Nov 02 2013
The team of All In with Chris Hayes puts out a daily request on Twitter asking their followers to send them the things they find most interesting on the internet. These are their finds for November 1, 2013.
1. Halloween post-mortem;
2. subway game
3. daylight savings time unmasked.
Nov 02 2013
Escape the cold this winter in a faceless fleece bodysuit!
Scott R Dixon
Every year as the temperatures drop, Japan finds another creative way to make the cold winter months more bearable. This year, a Japanese outdoor product company has the newest way to keep warm-a full-body fleece suit that turns you into an anonymous humanoid!
The makers of the 4,980 yen (US$50) “Humanoid Fleece” had your best interests in mind when designing garment. When wearing the suit, you will not have to worry about taking it off ever because there are enough zippers, openings and pockets to maneuver around your daily life in full Humanoid Fleece form.
Nov 02 2013
Welcome to the Health and Fitness NewsWelcome to the Stars Hollow Health and Fitness News 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. Also an opportunity to share and exchange your favorite healthy recipes.
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.
You can now find past Health and Fitness News diaries here and on the right hand side of the Front Page.
Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt
These hearty vegetarian meals in a bowl (or on a plate) are inspired by the Korean dish bibimbap. I call them “Big Bowls” because they are also inspired by a popular food truck I’ve eaten at, in Portland, Ore., whose only offering is called Big Bowl, and is a comforting bowl of brown rice, with black beans, salsa, avocado and queso blanco. The long line of people I observed at this truck confirmed for me the fact that a simple, satisfying meal with grain, protein and terrific vegetables can be worth standing in line for.
One marinade can be used for a variety of vegetable toppings in this dish.
Farro or Bulgur With Black-Eyed Peas, Chard and Feta
A spiced up version of a classic Greek preparation: black-eyed peas cooked with greens.
Red Rice or Farro With Miso-Roasted Squash, Leeks, Red Pepper and Tofu
One sweet-and-salty marinade works for the tofu and the vegetables in this dish.
Millet Polenta With Tomato Sauce, Eggplant and Chickpeas
A comforting dish that works equally well with canned or fresh tomatoes.
Millet Polenta With Mushrooms and Broccoli or Broccoli Raab
A savory mix of mushrooms that would pair well with a variety of grains.
Nov 02 2013
“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.
Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting thea Pundits”.
Follow us on Twitter @StarsHollowGzt
Roger Cohen: A Journalist With a Mission
Glenn Greenwald believes that he faces possible arrest if he returns to the United States but is unbowed.
A young American lawyer comes to Brazil in 2005, falls in love, finds that his gay relationship confers greater legal rights than back home, starts a blog called Unclaimed Territory focusing on illegal warrantless eavesdropping by the National Security Agency, takes a place in the hills of Rio with a bunch of rescue dogs, denounces the cozy compromises of “establishment journalists,” gets hired to write a column by Britain’s Guardian newspaper, is sought out by the N.S.A. whistle-blower Edward J. Snowden, becomes the main chronicler of Snowden’s revelations of global American surveillance, is lionized for work that prompts a far-reaching debate on security and freedom, files repeated thunderbolts from his leafy Brazilian perch, and ends up, in just eight years, as perhaps the most famous journalist of his generation.
These things happen. At least they happen in the empowering digital age, and they happen to Glenn Greenwald. [..]
American society will also benefit from Greenwald’s ongoing revelations about out-of-control surveillance. He has testified before the Brazilian Senate, and should be allowed to testify before the U.S. Senate. He says, “I am definitely going back, I refuse to be exiled for a lie.”
He deserves assurance that he can return to the United States without facing arrest.
Yochai Benkler: Congress should grant Edward Snowden amnesty
The man who sparked the NSA surveillance debate remains in exile. We should thank him for his role and let him come home
Congress has in its power the ability to bring home the man without whom all the abuses, errors, and oversight workarounds would have continued unchecked. Five years ago, when Congress passed the Fisa Amendments Act, the legislature included in that statute a set of provisions that immunized the telecommunications companies that cooperated with the Bush administration’s warrantless wiretapping program from civil suits by citizens whose rights had been violated and from states that wanted to investigate or sanction these companies. That provision was roundly criticized by civil liberties advocates, but it does provide a legislative model for what Congress could now do to protect Snowden from criminal or civil liability arising from his disclosures.
Critics say that Snowden broke the law and should pay the price; they argue that facing the consequences is what civil disobedience requires; that is what we learned from Martin Luther King, they say. But do they really believe that ultra-segregationist Bull Connor’s arrests in the civil rights era were justified?
Fast food workers are often on government assistance. The best solution, despite GOP resistance, is to raise the minimum wage
You’ve got to feel for McDonald’s. Every time the misunderstood corporation tries to offer its’ low-wage employees a hand, it backfires. First the fast food giant was ridiculed this past summer for dispensing helpful budgetary advice to its struggling workers (in a nutshell: get another job). Now the company is in hot water again after a recorded call to its’ McResource helpline, in which an employee who reported not being able to make ends meet was advised to sign up for food stamps and other government assistance programs, went viral online. Strangely though, the very people who ought to be most upset about this state of affairs – small government loving republicans who don’t want anyone relying on federal assistance for anything – have raised little or no objection. [..]
So for now we are stuck with a situation where one set of American workers has to subsidize the wages and benefits of another set of workers just so that certain corporations can keep their low end labor costs down and their profits way up. Fast food workers have actually come up with the most feasible way out of this unsustainable situation. They are asking their employers to raise their wages to $15 an hour, up from the average of $8 an hour. Needless to say McDonald’s and their fast food counterparts will happily stick to the cozy arrangement they have going as long as their enablers in congress allow them to. They may soon find, however, that the American taxpayer is not quite so easily played.
Heidi Moore: Little surprise here: women expected to do more at home – and at work
A new study illuminates how ‘favors’ are expected of women at work, but they often go unacknowledged, keeping women down
No matter what profession a woman works in, she’s actually in the service profession.
That’s the upshot of an illuminating (and to many, enraging) new Columbia Business School study highlighted this week, showing that co-workers and bosses feel entitled to favors from women – or, in fact, that almost everything a woman does at work is considered “a favor” that is off the clock. To put it another way, when a woman takes on a project no one else will, or does something helpful or thoughtful, it’s seen as something she does for fun. When a man does it, it seen as real work.
The revelation of this structural ingratitude explains a lot. It’s a pivotal point in understanding a key issue in workplaces: why can’t women form lasting alliances, even though they spend more time contributing to their organizations by mentoring?
Ana Marie Cox: Political games: why Democratic senators keep their Hillary support secret
There’s no point to making support for something political private. Hillary should leave the game playing to Bill
The childish behavior of men in Congress has always made “boys’ club” seem less like an epithet and more like something to strive for. Female politicians on the Hill, held to a higher standard in many ways, have had fewer scandals (financial or sexual) than their male counterparts and have a reputation for level-headedness that was thrown into high relief during the shutdown. As Senator John McCain said when the episode wound to a close:
Leadership, I must fully admit, was provided primarily by women in the Senate.
So male representatives are boys and women are the grown-ups, which is why the revelation that the US Senate’s 17 female Democratic members sent a secret mash note to Hillary Clinton is so puzzling. The letter’s existence came to light on Monday, when Senator Kay Hagan (North Carolina Democrat) made a reference to it during a talk at a political fundraiser; that it was a secret letter – “Ixney on Illaryhay orfay residentpay!” – became clear on Tuesday, when reporters followed up on the remark and there was “a round of apologetic e-mails from [Hagan’s] Senate office to other offices on Capitol Hill”.
John Nichols: Chris Christie’s No Moderate, and Barack Obama Ought to Say That
President Obama will make a campaign swing into the battleground state of Virginia this weekend, on behalf of Democratic gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe.
McAuliffe has been consistently ahead in the polls and his chances of winning look reasonably good-as do those of other Virginia Democrats in high-profile races. The Virginia Democrats have two advantages: Republican foes who have gone to extremes on social issues and a broad revulsion in a state with high levels of federal employment at Republican tactics during the government shutdown.
So Obama’s trip to Virginia comes with few risks.
The thing is that, at this point in his tenure, Obama could afford to take some political risks.
For instance, he could travel to the other state that is holding a gubernatorial election this fall: New Jersey.
Nov 02 2013
This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.
Find the past “On This Day in History” here.
November 2 is the 306th day of the year (307th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 59 days remaining until the end of the year.
On this day in 1777, the USS Ranger, with a crew of 140 men under the command of John Paul Jones, leaves Portsmouth, New Hampshire, for the naval port at Brest, France, where it will stop before heading toward the Irish Sea to begin raids on British warships. This was the first mission of its kind during the Revolutionary War.
After departing Brest, Jones successfully executed raids on two forts in England’s Whitehaven Harbor, despite a disgruntled crew more interested in “gain than honor.” Jones then continued to his home territory of Kirkcudbright Bay, Scotland, where he intended to abduct the earl of Selkirk and then exchange him for American sailors held captive by Britain. Although he did not find the earl at home, Jones’ crew was able to steal all his silver, including his wife’s teapot, still containing her breakfast tea. From Scotland, Jones sailed across the Irish Sea to Carrickfergus, where the Ranger captured the HMS Drake after delivering fatal wounds to the British ship’s captain and lieutenant.
In September 1779, Jones fought one of the fiercest battles in naval history when he led the USS Bonhomme Richard frigate, named for Benjamin Franklin, in an engagement with the 50-gun British warship HMS Serapis. After the Bonhomme Richard was struck, it began taking on water and caught fire. When the British captain of the Serapis ordered Jones to surrender, he famously replied, “I have not yet begun to fight!” A few hours later, the captain and crew of the Serapis admitted defeat and Jones took command of the British ship.
John Paul Jones (July 6, 1747 – July 18, 1792) was the United States’ first well-known naval fighter in the American Revolutionary War. Although he made enemies among America’s political elites, his actions in British waters during the Revolution earned him an international reputation which persists to this day.
Captain Jones’s is interred at the US Naval Academy in a marble and bronze sarcophagus.
Nov 02 2013
NSA chief Keith Alexander blames diplomats for surveillance requests
Paul Lewis, The Guardian
Thursday 31 October 2013 22.16 EDT
The director of the National Security Agency has blamed US diplomats for requests to place foreign leaders under surveillance, in a surprising intervention that risks a confrontation with the State Department.
General Keith Alexander made the remarks during a pointed exchange with a former US ambassador to Romania, lending more evidence to suggestions of a rift over surveillance between the intelligence community and Barack Obama’s administration.
The NSA chief was challenged by James Carew Rosapepe, who served as an ambassador under the Clinton administration, over the monitoring of the German chancellor Angela Merkel’s phone.
Rosapepe, now a Democratic state senator in Maryland, pressed Alexander to give “a national security justification” for the agency’s use of surveillance tools intended for combating terrorism against “democratically elected leaders and private businesses”.
“We all joke that everyone is spying on everyone,” he said. “But that is not a national security justification.”
Alexander replied: “That is a great question, in fact as an ambassador you have part of the answer. Because we the intelligence agencies don’t come up with the requirements. The policymakers come up with the requirements.”
He went on: “One of those groups would have been, let me think, hold on, oh: ambassadors.”
…
It also risked deepening the division between the Obama administration and the intelligence community, which have been briefing against one another throughout the week
…
Just hours earlier, secretary of state John Kerry appeared to lay the blame at the door of the NSA, when he said certain practices had occurred “on autopilot” without the knowledge of senior officials in the Obama administration.
Recent Comments