[Signal boosts are awesome! --L.]
- GOP Senators Reject Paycheck Fairness Even As Their Personal Wealth Rises
- [RHRealityCheck.org - Jodi Jacobson]
A new study by the Center for Responsive Politics of federal financial disclosures released earlier this year shows that despite the persistently bad economy, the collective personal wealth of congressional members increased by more than 16 percent between 2008 and 2009…
The median wealth of a U.S. senator was nearly $2.38 million, up from $2.27 million in 2008.
What is the median net worth of the average US family? Less than $48,000.
- Planet Found Around Wrong Kind Of Star
- Astronomers have already discovered hundreds of exoplanets. But make way for the new kid. Which is orbiting a kind of star that models say it shouldn’t.
- It came from another galaxy
- Extrasolar planet traces its origin outside the Milky Way
- Hollywood Feminist of the Day: Ryan Gosling
- [Women & Hollywood - Melissa Silverstein]
Ryan Gosling one of the stars of Blue Valentine got into the conversation and talked about how misogynistic the system is. I love guys who use patriarchy and misogyny [in] a single press statement. [blockquotes him]
…Gosling’s statement is one of the most feminist statement about the movie business that I have seen in a long time, if ever.
- Serious media executive rails against NPR Nazis and jokes about beheading
- It's now thoroughly mainstream for right wing news executives and commentators to accuse liberals and journalists of being Nazis, murderers and terrorist sympathizers — while liberals and journalists who express alarm at such things are marginalized as extremists. Can we see the problem here?
- Jan Gossart
- [lines and colors :: a blog about drawing, painting, illustration - Charley Parker]
Though strongly influenced by his predecessors Jan van Eyck and Rogier van der Weyden, Gossart was a key figure in the incorporation of Italian painting techniques and mythological subject matter into Flemish art.
…noted in particular for his playful, illusionistic use of space…
- Unworldly Fitness Climbing Wall with Odd Challenges in Tokyo
- [Freshome.com - Lavinia]
The uncommon climbing wall below is just one of the “accessories” of the much talked about Illoiha Omotesando fitness club in Tokyo and was designed by Nendo. Instead of the usual rock-shaped holding elements, this wall features plenty of unexpected objects…
- Samuel Delany Will Come Into Your House And Shred Your Notebooks
- [Delany's book, On Writing] might actually be that rarest of creatures – academic bathroom reading. This isn't, by any means, a criticism. It's a very dense, ruminative book full of ideas that will pop into your head a few days after you read them.
- BBC News – UN pay strike closes Palestinian schools in West Bank
- The current action dates back to an incident earlier this year when staff went on strike for a week in protest against disciplinary action taken against a teacher at a UN school in the West Bank.
Workers are now striking, demanding that they get paid for that original week as well as for the current month of strike action.
In a somewhat Catch 22 situation, the longer the strike continues, on the bigger their grievance gets and the more workers want to be paid.
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- BBC News – Amnesty calls for inquiry into Egypt ‘police torture’
- The disfigured body of Ahmed Shaaban, 19, was found in a canal last week after he and a friend were arrested in the northern port city of Alexandria.
The police deny any wrongdoing.
Amnesty has also called on the Egyptian authorities to guarantee the safety of Mr Shaaban's friend, Ahmed Farrag Labib, who is still in police custody.
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- BBC News – Nigerian military rescue 19 hostages in Niger Delta
- Nigerian troops have rescued 19 hostages kidnapped by militants in the Niger Delta this month, officials say.
Two Americans, two Frenchmen, two Indonesians and a Canadian were freed along with 12 Nigerians in a land, air and sea assault, said officials.
Security sources told the BBC the freed hostages were euphoric.
The operation was the first successful rescue of foreign captives in the Delta without any of the hostages being killed in the process.
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- Baby Sea Dragons at Georgia Aquarium!
- [ZooBorns - Andrew Bleiman]
- The lessons of Andhra Pradesh | Analysis & Opinion |
- [Reuters - Felix Salmon]
…simply the latest and largest proof that microfinance as an industry is at the mercy of regulators and politicians, who are more likely to get things wrong than they are to get things right. Remember Nicaragua? It doesn’t take much in the way of political demagoguery to persuade a population to stop paying its loans en masse, driving the local lenders into immediate bankruptcy. Similar things have happened in Bolivia, Bosnia, Pakistan, and Morocco…
…This is a global issue, which should be addressed by scaling back, going local, giving borrowers ownership of their lenders, and generally being much less ambitious when it comes to growth rates. Much better that full-service banks grow organically out of local communities…
[I confess, after reading this article, I still don't understand. -L]
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- It’s good to be all the king’s men
- Did Congress declare Educate the Public About the Hierarchy of Justice Week and I missed the announcement? Because the past few days have drawn a very clear diagram of the modern American law-enforcement privilege pyramid.
At the bottom of the pyramid, black and Hispanic men, who can be stopped on the street and frisked for no legal reason. [link link and link]…
At the top of the heap, you get federal intelligence agents, who can destroy evidence in a torture-related murder case, and the Justice Department will just sit there “investigating” until the statute of limitations runs out.
[In case it needs to be said: I don't agree with every word of everything I link to. --L.]
The Of interest (Thu, Nov 18th, 11am) by Lee Salazar, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-Share Alike 3.0 United States License. Terms and conditions beyond the scope of this license may be available at leesalazar.com.