I don’t want to explain. I don’t want to say anything, because ipnot’s work is pure magic, which cannot fail to delight. Just have a wander, go look, wonder, smile, and laugh! If you’d like to read more, head over to Spoon & Tamago.
The second journey that Lufthansa #inspiredby HEIMWEH takes us on, “The Colors of Home”, followers Nepalese jewellery designer Arpana Rayamajhi from her adopted city of New York to her native land of Nepal, in search of the meaning of home.
In the film, Lufthansa accompanies Rayamajhi from New York back to her hometown of Kathmandu, where the designer searches for her creative and personal identity. Having experienced a childhood influenced by strong Nepalese women, Rayamajhi finds herself navigating a city that is at once familiar and distant. In between this tension, she must learn to reconnect with her roots, be inspired by different versions of creativity, and experience a new feeling of what it means to be home.
Beginning in Kathmandu, Lufthansa’s voyage transports the viewer through the journey of color, sound and vibrancy of the capital, as well as the city of Pokhara and its regional provinces. Sweeping views of the Himalayas alternate with vast cityscapes, showcasing the vast diversity of both the country and Rayamajhi’s inner journey.
Via iGNANT.
Spring is here! Well, it’s here for some people, like Kestrel, who sent some wonderful displays of a burgeoning Springtime. Click for full size!
© Kestrel, all rights reserved.
There are going to be a lot of woodpecker shots, there are at least a dozen at the deck every day, mostly Downys, but a few Hairys as well. Click for full size.
© C. Ford.
Rep. Dan Shaul (Facebook).
A Missouri representative is rushing to kill off a minimum wage hike, on the basis that certain jobs weren’t ever meant to provide a living wage, so hey, you can keep paying people shit wages. It’s interesting, if depressing, to read all the twists and turns republicans use to justify being corrupt, villainous assholes, with a pointed interest in keeping people poor. Well, some people.
A Missouri Republican introduced legislation that would stop Kansas City from enacting a higher minimum wage — because he said workers weren’t meant to live on those wages.
Rep. Dan Shaul (R-Jefferson City) wants the statehouse to quickly pass his bill that would prohibit cities and counties from paying a higher minimum wage than what is set by state law, reported the Kansas City Star.
The bill contains an emergency clause that would allow it to go into effect as soon as the governor signs it, and the newspaper reported Shaul’s bill is moving quickly through the legislative process.
“The minimum wage wasn’t meant to be a living wage,” Shaul told the Star. “I’m all for family sustainable wages, and I certainly don’t want a family to have to work two or three jobs to get by. But grocery store baggers and fast food work isn’t where you should be working to sustain your family.”
Right. Because if the jobs you can manage to get might be as a grocery clerk or working in a restaurant, well, you should have known better, you stupid peon! Those aren’t proper jobs! Get a good, white person type job, er, white collar job! That way, you can call it a career, and get by just dandy. All that cost of living jazz, well, that doesn’t mean anything. House payments? Pfffft, get a proper job and you can get a loan! Being in debt up to your neck is the American way, you bet. Or you know, you should have just been born rich. It seems the concept of choice is a rethug Shibboleth.
CREDIT: Screencap via Twitter.
Hide & Don’t Seek, the new rethuglican game with healthcare. They have literally hidden their ACA replacement bill. That makes it clear just how lousy it is, and that it basically only has to do with healthcare in the sense of removing it.
Democratic lawmakers spent much of Thursday wandering around the Capitol in an attempt to find House Republicans’ health care plan to replace the Affordable Care Act. They couldn’t find it.
On Wednesday, House Republicans said they would release their much anticipated plan the next day, but that only House Republicans would be able to see it. Rep. Chris Collins (R-NY) said it would be available in a “basement of an office building that adjoins the Capitol.”
“No one is getting a copy … We can go and read it,” Rep. Collins told the Washington Examiner.
Democratic lawmakers, such as Rep. Steny Hoyer, (D-MD) Rep. Jan Schakowski (D-IL), and Rep. Frank Pallone (D-NJ) went on an “egg hunt” for the document.
Sen. Rand Paul (R-KY) tweeted that the bill was “under lock and key,” but that he would demand a copy so the American people could see it. Sen. Paul added that it was “unacceptable” that one of the biggest issues before Congress and the American people would be kept secret.
Paul then reportedly wheeled over a copy machine to make copies of the bill, but was barred from entering the room where it was reportedly being kept. The bill had also been moved from the room before Paul got there, Politico reported.
You can follow all the tweets and the idiotic Republican hiding of healthcare at Think Progress. I think everyone is going to find that when they get to the bill, there is no there there.
© C. Ford. All rights reserved.
More and more efforts are directed at divestment, and Norway’s largest private investor has decided to go No DAPL.
The largest private investor in Norway has pulled out of three companies connected to the Dakota Access Pipeline (DAPL) because of the conflict at Standing Rock.
Storebrand, an Oslo-based financial-services company that specializes in sustainable, socially conscious investing, has sold off nearly $35 million worth of shares in Phillips 66, Marathon Petroleum Corporation, and Enbridge, the company announced on March 1.
“Storebrand has made the decision to withdraw all investments from the controversial Dakota Access pipeline, including positions in the North American companies Marathon Petroleum Corporation, Enbridge Inc. and Phillips 66,” said Storebrand in a statement on March 1.
“Our conclusion is that these are poor long-term investments, both for our pension customer and from a sustainability point of view,” the company said.
Storebrand had investments of $11.5 million in Philips 66, $7 million in Marathon Petroleum Corp. and $16.2 million in Enbridge Inc., for a total of $34.8 million, said the company. According to its website, it has been in operation since 1767 and was managing pension funds since 1917, pre-dating Norway’s social security system by 50 years.
“There is too much uncertainty, for us as an investor, as to whether there has been a good process that ensures the rights of all parties in the conflict,” said Matthew Smith, Head of Sustainable Investments. “There has been involvement by the United Nations, by President Obama, and President Trump. Caught in the middle are the people directly impacted by the pipeline.”
[…]
Storebrand tried numerous tactics to enact change, Smith said in the statement, but none of them worked.
“Generally, it is our belief that we can have a more positive effect on companies and situations by using our position as an owner to effect change. We have successfully done so on many occasions, but it doesn’t always work,” Smith said. “Storebrand has been in direct contact with the companies, and has worked with international groups of investors. Our most recent initiative is an investor letter, representing 137 investors with $653 billion assets under management, that encourages involved banks that have lent money to the project to use their position and influence to engender positive change and a reconsideration the routing of the pipeline.”
Storebrand was forced to conclude that “active ownership is not going to deliver a better outcome,” he said. “We do hope that this can give a final indication to the involved companies to reconsider the routing of the pipeline.”
The investor joins a growing number of companies and entities that have pulled funds from Wells Fargo and other banks that are financing DAPL, ranging from the City of Seattle to individual account holders. Others, such as New York City, have put DAPL banks on notice.
The decision was not easy, Smith told The Guardian.
“Divestment is a last resort,” he said. “When you divest from companies, you give up your possibility to influence companies to come to a better solution.”
Full story at ICMN.
Credit: Democracy Now.
Republican Arkansas state Sen. Kim Hendren introduced a bill to the state legislature that will ban the works of historian Howard Zinn from any schools that receive public funds.
The Arkansas Times reported Thursday that House Bill 1834 would ban all public schools and open enrollment charter schools from “including in its curriculum or course materials for a program of study books or any other material authored by or concerning Howard Zinn.”
Zinn is the author of “A People’s History of the United States,” the groundbreaking re-examination of U.S. history in terms of its effects on the poor, people of color and women.
What began as a fringe interpretation of history has gradually gained ground. In 2014 and 2015, Republicans across the country fought a pitched battle against the federal AP high school history program. Conservatives argue that the curriculum looks at U.S. history through the lenses of race and class, placing too much emphasis on slavery and Native American genocide and not enough on American exceptionalism and the glory of the free market economy.
Why you can’t go around teaching history that isn’t properly whitewashed, oh no. Lies are so much better. As usual, in that exceptional American way, the truth is the enemy. Full story here.
Adding to the load of exceptional American stupidity, is Ryan Zinke, the new Secretary of the Interior. What’s he done? Why, he’s lifted the ban on lead ammunition and fishing tackle. Because lead doesn’t cause any harm at all, right? Right.
Naturally, the NRA is elated over this idiotic move. As lead causes the unintended deaths of birds and fish, you’d think perhaps all those avid hunters and fishers would have a moment of head scratching, and figure out that lead would mean less animals available for them to slaughter. And of course, having lead scattered all over the place, leaching into the ground and water, eh, what’s the problem?
In the hypocritical stupidity exceptionalism category, we have one Mike Pence, and his little email problem:
Vice President Mike Pence routinely used a private email account to conduct public business as governor of Indiana, at times discussing sensitive matters and homeland security issues.
Emails released to IndyStar in response to a public records request show Pence communicated via his personal AOL account with top advisers on topics ranging from security gates at the governor’s residence to the state’s response to terror attacks across the globe. In one email, Pence’s top state homeland security adviser relayed an update from the FBI regarding the arrests of several men on federal terror-related charges.
Cyber-security experts say the emails raise concerns about whether such sensitive information was adequately protected from hackers, given that personal accounts like Pence’s are typically less secure than government email accounts. In fact, Pence’s personal account was hacked last summer.
President Donald Trump and the Russian foreign minister used the same phrase to push back against the widening scandal engulfing the White House.
[…]
Trump said in his statement late Thursday that Sessions was “an honest man” who “did not say anything wrong” by denying during his Senate confirmation any contacts with Russian officials — despite having twice met with Russian ambassador Sergey Kislyak during the campaign.
“He could have stated his response more accurately, but it was clearly not intentional,” Trump said in his statement.
There’s a mouthful of double speak. If Sessions spoke more accurately, that would have meant telling the truth. As he didn’t, it was an intentional case of lying, full stop. It’s a simple question: did you meet with so and so? Here’s how to answer that one: yes or no. Could not possibly be more simple. There simply isn’t double speak wiggle room here, regardless of the shit the Tiny Tyrant is pumping out. And if there’s some sort of claim that Sessions just didn’t remember, fine, then that means he’s too damn old for the job, kick him out.
“This whole narrative is a way of saving face for Democrats losing an election that everyone thought they were supposed to win,” the president continued. “The Democrats are overplaying their hand. They lost the election and now, they have lost their grip on reality. The real story is all of the illegal leaks of classified and other information. It is a total witch hunt!”
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov signaled his agreement with Trump early Friday and also denounced the scandal as a “witch hunt.”
“I can cite the media that say all this is very much reminiscent of a witch hunt and the McCarthyism era which we all thought was long gone,” Lavrov said.
This whole narrative is about corrupt liars with Nazi inclinations infesting the white house. This whole narrative is about a puppet regime. This whole narrative, well, this could go on all day. As for this godsdamn witch hunt bullshit, enough! Stop it already. It’s not in the least a witch hunt, has nothing at all in common with a witch hunt. Anyone seen The Inquisition around lately? Seen gibbets with corpses hanging? Stakes with people on fire, greasy oily smoke? No? Then shut the fuck up. Criticism is not a witch hunt. Attempting to find out the truth is not a witch hunt. Asking questions is not a witch hunt. This is the cry of fucking idiots everywhere, and in many cases, the cry of guilty fucking idiots. Oh, and McCarthyism was a commie hunt, just so you know.
Republican Logo (Shutterstock).
President Donald Trump has made a habit of criticizing the media, calling both stories and news outlets he doesn’t like “fake news” and declaring the press the “enemy of the people.” While some bristle at the idea of the president of the United States attacking the fourth estate, it would appear that Trump’s base doesn’t actually think a free press is all that necessary.
In a new poll, only 49 percent of Republicans and people who lean Republican said it was very important for American democracy that “news organizations are free to criticize political leaders.” The poll, which was published Thursday by the Pew Research Center, found that 76 percent of Democrats and Democrat-leaning respondents said the free press was an important part of maintaining a strong democracy.
That’s a whole lot of people who think an independent press is simply not necessary, and in an age where ignorant celebrities can waltz into the highest office in the land, that’s disturbing. It’s an indicator of just how many people are openly willing to embrace a dictatorship.
76% of Dems, 49% of Repubs say freedom of press to criticize political leaders is very important to democracy https://t.co/bWfTjlJu7B pic.twitter.com/QXXXGj6zuI
— Pew Research Center (@pewresearch) March 2, 2017
Full story here.
You can read all about this new children’s book at Out. Keith Haring: The Boy Who Just Kept Drawing is now available at Penguin Random House.
The myths of the Religious Right, they never, ever die, just keep being recycled in order to shore up claims of christian persecution.
Earlier this week, James Dobson interviewed Kelly Shackleford and Jeremy Dys of the First Liberty Institute about what they see as the vital need for President Trump to protect the religious liberty of Christians in this nation.
Dobson, Dys and Shackleford insisted that conservative Christians are under relentless attack in America and facing increasing persecution, so much so that now even five-year-old girls are being told they cannot pray before eating their lunch at school.
“The attacks are not just increasing, they’re increasing at an exponential level,” Shackleford asserted. “So we’re seeing a lot more attacks, [including] a little five-year-old girl we represented who was actually stopped from paying over her meal and told—quote—’It’s not good to pray in school’.”
“You’re not making that up,” Dobson responded, to which Shackleford replied that this was indeed one of the “real cases that are occurring all over the country.”
Later in the program, when Dys brought up the incident again, Dobson still couldn’t believe that “that’s a real story,” but Dys assured him that it was, saying that he was personally in the room when the young girl was asked to identify the teacher who allegedly told her that she was not allowed to pray because “it’s not good.”
“These are real stories,” Dys insisted.
Okay, everyone counted all the “really trulys” and “real stories!”, right? For sure, absolutely real, the truth, you know, because he was actually there, right there in the room!
If this story sounds familiar, that might be because we covered it back in 2014 after Fox News commentator Todd Starnes wrote about it in one of his columns while conveniently failing to mention that the young girl in question just so happened to be the daughter of the man who was the vice president of sales at the Christian publishing house that was publishing Starnes’ forthcoming book, that just so happened to be about how Christians in America were under attack.
As we noted back then, the school district launched an investigation into the allegations and concluded that there was “no proof whatsoever” that this young girl had ever been told to stop praying. The teacher identified by the student, according to the school, wasn’t even in the cafeteria at the time the event supposedly occurred:
School officials said Wednesday that they can’t find any evidence to suggest that a kindergartner was told not to pray in a Seminole County elementary lunchroom.
But the school district apologized anyway, and a lawyer for the girl’s parents said they are satisfied with the outcome.
“We found zero evidence an incident ever occurred,” said district spokesman Mike Lawrence. “There’s no proof whatsoever.”
…
As for the identified staffer, a school-district investigator has concluded that “there is no way possible that person was anywhere near the lunchroom” that kindergartners and first-graders use. In addition to the student and her family, the district has interviewed staffers, the accused adult and Gabriella’s classmates, Lawrence said.
If there’s one truth the Religious Right does demonstrate, repeatedly, it’s their absolute willingness to lie, because they know there are a whole bunch of smug assholes out there who are so desperate for power over others, they’ll promote whatever shit they are told to swallow.
Via RWW.
Space Cake! More images and instructions here.
Real Space! © Peter Kurucz. You can see many more amazing photographs here.
