Tom Faranda's Folly

People who (say they) will "leave the country" if Trump wins.

Here's the article and the full list is below.

Sharpton will leave? That's reason enough to vote for Trump ...

"...I’ll Leave The Country If Trump Wins"

    ... celebrities who have said they’ll leave America if Trump is elected:

• Lena Dunham
• Samuel L. Jackson
• Miley Cyrus, Cher
• Jon Stewart, Raven Symone
• Natasha Lyonne
• Omari Hardwick
• Spike Lee
• Chloë Sevigny
• Eddie Griffin
• George Lopez
• Al Sharpton
• Neve Campbell
• Rosie O'Donnell
• Whoopi Goldberg
• Chelsea Handler

Rugby: Australia v New Zealand, South Hemisphere Championship, 2nd round

Played in Wellington, New Zealand. Highlights below, and the entire match here.

And here is the first match, played in Sydney the week before.

WSJ: Epipen generic available in a few weeks

An "authorized" generic. So why buy the name brand? May have something to do with insurance!? That's doesn't sound right to me.

 

Gene Wilder - hard to believe he was 83

From Blazing Saddles - "The Waco Kid"

Limbaugh on Colin Kaepernick's decision to sit during the National Anthem

Kaepernick the San Francisco 49er quarterback.

Here's his explanation - hit the link (and of course no one should force him to stand)

Colin Kaepernick explains why he sat during national anthem - N

Here's Rush Limbaugh's interesting points -

"Colin Kaepernick can make the courageous decision to sit on the bench during the national anthem, and he's applauded for courageous dissent and protest by all the usual suspects in the Drive-By sports media. But the Dallas Cowboys asked to put a sticker on their helmet this season to honor cops, particularly the five officers killed in that mass assassination attempt, and the NFL said, 'No, no!' I guess it would be unnecessarily provocative to honor the police." -Rush

and

"It's ironic that we have now a quarterback who was adopted and raised by a white family, who was scouted and signed by white scouts, was employed by white owners, the National Football League, decides now to steal the stage of the National Football League to make personal statements..."

Rugby: Ex New Zealand flyhalf Dan Carter, playing in France & still great

Carter, the hero of last year's World Cup winning New Zealand team, no longer playing International rugby, but doing it in the French professional league (currently the highest paid rugby player in the world).

 

Ultra-endurance events are dangerous -

And can kill you. As happened in this London to Paris event.

45-year-old got into difficulty in the water near Calais while was taking part in London-to-Paris Enduroman event

A British athlete who was trying to run, cycle and swim from Marble Arch in London to the Arc de Triomphe in Paris has died crossing the Channel.

Nick Thomas got into trouble in the water near Calais, according to Enduroman – the event’s organisers. The 45-year-old from the Shropshire town of Ellesmere, near the Welsh border, had been swimming for 16 hours.

****

Enduroman, based in Dorset, says the Arch to Arc event includes an 87-mile run from London to the south coast and a 181-mile bicycle ride to Paris. In between, athletes must complete the Channel swim – usually 21 miles and in water temperatures of 16C (61F) or below.

 

WaPo: Obamacare: the collapse continues - enrollments way off

Predicted in many places, including by me. It was inevitable. Just a terrible design.

Health-care exchange sign-ups fall far short of forecasts

Enrollment in the insurance exchanges for President Obama’s signature health-care law is at less than half the initial forecast, pushing several major insurance companies to stop offering health plans in certain markets because of significant financial losses.

As a result, the administration’s promise of a menu of health-plan choices has been replaced by a grim, though preliminary, forecast: Next year, more than 1 in 4 counties are at risk of having a single insurer on its exchange, said Cynthia Cox, who studies health reform for the Kaiser Family Foundation.

Cardiologist (controversial!) on benefits of high fat diet

In the NY Times health and fitness section, so it must be true. Fat is OK, sugar very bad ... Worth hitting the link for the whole article.

LONDON — Every morning, British cardiologist Dr. Aseem Malhotra stirs one tablespoon of butter and one tablespoon of coconut oil into his coffee. While it may not sound appetizing, the concoction — also known as “bulletproof coffee” — is popular among people who follow high-fat diets and modeled after yak-butter drinks consumed in Tibet for centuries. The combination, says Dr. Malhotra, gives him energy and “keeps me pretty full.”

“As part of a heart-healthy diet, I advise my cardiac patients to enjoy full-fat cheese, along with olive oil and vegetables,” says Dr. Malhotra, who regularly indulges in grass-fed meat and three-egg omelets, yolks included. “You should see the look on their faces when I tell them.”

Dr. Malhotra, who works with Britain’s National Health Service, is among a small but increasingly vocal group of doctors in the United States and Britain who are challenging the medical and nutritional orthodoxy around fat, carbohydrates and calories. He has been a fixture on social media and on television programs in Britain, thanks in part to a series of controversial papers he published in medical journals arguing that saturated fat, especially from dairy, can be protective against heart disease, that sugar is “public health enemy No. 1” in the Western diet, and that the dangers of high cholesterol are overstated.

In May, as a member of the National Obesity Forum, a nonprofit group, he helped write a widely publicized report that criticized the British government’s dietary advice to avoid saturated fat and eat low-fat foods. And in a country known for its sweet tooth, Dr. Malhotra is outspoken about the harms of excess sugar.

His critics – of which there are many – have pushed back. Public Health England, the agency that issues the country’s dietary guidelines, said the obesity forum report that Dr. Malhotra helped author was “irresponsible and misleads the public.”

Amazingl, Yanks have a shot at Wild Card - 2 & 1/2 games out.

As they've beaten the Orioles, 14-4 and 13-5 in consecutive games.

Starlin Castro had a HR and four hits Saturday.

 

Chris Christie, spotted in DC, and still, uhh, pudgy.

A six second video by my Washington-area based brother -

 

The two murdered nuns in Mississippi were nurse practitioners working with the poor

Tragic. A very nice remembrance of the two sisters if you hit the link.

"These were just two wonderful faith-filled women who just brought so much life to this poor little section of Mississippi. They and so many of the sisters who have come down here throughout the years are the unsung heroes," said Franciscan Father Greg Plata, sacramental administrator of St. Thomas the Apostle Church in Lexington, where the sisters participated in parish life.

Good piece on Obamacare's future and the "public option".

From NRO - and lower cost does = less effective health care.

The most consequential difference between public and private insurance is the ability to regulate prices. Private insurers must negotiate contracts with their networks of hospitals and physicians. Public insurance, like Medicare, is in the business of regulating prices, not negotiating them. Medicare, for instance, sets regulated prices for the services it covers on a take-it-or-leave-it basis. Because Medicare is so important to the bottom lines of many providers, they have no choice but to take what Medicare pays, even though it is usually well below what private insurers pay for the same services.

But government-imposed price controls always have a predictable result, which is reduction in those willing to supply the service at the regulated price. This is evident in the Medicaid program. Many hospital and physicians purposely steer clear of the program because of its very low reimbursement rates. As a result, Medicaid enrollees often have much more trouble accessing care than do patients with private insurance.

 

This does not mean that a public option wouldn’t attract enrollment. It probably would because the regulated prices it would pay to providers would allow it to charge a premium below that charged by many of the private offerings. Some consumers would take that option not thinking much about what it might mean when it comes time to find a doctor to take care of them.

 

In selling Obamacare to the electorate, President Obama argued repeatedly that the law wouldn’t lead to “government-run” health care because the coverage would be delivered by private insurance, at least for those who get their insurance through the exchanges. But this was always more of a debating point rather than a statement based on conviction. The president himself has always favored public over private insurance, as do most of those who supported the legislation. The only reason a public option wasn’t included in the ACA in the first place was because a sufficient minority of Democrats in Congress feared the idea would sink the entire bill.

 

Now that the ACA is on the books, and the private-insurance options are on shaky ground, there’s no real reason for proponents of the ACA not to fully embrace the public option. It’s what most of them wanted all along, and the turbulence among the private insurers provides the perfect excuse to pursue it.

 

The fact that introducing a public option at this stage would only add to the instability of the private options offered on the exchanges is not a reason for the public-option advocates to abandon the idea because they never really wanted a functioning private-insurance marketplace anyway. The goal all along has been government-run health care, even if they haven’t always been willing to admit that.

What countries REALLY won the most medals at the Rio Olympics?

Here's the result if you figure it as the medals per capita  based on population.

This is from mercatornet, an Australian/New Zealand website.

Tiny Grenada finished atop the medals per capita table with one silver medal shared amongst the population of just 106,000. 

On the medals per capita list the top ten is very different: Grenada, Bahamas, Jamaica, New Zealand (hurrah! it was in fact New Zealand's most successful games in terms of total medals won - 18), Denmark, Croatia, Slovenia, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Hungary. Hardly world powerhouses. In fact Great Britain came 19th on this list and the USA came 42nd. Now they just need to do a list based upon medals per government dollars spent on sports.  

NY Yankess - Gary Sanchez - 9 homers in first 21 games - looks like the real deal.

At 23 years old and with a cannon for an arm, he could be the Yankee catcher for the next dozen years. No Yankee has ever hit 9 homers in his first 21 games in the major leagues.

Here's #9 - a 420 foot bomb.

BBC: "What Trump's hand gestures say about him"

Very interesting and an analysis useful to anyone trying to communicate with people.

BBC: "Germans told to stockpile food & water for civil defense"

And Germany is not an earthquake zone. Do they know something we don't know?

For the first time since the Cold War the German government is advising citizens to stockpile food and water for use in a national emergency.

WaPo on who's donating to the Clinton campaign - hint - it's not small donors

People with big bucks that's who. Defending the status quo... $50,000 a head for a Cape Cod "soiree". I doubt if any of my Cape Cod friends made it, but I'll check around.

Just 28 people joined Clinton for cocktails and dinner in Schuster’s back yard. The Democratic nominee has spent much of August in such exclusive environs, helping her campaign and the party scoop up at least $32 million in three weeks as part of a nonstop press of high-dollar fundraisers.

How to buy access to Secretary of State Clinton

Through her foundation, of course. Astonishing that she gets a pass on this.

Included among the Abedin-Band emails is an exchange revealing that when Crown Prince Salman of Bahrain requested a meeting with Secretary of State Clinton, he was forced to go through the Clinton Foundation for an appointment. Abedin advised Band that when she went through “normal channels” at State, Clinton declined to meet. After Band intervened, however, the meeting was set up within forty-eight hours. According to the Clinton Foundation website, in 2005, Salman committed to establishing the Crown Prince’s International Scholarship Program (CPISP) for the Clinton Global Initiative. And by 2010, it had contributed $32 million to CGI. The Kingdom of Bahrain reportedly gave between $50,000 and $100,000 to the Clinton Foundation. And Bahrain Petroleum also gave an additional $25,000 to $50,000.

The chief diplomat of of the United States - corruption at the highest level.

 

World's richest man (Bill Gates) now worth $90 billion

Nice work if you can get it. At $90 billion, the Microsoft Corp. co-founder’s net worth is equal to 0.5 percent of U.S. GDP.

 

Rugby: New Zealand v. Australia, Southern Hemisphere championship, 1st round

YIKES! Played in Sydney. Despite all those retirements, All Blacks rampant.

 

If you believe in Global Warming here's "a list of changes" you must make

The list was compiled by Ann Althouse, law professor at the University of Wisconsin, Madison. She posted it back in 2010 and re-posted it yesterday in response to this NPR stuff  "Should We Be Having Kids In The Age Of Climate Change?"

You'll get the point of Althouse, who is almost exactly my age and has two grown sons. 

a list of changes you could make to your behavior.

AND: Here are some more things I want to see from you to prove that you really believe in global warming.

1. Your weight should be at the low end of normal, indicating that you are not overconsuming the products of agriculture.

2. You should not engage in vigorous physical exercise, as this will increase your caloric requirements. You may do simple weight-lifting or calisthenics to keep in shape. Check how many calories per hour are burned and choose a form of exercise that burns as few calories as possible.

3. Free time should be spent sitting or lying still without using electricity. Don't run the television or music playing device. Reading, done by sunlight is the best way to pass free time. After dark, why not have a pleasant conversation with friends or family? Word games or board games should replace sports or video games.

4. Get up at sunrise. Don't waste the natural light. Try never to turn on the electric lights in your house or workplace. Put compact fluorescent bulbs in all your light fixtures. The glow is so ugly that it will reduce the temptation to turn them on.

5. Restrict your use of transportation. Do not assume that walking or biking is less productive of carbon emissions than using a highly efficient small car. Do not go anywhere you don't have to go. When there is no food in the house to make dinner, instead of hopping in the car to go to the grocery store or a restaurant, take it as a cue to fast. As noted above, your weight should be at the low end of normal, and opportunities to reach or stay there should be greeted with a happy spirit.

6. If you have free time, such as a vacation from work, spend it in your home town. Read library books, redo old jigsaw puzzles, meditate, tell stories to your children — the list of activities is endless. Just thinking up more items to put on that list is an activity that could be on the list. Really embrace this new way of life. A deep satisfaction and mental peace can be achieved knowing that you are saving the earth.

Last night's Midnight Run; ended at Herald Square

Click on the name if you're unfamiliar with Midnight Run. And here's a kind of interesting (I think) picture, with the Herald Square clock in the foreground and Empire State building behind.

WSJ: neat vid - Galaxy note 7 works underwater

Clever although I wouldn't take it diving.

 

Pole position! Brigid and Joe at Machu Picchu

In Peru, at the famous site two days ago - actually Joe took the picture - that's Brigid on the left and my brother Jim's wife Maria on the right. In the middle, Nancy and Arthur, two friend's of Jim. Brigid and Joe get back next Tuesday from their 12 day trip.

Javelin: Great story of current world champion Julius Yego of Kenya

 Olympic javelin final is today. Loved this video. A real resemblance and same build to my favorite javelin thrower, Tim! Yego is the first Kenyan to win the championship of a field event at World or Olympic level. He will be one of the favorites to win Olympic gold in Brazil

Here was his World Championship winning throw, the fourth longest javelin throw ever.

How the Naked Donald Trump statue(s) were made

They just popped up today. And the "artist" made a youtube video - note title.

 

Carly Fiorina on the 96th anniversary of the passing of the 19th Amendment (women's right to vote)

Hit the link for her 55 second video. I wish she were running, instead of Trump. But that's not to day I'd ever vote for Hillary.

96 years ago today ...

Croton makes "Safest places" ranking

Among places in Westchester with 8,000 residents or more, safewise.com ranked Hillary Clinton’s home base of New Castle second; North Castle sixth; Croton-on-Hudson 11th; Sleepy Hollow, 12th ; Harrison 18th; Eastchester, 20th; Mount Pleasant, 23rd.

Safewise said it used FBI crime statistics from 2013, the most recent available, and population data for its survey.

"Sugar high" for children is a myth? More settled science?

No scientific connection between sugar and children's behavior?

 

WSJ: Older Olympic athletes "a dominating trend"

Yay. I love it. Living in hope.

 

John McLaughlin

Long ago - 25 years I'd guess - Brigid and I used to watch The McLaughlin Group. But eventually we found the show a bit tiresome. You always knew what positions the panelists would take.

But he had an amazing career, including being a Jesuit priest and married (& divorced) twice.

His death was announced on the program’s Facebook page. The columnist Eleanor Clift, a longtime panelist on the show, wrote in The Daily Beast that he had been treated for prostate cancer for some time and that it had spread.

Ben Hur: How they did the chariot race + a review

The review is by Bishop Robert Barron - but - SPOILER ALERT - don't read if you don't want to know what happens -

Lew Wallace’s nineteenth century novel, Ben-Hur: A Tale of the Christ, inspired two silent movies in the early decades of the twentieth century and the magnificent 1959 film starring Charlton Heston in the lead role. Almost everyone agrees that Heston was born to play the part, and who can forget the drama and excitement of the chariot race with which the movie comes to its climax? Roma Downey and Mark Burnett have produced a new instantiation of the story, a streamlined version of the 1959 film.

Here's how they did the chariot race, from the Wall Street Journal youtube channel. Whew.

Movie is out on the 19th.

Sloppy eating: hippos and watermelons

One bite, more or less...

 

Olympic women's hoops - Turkey v. Spain amazing ending

"The thrill of victory, the agony of defeat." Turkey in red.

 

It's Fess Parker's birthday - so here's Davy Crockett - A little bit of a shootin' contest!

a classic with "Bigfoot Mason".

CATO Institute ranks NY State #50 for freedom

Go here -

#50 - New York

 

In case you missed it - the Louisiana flood rescue from the car

Wow. The guy risked his life to save her - and the dog ...

Allyson Felix, the USA sprinter at her 4th Olympics

This time she's running in the 400 - finals tonight around 9:30  - and probably the relays. She missed qualifying for the USA team in the 200 by 1 hundredth of a second. Felix has won four gold medals and two silvers in the Olympics and lots (14!) of World Championship medals.

 

Brazil v. Switzerland Women's Beach volleyball - wild rally

Brazil is seeded #1, but just survived. you have to hit the link  below since NBC is not allowing embedding.

 https://youtu.be/CtTsQqUf5-M

In India - saving a leopard stuck in a well

How'd he (she) get down there in the first place?

 

 

National left handed day is today!

a very important website -

Happy Left Handers Day!

And I've adopted this poster -

Bill Murray's sensible comment on the Olympics

Sent to me from Australia by Brigid's niece June.

NatGeo: Surviving an elephant attack

Whew. Guardian angel working overtime? You have to watch this a couple of times to realize what happened.

 

If you only read the NY Times - you missed this on CNN

Of course CNN is in the tank for Clinton, but they're not dishonest.

"(Clinton) Voters we met seemed to be OK with a few untruths here and there." Ain't that the truth.

Newly released Clinton emails shed light on relationship between State Dept. and Clinton Foundation

Joe and Brigid - off to Peru!

Yesterday they drove to Washington DC to meet up with my brother Jim and his wife Maria - who is from Peru. They fly out today to Lima and also going to Cusco and Machu Picchu. Both very excited about the trip as well they should be.

Tom and Tim not so fortunate - we are staying behind to hold the fort in Croton.

Before they left yesterday we all had brunch together at the diner - here's a picture showing how excited the boys are to be eating out with their parents.

And here's the dynamic duo as they set out for Washington.

They get back to Croton on the 23rd.

Love this - Columbian weightlifter @ his 4th Olympics wins Gold, retires on stage

Oscar Figueroa misses this lift, but he'd already won the medal. Awesome!

"Macy’s Sordid History: Pregnant Women"

A sad tale. I hope their treatment of employees gets lots of publicity.  A PR from the Catholic League.

Macy’s Sordid History: Pregnant Women

August 10, 2016

Bill Donohue comments on Macy's firing of an employee going through a high-risk pregnancy:

Anabelle Mayi had been working at Macy's flagship store in Manhattan for two-and-a-half years when she was diagnosed with a high-risk pregnancy in April 2015. She requested reasonable accommodations, like a chair or stool so she could sit down periodically while working at the counter. According to Manhattan Legal Services, which filed a charge with the federal Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, she was first told "this would not be possible" but that a transfer to an office job would be. But although her physician filled out the required Family and Medical Leave Act paperwork requesting the needed accommodations, Macy's did not provide them. When Mayi subsequently took several sick days for pregnancy-related illness, Manhattan Legal Services says she found her employee access blocked. On July 7, she was officially terminated.

It is incredible that Macy's can make accommodations for men who think they are women—allowing them to use the women's bathrooms, even at the discomfort of other customers, and firing employees who voice religious objections (click here). But they cannot give a chair to an employee with a high risk pregnancy in order to safeguard her and her baby's health.

Contact Christine Olver, media relations manager: christine.olver@macys.com

 

CNN: Trump tower climber just wanted to meet with Donald

Haha. It all played out on live TV. I saw him yanked into the window by the police as I strolled along on the ellyptical in the gym.

 

Wall Street Journal on Trump's economic plan

They like it.

Trump’s Tax Revolution

By JAMES FREEMAN

On Monday Donald Trump laid out an economic plan that “is his most detailed so far and marks a step forward on regulation, taxes and energy,” writes the Journal editorial board. In contrast to Hillary Clinton’s plan to increase both taxes and regulation, Mr. Trump wants to slash the corporate income tax rate to 15% from 35% and allow businesses to immediately expense new investments. He’s also adopted the House Republican plan to simplify taxes for individuals and reduce rates. And he’s calling for a moratorium on new regulations from the federal bureaucracy.

Mr. Trump is still pushing anti-growth trade policy—as is Mrs. Clinton—but the Trump tax and regulatory agenda would create the conditions for American economic revival. The editorial board concludes, “One economic speech won’t persuade Americans who have doubts about President Trump. To revive his campaign, he’ll need to carry the economic growth theme every day from here to November.”