What they are saying

The inbox has been overflowing recently so I took the time to sift through the sea of missives (something I rarely do as many readers already know). Below are a few of the comments dating back several weeks:

Best thing I've read all day. - Bill in Washington, DC
I am glad someone says it like it is. - Richard in Asheville
Way cool blog - Tommy in Miami
What it is, is fantastic! - Jean in Paris
You're a genius - Ted in Davidson
Carolina Naturally and coffee gets my day off right - Mary in Tulsa
Best thing I've found on the net in a long time. - Kenneth in Dallas

Editor's Note: Not too sure about the 'genius' thing there Ted. I'll just have to take your word for it ... the Mrs., is withholding judgment for the moment.

Our Readers

Today readers in

Canada, France, Brazil, Germany, Spain, Switzerland, Russia, Greece, Italy, India, Pakistan, Vietnam, Scotland, England, Argentina, Finland and the United States

have enjoyed Carolina Naturally today.

The History of Service Monkeys

The first service monkey, Jack the Signalman

Click on the picture for the full story.

Blackwater say they're guilty

Five former Blackwater mercenaries pled not guilty to manslaughter charges on Tuesday, for a massacre that occurred in Baghdad in September 2007.
The trial is taking place in Washington DC, not in Iraq, which begs the question ... is justice being served or sidestepped.

Read the rest here.

Coal Ash not regulated

The giant swamp of coal ash that's turned several hundred acres of Tennessee into a toxic wasteland was not subject to federal regulation.
Before it spilled out of its boundaries that is.
But the EPA has been studying the question of whether coal ash waste should be regulated since then ... or at least they say they have.

Read more in the New York Times.

The shrub's flubs

"Our enemies are innovative and resourceful, and so are we. They never stop thinking about new ways to harm our country and our people, and neither do we."

Check this out form the BBC:
The 'misunderestimated' president?

Also this from the Guardian:
George Bush's Gaffs.

Lawdy Miss Clawdy

Elvis in '68

Today is Elvis' birthday for all you out there that weren't aware of it ... all two of us!

Death Knell ForThrift Stores

Just when working families are beginning to rely on thrift stores the most ...

Thrift stores may be forced to throw away truckloads of children's toys and clothing. a new law, set to take effect next month, aims to keep lead-contaminated merchandise from kids. it requires all products for children age 12 and younger to be checked.
- from msnbc

...from the Salvation Army to Goodwill, a new law that goes into effect on February 10, 2009 is causing waves of panic among thrift store operators, children’s clothing merchants and shoppers who worry that their options for affordable kids wear my shrivel.

The law, under the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act, was quietly approved by congress last year, and calls for all merchandise, including clothing and toys, intended for children under 12 be tested for lead and other potentially dangerous chemicals used in plastic products.
- from the Santa barbara Daily Sound

Bad economy means house prices plummet

From the "Every cloud has a silver lining" Department:

One good thing about,a gloomy economy -- more people can afford to buy a house.
For example, for $500 you can buy this three bedroom bungalow (pictured) in Detroit.

From Les Christie's story in CNN:

The real estate market is so awful that buyers are now scooping up homes for as little as $1,000. There are 18 listings in Flint, Mich., for under $3,000, according to Realtor.com. There are 22 in Indianapolis, 46 in Cleveland and a whopping 709 in Detroit. All of these communities have been hit hard by foreclosures, and most of these homes are being sold by the lenders that repossessed them ... In Detroit for instance, Century 21 Villa owner Randy Eissa has a three-bedroom, one-bath bungalow of about 1,000 square feet listed at just $500.

Radical cheap: $1,000 homes

Hoarder dies in garbage labyrinth

Gordon Stewart, 74, was found dead in his Buckinghamshire, England home inside a maze of tunnels he had burrowed through the garbage that packed his property. He apparently died of dehydration.

From The Telegraph:

The Thames Valley Police Specialist Search and Recovery team, who usually deals with underwater rescues or explorations of contaminated sites, used their cutting-edge equipment to navigate their way through the rubbish, locating his body in one the tunnels. The highly-trained team carry breathing apparatus, gas detectors, analyzers and remote cameras, and wear protective clothing....

One neighbor, who asked not to be named, said: "He was slightly eccentric, but very clever. He was just a collector. He came home with a load of cardboard boxes and lived in his own world."

Pensioner 'entomed in labyrinth of tunnels carved into rubbish'

Science News

Alan Kogut of NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center says he and his colleagues have discovered a mysterious "booming noise" coming from space that's six times more powerful than all other space radio sources combined.

For now, the origin of the signal remains a mystery.

"We really don't know what it is,"said team member Michael Seiffert of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif.

And not only has it presented astronomers with a new puzzle, it is obscuring the sought-for signal from the earliest stars.

Mystery Roar from Faraway Space Detected

Merle Haggard sues environmental group

Country star Merle Haggard has sued an environmental awareness group, claiming it illegally used his name and likeness to raise money.
The lawsuit was filed Thursday in Chancery Court against the Green Train, a Nashville-based organization, and its founder, Robert K. Wolf.
It seeks unspecified compensatory damages.

Haggard claims in the lawsuit that the group forged his signature and exaggerated his involvement with the organization to solicit money.
He says his reputation could be irreparably harmed by continued association with the group.

The Green Train bills itself as a nonprofit that educates the public about environmental issues. Its concert-and-train tour scheduled to depart Portland, Ore., in April and travel through 28 states on a six-week whistle-stop tour with several concerts along the way before ending in Washington D.C.

According to the lawsuit, Haggard donated $20,000 to the Green Train and agreed to ride the train as support and entertainment.
He also attended a fundraising lunch and said he would ask a few of his fellow artists if they would agree to ride the train.
But the lawsuit said the group "greatly exaggerated" Haggard's support and misstated that he has personal involvement in the project's operations.

Haggard, who has had 38 No. 1 hits stretching back to 1966 including "Okie From Muskogee," said that without his consent, permission or knowledge, the group used his name and image on all materials for the Green Train and forged his signature on "personal letters" and other solicitation materials and on merchandise sold on e-Bay and in nightclubs.

The forged letters went to some of Haggard's friends in the entertainment industry, including Dolly Parton, Jewel, Vince Gill and Amy Grant, the lawsuit states.
Haggard also contends that the group did not have a state permit to raise contributions and did not report the contributions, and that "substantial amounts" of the tens of thousands of dollars it raised went to Wolf's personal use.

"By using Mr. Haggard's name and other aspects of Mr. Haggard's identity to promote the Green Train project under these circumstances, defendants create the false impression that the project has been operated in a credible, ethical and legal fashion, when in fact that is not the case," the lawsuit alleges.

Besides compensatory damages and attorney's fees, he asks that his name be removed from the Green Train.
He also asks the court to bar the group from keeping contributions illegally raised in his name without making "full and complete disclosure of all relevant facts to the donors."

*****

Never been a Haggard fan myself - but if his allegations are true, then you go Merle! Green Train sounds like a great thing on the surface ... the idea behind it is a good one. The machinations of the workings under the surface seem to be less than above board in this case, though.

Fatal police shooting ignites violent protests

In grainy cell-phone videos played over and over on the Internet (including here - see link below), police officers force an unarmed black man to the ground and hold him face-down on a crowded train platform.
Suddenly one of the officers draws his gun and fatally shoots the man in the back - then looks up.

The New Year's Day death of 22-year-old Oscar Grant has led to violent street protests amid allegations from the family's attorney that some of the officers used racial slurs.

The officer remains free and has not been charged with any wrongdoing.
And some experts have questioned whether he fired his gun deliberately or mistakenly believed he was using his stun gun instead.

At a rally Wednesday attended by hundreds of people, Shawanda Thomas held a fluorescent yellow sign that read: "Oscar Grant: Murdered! The Whole Damn System is Guilty."

Extra police were posted Thursday at Bay Area Rapid Transit stations after a group of angry demonstrators smashed storefronts late Wednesday, set fire to cars and clashed with officers equipped with riot gear and tear gas in downtown Oakland.
More than 100 people were arrested and about 300 businesses were damaged.

Oakland Mayor Ron Dellums called for calm. "Even with our anger and our pain, let's still address each other with a degree of civility and calmness and not make this tragedy an excuse to engage in violence," he said.
"I don't want anybody hurt. I don't want anybody killed."

At the mayor's request, the Oakland Police Department launched an investigation into the shooting Thursday. Alameda County District Attorney Tom Orloff, whose office also is investigating, said he probably would decide within two weeks whether to file charges.

Transit police officer Johannes Mehserle was initially placed on paid leave.
He resigned from the BART police force Wednesday, but officials say he has refused to speak with the transit agency's investigators.
He has not spoken publicly about the incident.
Mehserle's attorney, Christopher Miller, declined to comment on the investigations.

Grant's family has filed a $25 million wrongful-death claim against BART, the San Francisco Bay Area's commuter rail system, and relatives want Mehserle to be criminally charged.
"They want justice, but they don't want any more violence," said John Burris, an attorney for Grant's family.
"That officer hasn't been prosecuted ... That's why people don't have confidence in the system right now."

*****

Violence is not the answer and those condoning, encouraging, perpetrating and/or any other way continuing said violence needs to be prosecuted as does the former (as he has resigned), BART police officer.

Earlier on Carolina Naturally: Video shows BART Cop killing unarmed man.

Catholic paper that used Allah can print

Malaysia will lift a ban on the Malay edition of a Catholic newspaper if it agrees to stop using the word "Allah," an official said Thursday, but the editor of the paper rejected the precondition.

The Home Ministry ordered the Herald newspaper last week to stop printing its Malay edition for violating a 2007 ban on the use of the word "Allah," except to refer to the Muslim God.

The newspaper had been using "Allah" as a translation for God, regardless of denomination, as is typical in Malay.

The dispute has become a touchstone for recent religious tensions in Malaysia, which is predominantly Muslim but prides itself on its ethnic harmony.

The government agreed Thursday to lift the ban.
"If they stop printing the word 'Allah,' they can publish anytime," Che Din Yusoh, a senior official with the ministry's publications control unit said.

The Herald's English, Mandarin and Tamil editions - read mostly by the ethnic Chinese and Indian minorities - were not affected by the ban.

Malay is the language of the majority Malay Muslims as well as indigenous Christian tribes in the eastern states of Sabah and Sarawak.

The Herald has challenged the "Allah" ban in court, saying the translation has been used for centuries in Malay and that the Arabic word is a common reference to God that predates Islam.

It says the ban is unconstitutional and threatens the religious freedom of minorities.

The government, meanwhile, says the use of the word by non-Muslims could confuse Muslims.

The court has not yet issued a ruling.

*****

OK, now who would be confused, again?

Australia to allow anti-whaling ship to dock

The Australian government said today that radical conservationists who have been pursuing Japanese whalers in Antarctic waters can refuel their ship in Australia, despite Japan's objections that they are tantamount to terrorists.

Acting Prime Minister Julia Gillard told reporters in Melbourne that there was no reason to ban the Sea Shepherd group's anti-whaling ship, the Steve Irwin, from docking in Hobart, Tasmania, when it arrives next week.

Japan had said Tuesday it planned to ask Australia to bar the ship from its ports.

"We have not received an impending vessel request from the Steve Irwin," said Gillard, who is filling in for vacationing Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
"Should such a request be received, then the Steve Irwin will be permitted to dock at an Australian port."

The Steve Irwin is named after the late Australian conservationist and TV personality.

Listen up You Lunatic! Your Job Was to Prevent 9/11!

More truth about the Wing-Nut Lies

Why Regulations Matter

repugicans take note - this is why regulations matter:

Gary Leong knew things weren’t right during a recent tour of a Chinese plant when he witnessed workers manufacturing glucosamine sulfate to relieve joint discomfort in the morning and fertilizer to help plants grow in the afternoon - using the same equipment.

“Cross-contamination issues are huge,” says the head of scientific and technical affairs at Jamieson laboratories, Canada’s largest manufacturer of natural health products.

Charged with guaranteeing the purity and safety of the company’s vitamins, but also facing competitors that offer them at a lower price thanks to cheaper raw materials, Leong brought Jamieson auditors to China to see if sourcing directly from China was a viable option.

...after observing the operations at the glucosamine sulfate/fertilizer factory, the Jamieson executive visited an ascorbic acid plant, one of four in China responsible for 90 per cent of the world’s supply of vitamin C found in processed foods and natural-health products.

“They had a purified water system that they claimed they were using to manufacture their ascorbic acid with. Well, the night I was going through the plant, that purified water system was turned off and they were still operating,” says Leong.

“Basically, they’re letting economic choices rather than quality or integrity factors determine when they use it. And that’s a minor indication, but it’s indicative of the whole problem over there.”

Read the rest in the Edmonton Journal

America after the shrub: By the numbers

Salon.com has got a very good, heavily linked and referenced roundup of the damage done to the US economy and body politic during the shrub's and the cabal's junta:

How much poorer are we going to get before we start getting richer again? Here are some (scary, morbid, gruesome) clues.

Expected shortfall of gross domestic product below normal growth path in 2009: $900 billion

Decline in the Dow Jones Industrial Average from its decade high to its value at the close of business, Jan. 7, 2009: 5,394.83, or 38.1 percent

Number of manufacturing jobs lost since 2000: 3.78 million

Increase in number of unemployed workers from 2001 to 2008: 4 million, a jump of 2.7 percent in the unemployment rate

Real median household income according to the 2000 census, adjusted for inflation: $51,804

Real median household income as of August 2007: $50,233

Of course, the government didn't sit idly by while our financial future was disappearing down the drain. Instead, the feds have pumped in hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars, hoping to juice lending and public spending.

Cost of finance industry bailout: $350 billion, with another $350 pending congressional approval

Cost of auto industry bailout: $17.4 billion, so far

And even though there's widespread agreement among economists that the government needs to be spending a large sum of money on an economic stimulus package, it still won't look pretty on the public balance sheet.

National debt: $10.6 trillion

Amount of that debt owned by China: At least $800 billion

W. and the damage done

Facts versus the Lie

The lie of "liberal, out-of-touch Hollywood"

Screenwriter/show-runner John Rogers has had it with the wing-nut myth that Hollywood keeps making anti-war movies that flop, proving how out of touch the Liberal Elite are with the will of the masses.
He has written a wonderful debunking of this notion, looking at every war-related film in 2007/2008 and calculating how profitable they were.

Conclusion: Hollywood makes a modest number of films with anti-war messages, and most of them make a decent amount of money.
Then he goes on to offer an inside account of the process by which potentially risky "message" films get made by big, bottom-line oriented studios.

The whole thing was prompted by a comment by John "Dirty Harry" Nolte, whose site offers this epithet to describe himself: "[a] right-wing, Tim Robbins-loathing blogger."

Nolte posted, "Between narratives and documentaries I’ve counted 16 anti-Iraq war films over the last two years. All have flopped, miserably. More are on the way."

As Rogers shows, this is just not true, as a purely factual matter.

From Rogers' piece: Big Hollywood and Why I Admire David Zucker

1.) Body of Lies (2.714 theaters) -- Actually the point of the column in question. Definitely War on Terror oriented. And as noted in the column cited, not profitable at only $39 million against a production budget of $70 million -- oh I'm sorry, what? We're using worldwide box office? Okay, not my idea, but okay. In that case, Body of Lies made $108 million against $70 million production, plainly in the black, even before after-market sales. That's right, the movie they use as an example of a flop on Day One of their shiny new website actually made money according to their own standards. Way to bring the rain, boys. In profit.

Read the rest of the piece here

Daily Horoscope

Today's horoscope says:

Work quickly and intelligently.
Slow and easy does it.

OK, folks, now which is it?!