If you’re in need of a windmill or two to tilt at, here’s one that should fit most any passion. Save Our Spoons from Rebekah. She’s certain that spoonless foods like go-gert, cereal bars and soup in a sip cup are a plot. Spoons, of course, were the only utensil used by peasants. To have a knife or, gasp, a fork, you had to be rich.
On this date in 1863 President Abraham Lincoln rose to speak a minimalist 272 words before a gathering of some 15,000 Americans on a rise overlooking the Gettysburg, Pennsylvania battlefield. Lincoln’s speech lasted less than two minutes and the President was finished before many realized he had spoken
Four score and seven years ago our fathers brought forth on this continent, a new nation, conceived in Liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.
Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting place for those who here gave their lives that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this.
But, in a larger sense, we can not dedicate — we can not consecrate — we can not hallow — this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it, far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced.
It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us — that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they gave the last full measure of devotion — that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain — that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom — and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.
No mention of North or South. No mention of slavery. Just 272 words that speak to what is at our core. That which is most precious to us, and, we hope, the rest of humanity.
My Soundtrack: Lemons From Lemonade by The Celebrity Pilots on WOXY.
If I’d gotten less than 8 out of 8 I would have had to turn in my math teaching certificate. The problems are actually pretty easy if you do simple puzzles on a regular basis. The balance question was the toughest. It took me about a minute to sketch it out. How well did you do?
My Soundtrack: Quiet As A Mouse by Margo & The Nuclear So and So’s on WOXY.
Special prosecutor Patrick Fitzgerald said in court filings that the ongoing CIA leak investigation will involve proceedings before a new grand jury, a possible sign he could seek new charges in the case.
In filings obtained by Reuters on Friday, Fitzgerald said the investigation is continuing and that the investigation will involve proceedings before a different grand jury than the grand jury which returned the indictment against Vice President Dick Cheney’s chief of staff, Lewis Scooter Libby.
Fitzgerald did not elaborate in the document.
Ho, ho, ho. Do you suppose there is a Santa Claus?
My Soundtrack: The Farmer’s Hotel by Silver Jews on WOXY.
Thus spoke warhawk U.S. Rep. John Murtha (D-Pa.) yesterday. Our troops have become the primary target of the insurgency. said Murtah. We have become a catalyst for violence… It’s time to bring them home. President George Bush compared Murtha, a decorated Marine veteran of both the Korean and Vietnam wars, to lefty Michael Moore.
Murtha’s replied: I like guys who got five deferments and [have] never been there and send people to war, and then don’t like to hear suggestions about what needs to be done.
Yeah. Me too.
My Soundtrack: Me And Mia by Ted Leo/Pharmacists on WOXY.
A couple of generations ago there was something called Burma Shave signs. These roadside advertisements gave travelers a chance to smile as they drove to their destination. Google’s logos are like that for Internet surfers in search of that specific piece of information. You can find seven years worth of holiday designs on Google.
I’m a fair rough carpenter. I grew up watching my grandfather and father build things from wood although neither made a living in that way. The smell of sawdust is comforting. The perfection of a well-driven nail is a bit of magic. Every day I marvel that I built the floor-to-ceiling book case that covers the wall behind me.
…The only good carpenter
is the one who knows that he’s not good.
He’s afraid that he’ll ruin the whole house,
and he works slowly…
From Putting In A Window by John Brantingham.
Life is like that, isn’t it?
My Soundtrack: The Quick Fire by The Six Parts Seven on WOXY.
Chris Miller is having a conversation at Unquiet Desperation that has spilled over into Brewed Fresh Daily. You can read the particulars of the discussion there, but what I want to address is Chris’ question concerning sources and trustworthiness. As I was pondering his question, this email hit my inbox:
Epa Proposes Chemical And Pesticide Testing
On Orphans & Mentally Handicapped Children
Public comments are now being accepted by the EPA on its newly proposed federal regulation regarding the testing of chemicals and pesticides on human subjects. The newly propoed rule allows for government and industry scientists to treat children as human guinea pigs in chemical experiments in the following situations:
–Children who “cannot be reasonably consulted,” such as those that are mentally handicapped or orphaned newborns may be tested on. With permission from the institution or guardian in charge of the individual, the child may be exposed to chemicals for the sake of research.
–Parental consent forms are not necessary for testing on children who have been neglected or abused.
–Chemical studies on any children outside of the U.S. are acceptable.
The email links to this piece on the webpage of the Organic Consumers Association, which tells the reader:
Public comments are now being accepted by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) on its newly proposed federal regulation regarding the testing of chemicals and pesticides on human subjects. On August 2, 2005, Congress had mandated the EPA create a rule that permanently bans chemical testing on pregnant women and children.
But the EPA’s newly proposed rule, misleadingly titled “Protections for Subjects in Human Research,” puts industry profits ahead of children’s welfare. The rule allows for government and industry scientists to treat children as human guinea pigs in chemical experiments in the following situations:
1. Children who “cannot be reasonably consulted,” such as those that are mentally handicapped or orphaned newborns may be tested on. With permission from the institution or guardian in charge of the individual, the child may be exposed to chemicals for the sake of research.
2. Parental consent forms are not necessary for testing on children who have been neglected or abused.
3. Chemical studies on any children outside of the U.S. are acceptable.
All sounds pretty horrible doesn’t it. If true it would be positively Mengeleian. Fortunately, it’s not true.
Here’s the link to the document.
And I’ve abstracted the relevant passages from the rather long document.
The first piece to read is this:
Sec. 26.420 Prohibition of research involving intentional dosing of children.
Notwithstanding any other provision of this part, under no circumstances shall EPA or a person when covered by Sec. 26.101(j) conduct or support research involving intentional dosing of any child.
Sec. 26.421 Prohibition of EPA reliance on research involving intentional dosing of children.
In its regulatory decision-making under the Federal Insecticide, Fungicide, and Rodenticide Act (7 U.S.C. 136 et seq.) or section 408 of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (21 U.S.C. 346a), EPA shall not rely on any research involving intentional dosing of any child, except when such research is deemed scientifically sound and crucial to the protection of public health, under the procedure defined in Sec. 26.603.
It’s clear that the proposed rules prohibit the intentional dosing of children. Period. So what does that mean? The way I read it, it means that research can be carried out on children who have been unintentionally dosed.
For instance. If you live in a neighborhood where lawn care companies regularly spray, then children in that neighborhood may be solicited for study.
I’ll leave the rest for your own conclusions, but here’s my problem. I don’t like pesticides and herbicides. I think they have caused more problems than they have solved. I would be happier if we kept pesticides and herbicides as far away as possible from children.
Having said that, organizations that scream wolf when they clearly are either not in total control of the facts or outright lying to achieve an associated agenda, damage the good works being done by people in this area.
It reminds me of how President George Bush led us to war under false pretenses. (And spare me the Talking Points, those dogs won’t hunt.) Now, faced with what may in fact be very credible intelligence concerning the presence of nuclear weapons in Iran, we, and the world community, have to ask: are you telling the truth this time?
What’s up with the Pee Dee’s fascination with god on Mondays? Has someone declared page one, above the fold sacred space? Or is it that no one is working on the Sunday writing real news so the paper just keeps a stash of Softball-worthy stories on tap? Softball wants to know when the pink and fuzzy mascot spread is going to run.
My Soundtrack: Made Up Happiness by The Phoebus Mass on WOXY.
I’m shameless about eavesdropping which made me love this blog. The premise is simple: New Yorkers over hear conversations, type them up and send them to Overheard In New York which posts them. Knowing New Yorkers, I’m betting that people read for two reasons: to laugh at lame people, and to see if they’re conversation got posted.
A few gems:
It’s An Epidemic of Carries Bradshaw
Chick #1: Excuse me, ma’am, but would you mind moving your bag so that my son and I could sit next to each other?
Chick #2: Honestly? I just don’t feel like going through the motions right now.
–6 train, overheard by: Anne O.
That Requires Testimony, Old School
Girl: I don’t know if he’s straight or gay, I can’t tell.
Guy: You know that saying “innocent until proven guilty”? Well, everyone at Pratt is gay until proven straight.
–Hoyt-Schermerhorn station, overheard by: Peter F.
Stopping Anti-Semitism Should Be the Cheap One
Hobo: Anyone got a dollar, anyone got a dollar? Anyone got a dollar, anyone got a dollar?
Lady: Here, take $5. Now get off the train. You givin’ us black people a bad name.
–D train
My Soundtrack: Find What You Get by Gang Bang on WOXY.
My dad and I rescued coffee-cans full of tadpoles and put a bunch of them in an aquarium. It was fascinating watching them transform into bullfrogs that I then set free in the pond. When we lived in town I used to rush out after rainstorms so that I could build cinder dams in the gutter in front of our house. Kids need water to play in. Is it a back-to-the-womb thing? Who knows?
Some other fortunate kids have Sandy over at the M.A.W.B squad as a mother. She has posted a series of photos of her own rescue of turtle eggs layed by a momma turtle from her pond. It might have been interesting to have found a safe way to mark the turtles so that the family could see if any of them show up next year to lay their own eggs.
My Soundtrack: We Built Another World by Wolf Parade on WOXY.
I’ll be blogging live this evening from the Cleveland premier of Wal Mart: The High Cost Of Low Price. I’ve got a front-row seat, power and wifi so I’m a happy blogger.
The showing I’m blogging is at the Workman’s Circle on Green Road in South Euclid between Cedar and Mayfield.
My headcount is fifty-three people have come to see the movie.
Our own Jaclyn, of the newly redesigned Let The Lady Speak, is introducing the movie.
H&H Hardware in Middlefield, Ohio, the controversial Ace Hardware closing opens the movie.
The China connection is made early in the movie.
Greenwald also goes out of his way to make the point that the people he is profiling are Reagan Republicans and life-long conservatives.
Ah, the little lie that Wal Mart told about H&H Hardware comes out. When the owner of H&H Hardware was shopping a business plan to prepare to compete with Wal Mart, he discovered that his building had depreciated, not appreciated, in the 10 years since it was built.
The appraiser told him that the depreciation was due to the Wal Mart being under construction. This is the part that Wal Mart doesn”t tell when it tried to poke holes in the movie two weeks ago.
One person being interviewed compares Wal Mart to a neutron bomb for the way it leaves downtown areas vacant and abandoned.
Jaclyn, sitting to my right, finds the sound levels in the movie distracting. The music is too loud in relation to the dialog. For whatever reasons, the production qualities of the movie are not the best.
$1,557,000,000 cost to the taxpayers every year from Wal Mart”s shifting of employee healthcare costs of to state health care systems.
An anonymous note typed on a computer and printed out that read We Need A Union was enough to mandate a phone call to Bentonville by the store manager. That day, the store manager sent an employee to the airport to meet the Wal Mart corporate jet bring in three corporate executives to deal with the union organizing problem.
Forced, unpaid overtime is the norm at Wal Mart. Working off the clock is expected if you don”t want to lose your job. Why isn”t this a national class-action suit? There are 31 suits in the courts across the country. In Texas alone, the movie tell us, Wal Mart cheats employees out of $150 million each year.
$1,008,000,000 in government subsidies to Wal Mart nationally.
Wal Mart moved a store from Cathedral City, California to just across the city line to avoid paying sales tax that was about to become due as part of a subsidy deal.
Herbicides, pesticides and fertilizers stored in Wal Mart parking lots run off into watersheds and contaminate drinking water in the City of Belmont, South Carolina. Visit Catawba Riverkeeper for more on the story.
There is a Walton family bunker that was built after 11 September 2001.
A preacher in the movie says that Wal Mart represents plantation capitalism.
A good movie, even with the production faults. Jaclyn did an excellent job of handling the questions and answers session after the movie and about 2/3 of the audience stuck around to talk to her.
If you couldn’t be at the premeir tonight, there are multiple showings of the movie around Cleveland all week. You can find one close to you on the movie’s website by typing in your Zipcode. I’ll be checking with Jaclyn to make sure I haven’t missed any screenings.
[Update — 1119 — Here’s the latest list of showings in Cleveland.]
My Soundtrack: Don’t Leave Just Now by Wussy on WOXY.
Jill over at Writes Like She Talks throws down the gauntlet this morning about Cyber Journalist’s rebuttal to Top Ten Reasons For Reading A News Site. If you want to see the future of newspapers, consider the town crier. Below is my rebuttal to the rebuttal.
Top 10 Reasons for Reading a Newspaper
1. My newspaper has never crashed, gone down, or flashed animated ads at me. No, but it has dumped thousands and thousands of annoying slick circulars and other advertisement in your lap and all over the floor.
2. Anywhere I travel, my newspaper goes with me. I don’t need a laptop or a wireless connection or a PDA. True, but when your done reading the news on your laptop or PDA, you don’t have to search for a trash can to toss the news away.
3. I can read my newspaper while standing, while eating, while riding a bus, but not while driving my car, which is just as well since I should be paying attention to the road. Yes, but you can’t listen to your newspaper while you’re jogging or in the shower or driving.
4. If I read a story I like, I can tear it out and save it, and not have to pay to read it 30 days later. Ah, but if you read a story you like and save it to your laptop, you don’t add to the clutter on your refrigerator or in your home office.
5. I don’t have to sign in or customize or register or remember passwords to read my newspaper. And I often enjoy articles in my newspaper on topics I wouldn’t normally think I’d be interested in. And if you do it online, you’re not restricted to the editorial decisions of a team of editors concerning what is and isn’t newsworthy.
6. My newspaper has high-resolution pictures and type on large pages that load almost instantly, making it easy to browse and enjoy. That’s right, and if you’re vision impaired, you can actually enlarge the type on your laptop to make it more readable, not to mention have access to video and audio.
7. My newspaper is cheap, disposable and easy to replace. If it’s lost or stolen, it’s no big deal. That only works if you don’t consider the larger costs of a disposable medium that requires the destruction of millions of trees and takes up valuable landfill space.
8. My newspaper is not made of unrecyclable toxic materials. Have you ever taken a look at the toxic content of color ink used in slick advertising?
9. If my newspaper makes a mistake, the correction is posted with an explanation. It’s not sneakily applied to the original story after I’ve read it. But if the editor disagrees with your idea of what is a mistake, you don’t get to post a comment.
10. I can read my newspaper sitting outside on a nice day in the sun, even if a breeze is blowing, because I know how to fold a newspaper. And wireless connections and long battery life allows you to surf the world and read hundreds of newspapers from many sidewalk cafes.
My Soundtrack: Straight Thru You by The Morning After Girls on WOXY.
Molly Danzinger, a nearly graduated student from Case and a psychiatric social worker has started blogging at After Englightenment. My post about Target set her off: oh oh oh, my class is starting so i can’t go into my tirade on how miserable it makes me when my integrity is at odds with my frivolous self-comforts… Please make her welcome.
Jimi Izrael offers up his take on the New Times merger and his days in the bullpen at the Scene as only he can. Jimi’s sojourn there came long after my time with then editor Mark Holan. Cavana Faithwalker suggested a few weeks ago that we take a road trip to Lexington. I think we need to go sooner rather than later.
In an obvious ploy to steal fame and fortune away from J.K. Rowling’s British franchise, the Kansas school board has decided to make it’s educational system Hogwarts-Friendly. From a reader of the James Randi Educational Foundation comes a description of how Kansas schools might look come next fall. Cool.
Reader David F. Mayer has come up with a likely curriculum for a few of our centers of higher learning, particularly in Kansas, if the present trend toward the educational standards expressed above, should continue:
Freshman year — Numerology: Secrets of calculation by cabbalist masters; Alchemy: How to turn lead into gold.
Sophomore year — Demonology: How to tell if you are possessed and what to do about it; Astrology: How to use astral charts to make important decisions.
Junior year — Creationism: How the entire Universe was created in only six days; Spiritualism: Ghosts, spirits, fairies & elves and how to communicate with them.
Senior year — Conjuring: Magic spells and how to cast them; Alternative medicine: How herbs and sea salt can cure all diseases.
Statement by the chairman of the Kansas Board of Education: We are working hard to bring our children back into the 10th century.
Statement by Mark Twain over 100 years ago: God made the idiot for practice. Then he made the school board.
And everyone was wondering where Snape would find a new job.
My Soundtrack: Why Bother At All by Koufax on WOXY.
It is the Veteran, not the preacher, who has given us freedom of religion.
It is the Veteran, not the reporter, who has given us freedom of the press.
It is the Veteran, not the poet, who has given us freedom of speech.
It is the Veteran, not the campus organizer, who has given us freedom to assemble.
It is the Veteran, not the lawyer, who has given us the right to a fair trial.
It is the Veteran, not the politician, who has given us the right to vote.
I write a lot about the Bentonville Behemoth, but it’s not the only bad actor in the retail universe. Other big boxes, like Target, have their problems. One of the important components of these stores is the pharmacy. Target has decided to make it’s pharmacy judgmental towards customers wishing to fill prescriptions.
From the Planned Parenthood Foundation Of America today came this announcement:
Planned Parenthood Federation of America today condemned the Target Corporation for standing by a company policy that allows pharmacists to refuse to fill valid, legal prescriptions for birth control, including emergency contraception. Over a period of 18 months, PPFA has urged Target to implement a policy that respects the rights of its customers by ensuring that Target pharmacies fill prescriptions in-store, without discrimination or delay. Yesterday Target decided it was unwilling to implement a customer-friendly policy.
Do you suppose they ever check to make sure male customers are legally married before they fill their prescription for Viagra?
My Soundtrack: Kirbys House by Razorlight on WOXY.
John Ettorre is offering a free pass to the Wordcrafter’s Literary Festival to his first reader that emails him before 4 p.m. EST today. The week-long conference begins tomorrow at Cleveland State University.
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