Posts
Thanks to Stinky for this link.
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Greedy bastards released a new trailer for "Half-Blood Prince". If you a fan and like being pissed off, click here.
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Chief of Staff of the Army General George W. Casey (L) administers the Oath of Office to General Ann E. Dunwoody during a ceremony at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia on November 14, 2008. Dunwoody made history as the United States' first 4 star female officer.
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According to the Associated Press, Thursday "A South Carolina Roman Catholic priest has told his parishioners that they should refrain from receiving Holy Communion if they voted for Barack Obama because the Democratic president-elect supports abortion, and supporting him "constitutes material cooperation with intrinsic evil.""
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Associated Press - Men on motorcycles splattered 15 students, teachers with acid in Kandahar
"The evil of the world is made possible
-Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged, 1957US (Russian-born) novelist (1905 - 1982)
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A traffic accident hurls coffin against the back of woman's neck
Associated Press
SAO PAULO, Brazil - Police say a woman has died on the way to a cemetery when a traffic accident hurled her husband's coffin against the back of her neck.
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BusinessWeek - This holiday season is shaping up to be the battle of the better deal — and it's a bloody battle indeed.
For months, retailers have been throwing themselves at consumers with promotions, yet October results show such efforts aren't yielding much, with same-store sales coming out negative across retail sectors. Less than three weeks away from Black Friday — the biggest U.S. shopping day of the year — retailers are bracing themselves for what promises to be the weakest holiday season in decades.
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CNN.com - Seventy-six percent of those questioned in a CNN/Opinion Research Corporation survey released Monday disapprove of how President Bush is handling his job. That's an all-time high in CNN polling and in Gallup polling dating back to World War II.
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AP Associated Press - Israeli police rushed into one of Christianity's holiest churches Sunday and arrested two clergymen after an argument between monks erupted into a brawl next to the site of Jesus' tomb.
More on this story, click here.
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This Christmas season, other national retailers have joined Kmart in advertising their layaway options, among them TJ Maxx Corp., Goody’s Family Clothing Inc., Marshalls Inc. and Burlington Coat Factory, along with numerous regional chains and local stores.
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The nation's economic woes are making it tough for day care centers as layoffs and reduced hours have forced many parents to abandon day care so they can pay bills. For more on this story, click here.
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The only way to make sure people you agree with can speak is to support the rights of people you don't agree with. -Eleanor Holmes Norton
You cannot make yourself feel something you do not feel, but you can make yourself do right in spite of your feelings.-Pearl S. Buck
Ultimately, America's answer to the intolerant man is diversity, the very diversity which our heritage of religious freedom has inspired.-Robert S. Kennedy
The care of human life and happiness, and not their destruction, is the first and only object of good government.-Thomas Jefferson
Three days ago the first African American man was voted President of the United States. An landmark moment that illustrated just how far the American people have come on the road to equality.
...And on that same day, African Americans showed just how far they still have to go as a people to show that same equality to others. According to MSNBC.com, 7 out of 10 African Americans in California voted for Prop 8, a law which effectively denies Gays and Lesbians the right to marry. I am not going to argue for or against homosexuality. Your beliefs or your beliefs. What I do have a problem with is government forcing those beliefs on to others.
Not that long ago in the U.S. interracial marriage, the marriage between two people of different race, was against the law. It wasn't until 1967 was it completely erased in every state. How can I compare these two laws? Both times the government put stipulations on something that was none of their business.
I am a heterosexual, christian black female. I am also a staunch supporter of the seperation of church and state. I don't want the government telling me what I can do in my house and I will lobby for my neighbor to have that same right. The right for two people to commit themselves to the one they hold most dear is not something the government should have the right to sanction or not.
The idea that we as African Americans would help to deny another group the equality that we celebrated just a mere three days ago? That's just sad.
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"On a state-by-state level, [....]if there were no voters under 30, the only states that would switch to Republican presidential candidate John McCain are Indiana and North Carolina.
Without younger voters, Obama would still have won the 270 electoral votes he needs to become the next president. [....] In the make-believe world where no African-Americans voted, while Obama still would have won most of the states that he won, McCain would have been able to take the hotly contested states of Florida, Indiana, North Carolina, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Virginia.
The 107 electoral votes from those states would have been enough to shift the map in McCain’s favor."
For more on this story click here.
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Its the insane moments when I love the business I work in...
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Again... congratulations to President-elect Barrack Obama.
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Click on the title to get the latest election results.
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Picture Courtesy: WPTV.com
LOXAHATCHEE, FL -- A Loxahatchee resident is rattled after he says he came home Sunday evening to find his vehicle and home spray painted with racist graffiti and anti-Obama messages.
"Live with a man 40 years, share his house, his meals, speak one very subject. Then tie him up and hold him over the volcano's edge. And on that day you will finally meet the man"
- Book, Firefly
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The other day on Slate's Political Gabfest, I heard an interesting story about a new law in New Hampshire. Effective November 1st, all doctors must do an ultrasound before performing an abortion.
Most clinics already perform ultrasounds to determine gestation. No, the part that gets me is the new law states that the doctor doing the ultrasound, must "provide a simultaneous explanation of what the ultrasound is depicting," and also "display the ultrasound images so that the pregnant woman may view them."
The law goes so far as to specify the doctor's script: The physician must describe the heartbeat and the presence of internal organs, fingers, and toes. The patient then has to certify in writing that the doctor or technician duly did all of this before the abortion. The law also requires that after this ultrasound is performed, the doctor must wait at least one hour before performing the abortion. Probably, so the woman can stew in her own slutty guilt.
I could go on and on...and on about how this smacks of pro-lifers trying to guilt women into not getting in an abortion. I could also say there is something very condescending and paternalistic about the government thinking a woman can't decide what to do with her own body without the government's "protection".....but I won't.
Slate does a much better job of getting my point across and with bigger words. No, I want to hear what you think.
Comment below. Your opinion is important to me...mostly.
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(SPOILER ALERT:Go forth at your own risk...)
Previously on Heroes...the writers decided to kill Adam after bringing him back for two scenes, Peter continued to be a whiny douche and Parkman became BFFs with a turtle.
NBC's Heroes has been back for a couple of weeks now with a very uneven season so far. In a review I read on an earlier episode, the author compared Heroes to a soap opera and it gave me pause.
Let's think about this for a minute. What are typical elements of a soap opera? We have a family central to the show's hierarchy that have a large number of statistically impossible beautiful people. There's a long lost daughter, a wayward black sheep who is the real heart of the family. There is a central matriarch whose calculated machinations have effectively done more damage to her grand plans than helped and a tyrannical patriarch back from the grave.
For our supporting cast we have a trailer trash baby mama, a silent ethnic employee willing to do the dirty work to cover up the families mistakes...you know I'm just going to stop right here.
Yes, Heroes is very much a soap opera. Catty, melodramatic and serialized to the point of incoherency.
But is being a soap a bad thing?
While I am not one to extol the virtues of soap opera quality, I have on occasion been caught up in a truly compelling storyline. (I am only slightly ashamed that I was completely caught up in whether the lesbian would ever get her rape baby back from her best friend who stole it because she thought her own baby was dead.).
And while on paper stealing your ex's embryos to impregnate yourself with them to ransom his kid back for your son sounds a little silly on paper, my college roommate would beg to differ with you.
So if we disregard our elitist tendencies to societies definition of "quality television" and acknowledge a show for its "watchability", where does that leave Peter, Claire, Gabriel (aka Sylar for the less informed) and the rest of the Petrelli Family?
As long as they keep us wanting to watch, I'll go with...we'll see.
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Are current events moving us forward as a nation...or just showing how little we've changed over the years?
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Editor's Note: I posted this a few years back on a previous blog, but (Good or Bad) it still rings true....
For anyone between the ages of 20 and 40 there is an important milestone that I feel the need to discuss. It defined my idea of black college life and made a damn sexy accessory of the flip up glasses well into the mid-90's. If you don't already know where I'm going with this, I pity you. Let me give you a hint.
"I know my parents love me..."
"Stand behind me come what may."
"I know now that I'm ready, yeah"
" 'Cause I finally heard them say..."
IT'S DIFFERENT WORLD! WHOO! FROM WHERE YOU COME FROM! YES, IT IS NOW, YEAH!
I'm sorry ya'll I had to go back for minute. Anyway, the Oxygen channel has been showing reruns of this hallowed institution and it has brought back many a cherished memory and not a few embarassing fashion choices. I will be the first to admit I had a few neon green outfits in the closet, no shame.
Looking at the show again in the naughts made me realize how important it was to the shaping of who I am today (After Denise left, of course. I don't care what certain people say, the show was not worth a damn till Lisa Bonet left).
Here you had a handful of young African Americans from all walks of life going to college. There were no drugs, no gangs, justed educated men and women trying to make a difference in not only their lives, but the lives of others. It dealt with social issues, i.e. AIDS, Domestic Abuse, Date Rape, etc. And it also addressed relatively realistic campus life on an HBCU (that's Historically Black College or University for the uneducated).
Sure, Mom always stressed the importance of a good education, but it was Dwayne Wayne and Whitley Gilbert that made me believe I could learn something. I'm sad to say I've already lost some of those important lessons.
Does anybody remember the "Mamie" episode? During one of the earlier scenes Ron tries to cheer up a depressed Dwayne by playing "The Dozens", a pseudonym for "Ya Mama" jokes. They are informed by, I can't remember who, that "The Dozens" were away of slave traders degrading and devalueing those slaves on the block that they deemed not fit for sale. I wonder if Wilmer Valderrama would be so proud of his little MTV show if somebody supplied him with that bit of info. (He should already be embarassed just because Ya Mamma jokes were old in the 90's)
Getting back to my point, A Different World, and The Cosby Show as well, were a positive for many in my generation. It told young African Americans that you could go to college, that you could be the doctor. What African American shows do the youth of today have to learn from? Heck, what shows do they have period? \
......(Crickets)......
Yeah, sad, isn't?
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I hide in the shadows...waiting...wondering. Do I venture out or do I wait for the prey to come to me? There is some security to hanging back, but as they say, nothing ventured, nothing gained.
Screw it...I'm going out there.
I stick close to the walls, keeping my backed protected, weapon at the ready. I see her...a young female. She hasn't noticed me yet. I aim...and fire.
"AAAAAAGGGHHHH, DAMN IT!"
She barrels after me in a rage and I race for high ground, my blood pumping in my ears. So intent am I in getting away from the her that I don't look where I'm going and run headlong into my own kinsmen....my young nephew. For a moment we stare at each other. Any other time it would be different, but today?
Kill or Be Killed....Every man for himself. I aim straight for his heart.
As he screams and shakes his temporarily disarmed laser gun, I run away laughing and shouting, "Happy Birthday, Sweetie!"
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A cousin of mine once got so caught up in gambling she lost everything. It got so bad she was going to lose her house. She came to me and asked for help.
She said she was going to clean up her act and needed money to get back on her feet. I said sure and gave $4000 out of my savings...
Then she then went to Vegas for a week and came back to borrow another $2000. Well, of course I gave it to her because, after all, her problems are my problems, right?
WRONG, but unfortunately for your average taxpayer, that's exactly what the Federal Reserve is doing for "Cousin Wall Street".
Now before I get started on a loud and obnoxious rant, I want to preface it with this. I completely supported the first buyout.
I roughly understood the concept and need for such a measure. If Wall Street freezes up than nobody will lend me the money to buy that new TiVo I've been eyeing. So help the big, sad companies stay on their feet and infuse the market with liquid capital. Good deal.
So we did. We gave them money and said "Doctor! Heal thyself!"
...and then the DOW dropped another 600 points.
..Nice...
Since that first buyout a week ago the stock market has dipped under 10,000. The stock market hasn't been under 10,000 since March 29, 1999. What have the executives at AIG (the recipients of our first midnight money wire from Western Union) been up to since then?
Why they took a $3 million dollar week off and, to add insult to injury, want more money from us!
Now I don't claim to know anything about money management. My checkbook looks like the worse game of Sudoku ever played, but something just doesn't ring smart about handing over your checkbook to a person who obviously has a gambling problem.
And don't give me the crap about this not being the same thing. The definition for addiction on dictionary.com states that addiction is "the state of being enslaved to a habit or practice or to something that is psychologically or physically habit-forming....to such an extent that its cessation causes severe trauma."
Those in the stock market live their life by volatile numbers that could go either way simply by the whim of a barely comprehensible formula. Their lively hood, their well-being...hell, even their self-worth defined by how they play the stocks. If that doesn't sound like an addiction, I don't know what does.
The difference between them and a run-of-the-mill drug addict or regular old working class gambler is that now, thanks to the FED, they're playing with our money and just as fast and loose as they always did. That doesn't work. The need to get help. They need to understand that what they're doing isn't healthy and someone needs to be monitoring them. A sponsor, so to speak, who will throw out the liquor bottles and check their arms for track marks.
I'm all for helping out family in trouble...but not with a blank check.
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I could see where she was coming from. I sit in my office all day reading my favorite websites and playing mindsweeper and I get paid for it. Sweet, right?
But there was one big problem with that statement and its one we all can see coming...getting paid to be unproductive won't last for very long.
Unfortunately, my profession's profitability is quite dependent on other people's profession's profitability. Put simply: they don't make money...I don't make money. Insurance companies, stockbrokers or "Mom and Pop", it doesn't matter to me. If they have no money in their budget for extras than I don't have any money for food, hence why I've examined the existensial qualities of my navel...and gotten totally awesome at bejeweled. (My only real accomplishment in the past few weeks.)
I know and you know that if it comes to light that I have time to peruse the interweb, balance my checkbook...talk to you good people, eventually the higher ups will come to the inevitable conclusion its a lot cheaper for them to allow me to do that from the comfort of my own home.
Basically, I sit, waiting on a time bomb that will bring with it the massive devastation of unemployment, soup lines and a larger no pants radius...and I'm not alone.
Every day on CNN, MSNBC, etc. we hear about company's cutting back, increased inflation and people killing themselves rather than lose their house. People just like me are sitting in offices, cubicles and behind reception desks twiddling their thumbs, checking their email, getting the high score on Flood It! and sending out their resumes wondering just as much as I am "do the bosses know?" and "how long can I get away with it?".
The question she should have asked me isn't how many would like to be in my situation. (Many do and don't like it.) The question she should have asked me is for how long?
Tick...Tick...Tick...
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