Tag: News

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

October 30 is the 303rd day of the year (304th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 62 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1938, Orson Welles scares the nation.

The War of the Worlds was an episode of the American radio drama anthology series Mercury Theatre on the Air. It was performed as a Halloween episode of the series on October 30, 1938 and aired over the Columbia Broadcasting System radio network. Directed and narrated by Orson Welles, the episode was an adaptation of H. G. Wells’ novel The War of the Worlds.

The first two thirds of the 60-minute broadcast were presented as a series of simulated “news bulletins”, which suggested to many listeners that an actual alien invasion by Martians was currently in progress. Compounding the issue was the fact that the Mercury Theatre on the Air was a ‘sustaining show’ (it ran without commercial breaks), thus adding to the program’s quality of realism. Although there were sensationalist accounts in the press about a supposed panic in response to the broadcast, the precise extent of listener response has been debated. In the days following the adaptation, however, there was widespread outrage. The program’s news-bulletin format was decried as cruelly deceptive by some newspapers and public figures, leading to an outcry against the perpetrators of the broadcast, but the episode secured Orson Welles’ fame.

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 EU treads uncharted waters to defend single currency

by Claire Rosemberg, AFP

2 hrs 26 mins ago

LOL It looks like the Tea Party backed candidates are too nuts for Conservative, Libertarian Bob Barr. Barr, former conservative congressman and 2008 libertarian presidential candidate, endorsed Sen. Russ Feingold, (D-WI) for re-election over his Tea Party backed opponent, Ron Johnson.

What I look for in Washington are folks in the Senate and the House who put the Constitution first. Not the “R” or the “D”, not partisan politics but the Constitution. And what you have in Russ, and I have worked closely with him over a number of years to try to rein in the Patriot Act, to try to rein in the government surveillance and so forth – this is a man who understands the Constitution, who supports and fights sometimes against his own party to defend the Constitution in the Congress of the United States in ways that are much more consistent and much more proactive than a lot of Republicans

Barr also attacked the Republican Senate candidate, Ken Buck, who is running against incumbent Democrat, Michael Bennett.

Who says that Republicans don’t criticize Republicans?

As David Weigel notes:

If Russ Feingold loses his Senate seat, it will hit Democrats harder than almost any other 2010 setback coming their way on Tuesday. . . .

If Feingold leaves the Senate, there is no storm-the-barricades opponent of war on terror spying, or advocate of campaign finance reform. There are Democrats who’ll go along with it, but there’s no one else who relishes casting a lone vote or has the media profile to attempt it and get the press to care about it. . . .

If you can’t vote for Russ Feingold at least send him $5 or whatever you can afford. We need him in the Senate.

Donate for Russ @ Act Blue

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

October 29 is the 302nd day of the year (303rd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 63 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1787, Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart’s opera “Don Giovanni” makes its debut in Prague at the Estates Theater. It is an opera in two acts with the music by Mozart and with an Italian libretto by Lorenzo Da Ponte. It is about a “young, arrogant, sexually prolific nobleman who abuses and outrages everyone else in the cast, until he encounters something he cannot kill, beat up, dodge, or outwit.” The opera is sometimes characterized as comic because it combines comedy, drama and the supernatural. It is among the top 20 operas performed in North America.

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Haiti cholera deaths rise above 300

by Clarens Renois, AFP

1 hr 58 mins ago

A Connecticut judge has ruled that voters who desire to dress up as their favorite WWE wrestler can do so and will be allowed to vote. It seems that WWE CEO Vince McMahon whose wife Linda is the Republican candidate for the Senate, was concerned that voters wearing WWE themed clothing would be barred from voting because the clothing might be considered electioneering. So, Vince did what all red-blooded Tea Baggers do – he sued and No, we’re not making this up.

On Wednesday US District Judge Janet Bond Arterton ruled that Nutmeg State election officials must allow voters to wear World Wrestling Entertainment-themed clothing to the polls.

Such garb cannot be considered political advertising for former WWE CEO and current Connecticut GOP Senate candidate Linda McMahon, said Judge Arterton

Riley Waggaman: @ Wonkette

BECAUSE DIDN’T THOMAS JEFFERSON WEAR A WIG?

Connecticut Voters Allowed To Dress Like Idiots At the Polls

In other “November is our N word” election news: CEO of fake wrestling and also Linda McMahon’s husband “Mr. McMahon” filed a very serious lawsuit because he was worried that teenagers wearing WWE spandex thongs wouldn’t be allowed to vote – you know, since people dressed like idiots might be considered “political advertising” for Linda McMahon. Anyway, Vince McMahon won his frivolous and pointless lawsuit. Yippee, feel free to dress up as the “The Ass Demolisher” or whatever those silly WWE spandex men are called. Clearly this is just another example of activist judges legislating from the bench. What’s next? Do the gay people in New York get to wear their assless chaps to the polls, even though this would obviously be illegal political advertising for Carl Paladino? Of course. In Barack Obama’s America, No means Yes and Yes means Assless Chaps.

So all you Nutmeggers can re-use those Halloween costumes on Tuesday but I want pictures.

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

October 28 is the 301st day of the year (302nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 64 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1893, Symphony No. 6 in B Minor, Pathetique, the last symphony written by Pyotr Ilyich Tchaikovsky is premiered in St. Petersburg. Nine day s later, Tchaikovsky died suddenly at age 53 possibly from cholera but others have theorized that he might have committed suicide. Tchaikovsky was homosexual and often suffered from bouts of depression and doubts about his creative talents throughout his life. At one point while composing the 6th, he tore up the manuscript and discarded it.

Tchaikovsky dedicated the Pathetique to Vladimir “Bob” Davydov, his nephew While the relationship was apparently never consummated, Davydov was reportedly one of the great loves of Tchaikovsky’s life.

The theme in this first movement is most familiar since it has been frequently used in movies and songs.

The second theme of the first movement formed the basis of a popular song in the 1940s, “(This is) The Story of a Starry Night” (by Mann Curtis, Al Hoffman and Jerry Livingston) which was popularized by Glenn Miller. This same theme is the music behind “Where,” a 1959 hit for Tony Williams and the Platters as well as “In Time,” by Steve Lawrence in 1961. All three of these songs have completely different lyrics.

British progressive rock band The Nice covered Symphony No. 6 on their album Five Bridges.

Tchaikovsky’s Sixth Symphony has proved a popular choice with filmmakers, with extracts featuring in (amongst others) Now, Voyager, the 1997 version of Anna Karenina, Minority Report, Sweet Bird of Youth,Soylent Green and The Aviator.

Tchaikovsky’s Sixth Symphony has also been featured during the 2010 Winter Olympics closing ceremony, being danced by Russia’s national ballet team.

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Cholera-hit Haiti told to prepare for worst as toll rises

by Alex Ogle, AFP

17 mins ago

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

October 27 is the 300th day of the year (301st in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 65 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1904, the New York Subway opens.

While London boasts the world’s oldest underground train network (opened in 1863) and Boston built the first subway in the United States in 1897, the New York City subway soon became the largest American system. The first line, operated by the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT), traveled 9.1 miles through 28 stations. Running from City Hall in lower Manhattan to Grand Central Terminal in midtown, and then heading west along 42nd Street to Times Square, the line finished by zipping north, all the way to 145th Street and Broadway in Harlem. On opening day, Mayor McClellan so enjoyed his stint as engineer that he stayed at the controls all the way from City Hall to 103rd Street.

History

A demonstration for an underground transit system in New York City was first built by Alfred Ely Beach in 1869. His Beach Pneumatic Transit only extended 312 feet (95 m) under Broadway in Lower Manhattan and exhibited his idea for a subway propelled by pneumatic tube technology. The tunnel was never extended for political and financial reasons, although extensions had been planned to take the tunnel southward to The Battery and northwards towards the Harlem River. The Beach subway was demolished when the BMT Broadway Line was built in the 1910s; thus, it was not integrated into the New York City Subway system.

The first underground line of the subway opened on October 27, 1904, almost 35 years after the opening of the first elevated line in New York City, which became the Ninth Avenue Line. The heavy 1888 snowstorm helped to demonstrate the benefits of an underground transportation system. The oldest structure still in use opened in 1885 as part of the BMT Lexington Avenue Line, and is now part of the BMT Jamaica Line in Brooklyn. The oldest right-of-way, that of the BMT West End Line, was in use in 1863 as a steam railroad called the Brooklyn, Bath and Coney Island Rail Road. The Staten Island Railway, which opened in 1860, currently uses R44 subway cars, but it has no links to the rest of the system and is not usually considered part of the subway proper.

By the time the first subway opened, the lines had been consolidated into two privately owned systems, the Brooklyn Rapid Transit Company (BRT, later Brooklyn-Manhattan Transit Corporation, BMT) and the Interborough Rapid Transit Company (IRT). The city was closely involved: all lines built for the IRT and most other lines built or improved for the BRT after 1913 were built by the city and leased to the companies. The first line of the city-owned and operated Independent Subway System (IND) opened in 1932; this system was intended to compete with the private systems and allow some of the elevated railways to be torn down, but was kept within the core of the City due to the low amount of startup capital provided to the municipal Board Of Transportation, the later MTA, by the state.[3] This required it to be run ‘at cost’, necessitating fares up to double the five cent fare popular at the time.

In 1940, the two private systems were bought by the city; some elevated lines closed immediately, and others closed soon after. Integration was slow, but several connections were built between the IND and BMT, and now operate as one division called the B Division. Since the IRT tunnel segments are too small and stations too narrow to accommodate  B Division cars, and contain curves too sharp for B Division cars, the IRT remains its own division, A Division.

The New York City Transit Authority, a public authority presided by New York City, was created in 1953 to take over subway, bus, and streetcar operations from the city, and was placed under control of the state-level Metropolitan Transportation Authority in 1968.

In 1934, transit workers of the BRT, IRT, and IND founded the Transport Workers Union of America, organized as Local 100. Local 100 remains the largest and most influential local of the labor union. Since the union’s founding, there have been three union strikes. In 1966, transit workers went on strike for 12 days, and again in 1980 for 11 days. On December 20, 2005, transit workers again went on strike over disputes with MTA regarding salary, pensions, retirement age, and health insurance costs. That strike lasted just under three days.

Evening Edition is an Open Thread

1 Haiti reports 25 new cholera deaths

by Clarens Renois, AFP

2 hrs 30 mins ago