I love Leslie Uggams. She really should have been a bigger star….
The great singer and performer is 68 years old today.
Here’s one of my favorites of her performances:
Pope Shuts Down Famous ‘Party Monastery’ with ‘Prancing Nuns’
Another “Truth is Stranger than Fiction” item….
Don’t these people watch “The Borgias?”
From Rawstory.com:
ROME – Pope Benedict XVI has shut down a famous community in Rome that organised dances by a former nightclub dancer nun and hosted VIPs like Madonna, earning the disfavour of the Vatican.
The closure of the monastery of Santa Croce in Gerusalemme, which holds some of the Church’s most prized relics, was reported by Italian dailies La Stampa and Il Foglio.
The reports said the community of Cistercian monks based at the church for more than five centuries was being transferred to other churches in Italy.
Contacted by AFP, the Vatican did not deny the reports.
The basilica had become a hub for the “Friends of Santa Croce”, an aristocratic group, and had been criticised for some unorthodox practices including dances in which nuns pranced around the altar.
One of the nuns who performed at the church, a former disco dancer, can be seen in a YouTube video performing a modern dance with a crucifix.
The basilica’s longtime abbot, Simone Fioraso, a flamboyant former Milan fashion designer, was already moved out of the basilica two years ago.
via Pope shuts down famous ‘party monastery’ with ‘prancing nuns’ | The Raw Story.
Filed under Religion
Jane, I mean Laura, You Ignorant Slut…
Doesn’t NBC remember they started this as parody on Saturday Night Live in the 1970’s?
And now, it’s become reality….
This is the latest bust up at MSNBC
Ed Schultz will take one week of unpaid leave from MSNBC following his controversial comments about Laura Ingraham.
On his radio show Tuesday, Schultz called Ingraham a “right-wing slut.”
Wednesday evening, the network released the following statement about the matter, saying “remarks of this nature are unacceptable and will not be tolerated”:
And this is where Dan and Jane started it all….
Seems the times aren’t a changing that much.
Except satire has now become reality…
via Ed Schultz To Take Unpaid Leave From MSNBC Following Laura Ingraham ‘Slut’ Comment.
Filed under Entertainment, Politics, Uncategorized
GOP Leader Cantor Says Congress Won’t Pay For Missouri Disaster Relief Unless Spending Is Cut Elsewhere
These guys are cold and heartless….
Really cold…
I’m starting to dislike Cantor more than just about any of the other Republican leaders.
He’s the coldest blooded snake in the bunch.
From ThinkProgress.org:
Firefighters and rescue workers who arrived in Joplin, MO, found that the deadly tornado that hit the state Sunday had left a “barren, smoky wasteland” in its path. Rescue workers worked through more storms in an effort to find potential survivors, even as the death toll rose to at least 119. President Obama pledged full support to the state Monday, telling survivors, “We’re here with you. We’re going to stay by you.”
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA), however, said that before Congress approved federal funds for disaster relief, it had to offset the spending with cuts to other programs. The Washington Times reports:
House Majority Leader Eric Cantor said Monday that if Congress passes an emergency spending bill to help Missouri’s tornado victims, the extra money will have to be cut from somewhere else.
“If there is support for a supplemental, it would be accompanied by support for having pay-fors to that supplemental,” Mr. Cantor, Virginia Republican, told reporters at the Capitol. The term “pay-fors” is used by lawmakers to signal cuts or tax increases used to pay for new spending.
In 2005, Republicans criticized then-House Majority Leader Tom DeLay (R-TX) for his willingness to fund relief in the wake of Hurricane Katrina by adding to the deficit. “It is right to borrow to pay for it,” he said at the time, explaining that cuts could “attack” the economy.
Meanwhile, as Climate Progress reports, the government’s tornado forecasting service faces cuts in the GOP Congress, including cuts to NOAA weather satellite that “could halve the accuracy of precipitation forecasts.” Accurate and early forecasting is tremendously important, as “tornado deaths in the United States have gone from 8 per 1 million people in 1925 to 0.11 per 1 million people today — a trend largely attributed to early-warning systems fed by advanced meteorology and the introduction of Doppler radar.”
Psychopaths in High Places
This explains so much…
Fr0m NPR:
Some psychologists have a theory that many of the world’s ills can be blamed on psychopaths in high places.
“Robert Hare, the eminent Canadian psychologist who invented the psychopath checklist, … recently announced that you’re four times more likely to find a psychopath at the top of the corporate ladder than you are walking around in the janitor’s office,” journalist Jon Ronson tells Guy Raz, host of weekends on All Things Considered.
Ronson is the author of a new book, The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness Industry. The titular test is called the PCL-R. Invented by Hare, it’s a checklist of characteristics common to psychopaths: things like glib and superficial charm, grandiosity, manipulative behavior and lack of remorse.
Picture a psychopath and you might think of Norman Bates. But Ronson says successful businessmen can also score high on the checklist. While researching his book, Ronson visited the Florida home of Al Dunlap — known as “Chainsaw Al” — who as CEO of appliance maker Sunbeam was notorious for his gleeful fondness for firing people and shutting down factories.
“So I turned up at his house, and it was full of sculptures of predatory animals,” Ronson says. “And he immediately started to talk about how he believed in the predatory spirit, which was word for word what Bob Hare writes about in the checklist: Look out for their belief in the predatory spirit.”
But Dunlap managed to turn the psychopath test on its head, Ronson says.
“He admitted to many, many items on the checklist, but redefined them as leadership positives,” he says. “So ‘manipulation’ was another way of saying ‘leadership.’ ‘Grandiose sense of self worth’ — which would have been a hard one for him to deny because he was standing underneath a giant oil painting of himself — was, you know, ‘You’ve got to like yourself if you’re going to be a success.'”
Filed under Politics
John Edwards Prosecution Given Go Ahead By Justice Department
Since they are canceling so many long running soap operas on television, it’s amazing that this one just keeps going on and on….
But it looks like it might be retooled into a “Judge Judy” episode….
From HuffingtonPost.com:
The U.S. Department of Justice has indicated that it will allow John Edwards to be prosecuted in an investigation into alleged campaign finance violations, North Carolina station ABC11 reports.
According to the local outlet, the 2008 presidential candidate is expected to be indicted in the case.
NBC News confirms that the Justice Department will permit prosecutors to file criminal charges against Edwards.
WRAL News reported on Tuesday that the culmination of the probe was imminent.
Sources told WRAL News on Tuesday that a major development would occur in the next two weeks. It could be an indictment or perhaps a plea deal. Sources said it’s unlikely that prosecutors would walk away from the case.
The AP relays background on the case:
Edwards’ mistress Rielle Hunter has sued former campaign aide Andrew Young to have a sex tape and other items returned to her. Young has said he helped cover up Edwards’ affair during the 2008 presidential campaign and worked for months to keep Hunter in hiding.
…
Edwards has admitted to the affair and fathering Hunter’s child. She worked as a videographer in 2006 for Edwards’ political action committee.
WRAL reports:
Former Edwards aide Andrew Young wrote in his tell-all book, “The Politician,” that heiress Rachel “Bunny” Mellon gave Edwards a total of $700,000 as a gift. The so-called “Bunny money” helped fund the cover-up of Edwards’ affair with video producer Rielle Hunter, who was pregnant with the former U.S. senator’s child.
Political observers have said the money was a campaign contribution and should have been noted in Edwards’ campaign finance reports.
via John Edwards Prosecution Given Go Ahead By Justice Department: Report (VIDEO).
Filed under North Carolina, Politics
The REAL Rapture Comes On October 21
This gives him a little more time to fundraise and milk publicity…
From News One:
Harold Camping, the preacher who incorrectly predicted that the world would end on May 21st 2011, is now claiming that the false doomsday was merely a warning, and that the end will in fact come on October 21st 2011.
“We’ve always said May 21 was the day, but we didn’t understand altogether the spiritual meaning,” the persistent leader stated during a 90 minute message.
Camping, who incorrectly predicted the world to end back in 1994, says he will no longer post billboards and messages about Judgment Day.
“The world has been warned,” he said. “We don’t have to talk about this anymore.”
via Harold Camping: The REAL Rapture Comes On October 21 | News One.
Filed under Religion
King James Version Is The Only Bible With Power To Unite
Interesting article….
It should remind some of the Religious Conservatives- who won’t listen anyway- that there are multiple interpretations and translations of the Bible…
I think some of the other versions simplify things too much and take away the mystery…
None have the poetry of the King James Version.
As a work of literature, it’s magnificent.
I’ve actually read that version cover to cover…
You may pick yourselves up off the floor now…
Most of the Bible translations crowding American bookstores lack the KJV’s gravitas and spiritual substance, Jeffrey said, and their sheer variety fractures Christian unity.
The need for the KJV itself was prompted by a related situation, Jeffrey argues in a forthcoming book, “The King James Bible and the World It Made.”
In King James’ England, the Bishops’ Bible, favored by Anglicans, prevailed in churches, while the Puritan-preferred Geneva Bible was read in homes. Dissonances between the two versions sowed theological doubts and divisions. Hoping to paper over those divides (and supersede the anti-monarchical Geneva Bible) King James seized on the idea of a new, unifying Bible.
“One could be forgiven for thinking that a similar case for a common Bible in English is far stronger now than it was then,” Jeffrey writes.
Jeffrey and other scholars acknowledged, though, that such a task would be difficult.
“Another translation could be created, but it would never have the cultural uniqueness and authority that the KJV had,” said Timothy Larsen, a Wheaton scholar and author of a book about the KJV’s influence on the Victorian era. “Too many choices would have to be made.”
Bible translation is inherently theological, Larsen said, and getting contemporary Christian camps on the same page, so to speak, would be next to impossible.
As a result, Bible use is more democratic today, with no one translation wearing the crown, which some experts say is a good thing.
“The variety of ways in which the Bible allows for different translations demonstrates that it is a living, amazingly enduring document,” said Kristin Swenson, a religious studies scholar at Virginia Commonwealth University.
via King James Version Is The Only Bible With Power To Unite.
Filed under Religion
Democrat Wins Upstate New York Congressional Race – NYTimes.com
More from the New York Times:
Democrats scored an upset in one of New York’s most conservative congressional districts on Tuesday, dealing a blow to the national Republican Party in a race that largely turned on the party’s plan to overhaul Medicare.
The results set off elation among Democrats and soul-searching among Republicans, who questioned whether the party should rethink its commitment to the Medicare plan, which appears to have become a liability as 2012 elections loom.
Two months ago, the Democrat, Kathy Hochul, was considered an all-but-certain loser. But Ms. Hochul seized on her Republican rival’s embrace of the proposal from Representative Paul Ryan, Republican of Wisconsin, to overhaul Medicare, and she never let up.
via Democrat Wins Upstate New York Congressional Race – NYTimes.com.
Democrat Wins Republican Seat in Special Congressional Election in NY-26
Congratulations to Democratic Congresswoman-Elect Kathy Hochul.
This Congressional district is so Republican it has only elected a Democrat something like 3 times since the Civil War.
The Ryan Republican plan to destroy Medicare handed this race to the Democrats.
I just hope the Democrats take note and stand by their position as protectors of Medicare and Social Security. And I hope they make damn sure everyone knows the GOP wants to destroy them both. Now we have them on record.
From The Hill:
The emergence of Medicare reform as an issue in the New York special election “changed the climate,” presenting Democrats with an opportunity to capture the heavily Republican district, according to Rep. Steve Israel (N.Y.), chairman of the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee.
The House GOP’s budget plan converts Medicare to a type of voucher system for those currently under 55 as a way to rein in costs. Instead of government-run Medicare, seniors would buy private insurance and the government would foot some of the bill.
Only four Republicans voted against the proposal when it came up in the House in April and Jane Corwin, the GOP nominee in the 26th district, embraced the plan.
“Whether the Democrat is elected or not, Medicare changed the climate in that district,” Israel told The Ballot Box.
via Dem campaign chief: Medicare ‘changed the climate’ in NY-26 – The Hill’s Ballot Box.
Lost in the 21st Century 