Usa Thread

[Bangkoktraveler]

Looks like the Terminator might be getting terminated. When his 10 year old kid came out of the closet, Maria cut him off. Shit, what else can happen to him.

[Steve]

Its no surprise he cheated. In fact, I'd go as far as to say I'd be surprised if he wasn't cheating. He's a known womanizer. I assumed he was womanizing as governor. I wouldn't hold it against him if he did as long as state money and resources aren't involved. Its his private life.

 

The cynic in me says the only reason why it came out now was because the money to the mother either stopped or he was asked for more and wouldn't give it.

 

 

[Steve]

Lottery winner still qualifies and gets food stamps..HAHAHAHA

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_localdtw/20110518/ts_yblog_localdtw/2m-michigan-lottery-winner-defends-use-of-food-stamps

 

Second shocker....he's white! haha...sorry, had to go there. Don't lie and say you didn't think the person was going to black like I did. :nahnah:

[Steve]

I know know much about than the basic info about Chavez but I am not aware of anything congroversial or specifically anti American or racist about his history to say he shouldn't have a Navy vessel named after him. Doing so is causing a wee bit of controversy. Mexican american groups are gonna cry foul. Any thoughts?

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20110518/pl_yblog_upshot/navys-plan-to-honor-cesar-chavez-irks-lawmaker

 

 

 

[Flashermac]

I liked Chavez. Never heard anything bad or anti-American about him. I remember buying tacos at a Chavez fund raiser at San Francisco State once. (They were good even though made with tuna fish. )

 

p.s. For fast and easy barbecue, dump some barbecue sauce on canned tuna. Can't tell the difference from the taste.

 

p.p.s. I didn't automatically assume the food stamps lottery winner was black, since my grandmother got food stamps for a short while. Then somebody decided her widows pension put her $10 too much! Was she ever pissed off.

 

 

[Flashermac]

Another Too-Fat-To-Fly Controversy Hits Southwest Airlines :content:

 

 

 

NEW YORK (CBSNewYork) — Southwest Airlines has apologized to a mother and daughter who said they got rough treatment at the airport.

 

Kenlie Tiggeman, a 30-year-old political strategist and weight loss blogger in New York City, said it was humiliating, being told she was too fat to fly, reports CBS 2’s John Slattery.

 

“It was rude. It was in front of lots of people,†said Tiggeman, who’s originally from New Orleans.

 

[color:red]Tiggeman said the incident happened in Dallas over Easter. She and her mother were told by a gate agent they each had to purchase two seats.

 

“And said that we were, in fact, too fat to fly, without an additional ticket,†Tiggeman said.[/color]

 

Yet this was a return flight, and they hadn’t been stopped before. The gate agent said it was policy.

 

“I was asked what size clothes, and how much I weigh. I gave answers in front of a gate full of people, some of whom were snickering,†Tiggeman said.

 

Tiggeman, who once weighed 393 pounds, is down to 268 pounds.

 

[color:red]A spokeswoman for Southwest said: “If a passenger cannot fit in a seat with the armrests down, a second seat must be purchased. If the flight is not full, that added charge will be refunded.â€[/color]

 

But Tiggeman said she does fit in a seat.

 

Southwest, which allowed the woman and her mother on a later flight, apologized, refunded their tickets and gave them free vouchers.

 

Passengers at LaGuardia said Tiggeman got a raw deal.

 

“As long as she fit in that seat, she should have been allowed to fly,†passenger Arnette Small said.

 

“I mean, if she fits, she fits, that’s what I say,†Kala Drust said.

 

“I think if people are rather large they to take accountability for their size and need to buy two tickets. If in fact she fit in the armrests, it’s a different ball game,†Dan Hehal added.

 

Last year, movie director Kevin Smith, known for his cult hit “Clerks,†was ejected from a Southwest flight, told that he didn’t fit. The airline later apologized.

 

The policy on wide-body passengers varies from airline to airline. All the Federal Aviation Administration requires is that each passenger be in a belt, which sometimes requires a seat-belt extender.

 

Tiggeman said she purchased two tickets to fly in the past, but since she’s lost so much weight, she’s been told by several airline employees it was no longer necessary.

 

 

 

Link

 

 

 

[Flashermac]

 

 

Circumcision Ban to Appear on San Francisco Ballot

 

 

 

SAN FRANCISCO — A group seeking to ban the circumcision of male children in San Francisco has succeeded in getting their controversial measure on the November ballot, meaning voters will be asked to weigh in on what until now has been a private family matter.

 

City elections officials confirmed Wednesday that the initiative had received enough signatures to appear on the ballot, getting more than 7,700 valid signatures from city residents. Initiatives must receive at least 7,168 signatures to qualify.

 

If the measure passes, circumcision would be prohibited among males under the age of 18. The practice would become a misdemeanor offense punishable by a fine of up to $1,000 or up to one year in jail. There would be no religious exemptions.

 

The initiative appears to be the first of its kind in the country to actually make it to this stage, though a larger national debate over the health benefits of circumcision has been going on for many years. Banning circumcision would almost certainly prompt a flurry of legal challenges alleging violations of the First Amendment's guarantee of the freedom to exercise one's religious beliefs.

 

Supporters of the ban say male circumcision is a form of genital mutilation that is unnecessary, extremely painful and even dangerous. They say parents should not be able to force the decision on their young child.

 

"Parents are really guardians, and guardians have to do what's in the best interest of the child. It's his body. It's his choice," said Lloyd Schofield, the measure's lead proponent and a longtime San Francisco resident, who said the cutting away of the foreskin from the penis is a more invasive medical procedure than many new parents or childless individuals realize.

 

But opponents say such claims are alarmingly misleading, and call the proposal a clear violation of constitutionally protected religious freedoms.

 

"For a city that's renowned for being progressive and open-minded, to even have to consider such an intolerant proposition ... it sets a dangerous precedent for all cities and states," said Rabbi Gil Yosef Leeds of Berkeley. Rabbi Leeds is a certified "mohel," the person who traditionally performs ritual circumcisions in the Jewish faith.

 

He said he receives phone calls every day from members of the local Jewish community who are concerned about the proposed ban. But he said he is relatively confident that even if the measure is approved, it will be abruptly—and indefinitely—tied up in litigation.

 

The initiative's backers say its progress is the biggest success story to date in a decades-old, nationwide movement by so-called "intactivists" to end circumcision of male infants in the U.S. A similar effort to introduce a circumcision ban in the Massachusetts Legislature last year failed to gain traction.

 

"It's been kind of under the radar until now, but it was a conversation that needed to happen," Mr. Schofield said of the debate over male circumcision. "We've tapped into a spark with our measure—something that's been going on for a long time."

 

International health organizations have promoted circumcision as an important strategy for reducing the spread of the AIDS virus. That's based on studies that showed it can prevent AIDS among heterosexual men in Africa.

 

But there hasn't been the same kind of push for circumcision in the U.S., in part because nearly 80% of American men are already circumcised, a much higher proportion than the worldwide average of 30%. Also, HIV spreads mainly among gay men in the U.S., and research indicates circumcision doesn't protect gay men from HIV.

 

For years, federal health officials have been working on recommendations regarding circumcision. The effort was sparked by studies that found circumcision is partially effective in preventing the virus' spread between women and men. The recommendations are still being developed, and there is no date set for their release, said a spokeswoman for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

 

The CDC doesn't have a position on the San Francisco proposal, said the spokeswoman, Elizabeth-Ann Chandler.

 

 

 

Link

[Steve]

The far left and the far right amounts to the same thing. Telling me what I can't do or takes away my civil liberties. Exremism robs me of my freedom.

[Flashermac]

I remember a prof explaining the political extremes not by drawing a straight line, but rather a circle. As the extreme right and left move away from each other they eventually meet the bottom of the circle. Not a bean's worth of difference between them at that point.

 

 

[Flashermac]

 

 

West: Obama 'a black mascot' and 'black puppet'

 

 

 

Cornel West, a Princeton University professor and leading black intellectual, is harshly criticizing President Obama, a candidate he once supported but now calls “a black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a black puppet of corporate plutocrats.â€

 

West, a former Harvard University professor, said during an interview with the website Truthdig posted yesterday that the president has not been true to his race.

 

“I think my dear brother Barack Obama has a certain fear of free black men,†West said. “It’s understandable. As a young brother who grows up in a white context, brilliant African father, he’s always had to fear being a white man with black skin. All he has known culturally is white…When he meets an independent black brother, it is frightening.â€

 

The White House did not have an immediate comment. West did not respond to messages left at his office.

 

Republicans have questioned Obama’s origins — to the point where he felt compelled to release his long-form birth certificate to prove he was born in Hawaii — but West also uses Obama’s past to draw into question the president’s racial bearings.

 

“Obama, coming out of Kansas influence, white, loving grandparents, coming out of Hawaii and Indonesia, when he meets these independent black folk who have a history of slavery, Jim Crow, Jane Crow and so on, he is very apprehensive,†West said. “He has a certain rootlessness, a deracination. It is understandable.â€

 

West is a professor at Princeton's Center for African American Studies and is the author of "Race Matters." He was a professor at Harvard, but left in 2002 amid quarrels with then-president Lawrence Summers.

 

West also recounts personal slights — that his phone calls didn’t get returned, and that he couldn’t get a ticket with his mother and brother to the inauguration.

 

It is not the first time West has raised questions about Obama. Last year, during an interview with NPR, he said he wished the president were more “Martin Luther King-like.â€

 

 

 

Now Obama's isn't black enough?