- The Power Of Print | Media Access Project
- Just last week, RoadMAP was complaining that the News of the World scandal was being overlooked by U.S. media
- Michele Bachmann’s bogus attack on the black farmer settlement | The Plum Line • by Adam Serwer
- …almost a liberal parody … Asked about potential cuts to hundreds of billions in agriculture subsidies, her response in effect is, “you know who doesn’t deserve government money? Black people!”
- …the USDA spent years handing out…assistance to white farmers hand over fist while ignoring black farmers…has [now] agreed to help black farmers who asked for but did not receive assistance during that time. Bachmann…insisted that there is “proof positive” of fraud … [But claims] filing for the second Pigford settlement hasn’t even begun yet, and 31 percent of the claims in the first settlement were denied. Not only that, but the second [one] was passed with an assortment of new anti-fraud provisions.
- …it’s telling that when asked about the more than a hundred billion dollars the federal government dishes out in agriculture subsidies a year, Bachmann started complaining about [Pigford, which is only] $1.2 billion…
- Plain English Urged to Limit Federal Bureaucracy – Miller-McCune
- The bill (all two-and-a-half pages of it!) required government agencies by this week to come up with plans to write all public communication from here on out so that people can actually understand it.
- …it turns out writing in simple English is an actual skill …
- Cheek thinks it takes three people to write any good regulation: a policy expert, a lawyer and a writer…
- Crummy wording in instructions can mean the difference between a veteran collecting disability payments or not, or an immigrant violating visa requirements or not. The Center for Plain Language [link]…even goes so far in its tagline as to call plain writing a “civil right.” …
- When people don’t understand the letters they get in the mail or the forms they have to fill out, each case of confusion requires a bureaucrat to individually explain things, which isn’t a particularly efficient use of government resources.
- Can PTSD Become Hereditary? – Miller-McCune
- The hippocampus is one seat of the problem, but scientists have also noticed effects on the epigenome, the complex of molecules wrapped in and around a gene thread that affects which genes are expressed. It’s a flexible system that responds to the environment. Two people hardwired for the same trait might not show the trait in the same way because they have epigenetic differences that mute or emphasize the genes.
- The epigenome happens to be pretty important in controlling stress hormones… a study by Rachel Yehuda and her colleagues at the Mt. Sinai School of Medicine found that levels of cortisol were significantly different from ordinary populations among Holocaust survivors — and among their children.
- The Price of Bread: A Measure of Political Stability | MoJo Blogs and Articles | Mother Jones • by Christian Parenti
- Consider this: between June 2010 and June 2011, world grain prices almost doubled. In many places on this planet, that proved an unmitigated catastrophe. In those same months, several governments fell, rioting broke out in cities from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, to Nairobi, Kenya, and most disturbingly three new wars began in Libya, Yemen, and Syria. Even on Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula, Bedouin tribes are now in revolt against the country’s interim government and manning their own armed roadblocks.
- And in each of these situations, the initial trouble was traceable, at least in part, to the price of that loaf of bread.
- IMF Says Greece Poses Region Contagion Risk Even Without Default | BusinessWeek.com
- Greece’s sovereign-debt crisis risks contaminating the rest of the euro region even if officials avert a default, the International Monetary Fund said.
- Reaganite Delusions – NYTimes.com – Paul Krugman
- The delusion that we never had good growth until Reagan came along is very widespread on the right
- A Clarification To The Post Below
- I was wearing my medieval velvet beret with the tassel on the side while writing it, surrounded by them academic robes. I was not wearing my fighting helmet and double swords and throw-knives. Sometimes the former is necessary, sometimes the latter.
- Who is harmed by a “real names” policy? | Geek Feminism Blog • by Skud
- …a list of groups of people who would be harmed by a policy banning pseudonymity and requiring “real names”. Unfortunately that document’s not available anywhere publicly online, so I thought it might be good to recreate it on the Geek Feminism wiki, and offer it as a general resource.
- Here it is: Who is harmed by a “Real Names” policy?
- Please help us fill in any categories of people you can think of who benefit from pseudonymity online, or who may experience real harm from a policy that bans it. You can edit the wiki directly if you like, or just drop a comment here on this post and we’ll try and include them.
[My bookmarks live at delicious.com/camryl. In case it needs to be said: I don't agree with every word of everything I link to. Also, signal boosts are awesome! --L.]
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