zion, ... you insisted 'it's in the Torah -- it's in there!' (It isn't)."
Joe Eszterhas
Reaches Deal In DUI
Rima Fakih
Rima Fakih, the first Arab-American to be crowned Miss USA, pleaded no contest Wednesday in a Michigan drunken driving case.
The former beauty queen offered the plea to driving while visibly impaired.
"You learn, you pay your price for making mistakes and you move on. I'm very happy I can put this behind me," Fakih, a former Miss Michigan who was crowned Miss USA in 2010, said outside the court in Highland Park, an enclave of Detroit.
A no contest plea isn't an admission of guilt but is treated as such for sentencing, which will take place May 9. She faces a maximum penalty of 93 days in jail.
Her lawyer, W. Otis Culpepper, predicted that Fakih would be sentenced to probation, which he said she could serve in California, where she is pursuing opportunities in the entertainment industry. Fakih will "get back to California and get on with being a Hollywood kind of person," Culpepper said.
Rima Fakih
Faulted In Pepper-Spraying
UC Davis
University of California officials and campus police showed poor judgment and used excessive force in the pepper-spraying of peacefully protesting students allied with the Occupy Wall Street movement last fall, an investigative panel found on Wednesday.
A scathing, 190-page report on the UC Davis confrontation, which was captured on video and widely replayed on television and the Internet, was the work of a task force headed by former California Supreme Court Justice Cruz Reynoso.
"Our overriding conclusion can be stated briefly and explicitly," wrote Reynoso and his co-authors. "The pepper-spraying incident that took place on November 18, 2011 should and could have been prevented."
The report, delayed for weeks by a lawsuit from the university police union, criticized officers for using pepper spray to break up a peaceful demonstration and accused school administrators of bungling decisions at nearly every point leading up to the incident.
The panel also singled out police department commanders, including Lieutenant John Pike, who was seen in video footage dousing a cluster of protesters at close range as he walked back and forth in front of them. The report said the pepper spray he used was in a larger can with a more forceful nozzle than the variety officially approved for the police department
UC Davis
Alive & Foaming In Florida
Joe McCarthy
Republican Rep. Allen West (R-Deluded) said he believes 75-plus House Democrats are members of the Communist Party, a claim that echoed Joe McCarthy's unsubstantiated 1950s charges that communists had infiltrated the top ranks of the U.S. government.
Addressing a town-hall meeting Tuesday in Florida, the freshman lawmaker was asked how many members of the American legislature are "card-carrying Marxists." West said "there's about 78 to 81 members of the Democratic Party that are members of the Communist Party." He did not provide names.
West's office said Wednesday that the congressman stood by the comments and was referring to the 76 members of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, the largest group within the House Democratic caucus.
"The Communist Party has publicly referred to the Progressive Caucus as its allies," said Angela Melvin, a spokeswoman for West. "The Progressive Caucus speaks for itself. These individuals certainly aren't proponents of free markets or individual economic freedom."
Joe McCarthy
Media Stalking Over Stalker Story
Alec Baldwin
Alec Baldwin took to Twitter to accuse the New York Post, NBC's "Today" morning show and other news outlets of stalking him to get an interview about a woman charged with stalking him.
Baldwin tweets that crews from both organizations -- and others -- have been camped outside his Greenwich Village home in New York City. It is the same home where the Canadian woman, Genevieve Sabourin, appeared over the weekend, prompting him to call police.
"Outside my apt, "journalists" from the Post camped out to talk to me about stalking," he wrote late Tuesday. "They camped out all day. Wait. Isn't that.......?"
Baldwin added Wednesday morning: "Outside my apt today, alongside the other stalkers from the tabloid press, a crew that identified themselves as being with the Today Show. ... I haven't appeared on the Today Show in many years. But did they have to camp outside my apt?"
Alec Baldwin
Dismisses Israeli Travel Ban
Günter Grass
Günter Grass says Israel's decision to bar him from visiting the country because of his poem criticizing the Jewish state reminds him of similar steps that dictatorial governments have taken against him.
Previously the German literature Nobel laureate has only been barred from entering a nation by then Communist-ruled East Germany and the military junta in Myanmar about 25 years ago, Grass said in a reaction piece published by German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung on Wednesday.
In his poem "What Must Be Said," published by Sueddeutsche Zeitung and other dailies across Europe on April 4, Grass criticized what he called Western hypocrisy over Israel's nuclear program and labeled the country a threat to "already fragile world peace" over its belligerent stance regarding Iran.
In his poem, Grass called for "unhindered and permanent control of Israel's nuclear capability and Iran's atomic facilities through an international body." Also, he specifically criticized Israel's "claim to the right of a first strike" against Iran.
Günter Grass
Rents Public Beach - Cheap
Jennifer Lopez
Jennifer Lopez is drawing a line in the sand -- paying nearly a grand to rent out a public beach in L.A. last weekend ... to keep randos away from her family and children.
Sources tell TMZ, Jennifer forked over $925 to the city of Long Beach to rent out Marine Beach on Saturday -- 3,400 feet of shoreline -- just for her, her kids, her BF Casper Smart and other family and friends.
To keep out the riffraff, we're told lifeguards marked off the water using buoys -- and kept the beach gates locked.
We're told J.Lo and co. brought their own jet skis for awesome fun times -- and even hired a wakeboard instructor.
Meanwhile, a bunch of sad locals stayed home and played with dirt.
Jennifer Lopez
Bodleian & Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana
Libraries
The Bodleian Libraries of the University of Oxford and the Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana (BAV) said on Thursday they intended to digitise 1.5 million pages of ancient texts and make them freely available online.
The libraries said the digitised collections will centre on three subject areas: Greek manuscripts, 15th-century printed books and Hebrew manuscripts and early printed books.
The areas have been chosen for the strength of the collections in both libraries and their importance for scholarship in their respective fields.
With approximately two-thirds of the material coming from the BAV and the remainder from the Bodleian, the digitization effort will also benefit scholars by uniting virtually materials that have been dispersed between the collections for centuries.
Libraries
Graffiti Pops Up
Gerald Ford
Former President Gerald Ford is remembered in his hometown of Grand Rapids by a museum and a stretch of interstate. Now, a graffiti artist has decided to memorialize the 38th commander in chief on the freeway that bears his name.
Several stenciled Ford images have popped up recently along east I-196 in the West Michigan city. One is accompanied by the phrase, "I am indebted to no man" - words spoken by Ford in 1974 after he took the oath of office. It was taken from the full quote, "I am indebted to no man and only one woman, my dear wife, Betty, as I begin this very difficult job."
"They do seem fun and playful, ignoring the fact that it's defacement of public property," James Draper, registrar at the Gerald R. Ford Public Museum, told Mlive.com for a story Tuesday. Draper said he was speaking personally and not on behalf of the museum.
The freeway is technically under the jurisdiction of the Michigan Department of Transportation. Department spokesman John Richards told The Associated Press that the graffiti will be removed.
Gerald Ford
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