pnwmom
pnwmom's JournalBernie says the President got it RIGHT in his Sunday address.
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/2016-presidential-candidates-react-to-obamas-oval-office-address-on-isis/And Hillary also has called for greater help from other powers in the region, while ruling out US ground forces.
http://learningenglish.voanews.com/content/oval-office-address-obama-calms-amricans/3091754.html
Growing number of cyber shills
I do wonder, sometimes.
http://consumerist.com/2011/12/13/growing-number-of-cyber-shills-invade-online-reviews/
Since the dawn of online reviews, businesses have been attempting to game the system by flooding sites with bogus star ratings, fictitious reviews. And even though the major sites have enacted safeguards to prevent automated ways of rigging reviews, theres little they can do to stop an actual human from logging on to boost a review in exchange for a few pennies.
And thats literally all it takes, says a new study from researchers at the University of California Santa Barbara, which found that a growing number of companies are turning to shadowy shills in China, where a fake review or a Facebook like, a Twitter follower, etc. from a real person can run you as little as $.13 to $.70.
The chart shown above (from the UCSB study) shows what two China-based companies charged per-task for things like posting on forums and registering accounts.
Explains InfoWorld.com:
Organizers enlist dozens or hundreds of professional shills. They orchestrate mass account creation (bolstering XYZ Systems now has 100,000 registered users claims), generate bogus ratings, post canned cut-and-paste positive reviews and follow up with screenshots of their successes. Money flows from the customer to the organizer, then to the shills. And its very difficult if not impossible to trace.
Abusive private messages
Is there any action to take on these, other than blocking the person from sending future abusive emails?
I just got a PM that is titled "Fuck You" and goes on to tell me how much I suck as a person. This person then got two hides (he was abusive in the thread to other posters, too) and his account is now "flagged for review.)
I've never, with all my posts, had anyone send me an abusive email before. Maybe I've just been lucky.
All products created by Big Pharma are not created equal.
All products approved by the FDA are not equally safe and effective.
Not every person benefits from the products that benefit most other people.
Drugs are a vital part of the health care system but not every drug is equally safe and effective.
Vaccines are a vital part of the health care system but not every vaccine is equally safe and effective.
A vaccine, like a drug, may be taken off the market when the risks turn out to outweigh the benefits. (As with the old DPT vaccine.)
Having specific concerns about a particular drug or vaccine in particular situations does not make anyone either anti-drug or anti-vaccine.
Given all the above, mandated vaccines historically have been reserved for potentially serious diseases that can be spread through casual contact: like measles, whooping cough, etc.
HPV was the first vaccine that a governmental unit (Rick Perry's Texas) tried to mandate even though it was for a disease that was NOT spread through casual contact.
IMO, in order to preserve public confidence in the system, we should be wary of mandating vaccines that are not spread through casual contact unless the disease is both life threatening and not easily treatable. (Such as an HIV vaccine)
Big Pharma will produce the vaccines it deems to potentially have the most profit. That's why Big Pharma wants a mandate -- for everything. Big government should only mandate vaccines based on overall social good -- not the economic good of Big Pharma.
Big Pharma will pick the low-hanging fruit -- i.e., produce the vaccines that are easiest to produce. That does not mean we have to eat everything Big Pharma picks. We can only eat so much, so we need to be choosy.
Vaccines should be prioritized on a public health need -- not based on which is easiest or most profitable for the drug companies. So the decisions regarding the need for a vaccine or a mandate should be driven by the CDC and/or the FDA, not Big Pharma.
Only a legal loophole allowed the sale of the CA shooters weapons.
Someone other than the shooters legally purchased the weapons (after which they were illegally transferred to the shooters) but the weapons shouldn't have been able to be purchased by anyone in CA -- except for a legal loophole.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/san-bernardino-shooters-assault-rifles-california_5661f892e4b079b2818ea0ac
The two assault-style rifles that the attackers used to carry out a shooting massacre in San Bernardino on Wednesday were legally purchased in California due to a technical loophole in the state's assault weapons ban.
Meredith Davis, a spokeswoman for the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF), confirmed to The Huffington Post that the two long guns were bought legally in the state, but declined to identify the dealer who sold the weapons or the person who purchased them. Davis said that law enforcement is still investigating how the shooters, Syed Rizwan Farook and Tashfeen Malik, acquired the rifles, since someone else purchased them.
The Smith & Wesson M&P15 that Farook wielded and Malik's DPMS A-15 were both legal in California despite the state's tough assault weapons ban because they had button mechanisms to release their ammunition magazines. An exception known as the "bullet button loophole" allows rifles that would ordinarily be prohibited to be manufactured and sold if they have the button-release feature, since their magazines are then considered fixed rather than detachable.
The loophole has spawned a cottage industry for gun makers in California, some of whom specialize in specially manufacturing assault-style rifles to comply with state law.
Rosa Parks had no children and her only brother died decades before she did.
So there may not be anyone left who can truly speak for her now.
But we should all remember her. She had a long and productive life as a citizen-activist, and 23 years spent working as a secretary for US Rep John Conyers.
ON EDIT: She had a substantial estate when she died, which she left to a charity. Her nieces and nephews sued the charitable trust and battled all the way to the Michigan Supreme Court, where they finally lost -- and yet, with her papers and memorabilia valued in the millions, the battle didn't end till earlier this year, ten years after her death.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rosa_Parks
Shortly after the boycott, she moved to Detroit, where she briefly found similar work. From 1965 to 1988 she served as secretary and receptionist to John Conyers, an African-American U.S. Representative. She was also active in the Black Power movement and the support of political prisoners in the US.
After retirement, Parks wrote her autobiography and lived a largely private life in Detroit. In her final years, she suffered from dementia. Parks received national recognition, including the NAACP's 1979 Spingarn Medal, the Presidential Medal of Freedom, the Congressional Gold Medal, and a posthumous statue in the United States Capitol's National Statuary Hall. Upon her death in 2005, she was the first woman and third non-U.S. government official to lie in honor at the Capitol Rotunda.
http://trialandheirs.com/blog/celebrities/rosa-parks-final-wishes-ignored-for-years-are-finally-restored
Her final wishes were not so modest. She assigned all of her belongings to a charitable institute to educate and motivate youth and adults, particularly African American persons, for self and community betterment. She called this the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self-Development. She named her close friend, Elaine Steele, along with a retired Detroit judge, to oversee her estate. She also named Elaine Steele as a prominent beneficiary, including a 90% recipient of royalties, with 10% passing to her nieces and nephews.
But Parks many nieces and nephews did not agree with her final will and trust, which were created in July, 1998. They sued to challenge the estate plan, accusing Steele of using undue influence on Parks. Steele denied it. After the case was started, amid claims of mismanagement, the probate judge removed Steele and the other appointed executor and replaced them with two local attorneys.
On the eve of Rosa Parks estate trial, the parties settled with a confidential settlement agreement that upheld the will and trust as valid, re-instituted Steele and the retired Judge as the executors, and gave the nieces and nephews additional rights and royalties related to Parks. This left Steele in control of Rosa Parks Institute.
http://nypost.com/2014/04/10/rosa-park-archive-up-for-auction-as-heirs-friends-battle-in-court/
Parks wanted people to see her mementos and learn from her life, said Elaine Steele, a longtime friend who heads the Rosa and Raymond Parks Institute for Self Development, a foundation Parks co-founded in 1987 in Detroit.
In my opinion, it was quite clear what she wanted, Steele said.
http://blogs.indiewire.com/shadowandact/the-unfortunate-story-of-the-years-long-battle-over-rosa-parks-belongings-finally-resolved-film-material-20151201
According to Steven G. Cohen, who represents the Rosa & Raymond Parks Institute, the family dispute has been settled, stating: Im sure I speak for everyone involved: theyre thrilled with the disposition of the artifacts and the use made by them."
The Senate just repealed ACA and defunded Planned Parenthood; Bernie didn't vote.
Obama will veto this piece of shit, but it should never have had to come to his desk. With a vote as close as this one, any one vote might have been critical.
Bernie was out campaigning.
http://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/262071-senate-approves-bill-repealing-much-of-obamacare
Consumers reports: The FDA approval of GMO salmon is an "abuse of public trust."
It's been approved without allergy testing, though small studies showed significant allergies, and no labeling is required.
This is why people are fighting GMO's. The FDA and the producers are deliberately limiting safety research. There's no excuse for this.
http://www.nytimes.com/roomfordebate/2015/12/02/are-genetically-engineered-salmon-too-fishy/the-fdas-decision-on-the-aquabounty-salmon-is-an-abuse-of-consumer-trust
Michael K. Hansen is a senior scientist with Consumers Union, the policy and action division of Consumer Reports.
The F.D.A.'s decision to allow the sale of genetically modified salmon the first genetically engineered animal approved for human consumption discounted the needs of American consumers.
When it comes to food, consumers deserve rigorous safety testing for human and environmental risks and meaningful labels they can use to decide what to eat. They got neither.
SNIP
The AquaBounty salmon was engineered with genes from two other fish species to promote rapid growth. The F.D.A. should have rigorously assessed whether that process introduced any new safety risks, including whether this G.M.-salmon has higher levels of proteins known to cause severe allergic reactions in some people.
The F.D.A. had 15 years to mull over AquaBounty's application, but did not require that the company follow up on allergenicity tests it did on just 18 fish despite the fact that the tiny sample study strongly suggested G.M.-salmon could pose a greater allergen risk. The F.D.A. should have conducted the most thorough safety assessment possible, considering this approval of the first genetically engineered animal for food sets a market precedent.
The F.D.A. also failed to require that AquaBounty salmon be labeled as such, even though poll after poll show that more than 90 percent of consumers favor labeling of all genetically engineered food.
SNIP
The Five Stages of White Privilege Awareness
This is by a blogger I don't know. But I thought this was worth passing on.
http://www.therustylife.com/2014/03/the-complete-white-privilege-series/
The 5 Stages of White Privilege Awareness
Stage One:
Im not a racist!
AKA DENIAL
When I was 19-years-old I went on a Spring Break trip to the Harambee Center in Pasadena. We spent the week working in different parts of the city, doing home visits with families in Watts, and discussing various issues relating to race and reconciliation. On our first night in Pasadena I remember listening to a white man talk about race and he opened with this line to a group of 50 college students, the vast majority of whom were white:
You are all racists. Every last one of you.
Obviously not one for easing into things, that guy. I was sitting near the back and I remember thinking, WHAT??? Are you kidding me with this? I am not a racist. My boyfriend in high school was totally Korean. How could I be a racist if I dated someone who wasnt white? I dont think so. No way.
Id like to say that I listened with an open ear and thus began a lifelong quest of inner examination and contemplation surrounding race. But I didnt. I completely tuned him out, full of my own righteous indignation.
SNIP
One more thing I've become disturbed by in efforts to help various friends and family members
is how incredibly complicated paperwork has become. And then that paperwork becomes the excuse for mistreating people. They break contracts they never understood and never had a choice to not sign -- and then they get punished for it.
It's like you need a college degree for practically everything these days. Not literally -- but you need college level reading skills to figure out a rental agreement or a loan agreement. And you need solid math skills to understand the interest on your credit cards.
So most people probably just sign on the bottom line -- because they don't have any other choice. And they don't know what they're getting into.'
All of this has a huge impact on politics. People who don't really understand the tax system, for example, aren't going to be able to weigh the various proposals of the candidates. They might incorrectly think their own taxes will rise because they don't understand how a progressive tax system works. So they choose candidates based on gut feelings or a political party because their parents belonged to it.
More and more, American life seems to be snowballing out of control, and people are afraid. Of course they're attracted to people who appeal to that fear. Take-charge types like Adolph Trump.
And that scares me.
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