September 17, 2013

Impotent Rage

In MY opinion,this is what is at the heart of so many of the incidents we have come to know as "tragedies".

Is it the impotent feelings of helplessness/hopelessness that may be driving so many people to crack under the pressure? The pressure may be self-imposed or could be triggered by an unjustified (in their eyes) job-loss, failed love life, loss of family, etc.

We do not cope well lately.

Too many people seem to be looking for vengeance. Does that make us much different from the people we love to fight against in another part of the globe?

Many unhappy people are too ready to lash out, and of course if they are armed, we all know what happens next.

America is seen to have the unique experience of gun-murder rates, whether one-on-one or on groups,

What is also unique about us is this:

Lose a job?..lose your health care for the family,,maybe lose your home...

Poor?..good luck, you're on your own

Want to go to college?..be ready to mortgage your whole life to rich bankers who may be deducting those inexcusable debts from your Social Security

Hungry?..Good luck, you loser..you should have saved more money, or maybe you are not worthy of food assistance..

WE HAVE NO SOCIAL SAFETY NET here that is automatic ...a given..something you have as a citizen.

When there is no "commons", society reverts to anti-social behaviors.

Any person (the day after an "incident&quot who has had a family member gunned down in a workplace/school/random massacre, would probably be in favor of paying any amount of extra tax required to put a safety net in place, so that even some person somewhere might feel less impotent rage..and the need to lash out at innocents..

September 12, 2013

Better Call Saul Is Happening

http://www.slate.com/blogs/browbeat/2013/09/11/better_call_saul_breaking_bad_spinoff_with_saul_goodman_is_probably_happening.html?wpisrc=most_viral



The PR department at AMC just sent out the following brief statement:

AMC and Sony Pictures Television confirmed today that they have reached a licensing agreement for a spinoff of Vince Gilligan’s landmark AMC/SPT series Breaking Bad. As conceived, the new series is based on the show’s popular Saul Goodman character with the working title Better Call Saul. Plans call for Saul to be a one-hour prequel that will focus on the evolution of the popular Saul Goodman character before he ever became Walter White’s lawyer.


snip

September 12, 2013

Creationists ... Threaten to Make a Mockery of Texas Science Education

Creationists Once Again Threaten to Make a Mockery of Texas Science Education
http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2013/09/12/texas_creationists_textbook_reviewers_want_more_religion_in_their_science.html
By Phil Plait

|

Posted Thursday, Sept. 12, 2013, at 8:00 AM

Let me get this out of the way immediately: The Earth is more than 4 billion years old. Evolution is real and is the basis for all modern understanding of biology. Climate change is happening, and humans are causing it. These fundamental scientific truths are agreed upon by the vast, overwhelming majority of scientists who study those particular fields, because of the vast, overwhelming evidence in those particular fields supporting them. It’s important that we teach this to young students, as well as how to understand what constitutes real evidence as opposed to ideological zealotry.

If you live in Texas, however, that necessity is under a real threat.

It has been for a long time; in 2007 Gov. Rick Perry appointed Don McLeroy, a young-Earth creationist, to head the state Board of Education (BoE), setting up a situation where education in Texas suffered mightily. In 2009 the state science standards were weakened, with clearly Biblically based beliefs behind the effort. In 2010 the BoE approved revisionist history in the textbooks (including apologetics for Joseph McCarthy, in case you were wondering just how ridiculous this stuff gets). In 2011 Texas creationists tried to get religious supplemental materials inserted into classes but lost. It goes on and on, and all the while they’ve been picking away at science and reality.

And now we’re entering a new round. Earlier this year, the BoE sent out letters to “experts” asking to help them evaluate the high school biology textbooks being considered for use.

You can guess where this is going.

Several of the “experts” were creationists, and they met recently to give their opinions. Several statements given by them have been made public, and well, wow:

snip

September 12, 2013

College Acceptance for this school is 100%

The article is from August but the story is a good one that I had missed.

Several things jumped out at me:

uniforms
discipline
elimination of "sports " as a focus
elimination of "electives"
local companies supporting/hiring/training kids in school
pride
community involvement
concentrating on kids who previously had few if any choices

While it;s a religious school, it seems to have found the sweet-spot, and is turning lives around, and giving many boys a future



http://www.leadertelegram.com/features/religion/article_b983c580-f2d5-5094-9f09-373c01ba5cec.html

Posted: Saturday, August 24, 2013 12:00 am

By Angel Jennings Los Angeles Times | 0 comments

LOS ANGELES - The young man with braces and close-cropped hair as precise as a geometry lesson steps onto the stage at Verbum Dei High School, grabs the microphone from the lectern and introduces himself.

"My name is Ricardo Placensia," he says, then lets out a nervous laugh. "I interned at Locke Lord law firm, and this fall I will be attending UC Riverside."

The crowd at the all-male Catholic school in Watts erupts in applause.

Later in the ceremony, another teenager with precision-cut hair - but no braces - takes his moment in the spotlight.

"Hi. I'm Roberto Placensia," he says. "I've been interning for four years at Keenan & Associates, and this fall, I will be attending the University of California, Riverside."


snip

September 12, 2013

Bones, Sleepy Hollow start up in a few days.. and Bill Maher too

I'll give Sleepy Hollow a few shows to "win me over"..
Bones is kind of boring now, but new episodes are better than nothing


http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2013/08/01/list-of-2013-fall-tv-show-premieres-dates/195183/

September 11, 2013

Things that need to be considered by young-healthy (uninsured) people

Are you of childbearing age? (for the women)
Are you capable of impregnating a young woman? (for the guys)
Are you sexually active?
Are you saddled with college debts?
Do you text/use your phone in public places/on the streets/in the car?
Do you cross busy streets?
Do you drive?
Do you ski? surf? play basketball/soccer/golf/tennis?
Do you ride bikes? or motorcycles?
Do you occasionally drink alcohol?
Do you mingle in crowds? (parties/concerts/sporting events?
Do you have family members with little kids?

EVERYTHING mentioned CAN have medical consequences, with very little effort on your part.

Just because you are young and healthy (for NOW), does not mean that you are INVINCIBLE or incapable of being injured or catching something from another person (young or old or in-between)

You are probably not likely to need LIFE insurance (unless you have a spouse & kids), BUT it's shameful to NOT have health care insurance , because you WILL need it , even if you think you will never get hurt or sick.

September 10, 2013

What the HELL is it with George Z.? Are police afraid to detain him?

Can anyone even begin to imagine the SAME scenarios with another random guy, that does NOT end up cuffed in the back of a cop car, and then in a holding cell?

September 8, 2013

TV by the Numbers (latest dates & times)

http://tvbythenumbers.zap2it.com/2013/08/01/list-of-2013-fall-tv-show-premieres-dates/195183/

September 6, 2013

There is a "saving-face"

If the senate vote goes against the WH, the president can say that although it may be morally just, to try to do anything to stop repugnant acts such as gassing innocents, there is also a legal framework that was perhaps irreparably broken by the blatant falsehoods of past administrations.

Intervention once was a given by previous presidents:

Truman & Korea
Eisenhower/Kennedy/Johnson & VietNam
Reagan & the Contras/Lebanon/Grenada
GHWB & Panama/Kuwait
Clinton & Kosovo
BushII & Iraq/Afghanistan

In the era of modern Social Media, there is a great deal of extra attention paid to every detail of war-making, even if we do not call each adventure a "war", the public can easily research how "small interventions" spin out of control and escalate.

It could also be said, that this is not a surprise in this particular congress that would vote against a presidential proffer that it's hot in the summertime, cold in the winter, or that July follows June.

He could wrap it up by saying that he personally would like to "do something", but as the head of only 1/3 of the constitutionally mandated government, he recognizes that congress has the right to declare war, and that a new definition of "war" is now (by this precedent), is ANY use of military as an antagonist.

Congress wants BACK the constitutional authority previously given to presidents, and has accepted full responsibility to vote on each and every military incursion in the future.


From wikipedia:

Face refers to two separate but related concepts in Chinese social relations. One is mianzi (Chinese: ), and the other is lian (Traditional Chinese: 臉, Simplified Chinese: ), which are both used commonly in everyday speech rather than in formal writings.

Lian is the confidence of society in a person's moral character, while mianzi represents social perceptions of a person's prestige. For a person to maintain face is important with Chinese social relations because face translates into power and influence and affects goodwill. A loss of lian would result in a loss of trust within a social network, while a loss of mianzi would likely result in a loss of authority. To illustrate the difference, gossiping about someone stealing from a cash register would cause a loss of lian but not mianzi. Repeatedly interrupting one's boss as he is trying to speak may cause the boss a loss of mianzi but not lian.

When trying to avoid conflict, Chinese in general will avoid causing another person to lose mianzi by not bringing up embarrassing facts in public. Conversely, when challenging authority and another person's standing within a community, Chinese will often attempt to cause a loss of lian or mianzi. A very public example of this occurred during the Tiananmen protests of 1989 when Wu'er Kaixi scolded Premier Li Peng for being late to a meeting with the demonstrators, resulting in Li's loss of mianzi because he was seen as either tardy or insincere about the meeting.

Notice that directly lying doesn't cause a loss of face. For example, if a reservation is cancelled by an airline, then they can lie that it is merely delayed. Inability to arrange the trip would cause a loss of face, while lying that it is delayed does not. So-called "polite lies" are perfectly acceptable, and even expected.

September 5, 2013

Fecal Bacteria From Thin Humans Can Slim Mice Down (eew, but....)

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/06/health/gut-bacteria-from-thin-humans-can-slim-mice-down.html?pagewanted=all
By GINA KOLATA
Published: September 5, 2013



The trillions of bacteria that live in the gut — helping digest foods, making some vitamins, making amino acids — may help determine if a person is fat or thin.

The evidence is from a novel experiment involving mice and humans that is part of a growing fascination with gut bacteria and their role in health and diseases like irritable bowel syndrome and Crohn’s disease. In this case, the focus was on obesity. Researchers found pairs of human twins in which one was obese and the other lean. They transferred gut bacteria from these twins into mice and watched what happened. The mice with bacteria from fat twins grew fat; those that got bacteria from lean twins stayed lean. The study, published online Thursday by the journal Science, is “pretty striking,” said Dr. Jeffrey S. Flier, an obesity researcher and the dean of the Harvard Medical School, who was not involved with the study. “It’s a very powerful set of experiments.”

Michael Fischbach of the University of California, San Francisco, who also was not involved with the study, called it “the clearest evidence to date that gut bacteria can help cause obesity.” “I’m very excited about this,” he added, saying the next step will be to try using gut bacteria to treat obesity by transplanting feces from thin people.

“I have little doubt that that will be the next thing that happens,” Dr. Fischbach said. But Dr. Flier said it was far too soon for that.

“This is not a study that says humans will have a different body weight” if they get a fecal transplant, he said. “This is a scientific advance,” he added, but many questions remain.

snip

In fact, the part of the study that most surprised other experts was an experiment indicating that, with the right diet, it might be possible to change the bacteria in a fat person’s gut so that they promote leanness rather than obesity. The investigators discovered that given a chance, and in the presence of a low-fat diet, bacteria from a lean twin will take over the gut of a mouse that already had bacteria from a fat twin. The fat mouse then loses weight. But the opposite does not happen. No matter what the diet, bacteria from a fat mouse do not take over in a mouse that is thin.

snip