January 2009
“California today, they voted against offshore drilling. Not on their land, or...”
– glen beck (via pam’s)
ok - we’ll go. and we’ll take the 13% of the national GDP that we generate with us. and the 10% of national crude oil production. and the 13% of US agricultural production. and disneyland. we’re totally keeping disneyland.
Where's the best place to get tacos in LA?
taco trucks:
la estrella, york & ave 54, highland park - best asada in the world
taco zone, alvarado around montana, 2 blocks n of sunset
el matador, western just s of the 101, the truck on the north side of the auto shop parking lot, NOT the truck on the south side
counter service:
loteria, farmer’s market
hugo’s tacos, coldwater and riverside
cactus taqueria, vine and...
Celebrate The Ledbetter Act, But Prepare For A... →
article about the number of conservative decisions made by the supreme court that advance business interests at the cost of civil rights protections. the ledbetter act was a great step by obama/congress to push back against that trend, but there’s a lot more work to be done, and evidence that the supreme court will continue to interpret things this way even when congress clearly directs...
a perhaps unpopular position
so the lady in LA who just had 8 babies apparently already has 6 young children. and now there’s been a lot of chatter about how she shouldn’t have had them and how it’s “uncute” to have so many babies.
What I do want to rant about for this Friday is the flack this woman is getting for making her choice. When doctors gaver her the option of reducing the number of...
spirit of service #2
in a continuing series of suggestions on how to get involved with public service.
this one is another online volunteering thing, so you can do it from the comfort of your home, on your own time, at 3am if you want.
kiva.org is a microlending organization - collects small donations, lumps them together for relatively small grants to individuals in developing countries. the grants usually serve as...
do it nancy
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) said she didn’t come to Washington to be “bipartisan”, one day after shuttling through an $819 economic stimulus bill without a single Republican vote. “I didn’t come here to be partisan, I didn’t come here to be bipartisan,” Pelosi told reporters at her weekly press conference. “I came here, as did my colleagues, to be nonpartisan, to work for the American...
Does Information Technology Erode the Power of... →
fascinating article on an online petition for democracy in china.
psa: this whole jessica simpson thing still going...
melissa at shakesville points to an actual headline today:
Jessica Simpson Steps Out Amidst Weight Controversy.
i had to stop for a sec when i read that, but melissa goes on:
Seriously. Because, as everyone knows, once someone deems you a fatty, you’re supposed to shamefully hide your disgusting body away from public view, preferably in an attic or dungeon. If you’re fat,...
“A source who was at the White House signing ceremony today says Obama offered...”
– they better be.. (tpm)
let's hear it for the three branches of government
you’ve likely heard that the lily ledbetter act was signed into law today. this is great news for advocates of equal pay and anti-discrimination and all those other good things.
it’s also a great example of why we have three separate branches of government. checks and balances, yo! so the legislature passed this law saying that a person could sue their employer for discriminatory pay...
“We need a widespread rebellion of women who are tired of worrying about their...”
– Laura Fraser (via notemily: gauntlet)
morally policing the poor
there’s a legislative proposal in west virginia that would subject all recipients of welfare based services to random and suspicionless drug testing. this would apply to anyone getting food stamps, welfare, or unemployment benefits. (aclu blog)
from a financial standpoint, this is a pretty stupid idea. random drug testing and processing urine results and following up to penalize people with...
does race still matter?
from jeff jacoby’s op-ed in the boston globe today, which asked if a journalist’s race should matter:
But why should it matter to anyone but a racist whether a White House reporter is black or white? Well, says Michael Fletcher, a colleague of Kurtz’s, “you would want to have black journalists there to bring a different racial sensibility.” By the same token, more evangelical...
Study Finds High-Fructose Corn Syrup Contains... →
(via clothedinsky)
so… jeremy piven really loves eating jam by the jarful?
from CIA career website:
To be considered suitable for Agency employment, applicants must generally not have used illegal drugs within the last twelve months. The issue of illegal drug use prior to twelve months ago is carefully evaluated during the medical and security processing.
so for the love of god don’t smoke pot, but go ahead and drug and rape the women in the country with whom...
“The Justice Department is investigating the CIA station chief in Algeria for...”
– AMERICA KICKS ASS. and makes me feel like throwing up. (daily beast)
you guys can probably help with this
so i’m working from home today, which happens rarely/never even though i’m way more productive when i do it.
a bit of background: i’m required by various rules to bill my time in a timekeeping program, so i have lots of time slips saying what i was doing when for which case/client and which funding code. (yes, it’s as fun as it sounds.) and we’re supposed to take at...
“i can certainly see why, but think of it this way…the homeless man now has food & a roof over his head for 15 years.i would say that his situation might have improved, despite his lack of freedom.” petitchaton. (via msbadkittie: indieandyy)
as a taxpayer, you should think this is a really stupid idea. the average cost to incarcerate a single prisoner for one year in a CA prison was $30,929 -...
Ashlee Simpson-Wentz is a voice of sanity in a... →
maura: for real.
see what happens when the mass media picks on a woman’s body for no good reason? smart girls with good taste in music spring to jessica simpson’s defense. ashlee simpson-wentz-mowgli becomes the calm voice of reason. it’s a world gone topsy-turvy. nobody wants this. none of this would have happened without the fat jokes! that should be reason enough to hold back...
the news, it is bad
this is just from a super quick scan of the latimes this morning:
backlog of LA County Sherriff’s DNA testing wider than previously reported: 815 sexual assault cases with untested DNA and no suspects have been tallied so far; statute has expired on 51 of them. so while in LA you don’t have to pay for your own rape kit, you can’t expect law enforcement to actually do anything...
i need someone new
to listen to me practice presentations. (i am always too long. there is too much info in my head to convey in the limited time they give me.)
i’ve used my friends enough already - one of them practically learned property law while helping me study flashcards for the bar exam - and my cat knows enough about social security law that she could probably represent an appeal in an administrative...
UGH, peta
“NBC pulled the plug on a PETA pro-veggie commercial planned for the Super Bowl because it “depicts a level of sexuality exceeding our standards,” according to NBC Universal’s advertising standards executive, Victoria Morgan. The ad, which carries the tagline, “Studies Show Vegetarians Have Bet ter Sex,” shows lingerie-clad stunners getting “intimate” with vegetables. One shot depicts an actress...
in case you were wondering my position on...
i’m for it.
and my position on cutting those funds from the bill in order to please republicans who may not vote for it anyway and aren’t giving us anything in return for the cut? i’m against it.
some interesting numbers:
“Contraception spending saves money in the long run — some $200 million over five years, according to a Congressional Budget Office evaluation of a...
yo dude who i'm on the phone with:
i understand that you feel that while you were working for the city in some undefined contract capacity and were nearby the wildfire, you may have been exposed to some toxic fumes. and i understand that you want to know whether you can sue the city.
HOWEVER. please do not tell me about the settlement in the LA fire department case where officers played a series of pranks on a black co-worker...
YOU POOR THINGS
LARGE law firms have long been known for lock-step salary increases and annual bonuses. But the recession and other economic pressures are changing that, with many firms deciding to freeze salaries and rethink bonuses.
In mid-December, the legal profession was taken aback when Latham & Watkins, considered a market leader, announced that it would keep 2009 associate salaries at their 2008...
“The internet is the virtual watercooler (or coffeehouse, or playgroup, or pub)...”
– Lauredhel at Hoyden About Town. (via thecurvature)
who ever knows what's going on inside other people
i just went to the kitchen to get coffee because i can’t even start to wake up today and was standing there bleary-eyed and yawning. in walks one of the office secretaries - 50+, frumpy, always seemed totally bland. she tells me she’s developed a new secret for waking up in the morning: she bought a surfboard at a swap meet for $15 (it’s held together with duct tape) and goes to...
maura:
reblogging a ‘what the heck happened to...
Relatives seek missing in Mexico corpse horror →
Relatives of scores of missing people demanded on Saturday that Mexican authorities dig up mass graves and identify human remains after a drug gang suspect confessed to dissolving the bodies of 300 murder victims with corrosive chemicals. Santiago Meza, known as “The Stew Maker,” admitted after his arrest on Thursday to disposing of hundreds of bodies in recent years for a faction of...
What were you doing when Google Earth took your... →
urg: This should make you think twice before you start your next sword fight.
i’ve seen this link crop up a few times today, so i feel obliged to point out that this was all a public art project staged specifically to be captured by google earth. there’s a great youtube video of the making of.