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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

Saturday, May 18, 2024

Washington Post: “Paul D. Parkman, a scientist who in the 1960s played a central role in identifying the rubella virus and developing a vaccine to combat it, breakthroughs that have eliminated from much of the world a disease that can cause catastrophic birth defects and fetal death, died May 7 at his home in Auburn, N.Y. He was 91.”

New York Times: “Dabney Coleman, an award-winning television and movie actor best known for his over-the-top portrayals of garrulous, egomaniacal characters, died on Thursday at his home in Santa Monica, Calif. He was 92.”

The Wires
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The Ledes

Friday, May 17, 2024

AP: “Fast-moving thunderstorms pummeled southeastern Texas for the second time this month, killing at least four people, blowing out windows in high-rise buildings, downing trees and knocking out power to more than 900,000 homes and businesses in the Houston area.”

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

Marie: BTW, if you think our government sucks, I invite you to watch the PBS special "The Real story of Mr Bates vs the Post Office," about how the British post office falsely accused hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of subpostmasters of theft and fraud, succeeded in obtaining convictions and jail time, and essentially stole tens of thousands of pounds from some of them. Oh, and lied about it all. A dramatization of the story appeared as a four-part "Masterpiece Theater," which you still may be able to pick it up on your local PBS station. Otherwise, you can catch it here (for now). Just hope this does give our own Postmaster General Extraordinaire Louis DeJoy any ideas.

The Mysterious Roman Dodecahedron. Washington Post: A “group of amateur archaeologists sift[ing] through ... an ancient Roman pit in eastern England [found] ... a Roman dodecahedron, likely to have been placed there 1,700 years earlier.... Each of its pentagon-shaped faces is punctuated by a hole, varying in size, and each of its 20 corners is accented by a semi-spherical knob.” Archaeologists don't know what the Romans used these small dodecahedrons for but the best guess is that they have some religious significance.

"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.”

Contact Marie

Click on this link to e-mail Marie.

Page Links
Saturday
Mar032012

Rush Limbaugh Is a Big Fat Idiot ...

... And Al Franken is a Senator who can subpoena him.

I have some additions to make to the published comments on Rush Limbaugh.

A reader writes that a friend of hers reminded her,

Rush Limpballs was reprimanded immediately after a broadcast of Monday Night Football after making a racist comment about Donovan McNabb, quarterback for the Philadelphia Eagles a few years ago. He was immediately fined and taken off the air and very soon afterwards FIRED from his newly hired and long desired position of being a broadcaster for the National Football League and the sweet position of being given MNF. Clearly, one race related comment during one MNF game is worse than the toxic ugly words he has used to once again downgrade women and the strong Georgetown student during the course of this week.

The problem of course is that there is no one to fire Rush from his radio show. His show is syndicated and airs on about 600 radio stations, including the Armed Forces Services Network. Yes, indeed, your tax dollars are supporting Rush's effluvient Santorum. Petitions and letters asking Congress to remove Rush from the AFSN have been unsuccessful. There are only two routes to having him removed: sponsor by sponsor and station by station. This process has been somewhat successful in limiting Glenn Beck's airtime. When sponsors dropped their backing of Beck's Fox "News" show in response to public pressure, Roger Ailes canned him. And he lost his radio audience in several markets -- New York & Philadelphia among them -- when local stations dropped his show.


Another friend of Reality Chex, who is a prominent psychiatrist, tells me that he feels not enough attention has been paid to Rush's suggestion to tape college students having sex and post the videos on the Internet for viewers to "enjoy." This is symptomatic of Rush's objectification of women (ah, those four wives) and a sexual preference for porn (and masturbation?). The doctor describes pornography as "a sexual fetish -- preferring sexual stimulation by inanimate objects." Rush likes his women pixilated and in two dimensions. The psychiatrist also notes that 40 percent of sex addicts have associated chemical addictions. Could that possibly apply to Oxycontin Man? And Rush may be a sick-o, but do his fundamentalist Christian disciples really approve of compulsive masturbation to sexual imagery? How about you, Rick Santorum? Why do "entertainers" get a special pass to have sex "that is counter to how things are supposed to be"?

Finally, this, which is P. D. Pepe's comment come to life on the itty-bitty screen:

Comment1 Comment

Reader Comments (1)

Someone should do some pro-bono work in the interest of Democracy and get a legal suit going against Rush in the young lady's behalf. A well publicized law suit could keep this Republican defamatiom of women in constant view until well after the election.

March 4, 2012 | Unregistered CommenterCarlyle

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