THE OTHER SHOE DROPS: Updates To Previous Posts
† The Other Shoe Drops (“Can Cafferty, CNN: Chinese,” first item): Less than a day after the Chinese government agreed to meet with an envoy of the Dalai Lama, the state-controlled English-language newspaper People’s Daily resumed its relentless personal attacks on the Tibetan spiritual leader and his followers, “the Dalai clique,” leading some to question whether the offer to negotiate was just a PR stunt, reports The Washington Post. In an online discussion on a Chinese forum, one participant noted: "Now we have to stabilize the situation. After the Olympics, no one will care about the Dalai Lama."
† The Other Shoe Drops ("Now Is Not The Time To Talk About Race," fourth item): Ukraine wants the famine of 1932-33 caused by Stalin’s forcing peasants off their lands and relocating them to collective farms to be recognized by the world as genocide. Various estimates put the number of people who perished between 2.5 million and 10 million in what Ukrainians refer to as “Holodomor” - death by hunger. Ukrainian President Viktor Yushchenko says Ukraine became "a vast death camp," charging that the true purpose of the famine was to “crush Ukraine’s national identity and desire for self-determination.” Russian politicians and historians claim that “the famine was the awful but collateral consequence of ruthless agricultural policies and the drive to industrialize, not a case of deliberate mass murder,” reports the WaPo – and that Russians also died and to call the famine a genocide against Ukrainians is to defame and demonize modern Russia. Gee, the Russians sound just like the Turks denying the Armenian Genocide.
† Not Your Father's (Or Your) Sex Education (second item): At their wedding 28 years ago, Donald Brunner was the bridegroom and Frances Gottschalk was the bride. Ob-la-di, ob-la-da life goes on bra - and Donald is now Denise, making the Brunners of New Milford, NJ, a same-sex couple in a state that does not recognize such unions, reports The New York Times:
In 2002, Donald started taking female hormones. Fran did not want to break up.
“She was still the same person, she’s still the same person, but the package had just changed,” Fran said. “Everything that attracted me to her, or him, is still there, and we’re comfortable.”
Their older daughter, Jessica, became suspicious when Donald recommended a nail salon to her. When the Brunners told their children about the pending surgery, Jessica, then 17, worried about divorce; Scott, then 14, said, “cool”; and Alyssa, 12, cried for hours that she wanted a normal dad.
The couple went door to door, explaining to the neighbors.
“I had everything from ‘Welcome to the other team’ to ‘What are you going to do, parade around in front of my house in a dress?,’” Denise remembered.
† Is Abortion Still “The Third Rail” In Politics?: Two years ago, 56 percent of SD voters defeated a ballot measure to ban abortion, largely because it did not include exceptions for rape, incest, or the life and health of the mother. A retooled measure that includes these exceptions, will be on the ballot again this November. A Planned Parenthood spokesperson complains to The New York Times that rape and incest would have to be reported to the police, and doctors would have to document that a woman’s life or health is imperiled unless she aborts her baby. But pro-life activists counter that the exceptions undermine the effectiveness of the law to significantly reduce the number of abortions in the state.
It will not change biofuel mandates that are directing more corn to ethanol and contributing to a global rise in food prices. It will do little to ease worldwide food shortages. And at a time of high volatility in the futures markets, it will not require tougher regulation.
Critics are calling on Congress to replace direct payments with a revenue assurance program “that would help farmers in times of need, but save money in boom years when crop yields are strong and prices high.”
Comments