Welcome! "What's Happenin'?" is a casual community diary (a daily series, 8:30 AM Eastern on weekdays, 10 AM on weekends and holidays) where we hang out and talk about the goings on here and everywhere.
We chat about our lives, our health, our families, our social circles, our pets, etc. We welcome links to your writings here on dkos or elsewhere, posts of pictures, music, etc.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
Everyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome here.
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Good Morning!
Longwood Gardens. March, 2012. Photo credit: joanneleon
You can have either the Resurrection or you can have Liberace. But you can't have both.
~Liberace
News
Chicks and Eggs: Best Live Nest Cams for Easter
[ ... ] I've collected some of the best live streaming nest cams on the web. They all have eggs or chicks in the nest, or are about to have eggs.
Occupy promises upsurge as activists prepare for 'summer of discontent'
Fresh protests and demonstrations have already begun with a major push scheduled for May 1. Supporters are gearing up for an election year marked by Republican and Democratic party conventions in August and September as well as a Nato summit in Chicago in May.
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But there are serious challenges ahead for the Occupy movement as it seeks to have the same impact in 2012 as it did in 2011. Over the winter it has morphed into a much broader spectrum of interests and activities. Many Occupy groups have shed supporters, some have disappeared and others have moved beyond a focus on income inequality to take on environmental issues, oppose foreclosures and get involved in a myriad of other social issues.
Some observers say that has seen the movement start to fade from public consciousness as something new and turn into something that looks more like a conventional set of protest causes. "Occupy Wall Street could be a chapter in American history or it could be a footnote. It does seem it is going down the path towards footnote," said Dominic Tierney, a political scientist at Swarthmore College.
New film about fracking stars Matt Damon, John Krasinski, and maybe you
Ryan Gosling may have saved a woman from a speeding car, but some of our other favorite stars are doing the next best thing: starring in an anti-fracking movie. Gus Van Sant is directing, and the cast includes Matt Damon, John Krasinski, Frances McDormand, probably Hal Holbrook — and, if you can get to Pittsburgh this weekend, maybe you.
There’s only been vague information about the plot of the movie, called Promised Land, but this isn’t a documentary — it’s a butts-in-seats triumph-of-the-little-guy film with big-name stars. (Also possibly Dave Eggers wrote the script?) So it’s got the potential to seriously raise awareness about fracking and its dangers. Think less Gasland, more Erin Brokovich.
Mike Bloomberg's New York: Cops in Your Hallways
An amazing lawsuit was filed in New York last week. It seems Mike Bloomberg’s notorious "stop-and-frisk" policy – known colloquially in these parts by silently-cheering white voters as the "Let’s have cops feel up any nonwhite person caught walking in the wrong neighborhood” policy – isn’t even the most repressive search policy in the NYPD arsenal.
Bloomberg, that great crossover Republican, has long been celebrated by the Upper West Side bourgeoisie for his enlightened views on gay rights and the environment, but also targeted for criticism by civil rights activists because of stop-and-frisk, a program that led to a record 684,330 street searches just last year.
High hopes for LowLine as funding deadline is reached
The world's first underground park moves a step closer to reality on Friday, when a public funding drive for an innovative design proposal closes.
A plan to build the LowLine, a vast, subterranean public space in New York's Lower East Side, has has attracted donations totalling more than $150,000 on the funding website Kickstarter since 22 February.
Neil Young Trademarks New Audio Format
They might sound like great song titles, but "21st Century Record Player," "Earth Storage" and "Thanks for Listening" aren't new Neil Young tunes. They're trademarks that the rocker recently filed with the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office, Rolling Stone has found, and they indicate that Young is developing a high-resolution audio alternative to the MP3 format.
According to the filed documents, Young applied for six trademarks last June: Ivanhoe, 21st Century Record Player, Earth Storage, Storage Shed, Thanks for Listening and SQS (Studio Quality Sound). Included in the filing is a description of the trademarks: "Online and retail store services featuring music and artistic performances; high resolution music downloadable from the internet; high resolutions discs featuring music and video; audio and video recording storage and playback." The address on file corresponds to that of Vapor Records, Young's label. (Young's representatives declined Rolling Stone's request for comment.)
Springsteen playing in Philadelphia last week. At the 2:50 mark, the band stops the song after Bruce sings the line "and the big man joined the band" so that the crowd can honor Clarence Clemons. In the second video at the :40 mark, he surfs the crowd. And at the end of that song, yes this is Philadelphia but they are not booing. They are chanting "Bruuce". In the third video at the 3:30 mark he pulls a dancing partner up to the stage from the audience.
Tenth Avenue Freeze Out, Wells Fargo Center (3/28/12)
"Bruce Springsteen Crowd Surfs During 634-5789@Wells Fargo Center, Philadelphia 3/28/12
"Dancing In The Dark" Bruce Springsteen@Wells Fargo Center Philadelphia 3/28/12
Photo Gallery,
Rolling Stone:
The Hottest Live Photos of 2012
Photo Gallery,
Wired:
What Space Looks Like to Kids
Spacing out in the classroom is usually frowned upon by teachers. But some students can turn real thoughts of space into an art teacher's pride.
Cut Through Political Rhetoric and Track Elections Online
Ah, elections. The theater of democracy. At this point we're aware that a certain amount of rhetoric and hand-waving accompanies the proceedings. So to make an informed vote come November, we have to cut through the noise. This is not as daunting a task as it once was — or as some think it still is. While the internet allows politicians to turn up the rhetorical volume, it also allows us voters myriad smarter ways to pay attention.
In this how-to we take a look at doing just that, and explore how to cast a vote for the candidate best suited to serve your needs over the next two, four or six years.
Sciency, girl-positive steampunk kids' adventure novel on Kickstarter
Wollstonecraft
This is a pro-math, pro-science, pro-history and pro-literature adventure novel for and about girls, who use their education to solve problems. This is the made up story about two very real people -- Ada, the world's first computer programmer, and Mary, the world's first science fiction author. If Jane Austen wrote about zeppelins and brass goggles, this would be the book. Why "Wollstonecraft"? Mary names the detective agency after her mother, the famous feminist writer. If this is the kind of book you'd like to see, please support this project.
Electric cars bounce back
NEW YORK - Just when it looked like electric cars were running out of juice, the return of $4-a-gallon gasoline is generating new life for battery-powered vehicles.
Electric-drive vehicles, including hybrids, plug-in models and pure battery-powered cars, were the fastest-growing segment in the U.S. auto market in the first quarter, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
Sales of those models rose 49 percent to 117,182 vehicles in the first quarter, from 78,527 a year earlier before Japan's earthquake and tsunami pinched output.
Occupy Philadelphia reemerges with Rittenhouse Square rally
Occupy Philadelphia celebrated its six-month anniversary Friday with signs, cheers, and a clear message: Though the group's City Hall encampment was disbanded over the winter, the group never went away.
For the last four months, organizers said, members of the group have been working on outreach campaigns involving plans to protest the city's restrictions on outdoor feeding of the homeless, occupy vacant lots, and provide free information on social issues.
This weekend, Occupy planned to roll out the first of its spring events, starting with a rally in Rittenhouse Square on Friday afternoon. The group of fewer than 100 members marched to Independence Mall, where some planned to stay all weekend in a short-term encampment. Park rangers said members would be allowed to stay as long as they did not camp or sleep there.
District’s two Occupy camps headed toward McPherson Square merger
“The two occupations in Washington, D.C., are uniting in McPherson Square,” said Lacy MacAuley, 33, an Occupy protester. “We’ve been getting closer and closer and doing joint [protest] actions. So this is something that’s been in the air for a while.”
Occupy Chicago kicks off 'Chicago Spring' with rallies
April 7, 2012 (CHICAGO) (WLS) -- A march and rally across the city were the focus of what organizers called the kickoff of "Chicago Spring."
Occupy Chicago called Saturday a citywide day of action. Groups all across the city rallied in 13 neighborhoods. Some events were in Chicago's suburbs, as well. Those gathered talked about a number issues, like foreclosures, residents' visions for their communities and genocide.
Obama’s Game Plan: Let’s Make This All About the Republicans
It is a truism in political science that whenever a President runs for reëlection, the race ultimately turns into a referendum on his character and his performance. In normal times, this works out well for the incumbent. Americans are generally predisposed to like their Commander-in-Chief, and over any given four-year period the American economy usually expands, which mitigates the desire to throw him out. Statistical studies of past elections suggest that incumbency is worth perhaps two or three percentage points on Election Day, and this is often enough to ensure victory for the sitting President. As Rick Santorum pointed out the other night, only once in the past hundred years has a Republican contender defeated a Democratic President who was running for reëlection—1980, when Ronald Reagan sent Jimmy Carter back to Georgia.
It is no coincidence that the late nineteen-seventies were a period of economic strife: high inflation, rising oil prices, stubbornly high unemployment. About the only circumstance in which incumbency isn’t a big advantage is when the country is in dire economic straits. The nightmare scenario for Obama, having taken over during a recession that turned out to be the worst since the Great Depression, has always been that he would turn into another Carter. If the general election had taken place in 2010, that might well have been his fate.
Things look considerably brighter now. Still, compared to past recoveries, this one has been pretty weak—too weak to dislodge the impression in the minds of many Americans that the country is going in the wrong direction. In such an environment, and with a candidate whose approval rating in the Gallup tracking poll has been stuck in the mid-forties (today it popped up to forty-nine per cent—we’ll see if that rise is sustained), the White House is understandably eager to turn the election into a referendum on the Republican Party rather than a referendum on Obama.
The spectacle of democracy in the US
The US presidential election looks like a massive TV commercial, an advertisement, extended over more than a year.
What do these elections mean? Do they make any difference? Why does President Obama need "space" for his second term election - what did he do with the "space", indeed the mandate he received after his first election? Why should anyone believe that the careerism that wasted that first term will not continue to spoil the second the term, the new "space" he will be given where to win the next election?
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Americans (and many others around the world) were counting the seconds that the Bush presidency would finally end and Obama's to start - but to what avail? What did he do differently than Bush? Just look at his speeches in front of AIPAC and take it down from there.
So what is the purpose, or the function, or the use of these American presidential elections?
A master torturer.
Egypt's former spy chief to run for president
Omar Suleiman, Egypt's former spy chief, has decided to run in next month's presidential election, two days after ruling himself out of the race, the official MENA news agency reports.
His change of mind on Friday came after a group of demonstrators gathered to urge Suleiman, who served as Hosni Mubarak's vice president before the strongman's overthrow last year, to run, said a statement attributed to him.
Hundreds of Suleiman's supporters had rallied in Cairo to press the former intelligence minister to join the race, carrying banners reading "Suleiman, save Egypt" and "We need you Suleiman".
[ ... ]
It also was a blow to the hopes of the youth activists who spearheaded the popular uprising that toppled Mubarak last year but have been disappointed by the continued influence of members of his ex-regime and have been largely squeezed out of the race.
What took them so long? The other party leaders are not popular either. Like the U.S., the U.K. is not very happy with any of their party leaders.
Poll: Half in U.K. do not trust Cameron
LONDON, April 7 (UPI) -- More than half of Britons do not trust Prime Minister David Cameron to lead the country out of its economic woes, a poll released Friday indicated.
The Road We Need Not Have Traveled
Let’s start with the delay. All of the men could have been brought to trial years ago, but President Bush decided he could ignore the Constitution. He ordered them to be held in secret C.I.A. prisons and subjected to brutal and illegal interrogations. Mr. Mohammed was waterboarded 183 times in one month alone. That torture produced no useful intelligence, according to virtually all accounts, except those offered by people like former Vice President Dick Cheney, who was the key architect of the Bush administration’s lawless detention and interrogation policies.
When Mr. Mohammed was moved to Guantánamo Bay, finally, with the four others, there were immediate questions about whether they could ever be tried legitimately, given how tainted the evidence was. Mr. Bush did nothing, content with arguing that Congress’s decision to declare a perpetual state of war with Al Qaeda gave him the right to hold prisoners indefinitely without any trial.
President Obama came into office pledging to close Guantánamo Bay and restore the rule of law to the treatment of terrorism suspects. He has largely failed.
War crimes. Will anyone do anything about it?
“The Warrior Class”: Blackwater videos in Harper's Magazine show brutality on display
This month's Harper’s Magazine includes a feature by Charles Glass about the growth of private security firms since 9/11, “The Warrior Class: A golden age for the freelance soldier.”
The conclusion to the piece describes a series of videos shown to Glass by a source who had worked for the private-security company Blackwater (now Academi, formerly also Xe Services) in Iraq.
Above, one of the five Blackwater clips published online by Harper's. This one is dated April 1, 2006, and was shot from the front seat of the fourth car in an armored convoy. Glass describes its contents:
Driving along a wide boulevard in Baghdad, the lead vehicle swerved close to the curb of a traffic island. A woman in a black full-length burka began to cross the street. The vehicle struck the woman and knocked her unconscious body into the gutter. The cars slowed for a moment, but did not stop, nor did they even determine whether the victim was dead or alive. A voice in the car taking the video said, “Oh, my God!” Yet no one was heard on the radio requesting help for her. Most sickeningly, the sequence had been set to an AC/DC song, whose pounding, metallic chorus declared: “You’ve been… thunderstruck!”
This looks like an official admission of drones used over Iran.
Report: U.S. operated inside Iran to collect information on nuclear program
The CIA has been operating stealth surveillance drones deep inside Iran for the last three years, the Washington Post reported on Sunday.
The drones were operating freely above hundreds of suspicious facilities, before the aircraft, named the RQ-170 Sentinel, crashed within Iran in December.
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The Obama administration believes that the improved intelligence gathered through these covert operations will strengthen its bargaining power in the upcoming nuclear talks with Iran.
Interesting that the
Washington Post published this. It's very hard to excerpt and really needs to be read in its entirety.
Support our troops? Then bring them home.
Jack, my co-pilot, sleeps in the passenger seat. His chin rests on my upper leg. The car in front of us wears two Support Our Troops ribbons. One is yellow; the other red, white and blue. Both are made in China. On the rear bumper is a faded black MIA sticker. That driver probably means well, but by now I’ve seen too many ribbons. While the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq kill and maim, I think of how they are also shaping the future of returning veterans. Many of these men and women will come home and go missing, and you won’t even know it. Returning from a war is more than getting off an airplane and putting on civvies. Combat changes a person. It changed me.
I’m driving angry.
I want to tell the guy in front of me: You want to support the troops? Get them the hell out of the line of fire. Or, if you think this war is so necessary, get over there yourself. If you’re too old, pull your kids or grandkids out of college and send them.
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If you’ve never hunted humans, if you’ve never been hunted, if you haven’t been shot at on a regular basis, just try to appreciate what this person has been through. Then get down on your knees and thank your lucky stars it wasn’t you.
I’m driving lost.