Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Street Harrassment: Assertive Stories
You got great legs, baby!" a 43-year-old man told Brittney, a 15-year-old girl, as she waited for the subway on her way to school in NYC. In response, she said, "Excuse me, you probably have a daughter older than me." Unconcerned by that thought he said, "Sorry you just look so sexy in that schoolgirl outfit I couldn't help it and you do have great legs." Undeterred, Brittney said, "Sexual harassment is a crime, leave me alone or I will report you," and the harasser hurried away.
Phil Plait: Stop Giving Airtime to Crackpots (Slate)
In very welcome news, BBC journalists have been told to stop inviting crackpots on news shows in the name of balance.
Mark Morford: Kiss lick moan iWatch (SF Gate)
Quick: Can you guess how many financial prophets and tech pundits were completely, I mean 100%, jaw-droppingly wrong about the first iPad, in the months leading up to its release? How many said it was a massive misstep, sure to be an embarrassing flop for Steve Jobs, given how there is no imaginable use for what amounts to an engorged iPod Touch that can't even make phone calls?
Carmen Burana, M. Murberg: 5 Ridiculous Lies You Probably Believe About Psychology (Cracked)
After a semester of intro to psychology and a dozen BuzzFeed quizzes, you might think you've got a pretty good understanding of how the human psyche works. Unfortunately, you're probably basing that assumption on a science that's less "science" and more "a string of guesstimates cobbled together over the last hundred years or so." Not everything you learned from your high school psychology teacher/gym coach is rock-solid truth, guys.
Roy Greenslade: "Sheikh down: how Mazher Mahmood, the king of the sting, was caught out" (Guardian)
The Sun on Sunday's 'fake sheikh' has won awards for his elaborate set ups. Yet the ruthlessness with which he entraps his prey means singer Tulisa Contostavlos can count herself lucky to escape his clutches.
Rebecca Schuman: Germans Love Getting Naked at the Beach. So Should We (Slate)
Nude bathing has a special German name, of course: FKK, which stands for Freikörperkultur, or "free body culture," and despite what you've seen in Eurotrip, it's less about sex or exhibitionism and more about convenience and freedom.
Alex Hern: Who are the 6 million people still getting Netflix by mail? I'm one of them (Guardian)
Sure, the streaming revolution has come. But that doesn't mean there's no upside to the postie handing you a movie.
Climb Mount Everest
Safely. On your computer.
Weird Al
See all 8 new videos.
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David Bruce has approximately 50 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
wrote:
took the day off.
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Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
From The Creator of 'Avery Ant'
from Marc Perkel
BartCop
Hello Bartcop fans,
As you all know the untimely passing of Terry was unexpected, even by
him. We all knew he had cancer but we all thought he had some years
left. So some of us who have worked closely with him over the years are
scrambling around trying to figure out what to do. My job, among other
things, is to establish communications with the Bartcop community and
provide email lists and groups for those who might put something
together. Those who want to play an active roll in something coming from
this, or if you are one of Bart's pillars, should send an email to
active@bartcop.com.
Bart's final wish was to pay off the house mortgage for Mrs. Bart who is
overwhelmed and so very grateful for the support she has received.
Anyone wanting to make a donation can click on this the yellow donate
button on bartcop.com
But - I need you all to help keep this going. This note
isn't going to directly reach all of Bart's fans. So if you can repost
it on blogs and discussion boards so people can sign up then when we
figure out what's next we can let more people know. This list is just
over 600 but like to get it up to at least 10,000 pretty quick. So
here's the signup link for this email list.
( mailman.bartcop.com/listinfo/bartnews )
Marc Perkel
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
FWIW, the first official e-page debuted 07/26/01 - 13 years ago, this Saturday. That's somewhere around 4700 pages. (Thanks for the reminder, Marianne!)
First Comedy Album to Reach No. 1 in 50 Years
Weird Al
"Weird Al" Yankovic has collected his first No. 1 album, as the antic musician's latest release became the first comedy album to top the U.S. chart in more than half a century.
Yankovic's "Mandatory Fun" captured the pinnacle with sales of 104,000 copies in its debut week, according to Nielsen SoundScan data for the week ending July 20. His previous peak came in 2011, when "Alpocalypse" reached No. 9. The veteran parodist's album was pushed by a video campaign led by "Tacky," his spoof of Pharrell's "Happy." Comedy last reigned on the chart in 1963, when Allan Sherman's "My Son, the Nut" became the Chicago-born comic's third No. 1 LP.
Three other new titles followed Yankovic's album onto the chart. Jason Mraz's "Yes!" (Atlantic) placed at No. 2, entering with 81,000 units sold. The singer-songwriter matched the peak of his last release, "2012's Love is a Four Letter Word."
Chicago rock quartet Rise Against logged on at No. 3 with "The Black Market" (Interscope), tallying 53,000. The group matched the peak of its 2008 collection "Appeal to Reason," but performed shy of 2011's "Endgame," which topped out at No. 2.
Weird Al's
Happy 42nd Birthday
Landsat
Forty-two years ago today, the United States launched the first satellite in what would become a continuous program that keeps an eye on Earth from space to this day.
The Landsat 1 satellite, a joint project of NASA and the U.S. Geological Survey, flew into orbit on July 23, 1972, from Vandenberg Air Force Base in California. The mission: to study and monitor the approximately 30 percent of the Earth's surface that is covered by land.
Landsat 1 carried a camera system and a multispectral scanner. The camera was designed to be the primary observation instrument, according to NASA, but scientists soon discovered that the scanner was sending back far better data.
Landsat 1 was decommissioned in January 1978. By that time, it had a partner in orbit: Landsat 2, which launched in January 1975 and sent back Earth observations until 1982. The Landsat program is now the longest-running, continuous observation of Earth's land ever. The eighth satellite in the series, Landsat 8
Landsat
Clouds Over Wagner's Green Hill
Bayreuth Festival
The curtain goes up on the Bayreuth Festival this week, but observers say the prestigious month-long summer music fest dedicated to the works of Richard Wagner could be losing some of its shine.
Detractors say that under its current management -- Wagner's great-granddaughters Katharina Wagner and Eva Wagner-Pasquier, who took over in 2009 -- the festival is on its way downhill.
But the perceived drop in artistic standards may now be starting to hit ticket sales -- unheard of for a festival which has always prided itself on being sold out and having a waiting list for tickets stretching to 10 years and more.
Ever since Wagner's grandsons Wolfgang and Wieland relaunched the event after World War II, tickets to Bayreuth have been the hardest to come by in the world of opera and classical music.
But this year, when a contingent of seats was made available directly on the Internet for the first time, they did not sell out straight away.
Bayreuth Festival
This Week Only
Marvel Comics
Marvel is opening up its massive vault of digital comics for only 99 cents this week to coincide with San Diego Comic-Con. A subscription to Marvel Unlimited - which offers immediate access to over 13,000 comics - normally runs $9.99 per month or $69 if you pay for an entire year up front. But Wired reports that for this week only, paying just under a buck will get you a month's worth of unfettered access to Marvel's universe. There are some limitations; you can store a maximum of 12 comics on a device for reading offline, and there's usually a wait of several months before new issues reach the service. (Marvel isn't trying to put your local comic book shop out of business, after all.) And yes, Marvel Unlimited is only available in the US.
But there are also perks that come with reading on a screen instead of paper, including original, made-for-digital stories. So if you're headed to experience the Comic-Con madness in San Diego, this could make for a great way to brush up on your superhero expertise - and there's been some huge news lately.
Marvel Comics
$25M Koch Gift
Black Colleges
America's black colleges are struggling for funds. The Republican Party is struggling to attract black voters.
Enter a $25 million gift to the United Negro College Fund from the conservative Koch brothers, which has pitted the needs of black students against liberals' insistence that the Kochs are pursuing a racist political agenda.
Whether genuine philanthropy, political jujitsu or some of both, the gift sparked a debate that peaked when Lee Saunders, president of the powerful American Federation for State, County and Municipal Employees union, sent the UNCF a blistering letter ending the union's financial support.
Historically black colleges and universities have educated a huge percentage of black America. Today, HBCUs are facing unprecedented challenges: decreases in government funding, tougher parent loan eligibility, and the threat of losing even more federal aid based on low retention and graduation rates.
Black Colleges
No Verdict
Jesse Ventura
There's still no verdict as jurors try to decide whether a decorated military sniper libeled former Minnesota Gov. Jesse Ventura in his bestselling memoir.
Jurors deliberated from about 9 a.m. until about 4 p.m. Wednesday before leaving the federal courthouse in St. Paul. They received the case around noon Tuesday.
The jury has posed two questions to the judge. The subjects and answers haven't been disclosed.
Jesse Ventura
Refuse To Serve
Israeli Reservists
More than 50 former Israeli soldiers have refused to serve in the nation's reserve force, citing regret over their part in a military they said plays a central role in oppressing Palestinians, the Washington Post reported on Wednesday.
"We found that troops who operate in the occupied territories aren't the only ones enforcing the mechanisms of control over Palestinian lives. In truth, the entire military is implicated. For that reason, we now refuse to participate in our reserve duties, and we support all those who resist being called to service," the soldiers wrote in a petition posted online and first reported by the newspaper.
While some Israelis have refused to serve in the Palestinian territories of the West Bank, the military's structure is such that serving in any capacity forces one to play a role in the conflict, said the soldiers, most of whom are women who would have been exempted from combat.
Their comments come as the conflict in Gaza continues to escalate, displacing thousands more Palestinians in the battered territory even as the United States presses both sides for an immediate ceasefire and longer-term peace plan.
Israeli Reservists
Anti-Choice Convention
New Orleans
Hundreds of anti-choice activists are currently congregating in New Orleans to stage protests against abortion around the city, an event that's expected to last all week long. So far, tensions have come to a head in an unexpected place: the sanctuary of a church, where abortion opponents interrupted a service to tell congregants that they don't have a "true faith" because their denomination supports reproductive rights.
This week's protests are being spearheaded by the national anti-abortion group Operation Save America
As the Uptown Messenger reports, anti-abortion activists interrupted worship at the church - specifically, disrupting a moment of silence for a church member who recently passed away - to declare that this particular church isn't a "true faith" and tell the service attendees to "repent." Operation Save America's opinion about the First Unitarian Universalist Church is made clear on its website, which refers to the "church" and its "pastor" in scare quotes and calls it a "synagogue of Satan."
Nonetheless, over the weekend, the mayor of New Orleans issued an official proclamation of welcome to the protesters, signing a certificate thanking the anti-choice group for its "service" to the city. That prompted more than 500 New Orleans residents to sign a petition asking the mayor to reconsider. "Regardless of personal ideologies, most Americans agree that harassing women and threatening doctors is extreme behavior that should not be welcomed by the mayor's office. The certificates signed by you gives them a legitimacy that they do not deserve," the petition reads.
New Orleans
Nonprofit Empire
Kochs
It was nearing 2 a.m., the AC had been shut off and the air in the century-old downtown office of Brigade Media, a tech startup that hosted a hackathon in conjunction with a libertarian tech conference here, was starting to feel heavy. A small group of unwashed, sleep-deprived coders toiled quietly over their computers while a young man in a corner was passed out on a beanbag chair with a laptop balancing on his chest.
The hackathon - an event in which teams compete to build new apps and programs within a short period of time - was part of the first inaugural Reboot, conference where hundreds of conservative hackers, coders, designers, tech entrepreneurs and conservative political activists joined some of the nation's top Republicans to strategize and - ideally - emerge with The Next Great App. As an incentive, the conference organizers offered $10,000 in prize money to be awarded to the best ideas.
The gathering was the first inaugural conference put on by Lincoln Labs, a year-old club of politically-minded technologists started by three millennials with backgrounds in Republican politics: Garrett Johnson, a former aide to Florida Gov. Jeb Bush; Aaron Ginn, who worked on Mitt Romney's digital team; and Chris Abrams, who runs digital operations for Vanity Fair magazine. The group - which adopts the label "conservatarian," a popular buzzword for the ideological coalition between conservatives and libertarians - was born in 2013 in the aftermath of the failed Republican attempt to regain control of the White House, in which President Obama's mastery of digital campaigning and data collection trounced Republican efforts to match it.
For most of Lincoln Lab's existence, the group has relied upon financial backing and support from the orbit of activist groups that are part of Charles and David Koch's donor network. Last weekend's conference was sponsored by an array of groups from the Koch network: Generation Opportunity, its youth outreach group; the Libre Initiative, its Hispanic organization; Americans for Prosperity, its lead political advocacy arm; and i360!, which collects data on behalf of the Koch network. Microsoft, Google, and Stampede, a political consulting firm that provides campaign services to conservative candidates, also served as sponsors for the event.
Kochs
Queen's Horse Fails Drug Test
Estimate
Animal feed manufacturer Dodson and Horrell has launched an investigation into a component used in one of its products after Queen Elizabeth's racehorse Estimate tested positive for the banned substance morphine.
Buckingham Palace said on Tuesday that Estimate, winner of 2013's Ascot Gold Cup and runner-up this year, was one of five horses to have tested positive for morphine, allowed in training as a pain killer or sedative but banned on race days.
It was believed the contamination could have been caused by naturally occurring poppy seeds, and it had recalled certain batch numbers of its Alfalfa Oil Plus as a precautionary measure.
It is thought five-year old mare Estimate will be disqualified from June's second-place finish at Royal Ascot and the Queen will have to pay back 80,625 pounds ($137,400) in prize money.
Estimate is not suspended from racing and is expected to appear at Glorious Goodwood next weekend.
Estimate
Only 3 Minutes of Actual Game Play
'Family Feud'
"Family Feud" has been around for almost 40 years, and one thing about the show hasn't changed: It really is dependent on the host. It turns out that without Steve Harvey, one recent episode of the "Feud" would have been only three minutes long.
In the video (via the AV Club) YouTube user "GeorgeousWig" cut out all of Harvey's jokes, his repeated readings of the questions, and the families cheering "good answer!" even when their relatives gave a bad one. The result is a dizzying three minutes of answers, buzzes, bings, and other noise.
If it's disturbing that one of America's most popular game shows has 19 minutes of padding in a 22 minute episode, realize how much time it takes to spin the wheel on "Wheel of Fortune" or hug Drew Carey on "The Price is Right."
Now if only someone would cut a Richard Dawson-free episode of the classic "Family Feud" so we could get a historic comparison.
'Family Feud'
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