paulnolan
Glenn Beck: It's not 'baseless' to claim Obama hates white CEOs
"If I get out of control and start leveling baseless charges," Glenn Beck claimed on his Fox News Channel show Monday, "guess what happens? I'm fired."
But that evidently didn't stop him from later accusing President Barack Obama of allegedly refusing to meet with BP's CEO because the British oil giant's top executive is white.
The Fox News host played a clip of President Obama declaring, "My experience is when you talk to a guy like a BP CEO, he's going to say all the right things to me. I'm not interested in words, I'm interested in action."
He then went on to rebuke Obama for saying he'd meeting with the president of Iran, but not the chief of BP.
Lampooning Obama, Beck remarked, "I'll meet with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad… without any preconditions because we have to be able to talk… We'll sit down, have some tea, some crumpets… Yeah, you're a raging lunatic but we can get through to you and trust you. Now, the BP CEO? Depart from me, evil one!"
Source: The Raw Story (via Bloggerheads)
barack obama, glenn beck, mahmoud ahmadinejad, oil, race / racism
President Obama to visit Ohio; 62-foot statue of Jesus explodes
The White House Tuesday announced that President Obama will travel to Ohio on Friday. Specifics of the trip have not been released yet.
In other Ohio news, A six-story statue of Jesus Christ was struck by lightning and burned to the ground, leaving only a blackened steel skeleton and pieces of foam that were scooped up by curious onlookers on Tuesday. The "King of Kings" statue, one of southwest Ohio's most familiar landmarks, had stood since 2004 at the evangelical Solid Rock Church along Interstate 75 in Monroe, just north of Cincinnati. Lightning set the statue ablaze around 11:15 p.m. Monday. The sculpture, about 62 feet tall and 40 feet wide at the base, showed Jesus from the torso up and was nicknamed Touchdown Jesus because of the way the arms were raised, similar to a referee signaling a touchdown. It was made of plastic foam and fiberglass over a steel frame, which is all that remained Tuesday.
Outside of geographical location, the two news items are probably not related.
SOURCE 1 & 2
You Slut! - MyBloodyJesusExplorerOnFire
acmeeoy
Daisy Bitch
Daisy Bitch: Director: Pnina Halfon | Genre: Documentary | Produced In: 2006
Synopsis: Daisy Bitch is the stage name of a young Israeli drag queen named Eli Abergel. The film documents Eli's life for two years, enters his personal world behind the costumes and make-up, and turns into a psychological journey which reveals his unique and complex relationship with his conservative Jewish mother, Jacqueline. Coming to term with her son's strange lifestyle leads to a turning point in their lives. A huge gap exist between Eli's two worlds: on the one hand, the world of the homo-lesbian community in Tel Aviv and on the other, living as an IDF solider in a low socio-economic, conservative family from a suburban proletarian town. The conflict that emerges from within this impossible combination reaches its climax at the end of the film.
x-posted to ontd_feminism
angi_is_altered
A School Prays for Help
Towns Tap Businesses, Churches to Shore Up Budgets
LAKELAND, Fla.—When his budget for pencils, paper, and other essential supplies was cut by a third this school year, the principal of Combee Elementary School worried children would suffer.
Then, a local church stepped in and "adopted" the school. The First Baptist Church at the Mall stocked a resource room with $5,000 worth of supplies. It now caters spaghetti dinners at evening school events, buys sneakers for poor students, and sends in math and English tutors.
children, education, religion
mydogfred
Obama Kids -- Most Baller Father's Day Gift Ever
When your father is the Leader of the Free World, there tend to be some pretty cool perks -- like when Sasha and Malia Obama went to the Lakers game last night ... and picked up an AWESOME Father's Day gift for their dad.
Sources close to the situation -- but not too close -- tell us the daughters really wanted to get their dad a Lakers jersey for his special day. So, AEG president Tim Leiweke -- whose suite they happened to be sitting in -- ran down to the Lakers team shop in the Staples Center and had an Obama jersey made up on the spot.
To top things off, Phil Jackson even autographed the gear for the kids after the game.
Way cooler than that ugly tie you were gonna get your dad.
Hey Jude-The Beatles
obama family
thebigbadbutch
Seattle cop punches woman in face during routine jaywalking stop
A teen took a fist to the face by a cop, all because he stopped her for jaywalking.
Investigators in Seattle are reviewing the incident, which was captured on video, but the president of the Seattle Police Officers Guild argues the use of force was justified.
"He did nothing wrong," Rich O'Neill said, according to the Seattle Post-Intelligencer. "If anything, I think he maybe waited a little too long to engage in force because I think he was trying to defuse the situation."
But "it was obvious from the audio anyway of the two individuals that they were not going to be calmed down."
The incident began when an unnamed police officer spotted a teen jaywalking across Martin Luther King Jr. Way South around 3:10 p.m., according to a report on the Seattle Police Department Web site.
fuck the police, police brutality, race / racism
optimsprm
Too much anger and too few ideas. America needs a better alternative to Barack Obama
Jun 10th 2010 | HAPPY days are here again for the Republicans, or so you might think. Barack Obama's popularity rating is sagging well below 50%. Passing health-care reform has done nothing to help him; most Americans believe he has wasted their money—and their view of how he is dealing with the economy is no less jaded. Although growth has returned, the latest jobs figures are dismal and house repossessions continue to rise. And now his perceived failure to get a grip on the oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico is hurting him; some critics call it his Hurricane Katrina; others recall Jimmy Carter's long, enervating hostage crisis in Iran. Sixty per cent of Americans think the country is on the wrong track.
All 435 seats in the House are up for grabs in November. The polls portend heavy losses for the Democrats, who currently enjoy a 39-seat majority there. Quite possibly, they will lose control of it. The Republicans stand less chance of winning the Senate, where a third of the seats are contested this year, but they should win enough to make it almost impossible for the Democrats to break a filibuster there by picking off a Republican or two. The second two years of Mr Obama's presidency look like being a lot tougher than the first.
I think that this makes some good points, this has long been one of my main points of contention with the Conservative Movement (a phrase that seems to strike me as oddly oxymoronic) that they seem to oppose those who are in power when it's not them, without giving any alternatives to what they see as the problems
klutzy_girl
Make the Obama family's favorite apple pie
President Obama has a special nickname for his pastry chef, Bill Yosses.
"The President calls Bill "The Crust Master," Michelle Obama revealed last year at the Governor's Dinner preview event in the White House Kitchen, "because he's a big pie guy, and he has some of the best pies and tarts that come out of this place, and the fillings are just perfection – which is a problem."
But the nickname isn't a problem for Yosses, who tells PEOPLE, that his "apple pie is certainly a crowd pleaser."
"There are very few refusals from anyone when apple pie is the dessert," he says. Apart from his crust, the pastry chef has another secret: He uses a combination of apples "for a more complex flavor." (His favorites include Honey Crisp; Granny Smiths and Braeburn, among others.)
And then there's that secret crust. "More important is the technique of pre-baking the pie shell bottom beforehand," Yosses tells PEOPLE, "then filling it and adding the top cover. That gives a well-baked crust that melds with the filling."
Curious about how to bake the pie? Read on for Yosses' recipe (and baking tips).
petalsinthewind
Pride Month: Transmisogyny
This is for yesterday.
What Transmisogyny Looks Like
By Tobi Hill-Meyer
This is a topic that has been vital to my understanding of the world over the past few years, but it's still relatively unknown outside certain circles of activists. When I mention it as an area of my work, I almost invariably have to explain what it is. The short answer is that it is the intersection of transphobia and misogyny that specifically targets trans women. But that dry academic answer never communicates the visceral and intense experience that it is.
Here's a limited list of examples of what transmisogyny looks like. Every example on this list has a story (or dozens of stories) behind it.
Relationship and Sexual Violence
When trans women desperately in need of sexual assault or domestic violence services are turned away because their needs are considered less important than the hypothetical discomfort their presence might cause for others, that's transmisogyny.
When activists encourage people not even to try to fight for trans women's access to sexual assault and domestic violence services because of the possibility that it could leave trans men unable to access those services, that's transmisogyny.
When I, personally, sought out support after being abused by my trans male partner and was told by a prominent genderqueer activist that because I'm a trans woman and felt validation in talking with cis women who have experienced abuse, I must have invented the abuse in an attempt to feel more like a woman by having an abusive boyfriend, that's transmisogyny.
When a trans woman is brave enough to talk openly about surviving childhood violence and experiencing rape, only to be told that her pain is less valid or important than cis women's experience of sexism, that's transmisogyny.
lgbtq / gender & sexual minorities, sexism, transphobia, women
fading_october
Legionnaires Disease linked to windscreen wash
If you use standard tap water in your windshield washer fluid reservoir instead of a cleaner, you may have effectively turned your vehicle into a biological weapon. Sure, that sounds cool and all, but according to BBC News, the only person you're going to be hurting is yourself. As it turns out, using plain water can cause the washer fluid system to become a breeding ground for Legionella bacterium – the same nastiness that causes Legionaires' Disease and pneumonia. Spray your windshield and the bacteria becomes airborne, allowing it to easily enter your lungs and wreak havoc with your immune system.
Researchers discovered the hive of scum and villainy lurking under the hood by attempting to discern why professional drivers were five times more likely to become ill than their amateur counterparts. After a little scientific sleuthing, the lab coats unearthed the bacteria. So do the world a favor and top off your windshield washer fluid reservoir with some sort of purpose-built cleaner. The stuff will kill the infection-causing bacteria and will keep the fluid from freezing in the winter. Not bad for 99 cents a gallon.
For some reason I found this really interesting. I don't drive, but I've seen my parents do this. Have you ever used water as a replacement?
ubiquitous_a
One of these things is not like the others......oh wait.
Waking America From the BP Nightmare
The spill cam, requested by Congress, has brought the horror into homes across the country, as we watch tens of thousands of barrels of oil billowing into the Gulf every day.
For years, the oil industry swore this could never happen. We were told that technology had advanced, that offshore drilling was safe.
BP said they didn't think the rig would sink. It did.
They said they could handle an Exxon Valdez-sized spill every day. They couldn't.
BP said the spill was 1,000 barrels per day. It wasn't. And they knew it.
Now the other big oil companies, testifying in Congress today, contend that this was an isolated incident. They say a similar disaster could never happen to them.
And yet it is this kind of Blind Faith -- which is ironically the name of an actual rig in the Gulf -- that has led to this kind of disaster.
In preparation for this hearing, Congress reviewed the oil spill safety response plans for all the top five oil companies.
What we found was that Exxon, Chevron, ConocoPhillips, Shell and BP have response plans that are virtually identical. The plans cite identical response capabilities and tout identical ineffective equipment. In some cases, they use the exact same words and made the exact same assurances.
The covers of the five response plans are different colors, but the content is ninety percent identical.
Like BP, three other companies include references to protecting walruses, which have not called the Gulf of Mexico home for 3 million years.
OP: So, aside from the different shades of color, my initial thought was that these documents look to me as though they were created by, if not the same person, then certainly the same consulting firm. (Actually, it looks like the top three were probably created by one person, and the bottom two possibly by a second one....I'm basing this on the slightly different styles of placement and font) Since in my current job, I do technical/business writing and have spent a great deal of time where I create documents for various customers, this is something that kind of screamed out to me. Turns out, I was correct. See that little "wooshy" logo at the bottom of each document? That seemed to be the clincher, if one was even needed based on the graphics and virtually identical fonts used on the covers anyway.
After doing a bit of online searching, I located a link to this company called The Response Group.....and LOOK! There's the little "whooshy" logo! Who are they? Well, they describe themselves on their "about us" page as follows:
"Formed in 2003, The Response Group is an Emergency Response Consulting and Support company in a growing niche with operations in Houston, Beaumont, Boston, Chicago, Seattle, Durango, and Anchorage areas. While the home office is in Houston, there are over 35 employees throughout our various locations. "
They even have a special page dedicated to the creation of Oil Spill Response plans! Wheee!
While it's certainly beyond my own research skills, I would love to see someone like Rachel Maddow get hold of this and do some digging. I'm curious to know why on earth the largest oil companies in the world would come to this seemingly rather tiny firm to create their oil spill response plans, and apparently put them into implementation (i.e. wherein they apparently sit on a shelf and gather dust anyway because they are so useless) without even reviewing their contents to see if they actually make sense (read: walruses). Who are the people running this firm? What are their qualifications? Do they have ties to big oil beyond the obvious ones with their business?
Even if they themselves are not part of the problem, I certainly think Congress should have folks from this company answer questions about their work with the oil companies and determine if their clients even cared about the contents of these oil spill response plans, or if they knew they were providing cookie cutter stuff and had no feedback or input from the oil companies. If that is the case, it certainly would speak to an industry-wide problem of negligence as it pertains to safety planning.
Also: I haven't yet found the response plan documents for the other companies, but here's BP's version of their oil spill response plan that was created by The Response Group for the Gulf of Mexico.
Pride Month: Homelessness
And post for today. I'm leaving for Toronto in ten minutes and will be gone for a week, so I won't be posting then. I can't find the full speeches at the demonstration discussed below, so here is just a clip of Lt. Dan Choi's speech. There are more videos and pictures at the sources
Budget Cuts Put Those In LGBT Shelters On Streets
The problem is already bad and is about to get worse.
Experts told CBS 2 HD on Monday that hundreds of gay, lesbian and transgender young people are now homeless in New York City because of their sexual orientation.
Community advocates are alarmed at budget cuts that threaten to put some of them back out on the street.
There was a cry for help in Union Square as a small network of homeless shelters for gay, lesbian and transgender youth came under attack -- beset by bigots and budget cuts.
Community Rallies for Homeless LGBT Youth in Union Square
Earlier tonight a large crowd gathered in Union Square for a rally in support of homeless LGBT Youth. Sandra Bernhard opened the event by sharing how in her neighborhood she has often encountered kids who are staying at the Ali Forney Center, a shelter specifically for LGBT youth. "They're up-beat, they're smart, they have great potential. Everyone needs a little guidance now and then. It's up to us to take them in and do some damage control," she said.
One of the event's prominent speakers was Lt. Dan Choi, who brought an incredible emotional resonance to the crowd, urging everyone to join him in cheering for LGBT Youth and equality. "I have a message to all the LGBT Youth wondering if it's worth it to come out," he said. "You deserve to be treated like a full person. You are my heroes. Say it with me, I am somebody. I am somebody. I am somebody and I deserve full equality right here, right now."
activism, lgbtq / gender & sexual minorities, welfare
subversive_kiwi
Closing Arguments Underway in California Gay Marriage Trial
SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- Passionate protestors against California's same sex marriage ban gathered outside the Federal Courthouse in San Francisco Monday morning. Inside, closing arguments are now underway in the trial over Proposition 8.
"This case for us is about how we as Americans just want to be treated equally by our government and under the law and today we will be going to court with that very simple request," said plaintiff Sandy Stier.
"All we are asking the court to do is to make sure that we are protected under our constitution, like every American is supposed to be," said plaintiff Jeff Zarrillo.
Inside the courtroom right now are superstar attorneys Theodore Olson and David Boies. The attorneys are best known for battling each other over the Bush-Gore election controversy. They are now on the same side, arguing that Proposition 8, the voter approved ban on same sex marriage, is a violation of the constitution's guarantee of equality. Members of the Alliance Defense Fund were at the courthouse to support the Prop 8 ban.
"The 7 million voters in California voted for Prop 8. They made a reasonable, legitimate public policy decision that the constitution permits. The federal judge should just defer to their decision," said Jordan Lorence of the Alliance Defense Fund.
Chief U.S. Judge Vaughn Walker is also being asked to rule on the 18,000 same sex marriages that occurred in California during the six month period when they were legal. Yes on 8 attorneys want the judge to rule that government agencies, courts and businesses no longer have to recognize the couples as married.
"This is a very odd request by the defendants. That issue was resolved by the California Supreme Court, it is a matter of California state law and I don't think Judge Walker has jurisdiction to interfere with that decision," said ABC7 Legal Analyst Dean Johnson.
Judge Walker's opening line had the court buzzing.
"Judge Walker in his very first opening line said 'I'm sorry this took so long, but after all it is June and June is the month for weddings.' Was he telegraphing a decision?" asked Johnson.
Olson argued on how the word marriage has taken on an extended meaning throughout history. He brought up examples of how it was expanded to include slaves and interracial marriage. Olson argued that these expansions have not only changed the institution, but made it stronger.
Source: http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=news/state&id=7500996
Gah, I don't want to read into the judge's opening words too much, but doesn't that seem like a good sign?
california, marriage equality
BP: All Your GIS Data Are Belong To Us
Preface from the OP: After my last post regarding this teeny tiny little company called The Response Group (TRG) that is apparently the source of all of the (cookie cutter) Oil Spill Response Plans for all of the world's major oil companies. While doing a bit of research on that company, I came across a very interesting piece regarding what appears to be a systematic compartmentalization and restriction of access by BP to what is called GIS (Geographic Information System) data related to the Deepwater Horizon oil spill.
GIS is data linked to geographic location, and thereby used in cartography, land surveying, utility management, emergency management, etc. As it pertains to the oil spill in the Gulf, that information is being collected by various governmental entities and submitted to BP.....who is apparently then putting it behind BP firewalls and not making it accessible to the public, or to the various other respondant entities who are performing recovery work on the spill.
Last week, one of the GIS companies working with BP and all of the other folks involved in the oil spill wrote a VERY detailed open letter regarding their experience in recent weeks as the GIS provider. This timeline outlines not only a gradual, but ultimately complete takeover by BP of all GIS data related to the spill, but what started out as virtually no involvement by BP's IT group for the first few weeks (during which the folks from the GIS Institute apparently acheived a great deal), until they sprang into ninja-like readiness action and took over the whole damn thing.....and removed the GIS Institute from the project entirely.
Yesterday, that open letter was removed from the GIS Institute's website, by the author apparently. Read the information below, and I think you'll understand why this information should be publicized rather than erased.
Letter begins verbatim below line. Some original formating and page style is lost, but the ASCII code is retained in full and unedited:
Deepwater Horizon GIS Data Concerns
From: Andrew Stephens and Devon Humphrey
Subject: BP control of GIS data
This letter is being submitted to make it known that several key factors of the National Incident Management System (NIMS) and Incident Command Structure (ICS) are not being met in the Unified Command process of the BP Deepwater Horizon Incident. Specifically regarding the treatment of Geographic Information System (GIS) data, current configuration and process limit, or exclude completely, the flow of information about the extent and status of the disaster to government entities, emergency responders, and the public.
GIS is essential to the oil spill response effort and to the recovery of public resources. Almost every map and geographic display representing the Deepwater Horizon Incident is sourced by GIS data. Current GIS management processes indicate that BP is treating GIS data as proprietary information, and these data are currently being stored behind the BP corporate firewall. It is our understanding that public agencies, for example, The US Fish and Wildlife Service and The Louisiana National Guard, are literally submitting the only copy of agency field data, via wireless-enabled mobile GPS devices, directly to a BP GIS server behind the corporate firewall in Houston. Examples of these data are; dead bird and fish locations with photos, boom placement, engineered construction barriers, including dates, and other descriptive information and photos.
State Emergency Operation Center (EOC) staff, Parish EOC staff, and other Emergency Responders and Recovery Specialists do not have access to these GIS datasets, contrary to all NIMS guidance, protocols and principles.
What it means for GIS operations and disaster response:
One speculative consequence of BP's actions is that priorities for data use, dissemination, and analysis may have negative impacts on spill response timing and operations. Because BP IT decisions for the ICP are evidently being made from Houston, there is extremely limited exposure to the needs of commanders and field personnel in Houma. Furthermore, since edits need to be implemented on BP proprietary systems in Houston by BP personnel, the ability to quickly adapt to needs in ICP Houma, which were changing and growing on a daily basis, were very likely impaired. GIS professionals, scientists and developers have an approach to their work that relies upon openness and adaptability in order to succeed. Therefore, it is highly probable that decision support was weakened by BP's actions to take control over the GIS environment.
What this means to the non-GIS layperson:
1) The current configuration and process allow BP to limit or slow down the flow of information about the extent of the disaster to the government, the public and law enforcement, which I believe is against the spirit and letter of NIMS.
2) The current process allows BP to treat GIS datasets as proprietary information. It is my understanding that public agencies, like The US Fish and Wildlife Service and The Louisiana National Guard, are literally submitting the only copy of agency field data directly to a BP GIS server behind the corporate firewall. Examples of these data are; dead bird and fish locations with photos, boom deployment and engineered construction, dates, along with other descriptive information and photos.
3) The GIS information is essential to the recovery of public resources, and some data belongs to US taxpayers, not BP. BP is paying for the hardware and collection of these GIS datasets, yet it is my understanding that the data belong to the people of the United States. BP must not be allowed to protect these data as if they were a proprietary product.
4) State Emergency Operation Center staff, Parish EOC staff, and other Emergency Responders and Recovery Specialists do not have access to these GIS datasets, contrary to all NIMS guidance, protocols and principles. The effort to slow down the flow of information is at the expense of the containment and cleanup effort of the responders and is in our opinion, suspect behavior by BP.
5) The Federal On Scene Coordinator at ICP Houma, US Coast Guard Captain Ed Stanton, standing with USCG Rear Admiral James Watson, approved the National Incident Management System (NIMS) compliant design, and ordered the first database and server. That server was received by BP, and placed behind the BP firewall.
At the very least, per NIMS, there must be redundancy of GIS information managed jointly, and fully accessible to both the FOSC and the SOSC. Technology allows implementation of this design to occur instantaneously and automatically.
The Incident Commander, the FOSC, the SOSC, and the President need to establish NIMS compliant access policies over this GIS data while they still can. This GIS information is an important component of the record, and it would be a loss to learn that some critical part were mistakenly edited, deleted or otherwise changed.
We urge The President, via Incident Command, to determine a NIMS compliant, secure, data sharing policy, based on GIS industry best practices for all GIS data of the BP oil spill. We believe a high priority should be placed on sharing this information to all responders and researchers, for our welfare, rather than leaving it to one party to control access for its own welfare. We must not allow BP to slow down the collection or organization or distribution of these data – they have demonstrated in other areas during this incident, that they are often slow or inaccurate when providing scientific data, quantitative methods, and projection figures.
We did the best work of our GIS careers at the ICP in Houma, and we are proud of the accomplishments, hard work, and every decision made while on post.
Andrew Stephens, Former GIS Unit Lead ICP Houma, and
Devon Humphrey, Former GIO ICP Houma
End of verbatim content above line.
Don't bother reading the stuff under the cut unless you really want to delve into the details. I've included it because I felt the original letter should be posted in complete context.
aggravated
bp, drill baby drill, fail, oil, wtf
anolinde
Experts argue firing squad is a humane execution.
Mods: I hope this source is okay! First time posting here, so I hope everything is all right.
SALT LAKE CITY — A condemned Utah inmate's decision to die in a barrage of bullets fired by five unnamed marksmen has been vilified by many as an archaic form of Old West-style justice.
But some experts argue it is more humane than all other execution methods, without the court challenges of cruelty that have plagued lethal injection.
"Lethal injection, which has the veneer of medical acceptability, has far greater risks of cruelty to a condemned person," said Fordham University Law School professor Deborah Denno, who has written extensively on the constitutional questions that surround execution methods.
Ronnie Lee Gardner picked death by firing squad because he believes it is a more humane way to die — not because it evokes drama or controversy, his attorney told The Associated Press.
"It's not about the publicity. He just prefers it," Andrew Parnes said.
Late Tuesday, Parnes appealed Gardner's case to both the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver and the U.S. Supreme Court, hoping to block the execution. It was the same day Gardner ate what may be his last meal — steak, lobster tail, apple pie, vanilla ice cream and 7UP. Utah State Prison officials said Gardner now intends to fast until the execution set for early Friday.
Gardner, 49, was sentenced to death for a 1985 capital murder conviction stemming from the fatal courthouse shooting of attorney Michael Burdell during an escape attempt. Gardner was at the court because he faced a murder charge in the shooting death of bartender Melvyn Otterstrom.
Barring any last minute stays, Gardner will be the first person to die by firing squad in the United States in 14 years. He will be the third man killed by that same method in Utah since a U.S. Supreme Court ruling reinstated capital punishment in 1976: Gary Gilmore on Jan. 17, 1977 — after famously uttering the last words, "Let's do it" — and John Albert Taylor on Jan. 26, 1996.
Of the 49 executions held in Utah since the 1850s, 40 were by firing squad. The method has also been widely used around the globe and was long the primary method of execution employed by the military, even in the U.S.
But lethal injection has become the primary method used by most of the 35 states that still have capital punishment, according to the Death Penalty Information Center website. Yet it isn't without controversy.
University of Colorado law professor Michael Radlet has been tracking botched executions in the U.S. and found some 42 cases that went wrong between 1982 and September 2009. Of those executions, 30 were lethal injection, 10 were electrocution and two were from asphyxiation after exposure to lethal gas.
A court challenge of lethal injection in Kentucky essentially halted executions nationwide in 2007 as the U.S. Supreme Court grappled with whether a three-drug cocktail was more painful than just a single barbiturate. At the time, Kentucky had only had one execution by lethal injection — with no complications — but executions in Ohio and Florida had taken longer than usual and produced strong evidence that inmates had suffered severe pain in the process.
The court upheld Kentucky's use of the three drugs in 2008, clearing the way for capital punishment to resume, Denno said.
The firing squad has not been similarly challenged, and by all accounts, Utah's executions by firing squad were carried out without problems, Denno said.
"Even Gary Gilmore's father said it was a dignified execution," she said.
Utah's territorial government sought permission from the U.S. Supreme Court to use the firing squad back in the 1870s, according to Gillespie. The court said that "execution by shooting was not prohibited by the Eighth Amendment's cruel and unusual punishment clause, in that the method did not entail torture or unnecessary cruelty," Gillespie wrote in his book "The Unforgiven," which chronicles the history of capital punishment in Utah.
Historians say the method stems from 19th Century doctrine of the state's predominant religion. Early members of The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints believed in the concept of "blood atonement" — that only through spilling one's own blood could a condemned person adequately atone for their crimes and be redeemed in the next life. The church no longer preaches such teachings and offers no opinion on the use of the firing squad.
Death penalty advocate Kent Scheidegger agrees that capital punishment should not amount to torture, but says the average person "is not really all that concerned with a murderer experiencing painless death."
Public debate is focused more on the larger issue of the death penalty and whether or not the punishment deters crime.
"Arguing over the method of execution is kind of a distraction," said Scheidegger, legal director of the Sacramento, Calif., Criminal Justice Legal Foundation.
Religious and secular groups plan prayer vigils and rallies outside the state capitol and the prison in the hours leading up to Gardner's execution.
"If you think about it, how do you kill somebody in a permissible manner?" said Ralph Dellapiana, a co-founder of Utahns for Alternatives to the Death Penalty. "We don't care much about the method, we're of the 'it's all not OK' belief."
The barrage of publicity that follows the firing squad is largely what prompted Utah lawmakers to alter it's capital punishment law in 2004 to disallow the choice for inmates and make lethal injection the default method. Inmates sentenced before then — like Gardner — retain the choice.
In repealing the option, Utah lawmakers said they disliked the negative media attention that firing squads focused on the state, said Republican Rep. Sheryl Allen, who twice carried legislation to change the law.
In 1996, more than 150 media outlets descended on Utah to cover Taylor's execution, painting the firing squad as an Old West-style of justice that allows killers to go out in a blaze of glory that embarrasses the state.
Gardner is one of at least four of 10 men on Utah's death row who have said they want to die by firing squad.
Source (or here, here, or here).
What do you guys think? Pro- or anti-capital punishment? Either way, do you think execution via firing squad could be more humane than the controversial method of lethal injection?
capital punishment, utah
jenaimequetoi
The U.S. and soccer – that joke isn't funny anymore
Almost everyone's got a sport they dislike. Some people can't stand tennis, others don't like football. Hockey's too fast, golf's too slow. And some incredibly popular sports outside of the U.S., like cricket, are as well understood as trigonometry to most Americans.
Soccer is something of an exception. As a country, we've historically been unimpressed. We've even reserved its more internationally recognized name, "football," for our own game, which barely involves feet. But it's made an impact on young Americans—evident in the "soccer mom" appellation—and inevitably, it is gaining in popularity here. After all, soccer's the most popular sport in the world.
However, according to right-wing talk radio, it's un-American.
Fox News entertainer and part-time thriller novelist Glenn Beck took a long walk to lump together the World Cup with President Barack Obama. "It doesn't matter how you try to sell it to us, it doesn't matter how many celebrities you get, it doesn't matter how many bars open early, it doesn't matter how many beer commercials they run," said Beck. "We don't want the World Cup, we don't like the World Cup, we don't like soccer, we want nothing to do with it." He then got to his point, and added, "The rest of the world likes Barack Obama's policies, we do not."
On G. Gordon Liddy's show (when did he get a show?), his guest, the oh-so-charming Dan Gainor of the conservative thinktank Media Research Center, stated that soccer, a "poor man or poor women's sport" (take that Christiano Ronaldo, David Beckham and Kaka!) is being sold as part of the "browning of America."
So that's it, is it?
It's not hard to draw a line from conservative opposition to soccer and their ongoing narrative about "taking back America." You know, before we played soccer. Or before illegal immigration? Or before racial integration?
Where does that line end, exactly? Maybe Glenn Beck can chalk that out for me.
superfan1
Bill requiring women seeking abortion to get ultrasound goes to Jindal
abortion, louisiana
mrflagg
There's a pipe spewing a gazillion gobs of oil into the gulf, so let's build more windmills
For all his reputation as the nation's Top Talker, Barack Obama took his sweet time giving a maiden Oval Office address to the country. And waiting another nearly 60 days to speak nationally about the oil spill that's become the worst environmental disaster in the nation's history.
Obama, the first modern president to pass his first full year in office without addressing the country from his historic desk, had the setting right. Just back from a day-and-a-half on the gulf coast listening, reassuring, talking tourism, eating seafood. He wore the proper suit, had the requisite flags and family photos in the background.
For 18 minutes he delivered the words crisply and forthrightly, though too often distracting anxious viewers with his fidgeting hands like the lecturing professor he once was. Or wait! Was Mr. Cool nervous?
Psycho Killer Professor Charged with Murder for 1986 Shooting of Brother
CANTON -- Amy Bishop has been charged with murder for the 1986 shotgun slaying of her 18-year-old brother in their Braintree home, Norfolk District Attorney William R. Keating said this afternoon.
"The grand jury has indicted Amy Bishop for murder in the first degree,'' Keating told reporters. "Here in Massachusetts, we had evidence of a murder. We proceeded with that, as we should have. "The slaying of Seth Bishop was declared an accident by Norfolk County authorities at the time. But questions were raised about the investigation after Bishop, a college professor, was charged in February in a shooting rampage at the University of Alabama Huntsville. Three of Bishops' colleagues were fatally shot and three wounded in that case.
Keating said an indictment warrant has been lodged with Alabama authorities. He indicated that he would give the Alabama triple murder case priority. Asked whether Bishop would ever be tried in Massachusetts for murder, Keating said, "You never know.''( Collapse )
crime, murder
omgangiepants
A Doctor Tells Why She Performed Abortions—And Still Would
Dr. X is a physician at a community health center and a medical school faculty member in the Midwest. Health Affairs does not normally publish articles under pseudonyms, but given recent murders of abortion providers and other violent attacks against them, we decided not to publish the physician's real name out of concern for her personal safety. As always, we welcome Narrative Matters essays from varying perspectives.
This is a clinic where they kill babies!" A woman in a black beret stopped me as I entered an abortion clinic. Pamphlets in hand, she asked me with concern, "Are you pregnant? Do you need help?"
I wasn't pregnant. I was on my way to work.
I went to medical school to promote life. I defined that loosely: I wanted to do what I could to keep individuals healthy so we could be part of loving families and build healthy communities, supporting each other and enjoying being alive. While I was in medical school, a friend became pregnant after date rape, and I supported her through an abortion.
Around that time, I attended a talk at the medical school by the journalist Jack Hitt. He discussed "Who Will Do Abortions Here?"—his powerful, eye-opening New York Times article from 1998 about the threat to legalized abortion in the United States because of the lack of providers.
Then, as now, the number of abortion providers was dwindling. The number went from 2,680 providers in 1985 to 1,787 in 2005, the latest year for which statistics are available. Hitt described the upcoming retirement of the generation of obstetrician/gynecologists (OB/GYNs) who had watched women bleed to death from botched abortions and had responded to those tragedies by staffing clinics when the U.S. Supreme Court legalized abortion in its 1973 ruling in Roe v. Wade.
But no new generation of abortion providers was being trained, Hitt told us. When teaching hospitals merged with religious hospitals where abortions were banned, abortions were no longer done—or taught—at the teaching institutions. Other programs began to make abortion training optional: OB/GYN or family medicine residents who wanted the training needed to add it to their already heavy loads of required courses. Threats to the lives of abortion providers and their families dissuaded some practitioners from providing these services, even though they were trained to perform them and the procedure is legal. More than half of all abortion practitioners were past retirement age, Hitt said. One elderly practitioner flew his own plane to reach women in four states—he was the sole abortion provider in North Dakota—despite regular death threats.
There are now an estimated 1.5 million abortions each year in the United States, making it the most common surgical procedure. Yet there are fewer and fewer abortion providers available. One-quarter of women needing abortions must travel more than fifty miles for the procedure; 6 percent must travel to another state. During my medical training, I saw many women with an unwanted pregnancy, and I witnessed wide variation in the options that doctors offered patients in that situation.
abortion, womens health
US General who said gays caused massacre warns of 'HIV risk'
Just a few months after apologising for suggesting gay soldiers were responsible for the Srebrenica massacre, US Army General John Sheehan has said allowing gays to serve openly in the military would have a "devastating" effect.
He was writing jointly with the anti-gay Family Research Council president Tony Perkins for Politico magazine.
The pair wrote that homosexuality has "profound behavioural implications" and "inevitable" sexual attraction among soldiers could "devastate morale, foster heightened interpersonal tension and lead to division".
They added that an increased risk of HIV in gay and bisexual men would be "devastating" and have "pronounced implications for battlefield blood transfusions".
Quoting data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, they said gay and bisexual men were "50 times more likely to have HIV than heterosexual men".
The wrote: "This proposal is not about bigotry. Race is a superficial and benign element of one's humanness, while homosexuality is a matter of behaviour.
"Homosexuality is not about civil rights but conduct detrimental to the discipline, trust and combat readiness of what has been — and still is — the world's finest military."
They concluded: "If we want to keep it that way, we should not permit openly practicing homosexuals to serve in the US military."
Gen Sheehan avoided a reprimand for his remarks at a Senate hearing on the military's ban on out gay soldiers.
He said that Dutch military officials told him that allowing gay soldiers the Dutch army had led to poor morale, which led to a failure to prevent the genocide of 8,000 Muslims.
He later wrote to Dutch officials to apologise for "inaccurately " remembering discussions.
Source: Pink News
batshit, dont ask dont tell, hiv/aids, homophobia, military, netherlands, usa
watchsnowfall
The honour killing question: A family loses control
Cultural differences may have laid the groundwork for murder
They came to Canada in search of a better life. But somewhere along the way, the immigrant dreams of Muhammad Parvez and his eight children went horribly astray. Tuesday, in a Brampton court, Parvez and his son Waqas pleaded guilty to second-degree murder for killing Aqsa Parvez, 16. Both father and son took blame for strangling her. But Aqsa's death and the cultural context that surrounded it raised troubling questions: Was this the GTA's first honour killing? Or was Parvez simply a domineering father, who feared losing control of his youngest daughter?
Oops, forgot source!
Interesting points, but adjusting to cultural norms goes both ways. I'm not going to parade around in a bikini in Saudi Arabia - but the flipside is that I expect adaptation to Canadian cultural norms too. If a 16-year old girl feels more comfortale wearing a hijab, so long as it's her choice, that's great -- but she should also be able to wear blue jeans without the fear of abuse or death from her family. IMO, there is not enough support in place in this country for young girls in these types of situations, or support/education for the parents. No, not every immigrant family is going to kill their daughter for wearing lip gloss; but that doesn't mean we can ignore the tragic consequences of problems with cultural adjustment as isolated incidences.
jesidres
BRAVE REPUBLICAN TRIES TO GOAD EVIL SEKRET BLACK PRESIDENT TO HULK OUT
King seeing if "pot will come to a boil" after his Obama remarks
Republican Congressman Steve King says he stands by comments he made Monday that have drawn national attention and prompted a Republican congressional candidate in another state to cancel King's speech at his campaign fundraiser in Colorado.
During an interview on the G. Gordon Liddy talk show, King said President Obama has a "default mechanism" that "favors the black person." King also accused U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder of not pursuing a series of cases because those accused were minorities.
"I have no regrets about what I said. I stand by what I said because what I said is accurate. It's factual," King said during a telephone interview with Radio Iowa late this afternoon. "I think the president should answer and Attorney General Holder should answer for the justice department being used in the way it is, but what I said was accurate and it was objective."
King said his comments have been "distorted" by "the left" for political gain.
"All of these things are politically motivated. You have the professional hyperventilators out there who have the radar screen up all the time, trying to find something that they can twist or embellish. That's what's going on," King said during his interview with Radio Iowa. "I don't want anybody to think that Steve King loses a minute's sleep over this."
During his talk radio appearance on Monday, King said Obama has a "default mechanism in him that breaks down on the side of race" and King said that was highlighted by Obama siding with the black Harvard professor who was arrested in his home by a white policeman after a neighbor called about a possible break-in. This afternoon, King told Radio Iowa he had waited to respond to the furor over his comments about Obama and the attorney general.
"I actually, when this first popped…I told my people here that handle my media: 'Let's let this cook for a couple of days and see if this pot will come to a boil,'" King said. "I don't want to put it away in the first day because I think the American people need to have this debate about what appears to me to be an inclination on the part of the White House and the justice department and perhaps others within the administration to break on the side of favoritism with regard to race."
The Democrat who's challenging King in the fall election suggests King's flair for sparking controversy is standing in the way of progress on issues important to western Iowans. Matt Campbell of Manning, the Democrat running against King, says King comments are "of concern" to residents in the fifth congressional district.
"I think they're reflective of a pattern of Mr. King saying polarizing things," Campbell says. "I think collectively they preclude meaningful work on issues important to the development of western Iowa because of statements such as this."
During an appearance on the nationally-syndicated G. Gordon Liddy radio talk show on Monday King said he is "not a coward" when it comes to discussing the issue of race in America, and King added he is "happy to talk about these things." Campbell is challenging King to a series of at least three debates before the fall election.
"He's not debated since he's been elected to congress and I think that's something that, regardless of these statements, is incumbent on him to do," Campbell says.
King, the owner of an earth-moving company, served in the state senate for six years and was first elected to congress in 2002. He is running this year for a fifth term in the U.S. House.
Campbell made his comments this afternoon during a telephone interview with Radio Iowa.
barack obama, media, race / racism, republicans
Where's the Evidence? Judge Asks Proposition 8 Supporters
Packed San Francisco courtroom hears highly anticipated closing arguments in same-sex marriage case. Charles Cooper, the attorney defending a federal challenge to Proposition 8, came to San Francisco to deliver his closing argument on same-sex marriage Wednesday.
akuma_river
200 dead in last 7 days in cartel drug war
Mexico's bloodshed worsens as hundreds die in last 7 days
By DUDLEY ALTHAUS
Copyright 2010 Houston Chronicle
MEXICO CITY — More than 200 people have been slaughtered during the past seven days in the most violent week in the criminal insurgency racking Mexico since President Felipe Calderón unleashed federal forces against drug trafficking gangs.
The carnage has cut a wide arc through Mexico and underscored the gangsters' brazen willingness to take on military troops and Mexican federal police in direct combat.
Among this week's victims were 12 federal police officers ambushed Monday by presumed gangsters in western Michoacan state and three others bushwhacked in northern Chihuahua state. Army troops shot it out with gunmen Tuesday in Taxco, a tourist mecca 100 miles south of Mexico City, killing 15 alleged criminals.
"The difference now is that the criminals and security forces are clashing more frequently," said Raul Benitez-Manaut, a national security analyst. "The criminals are directly challenging the government."
Border murder rates in the U.S. may be down but not on the other side and that is what has the government all worried about.
P.S. the murder rates in my region (Victoria, Texas) have gone up and we are a hub of the major highways that go to all the major cities in Texas and the deaths are directly attributed to gang warefare with links to the Mexican Cartels and smuggling (human, drugs, and weapons). We are also about 500 miles inland of the border.
drugs, guns, mexico, murder, texas, war
ladypolitik
ONTD_Political's PotD: June 15, 2010.
Frozen land, forgotten people
In 1966, Bureau of Indian Affairs Commissioner Robert L. Bennett outlawed development on 1.6 million acres of desert in northeastern Arizona that was claimed by both the Navajo nation and the Hopi tribe. When the freeze ended, many residents didn't know where to begin.
Barbara Davidson | Los Angles Times
This is an audio/visual photo set; check out the source link for the full experience.
Beyoncé - Disappear | Powered by Last.fm
ontd_political photo of the day
evewithanapple
Boy, 11, slams residential schools legacy
An 11-year-old boy stole the spotlight at the opening day of the Truth and Reconciliation Commission hearings into the tragedy of Canada's residential schools.
The former foster child, who turned up to ceremonies at The Forks in Winnipeg on Wednesday, told CBC News that members of his family still suffer from the aftershocks the federal government's former policies had on his grandparents and elders.
Bury My Heart At Wounded Knee- Buffy Sainte-Marie
canada, youth


Major characters, Characters with special abilities, Hilda's coven,
James's coven
Seattle newborn army
1550s; England
Age when turned
June 15, 2006 (killed by Edward Cullen)
Redhead (by Jacob Black)
Bloodsucker (by Jacob Black)
Leech (by Jacob Black)
Brilliant Orange
Green (human)
Red (vampire)
James (mate) ♰
Riley Biers (pawn) ♰
Anne (older sister) ♰
Laurent (coven mate) ♰
Hilda (coven mate) ♰
Heidi (former coven mate)
Mary (coven mate) ♰
Noela (coven mate) ♰
Members of her newborn army
Limited self-control
Enhanced self-preservation
Maid (human life)
Leader of her army (vampire life)
Hilda's coven
"And the woman, Victoria, don't underestimate her."
―Laurent's warning.[src]
Victoria was the main antagonist in New Moon and Eclipse. She was a founding member of James's coven with the power of enhanced self-preservation, and James's mate and started a vendetta against Bella Swan in revenge for his death at Edward Cullen and the Cullens' hands.
To this end, she spearheaded several plots to end Bella's life, including creating a newborn army in Seattle, with the express purpose of killing her and destroying the Olympic coven. However, at the conclusion of the newborn crisis, Victoria's life of violence and malice was ended by Edward in the battle with the army. Her Life and Death counterpart is Victor.
She is portrayed by Rachelle Lefevre in the first two movie adaptations and replaced by Bryce Dallas Howard in the third. She is also portrayed by Sophie Labell in The Groundskeeper segment.
"Victoria had always seemed like a force of nature to me—like a hurricane moving toward the coast in a straight line—unavoidable, implacable, but predictable. Maybe it was wrong to limit her that way. She had to be capable of adaptation."
―Bella on Victoria[src]
Victoria was born in London, England in the 1550s. Her mother was a scullery maid and her father was the master of the house. She was the second illegitimate child, after her sister, Anne. Victoria and Anne worked hard as servants from early childhood. Anne was quite pretty, with mahogany hair and a cream and rose complexion, and though the green-eyed, bright red-haired, and freckled Victoria had nice features as well, she was considered "witchy." The sisters eventually got jobs together, Anne as a lady's maid, and Victoria as a kitchen drudge. The master of the house mistreated them; he was not a kind man, quick to beat a servant for any perceived fault—and lecherous as well. Both sisters grew adept at disappearing whenever possible. With her shockingly bright hair, it was more difficult for Victoria to avoid notice than most, and she received extra beatings simply for being visible.
Though their jobs kept them fed, the two sisters fled the house when Victoria was twelve years old. To avoid living in the streets during winter season, Anne agreed to work for a local pimp, on the condition that her sister would receive free lodging with the other working girls. The situation was worse for Anne and nearly as bad for Victoria as the house they'd run from, but it was better than the streets. Victoria perfected her ability to evade during her time here. One night, Anne went out to find a client—but she never returned. Afterwards the pimp kept Victoria locked up—determined to make the remaining sister learn her place, but she managed to escape shortly thereafter. She spent 2 years in the streets and survived on her own, sleeping in small, hidden places and stealing as little food as possible to keep her theft from being noticed and moved from house to house, leaving no trace behind. Her evasion had been perfected to the point that even dogs could not react to her presence. At age 15, a scullery maid was fired and she took the opportunity to get the job. Though the job was hard, it was at least stable. She wasn't hit as often, and was content for most of the part.
Three years later, the pimp spotted her buying groceries in the streets and tried to follow her home, but she managed to escape. She realized it would only be a matter of time before he found her, but she wasn't sure if she could make a living in the country if she left her job. It was at this time that Anne found her. Victoria woke in the night to see Anne in her attic room, standing over her. Anne was more beautiful than ever, though she'd lost all the pink in her cheeks. Victoria was ecstatic and wanted to embrace her sister, but Anne kept her distance, moving at a speed that shocked and silenced Victoria. Anne wanted to know if Victoria was happy and safe. Anne was not satisfied by Victoria's predicament. She pondered aloud killing the pimp, but decided that he was only a small part of the problem. Victoria would never be safe until she was stronger than those who would hurt or control her. Anne asked Victoria if she trusted Anne's judgement. Victoria agreed and Anne picked her up as if she were a doll, carried her out the window, and bit her. After her transformation, she was introduced to her sister's creator, Hilda, and two other vampires, Mary and Heidi. Victoria led a perfectly happy life with her coven for 2 years, and then they were joined by Noela. Shortly after that, the Volturi came to her coven and claimed that they had drawn too much attention from society and executed Hilda for the crime. Heidi was immediately taken in by the Volturi, under the influence of Chelsea's power. Victoria sensed that the rest of them will be slaughtered whether they surrendered or not and screamed for them to run. They all ran in different directions, but only Victoria managed to escape their slaughter. She lost her only sister that day. Since then, she had avoided all vampires.
While in London, she became the target of the tracker James, and she tried to avoid him for years. Eventually, he felt intrigued by her evasive skills and no longer wished to harm her. His change of decision allowed Victoria to lower her guard and let him catch up to her. In James, she found someone who was honest in his intentions and confident in his abilities. She was also attracted to his tracking skills, which was like a mirror of her own. Eventually, she fell in love with his self-assurance. It felt safe to her, stable in an odd way. While she was happier with James, her life was neither peaceful or easy. The way he liked to live constantly put her into situations that, on her own, she would have avoided. While chasing Mary Alice Brandon's scent to an asylum, Victoria made James hesitate for a short second when they crossed another vampire's scent.
As James grew more ambitious in his games, she became more cautious. She suggested teaming up with other useful vampires for the sake of numbers. Laurent joined their coven during one of these experiments, who was also attracted to James's power.
Twilight Edit
Main article: Twilight
James with Victoria at the baseball game.
"I'm the one with the wicked curve ball."
―Victoria.[src]
The coven heard rumors about large vampire groups claiming areas in the Pacific Northwest, and James was so intrigued that he decided to check them out. Victoria wanted to find more backup, but James did not want to waste time.
After coming across the Cullen family in Twilight, Victoria assisted James in finding information about Bella. His failed attempt to kill Bella cost him his life. Victoria, however, managed to escape to Seattle.
By losing her mate, she felt vulnerable and paranoid, and created a companion for her own safety, choosing a young human man, Riley Biers. She made sure that he was totally loyal to her, and was surprised at how readily he believed she had changed him out of love. Then she made more vampires, feeling that if she could surround herself with allies, she would be safe. At the same time, she hid herself from these new allies, aside from Riley. She was extremely paranoid for a time, setting up layers of protection for herself. She was loosely copying what she'd seen with the Volturi guard, but waiting for her newborns to be old enough to train. In the meantime, she had Riley control them with carefully constructed lies—most notably, the myth that vampires were destroyed by the sun.
Victoria at the prom in Twilight.
In the Twilight movie, she, James and Laurent feast on the people in Washington State, including one of Charlie Swan's close friends, Waylon Forge. She is also seen dressed in a prom dress with make-up on, maliciously spying on Bella and Edward as they dance at prom at the end of the movie.
Main article: New Moon
"Victoria plans on killing you slowly. Painfully."
―Laurent, to Bella.[src]
In the first 6 months after James's death, Victoria created 15 newborns—and killed roughly 4 humans to every one that survived as a vampire. One of the first was Diego; one of the last—of this period—was Raoul. Fred was also created during this period. About half of this first wave did not survive during Victoria's absence.
Her gift forewarned her when Edward was hunting her, just as it had with James. She left Riley behind to mind the other newborns she'd created. Passing through Texas, she ran up against a territorial coven with a small force of newborns. The encounter inspired her to use her newborns as an army to exact revenge on Edward by killing Bella: a way to make him feel the same pain that she'd felt when James died. When she was sure she'd thrown Edward off her trail, she headed back to Seattle.
She tracked Laurent down in Alaska and, feigning friendship, she gleaned all information he'd learned about the Cullens from the Denalis. She asked him to do her a favor: visit the Cullens and see if they were all still with Bella. It was a win-win for Victoria; if Edward was back in Forks, she assumed he would kill Laurent when he saw the connection to Victoria in his head. If not, Laurent would bring back news of the girl's location and how many protected her.
Victoria in a deleted scene from New Moon.
Meanwhile, she created more newborns, leaving them under Riley's care, in case she ended up having to go through the full coven to get to Bella. After thinking carefully about Alice and her gift, Victoria put Riley in charge of making all the decisions about the newborns' movements. She made no plans to use them for anything concrete and thought about them as little as possible.
Laurent called Victoria once to report that the Cullen house was empty and he would look around to see if Bella had gone with them. She heard nothing more from Laurent and went to investigate, and discovered the werewolves. This was an unforeseen problem. James had tracked a werewolf once, for the challenge of it. He'd been successful, as usual. But the wolves were supposed to be nearly extinct, not traveling in large packs. Nor should they be able to maintain their wolf forms in the daylight. This was worrying, but secondary to the fact that Victoria had crossed a fresh trail left by Bella. The Cullens were gone, and all she had to do was get past the wolves to kill her.
Victoria escaping in the water.
No matter how hard she tried, the werewolves always found her and her survival instincts got the better of herself. However, with the Cullens absent, she was patient. Then one night, she caught Alice's scent and knew her hopes for an easy kill were over. It did not take long before all the Cullens returned.
In the movie, Victoria finds Bella in the water and attempts to make a move on her, but Jacob drags Bella out before she could try.
The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner Edit
Main article: The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner
Riley and Victoria.
"Of course, it wasn't weird that we could sympathize each other when it came to her."
―Bree Tanner on Victoria.[src]
In the Eclipse novella, The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner, Victoria did not appear, but simply spoke in the shadows.
After the Cullens returned to Forks, Riley and the newborns became her first priority: She created more and more of them, until Seattle was nearly overrun, but had managed to evade Alice's vision by hiding in the shadows and letting Riley select the members.
Victoria made continuous feints into the area around Forks, gathering information and hoping that the Cullens would believe these fruitless attacks were all that she had up her sleeve.
She later sent Riley to get an article of Bella's clothing, her red blouse, to give her scent to the other newborns and get them into action, while testing the blind spots in Alice's vision at the same time.
One night, the Volturi came to Victoria and Riley and gave her a five-day limit to fulfill her army's purpose, which explains why they made a decision to attack the Cullens when they did. Moments after the encounter, one of the members, Diego told Riley about what he had discovered about sunlight's effects on vampires. Riley had hoped that Victoria would spare him, but meeting the Volturi made her paranoid and she wanted to move as fast as possible and then escape. By tormenting Diego to death, she extracted all information out of him and forced Riley to either side with her or against her. Riley reluctantly sided with her and helped kill Diego, much to his dismay.
Knowing that she could completely trust him now, she ordered him to prepare the army to attack the Cullens and manipulate them into the same mindset.
Main article: Eclipse
Victoria, beheaded by Edward.
"You want me to feel the pain you felt when I killed James. When I tore him to pieces. When I turned him into ash. When I turned him... into nothing."
―Edward's provocation[src]
In Eclipse, Bella Swan figured out Victoria's plan and gave her realization to the Cullens, and subsequently the Uley pack. The two groups began planning strategy for the upcoming struggle.
On the day of the fight, while her army was fighting with the Cullens and wolves, she tracked down Edward's scent with Riley and followed it to Edward's and Bella's hiding place. She had planned to use Riley to distract Edward while she made her move on Bella. Riley momentarily hesitated when Edward told him that Victoria only used him, but she persuaded him otherwise. She attempted to escape when Seth attacked Riley, drawing away her object of distraction, but Edward taunted her relationship to James, angering her to the point that she warred with her survival instincts. She fought Edward while Riley battled Seth. After Seth killed Riley, Victoria tried to escape again, but Edward caught her and immediately ripped her head off. Victoria's and Riley's remains were then burned, while her newborn army was defeated by the other Cullens and the pack.
Victoria in the forest in Twilight.
"Her orange hair was brighter than I'd remembered, more like a flame. There was no wind here, but the fire around her face seemed to shimmer slightly, as if it were alive."
―Bella on Victoria's hair[src]
Victoria was described as being 5'6" tall, with long, curly, brilliant orange hair that was usually described as looking like fire with the usual blood red eyes of a vampire. She had green eyes as a human. She possessed a seductive, feline beauty and had a soft, high soprano of a voice that contrasted with her fierce looks. She moved at a feline pace with perfect, lethal steps, as of her agility.
When Bella heard Victoria speak for the first time in Eclipse, she described her voice as 'belonging to blond curls and pink bubblegum', and can pass for a helpless girl to lure in a bait.
Victoria was shown to have a mysterious but elegant personality. She could best be described as calculating, however she was frequently bloodthirsty, whether it was when she was dying to kill Bella for her delicious blood on the baseball field in Twilight or when she was stalking Bella for revenge in New Moon and Eclipse. She is also marked as one of the most persistent and ruthless characters in the series.
Like most archetypical vampires and femme fatales, she was seductively charming and vain. As seen in Eclipse, Victoria was shown to be very manipulative and was willing to use others to achieve her own goals. Victoria manipulated Riley by telling him she loved him in order to get revenge on Bella and the Cullens, though she thought of him as nothing more than a pawn. In The Short Second Life of Bree Tanner, she was also petulant and spoiled, but at the same time overly cautious to the point of paranoia and vindictiveness. For self-preservation, she would go through any measure she deemed necessary.
Despite all this, she was also paranoid and easily intimidated by dangers, and would do anything to survive.
In the films, her personality was described as calculating and sinister, though self-preservation was still her top priority.
Victoria was a very capable fighter, and Bella describes her as "lethal", since even Edward, who could read her mind and was an equal fighter to Jasper, couldn't finish her immediately. They danced for a thrilling while, woven in a deadly blur. However, her ability was based more on her gift of self-preservation than on fighting skills; according to Stephenie Meyer, "her feet were dragged to safe spots and places".
Enhanced self-preservation Edit
Main article: Enhanced self-preservation
Victoria evading Jacob's attack.
"It's what you do, isn't it? It's why James kept you around. Useful, if you like to play deadly games. A partner with an uncanny instinct for escaping."
―Edward to Victoria[src]
Victoria's special ability was enhanced self-preservation, which is how she was able to escape being killed by the Quileute wolves and the Cullens in Twilight, New Moon and Eclipse. This ability was carried over because, as a human, she was a servant mistreated by her abusive masters. She had learned to hide from her masters for long periods of time. Also, when she ran away by herself, she was excellent at sneaking into houses, stealing food, and sleeping somewhere safe without any person or animal knowing. Edward identified her ability as self-preservation, which was the instinctive desire to do what is necessary to stay alive. This ability worked by sensing when her life was in danger, how to evade an enemy's approach and where to run in order to get away. Because of this ability, she became a prominent threat to Bella and the Cullens, as it was impossible to catch her and she made persistent attempts to destroy them.
In Eclipse, Edward angered Victoria enough to make her resist her survival instincts, but that brought her to her death when Edward ripped her body apart and burnt the pieces.
Relationships Edit
Victoria had an older sister named Anne, and once belonged to a coven of six vampires. She was in a coven with her mate, James, and Laurent; and later, leader of the Seattle newborn army. Riley Biers was a pawn she had created to deceive him with devotion.
James Edit
Main article: James and Victoria
Victoria's mate: James.
"We'd play hide and seek sometimes. No one can hide like me. But no one can seek like James. Some games lasted for months, but we'd always get hungry for each other, so I'd let him find me… We never could get sick of each other. We would've had forever to try."
―Victoria[src]
James was Victoria's mate. She first met him on a hunt. He noticed her scent and immediately decided to hunt her down. He kept on her trail for months. However, she kept on evading him when he got close to her. Interested, James decided not to kill her, feeling that, when playing deadly games, it is always good to have a partner who can escape. He did not know that, because he didn't want to hurt her anymore, her gift didn't work as effectively. She eventually met him in a clearing that had a lot of escape routes, just in case. When they met, he proposed that they team up. She warily accepted and they joined each other.
Victoria quickly began to fall in love with James. She loved his ruthless personality and vicious nature. He found her to be a passionate lover who would be by his side though any situation.
Victoria proved to be a vital part of James's coven. In any situation that he was having trouble getting out of, she would help him escape. Also, she was the one who said that they needed more than just the two of them in their coven. That is why they often had more vampires in their coven. However, it was generally just the two of them.
When they entered the Forks area, they immediately picked up the scent of the Cullens. They met in the field as James was getting the lay of the land. Victoria wanted to add more vampires to their coven. However, James said that Laurent would be enough. She faithfully followed James in the hunt for Bella. She searched for information on Bella's life and told James that Bella's mother lived in Phoenix.
When James was killed, Victoria was a wreck. For the first time in centuries, she felt vulnerable. Due to this, she created Riley and the other newborns to befriend her. However, once she learned about the history of newborn armies, she decided to avenge James.
Laurent Edit
Victoria's old ally and traitor: Laurent.
Laurent was a member of James's coven, but when James and Victoria went to hunt down Bella, he told the Cullens that he was sick of James's games. Afterwards, he went and lived with the Denali coven and soon became Irina's mate.
Victoria sought him out months later. She did this for a few reasons. Mainly, she was still angry with his betrayal and wanted to send him straight to the Cullens if they were still around. Or, if Edward wasn't there, she would find out that the Cullens left and would make an easy kill for Bella.
She asked him to go back to Forks to see if Bella was still under the Cullens' protection. He called her once to tell her that the Cullens' house smelt as if it hadn't been entered in a while. As Laurent was passing through Forks, he came across Bella in the meadow and was about to kill her but was destroyed by Jacob Black and four other werewolves.
Riley Biers Edit
Main article: Victoria and Riley Biers
Victoria's pawn: Riley Biers.
"He's the liar, Riley. I told you about their mind tricks. You know I love only you."
―Victoria to Riley.[src]
Riley Biers was a vampire who Victoria created to protect herself from the Cullens. He seemed strong and smart, so she felt that he would be the perfect tool. She lied to him and said that she had been watching him for a while and had fallen in love with him. He immediately returned those affections, though they were only real for him. In the movie, she chose him based on his origin - and therefore knowledge - from Forks.
She left him in charge of the newborns when she created them, feeling that Alice would not know to look for his decisions. This proved useful when she had him steal things that contained Bella's scent to see if they could get past Alice. Victoria had Riley train the newborns to fight the Cullens.
During the fight, they went in search of Edward together. She caught his scent and thought that he would be anywhere Bella was. This proved correct and the fight began. Riley fought Seth while Victoria fought Edward; Edward tried to convince Riley that Victoria didn't love him. However, he remained loyal and fought. He lost the fight to Seth and cried out to Victoria for help, but she didn't even glance his way when he died.
Anne Edit
Anne was Victoria's older sister and creator. They were very close throughout their human lives as they both endured painful torments by their masters.
When Anne disappeared, Victoria was devastated by the loss of her only sister. She was happy when she saw her sister again five years later: and far more beautiful than she'd ever been (she had become a vampire). After hearing about what she had endured during her absence, Anne made the decision to turn Victoria into a vampire to free her from a life of slavery and hardships, and introduced her to their coven.
When the Volturi destroyed her coven, Anne and Victoria attempted to escape slaughter. While Victoria survived due to her supernatural self-preservation, Anne was caught and then killed. She never tried to avenge Anne's death, but her grief never faded over the centuries.
Bryce Dallas Howard and Rachelle Lefevre both play Victoria
Rachelle Lefevre portrayed Victoria in Twilight and New Moon movies. In Eclipse, she was replaced by Bryce Dallas Howard.
To prepare for her role of Victoria in the Twilight film, Rachelle Lefevre watched lion attacks on YouTube and acted like a cat for a day to get used to acting feline.
During her audition, she jumped on a chair and hissed at director Catherine Hardwicke, assuring her of her scary cat abilities. She also wrote a letter to Hardwicke about how she bonded and had a relation to Victoria. As in the novel, Victoria was portrayed as fierce and beautiful, but while in the book she didn't speak, in the movie she had a few lines and at the end during Bella's prom she appeared to be planning a way to get revenge for her mate, James.
In The Storytellers, Victoria is portrayed by Sophie Labell in the short movie The Groundskeeper.
In the books, Victoria first appeared in Twilight, and first spoke in Eclipse.
Stephenie Meyer's official website
The Twilight Series' official website
The Twilight Lexicon
James • Victoria • Laurent
Leaders Victoria • Riley Biers
Group leaders Raoul • Kristie
Members Adam • Casey • Dean • Diego • Doug • Fred • Heather • Jen • Jim • Kevin • Logan • Sara • Shelly • Steve • Bree Tanner • Warren
Originators Benito
Hilda • Anne • Heidi • Mary • Noela • Victoria
Current nomads Alistair • Boris • Charles • Charlotte • Fred • George • Huilen • Jennifer • Joham • Luca • Makenna • Mary • Maysun • Nahuel • Peter • Randall • Serena • Shelly • Steve • Toshiro
Former nomads Cold Man • Cold Woman • Garrett • James • Kumboh • Laurent • Victoria
Bella Swan • Edward Cullen • Jacob Black • Renesmee Cullen • Carlisle Cullen • Esme Cullen • Rosalie Hale • Emmett Cullen • Alice Cullen • Jasper Hale • Charlie Swan • Victoria • Bree Tanner
Beau Swan • Edythe Cullen • Carine Cullen • Earnest Cullen • Royal Hale • Eleanor Cullen • Archie Cullen • Jessamine Hale
Retrieved from "https://twilightsaga.fandom.com/wiki/Victoria?oldid=690249"


Man hospitalized after single-car crash on Strawberry Lane
A 43-year-old male was hospitalized after a single-car crash in Port Huron Township.
At around 6:15 p.m. Thursday, Fire Chief Craig Miller said the department responded after a vehicle crashed into the township's pump station at the north end of Strawberry Lane near Bakersfield Park.
He said there appeared to be no damage to the pump station, but first responders used the jaws of life to help the man out of the vehicle before he was transported to McLaren Port Huron in serious condition.
According to the St. Clair County Sheriff's Department, the accident is still under investigation and there were two individuals in the car.
It was not clear whether the 43-year-old, of Mt. Morris, was the driver. No other details were immediately available.


Politicians and hungry kids: it's the pandemic news from Britain
Posted on October 24, 2020 by Ellen Hawley
After refusing to find common ground with Manchester's political leadership over money to support workers and businesses devastated by a local lockdown, the government announced a new package of support for businesses and workers devastated by local lockdowns.
Andy Burnham, Manchester's mayor, said it was what he'd been pushing for all along.
So why did the government let the talks blow up before agreeing to provide support? So it can say, "Nyah, nyah, we win." The government can now claim that it was their idea all along and that they've forgotten where Manchester is anyway.
Irrelevant photo: Starlings in the neighbors' tree. They gather in large flocks in the fall and winter. The Scandinavian starlings spend their winters here. The ones that spend the summer here head south in the winter. Go figure.
This might be an appropriate time to talk about sewage.
No, that wasn't an editorial comment. I am so politically neutral that I can't even see myself in a mirror.
Ninety sewage treatment sites in England, Wales, and Scotland are starting to test for Covid. A pilot program in Plymouth spotted an outbreak that was clustered around some asymptomatic cases well before the test and trace system spotted it.
Admittedly, the test and trace system couldn't spot a Covid-infected camel if it crashed through the Serco board room with a nickelodeon on its back playing "Somewhere Over the Rainbow," but the point is that the sewage folks spotted the outbreak at an early stage. They'd have no problem spotting a camel either.
The nickelodeon might be more of a problem. It needs a different set of reagents and an entirely different testing protocol.
Having finally noticed that the test and trace system not only isn't working but that the percentage of people it contacts has fallen, the government placed an ad for someone with a track record of "turning around failing call centres."
The job pays £2,000 a day. And as I often have to remind you, in a pinch a person can live on that.
When I was looking for details on the program to support workers and businesses devastated by etc., I thought I could save myself a few keystrokes by just typing in the chancellor's last name, Sunak. Auto-complete took what I'd written and supplied "flip-flops." I was delighted: Sunak and Johnson had both flip-flopped on support for etc, and here Lord Google was writing an editorial for me.
I followed Lord G.'s editorial to pictures of physical flip-flops–those plastic sandals you can slip your feet into without having to fasten anything. Turns out I'd flip-flopped a couple of letters and typed "Sanuk," a brand of flip-flop that cost anywhere between £20 and £55.
I remember when flip-flops were cheap. Of course, I remember when gas (or petrol if you speak British) was $0.29 a gallon. I also remember when I was nineteen, and it was a shockingly long time ago.
After rising for seven weeks, the number of Covid cases in England looks like it's stopped rising. Hospitalizations always tag along behind, kind of like a pesky younger brother, so they're still going up.
An Australian company is working on a Covid test based on saliva–no swabs involved–that reports back in fifteen minutes and uses a hand-held device. That doesn't necessarily mean the device is cheap–the article didn't say what it costs–but it does mean you don't need an entire lab for the test, so there ought to be some savings in there somewhere.
Of course, in Britain, we'll have to contract with an outsourcing company to bring it into the country, and that should add a few million to the cost, if they get it here at all. But hey, what's a few million pounds between friends? After all, Parliament just voted not to give low-income families £15 per kid over the school holidays so the kids wouldn't go hungry. We might as well spend that money somewhere.
The tests themselves work out to about $25 each, although to get a more exact figure I expect you'd have to do some sort of mathematical gymnastics involving the cost of the hand-held gizmo and the number of tests you're going to do on each one.
The bad news is that the system's still being tested, but the hope is that it'll detect the virus when people haven't yet shown any symptoms but are already contagious. The current tests are most effective after symptoms have started, meaning they give a lot of false negatives.
After Parliament voted not to give families that £15 per low-income kid over the school holidays, cafes, restaurants, and local governments stepped in to help fill the gap.
The issue of kids going hungry was raised by a football player, Marcus Rashford, who learned enough about hunger as a kid to qualify as an expert. He shamed the government into creating a program over the summer, but the thing about eating is that having done it once doesn't keep you from needing to do it again.
Reacting to businesses stepping in to help, Rashford said, "Even at their lowest point, having felt the devastating effects of the pandemic, local businesses have wrapped arms around their communities today, catching vulnerable children as they fell.
"I couldn't be more proud to call myself British tonight."
Boris Johnson, on the other hand, "declined to welcome the offers of assistance," as one paper put it. I assume some reporter gave him the opportunity just to see if he would. But hell, if these kids wanted to eat over the holidays, they should've had the foresight to get themselves born into better-off families, the way he did.
Arguing against spending the money on kids, MP Brendan Clarke-Smith said, "I do not believe in nationalising children.
"Instead, we need to get back to the idea of taking responsibility and this means less virtue-signalling on Twitter by proxy and more action to tackle the real causes of child poverty."
Like low pay, possibly? Or a lack of jobs?
Nah, it's got to be personal irresponsibility.
The government's decision is particularly grotesque since it spent over £522 million on a summer program to tempt people back into cafes and restaurants, but only if they could afford to pay half the cost. And MPs are expected to get a £3,000 raise.
This entry was posted in Pandemic News and tagged Boris Johnson, Brendan Clarke-Smith, Britain, Covid, free school meals, hungry kids, Manchester, Marcus Rashford, pandemic, Rishi Sunak, testing sewage, tier 3 by Ellen Hawley. Bookmark the permalink.
55 thoughts on "Politicians and hungry kids: it's the pandemic news from Britain"
Stevie Turner on October 24, 2020 at 9:49 am said:
Low pay and a lack of jobs are of course reasons for child poverty, but I expect the Government are also thinking of the feckless who have no intention of ever working but also expect the Government to stop trying to make them take responsibility for their offspring and instead pay for any number of children they produce. This of course backfires on the poor kids who have to take the brunt of it all.
Ellen Hawley on October 24, 2020 at 1:03 pm said:
For centuries, there've been parents who fail their children in one way or another, and some do it economically, because they're messes. That's true when the government offers help and it was true when the government offered none. I suspect there aren't nearly as many of them as we're led to believe. I've talked to people who are convinced that they're everywhere, spending their cash of big-screen TVs, beer, and crisps, and trusting the government to feed their kids. The story's a powerful one, but it's also politically useful, so a kind of multiplier effect comes into play until, in some tellings, anyone who's having hard times is at fault. I've me people who seem to believe that letting people sink would miraculously cause them to pull their lives together. You're right, though: It backfires on the kids.
Richard on October 24, 2020 at 10:13 am said:
As Boris , Andy and Rishi argue over how much to give everyone I feel I need to bring your attention to the other side off the Atlantic Ocean. They are reaching fever pitch in their never ending election cycle and I've become aware of a new terrible disease to rival COVID! What is this gruesome "Socialism"? Is it infectious? Do masks help? How far away from an American do I need to stand to be safe?
Ellen Hawley on October 24, 2020 at 12:49 pm said:
Good questions, all. I'm 73 and spent most of my life in the US. During all that time, the country's been quaking in its flip-flops for fear of socialism swallowing it whole. So far–well, the tally of what elements of socialism have crept in really depends on what point you're trying to prove. Is social security socialist? (Answer: Not if you get it yourself, or expect to.) Is universal healthcare? (Definitely. That's why the US can't have it, however tempting it sounds.) Public libraries? (Maybe, but a lot of them were funded by Andrew Carnegie, so maybe not.) I could go on, and I could substitute other answers, depending on whether I wanted to prove that the US was sinking beneath the socialist tide or rising above it, but I've bored myself already. I've heard it all too often. I'd be surprised if many Americans could agree on a working definition of what this great boogeyman is. So if it is contagious, we might want to figure out what the symptoms and causes are.
I have done research! ( well , 10 minutes on the internet) , it seems "socialism" isn't an American disease! The most contagious countries are Belgium , Holland and Denmark . I've been to all three in recent years and haven't quarantined or been contacted by Track and Trace. I'm worried because Fox News keeps telling me how dangerous these countries are. It's a good thing we've Brexited them eh?
Yes. What a relief. And from the sound of things, instead of quarantining trucks coming back from them, we'll quarantine them before they go, just to make sure they have their paperwork filled out in quadruplicate and on websites that are down.
fragglerocking on October 24, 2020 at 10:16 am said:
You can see why Angela Rayner called one of them 'scum'. Not a nice word, but then not helping to feed kids is not a nice thing to do. (I know, dreadful syntax but I'm too dim to improve it this morning).
Yeah, I've been sorry that calling an MP an unpleasant name in parliament can't be defended on the grounds of truth. With libel and such, , that is a defense.
Emma Cownie on October 24, 2020 at 10:17 am said:
Yep, you cant get much lower than saying that hungry kids shouldn't get one decent meal a day over the holidays during a pandemic! Just maybe those kids parents are poor because of the pandemic, gosh, who knows? What gets me is that the Children's Minister also voted against it!
Now that I managed to miss. Good thing no one expects a children's minister to take care of children or anything.
Emma Cownie on October 25, 2020 at 7:59 am said:
Deeply depressing, really.
Ellen Hawley on October 25, 2020 at 8:28 am said:
It is.
Scribblans on October 24, 2020 at 10:24 am said:
The Government have been shocking.
(I'm not specifying on what exactly–basically put anything you like after the word shocking and that'll cover it.)
The meals thing is just mind-boggling. These people are entirely bereft of humanity when there isn't a 'return on investment' opportunity to be seen in a policy, for themselves or their circle, in pure cash terms.
They really are shocking. You'd expect at least a fig leaf or two.
paulinell on October 24, 2020 at 11:00 am said:
Totally agree with everything you've said, Ellen. The government's incompetence is bad enough but choosing to keep kids without food theyreally need is on another level. However I have read that there has been a lot of support from local businesses, food banks and so on. People who actually give a damn are doing the government's job for them. Shame on everyone who voted to leave kids hungry.
I'm hoping the response from businesses and local governments will shame the government into action, because it'll be too piecemeal to cover everyone. It really is shocking that they could just sit there and vote the proposal down.
Doug Jacquier on October 24, 2020 at 2:06 pm said:
The elephant in the room is that no modern economy can accommodate full employment on livable wages and no major political party is prepared to say that, let alone fund the consequences. The old economy could accommodate the less than well-educated through public transport, public service jobs and local government work gangs that at least provided a modicum of dignity through being considered as work. In the name of efficiency, we are left with an under-class that we are required to demonise for their inability to obtain largely illusory jobs in the new gig economy (because no-one wants to discuss the fact that 40% of adults are functionally illiterate and numerically incompetent despite the billions poured into education). Having corporates step up to fund feel-good programs supported by their previous exploitation of the recipients is an obscenity beyond forgiveness. Perhaps middle-class hand-wringers despairing of the parenting skills of the great unwashed could step up to take these children under their wing and deny them big screen TVs and crisps for their own good. No? Thought so.
I wrote this when I was a social worker in the 1990's and little has changed. https://sixcrookedhighwaysblog.wordpress.com/2019/06/20/dear-bring-back-the-lash-of-burnside/
It is so much easier to blame people than to fix the system.
Doug Jacquier on October 24, 2020 at 10:02 pm said:
… and it doesn't frighten the horse's (arses) ;-)
I can't add a thing to that. Not a word.
Blogging_with_Bojana on October 24, 2020 at 3:08 pm said:
They better approve those vaccines fast. The numbers are getting hard to control.
I don't think it's going to happen quickly. If I remember right, early next year is the best guess, and it's still up for grabs how effective they'll be. Better than nothing, surely, but not a quick return to normal.
Sorry to be grim.
Oh that was just me being silly.
Just watched the last debate. I wish I were that optimistic as Trump who said it's a matter of weeks.
He'd say anything.
Blogging_with_Bojana on October 25, 2020 at 9:05 am said:
Biden wasn't that convincing either.
But, again, he's not Trump. Right now, that's all he needs to be. Honestly, the country's at that point.
I believe you.
arlingwoman on October 24, 2020 at 3:29 pm said:
First I heard of the feeding kids issue was on Twitter. Someone had listed out Ireland, Scotland, Wales and England with a colon after each. After all but England was "We'll feed the kids." After England was: "Fuck 'em." I imagine here there are similarly diverging opinions about school food programs, but they were running pantries for the whole family over the summer. Good for the footballer for speaking out and taking action.
He's been amazing.
When we first moved to Britain, we noticed that no one was collecting food for food banks in the supermarkets. As far as I know, they didn't have them and didn't need them. People who needed social support got it–with problems, of course, but by US standards, at least, it was fantastic. Now, though, you see collection points all over the place, and food banks are still short on food. It shames us all. It shames us that people should have to go to a food bank at all.
I'm reminded of Wm Blake's "Is this a holy thing to see / in a rich a fruitful land? / Babes reduced to misery / fed with cold and usurous hand."
It's so true. I'm lucky to live in a community that really organizes to do things like feed, clothe, get school supplies and other things, and it's good to act as part of a generous community. Still, it's crazed that in a country this wealthy that it depends on what community you live in.
The Cheesesellers Wife on October 24, 2020 at 4:44 pm said:
CAN'T STOP GIGGLING, HELP………………
Oh, good. No that should've gone at the end.
"I do not believe in nationalising children."
TORY B*****D
Gosh, that blog went from sublime to something I cannot yet express clearly but steam is coming from my ears.
Yeah, sorry. I meant to end with something uplifting, but then I stumbled into that idiot's quote. I couldn't leave it out and didn't take the time to think about moving it to some less infuriating spot.
Laura (PA Pict) on October 24, 2020 at 7:56 pm said:
As someone who grew up in poverty (enough of a degree of poverty to be one of the subjects of a study into childhood poverty), I have been really upset by the callous response by the government to feeding children during this pandemic. It gets under my skin in a very visceral way. As heart-warming as the stories are of restaurants and community groups providing meals and food parcels, the good will and generosity of individuals should not negate the responsibility a government has to care for its citizens. They are a shower of utterly callous bastards.
It really has reminded us–or should, anyway–who they really are underneath all the p.r. And I agree–kids shouldn't be dependent on the goodwill of local people, which will inevitably have gaps anyway. What I will say for it, though, is that it points the government up for the cold-hearted bastards that they are. A petition I just saw had over 700,000 signatures already. I doubt it's more than a day old.
All of this, with the exception of a few mentions of Scotland,, Wales, and the Irelands could be written by a conscientious citizen if the US. That is sad AND scary.
Right down to the camel?
catladymac on October 24, 2020 at 10:03 pm said:
Actually…back in the 1850's when Jefferson Davis (yes, THAT Jefferson Davis) was Secretary of War to Pres. Pierce he imported camels for the army/cavalry too use in the American Southwest, figuring they would thrive in the desert environment. They did, but not as cavalry mounts. So for years thereafter, an odd camel would turn up here and there in – say – Arizona.
Talk about thinking you've seen a mirage.
mydangblog on October 24, 2020 at 9:59 pm said:
I have three pairs of Sanuks–they're the most comfortable flipflops I've ever worn, having yoga mats for soles–but they don't cost that much here! And was it in the UK where an MP blamed child poverty on families for having too many children or was that in the US?
I'm not sure. It could easily have been either. That kind of blame-the-poor-person is thick on the ground in both countries.
Widdershins on October 25, 2020 at 12:39 am said:
I think the ability of my flabber to ghasted is running dangerously low.
I can see how that would happen, even though I'd always assumed that the flabber was infinitely expandable. Who knew?
Widdershins on October 25, 2020 at 7:40 pm said:
Me too … and just when I think it's plumbed all possible depths …
Sheila Morris on October 25, 2020 at 3:13 am said:
I'm wondering if anyone is thinking of inventing an anger testing device which could be administered through saliva spewed at the government officials more interested in their own fortunes than in the hunger pangs of their country's children?
Bitter tonight, party of one. But thinking of inviting others to join via zoom.
That sounds like it would be simple to measure and could substitute for all the fuss and bother of a recall petition.
Mick Canning on October 25, 2020 at 10:16 am said:
I really, really want to say exactly what i think of the government's response to the appeal to provide the meals for the kids, but I don't trust myself not to write something heavily libellous.
Truth is a defense in any accusation of libel.
Mick Canning on October 25, 2020 at 4:50 pm said:
Cheryl, Gulf Coast Poet on October 25, 2020 at 7:09 pm said:
Not feeding children and blaming parents who have lost their jobs during the pandemic seems like a new low, especially when governments may be exacerbating the virus spread by mishandling the situation! Have a good week, Ellen! Cheryl
You too, Cheryl. I couldn't agree with you more.
cat9984 on November 11, 2020 at 7:34 am said:
Perhaps the children could eat what Parliament wastes (if they're anything like Congress). If Parliament wants them to show initiative, maybe they could steal the food before it gets to the dining room
Ellen Hawley on November 11, 2020 at 8:50 am said:
I hate to say it, but that joke's too bitter even for me. Not that our world doesn't justify it, mind you.