Apparently this week I'm big in France. ¿Bonjour, comment allez-vous? Okay, just a warning. While I love me some Jerry Lewis, I'm also a big fan of Pepé Le Pew (and his send up of Maurice Chevalier).
"Twitter has made the policy decision to off-board advertising from all accounts owned by Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik, effective immediately. This decision was based on the retrospective work we've been doing around the 2016 U.S. election and the U.S. intelligence community’s conclusion that both RT and Sputnik attempted to interfere with the election on behalf of the Russian government." (Grokked from Dan)
"Amazon will now allow deliveries inside your home when no one's there." Um, I don't think it was Amazon that had the objection before this. Now I can see the advantage for allowing services into the house while you're not at home, but I don't want to give up my freedom from being watched (having cameras in the home) for that functionality.
"The National Park Service proposes more than doubling the entrance fees at 17 popular national parks, including Grand Canyon, Yosemite, and Yellowstone, to help pay for infrastructure improvements." The National Parks are some of our greatest treasures and there really shouldn't be a fee to enter (fees are a recent adjustment to offset the budgetary cuts from Congress). So, yes, things need fixed and updated. I'd rather my taxes go to that than pay for an alternative engine for the F-35.
But, those fees may make some people a little more cognizant about their trips to parks. "A lot more Americans are getting out to hike and camp. State and national parks are booming. But there's a big downside. More people are showing up in wild lands unprepared, without the right equipment or skills. They're getting lost or hurt and that's putting new pressure on first responders."
Monsanto, dicamba, and the market of genetically engineered seeds. "It's an approach that Monsanto pioneered with crops that were genetically modified to tolerate… Roundup. After two decades of heavy exposure to glyphosate, however, devastating weeds like Palmer amaranth, or pigweed, evolved resistance to it. Farmers are looking for new weedkilling tools… Dicamba, however, has a well-known defect. It's volatile; it tends to evaporate from the soil or vegetation where it's been sprayed, creating a cloud of plant-killing vapor that can spread in unpredictable directions."
"Magnets have long posed health problems for kids. A 2013 study in the Annals of Emergency Medicine found that between 2002 and 2011, there were over 22,500 magnet-related injuries in those under 21. Most were from swallowing them, but 21 percent were nose-related." Yep.
"A 17-year-old undocumented immigrant to the U.S. underwent an abortion procedure on Wednesday morning, after a weeks-long legal fight with the Trump administration, which had sought to block her from leaving the detention facility where she's being held in Texas. A federal appeals court ruled in her favor on Tuesday." Resolution.
"'This current administration wants to send a clear message to all undocumented immigrants — that if you want to go to [a] hospital, you better think twice about it because you might be deported,' (a lawyer for the undocumented 10-year-old girl) told the magazine." And it's not the first time ICE has detained a family traveling to this children's hospital. This is exactly the wrong message you want to be sending.
"But in the middle of the drawing (on a Corn Pops cereal box), (Saladin) Ahmed spotted a lone non-yellow corn pop. The character looked as if he had brown skin. It also happened to be the only corn pop in all blue, and appeared to be waxing or scrubbing the mall’s floors." And Kellogg's did the right thing, they looked at it, saw he had a point, apologized and is fixing the art. Would have been better to not have let this slip through in the first place, but this is the response you'd expect from a company that walks the walk. As a designer (and illustrator) you have to be aware of these things. You have to look at the photos, illustrations, and design and recognize these messages. Or you end up publishing a photo of a guy with his dick hanging out of his pants (example from a previous job, it wasn't my design, but I had to update it and found that in the photo that had already been published).
"If we cut taxes," they say, "the economy will grow like wild fire." Yeah, tried it. Didn't work. "In 2012, the Republican governor pushed reforms through the state Legislature that dramatically cut income taxes across the board. Brownback boasted the plan would deliver a 'shot of adrenaline' to the Kansas economy… But the opposite happened… Revenues shrank, and the economy grew more slowly than in neighboring states and the country as a whole. Kansas' bond rating plummeted, and the state cut funding to education and infrastructure." Gee, just like what happened to Reagan when he cut taxes. And when GW cut taxes. It's almost like this "tax cuts to boost economy" wasn't true at all.
"'People don't understand, I went to an Ivy League college. I was a nice student,' Trump told reporters Wednesday. 'I did very well. I'm a very intelligent person.'" I'm glad all those people who were very anxious about the economy didn't elect an East-coast Elitist. Also, and I'm not saying that Trump is an abusive personality, but abusive personalities tend to say such things. "Well I can't be horrible, I sit on the church board…" Stuff like that.
"It's unusual for a White House adviser to appear at a news conference about an enforcement matter. And for Trump administration critics in Congress and out, it's yet another example of how the administration is refusing to respect the independence of the Justice Department."
"Some in the field, like Dr. Andrew Kolodny, say it's been frustrating to wait for the administration to respond to a crisis Trump first acknowledged on the campaign trail when he was running for president."
"Still, the president and his supporters have seized on the new details about the DNC-Clinton role to push their view that the various Russia investigations — from Capitol Hill to Justice Department special counsel Robert Mueller — are based on a fraudulent, politically inspired hit job." Note to everybody, the Steele Dossier came to light after the investigations were begun. Also, many items in that dossier have been shown to be true (although not the most salacious, at least not yet). But the end result isn't what launched the investigation, but what it's found so far and can prove.
2 comments:
I get that people enter the wilderness completely unprepared. Truly, I get this.
But I doubt paying more would make people more prepared. Seems to me it would make people more likely to expect an amusement park like situation where they just show up and go.
As far as pay for access, the WV governor was threatening to create a feel for several state parks (including the state forest closest to me) which was probably one of the stupidest things I've ever heard.
First, we *already* pay for the state parks. That's what my taxes are for.
Second, WV has a horrible obesity problem (as does the rest of the US, but we're in terrible shape), so restricting access to the outdoors where people can, you know, exercises is INSANELY stupid IMO.
Luckily the idea was shot down, but it so missed the point of what these areas are for.
More irritatingly, it was only state parks they wanted to charge for. NOT the Wildlife Management Areas, which exist primarily as a place where people can hunt in season (those areas almost never having hiking trails, and certainly not maintained trails). (Mind you, hunting is allowed in the state forests during hunting season. Including the incredibly busy state forest nearest to me.)
I agree that with having to pay more won't equate to smarter use of the parks (or more well prepared hikers). Although I think the "richer" people tend to have curated experiences (tours, hiring guides, etc).
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