There are a lot of blogs on the blogroll here that Google won't display. Sure, it let's you add them to the blogroll but it only displays ten. When the heck did they start that?
Apologies to those of you who mysteriously dropped off - it looks like I'm going to have to do major surgery to get everyone back.
Happy Fat Tuesday to all our readers.
* Offer void in Democratic controlled locations, like New Orleans.
The only difference between the Saint and the sinner is that every Saint has a past, and every sinner has a future.
- Oscar Wilde
Many people genuinely do not wish to be saints, and it is possible that some who achieve or aspire to sainthood have never had much temptation to be human beings.
- George Orwell
Debbie is good folks. I'd be very grateful if you click on over and sign the petition.My son is dying. He’s just 33 years young and father to two beautiful children. His doctors, who claim they exhausted all options, give him only a few weeks to live. But there is an option that remains--a possible miracle—hidden behind red tape. Bryan’s a fighter, courageously battling metastatic melanoma for over a year. He’s been prescribed multiple medications and received whole brain radiation twice. Yet despite the recent news he, and I, refuse to give up. Merck Pharmaceutical Company is presently trialing a possibly life-saving cancer drug, Anti PD-1. My son’s participation was rejected because of his advanced stage. Our last option is to appeal for “compassionate use,” which, much to my dismay, requires sensational efforts and a social media blitz. Why? What other use could there be for this drug but compassion? How can one be “too far advanced” to trial a potentially life-saving drug? It is senseless. Bryan is ready and willing. If it works, Merck helped save one of the most precious lives I know, and if not, it’s outside the scope of their study and caused no harm. We can’t, as a society, let this happen. We can’t sit back and watch families try, and fail, to exhaust all options.Help us make a difference, for Bryan and all cancer victims. Sign our petition to Merck:http://chn.ge/1h479Ej
To understand why and how the Republican Party lost Middle America, and faces demographic death, we need to go back to Bush I.I studied economics back at State U, and so I understand the arguments that maximizing trade maximizes economic output, and by implication economic output per capita goes up. But there's a Jedi hand wave that occurs at that point: ceteris parabis, "all other things remaining the same". They don't. Even the Libertarians over at Reason make this hand wave.
At the Cold War’s end, the GOP reached a fork in the road. The determination of Middle Americans to preserve the country they grew up in, suddenly collided with the profit motive of Corporate America.
The Fortune 500 wanted to close factories in the USA and ship production abroad — where unions did not exist, regulations were light, taxes were low, and wages were a fraction of what they were here in America.
Corporate America was going global and wanted to be rid of its American work force, the best paid on earth, and replace it with cheap foreign labor.
While manufacturing sought to move production abroad, hotels, motels, bars, restaurants, farms and construction companies that could not move abroad also wanted to replace their expensive American workers.
Thanks to the Republican Party, Corporate America got it all.
VOTE, n. The instrument and symbol of a freeman's power to make a fool of himself and a wreck of his country.
- Ambrose Bierce, The Devil's Dictionary
You know my wife is from the Philippines, so you also know we're keeping a close watch on the events there.America's friendship with the Philippines goes back a long way. If you have something to spare, it's going to friends.
The recent earthquake was centered between the islands of Bohol and Cebu. The damage was bad, but it could have been a lot worse than it was. Unfortunately, some very old churches - some dating from the 1800s and earlier - were seriously damaged. But some newer buildings were also destroyed.
My brother-in-law lives just up the road from the Gaisano Country Mall (google maps) which partly collapsed. His office is - or rather WAS - in the building across the street, which also partly collapsed. I was there last year - I know EXACTLY where these buildings are. The earthquake also closed shipping to Bohol by destroying the concrete shipping facilities in Tagbilaran.
Luckily, my wife's family in Cebu and their homes were ok.
The recent storm pretty much destroyed whatever was left of the seaside homes and fishing villages along the coast near Tacloban on the island of Leyte. The pictures you're seeing on the news are the worst of the disaster. Tens of thousands of people have lost their lives and their homes. I know someone who's immediate relatives live in Tacloban... and they haven't heard from anyone there in days. They fear the worst.
The Philippines has a pretty serious "rainy season" every year, and minor flooding is not an out-of-the-ordinary occurrence. I've been there during rainy season, and some places are low-lying enough so that you wade around in water up to your ankles almost everywhere - and sometimes up to you knees. That's why some homes are built up above the ground on bamboo posts: literally, to "stay above water"!
Filipinos are hardy, courageous, and people of faith. They will put their lives back together and rebuild their homes, schools, and businesses. And they'll do it without begging for anything from anyone.
Of course, if you or anyone you know wanted to send a donation to the Philippine Red Cross, it wouldn't hurt a bit.
