Help!

To keep the Conversation going, please help me by linking news articles, opinion pieces and other political content in today's Comments section.

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OR you can try this Link Generator, which a contributor recommends: "All you do is paste in the URL and supply the text to highlight. Then hit 'Get Code.'... Return to RealityChex and paste it in."

OR you can always just block, copy and paste to your comment the URL (Web address) of the page you want to link.

Note for Readers. It is not possible for commenters to "throw" their highlighted links to another window. But you can do that yourself. Right-click on the link and a drop-down box will give you choices as to where you want to open the link: in a new tab, new window or new private window.

Thank you to everyone who has been contributing links to articles & other content in the Comments section of each day's "Conversation." If you're missing the comments, you're missing some vital links.

The Ledes

Monday, April 21, 2024

New York Times: “Terry Anderson, the American journalist who had been the longest-held Western hostage in Lebanon when he was finally released in 1991 by Islamic militants after more than six years in captivity, died on Saturday at his home in Greenwood Lake, N.Y., in the Hudson Valley. He was 76.”

The Wires
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Public Service Announcement

The Washington Post offers tips on how to keep your EV battery running in frigid temperatures. The link at the end of this graf is supposed to be a "gift link" (from me, Marie Burns, the giftor!), meaning that non-subscribers can read the article. Hope it works: https://wapo.st/3u8Z705

"Countless studies have shown that people who spend less time in nature die younger and suffer higher rates of mental and physical ailments." So this Washington Post page allows you to check your own area to see how good your access to nature is.

Marie: If you don't like birthing stories, don't watch this video. But I thought it was pretty sweet -- and funny:

If you like Larry David, you may find this interview enjoyable:


Tracy Chapman & Luke Combs at the 2024 Grammy Awards. Allison Hope comments in a CNN opinion piece:

~~~ Here's Chapman singing "Fast Car" at the Oakland Coliseum in December 1988. ~~~

~~~ Here's the full 2024 Grammy winner's list, via CBS.

He Shot the Messenger. Washington Post: “The Messenger is shutting down immediately, the news site’s founder told employees in an email Wednesday, marking the abrupt demise of one of the stranger and more expensive recent experiments in digital media. In his email, Jimmy Finkelstein said he was 'personally devastated' to announce that he had failed in a last-ditch effort to raise more money for the site, saying that he had been fundraising as recently as the night before. Finkelstein said the site, which launched last year with outsize ambitions and a mammoth $50 million budget, would close 'effective immediately.' The New York Times first reported the site’s closure late Wednesday afternoon, appearing to catch many staffers off-guard, including editor in chief Dan Wakeford. As employees read the news story, the internal work chat service Slack erupted in what one employee called 'pandemonium.'... Minutes later, as staffers read Finkelstein’s email, its message was underscored as they were forcibly logged out of their Slack accounts. Former Messenger reporter Jim LaPorta posted on social media that employees would not receive health care or severance.”

Washington Post: “The last known location of 'Portrait of Fräulein Lieser' by world-renowned Austrian artist Gustav Klimt was in Vienna in the mid-1920s. The vivid painting featuring a young woman was listed as property of a 'Mrs Lieser' — believed to be Henriette Lieser, who was deported and killed by the Nazis. The only remaining record of the work was a black and white photograph from 1925, around the time it was last exhibited, which was kept in the archives of the Austrian National Library. Now, almost 100 years later, this painting by one of the world’s most famous modernist artists is on display and up for sale — having been rediscovered in what the auction house has hailed as a sensational find.... It is unclear which member of the Lieser family is depicted in the piece[.]”

~~~ Marie: I don't know if this podcast will update automatically, or if I have to do it manually. In any event, both you and I can find the latest update of the published episodes here. The episodes begin with ads, but you can fast-forward through them.

Contact Marie

Click on this link to e-mail Marie.

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Friday
May202016

Thank You

By Marie

As many of you noticed, safari & Akhilleus kept Reality Chex going while I was on the road. They did a fine job of it, too. I did not specifically ask them to help out; unlike me, I gather they both have real jobs and other real commitments and interests that take up a lot of real time. Nevertheless, both made significant contributions over the past week.

Here's the point where I have to wonder where the hell everybody else was. There are six other contributors who know how to do what safari & Akhilleus did. In addition, everybody who reads Reality Chex knows how to provide links to stories in the Comments section, as a few contributors did.

I'm not sure if you can call yourself a liberal -- and I know you can't describe yourself as a Sanders-style democratic socialist -- if you're happy to regularly take advantage of this site but you're unwilling to support it with a few contributions.  

 

P.S. If you comment on a news story or opinion piece that has not been linked here, for Pete's sake, provide a link. Even if you're commenting on a news event you saw on TV or heard on the radio, it's highly likely the story also made it into print. I used to accommodate "Random Reader Remarks" by trying to track down the stories the writers might have referred to. But I resent having to babysit adult commenters so I've pretty much quit doing that -- although I did it yesterday, and I'll do it again if someone comments or hints at some event that might be newsworthy.

Comments Off

Reader Comments (6)

Marie, I guess I am one of the contributors you are complaining about. To be honest, I was extremely busy this week and every time I got on here, safari and Akhilleus had done such a thorough job of capturing the important news that I didn't have anything to add. But the main reason I have not contributed much lately is that I am so disgusted by the ever worsening political news that I am trying not to spend so much time reading it to avoid being physically sick and depressed. I just can't figure out why this country seems so willing to lose its soul, to give away and reverse everything that has made this country great. How so many people can be supporting Trump is beyond comprehension. I am also disgusted by the way the media is framing the debate between Sanders and Clinton and the way they are treating each other. As a Bernie supporter, I realize his supporters are making the party look bad by acting up in Nevada, but I don't think the DNC is giving the Bernie supporters or Bernie the respect they deserve. Reading about the friction within the party has me scared to death that it will allow Trump to win. To keep sane at this point, I'm limiting my exposure to it. I don't have the energy to visit all the sites I usually do to keep being reminded of how messed up this country is right now.

May 20, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterLT

@LT: I'm not complaining about any individual. You have made many useful contributions in the past, & I'm grateful for them. I know people are busy; so was I -- that's why I didn't contribute much this week.

(The good news: I learned how to back a trailer around a corner. Up till now, I've left that job to handsome men, but I decided if they could do it, so could I. So I checked the YouTubes, & sure enough, there were a couple of videos that explained the principle. It probably took me 50 tries to get the trailer right where I wanted it, where it would have taken the handsome guys only two or three, but now I know how to get to Carnegie Hall.)

Reality Chex has thousands of readers. It's damned discouraging when only a few bother to share what political stories or opinions they've read elsewhere, especially when I made it clear I would not be able to contribute. (I'll admit that page was deleted; I don't know when that happened.) Certainly some of their readings would be of interest to other Reality Chex readers.

Marie

May 20, 2016 | Registered CommenterMarie Burns

LT

I hope you have a chance to read Krugman. It may cheer you up a bit in spite of his opening.

http://www.nytimes.com/2016/05/20/opinion/obamas-war-on-inequality.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&clickSource=story-heading&module=opinion-c-col-left-region&region=opinion-c-col-left-region&WT.nav=opinion-c-col-left-region

May 20, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterHaley Simon

Along with LT, I find it hard enough to just read the news. President Obama said it best at the WHCD, referring to mainstream media: "I think we can all agree that from the start [Trump]’s gotten the appropriate amount of coverage befitting the seriousness of his candidacy. Ha. I hope you all are proud of yourselves."
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/reliable-source/wp/2016/05/01/the-complete-transcript-of-president-obamas-2016-white-house-correspondents-dinner-speech/

And now Bernie, whom I support(ed), is threatening to use the nuclear option to get his way at the convention. AS IF he's been a Democrat all these years, fer Christ's sake. He ran as a Democrat because it was easier than trying to get on the ballot in all fifty states as an Independent. Now it's his convention to hijack?


Who knew there were so many dim wits in the Republican Party - though we did suspect...


Who knew someone of Bernie's age and experience could forget the lesson of Ralph Nader?


I've been following national politics since 1960 and don't recall a presidential election where BOTH political parties splintered and outsiders dominated going into the conventions.

May 20, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterCaptRuss

@CaptRuss
AS IF he's been a Democrat all these years, fer Christ's sake.

Well, yes he has, sort of. He has caucused or been aligned with the Democrats since he came to Congress in 1991.
http://www.cnn.com/2015/02/10/politics/bernie-sanders-democrat-or-independent/
The Democratic Party didn't seem to mind when Sanders gave them a 51/49 majority at one time.

May 20, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterDan Lowery

Thank you, Haley, for the positive news. I wish the Obama administration was better at advertising how they've helped the middle class. I've never understood how they, and Dems in general, aren't better at messaging.

May 21, 2016 | Unregistered CommenterLT
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