Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Jonathan Jones: Give me Van Gogh's ear over Damien Hirst's luxury basement any day. (The Guardian)
Once a symbol of soulful suffering, the painter's brutal act of self-mutilation is still a reminder that art should be more than the pursuit of money and success.
Mark Morford: Bikram Choudhury is not the Donald Trump of yoga. He's worse. (SF Gate)
Donald Trump, meet Bikram Choudhury. Bikram, meet the Donald. Are you two the same person? Are the same acidic demons burning away your respective souls? So it would appear. If nothing else, you two should start dating, like, immediately.
Arwa Mahdawi: This US election is a Netflix drama. No wonder we're binge-watching it (The Guardian)
It's impossible to take your eyes off the Clinton/Trump battle - the storyline has everything from the evil British villain to the ever-present threat of apocalypse.
Susan Elkin: How to get your boy reading (The Guardian)
Boys are generally less enthusiastic than girls to spend their time reading - but all they need are a few bookworm male role models.
Neil Clark: The Greatest of Ghost Stories (American Conservative)
In defense of literature that scares the living daylights out of us.
David Christopher Bell: 5 Lessons The 2016 Election Teaches Us About Sexual Assault (Cracked)
5. The Idea That Men Are Powerless Around Women Is Used To Excuse Terrible Behavior
4 Sixth-Sense-Style Twists You Didn't Even Realize Happened (Cracked)
4. 300 Is Ridiculously Over The Top Because It's Being Told By A Spartan
Stephen Roget: 5 Insane Celebrity Reactions To Totally Justified Criticism (Cracked)
When you accept a life in the public eye -- whether that's in entertainment, politics, or just being a woman on the internet -- you open yourself up to critics. You can either take that criticism in stride, attempting to learn from it on the extremely rare occasions when it could be considered constructive, or -- like the folks on this list -- you can fly straight off the rails and burn down everything you see in a righteous fury.
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David Bruce has over 80 Kindle books on Amazon.com.
wrote:
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has returned to semi-retired status.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
Team Coco
CONAN
Reader Contribution
Lumpy
Hey Marty:
I don't know if you, or any of your fine readers, are followers of the
art of astrology, but I definitely am. So, in the name of Entertainment, I'd like to
share my thoughts on what I think will be Trump's coming (I hope!) downfall. Some of
the terms may mean nothing to some folks, but they should get the big picture. I
haven't really delved into Hillary's chart yet...
I recently looked up Trump's chart and first I found that he has a natal Sun/Moon
opposition at 22 degrees Gemini to 21 degrees Sagittarius, indicating a very
volatile, unstable personality (I can vouch for that, as I once had a 'significant
other' with the exact same Sun/Moon configuration). That is one major reason why
Americans absolutely do NOT want him as our prez! However, that's not why I'm
writing, believe it or not.
I recently was looking through my emphemeris (a book of listings of where all the
planets are on any given date), and found that starting this coming December,
around the 27th or 28th (depending on the accuracy of Trump's chart, which I'd
found on the web), going through about the 15th of Jan/2017, the transiting
planet Saturn will be in an exact conjunction with Trump's natal Moon and in an
exact opposition to his natal Sun! As an avid astrologer, I know very well that is
a horrible configuration to have to suffer through and, while I normally don't
derive pleasure at the misfortune of others, I almost LMAO!
This is something Trump will experience every 28-29 years of his life (as will
anyone born on that same date or w/ that same natal config.), so he's been through
this at least once before. However, when it's happened before the other planets were
in different places, making the circumstances different. I haven't gone far enough
to check the ephemeris and see where the other planets were before in relation to
Trump's natal chart. My main concern is the here and now, looking for any sign that
he won't get elected.
I would like to share some thoughts concerning these transits from a couple of
other, professional, astrologers. One of the greatest astrologers of our time,
Robert Hand, says in regard to just the Saturn-opposite-Sun transit, "This may be
a very discouraging time. Your vital energies are at a 29-year low, and you may
feel quite incapable of dealing with the adversities that often accompany this
transit...This is not usually a good time for successfully attaining your goals.
You may feel...as if the burdens of life are too much for you."
In speaking of Saturn's conjunction to the natal Moon, Hand says, "...Quite
possibly you will feel lonely and depressed...If you do not live up to the demands
of your ideals, your confidence will suffer and you will feel a sense of weakness,
defeat and inferiority. During this transit you may withdraw from others, have
difficulty in relationships - especially with women - experience depression and
feel quite inferior to life's demands."
Hands write-ups are longer, of course, and more complete, but I don't want to
infringe on any copyrights or anything. These are from Hand's book, "Planets In
Transit".
I looked up another of my favorite sources for astrological info, an awesome
website called "Café Astrology", and it basically said the same thing, albeit much
longer and more complete. If anyone's interested, here's the link that will take
you to that site's 'Saturn transits' page.
Remember that in writing up these
sorts of things, astrologers are inclined to sugar-coat reality a little bit, so
that they don't scare the Hell out of their clients, the same way doctors try to
make stage-3 or 4 cancer seem 'not-so-bad'.
I know that the polls are showing Trump catching up w/ Hillary, even surpassing
her by one point in ABC's poll (really????). However, it really did ease my heart
to see these transits in Trump's chart, simply as an indicator that he will NOT be
celebrating being elected, much less being sworn-in, as America's new president.
Either that or, if he is elected, he'll begin to regret the Hell out of it, LOL! I
can only hope that it's the first option.
I'm still loving your site...still stopping by each and every day! It's one of my
favorite forms of Entertainment! :D
Keep it up!
Tiera H.
Thanks, Tiera!
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Temp
from Marc Perkel
Patriot Act
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
THE ONLY MISSING IS US!
HOW ABOUT EDUCATION, AND HIGHER WAGES?
FUCK JAMES COMEY!
10 NASTY WOMEN!
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
The very hungry caterpillar(s).
Recalls Twitter Feud
Jon Stewart
Jon Stewart told a packed New York audience tonight that, no, he didn't miss his nightly perch even "on the eve of the last American election" ever, but his enthusiastic comic demolition of Donald Trump told a different story.
"We were a beautiful, great country," Stewart said, kicking off an all-star comic lineup that included Jerry Seinfeld, Louis C.K. and Jim Gaffigan at the 10th Annual Stand Up for Heroes event at the Theater at Madison Square Garden. Bruce Springsteen capped the evening with a four-song acoustic set - and told a few jokes himself - to benefit the Bob Woodruff Foundation for veterans.
The meat of Stewart's dish, though, was his reading of actual tweets Trump directed his way in 2013, when the pre-candidate called Stewart "overrated" and repeatedly referred to him by his birth name Jon Leibowitz. "Oh, I think this guy is trying to let people know I'm a Jew," Stewart laughed. "Doesn't my face already do that? I could be on the poster for Yentl!"
Stewart, calling Trump's tweets "crude and horrible," then recounted his own response, when he started calling Trump "F*ckface Von Clownstick," which quickly became a meme and prompted one last, late-night tweet from the "man who might be our next President."
"At 1:30 in the morning, he tweeted 'Little Jon Stewart is a pussy, he would be hopeless in a debate with me!"
Stewart ended his routine: "Vote wisely this November 8."
Jon Stewart
Sues to Reclaim Rights to Film Scores
Ennio Morricone
Friday the 13th, This Is Spinal Tap and now, film scores created by the legendary Italian film composer Ennio Morricone: It may be time to realize that an event that many lawyers foretold - authors terminating copyright grants - is at hand in the film industry.
On Monday, Morricone's company filed suit in New York federal court with the aim of recapturing the copyrights to three of his film scores. According to a complaint against Bixio Music Group, Morricone has sent termination notices on film scores for Cosi Come Sei (Stay As You Are), Il Giocattolo (A Dangerous Toy) and Un Sacco Bello (Fun Is Beautiful).
The 1976 Copyright Act allows authors or their heirs to cancel a grant 35 years after initial publication. Those who do the math will figure out why works created in the late 1970s and early 1980s are suddenly subject to recapture by their creators. In the past couple months, lawsuits involving termination have been filed with regard to Friday the 13th and This Is Spinal Tap, making the topic quite hot.
The complaint (read here in full) states Morricone made written agreements from 1978 to 1980 with Edizioni Musicali to compose the scores for these three films. Subsequently, Edizioni Musicali assigned the United States copyrights to Bixio, which registered a claim with ASCAP to collect royalties from the public performance of the films.
The termination notices were served in 2012, and according to the lawsuit, recorded by the U.S. Copyright Office the following year. In the past couple of years, Morricone assigned rights to his own company.
Ennio Morricone
Settles With Hulk Hogan
Gawker
Shuttered online news website Gawker Media LLC has reached a $31 million cash settlement with Hulk Hogan, the former professional wrestler who obtained a $140 million judgment against the site over a leaked sex tape.
Hogan's judgment forced Gawker, known for its irreverent tone and gossipy posts, into bankruptcy in June. Its sister websites, including sports site Deadspin and women's site Jezebel, were acquired for $135 million by media company Univision Holdings Inc in a bankruptcy auction this summer.
Silicon Valley billionaire Peter Thiel (R-Shitheel) revealed that he helped fund the invasion of privacy lawsuit filed by Hogan, whose real name is Terry Bollea. The news site published an article in 2007 about Thiel's homosexuality.
Gawker founder Nick Denton, who filed for personal bankruptcy to protect himself from Hogan's judgment, has accused Thiel of using his wealth to carry out a vendetta against him and his site.
Gawker
Press Regulation
UK
The British government was accused Tuesday of capitulating to "media barons" after indicating it may abandon a measure to punish newspapers that refuse to join a government-approved press regulator.
Culture Secretary Karen Bradley announced consultation into whether to implement 2013 legislation that would force news organisations to pay all the costs of libel and privacy suits against them, even if they won.
The so-called Section 40 measure would only apply to groups that refuse to join a new press regulator, IMPRESS, that was introduced after the 2011 phone hacking scandal.
It was intended as an incentive to make sure newspapers signed up to the new system, but has been condemned as a threat to press freedom -- and failed to achieve its purpose.
Only around 50 organisations are members of IMPRESS, while around 2,500 have joined the unofficial IPSO regulator -- presenting the government with what Bradley admitted was "a dilemma".
UK
Promises More Obstructionism
GOP
The Supreme Court has existed with its full complement of nine justices for close to 150 years, no matter who occupied the White House. Now some Republican lawmakers suggest they would be fine with just eight for four years more rather than have Hillary Clinton fill the vacancy.
The court has operated with eight justices for the past eight months as Republicans controlling the Senate have blocked confirmation hearings for President Barack Obama's nominee Merrick Garland. Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Turtlehead), and his GOP colleagues have insisted that American voters should have a say, choosing the next president in Tuesday's election. The 45th president - either Democrat Hillary Clinton or Republican Donald Trump (R-Pinche Güerito) - would fill the current vacancy created when Justice Antonin Scalia (R-Corrupt) died in February.
But several Republicans have said if the voters elect Clinton, they'll block her nominees, effectively abandoning their advice and consent role for her entire term.
"If Hillary Clinton becomes president, I am going to do everything I can do to make sure four years from now, we still got an opening on the Supreme Court," North Carolina Sen. Richard Burr (R-The 'C' Word) said in an audio recording of his meeting with GOP volunteers on Saturday. CNN obtained a copy of the audio.
GOP Sens. John McCain (R-Obsolete) of Arizona and Ted Cruz (R-Sell Out) of Texas have also suggested blocking any Clinton nominees. Sen. Rand Paul (R-Unemployable), said in a debate Monday night that he "can't imagine" voting for any Clinton nominee though he stopped short of vowing to block a pick from a Democratic president.
GOP
Patriarchy Is Forever
Pope
Pope Francis said on Tuesday he believes the Roman Catholic Church's ban on women becoming priests is forever and will never be changed, in some of his most definitive remarks on the issue.
He was speaking aboard a plane taking him back to Rome from Sweden, in the freewheeling news conference with reporters that has become a tradition of his return flights from trips abroad.
A Swedish female reporter noted that the head of the Lutheran Church who welcomed him in Sweden was a woman, and then asked if he thought the Catholic Church could allow women to be ordained as ministers in coming decades.
"St. Pope John Paul II had the last clear word on this and it stands, this stands," Francis said.
Francis was referring to a 1994 document by Pope John Paul that closed the door on a female priesthood. The Vatican says this teaching is an infallible part of Catholic tradition.
Pope
Trainees Face Tiny Enemy
Naval Special Warfare
Despite being young and healthy, several U.S. military trainees have developed a rare bacterial infection that usually does not affect healthy people, a new study shows.
The cases highlight the unique stresses this group of trainees, called Naval Special Warfare trainees, face that may put them at risk for infection with this bacterium, called Shewanella algae.
Naval Special Warfare trainees include Navy SEALS, Navy divers and other specialists. The bacterium is common in seawater, but most healthy people don't get sick from it even if they come into contact with the microbe. Rather, people with compromised immune systems are more likely to get sick from this bacterium. [7 Devastating Infectious Diseases
But during training, these trainees are placed in an uncommon situation, particularly during the five-day stretch called "Hell Week," and this increases their vulnerability to infection, said Dr. Kristi Stone-Garza, a staff physician at the Naval Medical Center San Diego and the lead author of the study.
When a person is in an extremely stressful situation like that, it's possible to induce an "immunocompromised state" in an otherwise healthy person, Stone-Garza told Live Science.
Naval Special Warfare
Deforestation For Avocados
Mexico
Deforestation caused by the expansion of Mexican avocado orchards is much higher than previously thought, authorities said Monday.
Talia Coria, an official in the attorney general's office for environmental protection, said almost 50,000 acres (20,000 hectares) of forest land are converted to agricultural uses each year in the western state of Michoacan, the world's top producer of avocados.
Experts say a mature avocado orchard uses almost twice as much water as fairly dense forest, meaning less water reaches Michoacan's legendary crystalline mountain streams on which trees and animals in the forests depend. Species like the monarch butterfly also rely on Michoacan forest as habitat, though Coria said there does not appear to have been damage to the monarch wintering grounds from avocado expansion yet.
Guillermo Haro, the attorney general for environmental protection, said Michoacan grows about eight out of 10 avocados exported worldwide, but added that the state's forests "are a wealth greater than any export of avocados."
Mexico's National Institute for Forestry, Farming and Fisheries Research had previously estimated the loss of forest land to avocado planting at about 1,700 acres (690 hectares) a year from 2000 through 2010. However, the rising popularity of the fruit and higher prices have apparently lured growers to expand orchards faster in recent years.
Mexico
Rare Meadow Jumping Mouse Populations Discovered
New Mexico
Biologists who spent weeks in three New Mexico national forests searching for signs of an elusive, endangered mouse that looks somewhat like a tiny kangaroo have found what they call irrefutable evidence that it still lives in the state for which it is named.
The biologists trapped New Mexico meadow jumping mice and collected fur and fecal samples during summertime surveys in the southern Lincoln National Forest, the northern Santa Fe National Forest and Apache-Sitgreaves National Forests along the New Mexico-Arizona border, Beth Humphrey, a district ranger with the U.S. Forest Service, said Tuesday. They had not been seen for years in those places.
With a tail that makes up for most of its length, the rodent is called a jumping mouse because it can leap more than 2 feet into the air when frightened. Super-long tails help the mice keep their balance, especially when they scale plant stems to reach ripening seeds, one their main food sources.
The New Mexico meadow jumping mouse was listed as an endangered species in 2014, prompting the U.S. Forest Service to fence off streams and watering holes in the Lincoln and Santa Fe forests to protect habitat thought to be ideal. That spurred criticism from ranchers and others that the federal government was trampling private access to public lands in New Mexico.
The mice live near streams and depend on tall grass to hide from predators. They hibernate for about nine months, emerging in the late spring to gorge themselves before mating, giving birth and going back into hibernation. They normally live three years.
New Mexico
In Memory
Don Marshall
Don Marshall, who appeared on TV shows including "Star Trek," "Land of the Giants" and "Julia," died Sunday in Los Angeles. He was 80.
Fellow "Star Trek" cast member BarBara Luna reported his death on Facebook and said that he died peacefully with his daughter, son and twin brother Doug Marshall at his side.
On "Star Trek," he played Lt. Boma in "The Galileo Seven" episode in 1967. On the late 1960s sci-fi drama "Land of the Giants," he had a recurring role as Dan Erickson.
Among his other TV guest roles were as one of Diahann Carroll's boyfriends on groundbreaking series "Julia" and on series including "Bewitched," "The Bionic Woman," "The Incredible Hulk" and "Little House on the Prairie."
Marshall said he was grateful to get the role at a time when there were so few opportunities for African-American actors. "There weren't that many jobs, guest starring jobs, for African-Americans or any minorities, really. I was very grateful to get the opportunities I got, and it made me work very hard on each part, to make sure that whatever I was doing was right and that the characters I played were very strong people. I tried to bring out the best in the person I played," he told StarTrek.com.
Born in San Diego, he started out as an engineering student. Marshall also appeared in films including "The Thing With Two Heads" and "Uptown Saturday Night." He often mentioned in interviews that he was working on a remake of "Land of the Giants."
Don Marshall
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