From Giliell, oh, so pretty! Click for full size.
© Giliell, all rights reserved.
Affinity
Art, Fun, & Nonsense.
From Giliell, oh, so pretty! Click for full size.
© Giliell, all rights reserved.
A Russet-throated Puffbird, from “The”. Beautiful Dinosaur!
© “The”, all rights reserved.
Ben Carson. Talking about slaves. Well, in a manner of speaking, very bad speaking. I have no idea how this man ever got a degree of any kind, but this level of stupidity should be lethal.
At one point during the talk, Carson reflected on how America was a land of “dreams and opportunity.”
“There were other immigrants who came here in the bottom of slave ships who worked even longer, even harder for less,” Carson noted. “But they too had a dream, that one day their sons, daughters, granddaughters, great-grandsons, great-granddaughters might pursue prosperity and happiness.”
So, slaves were people who just jumped on a ship, stuffed themselves into chains in intolerable conditions, and just worked for less once they arrived here to happy immigrants land. Could we at least get a law which prohibits people this astonishingly dense from speaking in public? Please?
Via Raw Story.
Khizr Khan speaks at the Democratic National Convention accompanied by his wife Ghazala — screenshot.
Khizr Khan, the Muslim American Gold Star father who famously railed against President Donald Trump at last year’s Democratic National Convention, has cancelled a planned speech he was scheduled to give in Toronto after being informed that the U.S. government is “reviewing” his travel privileges.
KHIZR KHAN EVENT CANCELLATION
Late Sunday evening Khizr Khan, an American citizen for over 30 years, was notified that his travel privileges are being reviewed. As a consequence, Mr. Khan will not be traveling to Toronto on March 7th to speak about tolerance, understanding, unity and the rule of law. Very regretfully, Ramsay Talks must cancel its luncheon with Mr. Khan. Guests will be given full refunds.
Mr. Khan offered his sincere apologies to all those who made plans to attend on March 7th. He said: “This turn of events is not just of deep concern to me but to all my fellow Americans who cherish our freedom to travel abroad. I have not been given any reason as to why. I am grateful for your support and look forward to visiting Toronto in the near future.
This fairly SCREAMS unpresident pettiness. Full story here.
He would have been 90 years old today. In reading a remembrance, there was this particular quote:
“The more power you have, the harder it is to know who is lying to you and who is not. When you reach absolute power, there is no contact with reality, and that’s the worst kind of solitude there can be. A very powerful person, a dictator, is surrounded by interests and people whose final aim is to isolate him from reality; everything is in concert to isolate him.”
— From The Paris Review Interviews, Gabriel García Márquez, The Art of Fiction No. 69
How very apt.
Twitter psychology re POTUS, from a UCBerkeley cognitive scientist, author @GeorgeLakoff pic.twitter.com/3ytTFSPUDw
— Eric Lipton (@EricLiptonNYT) March 5, 2017
Earlier this year, George Lakoff, a cognitive linguist at the University of California, Berkeley, crafted a “taxonomy” of how Trump uses Twitter to shift the conversation from unwelcome reports and subsume the news cycle with his own agenda.
There’s an excellent analysis of The Ministry of Truth at The Washington Post. Recommended Reading.
Tucker Viemeister.
President Trump is preparing to sign a new executive order Monday that White House officials hope can withstand legal scrutiny in imposing a 90-day ban on U.S. entry for new visa seekers from six majority-Muslim nations, according to a fact sheet the administration sent to Congress.
In addition, the nation’s refugee program will be suspended for 120 days, and it will not accept more than 50,000 refugees in a year, down from the 110,000 cap set by the Obama administration.
The new guidelines name six of the seven countries included in the first executive order, but it leaves out Iraq. That nation will increase cooperation with the United States on additional security vetting under separate negotiations and its citizens are not subject to the new order, the fact sheet states.
They hope it can withstand scrutiny? Hope? Jesus Christ, you about have buildings full of bloody lawyers, pretty sure they could just tell you. What they are hoping is that attempting to sound less like draconian fascists will baffle, boggle, and delay those awful judges.
“The United States has the world’s most generous immigration system, yet it has been repeatedly exploited by terrorists and other malicious actors who seek to do us harm,” the fact sheet stated.
No. No, the States does not have the world’s most generous immigration system. One of the nastiest aspects of American exceptionalism is this idea that no matter what is on the table, ‘Merica is always the bestest ever! When it comes to the refugee situation, the U.S. is way the fuck down on the generosity list. The same old bullshit line is being used as justification, the war on terror. Thanks ever, Bush. Again, the behaviour implies the States are the only target of terrorism, which couldn’t be further from the truth. We’ve been pretty damn lucky in that regard, compared to other countries. While this idiocy is going on, Iran and North Korea are playing with missiles. Guess that’s not as important as tearing families apart and making people miserable. Oy. I have canvas and paints out today, so hopefully this will be the day’s dose of stupid.
The full story is at The Washington Post.
Also see this:
Donald Trump’s top advisers try to cheer up the sulking commander in chief by reminding him of their looming plan to endanger the lives of some of the most desperate and vulnerable people on earth.
That fact comes to us not from Trump’s political opponents or some nefarious conspiracy of “Obama holdovers” in the “deep state,” but from Trump’s closest friends and allies in politics.
I find all of this to be wildly attractive, it’s so Geigeresque.
A group of MAarch students from the Bartlett School of Architecture have devised a method of turning felt into load-bearing structures that they hope to build into an fabric pavilion.
The Flextiles project focused on developing a design system using a composite of felt fibres and expandable foam for reinforcement.Students Noura Mheid, Hameda Janahi, Minzi Jin, Zoukai Huo found inspiration in the traditional craft of felt-making as well as the differential growth patterns found in nature – which is what gives their finished structures their distinctive, seaweed-like curls.
After exploring the load-bearing potential of these structures by crafting them into chairs they could sit on, they finished the project by presenting a fabric wall unit. The unit forms one side of what they hope they can one day extend into a full pavilion.
Their process stands in contrast to most current fabric architecture, which usually features soft fabric attached to a support structure. The Flextiles structures can be soft in some places and hard in others, transitioning smoothly from one to the other.
“Unlike traditional uses of fabric in construction, this technology introduces a new perspective on how to integrate structure into a soft material such as fabric and go beyond the typical disintegration between the draping of fabric onto a completely segregated support,” Mheid told Dezeen.
You can read and see more at Dezeen.
© Moisés Hernández.
Mexican designer Moisés Hernández’ dipped his Immersed Birds collection in dye to emulate the plumage of tropical fauna. The wooden birds are based on the form and colouring of toucans, hummingbirds and Mexican quetzals – chosen for their bright, contrasting feathers.Hernández used computer-numerically-controlled (CNC) technology to mill soft, continuous wooden shapes that replicate the structure of the birds’ bodies. Exaggerated tubes form tails, while slender spikes make for beaks.
The designer then developed an experimental painting technique that immersed sections of the wood in coloured water. This allowed Hernández to create overlapping and contrasting layers of colour, and play with transparency – leaving the grain of the wood visible beneath the dye.
“This way, the birds acquire a duality where handmade and machine-made complement each other, resulting in three decorative figures,” said the designer, who has exhibited his work around the world.
© Moisés Hernández.
Via Dezeen. Moisés Hernández’ site is full of wonders, oh, have a visit!
Bloom Bookcase, Raw Edges.
Oh, I want! I want one of these a whole wall length. Great design. This was one of the designs included in Dezeen’s 10 shelving designs that are perfect for book lovers, which led me to the Bloom Bookcase by Raw Edges.
Coils. © C. Ford.
Bullfinch, from Charly. Such a dashing dinosaur. Click for full size!
© Charly, all rights reserved.
President Trump walks to Marine One on the South Lawn of the White House with his grandchildren Joseph and Arabella Kushner, before departing for Florida on March 3. (Ricky Carioti/The Washington Post).
Trying to read a rather important article about the Tiny Tyrant’s latest meltdown, which also contains some serious stupidity – he’s intent on proving President Obama wiretapped him, even though it has been pointed out to him, more than once, that if a wiretap was approved, that would mean there was evidence of criminal activity on Trump’s part. The average bear would have backpedaled on this nonsense right away, saying they shouldn’t have taken Breitbart so earnestly or something, but no. In the not so quiet background, Bannon is encouraging this idiocy, with talk of deep state having it in for Trump. So naturally, he ran away to Florida (a bit more on the later). Anyroad, I’m reading, but keep scrolling back up to look at that photo. That’s tape on his tie, right? (Click photo for full size.) Three pieces of tape. I’ve never seen that one before. Anyone out there also tape up the back of their tie?
As for the Tiny Tyrant’s need to run off to Florida every weekend, which is not only costing taxpayers millions for each trip, it’s not endearing the residents of West Palm Beach to him, either.
Residents and business owners in West Palm Beach complained over the weekend that President Donald Trump’s frequent trips to his Mar-a-Lago resort are making their lives miserable.
NBC News reported that Trump’s weekend visits were not only expensive for the taxpayers, but the safety measures implemented by the Secret Service are also costing local business owners big.
“We’re basically going broke,” a spokesperson for Southern Helicopter told NBC News. “We were not expecting him to come down almost every weekend.”
Jonathan Miller, the president of Stellar Aviation Group, worried that his business would go under if Trump continued to make Mar-a-Lago his weekend destination. Miller estimated that he is losing $30,000 each weekend because of Trump.
Additionally, the taxpayers of Palm Beach County are already on the hook for $1.7 million in extra security, and the White House has so far ignored requests to reimburse the county.