NJ's 'tanning mom': Life 'living hell,' I'm moving

 

A New Jersey woman widely known as "the tanning mom" is celebrating a grand jury's refusal to indict her on a charge she unlawfully let her 5-year-old daughter into a tanning booth.

Patricia Krentcil addressed reporters outside her Nutley home Tuesday night by yelling: "cha-ching!" Prosecutors announced earlier in the day she no longer faced a child endangerment charge.

She says her life has been "a living hell" and she plans to move to London for a year to decompress while her husband and kids stay in New Jersey.
Krentcil became a tabloid sensation because of her own deep tan and professed love of tanning. She says "tanning is not a crime" and she'll keep at it.
Asked what she learned from the whole episode, she replied, "People suck."

Dutch Prison Transformed Into Luxury Hotel

It was previously a place from which people desperately wanted to leave. As one of the Netherlands' most feared prisons for almost 150 years, Het Arresthuis in the city of Roermond was not a place you would want to stay. But following its closure and something of a makeover, people are now paying good money to spend a night at the former jail.

The 105 prisoner's quarters have been converted into 40 spacious rooms, including 24 standard rooms, 12 deluxe rooms, and four suites, all of which feature modern furnishings and chic interior design. All of the rooms are equipped with air conditioning, a flat screen TV, free WiFi, and even a personal coffee and tea machine.

Priorities

Pessimism about the future may lead to longer, healthier life

Pessimism about the future may lead to longer, healthier life

Older people who have low expectations for a satisfying future may be more likely to live longer, healthier lives than those who see brighter days ahead, according to new research published by the American Psychological ...

Lack of Sleep Messes With Your Genes

Lack of Sleep Messes With Your Genes

When sleep was restricted to under six hours a night for test subjects, researchers noted that 444 genes showed suppressed activity.

Eight Facts About Vitamin D and Rheumatoid Arthritis

Vitamin D deficiency can be a problem for people with chronic illness such as Rheumatoid Arthritis.

Five things you may not know about olive oil

Consuming olive oil in moderation has health benefits, study says
Nutritionists have long touted the heart-healthy benefits of extra-virgin olive oil. 

Recently, researchers found that consuming a Mediterranean diet heavy in olive oil can help lower some heart risks. Consuming more than four tablespoons a day can significantly lower your risk of having a heart attack, suffering from a stroke or dying of heart disease, according to the recent study published in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Olive oil is high in a type of fat known as monounsaturated fat, according to the Mayo Clinic. MUFAs, as they're commonly called, can help lower your cholesterol and control insulin levels in the body. In addition to olive oil, they can be found in avocados, nuts and fatty fish.
Of course, that doesn't mean you can go overboard. Even though it's made of "healthy fats," olive oil is still high in calories and should be used in moderation. Here are five things you might not know about this Mediterranean staple:
It helps more than your heart. Olive oil is full of polyphenols, a type of antioxidant that helps protect your cells from damage. Certain polyphenols also have anti-inflammatory properties.
Scientists have been exploring the effects these polyphenols may have on bone and digestive health as well as looking into how they could help prevent cancer. Other researchers are looking into olive oil's potential for improving cognitive function and memory.
Your oil may not be extra-virgin. In 2011, reporter Tom Mueller released his book "Extra Virginity: The Sublime and Scandalous World of Olive Oil." In it, he revealed a world of deception where low quality oils and artificial coloring were being passed off as extra-virgin olive oils to the American public.
"Virgin means made with physical processes, not with chemistry," Mueller told NPR. "Essentially, you crush an olive and out drops the oil in extreme synthesis."
There are laws in Europe monitoring the use of an "extra-virgin" label, but the United States does not have strict regulations, according to Mueller.
And when companies taint the oil, Mueller said consumers lose "that wonderful cocktail of anti-inflammatories and antioxidants." How you store it matters. When you're at the grocery store, look for olive oil that comes in a bottle made from dark green glass or another material that protects it from light, says Dr. John La Puma, founder of ChefMD.com.
Heat and light can damage the oil by creating oxidation, which changes the beneficial chemical compounds. Store your olive oil in a room-temperature cupboard or in the refrigerator to keep it cool.
A bottle of oil will last about a year on your shelf, according to the Stillwater Olive Oil Co. "After this time, the taste and health benefits, such as Vitamin E, beta-carotene, and other phenol levels decrease dramatically," the company's website states.
Americans buy a lot of it. Olive oil is one of the fastest-growing global industries, according to a report from Research and Markets, an international market research and data site. While Spain and Italy top the list of both producers and consumers, Americans seem to have jumped on the Mediterranean diet bandwagon in full force.
The United States ranks third on the list of the world's largest olive oil consumers. But the U.S. may not be there for long, according to the report.
"It is expected that in the near future, India and China will be on the list of largest consumers of olive oil, as people have started recognizing the health benefits of olive oil and have accepted it as cooking oil," a release from the site says.
You don't have to eat it. Olive oil beauty products are a multibillion dollar business, according to the industry website Olive Oil Source.
"What many consumers don't realize is something that people living millennia ago in ancient Greece took for granted; that extra virgin olive oil, all by itself, is one of the best beauty secrets," the site says.
The same antioxidants that heal your internal cells may help protect your outer layer from damage. Olive oil can now be found in everything from skin moisturizers to nail care kits.
If you're not ready to spring for the professional products, you can use olive oil at home to create a hair mask or as a cheap eye makeup remover.

The 1950s’ Most Nauseating Jell-O Soaked Recipes

Postwar America in the late 1940s was ripe for "better living through chemistry" and new processed foods. The Jell-O company took advantage of this and developed recipes for the suburban housewife to show off her culinary skills and stretch the family food budget. How else could you explain the abominations known as the Jell-O salad and Jell-O entrees? But Ruth Clark of the site The Mid-Century Menu is willing to try those recipes out, for the sake of understanding history. Collectors Weekly spoke to her about the food, and especially the Jell-O recipes, of the 1950s.

I haven’t really heard a lot of food historians talk about this, but I’ve found that food mixed into Jell-O stays fresher much longer than if you have it by itself.

Collectors Weekly: Whoa, how long are you talking about, like weeks?

Clark: Like days. For example, Perfection Salad is basically coleslaw inside of lemon or lime Jell-O, so it’s got cabbage and carrots and all kinds of stuff. But the cabbage will stay fresh for over a week. If you take a bite of it, it’s still crunchy. My husband, Tom, tries all this. He’s a chemist, so he’ll keep tasting it long, long after I’m done with it. But if you make regular coleslaw and put dressing on it, the cabbage becomes soggy after three days. And after five days, you’re not going to eat it.

We’ve done a lot of different Jell-O stuff and noticed that freshness is basically extended when you encase things in Jell-O. We’ve done cakes covered with gelatin, and the cake would still be moist after a week and a half. We made sandwiches with gelatin, open-faced sandwiches with flavored gelatin poured over the top, which was supposed to be like mayo. I thought it was going to be disastrous. Tom wolfed them down. He’s like, “These are really good and the bread isn’t soggy.” I’m like, “Are you kidding me?” Two days later, they were still edible.

But she talks about a lot more than just Jell-O. Read about pork fat cake, chocolate tomato soup cake, liver and green bean paté, chicken mousse, and more. More

Random Celebrity Photo

Archeaology News

Have Bones of Cleopatra's Murdered Sister Been Found?

An archaeologist lecturing in North Carolina this week claims to have identified the bones of Cleopatra's murdered sister or half-sister. But not everyone is convinced.

Richard III Burial Up to University, Says Minister

The burial site for the remains of Richard III will not be decided by Parliament.

The Ancient Lohar Blacksmiths of Rajasthan

Forging Ahead in Modern Times

The Lohar of north and central India are a caste of blacksmiths with a long history and an ancient way of life that may not last much longer... More

Eight Unforgettable Examples Of Land Art

Land art or Earth art is an art movement in which the landscape and the work of art are inextricably linked. It's also an art form that is created in nature, using natural materials such as soil, rock (bed rock, boulders, stones), organic media (trees, grass) and water. The works frequently exist in the open, located well away from civilization, left to change and erode under natural conditions.

Random Photo

Fifteen Scary And Ominous Photos of Dust Storms

A dust storm is a meteorological phenomenon common in arid and semi-arid regions. Dust storms arise when a gust front or other strong wind blows loose sand and dirt from a dry surface. Particles are transported by saltation and suspension, a process that moves soil from one place and deposits it in another.

Earth News

Entire Maldives Nation Becoming Biosphere Reserve

The entire Maldives, a nation of low-lying islands, pledges to become a sustainable reserve.

800-Foot-Deep Canyon Found Under Red Sea

Watch your step, Moses -- the 820-foot-deep canyon was was found by technology on a British ship that works like sonar.

Meteorite Crash Landings Mapped

A meteorite map pinpoints the locations of 34,513 strikes, dating back to 2,300BC.

Lost Continent Discovered Beneath Indian Ocean

A small, sunken continent was recently discovered beneath the Indian Ocean. The ancient mini-continent, called Mauritia, lies beneath the lava flows that created the islands of Reunion and Mauritius.

Astronomical News

'Dead' Stars May Host Living Worlds

Earth-sized planets that host life should be far easier to find around parent stars that are white dwarfs, the ultimate incarnations of stars like the sun.

Russian Meteor Likely An Apollo Asteroid Chunk

Before it collided with Earth, the Chelyabinsk space rock was a 10,000 ton meteoroid -- now astronomers think they know where it came from.

Are Star 'Crumbs' Evidence of Galactic Cannibalism?

Stars discovered in the Milky Way's halo could be what remains of smaller galaxies that were eaten to form the our galaxy.

Could a Comet Hit Mars in 2014?

A recently discovered comet will make an uncomfortably-close planetary flyby next year -- but this time it's not Earth that's in the cosmic crosshairs.

Upping the Cute Factor

Cow thinks she's a horse

A cow which thinks its a horse has become the unlikely star of a pony display team. The three-year-old, named Hettie Moo, was orphaned after her mother died giving birth. Hettie, a Belted Galloway cow, was spared the chop and brought up surrounded by horses at the Cairngorms Reindeer Centre in Aviemore, Scotland. She grew up thinking she’s a cow and feels “right at home” being ridden and attached to a carriage.

Hettie now struts her stuff for Chariots of Fire, a pony display team based in Lockerbie – leaping over 2ft jumps. Amanda Saville, who runs Sports Driving Unlimited, the equine charity which trains the Chariots of Fire team, said Hettie believes she is just another one of the ponies. She said: “There’s no doubt she thinks she’s a horse. She’s been reared with the ponies for years now, so there’s no reason for her to think she’s a cow.

“Of course it all seems a bit random as there’s no other cow in the world that does what she does right now, but it’s normal to her. She lives in the same stables as the ponies and is very happy to have such close company with them. It’s deserved as she had a tough start to life because her mother unfortunately died at birth. She was hand-reared by the people from the reindeer centre but she was so tame they couldn’t put her back in the herd and they certainly weren’t going to eat her.

YouTube link.

“So they simply turned up here one day with a big red ribbon round her neck and said ‘we thought you’d like her’.” Hettie sailed through an intensive training course and quickly began to conquer the large jumps that the Chariots of Fire team leap. Now taking parts in galas and agricultural shows, Hettie has become a hit with fans all around Scotland. Amanda said: “She’s been absolutely amazing as she took to it like a duck to water but I have to admit, it’s hysterical watching her.”

New Research Sheds Light On How Dogs Became Dogs

At first blush, the emergence of man's best friend is pretty straightforward. The first dogs descended from wolves in Europe about 14,000 years ago. Then humans domesticated those proto-dogs until the eventual animal known as a 'dog' had many of the traits we associated with the animal today.

That much of the evolutionary history of the modern dog has been clearly understood. But further research suggests that that European dog is not the ancestor of all our dogs; instead, every modern Western dog hails from a Southeast Asian progenitor lineage. Why did some upstart Southeast Asian lineage triumph, even in Europe, instead of the endemic European one? Turns out, it might have to do
with your pet dog's affinity for Cheetos.

Animal News

Shark Relative Had Buzz Saw Mouth

The prehistoric Helicoprion was the only animal with teeth arranged in a spiral to cut into its prey.

Food Stamps, Now for Pets

Free pet food, home delivered, is the goal of a new program aimed at those below the poverty line.

Big Birds Sing Like Barry White

Some bigger-bodied birds aim to attract females by breaking out the bass.

Animal Pictures

The Daily Drift

 

Well, how do you do?!

Some of our readers today have been in:

Almaty, Kazakhstan

Cairo, Egypt

Dubrovnik. Croatia

Makati, Philippines

Harare, Zimbabwe

Port-Of-Spain, Trinidad and Tobago

Lodz, Poland

Valdivia, Chile

Kota Kinabalu, Malaysia

Zamboanga, Philippines

Ankara, Turkey

Bila Tserkva, Ukraine

Santiago, Chile

Istanbul, Turkey

Algiers, Algeria

Kaunas, Lithuania

Bordeaux, France

Tyn Nad Vltavou, Czech Republic

Pretoria, South Africa

Tallinn, Estonia

Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Manila, Philippines

Jakarta, Indonesia

Warsaw, Poland

Puchong, Malaysia

Novi Sad, Serbia

Islamabad, pakistan

Johor Bahru, Malaysia

Ljubljana, Slovenia

Hanoi, Vietnam

Abu Dahbi, United Arab, Emirates

Riga, Latvia

Cape Town, South Africa

Lima, Peru

Bandung, Indonesia

Belgrade, Serbia

Sampaloc, Philippines

Today is For Pete's Sake Day

Don't forget to visit our sister blog!

Today in History

364   On the death of Jovian, a conference at Nicaea chooses Valentinan, an army officer who was born in the central European region of Pannania, to succeed him in Asia Minor.  
1154   William the Bad succeeds his father, Roger the II, in Sicily.  
1790   As a result of the Revolution, France is divided into 83 departments.  
1815   Napoleon and 1,200 of his men leave Elba to start the 100-day re-conquest of France.  
1848   Karl Marx and Frederick Engels publish The Communist Manifesto in London.  
1871   France and Prussia sign a preliminary peace treaty at Versailles.  
1901   Boxer Rebellion leaders Chi-Hsin and Hsu-Cheng-Yu are publicly executed in Peking.  
1914   Russian aviator Igor Sikorsky carries 17 passengers in a twin engine plane in St. Petersburg.  
1916   General Henri Philippe Petain takes command of the French forces at Verdun.  
1917   President Wilson publicly asks congress for the power to arm merchant ships.  
1924   U.S. steel industry finds claims an eight-hour day increases efficiency and employee relations.  
1933   Ground is broken for the Golden Gate Bridge in San Francisco.  
1936   Japanese military troops march into Tokyo to conduct a coup and assassinate political leaders.  
1941   British take the Somali capital in East Africa.  
1943   U.S. Flying Fortresses and Liberators pound German docks and U-boat lairs at Wilhelmshaven.  
1945   Syria declares war on Germany and Japan.  
1951   The 22nd Amendment is added to the Constitution limiting the Presidency to two terms.  
1964   Lyndon B. Johnson signs a tax bill with $11.5 billion in cuts.  
1965   Norman Butler is arrested for the murder of Malcom X.  
1968   Thirty-two African nations agree to boycott the Olympics because of the presence of South Africa.  
1970   Five Marines are arrested on charges of murdering 11 South Vietnamese women and children.  
1972   Soviets recover Luna 20 with a cargo of moon rocks.  
1973   A publisher and 10 reporters are subpoenaed to testify on Watergate.  
1990   Daniel Ortega, communist president of Nicaragua, suffers a shocking election defeat at the hands of Violeta Chamorro.  
1993   A bomb rocks the World Trade Center in New York City. Five people are killed and hundreds suffer from smoke inhalation.

Non Sequitur

Are Wal-Mart’s Financials A Light Bulb Moment?

There was a little glimmer of light in the Southern skies last week. It wasn’t exactly a light bulb flashing on over Wal-Mart Corporate Headquarters, but it did look as though someone was fumbling with the switch.
The company released its financial results for FY 2013 on Thursday and as usual, the results were boffo. Sales were up $10 billion, international sales rose 7.4 percent and the company gained market share in food, consumables, entertainment, toys, and health and wellness. Of course the company did its version of sharing the wealth, raising its dividend by 18 percent or $0.29 per share.
Those were the sounds of a cash register ringing, the door of a luxury automobile slamming, or the roar of a corporate jet taking off from Bentonville, Arkansas. The glimmer of light was in the footnotes. Same store sales grew only 1 percent in the fourth quarter where analysts were expecting the same 1.5 percent they had seen in a year earlier. Wal-Mart attributed this to a fall off in sales after Black Friday because, it said of an unusually long interval between Thanksgiving and Christmas.  Another slowdown in sales hit in late January and continued into this month.
The company’s explanation for the recent flat sales was the January 1 payroll tax “increase” and higher gas prices. The former, of course wasn’t an increase at all but Wal-Mart, without a hint of irony, complained that the expiration of the tax holiday took $15 a week out of the pockets of families earning $30,000 a year.
While Wal-Mart was outwardly analytic about these by numbers, inwardly it was freaked. In emails leaked to Bloomberg News, Jerry Murray, Wal-Mart’s vice president of finance and logistics, called February the worst start to a month he had seen in his seven years with the company. An email from another company executive said in part, “Where are all the customers? And where’s their money?”
OK, they still don’t get it, but maybe they are finally paying attention because a lot of us have wondered just what the Waltons see as their end game. Did they even have one? And not just them; the same could be asked about the Brothers Koch, the men and women who run the banks, and the energy, insurance, and agribusiness conglomerates.
Granted it has all gone swimmingly so far; they have broken the unions, depressed wages, shipped jobs overseas, evaded, whether legally or not, their share of taxes; fought to destroy the safety net, and bought off a goodly portion of the nation’s politicians. They have also managed to capture an unseemly percentage of the national wealth all while convincing millions of Americans that they deserve special treatment as “The Job Creators.”
However they seem to have ignored the back half of the theory of supply and demand. They’ve produced goods at a reasonable price, made them accessible to millions of potential buyers, and inform those buyers of their availability, but they have overlooked the part about nurturing a sustainable market for those goods.
As more and more money finds its way into fewer and fewer hands the One Percent are either oblivious or unconcerned about the dwindling middle class or that the rising numbers below the poverty line are hard pressed to purchase anything more than the necessities to feed, clothe, and house their families.
Maybe not even that. The Center for Housing Policy estimates that the number of working households spending more than 50 percent of their income on housing rose from a national average of 21.8 percent in 2008 to 23.6 percent in 2010. These figures were based on the 2010 census and don’t include effects of the tightening rental market since them. There isn’t a single state in the union where a minimum wage earner can afford a two bedroom market rate apartment while working fewer than 63 hours a week.
The Harvard Joint Center on Housing Policy says these “severely cost-burdened” families spend only about three-fifths as much on food, half as much on clothing, and two-fifths as much on healthcare as do families living in more affordable housing.
Now the temporary respite on payroll taxes has ended and family budgets are being hammered by nearly daily increases in gas prices, soon to be reflected in the cost electricity, heat, and everything that must be transported by trucks. Still the Masters of the Universe who control corporate America fight to cut the safety net and kill the minimum wage bill, still clueless to the fatal flaw in their business plans.
Maybe they should pay less attention to their own bottom line and more attention to Wal-Mart’s. With its core constituency of middle and lower income families it could be an early warning system for the ultimate result of income inequality. When that light bulb really flashes on, maybe as early as the first quarter 2013 report, Wal-Mart and everyone else will be able to see where the money has really gone – into the pockets of people who do not need to spend it.

Did you know ...

You could be arrested for your politics in America

That Comcast pulled all gun ads from cable network

A top papal candidate blame gays for child abuse sex scandal

Defeat of repugican Efforts to Steal Elections Hinges on SCOTUS Voting Right Act Case

repugicans know that most of America rejects their increasingly extreme ideology and they can’t win a fair election.  That is at the core of their war on the voting rights in the form of gerrymandering, voter ID laws, restricting voting days and hours. The available data shows that these methods not only establish a system in which some votes carry more weight than others establish, but also seeks to disenfranchise particular groups of people: minorities, women and the working poor.
The Voting Rights Act is the repugican cabal’s worst enemy because it contains mechanisms to prevent policies that will disenfranchise voters based on race.  Under Article 5 of the VRA, the worst offenders of racist voting policies must seek preclearance of proposed voting policies changes with the Department of Justice.
On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will listen to arguments in Shelby County Alabama vs. Holder.  In its brief,  Shelby County claims that racial segregation and discrimination no longer exist so we really don’t need Article 5.
William Consovoy, the lawyer representing Shelby County, is a  former clerk for Justice Clarence Thomas and specializes in cases that make voting harder for minorities.  As MSNBC reports:

William Consovoy also last year argued on behalf of repugican officials in Florida and Ohio, who in both cases were seeking to significantly reduce the days allotted for early voting, which blacks take advantage of more than whites.

Given that Thomas believes  Article 5 is unconstitutional, it’s likely he will support his former law clerk in this case – regardless of the facts. The 2011 Federal Court Ruling in this case upheld  the constitutionality of Article 5.

“The legislative record is by no means unambiguous. But Congress drew reasonable conclusions from the extensive evidence it gathered and acted pursuant to the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Amendments, which entrust Congress with ensuring that the right to vote—surely among the most important guarantees of political liberty in the Constitution—is not abridged on account of race.”

One need only look at the 2012 to see that policies seeking to deny racial minorities their right to vote persist and in earnest.  The former chairman of Florida’s repugican cabal admitted suppressing Democrats and especially the Black vote and Hispanic vote was the purpose  behind their vote suppression program. Rachel Maddow pointed to the fact that Michigan’s Emergency Financial Manager law disenfranchised 50% of Michigan’s Black voters in local elections.   repugicans in Ohio resented the notion of needing to accommodate urban read Black Voters and said so. 
The NAACP offers more data, facts and court rulings to prove how extensive racism continues to play a role in states that are the worst offenders.  When one looks at the compelling evidence in Alabama’s record, it seems that this case should be a slam dunk in favor of upholding Article 5. From page 15 of the NAACP’s brief.

Purposeful discrimination by Alabama lawmakers persists to the present day.  In United States v. McGregor, 824 F. Supp. 2d 1339, 1347 (M.D. Ala. 2011), the court found “compelling evidence that political exclusion through racism remains a real and enduring problem in [Alabama],” “entrenched in the high echelons of state government.”  The court rejected testimony by several white Alabama state legislators as lacking credibility, finding they were motivated by “pure racial bias” as they sought to “reduc[e] African-American voter turnout.”  Id. at 1345.
Several white legislators and their interlocutors were caught on tape comparing Black voters to “illiterate[s]” and “Aborigines.”  Id.

As for the plaintiff in this case, it’s funny what happens to their claim with a look at the recent history in Shelby County.  Pages 19-20 of the NAACP brief reveal Shelby County, continues to, shall we say, have issues with oversight because it gets in the way of things like a city’s effort to eliminate representation by Black members on City Councils.

More recently, in 2008, Section 5 prevented Calera from circumventing Dillard.  The City submitted a redistricting plan that eliminated the sole majority-Black district, and it also conceded that it had already adopted 177 annexations without seeking preclearance.  PA147a.  DOJ interposed an objection, but the City disregarded it and held an election based on the unprecleared changes.  The election resulted in the defeat of the sole Black member of the City Council.  PA148a.  DOJ then brought a Section 5 enforcement action, which resulted in a consent decree that finally remedied Calera’s circumvention of the Dillard decree.  Id.  Defendant-Intervenors are five Black ministers from Shelby County and an elected official who represents the district eliminated and ultimately restored by virtue of Section 5. Another Shelby County jurisdiction, the City of Alabaster, also engaged in repeat violations, drawing an objection for its discriminatory annexations in 2000, after Section 5 blocked similar efforts in the 1970s.  July 13, 2006 Hearing, at 386 n.98; see also October 25, 2005 (History) Hearing, at 435-37.

In five of the 8 wholly covered Article 5 states, objections under section 5 and litigation under Section two blocked over 100 racist voting laws in each state.
It doesn’t end there because there is evidence of similar types of laws being blocked in states that are partially covered under Article 5. According to the NAACP’s brief, Article 5 blocked 75 such laws in North Carolina between 1982 and 2006. If, as Shelby County claims, racial discrimination is in the past, why did Hispanics in Arizona face intimidation and mass challenges in 2006?
Consovoy says in his brief that it’s impossible to prove a negative.  It’s especially impossible when the facts over so overwhelming and compelling.
Consovoy continues to justify vote suppression as a disinfectant of the statistically non-existent voter fraud boogeyman.  Moreover, the vote suppression program won’t address the rare incidents of voter fraud, since the fraudsters in question tend to be repugicans.
Never mind the evidence of voter registration fraud attempted by the repugican cabal’s chief registration fraudster in the 2012 election and previously.
Consovoy also complains that Article 5 is just too expensive.  But, the NAACP proves in its brief that eliminating Article 5 would make defending against racist voting policies more expensive.  In some ways, this goes to the heart of why the repugican cabal wants Article 5 eliminated.
While litigation under article 2 is still possible it is both costly and time consuming. In other words eliminating Article 5 would serve as a financial deterrent to seeking legal remedy, even if it was possible to get such remedy before an election.
repugican desperate efforts to steal the vote come with the realization that America is getting browner and more Democratic. That is evident in efforts to suppress and rig the vote as we await the Supreme Court’s ruling in Shelby County Alabama v. Holder.  Just this past weekend, repugicans in Michigan decided to  go ahead with plans to rig the electoral college.
According to a poll by Gallup, released today, Democrats enjoy support by a ratio of 2 to 1 among Hispanic voters in all age groups. I’m not a political strategist, but somehow I doubt vigorously attacking the voting rights of racial minorities is the way to win them over.

The truth be told

Supreme Court throws out challenge to surveillance law

 

U.S.-based journalists, lawyers and human rights groups cannot challenge a federal law that allows surveillance of some international communications, the Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday in a case touching on government efforts to fight terrorism. Split 5-4 on ideological lines, with conservatives backing the government and the liberal wing in the minority, the country's highest court said none of the three categories, including human rights groups Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have legal standing to sue because they could not show they had suffered any injury.

The law in question was the 2008 amendment to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) that authorized mass surveillance by the U.S. government, without identifying specific targets, for the purpose of monitoring foreigners outside the country and gathering intelligence.

President George W. Bush authorized warrantless wiretaps after the September 11, 2001, attacks to find people with ties to the al Qaeda network and other groups. He ended that program in 2007, but Congress the next year reinstated parts of it.
The Obama administration argued that the challengers did not have standing, a position the court's majority endorsed.

Since the September 11 attacks, the Supreme Court has been reluctant to intervene in White House affairs governing national security and intelligence-gathering procedures, and the government has said it needs to be flexible in surveillance.

But the challengers said the amendment unreasonably added to their burdens by forcing them to stop communicating by phone and email with sources and clients, including in such places as Afghanistan or Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, and instead meet in person.
They also said it could subject millions of people to monitoring without a warrant, violating the protection against illegal searches and seizures under the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution.

In Tuesday's ruling, Justice Samuel Alito wrote on behalf of the majority that the challengers' argument was based on a "highly speculative fear" that the government would target their communications and not choose other means to carry out surveillance if it was required.

The law states that U.S.-based people should not be targeted and the various individuals and groups that filed suit had not shown any evidence that they had been, Alito said.
Likewise, the law's opponents had no evidence that the non-U.S. people they are communicating with have been targeted either, he added.
"We decline to abandon our usual reluctance to endorse standing theories that rest on speculation about the decisions of independent actors," Alito wrote.

Justice Stephen Breyer wrote a dissenting opinion in which he took issue with Alito's conclusion that the likelihood of harm was purely speculative.

"Indeed, it is as likely to take place as are most future events that commonsense inference and ordinary knowledge of human nature tell us will happen," Breyer wrote.
In the past, the court has embraced that wider view of what constitutes standing, he added.
Breyer said there is a "very high likelihood" that the government would cite the law when intercepting communications of the type at issue in the case.
Adopted in 1978, FISA required the government to submit a surveillance application to a special court for each person outside the country it was targeting.
The case is Clapper et al v. Amnesty International et al, U.S. Supreme Court, No. 11-1025.

NJ man accused of illegally selling deer to restaurants, used girlfriend's head as gunrest during hunts

Mark Jarema of South Jersey was charged by Pennsylvania authorities with forcing his girlfriend to help him in an illegal deer hunt, and sometimes "using her head as a gun rest to steady his weapon." He sounds like a real winner. The state's Department of Environmental Protection is having a hard time finding evidence to substantiate additional charges that restaurants purchased the meat from him, and served it to customers: "By the time we were informed of the potential sale," said a rep, "months had passed and it would have been impossible to link the sale to the restaurant."

Iran censors cover Michelle Obama's cleavage

Left, the first lady at the Academy Awards ceremony; right, as she appeared in a still shot on Iranian TV. Not the best idea, perhaps, when you're trying to bring attention to Argo's historical inaccuracies!

Random Celebrity Photo

One Times Square Under Construction

The building that would house the New York Times and give Times Square its name was under construction when this photograph was taken in 1903. Before the Times building went up, the area was known as Longacre Square. You can enlarge this photo at Shorpy and see the amazing details from 110 years ago. More

Meet Pavlov's Dogs

What kind of dogs did Ivan Pavlov use in his classical conditioning experiments? The dogs that learned to salivate to the sound of a bell weren't all purebreds -it turns out that Pavlov wasn't all that picky about his subjects. Smithsonian has a pictures of 35 of the dogs Pavlov used to develop his theories about conditioned reflexes in 1901. More

The Most Worthless Coin In The World

This month the Canadian mint stopped distributing the penny, or one-cent piece, as it costs more to make than it is worth. It's far from being the lowest-value coin around, however. Some central banks are clinging on to coins that are truly 'small change.' There are many precedents for scrapping small coins. The US abolished the half-cent in 1857 and the UK's halfpenny was withdrawn in 1984. New Zealand and Australia abandoned the one-cent and two-cent coin in the 1990s.

But there are coins, still legal tender, that have even lower value. Take the Burmese Pya - a US cent is worth 850 of these. The lowest-value coin of all is the Tiyin from Uzbekistan. About 2,000 equate to one US cent.

Alberobello

Hobbiton On The Mediterranean

One glance at the Italian village of Alberobello and you know that you have stumbled across something unique. Neat rows of whitewashed dwellings like something out of a fairy-tale. It's almost as if the Hobbits of Middle-earth had set up a Mediterranean colony.

These strange but charming dwellings are known as trulli. They are built without using mortar, part of a drywall culture of construction which predates written history in this part of Italy. Many of the trulli are around six hundred years old - the large slabs of limestone from which they are built were gathered from fields in the area.

Ten Lost Cities And Mythical Civilizations Of The Ancient World

Over the course of many centuries, countless things are lost. Books, ideas, buried kings - even entire cities. Whole capitals have vanished without a trace, leaving only rumors and contradictory accounts in books. Some of these places may have existed, others definitely did, and others still are legends we somehow dragged out the sand and into fact.

Is It Possible to Be Too Beautiful?

It's a terrible curse. But we all have our crosses to bear, so I've learned to accept mine. Science journalism tells us the ugly truth about beauty: there's such a thing as too much. James Hamblin writes in The Atlantic:

Yet life for the beautiful is not as perfect as it seems. In one study of job applicants, beautiful women who included a photo with their résumé were 41 percent less likely to land an interview than “plain” women who did the same [6]. When accused of homicide, beautiful women are more likely to be presumed guilty [7]. And attractive people are also more likely to be associated with a number of negative traits, such as conformity and self-promotion [3].

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Random Photo

Mystery of strange creature washed up on Welsh beach

This mysterious creature has been washed up on Tenby’s South Beach.

The photographs were taken by Peter Bailey from Tenby, Pembrokeshire, who was walking his dog along the beach on Friday evening.

He said: "I was taking my dog for her evening walk across the beach when she started acting out of character by howling and running round in circles.

 "I ran up to her to see if she was okay and then I came across this hideous looking carcass. I could see it had little hair left on it's decomposing body. Immediately I thought it was a horse but it had claws like a bear and the body of a pig. Surprisingly it didn't smell."

Animal Pictures