Tom Faranda's Folly

In Texas if you win a relay race, don't point at the sky

Or your team will be disqualified, and out of the state championships.

This is really stupid. They need to reinstae the team.

 

SC Justice Clarence Thomas on President Obama

A CSPAN interview cmoplete with a short video.

When asked about how he felt about the nation’s first black President, Barack Obama, Thomas said he always knew it would have to be a person who was “approved by the elites and the media” because if it was someone who they didn’t agree with, that person would be picked apart.

Two track meet winners

For some reason, I kind of like this picture.

The boy on Tim's left is his friend Liam who had just won the long jump competition at the fourth (and last) Mt Vernon developmental meet for freshman and sophomores. And Tim had won the discus.

Ugh, slightly different builds, eh? After the meet, Tim went to the gym and worked his way up to matching his PR, with a 315 lb. bench press. THEN he finished with 25 reps at 135 lbs!

 

 

Interesting - "Welcome to Wisconsin" sign

Sent to me by my friend Antoinette. Don't know if it's real, but it is clever ...

Excellent - America Mag links to a short video: "The Devil in Pope Francis' Teaching"

The Jesuit magazine in their weekly email linked to this -

Gerry Blaszczak, S.J., discusses Pope Francis' frequent mention of the devil and how it reflects the pope's Ignatian spirituality.

Jay Leno explains how the President can close Gitmo

Funny - Was up on drudge -

 

Rivera gets 10th save in ten attempts in April

Still great.

CNBC on the $2 trillion underground economy

In the piece, they estimate the underground economy at 8% of United States gross dometic product. I think that's a low estimate.

$2 Trillion Underground Economy May Be Recovery's Savior

The shadow economy is a system composed of those who can't find a full-time or regular job. Workers turn to anything that pays them under the table, with no income reported and no taxes paid — especially with an uneven job picture.

"I think the underground economy is quite big in the U.S.," said Alexandre Padilla, associate professor of economics at Metropolitan State University of Denver. "Whether it's using undocumented workers or those here legally, it's pretty large."

"You normally see underground economies in places like Brazil or in southern Europe," said Laura Gonzalez, professor of personal finance at Fordham University. "But with the job situation and the uncertainty in the economy, it's not all that surprising to have it growing here in the United States."

Estimates are that underground activity last year totaled as much as $2 trillion, according to a study by Edgar Feige, an economist at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

That's double the amount in 2009, according to a study by Friedrich Schneider, a professor at Johannes Kepler University in Linz, Austria. The study said the shadow economy amounts to nearly 8 percent of U.S. gross domestic product.

Much of that money goes into cash registers, said Gonzalez, as personal consumption has risen since the recession.

"There is consumer spending in the short term, with people having money even if it's not reported, and that's boosting the economy," she said. "But in the long run, an underground economy is telling us that things have to change."

Right!

Media fawns over gay basketball player; ignores attack on Catholic Archbishop

Something like 3 or 4% of the population has a same sex attraction. So... shouldn't 3-4% of professional athletes be gay also? So what's the big deal.

The big deal, of course, is that the media thinks it's a big issue - so they make it so.

Meanwhile the Archbishop of Belgium gets attacked by topless activists and no reporting at all.

Hit the link, I actually thought this was a phonied up story when my friend Joe emailed it to me, but it's not.

The archbishop was debating blasphemy laws at the ULB University in Brussels, when the bare-breasted women, their chests decorated with slogans such as “Anus Dei is Coming,” “My Body My Rules” and “God Save the Gouines” (a reference to the French radical feminist lesbian movement, the Gouines Rouges, or Red Dykes) surprised the archbishop and drenched him with water.

I wouldn't have reacted the way the Archbishop did - I would have just walked off (I think). Could you imagine if someone had waterbombed the basketball player Jason Collins - national outrage in the press! But an assault on a Catholic Bishop - no coverage at all.

So - who are the haters?

NY Times says average cost for prom: $1,139

Unbelievable. And absurd.

Tim (sophomore at Stepinac) was invited to the Croton HS Jr. Prom. Silly me, I thought junior prom was semi-formal. Guess I'm old and out of the loop.

Between the tux and other stuff, we laid out over $200 for Tim. He did look good great - and will kill me if I were to post his picture.

Joe went to two senior proms and we didn't lay out anywhere near the money NY times is talking about. I know, girls are more expensive.

Here's the article.

I guess I should at least feel good about all the money I saved my family by sitting out the big night. This year, according to the credit card company Visa, prom spending will reach an average of $1,139 per family, up 5 percent over last year. Parents of high school students are planning to pay for almost two-thirds of the cost, with the children covering the rest. (The numbers come from a survey of 3,000 people interviewed over the phone in February and March by GfK Roper OmniTel.)

More than $1,100? That’s a lot to shell out for a big dress-up party, while you sit home hoping that your offspring don’t get drunk or do anything else foolish. (Maybe it’s the influence of all that red-carpet coverage?)

Along with the statistics, Visa introduced a personal finance app called Plan’it Prom, to help families budget for the big dance. The free app will “help you cut costs for a night you’ll never forget,” the introduction says.

If I were shelling out $1,100 + for a prom, I'd certainly never forget it ...

Congress wants to pay (taxpayers!) for tanks the army doesn't want/need

A classic. What a mess. How many other needless systmes do we have? Why do we still have thousands of nuclear weapons?

... in the case of the Abrams tank, there's a bipartisan push to spend an extra $436 million on a weapon the experts explicitly say is not needed.

"If we had our choice, we would use that money in a different way," Gen. Ray Odierno, the Army's chief of staff, told The Associated Press this past week.

Why are the tank dollars still flowing? Politics.

Keeping the Abrams production line rolling protects businesses and good paying jobs in congressional districts where the tank's many suppliers are located.

If there's a home of the Abrams, it's politically important Ohio. The nation's only tank plant is in Lima. So it's no coincidence that the champions for more tanks are Rep. Jim Jordan and Sen. Rob Portman, two of Capitol's Hill most prominent deficit hawks, as well as Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown. They said their support is rooted in protecting national security, not in pork-barrel politics.

******

The Army's plan was to stop buying tanks until 2017, when production of a newly designed Abrams would begin. Orders for Abrams tanks from U.S. allies help fill the gap created by the loss of tanks for the Army, according to service officials, but congressional proponents of the program feared there would not be enough international business to keep the Abrams line going.

This pause in tank production for the U.S. would allow the Army to spend its money on research and development work for the new and improved model, said Ashley Givens, a spokeswoman for the Army's Ground Combat Systems office.

The first editions of the Abrams tank were fielded in the early 1980s. Over the decades, the Abrams supply chain has become embedded in communities across the country.

General Dynamics estimated in 2011 that there were more than 560 subcontractors throughout the country involved in the Abrams program and that they employed as many as 18,000 people. More than 40 of the companies are in Pennsylvania, according to Sen. Robert Casey, D-Pa., also a staunch backer of continued tank production.

A letter signed by 173 Democratic and Republican members of the House last year and sent to then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta demonstrated the depth of bipartisan support for the Abrams program on Capitol Hill. They chided the Obama administration for neglecting the industrial base and proposing to terminate tank production in the United States for the first time since World War II.

Really, how absurd is this - and we know who pays for it!

The Pope speaks to 70,000 youth - yesterday at the Vatican

Worthy sentiment.

"Build on high ideals, on the big things. We Christians are not chosen by the Lord for small little things, always go above and beyond, to the big things."

 

At yesterday's Penn Relays Women's National 4 x 400 relay - thrilling!

Is citizenship for illegal aliens a civil and human right?

Sounds kind of bizarre, but the Attorney General says it is.

hit the link.

"This is a matter of civil and human rights"

He was speaking to a Mexican-American group. Doesn't this mean that anyone who comes into  the USA is entitled to citizenship?

The Vatican's chief astronomer on science and religion

Pretty good short interview.

 

Sex After Death

From a friend of mine - who gets all the credit for this ...

A couple made a deal that whoever
died first would come back and ... inform the other if there is sex after
death. Their biggest fear was that there was no after life at all.

After a long life together, the husband was the first to die. True to his word,
he made the first contact:

" Marion .... Marion "


"Is that you, Bob?"


"Yes, I've come back like we agreed."


"That's wonderful! What's it like?"


"Well, I get up in the morning, I have sex. I have breakfast and then it's
off to the golf course. I have sex again, bathe in the warm sun and then have
sex a couple of more times..

Then I have lunch (you'd be proud -
lots of greens). Another romp around the golf course, then pretty much have sex
the rest of the afternoon.

After supper, it's back to golf course again.
Then it's more sex until late at night. I catch some much needed sleep and then
the next day it starts all over again".


"Oh, Bob! Are you in Heaven?"


"No -- I'm a rabbit somewhere in South Carolina .”

Will doubling your workout time double the benefits?

Another short piece from the excellent NY Times Health and Science section.

As you might surmise, the answer is pretty clearly "no", but it's still worth reading the short article.

In a notable study from 2011, people of all ages who exercised very moderately, for about 15 minutes a day, or approximately half of your current regimen, reduced their risk of dying prematurely by about 14 percent, or the equivalent of three additional years of life. Those whose workouts were twice as long — like yours, 30 minutes per day — saw an additional drop in the risk of premature death, but only by 4 percent. Using that data, other scientists have estimated that people who go really big with their workouts, increasing their exercise time from 50 minutes per day to 120 minutes per day — a 140 percent increase — achieve only about a 5 percent added decrease in their risk of dying too young.

The guy drafted #12 in yesterday's NFL first round, was a few minutes from death last November

UPDATE: An interview with the Oakland GM, and why they took Hayden.

Amazing. A fluke injury - in practice ruptured his vena cava! This injury usually occurs in car accidents, and is 95% fatal.

A whole series of "fortunate decisions and outcomes" and he survived.

D.J. Hayden, the draft’s miracle story, probably should have died at Houston last November

Cornerback D.J. Hayden might go in the first round of this week's NFL draft. The football staff at the University of Houston can't believe he's alive.

They go through the checklist of fortunate decisions and outcomes that saved Hayden's life on Nov. 6. Hayden was hit on a fairly routine play in practice. He was drifting over to break up a pass. Safety Trevon Stewart jumped for the pass. His knee hit Hayden in the chest. Collisions like it happen regularly in full-pads football practices.

"It's a hit you see all the time," Houston's athletic trainer Mike O'Shea said.

"It was a routine play," Houston coach Tony Levine said. "It was a collision I've seen happen to the naked eye probably thousands of times."

O'Shea witnessed the hit and saw Hayden go to his knees and figured Hayden probably had the wind knocked out of him, perhaps fractured a rib. Or figured at worst, he injured his spleen. Nobody knew that Hayden tore a vein near his heart and was in serious danger of dying.

 

Here's where the Houston personnel starts listing all the crucial moments.

Hit the link for the rest of the story - it's a quick read.

Unsurprisingly, large majority favors death penalty for terrorist. Too bad.

Yeah, too bad.

The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 61% of Likely U.S. Voters believe the surviving Boston marathon bombing suspect should receive the death penalty if convicted and found guilty. Just 23% oppose the death penalty in this case, while 16% more are undecided.

Well, count me with the 23%. For all sorts of reasons.

Of course, the sentiment is understandable.

Here's an excerpt from part of an article I read last night that I agree 100% with:

Lessons From Boston

Yet we must remember the moving moments. One came during the Mass and homily of Boston’s Cardinal Sean O’Malley April 21. He condemned the culture of death and quoted Blessed John Paul II: “Respond to the blind violence and inhuman hatred with the fascinating power of love.”  

After the Mass, the cardinal said he was opposed to the death penalty for the surviving bomber. “Forgiveness does not mean that we do not realize the heinousness of the crime,” he explained. “But in our own hearts when we are unable to forgive we make ourselves a victim of our own hatred. Obviously as a Catholic I oppose the death penalty, which I think is one further manifestation of the culture of death in our midst.” 

Seeking justice is morally appropriate, but politicians already baying for the death penalty is one more symptom of the culture of death that drenches our society.

 

Does cooling down after working out matter?

Probably not!

Most of us were taught in elementary school gym classes that the body requires a formal period of cooling down after a workout or competition. Instructors told us that by slowing to a jog or otherwise lessening the intensity of the workout, followed by stretching or otherwise transitioning out of physical activity, we would prevent muscle soreness, improve limberness and speed physiological recovery. All of this would allow us to perform better physically the next day than if we hadn’t cooled down.

But under scientific scrutiny, none of those beliefs stand up well.

Turns out, warming up is much more beneficial!

FULL DISCLOSURE: I always warm up, never warm down.

Whew! Quick save by a Columbian subway cop

On ABC. Sorry for the commercial.

 

Boston bombing victim talks about her decision to have her foot amputated

What a thing to have to decide. ... better off without your foot.

 

Fitness work after donating blood

This fellow had donated blood a few hours earlier, according to his business partner, who shot the video -

 

The "Economic Recovery" has been good - for the 7%

Good article on this in the Washington Post.

The non-existent (for 93% of the country) recovery from 2009 to 2011 saw the net worth of the top 7% of the population rise, while the bottom 93% actually had their net worth drop.

The primary reason for the discrepancy: the rally in financial assets, while real estate values (which comprise most of the net worth for most people) stayed flat or dropped. Further proof that the Wall Street bailout was for the benefit of a certain class of people ...

As economy recovers, the richest get richer, study shows

From 2009 to 2011, the average net worth of the nation’s 8 million most-affluent households jumped from an estimated $2.7 million to $3.2 million, Pew said. For the 111 million households that form the bottom 93 percent, average net worth fell 4 percent, from $140,000 to an estimated $134,000, the report said.

******

In the two-year period covered by the report, the Standard & Poor’s 500-stock index rose by 34 percent, while the S&P/Case-Shiller home price index slipped by 5 percent.

Fitness: long runs vs. sprints

A short piece in the NY Times

Which develops VO2 max more effectively: long runs done within a lower heart rate zone, or high-intensity training, i.e. sprints? Or does it depend on the individual?

VO2 max - a measure of aerobic fitness.

Pictures from yesterday's accident at 9/9A intersection

UPDATE: Here's the story - Driver blames brake failure in Route 9A garbage truck crash

Creating a HUGE delay, which I was caught in for over an hour. Finally able to extircate myself and everyone else in the car with me, on a route too complicated to explain.

The garbage truck (UPDATE - it was actaully a huge truck that was transporting gabage, not a garbage pick-up truck) was going down the big hill before entering Croton and flipped (as happens every few years with trucks, tractor-trailers, etc, going down that hill.)

And what a mess.

Driver pulled from flipped garbage truck

NY Times continues to have their internal problems.

I've posted about their "issues" a few times, like here. Intriguing New York Magazine article: "A New York Times Whodunit"

The Times is still considered akin to the bible by some, so it's fun to post this stuff.

From The Politico -

Turbulence at The Times

One Monday morning in April, Jill Abramson called Dean Baquet into her office to complain. The executive editor of The New York Times was upset about the paper’s recent news coverage — she felt it wasn’t “buzzy” enough, a source there said — and placed blame on Baquet, her managing editor. A debate ensued, which gave way to an argument.

Minutes later, Baquet burst out of Abramson’s office, slammed his hand against a wall, and stormed out of the newsroom. He would be gone for the rest of the day, absent from the editors’ daily 4 p.m. meeting, at which he is a fixture.

“I feel bad about that,” Baquet told POLITICO in a recent interview. “The newsroom doesn’t need to see one of its leaders have a tantrum.”

The episode electrified the newsroom, and details of what staffers described as “the altercation” — Baquet called it “a disagreement” — spread to other Times bureaus. But once the story had made the rounds, it wasn’t Baquet the staffers were griping about. It was Abramson.

A modern persecution: Romanian Bishop Ioan Ploscaru

Tough story. It does take some time to read.

ROME, April 23, 2013 - At least five times in the last two weeks, Pope Francis has called attention back to “our many brothers and sisters who give witness to the name of Jesus, even to the point of martyrdom.”

His name is Ioan Ploscaru. He died in 1998 at the age of 87, fifteen of which he spent in prison. For one fault alone: that of remaining faithful to the Church of Rome and therefore of refusing to switch to the Orthodox Church, as ordered by the communist government.

Sequester will close IRS for five days ... Yay!!

Uh oh. Hope this doesn't get me in trouble with them.

IRS to Close for 5 Days Due to Furloughs

In a memo to employees, IRS Acting Commissioner Steve Miller said the furlough days will be May 24, June 14, July 5, July 22 and Aug. 30 with two additional days possible in August or September. During these days, all public-facing operations will be closed as will toll-free operations and Taxpayer Assistance Centers.

Interesting NYT feature on "College Prestige vs. the Cost of Enrollment"

While some students will be able to go to college only if they receive financial aid and others have the resources to go wherever they want, most fall into a middle group that has to answer this question: Do they try to pay for a college that gave them little financial aid, even if it requires borrowing money or using up their savings, because it is perceived to be better, or do they opt for a less prestigious college that offered a merit scholarship and would require little, if any borrowing? It’s not an easy decision.

 

Depressing study on the mental health of our fellow Americans

Yeah, tough stats. Note that I don't agree with the sentiment expressed partway through the article about "Team Obama" intentionally wanting to produce stress.

Nevertheless the facts are disturbing.

Americans 'snapping' by the millions

Richie Havens, gone - and two versions of "Freedom", forty years apart

72.

Havens, First Woodstock Singer, Dies of Heart Attack

August 15, 1969, the opening of Woodstock -

 

and here the same weekend but 40 years later -

 

Pretty cool!

A fine, fine, essay/interview with bioethicist Leon Kass

In the past weekend's Wall Street Journal.

The Gosnell Trial - for eight murders - somehow overlooked by most of the media, since Gosnell is an abortionist

Well worth reading the entire essay, which only takes a few minutes.

Leon Kass: The Meaning of the Gosnell Trial 

Eminent bioethicist Leon Kass on the dangers of a world increasingly indifferent to matters of human dignity.

The trial of Kermit Gosnell—a Philadelphia doctor charged in January 2011 with, among other things, murdering seven infants who survived abortions he performed—has been under way for a month. But it was only last week that the case was thrust into the national spotlight. Thanks to intense pressure from conservative critics of the media's apparent lack of interest in the case, the rest of the country has now glimpsed some of what went on for years in Gosnell's benignly named Women's Medical Society.

Investigators who raided the clinic in 2010 saw "blood on the floor" and smelled "urine in the air," according to the grand jury that indicted Gosnell. They also found "fetal remains haphazardly stored throughout the clinic—in bags, milk jugs, orange-juice cartons, and even in cat-food containers." Members of Gosnell's staff testified that the abortionist would deliver babies who had been gestating for as long as 30 weeks, far longer than the 24-week limit imposed by Pennsylvania law. Gosnell or staff members would gouge the infant's neck with scissors to sever the spinal cord, according to the grand jury report. Gosnell referred to the method as "snipping."

These and other appalling details of the Gosnell trial elicit reactions that might be called revulsion or disgust or horror. The word that eminent bioethicist and physician Leon Kass prefers is "repugnance." This intense human reaction reflects a sort of deep moral intuition, he says, and it is one that deserves much more serious consideration than our too-sophisticated culture allows.

******

Degradation and its opposite, human dignity, are central elements of Dr. Kass's philosophy, and he fears that American society risks becoming disrespectful of dignity and indifferent to degradation.

Consider abortion. After years of calling for abortions that are "safe, legal and rare," the Democratic Party in its 2012 platform dropped such language altogether in an attempt to appeal to its feminist base. But viewing childbearing solely as a matter of personal reproductive choice, Dr. Kass says, "means we no longer see a child as a gift but as a product of our will to be had by choice only. That makes human choice the basis of all value"—at the price of the child, for "he or she comes from the hands of nature."

******

The idea that materialism "can cure men of the fear of God and the fear of death," as Dr. Kass puts it, is at least as old as ancient Greece. But today it has become especially potent thanks to "the new genetics, which bore more deeply than ever before into the molecular basis of living processes." Then there is the rise of neuroscience and evolutionary psychology, which purport to explain "absolutely everything about human life" in materialistic terms.

Take the concept of human dignity. In a 2008 essay highly critical of Dr. Kass's work on the Bush bioethics council, the Harvard psychologist Steven Pinker questioned the value of dignity as a moral guide. "Dignity is a phenomenon of human perception," Mr. Pinker wrote. "Certain signals in the world trigger an attribution in the perceiver." The perception of human dignity, Mr. Pinker went on, is no different from how "converging lines in a drawing are a cue for the perception of depth."

That such an outlook is both blinkered and dangerous, Dr. Kass thinks, should be obvious to anyone who has ever been in love or felt other great emotions. "There's no doubt that the human experience of love," he says, is mirrored by "events that are measurable in the brain. But anybody who has ever fallen in love knows that love is not just an elevated level of some peptide in the hypothalamus."

Nor are degradation and dignity. The Gosnell trial and the terrorist attack at the Boston Marathon have degradation written all over them. As for dignity, Dr. Kass says, "You see it in the way nurses treat people who come in for chemotherapy. You see it in the way a great hostess treats a handicapped guest, helping him without causing him embarrassment. You see it in the way people come close to where there is human suffering and are not put off by the horror but do what is humanly necessary."

Very cute; A young fan, not thrilled to be at Yankee Stadium

19 seconds long. After a short commercial.

Martin, the eight year old Boston terrorist victim, had received his first communion the day before

Thanks to my friend Joe for sending me this touching photo of Martin Richard - and for his family for releasing it.

And fine sentiments, including a dove of peace, on his banner. A loss to all of us as well as his family.

 

Baseball: Crazy baserunning adventures

Never seen this before. Hit the link. And then there's another link attempting to explain the rule.

Friday night in Milwaukee

Should the terrorist be held as an "enemy combatant"?

I agree with this.

Lindsey Graham: Boston bomber could be held as enemy combatant

Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) on Friday urged the Obama administration to consider holding the man allegedly behind the bombings of the Boston Marathon as an enemy combatant to help gather intelligence.

How the 2nd terrorist was caught

Acetaminophen (tylenol); Wonder Drug! It "Eases Existential Anxiety"

HA! Martin Heidigger, check your email!

Tylenol Eases Existential Anxiety

A common pain-reliever can also be used to cope with existential dread - anxiety arising from thinking about death - according to a new study.

Acetaminophen or Tylenol is an over-the-counter pain medicine used to relieve minor aches or fever. The new study has shown that Tylenol can also help reduce pain experienced after thinking about death or uncertainty of life.

So who needs church when you can just take tylenol? The whole article is only nine paragraphs, and the study group was 120 college students.

Here's a good investment article: "The 12 Myths of Gold Bugs"

I think for persons with enough assets, a holding in gold and silver is prudent.

Nevertheless, this is a good article.

12 (Misguided) Commandments of Gold Bugs

The"bonus" at the end also has an element of truth:

Bonus rule: Never admit Gold might be falling because it trades on human emotions and psychology and has no intrinsic value whatsoever.

that's right! BUT, what doesn't trade to a large extenet "on human emotions and psychology"?

Nine volunteer firefighters lost in the Texas fertilizer explosion

As the mayor says here, "devastating"

After capturing a terrorist, a Presidential lecture on diversity is not appropriate.

And maybe the term "tragedy" is also inappropriate. How about something like "terror attack"?

Good article this AM on Apple stock

In the NY Times. And it about sums it up.

After Apple’s Rise, a Bruising Fall

Wall Street has turned viciously on its one-time iDarling. The rout in Apple’s share price — it fell nearly 2.7 percent on Thursday, bringing the damage since late September to 44 percent — has many wondering when, and where, all of this will end.

The answer, of course, is that no one really knows. Yes, Apple is slowing, as companies inevitably do. But Apple remains enormously profitable and the envy of corporations worldwide.

And yet Apple’s decline in the stock market has been so swift and so brutal that the development has begun to change the way investors view the company. Apple no longer looks like a sure thing.

Hit the link for the whole piece.

WSJ columnist: "Clinging to Guns and Abortion"

Daniel Henninger's weekly column - the Gosnell murder case

Everyone clings to something, and we now know what liberals cling to.

But what do liberals cling to? Recent events have revealed two things. Gun control and abortion.

******

By now, many details of the accusations against Dr. Gosnell have become known. One will suffice. The Philadelphia grand-jury report, which is a hard read, says: "The way he ensured fetal demise [Dr. Gosnell's phrase] was by sticking scissors into the back of the baby's neck and cutting the spinal cord. He called that 'snipping.' Over the years, there were hundreds of 'snippings.'" Most were third-trimester babies. Eight of his clinic staff have pleaded guilty.

In these times of a media that need to fill a bottomless electronic news hole, a story as sensational as the Gosnell abortion trial should be everywhere. But as conservative bloggers and a few liberal writers such as Kirsten Powers have established in recent weeks, most major newspapers and TV networks have produced little or cursory coverage of this trial. The two exceptions are the Associated Press and Fox News.

The basic conservative criticism here is that the media have underplayed the Gosnell story because its details might undermine support for the abortion status quo, or at least cause people to ask what exactly that status quo is these days. Rather than risk that, the Gosnell story was demoted.

In response, some have said the conservative bloggers are wrongly seeing a conspiracy of silence where there is only a difference over news judgment. By now, this response is implausible. It is hardly a revelation anymore that the media play the news in subtle but tilted ways to protect what they think is a settled social good, such as access to abortion, no matter what.

******

Mr. Obama's remark about rural Pennsylvanians clinging to guns and religion is the coin of the realm in his crowd. But let's put their shared consensus another way: Somehow it became a conventional view in contemporary American politics that it is non-urban conservatives who in every case have to accommodate their beliefs to a national culture created by people who live somewhere else. "They" must adjust on abortion, guns, school prayer, sexual mores and all the rest of it. Liberals, meanwhile, not only feel no need to concede anything but use the commanding heights of the press and academia to define anyone who dissents from their ever-evolving national culture as a political fringe obsessed with people, one might say, who aren't like them.

******

Political correctness—the silent code that decides whose side of the story gets elevated and whose side gets buried—has been a blunt but effective weapon, which the dominant liberal culture has used to achieve a lot of victories over "them" the past 40 years. But the wins have come at a price. That price is the return of an unmistakable, growing and potentially destabilizing bitterness in American politics.

The whole column is worth a read.

Kimmel: the $15 million iPhone

The Boston bombing suspects/"persons of interest."

UPDATE: On further thought, there must be someting to this, or the FBI wouldn't have put out the information. They have more info they're not disclosing?

I don't know, doesn't seem to be a lot to go on. Guys in their early 20's walking around with backpacks? I don't see any pictures of them planting the backpacks anywhere. Maybe I'm missing something.

Boston bombing Suspects Pictures

The inevitable: Kimmel's Anthony Weiner interview

Vatican confirms miraculous healing in Colorado

The case of the young boy was studied for 14 years.

The two sisters who answered her plea were Sister Margaret Mary Preister and the late Sister Evangeline Spenner. Both were sisters from the order that Bonzel founded, the Sisters of St. Francis of Perpetual Adoration. The nuns prayed a novena, a nine-day vigil asking Bonzel to intervene on Luke’s behalf.

If you hit the link - it's a short article. Luke has "strained to come to terms" with what happened, and at 18 "is not a practicing Catholic."

Washington Post on the Boston bombs

A short article. Last sentence is below the link.

The devices’ design was immediately recognized by counterterrorism experts as a type touted by al-Qaeda for use by its operatives around the world. Similar devices have been used by terrorists in mass-casualty bombings in numerous countries, from the Middle East to South Asia to North Africa.

Yet the bomb’s simplicity and garden-variety ingredients complicate the task of determining whether the maker was an international terrorist, a homegrown extremist or a local citizen with a grudge, investigators and experts say.

******

“The presence of a pressure cooker in an unusual location, such as a building lobby or busy street corner should be treated as suspicious,” warned a Homeland Security brochure issued in 2010.

Ya think?

A Boston story: the man in the Cowboy hat who saved a life

Here's the article from the NY Daily news and an interview on CNN with him.

Images of the 53-year-old Boston native, wearing a cowboy hat while pulling a maimed victim in a wheelchair, were all over the Internet Tuesday. Arredondo did not run from the carnage at the marathon finish line. He turned around and dove into the mangled crowd and started pulling people out.

He first saw a young man struggling to stand, who apparently didn't realize his legs had been blown off.

"I told him, 'My name's Carlos, you're going to be OK, help is on the way," The Daily Beast reported. But the man seemed in danger of bleeding to death. Arredondo fashioned a tourniquet from a discarded sweater. "I tore it apart," he said.

And the Anderson Cooper brief interview -