Sunday, June 18, 2017
Energy Department To Close Office Of International Climate And Technology
The environment is clearly not as important as cost-cutting.
About That 'Julius Caesar' Shakespeare Play
For those of us who forgot what the play is about, Thug Notes provides some Dumbass Trump-free context...
School Employee Calls For Killing LGBTQ People At Pride Festival
Should Dylann Roof be labeled a terrorist?
Short Answer: YES
White supremacist and neo-Nazi Dylann Roof walked into Emanuel
African Methodist Episcopal Cult on June 17, 2015, during a prayer
service that killed nine people, all African-American. Since the tragic
event, a major debate that raged surrounding his arrest and trial was
whether or not to consider Roof a terrorist.Roof's status as a terrorist is in some ways a question of semantics. The charges against Roof included murder, attempted murder and use of a firearm. All of the charges were filed under the commission of hate crime and none were categorized as domestic terrorism.
Questions surrounding Roof linger as mass shootings continue to plague America. The most recent example is the recent shooting of Scalice (r-La.) and four others at a congressional baseball practice in Alexandria, Virginia, by James T. Hodgkinson last Wednesday.
Hate crimes soar two years after Dylann Roof massacre
Of course, those two events aren't directly linked. "But it’s certainly symbolic"...
Climate change is now shrinking the Colorado River
Saturday, June 17, 2017
The Daily Drift
Welcome to Today's Edition of
Carolina Naturally
Carolina Naturally
Carolina Naturally is read in 210 countries around the world daily.
Brain Exercise ... !
Today is - World Juggling Day
You want the unvarnished truth?
You want the unvarnished truth?
Don't forget to visit: The Truth Be Told
Yep!
Today in History
| 362 | Emperor Julian issues an edict banning christians from teaching in Syria. | |
| 1579 | Sir Francis Drake claims San Francisco Bay for England. | |
| 1775 | The British take Bunker Hill outside of Boston, after a costly battle. | |
| 1799 | Napoleon Bonaparte incorporates Italy into his empire. | |
| 1848 | Austrian General Alfred Windisch-Gratz crushes a Czech uprising in Prague. | |
| 1854 | The Red Turban revolt breaks out in Guangdong, China. | |
| 1856 | The Republican Party opens its first national convention in Philadelphia. | |
| 1861 | Lincoln witnesses Dr. Thaddeus Lowe demonstrate the use of a hot-air balloon. | |
| 1863 | On the way to Gettysburg, Union and Confederate forces skirmish at Point of Rocks, Maryland. | |
| 1872 | George M. Hoover begins selling whiskey in Dodge City, Kansas–a town which had previously been “dry.” | |
| 1876 | General George Crook‘s command is attacked and bested on the Rosebud River by 1,500 Sioux and Cheyenne under the leadership of Crazy Horse. | |
| 1912 | The German Zeppelin SZ 111 burns in its hangar in Friedrichshafen. | |
| 1913 | U.S. Marines set sail from San Diego to protect American interests in Mexico. | |
| 1917 | The Russian Duma meets in secret session in Petrograd and votes for an immediate Russian offensive against the German Army. | |
| 1924 | The Fascist militia marches into Rome. | |
| 1926 | Spain threatens to quit the League of Nations if Germany is allowed to join. | |
| 1930 | The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Bill becomes law, placing the highest tariff on imports to the United States. | |
| 1931 | British authorities in China arrest Indochinese Communist leader Ho Chi Minh. | |
| 1932 | The U.S. Senate defeats the Bonus Bill as 10,000 veterans mass around the Capitol. | |
| 1940 | The Soviet Union occupies Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia. | |
| 1942 | Yank a weekly magazine for the U.S. armed services, begins publication. | |
| 1944 | French troops land on the island of Elba in the Mediterranean. | |
| 1950 | Surgeon Richard Lawler performs the first kidney transplant operation in Chicago. | |
| 1953 | Soviet tanks fight thousands of Berlin workers rioting against the East German government. | |
| 1963 | The U.S. Supreme Court bans the required reading of the Lord’s prayer and Bible in public schools. | |
| 1965 | 27 B-52s hit Viet Cong outposts, but lose two planes in South Vietnam. | |
| 1970 | North Vietnamese troops cut the last operating rail line in Cambodia. | |
| 1972 | Five men are arrested for burglarizing Democratic Party headquarters at the Watergate complex in Washington, D.C. | |
| 1994 | Millions of Americans watch former football player O.J. Simpson–facing murder charges–drive his Ford Bronco through Los Angeles, followed by police. |
Portrait of an American Hero
The Lesbian Minority Woman Who Saved Wingnut Lives
Crystal Griner is a female minority, who just so happens to be
married to a woman. In 2015, Griner married Tiffany Dyar in Baltimore.…
Both
Griner and Bailey are minorities.
Crystal Griner is a female minority, who just so happens to be married
to a woman. In 2015, Griner married Tiffany Dyar in Baltimore.
It’s not that people should be defined by their skin color, gender,
or who they love. But in this case, these details are important enough
to focus on for a moment. Capitol Police special agents Crystal Griner and David Bailey are widely credited with saving wingnuts and staff during the horrific shooting in Alexandria, Virginia that left Scalise in the hospital in critical condition.
Speaker Ryan (r-WI) said of them during a House floor speech, “We are, as ever, awed by the tremendous bravery of the Capitol Police.”
Both Griner and Bailey were wounded.
Both Griner and Bailey are minorities.
Crystal Griner is a female minority, who just so happens to be married to a woman. Griner married Tiffany Dyar in 2015.
As ESPN’s LZ Granderson pointed out, Griner saved the life of Rep. Steve Scalise (R-LA), who is opposed to same-sex marriage:
Wednesday night, Dumbass Trump and First Lady Melania Trump visited Griner and her wife in the hospital, bringing a bouquet of flowers in thanks, according to a Pool report sent out..
Griner played college basketball for Maryland’s Hood College.
Griner and Bailey are heroes who rushed to save lawmakers even though they were injured themselves. Griner was shot in the ankle but is expected to recover.
Too often, all of the minority categories that Griner falls into are demonized by Republicans and this is a chance to emphasize the importance of humanity, of seeing people as whole beings with a history, with dreams of their own, with loves of their own.
Too many of our leaders, particularly Dumbass Trump but he’s not alone in this, are trying to divide us, to dehumanize the “other.” Wednesday, during moments of exceptional horror, these two Capitol Police special agents stepped up to do their jobs with incredible bravery and effectiveness.
In honoring these heroes, people should also take a moment to consider their humanity. Consider how the laws dealt with in Congress would impact these folks who just saved their lives or the lives of their colleagues.
The folks being hurt by laws bandied about in Congress aren’t nameless, bad “others.” They are sometimes people of stunning courage like Crystal Griner.
Humanity matters. It’s all we have, when all else is stolen and stripped away.
Instead of focusing on delegitimizing Crystal’s marriage, wingnuts should take this opportunity to look into the eyes and heart of a patriot who just so happens to love someone of her own gender and do the right thing.
Crossing the English Channel in a Flying Car
On Wednesday, pilot Bruno Vezzoli took off from Calais, France, and flew it to Dover, England, across the English Channel. The 36-mile flight came off without a hitch! Read more about the stunt here.
Broccoli extract lowers blood sugar in type 2 Diabetes
In a study just published in Science Translational Medicine, researchers randomized 97 people diagnosed with type 2 diabetes to take a concentrated broccoli sprout extract containing sulforaphane once a day for 12 weeks or a placebo with the same regimen. All but three of the participants were taking metformin, a standard treatment for controlling blood sugar.
US breaks record in wind and solar power energy
The number is up from last year, in which wind and solar power generated an annual average of seven percent of the country's electricity, the report from Electric Power Monthly shows based upon March.
San Andreas earthquakes triggered by rain and snow
The finding is important as it helps us understand what triggers earthquakes—and when they are more likely to strike.
The Louisiana coast is sinking rapidly
The Geological Society of America on Wednesday published a study by a team of Tulane University geologists that found Louisana's coastline is sinking 50 percent faster than was estimated two years ago. They discovered the coast is sinking at an average rate of 9 millimeters per year (with a margin of error of 1 millimeter). In some areas—including along the Mississippi River south of New Orleans—the rate is 12 millimeters per year.
McConnell’s Big Secret Is Out
If you thought being in an employer plan would protect you from
the evils of Dumbass Trumpcare, you are sadly mistaken. Dumbass Trumpcare V2.1 will
impose annual limits on as many as 27 million Americans and lifetime
limits on as many as 20 million. And it's not just in states with
waivers, which is to say your Democratic governor can't protect you.…
Dumbass Trump Junta Quietly Rolls Back Civil Rights Efforts Across Federal Government
Civil rights enforcement dies under Dumbass Trump not with a bang, but a whimper.
Verdict Rendering
Michelle Carter, now 20, is accused of involuntary manslaughter for sending a series of texts to her 18-year-old boyfriend, Conrad Roy, urging him to kill himself, which he did by running a generator in his truck as he sat in a parking lot in Fairhaven, Massachusetts, about 60 miles (96 km) south of Boston.
Update:
A judge found a Massachusetts woman guilty Friday of involuntary manslaughter in the suicide of her boyfriend.
Michelle Carter, now 20, sent 18-year-old Conrad Roy III hundreds of text messages before he killed himself in July 2014 by inhaling carbon monoxide in his pickup truck, reported CNN.
Many of those messages encouraged Roy to take his own life, and prosecutors argued that she berated the vulnerable young man after he developed second thoughts about suicide.
She encouraged Roy to get back into his truck at one point, and she listened by phone to his last breaths.
Prosecutors argued that Carter used her boyfriend’s suicide to get the attention from her friends.
‘No one is safe’
The St. Anthony police officer who fatally
shot Philando Castile in an event broadcast live on Facebook, escaped
all criminal charges resulting from the death.
‘I will make you disappear’
Russia claims they have killed ISIL leader Baghdadi
Mammoth Tusk Hunt in Siberia
That's me :). I needed to show how big a deal the mozzies were, that was the most effective way I could do it in a photo.The things a photographer will go through for the right image! You can read the extensive story of the expedition here, or a shorter form in an imgur album.
I fell in the river. When I took one shoe off to squeegee my sock the mozzies descended - then I realized it was a good photo so I took the other shoe off, waited for 40 hellish seconds & took this pic.
Friday, June 16, 2017
The Daily Drift
Welcome to Today's Edition of
Carolina Naturally
Carolina Naturally
Carolina Naturally is read in 210 countries around the world daily.
Oh, Fudge ... !
Today is - Fudge Day
You want the unvarnished truth?
You want the unvarnished truth?
Don't forget to visit: The Truth Be Told
Sounds about right!
Today in History
| 455 | Rome is sacked by the Vandal army. | |
| 1815 | Napoleon defeats the Prussians at the Battle of Ligny. | |
| 1858 | Lincoln, in accepting the wingnut nomination for the U.S. Senate in Illinois, declares that, “A house divided against itself cannot stand.” | |
| 1864 | The siege of Petersburg and Richmond begins after a moonlight skirmish. | |
| 1907 | The Russian czar dissolves the Duma in St. Petersburg. | |
| 1910 | The first Father’s Day is celebrated in Spokane, Washington. | |
| 1925 | France accepts a German proposal for a security pact. | |
| 1932 | The ban on Nazi storm troopers is lifted by the von Papen government in Germany. | |
| 1935 | President Franklin Roosevelt‘s New Deal legislation is passed by the House of Representatives. | |
| 1940 | French Chief of State, Henri Petain asks for an armistice with Germany. | |
| 1952 | Anne Frank: Diary of a Young Girl is published in the United States. | |
| 1955 | The U.S. House of Representatives votes to extend Selective Service until 1959. | |
| 1961 | Ballet star Rudolf Nureyev defects from the Soviet Union while in Paris. | |
| 1971 | An El Greco sketch, “The Immaculate Conception,” stolen in Spain 35 years earlier, is recovered in New York City by the FBI. | |
| 1977 | Leonid Brezhnev is named president of the Soviet Union. |
Czech cave sheds light on Neanderthal-Homo Sapiens transition
The Pod Hradem Cave in the eastern Czech Republic was first excavated in 1956-1958, and again in 2011-2012. The advanced techniques used during the second excavation revealed portable art objects, never-before-seen in the region, as well as raw materials that suggest long-distance travel. The dig turned up over 20,000 objects that include animal bones, stone tools, and weapons, as well as an engraved bone bead — the oldest of its kind found in Central Europe.
This is what Alzheimer’s disease does to the brain
Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is a progressive brain disease and the 6th leading cause of death
in the U.S. While symptoms of AD such as memory loss and impaired
judgement are widely recognized, we know less about what the disease
does to the brain. Science still has a long way to go when it comes to
understanding AD, but here’s what we know so far. This genetic mutation makes you more prone to colds
Just weeks after her birth, the young girl started to experience life-threatening colds, the flu, and other respiratory infections. Her doctors suspected she had an immune deficiency, so they went on to do further testing.
Turns out, she has a rare genetic mutation, according to researchers at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID). Her case is published in the Journal of Experimental Medicine.
State attorneys general probe opioid drug companies
Minnesota man arrested for torturing baby
A 31-year-old Moorehead, MN man is accused
of rubbing hot sauce and cayenne pepper in his 2-month-old daughter’s
eyes and throwing fireworks in her face to punish her.
United Airlines employee kicks woman in the head
A traveler said she was kicked in the head
by a United Airlines employee at the Houston airport — the site of
several other recent highly publicized incidents involving alleged
mistreatment of customers by the embattled carrier.
Department of Justice seizes rights to ‘Dumb and Dumber To’
On Thursday, the Department of Justice
seized the rights to the 2014 Jim Carrey movie “Dumb and Dumber To” as
part of an investigation into a state-sponsored Malaysian money
laundering operation.
Fugitive polygamous sect leader arrested
Jeffs, 57, was captured in South Dakota on Wednesday night and was being held in jail without bond.
Two men describe homophobic torture in Chechnya
The men, who were granted anonymity over fears of reprisal, gave Reuters accounts of their horrific ordeals at the hands of the authorities.
One of the men described being beaten by police after he refused to hand over the names of other gay men he knew, only escaping further torture after telling the authorities he was related to a policeman. He was taken to his family, and was then handcuffed to a radiator before his sister helped him escape.
"There was only one thing left to do: to get rid of me,” he said. “Because it was such a shame for a military family, for a rather big family. We [in Chechnya] have only one way to resolve this.”
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