CNN reported today on pet dangers. They geared it for the holidays, but most of them are dangers all year long.
"Dogs and cats do not know what is bad for them," said Dr. Cynthia Gaskill, associate professor and veterinary clinical toxicologist at the University of Kentucky in Lexington. "If there is medicine on the bathroom counter or food left on the table, that is irresistible to them."
And unless your houseguests are conscientious pet owners themselves, chances are they aren't aware that they may be creating a toxic environment for your pet. Gaskill says it is important to let guests know not to leave their medications in an open suitcase or otherwise exposed.
Over-the-counter and prescription medications can kill small animals.
Because metabolic systems vary between species, a drug that may alleviate pain in humans can easily induce a toxic reaction in a dog or cat. For example, ibuprofen ingested by a dog can cause gastrointestinal damage and kidney dysfunction. Cats are especially susceptible to even small amounts of acetaminophen (the active ingredient in Tylenol); ingestion of just one tablet can result in anemia and potential liver damage.
"Dogs will eat almost anything," [Dr. Robin] Van Metre[, a veterinarian at the Fort Collins Veterinary Emergency Hospital in Colorado,] said, "and there is no such thing as a dog-proof cap."
Here are more things that can hurt your pet (emphasis added):
Typical holiday staples such as grapes and raisins have been shown to cause renal failure when ingested by dogs.
Although small amounts of onions and garlic are often used in pet foods and treats to add flavor, ingestion of large amounts can cause severe red blood cell damage; cats are especially sensitive.
Macadamia nuts can cause a short-term hind-limb paralysis, and bread dough, if eaten before baking, can expand rapidly once ingested and cause ethanol poisoning.
Chocolate contains a theobromine, a chemical that can affect the heart, kidneys and central nervous system. Dark chocolate and baker's chocolate contain higher concentrations of theobromine and are more toxic than similar amounts of milk chocolate.
Sugar-free gums and candies that contain the sugar-substitute xylitol can lead to quick onset of toxic clinical signs that may include a rapid decrease in blood sugar and possible seizures.
On the plant side of things, there's more danger with a little bit of good news thrown in:
Think carefully before placing mistletoe or holly in low-lying areas, but put poinsettias anywhere you like. The effects of the poinsettia, long believed poisonous, are generally benign, says Dr. Anthony Knight, author of A Guide to Poisonous House and Garden Plants and professor of clinical sciences and toxicology at Colorado State University School of Veterinary Medicine and Biological Sciences.
Exposed plant bulbs such as Amaryllis and all species of lilies should be placed out of reach of pets not only during the holidays but year-round, Knight says.
Lily toxicity in cats can reach critical levels almost immediately after ingestion and lead to acute kidney failure within 48 hours or less.
"Lilies are one of the most poisonous houseplants that exists," Knight said. "It's not just the flower but also the leaves. ... If a cat eats any part of the plant, it would need to be treated immediately."
There you have it. If your dog eats like a dog with the wrong things, or your cat nibbles on dangerous decor, call the vet right away! Don't wait.
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Orbiting Toolbag and Other Space Happenings
Photo source: NASA
Spaceweather reported today on an errant object in the sky.
When Endeavour astronaut Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper dropped her toolbag during a spacewalk on Nov. 18th and it floated away, mission controllers probably thought they'd seen the last of it. Think again. Amateur astronomers have been monitoring the backpack-sized toolbag as it circles Earth not very far from the International Space Station.
After sunset on Nov. 22nd, Edward Light saw the bag using 10x50 binoculars as it sailed over his backyard in Lakewood, New Jersey. "It was quite a favorable 70-deg pass in clear skies," he says. "The visual magnitude of the bag was about +6.4 plus or minus half a magnitude." On the same night, Keven Fetter of Brockville, Ontario, video-recorded the bag zipping past the 4th-magnitude star eta Pisces: 900 kB movie. "It was easily 8th magnitude or brighter," says Fetter.
This week the toolbag is making a series of passes over Europe; late next week it will return to the evening skies of North America. Using binoculars, look for it flying a few minutes ahead of the ISS. Spaceweather's satellite tracker is monitoring both the space station and the tool bag; click here for predictions.
If you click on that last link, it will ask for your zipcode then show you the upcoming satellite flyovers you'll be able to see. Sadly, the toolbag isn't scheduled to fly over my house in the next week.
But the toolbag isn't the only interesting thing in the sky these days. There are planets out there, and they're about to put on a show.
NASA Science News reported yesterday that Venus and Jupiter are closing in on each other, culminating in a lovely conjunction with the crescent moon on December 1st.
This story ends with the best sky show of the year--a spectacular three-way conjunction of Venus, Jupiter and the crescent Moon.
It begins tonight with a sunset stroll.
At the end of the day, when the horizon is turning red and the zenith is cobalt-blue, step outside and look southwest. You'll see Venus and Jupiter beaming side-by-side through the twilight. Glittering Venus is absolutely brilliant and Jupiter is nearly as bright as Venus. Together, they're dynamite[.]
Add another stick of TNT and voila!—it's tomorrow. Go outside at the same time and look again. You’ll be amazed at how much the Venus-Jupiter gap has closed. The two planets are converging, not in the slow motion typical of heavenly phenomena, but in a headlong rush—almost a full degree (two full Moon widths) per night. As the gap shrinks, the beauty increases.
On Nov. 29th (sky map) the two planets will be less than 3 degrees apart and you'll think to yourself "surely it can't get any better than this."
And then it will. On Nov. 30th (sky map) a slender 10% crescent Moon leaps up from the horizon to join the show. The delicate crescent hovering just below Venus-Jupiter will have cameras clicking around the world.
Dec. 1st (sky map) is the best night of all. The now-15% crescent Moon moves in closer to form an isosceles triangle with Venus and Jupiter as opposing vertices. The three brightest objects in the night sky will be gathered so tightly together, you can hide them all behind your thumb held at arm's length.
The celestial triangle will be visible from all parts of the world, even from light-polluted cities. People in New York and Hong Kong will see it just as clearly as astronomers watching from remote mountaintops. Only cloudy weather or a midnight sun (sorry Antarctica!) can spoil the show.
Although you can see the triangle with naked eyes--indeed, you can't miss it—a small telescope will make the evening even more enjoyable. In one quick triangular sweep, you can see the moons and cloud-belts of Jupiter, the gibbous phase of Venus (69% full), and craters and mountains on the Moon. It's a Grand Tour you won't soon forget.
Finally, look up from the eyepiece and run your eyes across the Moon. Do you see a ghostly image of the full Moon inside the bright horns of the crescent? That's called "Earthshine" or sometimes "the da Vinci glow" because Leonardo da Vinci was the first person to explain it: Sunlight hits Earth and ricochets to the Moon, casting a sheen of light across the dark lunar terrain.
By itself, a crescent Moon with Earthshine is one of the loveliest sights in the heavens. Add Venus and Jupiter and … well ... it's time to stop reading and go mark your calendar:
Dec. 1st @ sunset: Sky show of the year!
More maps: Nov. 24, 25, 26, 27, 28, 29, 30, Dec. 1 2008.
Too bad I had to leave my telescope at my mom's house.
Saturday, November 22, 2008
Copernicus Remains Identified
The AP reported yesterday that the remains of Nicolaus Copernicus have been identified. It took longer than I expected. They were found about two years ago, shortly before a couple other ladies from my church and I went to Poland for the 60th anniversary celebration of the Polish church we support. I didn't blog about it at the time.
Copernicus did much of his astronomical work in Frombork (see green arrow), because his uncle was the bishop there. This map is of the northeast part of Poland at the time of Copernicus. The tan area was occupied by the Teutonic knights, and the green area, Warmia, was in Polish control. The Teutonic knights would invade Warmia frequently, and with Frombork so close to the border region, it came under attack sometimes.
Copernicus owned a tower in the castle, which he purchased when he first came to Frombork (I believe from Lidzbark-Warminski, over in the green area, where he had lived for a time), and then later he bought a house outside the castle walls. Whenever Frombork was under attack, the people escaped to the safety of the castle, and with his tower, Copernicus was able to continue his studies of the heavens.
This is Frombork castle, side view:
The main entrance to the castle is made up of apartments, and many of the scientists who work there live in the apartments.
Inside the castle is the Copernicus Museum, where they have replicas of the three instruments he used for studying the stars. He used this one for viewing. The long diagonal bar has measurement marks, and the "horizontal" bar has two eyepieces that he looked through.
He used this board, with a peg in the upper left corner and a measured arc drawn on it, to track the sun's position.
Then somehow he recorded the measurements of the other two instruments on this thing, which gave three dimensions to space. And with just these three, he was able to map out space and determine that the sun--not the earth--was the center of the solar system, and that the stars were beyond the solar system. Amazing! (Please forgive my vagueness. I don't know where I put my journal from that trip when I packed up my stuff to put my house up for sale last year, so I'm working from two-year-old memory.)
We got a special treat, because our tour guide Andrzej ("Ahnd-zhay") is a member of the church we were visiting in Lidzbark, so he was able to get us permission to see Copernicus's tower room even though it was closed to tourists. The furniture is from that time period, but did not belong to Copernicus. These are small models of his instruments.
The view from a higher tower in the castle includes the cathedral (right) where Copernicus helped his uncle the Bishop.
Copernicus was a canon of the church, a lay position at the time. Now it's a priestly function. What he did as his duty was care for this altar inside the cathedral.
The AP article has this to say about the burial of Copernicus:
Copernicus was known to have been buried in the 14th-century Frombork Cathedral where he served as a canon, but his grave was not marked. The bones found by Gassowski were located under floor tiles near one of the side altars.
According to Andrzej (actually his daughter, Magda, who spoke English beautifully--Andrzej only reads English, which he uses for translating scientific articles into Polish), when a canon died, it was customary to bury him near the altar he cared for. Over the centuries, many canons were buried by each of the altars.
What threw things into confusion at Frombork was that there was a plaque on the wall saying that Copernicus was buried there, and the plaque was in a different part of the cathedral, so all previous efforts at finding his body were focused there by the plaque. They were never able to find him.
Finally, they gave up and started looking by his altar, and by the outer cathedral wall they found a mistreated, unidentified body that could have been him. Magda and Andrzej were excited about it and were confident they had found Copernicus (the mistreatment was from later people being buried on top of and around the earlier bodies, not from any antagonism). He was found about a month before our tour.
They hoped to be able to find Uncle Bishop, so they could do DNA comparisons, but nobody knew where the uncle was buried. They expected there to be some investigating of the uncle's whereabouts. As it turned out, they must not have found him.
So, in the next stage [after examining the bones for reasonable identification], Swedish genetics expert Marie Allen analyzed DNA from a vertebrae, a tooth and femur bone and matched and compared it to that taken from two hairs retrieved from a book that the 16th-century Polish astronomer owned, which is kept at a library of Sweden's Uppsala University where Allen works.
"We collected four hairs and two of them are from the same individual as the bones," Allen said.
Magda and Andrzej--and all of Poland for that matter--have to be thrilled.
Copernicus did much of his astronomical work in Frombork (see green arrow), because his uncle was the bishop there. This map is of the northeast part of Poland at the time of Copernicus. The tan area was occupied by the Teutonic knights, and the green area, Warmia, was in Polish control. The Teutonic knights would invade Warmia frequently, and with Frombork so close to the border region, it came under attack sometimes.
Copernicus owned a tower in the castle, which he purchased when he first came to Frombork (I believe from Lidzbark-Warminski, over in the green area, where he had lived for a time), and then later he bought a house outside the castle walls. Whenever Frombork was under attack, the people escaped to the safety of the castle, and with his tower, Copernicus was able to continue his studies of the heavens.
This is Frombork castle, side view:
The main entrance to the castle is made up of apartments, and many of the scientists who work there live in the apartments.
Inside the castle is the Copernicus Museum, where they have replicas of the three instruments he used for studying the stars. He used this one for viewing. The long diagonal bar has measurement marks, and the "horizontal" bar has two eyepieces that he looked through.
He used this board, with a peg in the upper left corner and a measured arc drawn on it, to track the sun's position.
Then somehow he recorded the measurements of the other two instruments on this thing, which gave three dimensions to space. And with just these three, he was able to map out space and determine that the sun--not the earth--was the center of the solar system, and that the stars were beyond the solar system. Amazing! (Please forgive my vagueness. I don't know where I put my journal from that trip when I packed up my stuff to put my house up for sale last year, so I'm working from two-year-old memory.)
We got a special treat, because our tour guide Andrzej ("Ahnd-zhay") is a member of the church we were visiting in Lidzbark, so he was able to get us permission to see Copernicus's tower room even though it was closed to tourists. The furniture is from that time period, but did not belong to Copernicus. These are small models of his instruments.
The view from a higher tower in the castle includes the cathedral (right) where Copernicus helped his uncle the Bishop.
Copernicus was a canon of the church, a lay position at the time. Now it's a priestly function. What he did as his duty was care for this altar inside the cathedral.
The AP article has this to say about the burial of Copernicus:
Copernicus was known to have been buried in the 14th-century Frombork Cathedral where he served as a canon, but his grave was not marked. The bones found by Gassowski were located under floor tiles near one of the side altars.
According to Andrzej (actually his daughter, Magda, who spoke English beautifully--Andrzej only reads English, which he uses for translating scientific articles into Polish), when a canon died, it was customary to bury him near the altar he cared for. Over the centuries, many canons were buried by each of the altars.
What threw things into confusion at Frombork was that there was a plaque on the wall saying that Copernicus was buried there, and the plaque was in a different part of the cathedral, so all previous efforts at finding his body were focused there by the plaque. They were never able to find him.
Finally, they gave up and started looking by his altar, and by the outer cathedral wall they found a mistreated, unidentified body that could have been him. Magda and Andrzej were excited about it and were confident they had found Copernicus (the mistreatment was from later people being buried on top of and around the earlier bodies, not from any antagonism). He was found about a month before our tour.
They hoped to be able to find Uncle Bishop, so they could do DNA comparisons, but nobody knew where the uncle was buried. They expected there to be some investigating of the uncle's whereabouts. As it turned out, they must not have found him.
So, in the next stage [after examining the bones for reasonable identification], Swedish genetics expert Marie Allen analyzed DNA from a vertebrae, a tooth and femur bone and matched and compared it to that taken from two hairs retrieved from a book that the 16th-century Polish astronomer owned, which is kept at a library of Sweden's Uppsala University where Allen works.
"We collected four hairs and two of them are from the same individual as the bones," Allen said.
Magda and Andrzej--and all of Poland for that matter--have to be thrilled.
Tuesday, November 18, 2008
Happy Birthday, Mickey!
Mickey Mouse is 80 years old today. Here's his baby picture:
Here he is now:
We should all age this well!
Here he is now:
We should all age this well!
Monday, November 17, 2008
Morning Earthquake
I talked about Earthquake Weather (EW) before, although we didn't get an earthquake that time, and my post turned into commentary about the job I don't have anymore. The earthquake discussion is at the beginning of the post.
So, we've been having EW again: cold nights and hot days, the kind of temperature shifts that make the earth contract and expand.
I went to bed later than usual, at 2:30am, and around 9:30am I woke up and then started falling back to sleep. Just as I fell asleep, I felt the bed move as though somebody had given the mattress a light push. It moved a tiny bit to the side and back, and my mind started telling me it was just one of those moments of disequilibrium that I didn't need to worry about, when I felt the covers settle down around my legs more.
I was awake. I classified it as an earthquake about a 3.2 magnitude at my house--just strong enough to feel it but not strong enough to even move the miniblinds.
Caltech takes about 10 - 20 minutes to report an earthquake on its website, so my first attempt to see if I had just experienced an earthquake and not a figment of my imagination told me that there was a 4.1 earthquake 10 miles north of the observatory on Mt. Palomar at about 4:30am. The epicenter is about 35 - 40 miles from me, if the crow flies high enough to avoid the mountains. I slept through that one.
A little later, an aftershock showed up for 9:41:36 AM PST. Jackpot!
I'm not sure how long the link will be good, since it's in the "recent earthquakes" section of their site, so here's their summary:
== PRELIMINARY EARTHQUAKE REPORT ==
Southern California Seismic Network: a cooperative project of
U.S. Geological Survey, Pasadena California
Caltech Seismological Laboratory, Pasadena, California
***
Version #C: This report supersedes any earlier reports of this event. This event has been reviewed by a seismologist.
A minor earthquake occurred at 9:41:36 AM (PST) on Monday, November 17, 2008.
The magnitude 3.8 event occurred 16 km (10 miles) N of Palomar Observatory, CA.
The hypocentral depth is 10 km ( 6 miles).
So, that was my morning. I hope you had a good one too!
So, we've been having EW again: cold nights and hot days, the kind of temperature shifts that make the earth contract and expand.
I went to bed later than usual, at 2:30am, and around 9:30am I woke up and then started falling back to sleep. Just as I fell asleep, I felt the bed move as though somebody had given the mattress a light push. It moved a tiny bit to the side and back, and my mind started telling me it was just one of those moments of disequilibrium that I didn't need to worry about, when I felt the covers settle down around my legs more.
I was awake. I classified it as an earthquake about a 3.2 magnitude at my house--just strong enough to feel it but not strong enough to even move the miniblinds.
Caltech takes about 10 - 20 minutes to report an earthquake on its website, so my first attempt to see if I had just experienced an earthquake and not a figment of my imagination told me that there was a 4.1 earthquake 10 miles north of the observatory on Mt. Palomar at about 4:30am. The epicenter is about 35 - 40 miles from me, if the crow flies high enough to avoid the mountains. I slept through that one.
A little later, an aftershock showed up for 9:41:36 AM PST. Jackpot!
I'm not sure how long the link will be good, since it's in the "recent earthquakes" section of their site, so here's their summary:
== PRELIMINARY EARTHQUAKE REPORT ==
Southern California Seismic Network: a cooperative project of
U.S. Geological Survey, Pasadena California
Caltech Seismological Laboratory, Pasadena, California
***
Version #C: This report supersedes any earlier reports of this event. This event has been reviewed by a seismologist.
A minor earthquake occurred at 9:41:36 AM (PST) on Monday, November 17, 2008.
The magnitude 3.8 event occurred 16 km (10 miles) N of Palomar Observatory, CA.
The hypocentral depth is 10 km ( 6 miles).
So, that was my morning. I hope you had a good one too!
Saturday, November 15, 2008
Obama Sells Guns
WorldNetDaily reported Thursday on the rise in gun sales since the election.
Gun sales have skyrocketed since Barack Obama was elected, and many gun owners say they are concerned the nation's next president and a Democratic-controlled Congress will impose a ban on assault rifles and firearm ownership.
From Nov. 3 to Nov. 9, the FBI reported 374,000 background checks on people purchasing guns – a 49 percent jump from last year. Dealers are reporting larger-than-usual sales since Election Day, according to the Chicago Tribune. The rush to buy weapons is more intense than in the days following Y2K and the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.
Dallas, Texas, gun shop owner DeWayne Irwin said the election, combined with an unstable economy, triggered a firearms dash at his store.
"People are terrified of losing their right to protect themselves," Irwin told the Tribune. "The volume is 10 times what we ever expected. It started with assault rifles, but at this point people are buying ammunition, high-capacity magazines, Glocks – it's all flying off the shelf. With the economy the way it is, people are worried about instability. They are scared of civil unrest."
One of the newer advertisers on the talk radio station here is a gun shop in the San Diego area. Since the election, one of their ads has the gun shop manager saying he voted for Obama--not for President, but for Employee of the Month. "Gun Ban Obama, you see, has sold more guns in the last few months than all the Gun Exchange employees combined."
And I thought Obama was going to be bad for the economy...
Friday, November 14, 2008
Noisy Shrimp
I told the tale, earlier this year, about my dad's time as a radioman on submarines and what he said shrimp sound like. Now it appears that Great Britain is learning about shrimp sounds too.
The Daily Mail (UK) reported yesterday about pistol shrimp in British waters.
Pistol shrimps - which stun their prey by snapping their claws together to create a deafening 'crack' - normally live in the sub-tropics.
Despite being less than an inch long, the creatures can emit an astonishing 218 decibels - louder than a gunshot.
The sound stuns small fish and crabs, allowing the shrimp to move in for the kill.
The creatures, also known as snapping shrimps, are native to the warmer waters of the Mediterranean and have only been found swimming off the coast of Britain a handful of times this century.
A pair were discovered last week near the mouth of the Helford River in Cornwall by crab fisherman Tim Bailey, 56.
They were brought to the Blue Reef Aquarium in Newquay, where staff were forced to separate them to stop them stunning each other.
Much like we separate members of Congress by putting an aisle between them.
Douglas Herdson, the information officer at the National Marine Aquarium in Plymouth, said that the creatures are so loud that they can be heard by sailors.
'I have heard of yachtsmen being moored in a bay and not being able to sleep because of the noise these shrimps make,' he said.
Looks like my dad knew exactly what he was talking about.
Thursday, November 13, 2008
Testing Tolerance
Photo credit: Nuccio DiNuzzo
Chicago Tribune columnist Jim Kass told the tale today of a schoolgirl's test of tolerance (HT: Michelle Malkin).
As the media keeps gushing on about how America has finally adopted tolerance as the great virtue, and that we're all united now, let's consider the Brave Catherine Vogt Experiment.
Catherine Vogt, 14, is an Illinois 8th grader, the daughter of a liberal mom and a conservative dad. She wanted to conduct an experiment in political tolerance and diversity of opinion at her school in the liberal suburb of Oak Park.
She noticed that fellow students at Gwendolyn Brooks Middle School overwhelmingly supported Barack Obama for president. His campaign kept preaching "inclusion," and she decided to see how included she could be.
So just before the election, Catherine consulted with her history teacher, then bravely wore a unique T-shirt to school and recorded the comments of teachers and students in her journal. The T-shirt bore the simple yet quite subversive words drawn with a red marker:
"McCain Girl."
"I was just really curious how they'd react to something that different, because a lot of people at my school wore Obama shirts and they are big Obama supporters," Catherine told us. "I just really wanted to see what their reaction would be."
Immediately, Catherine learned she was stupid for wearing a shirt with Republican John McCain's name. Not merely stupid. Very stupid.
"People were upset. But they started saying things, calling me very stupid, telling me my shirt was stupid and I shouldn't be wearing it," Catherine said.
Then it got worse.
"One person told me to go die. It was a lot of dying. A lot of comments about how I should be killed," Catherine said, of the tolerance in Oak Park.
But students weren't the only ones surprised that she wore a shirt supporting McCain.
"In one class, I had one teacher say she will not judge me for my choice, but that she was surprised that I supported McCain," Catherine said.
If Catherine was shocked by such passive-aggressive threats from instructors, just wait until she goes to college.
"Later, that teacher found out about the experiment and said she was embarrassed because she knew I was writing down what she said," Catherine said.
One student suggested that she be put up on a cross for her political beliefs.
"He said, 'You should be crucifixed.' It was kind of funny because, I was like, don't you mean 'crucified?' " Catherine said.
Other entries in her notebook involved suggestions by classmates that she be "burned with her shirt on" for "being a filthy-rich Republican."
Some said that because she supported McCain, by extension she supported a plan by deranged skinheads to kill Obama before the election. And I thought such politicized logic was confined to American newsrooms. Yet Catherine refused to argue with her peers. She didn't want to jeopardize her experiment.
"I couldn't show people really what it was for. I really kind of wanted to laugh because they had no idea what I was doing," she said.
Only a few times did anyone say anything remotely positive about her McCain shirt. One girl pulled her aside in a corner, out of earshot of other students, and whispered, "I really like your shirt."
Catherine wore an "Obama Girl" T-shirt the next day.
Catherine wasn't very stupid anymore. She grew brains.
"People liked my shirt. They said things like my brain had come back, and I had put the right shirt on today," Catherine said.
She got extra credit in her history class for her experiment, and she learned how bad it can feel to be in the minority.
Most importantly, though, is that Catherine taught her school (and the rest of us) a valuable lesson that, really, everybody already knew: Tolerance, peace, and harmony live on the left side of the aisle, and intolerance, anger, and hate live on the right. I mean, I think that's what she discovered...
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
Happy Veterans Day
Photo credit: Alfred Eisenstadt
To all who served during wartime, thank you for the sacrifices you made for our country. We owe you a debt we cannot repay.
God bless our veterans on this and every day!
Monday, November 10, 2008
Handstands
I saw this at Sparks from the Anvil last month and thought about posting it on my blog, but evidently that thought left my mind almost as quickly as it arrived.
Then last Thursday I was talking to one of my daughter's friends, who had done gymnastics in high school and was now trying her hand at pole vault in college. The gymnastics reminded me of the video, so I told her about it, and when I got home, I asked my daughter to "Facebook it" to her.
Another of my daughter's friends was visiting at the time, so we showed it to her. And right before my daughter went to bed, she asked me to play it again for her (her computer was already shut down), so I did, which got the song running through my head so strongly that I woke up with it too!
Here's the video. Watch and be happy.
We've decided that the little girls with the T-shirts over their faces can probably see through the fabric. And the girl who sticks her face up to the camera in the middle of the video reminds me of my niece when she was younger (yes, my sister, that would be your daughter, not our brother's).
Great video! Thank you, WordSmith. You're a genius.
Then last Thursday I was talking to one of my daughter's friends, who had done gymnastics in high school and was now trying her hand at pole vault in college. The gymnastics reminded me of the video, so I told her about it, and when I got home, I asked my daughter to "Facebook it" to her.
Another of my daughter's friends was visiting at the time, so we showed it to her. And right before my daughter went to bed, she asked me to play it again for her (her computer was already shut down), so I did, which got the song running through my head so strongly that I woke up with it too!
Here's the video. Watch and be happy.
We've decided that the little girls with the T-shirts over their faces can probably see through the fabric. And the girl who sticks her face up to the camera in the middle of the video reminds me of my niece when she was younger (yes, my sister, that would be your daughter, not our brother's).
Great video! Thank you, WordSmith. You're a genius.
Movie Star Lip Quiz
Photo credit: Wireimage
The entertainment section of the Los Angeles Times has a fun quiz: Decide which Hollywood stars have real lips or enhanced lips. They show a '"then" and "now" picture and let you vote.
What made it tough for me with some of the stars was that the "then" picture had the woman smiling. This made her lips look thin and made it harder to decide if "now" was fuller because of collagen or just because she wasn't smiling.
Happy Birthday, Marine Corps!
Sunday, November 09, 2008
Remembering Kristallnacht
It was 70 years ago today.
YNet News reported today on a call for a night-long vigil.
Jews across the world will be lighting up the night this Sunday, as a vigil for victims of Kristallnacht, the Nazis' widespread anti-Jewish pogrom 70 years ago in which over a thousand synagogues were destroyed and hundreds of Jews were killed or arrested.
Israeli officials are encouraging synagogues and midrashot (centers for Jewish learning) across the world to remain illuminated overnight, on the night between November 9 and November 10, in memory of the fallen.
"The Nazis' objective was to darken Israel's eyes and turn off 'the light of the world', the light of the Torah and prayer that shone out of synagogues and midrashot," read a joint message published by Social Affairs Minister Isaac Herzog and chief rabbis Yona Metzger and Shlomo Amar.
"As such we call on all of the people of Israel, in the State of Israel and in the Diaspora, to light candles and leave lights on in synagogues and midrashot on the 12th night of (the Jewish month of) Marheshvan, in order to remember and to remind future generations never to forget the cruelty and evil actions that befell us," the statement continued.
In a related story, YNet News reported October 22, 2008, that artifacts from Kristallnacht had been found in a Brandenburg waste dump.
The items have recently been unearthed by [Israeli investigative reporter] Yaron Svoray at a waste site the size of four soccer fields in Brandenburg, located north of Berlin.
The waste site is located in close proximity to the former home of Hermann Goering, who commanded the German air force (Luftwaffe) during World War II.
Kristallnacht, also known as the "Night of Broken Glass" or the "Crystal Night pogroms," saw the destruction of more than 200 synagogues and the ransacking of tens of thousands of Jewish businesses and homes. During the Nazi pogrom 92 Jews were murdered and 25,000–30,000 were arrested and deported to concentration camps.
According to Svoray, the son of the waste site's watchman had told him that remnants from Kristallnacht were dumped there, and after learning of the possible importance of the artifacts from the director of the Kibbutz Lochmei Ha’ Getaot Museum, Simcha Stein, he returned to Germany with a group of volunteers.
"Within an hour of digging with our bare hands we found a bottle embossed with a Star of David," Svoray told Ynet. "We were very excited, because the chances of a bottle surviving a war are so slim.
"Forty meters (approx. 130 feet) from where we unearthed the bottle I discovered a huge metallic swastika. That's when I knew we had a major story on our hands," the journalist said.
Additional artifacts found by Svoray's crew included mezuzahs and chiseled windowsills and armrests from destroyed synagogues. A swastika-shaped ornament was also discovered.
The search for additional artifacts at the site is ongoing under the constant watch of bodyguards, this after Svoray complained of threats made on his life.
Pope Benedict XVI commemorated the anniversary as well.
"Still today I feel pain over what happened in those tragic events, whose memory must serve to ensure such horrors are never repeated and that we strive, on every level, against all forms of anti-Semitism and discrimination ...," said the pope.
"I invite people to pray for the victims of that night and to join me in expressing profound solidarity with the Jewish world," the pontiff told crowds at the Vatican after his regular Sunday Angelus address.
Pope Benedict, born Joseph Ratzinger in Bavaria in 1927, was forced to join the Hitler Youth as a teenager, though both his parents opposed the Nazis.
Earlier this year the pontiff spoke in New York about his teenage years being "marred by a sinister regime".
Let us never forget--and never repeat. I, for one, will be leaving my porch light on all night.
Photo credit (all photos): United States Holocaust Memorial Museum
Saturday, November 08, 2008
Democrats Eyeing Private Retirement Accounts
The Carolina Journal Online reported Tuesday that the Democrats aren't content to let you have your own piece of your retirement pie. They want it all under their thumb. (emphasis all mine)
Democrats in the U.S. House have been conducting hearings on proposals to confiscate workers’ personal retirement accounts — including 401(k)s and IRAs — and convert them to accounts managed by the Social Security Administration.
Triggered by the financial crisis the past two months, the hearings reportedly were meant to stem losses incurred by many workers and retirees whose 401(k) and IRA balances have been shrinking rapidly.
The testimony of Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York, in hearings Oct. 7 drew the most attention and criticism. Testifying for the House Committee on Education and Labor, Ghilarducci proposed that the government eliminate tax breaks for 401(k) and similar retirement accounts, such as IRAs, and confiscate workers’ retirement plan accounts and convert them to universal Guaranteed Retirement Accounts (GRAs) managed by the Social Security Administration.
It's all about equality. Not equality of opportunity, but equality of outcome. And the devil is in the details.
GRAs would guarantee a fixed 3 percent annual rate of return, although later in her article Ghilarducci explained that participants would not “earn a 3% real return in perpetuity.” In place of tax breaks workers now receive for contributions and thus a lower tax rate, workers would receive $600 annually from the government, inflation-adjusted. For low-income workers whose annual contributions are less than $600, the government would deposit whatever amount it would take to equal the minimum $600 for all participants.
In a radio interview with Kirby Wilbur in Seattle on Oct. 27, 2008, Ghilarducci explained that her proposal doesn’t eliminate the tax breaks, rather, “I’m just rearranging the tax breaks that are available now for 401(k)s and spreading — spreading the wealth.”
Where have I heard that before?
All workers would have 5 percent of their annual pay deducted from their paychecks and deposited to the GRA. They would still be paying Social Security and Medicare taxes, as would the employers. The GRA contribution would be shared equally by the worker and the employee. Employers no longer would be able to write off their contributions. Any capital gains would be taxable year-on-year.
As bad as all that is, that isn't enough confiscation of your retirement funds to suit the Democrats.
Analysts point to another disturbing part of the plan. With a GRA, workers could bequeath only half of their account balances to their heirs, unlike full balances from existing 401(k) and IRA accounts. For workers who die after retiring, they could bequeath just their own contributions plus the interest but minus any benefits received and minus the employer contributions.
To summarize, if I'm understanding this right, is that they'll take our 401(k) or IRA, guarantee an unreal return of 3%, force us to contribute 5% of our income whether we can afford that or not, and then they'll take whatever earnings and employer-contributed funds are left when we die. Oh, yeah, that sounds lucrative!
President-elect Barack Obama has admitted his goal is to spread the wealth from the successful (the upper middle class, not the truly wealthy who have ways of hiding their money from the tax man) to the less successful and the ones who don't even try. But I had no idea they'd be going after retirement accounts.
Hang onto your wallets, because there's no telling what they'll be trying to confiscate next.
Democrats in the U.S. House have been conducting hearings on proposals to confiscate workers’ personal retirement accounts — including 401(k)s and IRAs — and convert them to accounts managed by the Social Security Administration.
Triggered by the financial crisis the past two months, the hearings reportedly were meant to stem losses incurred by many workers and retirees whose 401(k) and IRA balances have been shrinking rapidly.
The testimony of Teresa Ghilarducci, professor of economic policy analysis at the New School for Social Research in New York, in hearings Oct. 7 drew the most attention and criticism. Testifying for the House Committee on Education and Labor, Ghilarducci proposed that the government eliminate tax breaks for 401(k) and similar retirement accounts, such as IRAs, and confiscate workers’ retirement plan accounts and convert them to universal Guaranteed Retirement Accounts (GRAs) managed by the Social Security Administration.
It's all about equality. Not equality of opportunity, but equality of outcome. And the devil is in the details.
GRAs would guarantee a fixed 3 percent annual rate of return, although later in her article Ghilarducci explained that participants would not “earn a 3% real return in perpetuity.” In place of tax breaks workers now receive for contributions and thus a lower tax rate, workers would receive $600 annually from the government, inflation-adjusted. For low-income workers whose annual contributions are less than $600, the government would deposit whatever amount it would take to equal the minimum $600 for all participants.
In a radio interview with Kirby Wilbur in Seattle on Oct. 27, 2008, Ghilarducci explained that her proposal doesn’t eliminate the tax breaks, rather, “I’m just rearranging the tax breaks that are available now for 401(k)s and spreading — spreading the wealth.”
Where have I heard that before?
All workers would have 5 percent of their annual pay deducted from their paychecks and deposited to the GRA. They would still be paying Social Security and Medicare taxes, as would the employers. The GRA contribution would be shared equally by the worker and the employee. Employers no longer would be able to write off their contributions. Any capital gains would be taxable year-on-year.
As bad as all that is, that isn't enough confiscation of your retirement funds to suit the Democrats.
Analysts point to another disturbing part of the plan. With a GRA, workers could bequeath only half of their account balances to their heirs, unlike full balances from existing 401(k) and IRA accounts. For workers who die after retiring, they could bequeath just their own contributions plus the interest but minus any benefits received and minus the employer contributions.
To summarize, if I'm understanding this right, is that they'll take our 401(k) or IRA, guarantee an unreal return of 3%, force us to contribute 5% of our income whether we can afford that or not, and then they'll take whatever earnings and employer-contributed funds are left when we die. Oh, yeah, that sounds lucrative!
President-elect Barack Obama has admitted his goal is to spread the wealth from the successful (the upper middle class, not the truly wealthy who have ways of hiding their money from the tax man) to the less successful and the ones who don't even try. But I had no idea they'd be going after retirement accounts.
Hang onto your wallets, because there's no telling what they'll be trying to confiscate next.
Neil Cavuto on More Bailouts
Neil Cavuto's Common Sense commentary on Fox News yesterday was brilliant.
So it looks like the auto giants are going to get another bailout. They say they desperately need another bailout. Nancy Pelosi says they deserve another bailout.
GM just lost two and a half billion dollars. The others aren't looking much better. Which is why they're so bitter and why they're in Washington looking to barter: "You give us the dough, or more jobs will go." So it looks like we're going to give them more dough.
What amazes me is that we're giving it without a lot more conditions. In fact, darn near no conditions, which to me is weird. You would think if you're giving a group that much money, you would at least politely ask them how they're going to spend it.
Here is what I would do: "OK. We will bail you out, but here's what you have to do: Resign. Each and every one of you chief executives will have to resign. Obviously you screwed up, built too much of the wrong cars people didn't want and too few of the real cars people did want. So here's what we don't want: You! Submit your resignations now, and understand that you're not entitled to any bonuses or golden parachutes on the way out. Just a swift kick-butt in the ass. Now sign here."
I wonder what would happen. I wonder if they would still seek that bailout. I wonder if any begging industry's CEO would seek a bailout if they knew they'd have to resign. Maybe we wouldn't see so many hats in so many hands. Maybe we wouldn't see any hat in any hand.
Or maybe we'd be pleasantly surprised that for the good of their company they'd leave the company.
Bailouts are dangers, my friends, not only because they absolve companies of their responsibilities, but the very CEOs responsible for the mess from claiming any responsibility.
So, if we're to go this maddening route, try this mad idea. Anyone can come to Washington begging to save jobs as long as they understand the first one they lose in the process--the very first--is their own.
I like it. Let's call Congress and get this started.
So it looks like the auto giants are going to get another bailout. They say they desperately need another bailout. Nancy Pelosi says they deserve another bailout.
GM just lost two and a half billion dollars. The others aren't looking much better. Which is why they're so bitter and why they're in Washington looking to barter: "You give us the dough, or more jobs will go." So it looks like we're going to give them more dough.
What amazes me is that we're giving it without a lot more conditions. In fact, darn near no conditions, which to me is weird. You would think if you're giving a group that much money, you would at least politely ask them how they're going to spend it.
Here is what I would do: "OK. We will bail you out, but here's what you have to do: Resign. Each and every one of you chief executives will have to resign. Obviously you screwed up, built too much of the wrong cars people didn't want and too few of the real cars people did want. So here's what we don't want: You! Submit your resignations now, and understand that you're not entitled to any bonuses or golden parachutes on the way out. Just a swift kick-butt in the ass. Now sign here."
I wonder what would happen. I wonder if they would still seek that bailout. I wonder if any begging industry's CEO would seek a bailout if they knew they'd have to resign. Maybe we wouldn't see so many hats in so many hands. Maybe we wouldn't see any hat in any hand.
Or maybe we'd be pleasantly surprised that for the good of their company they'd leave the company.
Bailouts are dangers, my friends, not only because they absolve companies of their responsibilities, but the very CEOs responsible for the mess from claiming any responsibility.
So, if we're to go this maddening route, try this mad idea. Anyone can come to Washington begging to save jobs as long as they understand the first one they lose in the process--the very first--is their own.
I like it. Let's call Congress and get this started.
Friday, November 07, 2008
First Dog Barney Bites Reporter
The Swamp reported yesterday on the latest news at the White House, complete with this video.
This reporter has no clue about dogs. The beginning of the video shows Barney turning away from the reporters, and at no time was his tail wagging. This was a Barney who wanted to be left alone. And when the clueless reporter stuck his hand in Barney's face, Barney let him have it.
To be fair, the reporter was a good sport about it, showing off his bandaged finger (treated by the White House physician, no less!) and discussing his treatment.
So now we know Barney is one more member of the Bush family that doesn't take any mistreatment from reporters.
This reporter has no clue about dogs. The beginning of the video shows Barney turning away from the reporters, and at no time was his tail wagging. This was a Barney who wanted to be left alone. And when the clueless reporter stuck his hand in Barney's face, Barney let him have it.
To be fair, the reporter was a good sport about it, showing off his bandaged finger (treated by the White House physician, no less!) and discussing his treatment.
So now we know Barney is one more member of the Bush family that doesn't take any mistreatment from reporters.
Thursday, November 06, 2008
Trashing Palin
Photo credit: Fox NewsIt was bad enough when the news media made its relentless attacks against Sarah Palin. That was to be expected for an industry that picked Barack Obama as its golden boy and took every opportunity to destroy anybody in Obama's way. They started with Hillary Clinton then moved on to McCain and slavered over the chance to dig up every speck of dust in Palin's life.
Now it's McCain's campaign staff trashing her. Tom Flannery's excellent column yesterday looked into the question of McCain blame.
The John McCain campaign didn't wait for Tuesday's decisive loss to start pinning the blame for the shellacking on Sarah Palin. It started weeks earlier with campaign operatives putting out the word that she was a "diva," saying she was difficult to work with and confirming reports of a rift with McCain. Not to mention the leaking of a $150,000 bill for clothing that Palin neither picked out nor paid for, but for which she was saddled with the entirety of the blame.
Talk about the "Straight Talk Express" going off the rails!
The media elites who have demonized and demeaned Palin in every way imaginable will surely run with the McCain campaign's spin and milk it for all it's worth. The storyline will likely lead the election postmortem coverage for quite some time to come. Before long, hardly anyone will remember how energized the Republican National Convention – and the Republican base nationally – was by the Palin selection, or how McCain emerged from that convention (thanks to her stunning performance) with a solid lead over Obama.
Then came the Wall Street financial crisis, and rather than side with the people – who abhorred the Washington bailout and opposed it with unbridled intensity – McCain instead made himself the public face of that bailout by suspending his campaign and rushing back to Washington to try to hammer out the deal. With that, his poll numbers collapsed.
McCain probably couldn't help himself. This is what he'd been doing his entire career – working with Washington liberals to push through horrendous legislation or reach arranged "compromises" favorable to the liberal agenda and then taking credit for being courageous enough to "do the right thing."
This time, McCain alienated not only conservatives across the country (as he had done repeatedly on a host of issues through the years – immigration, campaign finance reform, drilling, judges, etc.) but the vast majority of the voting public – and he never recovered from it. Hundreds of national opinion polls taken from that point forward showed Obama in the lead, often by double digits, as did most polls in the key swing states.
Flannery details multiple ways McCain hamstrung his own campaign, then he gives us this:
He also failed to answer the constant questions about Palin's supposed lack of experience. McCain should have been making the point that, however inexperienced she might be, she nevertheless has far more executive experience than Obama. As Newt Gingrich wrote earlier this week: "[I]t is revealing that no national network TV interviewer asked Gov. Sarah Palin about her experiences as governor; her experience writing an $11 billion state budget; her experience leading the 29,000 employees of the Alaskan state government; her experience negotiating a big deal with ExxonMobil, Shell, BP and the rest of Big Oil; her success in giving the money from that negotiation to the people of Alaska as a $1,300 tax cut for every man, woman and child in the state; or her experience in negotiating a natural-gas pipeline that is the biggest civil-construction project in North America, and which three former governors failed to get done."
Perhaps they were just too busy asking her "gotcha" questions in an attempt to reduce her in the eyes of the American people and impress their fellow media elites with their usefulness to the Obama campaign they all so enthusiastically abetted.
Precisely.
To that end, expect Democrats and the media to make the case in the weeks ahead that the McCain campaign was done in by his decision to nominate such a woefully unqualified running mate. In short, Sarah-bashing will be raised to something of an art form as she is blamed for everything that went wrong.
Still, the fact remains that when all of the votes were tabulated last night, John McCain was left lying in a bed that he himself had made. And if he wants to know who cost him this election, all he has to do is look in the mirror.
Michelle Malkin also has an excellent post on The McCain Campaign's Classless Cowards.
The anonymous trashing of Sarah Palin by blabbermouth McCain aides who are leaking to Fox News is disgusting. Absolutely disgusting.
Allah’s got the vid clip of a report citing unnamed McCain staffers accusing Palin of lacking, in Carl Cameron’s words, “knowledgeability.” More slime here. And here.
At least all the Hollywood and Manhattan Palin-haters were willing to sign their names and put their faces on their attacks.
Historic Voting
Photo source: womenincongress.house.govIt occurred, to me as the media celebrated the opportunity people had to vote for the first time for a black person, that it's not so historic.
The first year I was able to vote in a presidential election was 1976. I was a liberal, looking in scorn on the one or two guys in one of my classes who favored what we libs called "Big Business." They were disgusting.
When I went to the polling booth, did I vote for Jimmy Carter? Not at all.
I wrote in, "Barbara Jordan (D-TX)."
My historic moment was 1976, when I voted for a black and a woman. Obama and Palin weren't historic at all.
Tuesday, November 04, 2008
The End of the World as We Know It
Obama has been elected. @#%&*@!
I don't feel fine. Not yet. Our country is totally screwed (pardon my language, Mom).
Supreme Court Justices who will ignore the Constitution and set destructive precedents that will affect us for a generation or more.
The systematic dismantling of our military, weakening our position as the leader of the free world and opening the door to the enemies of liberty to take control of more countries. Unopposed.
The attempted destruction of Israel by her enemies, followed by nothing more than finger-wagging and a stern scolding of the aggressors (perhaps while blaming Israel for provoking the attacks) from our fearless Obamessiah.
Abortion all the time for any reason.
Working to shut down political dissent. First target: Rush Limbaugh. Or will it be Fox News?
Higher taxes on anybody who pays taxes now, especially businesses. Leading to the complete tanking of the economy. Even the Great Depression II.
There's more, of course, because the Democrats will be able to rule the country without enough Republicans to stop them. Congress's approval ratings are lower than President Bush's, but those same disapproved of Congressional leaders will now be setting the agenda for our country, and Obama will rubber-stamp them, because he's more of a follower than a leader.
Better fill up your tank with gas now, while you can still afford it. You can bet there won't be any drilling for more.
I'd better stop now. Good thing I'm such a sunny optimist, or this could have been really depressing.
In spite of my dismal vision of our country's future, I know Who's in charge. God gave us free will, and we exercised it in the voting booth. Now He will work that to His purposes.
It's time to pray for our nation and pray hard. And then fight for our nation and fight hard. I'll know better what that means when the time comes.
I Voted
I don't have a purple finger, but I voted.
For John McCain and Sarah Palin.
For traditional marriage.
For parental notification before a minor can have an abortion.
For citizen commissions to do redistricting.
Against pretty much everything else.
And now we wait...
Monday, November 03, 2008
Alaska Clears Palin of Troopergate Wrongdoing
The Anchorage Daily News reported today that Governor Sarah Palin was cleared by the Alaska Personnel Board of any ethics violations. Since this is good news for Palin, and since the mainstream media doesn't like good news for Palin, I decided to see what the MSM had to say (if anything) about the subject.
I checked the Los Angeles Times, and they have a headline pretending to take you to an article/blog post about Palin being cleared, but the link goes to a story about how Palin wore jeans on the final campaign day. (Oh, they fixed it now. They presented the highlights and quoted Palin but didn't point out the pertinent information that was also missed by the NY Times and Washington Post, below.)
Then I checked the New York Times, and they have the article (not a big headline, but findable) that describes how the Alaska Personnel Board cleared Gov. Palin. That part of the article takes 5 paragraphs. Then they go on to describe the findings of the Legislative investigator, discuss the "fired" (he wasn't fired, just shuffled to another job, prompting him to resign and claim he was fired) Monegan's point of view, and fail to report in the remaining 18 paragraphs that the Alaska Legislature (and its investigator) has absolutely no jurisdiction over gubernatorial ethics violations. That responsibility lies solely with the Alaska Personnel Board (see
Sec. 39.52.310 item c). But the New York Times didn't think that was worth mentioning.
You may notice that I didn't link to the New York Times. That's because I promised, after the NY Times spilled state secrets, that I would never link to them and only mention them if it helps discredit them.
The Washingon Post is also covering the story with an anti-Palin slant:
After Palin was selected as Sen. John McCain's running mate, her attorneys attempted to take the investigation out of the hands of the legislative investigator by asking her hand-picked, three-person State Personnel Board to look into the matter. At a routine meeting, the board surprised attendees by announcing that its investigator would release his findings yesterday.
Keep in mind that the "hand-picked" comment is a big, fat lie. Two of the three members were appointed by Palin's predecessor, Gov. Frank Murkowski (last paragraph). Also, the Post makes the same error as the NYT of assuming the Legislature had any legal purpose (besides sheer politics) in conducting an investigation.
Yes, your objective media at work...
I checked the Los Angeles Times, and they have a headline pretending to take you to an article/blog post about Palin being cleared, but the link goes to a story about how Palin wore jeans on the final campaign day. (Oh, they fixed it now. They presented the highlights and quoted Palin but didn't point out the pertinent information that was also missed by the NY Times and Washington Post, below.)
Then I checked the New York Times, and they have the article (not a big headline, but findable) that describes how the Alaska Personnel Board cleared Gov. Palin. That part of the article takes 5 paragraphs. Then they go on to describe the findings of the Legislative investigator, discuss the "fired" (he wasn't fired, just shuffled to another job, prompting him to resign and claim he was fired) Monegan's point of view, and fail to report in the remaining 18 paragraphs that the Alaska Legislature (and its investigator) has absolutely no jurisdiction over gubernatorial ethics violations. That responsibility lies solely with the Alaska Personnel Board (see
Sec. 39.52.310 item c). But the New York Times didn't think that was worth mentioning.
You may notice that I didn't link to the New York Times. That's because I promised, after the NY Times spilled state secrets, that I would never link to them and only mention them if it helps discredit them.
The Washingon Post is also covering the story with an anti-Palin slant:
After Palin was selected as Sen. John McCain's running mate, her attorneys attempted to take the investigation out of the hands of the legislative investigator by asking her hand-picked, three-person State Personnel Board to look into the matter. At a routine meeting, the board surprised attendees by announcing that its investigator would release his findings yesterday.
Keep in mind that the "hand-picked" comment is a big, fat lie. Two of the three members were appointed by Palin's predecessor, Gov. Frank Murkowski (last paragraph). Also, the Post makes the same error as the NYT of assuming the Legislature had any legal purpose (besides sheer politics) in conducting an investigation.
Yes, your objective media at work...
Reasons Not To Vote For Obama
First, let me start with the question of Obama's citizenship. Attorney Philip J. Berg, during the primary season, filed suit to require Obama to prove he's a natural born citizen of the US, since only that kind of citizen can be president. His efforts were helped (in the public square, not in the courtroom) by reports that Obama's Kenyan grandmother remembered being in the delivery room when Barack Hussein Obama, Jr. was born. In Kenya. To a mother who was legally too young to confer her American citizenship to her new bundle of joy. And unconfirmed reports circulated that an investigator was able to obtain a Kenyan birth certificate for this event, but I can't find any evidence that this was true.
In the end, Berg's case was dismissed. The judge said that voters don't have the legal standing to enforce the constitutional requirements of the presidency against a candidate for that office. I'm presuming, based on some of the wording, that if Obama wins, then maybe voters will be able to sue.
But yesterday Hawaiian officials declared that Obama's Hawaiian birth certificate is genuine, so that issue looks to be moot at this point. But really, there are plenty of other, better, reasons not to vote for Barack Obama.
Associations
I know. I know. People on the left don't think this point has any meaning. After all, it's old news. But Barack Obama has more unsavory friends and associates than any three other presidential candidates in the recent past. Does Obama even have any friends who are genuinely nice people?
Racist, anti-(white)American pastor Jeremiah Wright. Anti-(white)American priest Michale Pfleger. Domestic terrorist William Ayers. Convicted felon and Obama fundraiser Tony Rezko. PLO-supporting Khalid Rashidi. Even Michelle Obama's black "separationism" thesis at Princeton.
There's a saying that you know a man by his friends. These are Obama's friends.
Charles Krauthammer had an interesting take on the dismissal of Obama's associations by the liberal press:
Let me get this straight. A couple of agitated yahoos in a rally of thousands yell something offensive and incendiary, and John McCain and Sarah Palin are not just guilty by association -- with total strangers, mind you -- but worse: guilty according to The New York Times of "race-baiting and xenophobia."
But should you bring up Barack Obama's real associations -- 20 years with Jeremiah Wright, working on two foundations and distributing money with William Ayers, citing the raving Michael Pfleger as one who helps him keep his moral compass (Chicago Sun-Times, April 2004) and the long-standing relationship with the left-wing vote-fraud specialist ACORN -- you have crossed the line into illegitimate guilt by association. Moreover, it is tinged with racism.
Exactly. Who you surround yourself with matters, and Obama has surrounded himself for years with angry, America-hating creeps. It raises the serious question of who he will surround himself with during his administration, should he win (God forbid).
Energy
Obama wants us to conserve energy, and to do that, he wants "price signals" to make us quit using so much energy. If he artificially inflates the cost of gas and electricity through taxation, then he makes consumers hurt enough to stop driving and to keep the lights off at home.
At the same time, he wants to bankrupt the coal industry with greenhouse gas cap-and-trade fees, so no new coal plants will be built. And he opposes offshore oil drilling, though in August he softened that position to maybe possibly consider it.
Abortion
Obama is so much in favor of abortion that he does not appear to be on record opposing any kind of abortion for any reason. He supports allowing "aborted" babies that are born alive to die without medical care. He supports partial-birth abortion, the process of delivering the baby in a breech position but leaving the head inside the mother and puncturing the baby's skull to suck out the brain. He has promised Planned Parenthood, "The first thing I will do as President is sign the Freedom of Choice Act."
The bill would codify the 1973 Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, into law in all the states. This would overturn state laws that have been passed to limit or delay abortions. Contrary to Mr. Obama's pledges to reduce the number of abortions, he really wants to make them easier to get - while overriding state and federal laws.
Judicial Appointments
Obama believes that condition of a judicial nominee's heart is a more important consideration than his understanding of the law and the Constitution.
Taxes
Obama wants to raise taxes on the "rich" to give tax breaks to everybody else. Unfortunately, the definition of rich keeps dropping. It started as $250,000 then dropped to $200,000, then Biden said it was $150,000. Then Bill Richardson, while campaigning for Obama, defined rich as people making $120,000. The bottom line is that when Obama says, "rich," if you pay taxes, he's talking about you.
And what does Obama plan to do with his tax increases? He wants to "spread the wealth." Just ask Joe the Plumber. This post at Flopping Aces, including comment #2 and #16, gives real-world examples of the realities of redistributing wealth.
Don't forget, if you oppose higher taxes, Obama thinks you're selfish.
There's much more...
...but I'm running out of time.
DO NOT let the exit polling tomorrow discourage you from voting! It's not as bad as it looks. The exit polling in 2000 showed Al Gore winning Florida, and in 2004 they showed Kerry winning. The Democrats over-poll in exit polling because Republicans don't trust the pollsters and media, and so they decline to talk more than Democrats do. Keep the faith and VOTE MCCAIN/PALIN!
Update:
Here's a good summary of Obama's position on many topics, in his own words.
In the end, Berg's case was dismissed. The judge said that voters don't have the legal standing to enforce the constitutional requirements of the presidency against a candidate for that office. I'm presuming, based on some of the wording, that if Obama wins, then maybe voters will be able to sue.
But yesterday Hawaiian officials declared that Obama's Hawaiian birth certificate is genuine, so that issue looks to be moot at this point. But really, there are plenty of other, better, reasons not to vote for Barack Obama.
Associations
I know. I know. People on the left don't think this point has any meaning. After all, it's old news. But Barack Obama has more unsavory friends and associates than any three other presidential candidates in the recent past. Does Obama even have any friends who are genuinely nice people?
Racist, anti-(white)American pastor Jeremiah Wright. Anti-(white)American priest Michale Pfleger. Domestic terrorist William Ayers. Convicted felon and Obama fundraiser Tony Rezko. PLO-supporting Khalid Rashidi. Even Michelle Obama's black "separationism" thesis at Princeton.
There's a saying that you know a man by his friends. These are Obama's friends.
Charles Krauthammer had an interesting take on the dismissal of Obama's associations by the liberal press:
Let me get this straight. A couple of agitated yahoos in a rally of thousands yell something offensive and incendiary, and John McCain and Sarah Palin are not just guilty by association -- with total strangers, mind you -- but worse: guilty according to The New York Times of "race-baiting and xenophobia."
But should you bring up Barack Obama's real associations -- 20 years with Jeremiah Wright, working on two foundations and distributing money with William Ayers, citing the raving Michael Pfleger as one who helps him keep his moral compass (Chicago Sun-Times, April 2004) and the long-standing relationship with the left-wing vote-fraud specialist ACORN -- you have crossed the line into illegitimate guilt by association. Moreover, it is tinged with racism.
Exactly. Who you surround yourself with matters, and Obama has surrounded himself for years with angry, America-hating creeps. It raises the serious question of who he will surround himself with during his administration, should he win (God forbid).
Energy
Obama wants us to conserve energy, and to do that, he wants "price signals" to make us quit using so much energy. If he artificially inflates the cost of gas and electricity through taxation, then he makes consumers hurt enough to stop driving and to keep the lights off at home.
At the same time, he wants to bankrupt the coal industry with greenhouse gas cap-and-trade fees, so no new coal plants will be built. And he opposes offshore oil drilling, though in August he softened that position to maybe possibly consider it.
Abortion
Obama is so much in favor of abortion that he does not appear to be on record opposing any kind of abortion for any reason. He supports allowing "aborted" babies that are born alive to die without medical care. He supports partial-birth abortion, the process of delivering the baby in a breech position but leaving the head inside the mother and puncturing the baby's skull to suck out the brain. He has promised Planned Parenthood, "The first thing I will do as President is sign the Freedom of Choice Act."
The bill would codify the 1973 Supreme Court decision, Roe v. Wade, into law in all the states. This would overturn state laws that have been passed to limit or delay abortions. Contrary to Mr. Obama's pledges to reduce the number of abortions, he really wants to make them easier to get - while overriding state and federal laws.
Judicial Appointments
Obama believes that condition of a judicial nominee's heart is a more important consideration than his understanding of the law and the Constitution.
Taxes
Obama wants to raise taxes on the "rich" to give tax breaks to everybody else. Unfortunately, the definition of rich keeps dropping. It started as $250,000 then dropped to $200,000, then Biden said it was $150,000. Then Bill Richardson, while campaigning for Obama, defined rich as people making $120,000. The bottom line is that when Obama says, "rich," if you pay taxes, he's talking about you.
And what does Obama plan to do with his tax increases? He wants to "spread the wealth." Just ask Joe the Plumber. This post at Flopping Aces, including comment #2 and #16, gives real-world examples of the realities of redistributing wealth.
Don't forget, if you oppose higher taxes, Obama thinks you're selfish.
There's much more...
...but I'm running out of time.
DO NOT let the exit polling tomorrow discourage you from voting! It's not as bad as it looks. The exit polling in 2000 showed Al Gore winning Florida, and in 2004 they showed Kerry winning. The Democrats over-poll in exit polling because Republicans don't trust the pollsters and media, and so they decline to talk more than Democrats do. Keep the faith and VOTE MCCAIN/PALIN!
Update:
Here's a good summary of Obama's position on many topics, in his own words.
Saturday, November 01, 2008
Endangered Tree Octopus
In my extensive research for my Otto the Octopus post, I stumbled across this website devoted to saving the endangered Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus.
The Pacific Northwest tree octopus (Octopus paxarbolis) can be found in the temperate rainforests of the Olympic Peninsula on the west coast of North America. Their habitat lies on the Eastern side of the Olympic mountain range, adjacent to Hood Canal. These solitary cephalopods reach an average size (measured from arm-tip to mantle-tip,) of 30-33 cm. Unlike most other cephalopods, tree octopuses are amphibious, spending only their early life and the period of their mating season in their ancestral aquatic environment. Because of the moistness of the rainforests and specialized skin adaptations, they are able to keep from becoming desiccated for prolonged periods of time, but given the chance they would prefer resting in pooled water.
An intelligent and inquisitive being (it has the largest brain-to-body ratio for any mollusk), the tree octopus explores its arboreal world by both touch and sight. Adaptations its ancestors originally evolved in the three dimensional environment of the sea have been put to good use in the spatially complex maze of the coniferous Olympic rainforests. The challenges and richness of this environment (and the intimate way in which it interacts with it,) may account for the tree octopus's advanced behavioral development. (Some evolutionary theorists suppose that "arboreal adaptation" is what laid the groundwork in primates for the evolution of the human mind.)
It has a ring of authenticity to it while being completely unbelievable at the same time. In fact, there's even a link to the Telegraph article on Otto over on the left.
So I did a little more investigating and found the Tree Octopus in Wikipedia. Wikipedia says:
The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus was an internet hoax created in 1998 by Lyle Zapato.[1] This fictitious endangered species of cephalopod was given the Latin name "Octopus paxarbolis" (which means, roughly, "Pacific tree octopus"). It was purported to be able to live both on land and in water, and was said to live in the Olympic National Forest and nearby rivers, spawning in water where eggs are laid. Its major predator was said to be the Sasquatch.
The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus website is among a number of sites commonly used in Internet literacy classes in schools, although it was not created for that purpose. Despite the falsehoods shown on the site, such as its support by "GreenPeas.org," the mentioning of other hoax species such as the Rock Nest Monster, the mountain walrus,[2] and its affiliation with People for the Ethical Treatment of Pumpkins (P.E.T.PU.) (cleverly mixed with links to pages about real species and organizations), 24 of 25 students involved in one well-publicized test believed the content.[3][4] (emphasis added)
I'm glad I wasn't fooled.
Here's hoping the Otto story isn't a hoax!
The Pacific Northwest tree octopus (Octopus paxarbolis) can be found in the temperate rainforests of the Olympic Peninsula on the west coast of North America. Their habitat lies on the Eastern side of the Olympic mountain range, adjacent to Hood Canal. These solitary cephalopods reach an average size (measured from arm-tip to mantle-tip,) of 30-33 cm. Unlike most other cephalopods, tree octopuses are amphibious, spending only their early life and the period of their mating season in their ancestral aquatic environment. Because of the moistness of the rainforests and specialized skin adaptations, they are able to keep from becoming desiccated for prolonged periods of time, but given the chance they would prefer resting in pooled water.An intelligent and inquisitive being (it has the largest brain-to-body ratio for any mollusk), the tree octopus explores its arboreal world by both touch and sight. Adaptations its ancestors originally evolved in the three dimensional environment of the sea have been put to good use in the spatially complex maze of the coniferous Olympic rainforests. The challenges and richness of this environment (and the intimate way in which it interacts with it,) may account for the tree octopus's advanced behavioral development. (Some evolutionary theorists suppose that "arboreal adaptation" is what laid the groundwork in primates for the evolution of the human mind.)
It has a ring of authenticity to it while being completely unbelievable at the same time. In fact, there's even a link to the Telegraph article on Otto over on the left.
So I did a little more investigating and found the Tree Octopus in Wikipedia. Wikipedia says:
The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus was an internet hoax created in 1998 by Lyle Zapato.[1] This fictitious endangered species of cephalopod was given the Latin name "Octopus paxarbolis" (which means, roughly, "Pacific tree octopus"). It was purported to be able to live both on land and in water, and was said to live in the Olympic National Forest and nearby rivers, spawning in water where eggs are laid. Its major predator was said to be the Sasquatch.
The Pacific Northwest Tree Octopus website is among a number of sites commonly used in Internet literacy classes in schools, although it was not created for that purpose. Despite the falsehoods shown on the site, such as its support by "GreenPeas.org," the mentioning of other hoax species such as the Rock Nest Monster, the mountain walrus,[2] and its affiliation with People for the Ethical Treatment of Pumpkins (P.E.T.PU.) (cleverly mixed with links to pages about real species and organizations), 24 of 25 students involved in one well-publicized test believed the content.[3][4] (emphasis added)
I'm glad I wasn't fooled.
Here's hoping the Otto story isn't a hoax!
Rogue Octopus Wrecks Aquarium
Photo credit: EUROPICS
Don't let your octopi get bored. That's the lesson we learn from Otto the octopus.
The Telegraph (UK) reported yesterday about the cephalopod challenge. Here is the entire article:
Staff believe that the octopus called Otto had been annoyed by the bright light shining into his aquarium and had discovered he could extinguish it by climbing onto the rim of his tank and squirting a jet of water in its direction.
The short-circuit had baffled electricians as well as staff at the Sea Star Aquarium in Coburg, Germany, who decided to take shifts sleeping on the floor to find out what caused the mysterious blackouts.
A spokesman said: "It was a serious matter because it shorted the electricity supply to the whole aquarium that threatened the lives of the other animals when water pumps ceased to work.
"It was on the third night that we found out that the octopus Otto was responsible for the chaos.
"We knew that he was bored as the aquarium is closed for winter, and at two feet, seven inches Otto had discovered he was big enough to swing onto the edge of his tank and shoot out a the 2000 Watt spot light above him with a carefully directed jet of water."
Director Elfriede Kummer who witnessed the act said: "We've put the light a bit higher now so he shouldn't be able to reach it. But Otto is constantly craving for attention and always comes up with new stunts so we have realised we will have to keep more careful eye on him - and also perhaps give him a few more toys to play with.
"Once we saw him juggling the hermit crabs in his tank, another time he threw stones against the glass damaging it. And from time to time he completely re-arranges his tank to make it suit his own taste better - much to the distress of his fellow tank inhabitants."
That Otto is amazing. I learned to juggle balls when I was in my Acting class in college. But Otto figured out how to juggle hermit crabs, without the benefit of an instructor.
The aquarium personnel are going to have their hands full this winter.
Friday, October 31, 2008
Chicago is New US Murder Capital
Chicago Breaking News reported October 24, 2008, that Chicago is now the Murder Capital of the US.
Chicago is outpacing New York and Los Angeles in 2008 murders, the Sun-Times reports.
Chicago, whose population is less than either of those cities, posted 426 killings through Tuesday, compared with 417 in New York and 302 in L.A.
At the end of 1998, Chicago made international headlines as the U.S. "murder capital" after surpassing New York's homicide totals for the first time ever. Chicago shed that dubious distinction when murders plummeted over the last decade.
Did you catch that? Chicago had 426 murders through October 21st.
Contrast that to the US combat fatalities in Iraq, reported here.
I added up the deaths for this year (reported by Year/Month) all the way through the end of October, giving the terrorists an extra 10 days over Chicago's bad guys to get their shots in.
We've had 282 deaths in Iraq this year. As reported by the AP today, October saw 13 deaths, the lowest month this year.
Now, Obama wants to pull our troops out of Iraq ASAP and let the Iraqis fend for themselves. But Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles have all had worse years than our military in Iraq has. Imagine if Obama took the same approach to fighting murder in our major cities that he wants to take to fighting the terrorists in Iraq: Pull out the police and let the people of Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles defend themselves.
How well would that go? And how quickly would Obama and his supporters on the left start blaming Chicagoans for not stepping up to the plate fast enough to keep the bloodbath from happening? Because you can be darn sure that Obama wouldn't be accepting one iota of blame for the results of his policies.
Being on the left means never having to say you're sorry...
Chicago is outpacing New York and Los Angeles in 2008 murders, the Sun-Times reports.
Chicago, whose population is less than either of those cities, posted 426 killings through Tuesday, compared with 417 in New York and 302 in L.A.
At the end of 1998, Chicago made international headlines as the U.S. "murder capital" after surpassing New York's homicide totals for the first time ever. Chicago shed that dubious distinction when murders plummeted over the last decade.
Did you catch that? Chicago had 426 murders through October 21st.
Contrast that to the US combat fatalities in Iraq, reported here.
I added up the deaths for this year (reported by Year/Month) all the way through the end of October, giving the terrorists an extra 10 days over Chicago's bad guys to get their shots in.
We've had 282 deaths in Iraq this year. As reported by the AP today, October saw 13 deaths, the lowest month this year.
Now, Obama wants to pull our troops out of Iraq ASAP and let the Iraqis fend for themselves. But Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles have all had worse years than our military in Iraq has. Imagine if Obama took the same approach to fighting murder in our major cities that he wants to take to fighting the terrorists in Iraq: Pull out the police and let the people of Chicago, New York, and Los Angeles defend themselves.
How well would that go? And how quickly would Obama and his supporters on the left start blaming Chicagoans for not stepping up to the plate fast enough to keep the bloodbath from happening? Because you can be darn sure that Obama wouldn't be accepting one iota of blame for the results of his policies.
Being on the left means never having to say you're sorry...
Happy Halloween
It's almost 8:00pm, and I'm waiting for Trick-or-Treaters to come.
I stopped at Costco today for an emergency acquisition of creamer, and I also bought a package of candy just in case. It's Costco-sized candy: 150 pieces. I don't know what possessed me to get that many, but I didn't want to be caught short.
At home, I separated out the Kit-Kats into a smaller bowl to keep for us and put the rest into the big Halloween bowl. Then my daughter came home and announced that she just picked up three bags of candy, since we didn't have any. When I told her about the Costco bag, she said she'd take her candy to her friend's house for the party.
I put the Nestle's Crunch in the bowl with the Kit-Kats for my daughter and added a few packages of M&M's, because they're good to eat with a cup of tea, and then I put the big bowl by the front door and turned on the porch light.
I kept hearing voices outside, so I stayed ready to run to the door. Finally, I went outside and looked up and down the street. It's empty, except for the neighbors a couple doors down (grow-ups) who are standing outside talking.
No children. No costumes. My next-door neighbors with the little kids aren't home. The other next-door neighbors with the slightly older kids show no sign of Trick-or-Treating in their plans.
I have 150 pieces of candy...
Oh wait! I hear little kids outside. Maybe they're on their way.
You can watch this while I go hang out by the door. Beware, it could be disturbing to young children (HT: Michelle Malkin).
Update (9:15pm):
Nobody came. If I had a job, I could take the leftover candy (but not the Kit-Kats and Crunches) to work.
I stopped at Costco today for an emergency acquisition of creamer, and I also bought a package of candy just in case. It's Costco-sized candy: 150 pieces. I don't know what possessed me to get that many, but I didn't want to be caught short.
At home, I separated out the Kit-Kats into a smaller bowl to keep for us and put the rest into the big Halloween bowl. Then my daughter came home and announced that she just picked up three bags of candy, since we didn't have any. When I told her about the Costco bag, she said she'd take her candy to her friend's house for the party.
I put the Nestle's Crunch in the bowl with the Kit-Kats for my daughter and added a few packages of M&M's, because they're good to eat with a cup of tea, and then I put the big bowl by the front door and turned on the porch light.
I kept hearing voices outside, so I stayed ready to run to the door. Finally, I went outside and looked up and down the street. It's empty, except for the neighbors a couple doors down (grow-ups) who are standing outside talking.
No children. No costumes. My next-door neighbors with the little kids aren't home. The other next-door neighbors with the slightly older kids show no sign of Trick-or-Treating in their plans.
I have 150 pieces of candy...
Oh wait! I hear little kids outside. Maybe they're on their way.
You can watch this while I go hang out by the door. Beware, it could be disturbing to young children (HT: Michelle Malkin).
Update (9:15pm):
Nobody came. If I had a job, I could take the leftover candy (but not the Kit-Kats and Crunches) to work.
PETA Urges Ben & Jerry's to use Mother's Milk
This is old news by now, having happened in September, but I spotted it again in the file where I save blog ideas for future- or non-use.
WPTZ reported September 23, 2008, on a request PETA sent to Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sent a letter to Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, cofounders of Ben & Jerry's Homemade Inc., urging them to replace cow's milk they use in their ice cream products with human breast milk, according to a statement recently released by a PETA spokeswoman.
"PETA's request comes in the wake of news reports that a Swiss restaurant owner will begin purchasing breast milk from nursing mothers and substituting breast milk for 75 percent of the cow's milk in the food he serves," the statement says.
PETA officials say a move to human breast milk would lessen the suffering of dairy cows and their babies on factory farms and benefit human health.
"The fact that human adults consume huge quantities of dairy products made from milk that was meant for a baby cow just doesn't make sense," says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. "Everyone knows that 'the breast is best,' so Ben & Jerry's could do consumers and cows a big favor by making the switch to breast milk."
If it's tough on cows to be constantly giving milk to the ice cream cause, why would PETA want to subject young mothers to similar treatment? Do these people even think?
Ben and Jerry politely declined to follow PETA's suggestion.
"We applaud PETA's novel approach to bringing attention to an issue, but we believe a mother's milk is best used for her child," said a spokesperson for Ben and Jerry's.
The article has a full reprint of the PETA letter to Ben & Jerry's, and it's a real head-shaker.
By the way, I do not buy Ben & Jerry's ice cream, and I don't recommend that brand for any of my friends. Their company donates a lot of money to hard-left causes "that are organizing for systemic social change," and I don't want my money to support them. If you like hard-left causes, you might want to buy their ice cream.
WPTZ reported September 23, 2008, on a request PETA sent to Ben & Jerry's Ice Cream.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals sent a letter to Ben Cohen and Jerry Greenfield, cofounders of Ben & Jerry's Homemade Inc., urging them to replace cow's milk they use in their ice cream products with human breast milk, according to a statement recently released by a PETA spokeswoman.
"PETA's request comes in the wake of news reports that a Swiss restaurant owner will begin purchasing breast milk from nursing mothers and substituting breast milk for 75 percent of the cow's milk in the food he serves," the statement says.
PETA officials say a move to human breast milk would lessen the suffering of dairy cows and their babies on factory farms and benefit human health.
"The fact that human adults consume huge quantities of dairy products made from milk that was meant for a baby cow just doesn't make sense," says PETA Executive Vice President Tracy Reiman. "Everyone knows that 'the breast is best,' so Ben & Jerry's could do consumers and cows a big favor by making the switch to breast milk."
If it's tough on cows to be constantly giving milk to the ice cream cause, why would PETA want to subject young mothers to similar treatment? Do these people even think?
Ben and Jerry politely declined to follow PETA's suggestion.
"We applaud PETA's novel approach to bringing attention to an issue, but we believe a mother's milk is best used for her child," said a spokesperson for Ben and Jerry's.
The article has a full reprint of the PETA letter to Ben & Jerry's, and it's a real head-shaker.
By the way, I do not buy Ben & Jerry's ice cream, and I don't recommend that brand for any of my friends. Their company donates a lot of money to hard-left causes "that are organizing for systemic social change," and I don't want my money to support them. If you like hard-left causes, you might want to buy their ice cream.
Disposable Diapers Good for Environment
The Telegraph (UK) reported October 19, 2008, about the latest news on the environmental impact of disposable diapers ("nappies" in the UK).
A government report that found old-fashioned reusable [cloth] nappies damage the environment more than disposables has been hushed up because ministers are embarrassed by its findings.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has instructed civil servants not to publicise the conclusions of the £50,000 nappy research project and to adopt a “defensive” stance towards its conclusions.
The report found that using washable nappies, hailed by councils throughout Britain as a key way of saving the planet, have a higher carbon footprint than their disposable equivalents unless parents adopt an extreme approach to laundering them.
To reduce the impact of cloth nappies on climate change parents would have to hang wet nappies out to dry all year round, keep them for years for use on younger children, and make sure the water in their washing machines does not exceed 60C.
The conclusions will upset proponents of real nappies who have claimed they can help save the planet.
That's good to hear. When my son was born, I wanted to be a good mother, so I ordered a diaper service because everyone knows cloth diapers are better for the baby. But the parenting classes said that using plastic pants to cover the cloth would defeat the purpose of allowing the cotton to breathe. OK, I tried that, but an uncovered cloth diaper makes the baby's clothes wet too, and I was spending all my time changing baby clothes along with changing diapers. Within a couple weeks, I canceled the diaper service and had them send me disposables for the remainder of my already-paid-for month.
Vindication, however long delayed, is a beautiful thing.
A government report that found old-fashioned reusable [cloth] nappies damage the environment more than disposables has been hushed up because ministers are embarrassed by its findings.
The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has instructed civil servants not to publicise the conclusions of the £50,000 nappy research project and to adopt a “defensive” stance towards its conclusions.
The report found that using washable nappies, hailed by councils throughout Britain as a key way of saving the planet, have a higher carbon footprint than their disposable equivalents unless parents adopt an extreme approach to laundering them.
To reduce the impact of cloth nappies on climate change parents would have to hang wet nappies out to dry all year round, keep them for years for use on younger children, and make sure the water in their washing machines does not exceed 60C.
The conclusions will upset proponents of real nappies who have claimed they can help save the planet.
That's good to hear. When my son was born, I wanted to be a good mother, so I ordered a diaper service because everyone knows cloth diapers are better for the baby. But the parenting classes said that using plastic pants to cover the cloth would defeat the purpose of allowing the cotton to breathe. OK, I tried that, but an uncovered cloth diaper makes the baby's clothes wet too, and I was spending all my time changing baby clothes along with changing diapers. Within a couple weeks, I canceled the diaper service and had them send me disposables for the remainder of my already-paid-for month.
Vindication, however long delayed, is a beautiful thing.
Jerry Dog and his Ball Launcher
Ah, the joys of waiting on hold with the cable company. Two video blog posts while I wait and then recover.
This is a great gizmo for anybody with a ball-chasing dog (my little dog Abby didn't chase balls, and neither did our family dog Fifi when I was a kid).
Here is the comment that accompanies the video on YouTube:
I built the ball machine because I thought my dog Jerry, might like it and that it would be something fun for me to build. So after two years of on and off work, with many safety features such as IR proximity sensors to protect Jerry and my son from the machine, I finally complete.
Far from being a replacement for me, I was always right there with him enjoying his fun. And with all the troubles that I went through to build the ball machine, I still end up throwing more balls than that the machine could count! According to the computer, he played with the machine by himself only 3 times in his life.
I recently put this video on YouTube to keep alive my earlier memories of him and (hopefully) provide some "humorous distractions" for anyone that might drop by.
Please enjoy the video.
I did. Thanks.
This is a great gizmo for anybody with a ball-chasing dog (my little dog Abby didn't chase balls, and neither did our family dog Fifi when I was a kid).
Here is the comment that accompanies the video on YouTube:
I built the ball machine because I thought my dog Jerry, might like it and that it would be something fun for me to build. So after two years of on and off work, with many safety features such as IR proximity sensors to protect Jerry and my son from the machine, I finally complete.
Far from being a replacement for me, I was always right there with him enjoying his fun. And with all the troubles that I went through to build the ball machine, I still end up throwing more balls than that the machine could count! According to the computer, he played with the machine by himself only 3 times in his life.
I recently put this video on YouTube to keep alive my earlier memories of him and (hopefully) provide some "humorous distractions" for anyone that might drop by.
Please enjoy the video.
I did. Thanks.
Digital TV Conversion Instructions
It's time for another Public Service Announcement.
Senior citizens especially, please follow these instructions carefully for a smooth conversion to the digital TV age.
(Sorry for the format issue, but it's too good to ignore.)
Senior citizens especially, please follow these instructions carefully for a smooth conversion to the digital TV age.
(Sorry for the format issue, but it's too good to ignore.)
Saturday, October 25, 2008
Easing Pain
There have been quite a few studies lately focusing on pain management, each one with a different approach.
The Telegraph (UK) reported October 10, 2008, on a pain treatment that is eight times stronger than morphine and lasts 14 times longer--up to three days.
A team at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill School of Medicine have pinpointed the identity of a particular "pain protein" in nerve cells and have found a way of converting it from a substance that causes pain into ones that suppress it.
"This protein has the potential to be a groundbreaking treatment for pain," said lead study author Mark Zylka, assistant professor of cell and molecular physiology at UNC.
The substance, which can be injected, appears to have few side effects and works by neutralising the chemical in the body that causes the brain to feel pain.
The Telegraph reported back in January on another approach to reducing chronic pain.
Prof Hanns Ulrich Zeilhofer and colleagues at the University of Zurich identified a target, which is found in a part of the grey matter of the spinal cord, called the dorsal horn, where signals from pain nerves are relayed to the brain.
The protein receives signals from a messenger chemical, called GABA, which is found throughout the nervous system and inhibits signals. In chronic pain sufferers, these signals decline in the dorsal horn and, as a result, the pain continues.
To restore the signals, Prof Zeilhofer and his team used drugs to target one class of the so called GABA-A receptor. They found that by activating this target produces "pronounced analgesia" without unwanted sedation and without paralysis. Nor did mice build up a tolerance to treatment, unlike with many drugs.
The Telegraph also reported back in January on a gene-therapy approach to pain management.
Now a method to use gene therapy - a gene transplant - to simulate the pain relief effects of morphine and other opiate drugs has been developed by a team in the Department of Medicine and Department of Neurosciences at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York.
His team designed a virus that could carry a pain relief gene called prepro-beta-endorphin into nerve cells. The gene makes an opioid that the body itself produces and that acts like morphine.
The modified viruses were tested by injecting them directly into the spinal fluid of rats via a lumbar puncture, or spinal tap, with only one injection. Results showed that the rats remained symptom-free for over three months.
Another pain relief gene, interleukin-10, was also effective when similarly administered in small doses directly at the spine.
"One of the strengths of our gene therapy work is, that it was effective with an opioid gene and with a non-opioid gene," says Prof Beutler. "Both approaches have important implications."
And just in case you want something a little more natural, The Telegraph reported October 3, 2008, on a "magic bullet" pain-relief technique.
Childbirth, surgery and trips to the dentist might be less traumatic in the future, thanks to a team at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, which has achieved the feat in the laboratory by adding spice to an anaesthetic that by itself should not work because it does not get into nerves.
The sense of pain was selectively switched off in rat hindpaws by injecting QX-314, a normally inactive derivative of the commonly used local anaesthetic lignocaine, and capsaicin, the heat generating ingredient in chilli peppers.
In combination, these chemicals targeted only pain-sensing nerve cells, preventing them from sending signals to the brain. But even though the rats could not feel pain in their paws, they continued to move normally and react to touch.
Why am I focused on pain relief? Am I in pain? No. My mom has some pain since her recent ankle surgery, but it's not the kind of chronic pain these studies are trying to alleviate.
I'm concerned about the push in society for legalizing physician-assisted suicide. The arguments usually include the desire for people to be able to stop their suffering when it becomes unbearable. Morphine can alleviate pain, but the side effects from continuous use are troublesome.
With pain treatments like the ones highlighted by the Telegraph, we can see the time coming not too far down the road when chronic pain may no longer be a factor in the life decisions we have to make. And that can reduce the call for euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide. Any treatments that can help prolong life--rather than unnaturally cut it short--are the kinds of medical advances I want to highlight.
May these research teams be well-funded long enough to get their treatments to the market.
The Telegraph (UK) reported October 10, 2008, on a pain treatment that is eight times stronger than morphine and lasts 14 times longer--up to three days.
A team at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill School of Medicine have pinpointed the identity of a particular "pain protein" in nerve cells and have found a way of converting it from a substance that causes pain into ones that suppress it.
"This protein has the potential to be a groundbreaking treatment for pain," said lead study author Mark Zylka, assistant professor of cell and molecular physiology at UNC.
The substance, which can be injected, appears to have few side effects and works by neutralising the chemical in the body that causes the brain to feel pain.
The Telegraph reported back in January on another approach to reducing chronic pain.
Prof Hanns Ulrich Zeilhofer and colleagues at the University of Zurich identified a target, which is found in a part of the grey matter of the spinal cord, called the dorsal horn, where signals from pain nerves are relayed to the brain.
The protein receives signals from a messenger chemical, called GABA, which is found throughout the nervous system and inhibits signals. In chronic pain sufferers, these signals decline in the dorsal horn and, as a result, the pain continues.
To restore the signals, Prof Zeilhofer and his team used drugs to target one class of the so called GABA-A receptor. They found that by activating this target produces "pronounced analgesia" without unwanted sedation and without paralysis. Nor did mice build up a tolerance to treatment, unlike with many drugs.
The Telegraph also reported back in January on a gene-therapy approach to pain management.
Now a method to use gene therapy - a gene transplant - to simulate the pain relief effects of morphine and other opiate drugs has been developed by a team in the Department of Medicine and Department of Neurosciences at Mount Sinai School of Medicine, New York.
His team designed a virus that could carry a pain relief gene called prepro-beta-endorphin into nerve cells. The gene makes an opioid that the body itself produces and that acts like morphine.
The modified viruses were tested by injecting them directly into the spinal fluid of rats via a lumbar puncture, or spinal tap, with only one injection. Results showed that the rats remained symptom-free for over three months.
Another pain relief gene, interleukin-10, was also effective when similarly administered in small doses directly at the spine.
"One of the strengths of our gene therapy work is, that it was effective with an opioid gene and with a non-opioid gene," says Prof Beutler. "Both approaches have important implications."
And just in case you want something a little more natural, The Telegraph reported October 3, 2008, on a "magic bullet" pain-relief technique.
Childbirth, surgery and trips to the dentist might be less traumatic in the future, thanks to a team at Massachusetts General Hospital and Harvard Medical School, Boston, which has achieved the feat in the laboratory by adding spice to an anaesthetic that by itself should not work because it does not get into nerves.
The sense of pain was selectively switched off in rat hindpaws by injecting QX-314, a normally inactive derivative of the commonly used local anaesthetic lignocaine, and capsaicin, the heat generating ingredient in chilli peppers.
In combination, these chemicals targeted only pain-sensing nerve cells, preventing them from sending signals to the brain. But even though the rats could not feel pain in their paws, they continued to move normally and react to touch.
Why am I focused on pain relief? Am I in pain? No. My mom has some pain since her recent ankle surgery, but it's not the kind of chronic pain these studies are trying to alleviate.
I'm concerned about the push in society for legalizing physician-assisted suicide. The arguments usually include the desire for people to be able to stop their suffering when it becomes unbearable. Morphine can alleviate pain, but the side effects from continuous use are troublesome.
With pain treatments like the ones highlighted by the Telegraph, we can see the time coming not too far down the road when chronic pain may no longer be a factor in the life decisions we have to make. And that can reduce the call for euthanasia and physician-assisted suicide. Any treatments that can help prolong life--rather than unnaturally cut it short--are the kinds of medical advances I want to highlight.
May these research teams be well-funded long enough to get their treatments to the market.
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