CAROLINA NATURALLY: May 24, 2010

Monday, May 24, 2010

The Daily Drift

The Daily Drift

Today's horoscope says:
Get a fresh start today!
You can leave the small stuff for later -- for now, try to focus on getting your plans off the ground and getting to know the people who share your goals and might help you later on down the road.
Go for broad strokes and general outlines.
Write down all the fine details that you need to take care of later, and then your conscience should be clear.

Some of our readers today have been in:

Melbourne, Victoria, Australia

Kuching, Sarawak, Malaysia

Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia

Paris, Ile-De-France, France

Petach Tikva, Hamerkaz, Israel

Cairo, Al Qahirah, Egypt

Sao Paulo, Sao Paulo, Brazil

Berlin, Berlin, Germany

Quebec, Quebec, Canada

Bremen, Bremen, Germany

Auckland, Auckland, New Zealand

New Delhi, Delhi, India

Kuala Lumpur, Wilayah Persekutuan, Malaysia

Coffs Harbor, New South Wales, Australia

Brisbane, Queensland, Australia

Saint Mande, Ile-De-France, France

as well as Scotland, Bulgaria, Wales, and the United States in such cities as Westmont, Kingsland, Kingsport, Inez and more

Today is Monday, May 24, the 144th day of 2010.

There are 221 days left in the year.

Today In History May 24

Today's unusual holidays or celebrations are:

Morse Code Day

and

Brother's Day

Mark Twain's autobiography to be published

This should be a lot of fun. Not to mention teach us a few things we've forgotten

The Independent:

The creator of Tom Sawyer, Huckleberry Finn and some of the most frequently misquoted catchphrases in the English language left behind 5,000 unedited pages of memoirs when he died in 1910, together with handwritten notes saying that he did not want them to hit bookshops for at least a century.

That milestone has now been reached, and in November the University of California, Berkeley, where the manuscript is in a vault, will release the first volume of Mark Twain's autobiography. The eventual trilogy will run to half a million words, and shed new light on the quintessentially American novelist.

And I Quote

The brain is a wonderful organ; it starts working the moment you get up in the morning and does not stop until you get into the office.

~ Robert Frost

Which side of history do you want to be on?

Times Union:

Government is not a four-letter word. Yet, at every turn, we hear a knee-jerk negativism, a shotgun rage charging that the country is going to the dogs.

Yet, if every forward-looking measure, like assuring people of health care, is branded a socialist or, worse, a communist plot, we are simply substituting slogans for thinking.

Just ask any of those people over 65 who are fuming over socialized medicine if they are ready to give up Medicare -- which is wholly run by the government. Ask them if they are ready to end Social Security -- which is wholly run by the government. Ask any politician if he or she proposes to abolish these government-run programs. That would be political suicide.

And ask people who are complaining about government spending intended to stimulate a depressed economy, would they prefer the approach of a Herbert Hoover, who stood by as the country slipped into its worst depression in history?

War Is Making You Poor Act

Today, Rep. Alan Grayson (D-Florida) introduced legislation called the “War Is Making You Poor Act,” which aims to call attention to a) how much money is being spent to fight the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and b) how budget gimmicks are used to pay for them. Grayson’s legislation would slash the $159 billion request for supplemental war funding and use that money to deliver a tax break for all Americans.

A brilliant idea, that is going to be drowned out by the howls of stupidity and rank corruption that is Washington DC. What Grayson is proposing is a common sense solution — let people see the stupidity of what's going on, and the people won't stand for it. But just as seriously, that's why Grayson's proposal has less of a chance than a fart in a windstorm of staying together — the powers that run the government and the media are all about making sure people never see the stupidity of what's going on.

Full Story

Oh, and where are the teabaggers screaming for this - an end of a big government boondoggle and making the super-rich even richer ... oh, yeah, that's right, they're too busy calling the president a nigger ... my bad sorry, had a lapse and for moment thought teabaggers had brains.

Black box recovered from India crash site

Investigators find the black box in the wreckage of the Air India plane crash that killed 158.

Hoping for clues

Also:

Ziggy

http://imgsrv.gocomics.com/dim/?fh=cf16a69552fc5994da58551b0fb00e63

On The Job

On The Job

How companies spy on employees

By one estimate, some 40 percent of companies hire someone to read and review email.

IM conversations too

Also:

It's The Economy Stupid

Eight fake bargains to steer clear of

Some so-called deals will cost you a bundle in the long run if you're not careful.

Money wasters to avoid

Also:

Wall Street continues to thumb nose at Obama and American voters

It's good to be king.

J.P. Morgan Chase awarded its chairman and chief executive, Jamie Dimon, $91,000 in personal travel on the company jet in 2009, up from about $54,000 the previous year. His total perks increased 19 percent, to $266,000. Dimon, along with Goldman Sachs chief executive Lloyd Blankfein and McLean-based Capital One chief executive Richard Fairbank, also received sharply higher perks related to personal and home security.

"Marie Antoinette could fit into this crowd without missing a beat," said Nell Minow, co-founder of the Corporate Library, which found in recent studies of several thousand U.S. companies that more chief executives received club memberships than a year earlier, and companies paid more to cover executives' personal use of corporate planes. "Many people would think the solution would be not to be so provocative of unrest and unhappiness, but no, they're saying, 'Go ahead and do that, just build bigger walls around your house.' "

A review of the 29 largest publicly traded financial companies that received federal aid found that nearly one in three increased fringe benefits for their chief executives. Those raises contrast with the belt-tightening that many Americans have experienced during the recession.

Oil company given cleanup ultimatum

Frustrated by the lack of progress in the gulf, the U.S. government may push BP out.

'Deadline after deadline' missed

Also:

Lunatic Fringe

This summary is not available. Please click here to view the post.

VA and Healthcare ... yeah, right

So where exactly are the teabaggers and the repugicans when our vets are suffering from an overbloated government health care system?

Silence.

Improvised bombs rattled former Army Spc. Adam Pittman a dozen times in his three tours in Iraq, most severely when his Bradley fighting vehicle ran over one hidden in the dirt in 2005.

Now, part of Pittman's brain has gone dormant, and on most days he can't think straight.

He leaves the room and forgets what he was searching for. He gets migraines so piercing that his right eye sometimes curls away from his left. Anger comes easily, inspiring rages that sometimes have his wife terrified for herself and their 3-year-old daughter.

Although Pittman, who lives in Lillington, N.C., left the military in July 2008 complaining of headaches and memory loss, it took nearly a year for him to get a brain scan and another five months to start getting temporary disability benefits.

Vitamin D

Vitamin D: Why You Are Probably NOT Getting Enough and How That Makes You Sick

First female priest ordained in Italy

Don't hold your breath that we will see more of this elsewhere, though. Maria Vittoria Longhitano belongs to a small church that separated from the Roman Catholic church a few hundred years ago.

BBC:

Mrs Longhitano, who will now be known as Mother Longhitano, said she hoped to break down what she described as prejudice in the Roman Catholic church.

"We are talking about an extremely hierarchical system; a male caste with a strong instinct of self-preservation," she said.

"And this is why there is this general attitude against ordaining women in the Church."

The Roman Catholic Church says it obeys the directives of Jesus Christ, whose 12 Apostles were all men.