08/14/2010 archive

Welcome to the Stars Hollow Health and Fitness weekly diary. It will publish on Saturday afternoon and be open for discussion about health related issues including diet, exercise, health and health care issues, as well as, tips on what you can do when there is a medical emergency. Questions are encouraged and I will answer to the best of my ability. If I can’t, I will try to steer you in the right direction. Naturally, I cannot give individual medical advice for personal health issues. I can give you information about medical conditions and the current treatments available.

If it’s tomato season, it’s cucumber season, too – a time to think about light summer salads, garlicky chilled soups, even cooked cucumber dishes.

Their high water content makes cucumbers especially refreshing during the months when they’re at their best. Cucumbers also are a very good source of vitamin C  and caffeic acid, compounds that seem to help prevent water retention (which may be why cucumber rounds have long been favored as remedies for swollen eyes and sunburned skin). Cucumber juice also is used in natural skin care products because it contains silica, an important component of connective tissue and healthy skin.

Seek out unwaxed cucumbers, so you won’t need to peel them; the skin is a rich in fiber and a good source of potassium and magnesium. You won’t have to remove seeds if you’re able to use Persian or European cucumbers.

they will have a trojan horse hard nosed ‘democratic’ president in the oval office who has let George Bush and Dick Cheney and most of the previous republican administration off the hook effectively pardoning them for torture and all their other war crimes, continued if not expanded the overseas occupations the republicans started, given tens of trillions of dollars to wall street and other republican corporate cronies like the health insurance industry while ensuring the Military Industrial Complex remains the most corrupt and profitable racket in the history of humanity [1], and then falls all over himself bending over backwards to give the republicans anything and everything else they demand and more while conning the democratic base into supporting an ‘incremental’ bipartisanship with batsh*t crazy republicans fantasy to coopt that base into supporting republican policies across the board while insulting that base [2] at every opportunity and generally just screwing the working classes every way possible, while sending out scare letters [3] to that democratic base demanding money and votes because republicans are scary.

Who I’m sure hopes to guarantee himself a lucrative post presidential career continuing this good work for his constituents.

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

The Sunday Talking Heads:

This Week with Christiane Amanpour:

This week Ms Amanpour’s guest are Banking Committee member Republican Senator Bob Corker, former New Jersey Governor and former Goldman Sachs Chairman and CEO Jon Corzine, member of the President’s Economic Recovery Advisory Board, Laura D’Andrea Tyson, and Martin Regalia of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. They will discuss the failing economy and how to get it back in track.

She will host a roundtable with ABC’s Cokie Roberts, political strategist Matthew Dowd, Chrystia Freeland of Reuters and David Ignatius  of the Washington Post will discuss the crisis in Pakistan, how Russia’s severe drought and wildfires are triggering a global food crisis, Iran’s nuclear program, the winners and the losers in this week’s primaries, and all the week’s politics.

Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer:

Mr. Scheiffer’s guest will be Tim Kaine, DNC Chairman, Gov. Ed Rendell, D-Pa., Ed Gillespie, Former RNC Chairman, Ed Rollins, Republican Strategist, Karen Tumulty, Washington Post and John Harris, Politico.

Chris Matthews:

Mr. Matthews will host discussions with Howard Fineman, Newsweek

Senior Washington Correspondent, Norah O’Donnell, MSNBC, Chief Washington Correspondent, Kelly O’Donnell, NBC News, Capitol Hill Correspondent and John Heilemann, New York Magazine, National Political Correspondent. The questions that they will discuss:

Will Barack Obama’s Luck in His Weak GOP Opposition Hold for 2012?

What Investigations Would Top the GOP’s List if it Won Control of the House This Fall?

State of the Union with Candy Crowley:

This Sunday on State of the Union, Ms. Crowley is joined by DCCC Chair, Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-MD) and Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) to talk 2010 politics.

Her roundtable will discuss the state of the economy with Steven Pearlstein of the Washington Post and Jeanne Cummings of Politico.

Finally, she will talk about the “wacky weather” Climatologist Heidi Cullen and NASA scientist Tom Wagner.

Fareed Zakaris: GPS:

Mr. Zakariah will discus the troubled economy with Jeffrey Sachs, the man the NY Times has called “the most important Economist in the World”.

A panel of experts, including Mr. Sachs, will talk about climate and the flooding in Pakistan and Europe and the fires in Russia.

Also

What IS the state of Islam – in America and also around the world? What are its problems? What are the solutions to those problems? Fareed talks to a former Muslim and Muslim reformer.

And finally French criminals find themselves facing the short arm of the law.

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour a cup of your favorite morning beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

August 14 is the 226th day of the year (227th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 139 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the Social Security Act into law.

On this day in 1935, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signs into law the Social Security Act. Press photographers snapped pictures as FDR, flanked by ranking members of Congress, signed into law the historic act, which guaranteed an income for the unemployed and retirees. FDR commended Congress for what he considered to be a “patriotic” act.

U.S. Social Security is a social insurance program that is funded through dedicated payroll taxes called Federal Insurance Contributions Act (FICA). Tax deposits are formally entrusted to the Federal Old-Age and Survivors Insurance Trust Fund, the Federal Disability Insurance Trust Fund, the Federal Hospital Insurance Trust Fund, or the Federal Supplementary Medical Insurance Trust Fund.

The main part of the program is sometimes abbreviated OASDI (Old Age, Survivors, and Disability Insurance) or RSDI (Retirement, Survivors, and Disability Insurance). When initially signed into law by President Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1935 as part of his New Deal, the term Social Security covered unemployment insurance as well. The term, in everyday speech, is used to refer only to the benefits for retirement, disability, survivorship, and death, which are the four main benefits provided by traditional private-sector pension plans. In 2004 the U.S. Social Security system paid out almost $500 billion in benefits.

By dollars paid, the U.S. Social Security program is the largest government program in the world and the single greatest expenditure in the federal budget, with 20.8% for social security, compared to 20.5% for discretionary defense and 20.1% for Medicare/Medicaid. Social Security is currently the largest social insurance program in the U.S., constituting 37% of government expenditure and 7% of the gross domestic product and is currently estimated to keep roughly 40% of all Americans age 65 or older out of poverty. The Social Security Administration is headquartered in Woodlawn, Maryland, just to the west of Baltimore.

Social Security privatization became a major political issue for more than three decades during the presidencies of Gerald Ford, Jimmy Carter, Ronald Reagan, George H. W. Bush, Bill Clinton, and George W. Bush.

Social Security is under attack once again by The National Commission on Fiscal Responsibility and Reform. The commission was created by the executive order of President Barack Obama in January 2010 after Congress voted against the bill that would create it

No Boys.  Only the one crack at Keith and Rachel because it’s all Maricopa County and Joe Arpaio all the time on MSNBC during the weekend.

AMC has M*A*S*H x 2, the movie with all the minor characters who got cut from the TV Series like the Painless Pole (without whom the ‘Suicide is Painless‘ theme song doesn’t make much sense) and Spearchucker Jones and Duke (who’s absence, since he’s the second lead while Trapper John McIntyre only makes his appearance halfway through, is pretty puzzling).  Only Gary Burghoff is the same.

Yes, I did read all 3 novels by Rchard Hooker.  Why do you ask?

• ESPN– Little League Baseball, Southeast Region Final
• Oxygen– Monster-in-Law which, although it has J-Lo, also has Jane Fonda
• SciFi– Eureka’s Warehouse 13 crossover episode (imaginatively titled Crossing Over).
  
  Oh, and premiers of that and Haven.
• TBS– Diary of a Mad Black Woman (why Tyler Perry is famous)
• Turner Classic– The Boy with Green Hair, The Set-Up (Robert Ryan night)
• Discovery– Odd Couple survival night
• TLC– Say Yes to the Dress marathon
• TNT– A Few Good Men
• Toon– Ben 10 and Generator Rex premiers, Clone Wars bounty hunter episodes

Son, we live in a world that has walls, and those walls have to be guarded by men with guns. Whose gonna do it? You? You, Lt. Weinburg? I have a greater responsibility than you could possibly fathom. You weep for Santiago, and you curse the marines. You have that luxury. You have the luxury of not knowing what I know. That Santiago’s death, while tragic, probably saved lives. And my existence, while grotesque and incomprehensible to you, saves lives. You don’t want the truth because deep down in places you don’t talk about at parties, you want me on that wall, you need me on that wall. We use words like honor, code, loyalty. We use these words as the backbone of a life spent defending something. You use them as a punchline. I have neither the time nor the inclination to explain myself to a man who rises and sleeps under the blanket of the very freedom that I provide, and then questions the manner in which I provide it. I would rather you just said thank you, and went on your way, Otherwise, I suggest you pick up a weapon, and stand a post. Either way, I don’t give a damn what you think you are entitled to.

Later-

Alton has all you’d ever want to know about pressure-cooking broth.  Toon has new Children’s Hospital (new link), Dr. Quymn, Medicine Woman (memorable), and Look Around You does Sports (Darts and Fencing become ‘Dencing’, though I can perhaps think of another fusion).

• FX– Bedazzled
• Oxygen– Shall We Dance? (more J-Lo, but also Richard Gere and Susan Sarandon)
• TBS– The Truman Show (prescient and disturbing)
• TNT– The Fugitive
• USA– Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man’s Chest
• Disney– Summer Belongs To You

There will come a time when you have a chance to do the right thing.

I love those moments. I like to wave at them as they pass by.

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

40 Top Story Final.

1 BP to pay 50 mln dlr fine for deadly 2005 Texas blast

by Mira Oberman, AFP

Fri Aug 13, 5:21 am ET