Yankee Stadium

The house that taxpayers built | Salon

…nothing better captures the moment’s destructive greed than a billionaire politician using the municipal office he bought to defend charging $2,500 a ticket to a new Yankee Stadium he forced the public to finance….

I have a xerographic memory, so I copied a lot when I was in school.

U.S. to Steer GM Toward Bankruptcy: http://twurl.nl/ry2y6g

RT @apod: Above Earth Fixing Hubble: http://ping.fm/lTG0d

RT @hippiegrrl: RT @seanbonner: TX: For the record, that’s only if they have a permit.

Daimler buys 10% of Tesla: http://twurl.nl/j1vm72

Apparently this is a real, honest to God movie! http://is.gd/z8d7

Abortion: http://is.gd/B0Ij

PG&E signs solar-power contracts with BrightSource Energy for 1,310 megawatts, enough to power 530,000 California homes. http://is.gd/zRhL

Obama to Make Promised Address to Muslim World From Egypt http://is.gd/xQxn

The real skinny on the Republican fat cats: http://is.gd/wKyy

Florida law enforcement gets the green light to pull over motorists driving without their seat belt.

Chicken, spinach and garbanzo stew with paprika and garlic. The shrink’s workin’ late tonight, so it’s my turn to cook.

Maine becomes 5th state to allow same-sex marriage: http://is.gd/xgws

Slow day…

With more than six billion people on the planet, atrocities occur every minute on one scale or another: http://is.gd/xcEZ

D.C. Council member Marion Barry has now asked that the gay marriage bill be reconsidered. He didn’t realize what he was voting on before.

DC votes to recognize same sex marriage – unanimous. http://is.gd/wWc1

Dr frnd begging me to type notes & I hate med transcription! Where does friendship end?

Hi Tweeps. At some point today I’ll be closing this account. Catch me on Facebook: Bill Webb

Hi Tweeps,

Ibis on the Suwannee

Ibis "graze" on the Suwannee floodplain during the recent floods

save

Wondering how, given that he went to college in KY, he could have forgotten about the Derby. #FB

Execs Sentenced to Prison for Environmental and Employee Health Conspiracy

It boggles the mind how foolish some people can be. Greed must be able to derail common sense.

clipped from www.ens-newswire.com “These sentences show that senior managers, as well as companies, will be prosecuted when they break the law,” “These sentences mete out just punishment for the company and its employees’ disregard of the law which was demonstrated during the longest environmental crimes trial in this country’s history for multiple violations of worker safety and environmental protection laws,” The jury determined that the company concealed serious worker injuries from health and safety inspectors, and maintained a dangerous workplace that contributed to multiple injuries, including severe burns, broken bones and amputations and the death of one employee at the Phillipsburg plant. Those sentences were: 70 months for former plant manager John Prisque; 41 months for former human resources manager Scott Faubert; 30 months for former maintenance superintendent Jeffrey Maury; and six months for former Atlantic States finishing department head Craig Davidson.

RT @apod: Lyrid Meteor and Milky Way: http://ping.fm/aVsgV

So tell me: how is Hiney Flu better than Swine Flu? This PC bulls**t has got to stop.

Obama Not Pushing Liberal Issues, But Support Rising Anyway

Pubs are gonna have a hard time using their old rallying cries to dig themselves out of their hole.

clipped from www.washingtonpost.com a new Washington Post-ABC News poll shows rising support for same-sex marriage, legalized marijuana and a process by which undocumented immigrants could become legal residents.

Do Humans Need Biodiversity? YBYSA We Do!

Lessons from the Reverse Engineering of Nature | Miller-McCune Online Magazine

What is our own significance as a species? Are we privileged in ways others are not? Is our role on Earth fundamentally different from the roles other species play?

The question of the significance of species may seem esoteric and subjective, but the root causes of our most pressing environmental problems — and others far worse than what we’ve yet experienced — stem from our inability to answer that question definitively….

Conflicker Worm Invades Hospital Instruments

It was totally bound to happen…

clipped from www.siliconvalley.com Around March 24, researchers monitoring the worm noticed that an imaging machine used to review high-resolution images was reaching out over the Internet to get instructions — presumably from the programmers who created Conficker. The researchers dug deeper and discovered that more than 300 similar devices at hospitals around the world had been compromised. The manufacturer of the devices told them none of the machines were supposed to be connected to the Internet — and yet they were. And because the machines were running an unpatched version of Microsoft’s operating system used in embedded devices they were vulnerable.

LA Times: the current outbreak of the H1N1 virus may not even do as much damage as the run-of-the-mill flu outbreaks: http://is.gd/vABM

What IS this pandemic crap? “Regular” flu kills 600 people a week in the US and no one screams. Last swine flu epidemic was no show in ’76.

New Twitter users are a disloyal bunch, according to data from Nielsen Online, (Yeah?) http://digg.com/u126Bi

Hillaryous! http://digg.com/u1250g

An experimental drug greatly increased the number of people who appear to be cured of hepatitis C infection: http://digg.com/u124cv

Hannity Chickens Out On Waterboarding — No surprise…

The News Vault – Outgoing Link – Olbermann Pressing On Hannity’s Waterboard Offer

After Fox News Channel’s Sean Hannity made a seemingly impromptu offer last week to undergo waterboarding as a benefit for charity, MSNBC’s Keith Olbermann leapt at it. He offered $1,000 to the families of U.S. troops for every second Hannity withstood the technique.

Olbermann repeated the offer on Monday’s show and said in an interview Tuesday that he’s heard no response. He said he’ll continue to pursue it.

“I don’t think he has the courage to even respond to this _ let alone do it,” Olbermann said.

These guys: Hannity, Limbaugh and their ilk, are all the same. Run from the fight, but cheer from the sidelines. Ask them to sweat a little, or hurt a little, or even be uncomfortable* a little, and they’re world class pussies.

I feel the same way about cops who use tasers: let them use them all they want, but the Chief gets tased for every perp they zap.  That’ll keep it in perspective.  (And isn’t it embarrassing to be part of a society where the verb “tased” is in common use?)

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*I know waterboarding’s not just “uncomfortable,” but they seem to view it that way, as long as it’s not them.

Arlen Specter…

A fair number of people are criticizing Specter, saying “Oh, well, he just switched parties because he was afraid he’d lose his seat.”

Hello?  Of course that’s why.  Is that bad?

What should he have done, say “Oh, I’m sorry, if I can’t be a middle-of-the-road Republican senator, I don’t want to be one at all”?

Get real!

RT @googlenews: Swine flu cases rise to 91 in US with one death – Los Angeles Times http://bit.ly/Rg1NR

Obama Quits While Ahead

Obama Quits While Ahead – Borowitz Report

In a move that stunned both political allies and foes alike, President Barack Obama resigned today after serving 100 days in office, telling the White House press corps, “It’s all downhill from here.” …

RT @apod: GRB 090423: The Farthest Explosion Yet Measured: http://ping.fm/F9B5z

1st impression Firefox 3.5b4: KICKS ASS! Much faster than previous beta w/javascript, and at least twice as fast as 3.0. CSS rocks, too!

Testing Firefox 3.5b4. Holee s**t…is the Java rendering fast!

RT @the2ndroad: House passed Same-sex Marriage today! Next 24 hrs are CRUCIAL! Write your Senator in Maine! http://ow.ly/4jhe #marryME

Swine Flu — No Need To Panic

Good article. (I wrote it.)

clipped from open.salon.com Hysteria has already begun with the recent news of the swine flu outbreaks in Mexico, the US and Canada. I have spoken to people who say that they intend to wear face masks in public as soon as a case of the flu has been reported in our state. Others have stated that they will take further extreme measures, such as remaining home if “things get bad.” There is no denying that the possible spread of an especially dangerous strain of influenza is a matter of concern. Very young children, old folks like me, and people with suppressed or otherwise compromised immune systems are at real risk, but only if they actually contract the disease.  Fortunately, there are simple precautions that can be taken to minimize the chances of contracting any airborne disease, and of passing it on to others.

Twenty additional cases of swine flu have been confirmed at a New York City school: http://is.gd/uW9V

On Vacation

Be out of circulation Friday through Monday.  Have a great weekend!

Let’s think about people…the Earth will be fine!

“Technically, we are the subspecies Homo sapiens sapiens. Isn’t it great being the only species that gets to name all the species, so we can call ourselves “wise” twice! But given how we have been destroying the planet’s livability, I think at the very least we should drop one of the sapiens. And, perhaps provisionally, we should put the other one in quotes, so we are Homo “sapiens,” at least until we see whether we are smart enough to save ourselves from self-destruction….”

The best Earth Day essay I’ve read. Pretty-much covers my sentiments.

AlterNet: On Earth Day, Forget About the Planet — We’re the Ones Who Are Screwed

Oh, yeah?

The long-awaited arrival of the Automated Planet Finder to Lick Observatory is a milestone in the search for a world that could sustain life. It brings us one step closer to answering the profound question: Are we alone?

Seems to me that the pertinent question right now ought to be, “Will there be anyone left.”

A Fine Madness

On a small Atlantic island on the equator, in a lemon-colored bungalow with a clear view over a tinfoil bay, lives the Italian honorary consul. In his driveway are two ancient Fiat Pandas. In his back garden is a chocolate factory. The consul’s name is Claudio Corallo. He is 58 and lean, with close-cropped, neat gray hair, a matching mustache, and an inventor’s lively eyes. He speaks five languages fluently, and English sparingly and excitedly.

For the past decade, Corallo has been on a quest to produce some of the finest dark chocolate in the world. His bars, which range in cocoa content from 70 percent to 100 percent, and may contain ginger, arabica coffee beans, orange rind, or plump raisins soaked for months in his homemade cocoa-pulp alcohol, sell for between $12 and $14 for 100 grams in Europe, the United States, and Japan.

Life, Liberty, and Fine Chocolate

Google Labs

Like the other billion or so computer users out there (and like me) you probably think Google is pretty hot s**t already.

But have you checked out the experimental stuff that’s available for you to try?

http://www.googlelabs.com/

Scientists Learn How Alcohol Makes Cancer Worse: http://digg.com/u11PfY