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marmar
marmar's Journal
marmar's Journal
May 18, 2021
ISLAMORADA, Fla. — A 24-year-old man was arrested on Saturday after trying to speed away from law enforcement on U.S. 1, officials said.
Ignacio Luis Lamadrid Gomez is accused of speeding away from a Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officer during a traffic stop, deputies with the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office said.
Upper Keys Sgt. Robert Dosh saw Gomez going about 100 MPH in a 45 MPH zone. He tried to pull Gomez over and watched as he drove into on-coming traffic. .........(more)
https://nbc-2.com/news/state/2021/05/17/florida-man-arrested-for-speeding-claims-he-was-trying-to-go-back-to-cuba/
Florida man arrested for speeding claims he was trying to go back to Cuba
ISLAMORADA, Fla. — A 24-year-old man was arrested on Saturday after trying to speed away from law enforcement on U.S. 1, officials said.
Ignacio Luis Lamadrid Gomez is accused of speeding away from a Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission officer during a traffic stop, deputies with the Monroe County Sheriff’s Office said.
Upper Keys Sgt. Robert Dosh saw Gomez going about 100 MPH in a 45 MPH zone. He tried to pull Gomez over and watched as he drove into on-coming traffic. .........(more)
https://nbc-2.com/news/state/2021/05/17/florida-man-arrested-for-speeding-claims-he-was-trying-to-go-back-to-cuba/
May 18, 2021
(Slate) Republican governors have collectively decided it’s time for their residents to return to work—whether they’re ready or not. So far, 19 states, all with GOP leaders, have said they plan to opt out of the federal unemployment programs created in response to the coronavirus crisis some time this summer, well before their scheduled expiration in early September. Echoing the complaints of business owners, they argue that the aid, which provides an extra $300 a week on top of what states typically offer and is available to the long-term unemployed who’ve exhausted their normal benefits, is creating severe labor shortages in their states, because people are choosing to collect a government check instead of finding a job.
“Employers are telling me one of the big reasons they cannot recruit and retain some workers is because those employees are receiving more on unemployment than they would while working,” Idaho Gov. Brad Little said in a typical statement last week. “We want people working. A strong economy cannot exist without workers returning to a job.”
These officials may not be entirely wrong when they say unemployment insurance is making life harder for employers. There are now more job openings than before the pandemic, yet hiring slowed down significantly last month, and workers in some industries, like hospitality, are clearly being choosy about when and where they return to work, in part because federal support allows them to be.
At the same time, there are other obvious reasons it might be taking a while for the labor market to rev back up to full strength. The pandemic, after all, isn’t actually over: Cases are declining, but the totals are still nearly as high as they were last summer. Given that many people have yet to be vaccinated, health concerns may be keeping some people like the immunocompromised on the sidelines of the labor market. Also, schools are only partially reopened in much of the country, meaning parents still have significant child care responsibilities that may keep them from working. According to the the Return to Learn Tracker, a project by the American Enterprise Institute and Davidson College that monitors school reopenings, as of May 3 just 50 percent of the nation’s school districts were offering fully in-person instruction, meaning that “all grade levels can attend school in buildings five days per week, though families can opt for fully remote instruction or a hybrid model.” ..............(more)
https://slate.com/business/2021/05/republicans-states-unemployment-insurance-labor-vaccines-schools.html
The GOP Governors Kicking People Off Unemployment Are Doing a Crap Job Vaccinating Their States
(Slate) Republican governors have collectively decided it’s time for their residents to return to work—whether they’re ready or not. So far, 19 states, all with GOP leaders, have said they plan to opt out of the federal unemployment programs created in response to the coronavirus crisis some time this summer, well before their scheduled expiration in early September. Echoing the complaints of business owners, they argue that the aid, which provides an extra $300 a week on top of what states typically offer and is available to the long-term unemployed who’ve exhausted their normal benefits, is creating severe labor shortages in their states, because people are choosing to collect a government check instead of finding a job.
“Employers are telling me one of the big reasons they cannot recruit and retain some workers is because those employees are receiving more on unemployment than they would while working,” Idaho Gov. Brad Little said in a typical statement last week. “We want people working. A strong economy cannot exist without workers returning to a job.”
These officials may not be entirely wrong when they say unemployment insurance is making life harder for employers. There are now more job openings than before the pandemic, yet hiring slowed down significantly last month, and workers in some industries, like hospitality, are clearly being choosy about when and where they return to work, in part because federal support allows them to be.
At the same time, there are other obvious reasons it might be taking a while for the labor market to rev back up to full strength. The pandemic, after all, isn’t actually over: Cases are declining, but the totals are still nearly as high as they were last summer. Given that many people have yet to be vaccinated, health concerns may be keeping some people like the immunocompromised on the sidelines of the labor market. Also, schools are only partially reopened in much of the country, meaning parents still have significant child care responsibilities that may keep them from working. According to the the Return to Learn Tracker, a project by the American Enterprise Institute and Davidson College that monitors school reopenings, as of May 3 just 50 percent of the nation’s school districts were offering fully in-person instruction, meaning that “all grade levels can attend school in buildings five days per week, though families can opt for fully remote instruction or a hybrid model.” ..............(more)
https://slate.com/business/2021/05/republicans-states-unemployment-insurance-labor-vaccines-schools.html
May 18, 2021
The plastic crisis is tied not only to ecological destruction, but also drives systemic injustice. With plastic’s fall, will we rise?
ERICA CIRINO
(YES! Magazine) By the time I set out in 2016 with a crew of volunteer researchers to sail an old steel sloop named Christianshavn to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, public perception of plastic had shifted away from its longtime reputation as a modern human-made miracle to something more sinister.
My first thought as we entered the Garbage Patch was that we’d gone off course. After passing through rough waters outside the clockwise-spinning North Pacific Gyre, where the patch is located, we did not encounter the floating dump of human detritus we’d expected. Instead, we sailed through what seemed like clean blue sea, growing calmer the further we sailed west, away from Los Angeles, toward Honolulu.
Before long, one of the sailors, Danish plastic expert Malene Møhl, called the crew’s attention to the waters beneath our ship, which revealed an even more dangerous situation as the sea seemed to shape-shift before our eyes. As the waters calmed, we could see the Garbage Patch was not so much a mass of trash but a soup: the shredded corner of a sun-bleached orange plastic fish crate, a fist-sized chunk of white Styrofoam, a green shampoo bottle, a pink dustpan.
....(snip)....
How did we get here?
People have long had a proclivity for accumulating stuff, which, beyond mere utility, can confer messages about one’s wealth, status, and view of the world. The first mass-produced plastic, celluloid, used natural organic materials from trees and cotton: camphor and nitrocellulose. It was invented in the late 1800s to bypass inherent limits on materials available in nature—specifically ivory, which was becoming scarcer with every elephant slaughtered. Until then, ivory, tortoiseshell, horn, and other animal parts were used to make popular consumer products, particularly valuable items seen as luxuries, such as jewelry, furniture, and art.
Though celluloid could be formed into a variety of products, from photographic film to table-tennis balls, it was not exactly the ideal consumer material industrialists had hoped for: It could be tricky to mold consistently, and tended to lose its shape when reheated. Plus, celluloid proved to be extremely flammable. Then came Bakelite, the world’s first synthetic plastic, created in 1907 by Belgian inventor Leo Baekeland. ................(more)
https://www.yesmagazine.org/issue/solving-plastic/2021/05/10/plastic-free-world
Plastic World or Plastic-Free World?
Plastic World or Plastic-Free World?The plastic crisis is tied not only to ecological destruction, but also drives systemic injustice. With plastic’s fall, will we rise?
ERICA CIRINO
(YES! Magazine) By the time I set out in 2016 with a crew of volunteer researchers to sail an old steel sloop named Christianshavn to the Great Pacific Garbage Patch, public perception of plastic had shifted away from its longtime reputation as a modern human-made miracle to something more sinister.
My first thought as we entered the Garbage Patch was that we’d gone off course. After passing through rough waters outside the clockwise-spinning North Pacific Gyre, where the patch is located, we did not encounter the floating dump of human detritus we’d expected. Instead, we sailed through what seemed like clean blue sea, growing calmer the further we sailed west, away from Los Angeles, toward Honolulu.
Before long, one of the sailors, Danish plastic expert Malene Møhl, called the crew’s attention to the waters beneath our ship, which revealed an even more dangerous situation as the sea seemed to shape-shift before our eyes. As the waters calmed, we could see the Garbage Patch was not so much a mass of trash but a soup: the shredded corner of a sun-bleached orange plastic fish crate, a fist-sized chunk of white Styrofoam, a green shampoo bottle, a pink dustpan.
....(snip)....
How did we get here?
People have long had a proclivity for accumulating stuff, which, beyond mere utility, can confer messages about one’s wealth, status, and view of the world. The first mass-produced plastic, celluloid, used natural organic materials from trees and cotton: camphor and nitrocellulose. It was invented in the late 1800s to bypass inherent limits on materials available in nature—specifically ivory, which was becoming scarcer with every elephant slaughtered. Until then, ivory, tortoiseshell, horn, and other animal parts were used to make popular consumer products, particularly valuable items seen as luxuries, such as jewelry, furniture, and art.
Though celluloid could be formed into a variety of products, from photographic film to table-tennis balls, it was not exactly the ideal consumer material industrialists had hoped for: It could be tricky to mold consistently, and tended to lose its shape when reheated. Plus, celluloid proved to be extremely flammable. Then came Bakelite, the world’s first synthetic plastic, created in 1907 by Belgian inventor Leo Baekeland. ................(more)
https://www.yesmagazine.org/issue/solving-plastic/2021/05/10/plastic-free-world
May 18, 2021
(HuffPost) Unraveling the mystery behind a very erect giant carved into a hillside has been hard, but a recent discovery is hopefully leading scientists closer to the naked truth.
The cartoonish ancient figure, known as the Cerne Abbas Giant, is sculpted into the chalk hillside above Cerne Abbas in Dorset, England. Basically, it’s big, it’s holding a club and it’s got a phenomenal phallus.
For centuries, people have speculated about the age and meaning of the giant hewn into the hillside.
“Many theories have surrounded the giant’s identity and origins, including ancient symbol of spirituality, likeness of the Greco-Roman hero Hercules, mockery of Oliver Cromwell and fertility aid,” the National Trust writes about the figure.
There’s even a theory that the figure was carved around the body of an actual giant who was slain by local townspeople. ............(more)
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/cerne-abbas-giant-england_n_60a2c478e4b014bd0caf5449
Discovery About Naked Giant Carved Into English Hillside Arouses Scientists
(HuffPost) Unraveling the mystery behind a very erect giant carved into a hillside has been hard, but a recent discovery is hopefully leading scientists closer to the naked truth.
The cartoonish ancient figure, known as the Cerne Abbas Giant, is sculpted into the chalk hillside above Cerne Abbas in Dorset, England. Basically, it’s big, it’s holding a club and it’s got a phenomenal phallus.
For centuries, people have speculated about the age and meaning of the giant hewn into the hillside.
“Many theories have surrounded the giant’s identity and origins, including ancient symbol of spirituality, likeness of the Greco-Roman hero Hercules, mockery of Oliver Cromwell and fertility aid,” the National Trust writes about the figure.
There’s even a theory that the figure was carved around the body of an actual giant who was slain by local townspeople. ............(more)
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/cerne-abbas-giant-england_n_60a2c478e4b014bd0caf5449
May 18, 2021
Journalists should not give into GOP bullying to ignore the full-scale war Republicans are waging on democracy
By AMANDA MARCOTTE
PUBLISHED MAY 17, 2021 5:00PM
(Salon) Texas Rep. Dan Crenshaw was pretty angry with NBC's Chuck Todd on Sunday's episode of "Meet the Press." Todd was uncharacteristically determined to hold the Republican's feet to the fire, calling him out for his support of Donald Trump's Big Lie.
"Why should anybody believe a word you say if the Republican Party itself doesn't have credibility?" the host asked. When Crenshaw, clearly annoyed at being called out for his B.S., retreated by whining that "the press is largely liberal," Todd was rightly contemptuous, retorting, "There's nothing lazier than that excuse!"
At stake: Crenshaw's support for Trump's false claims that Joe Biden stole the 2020 election, claims that Trump used to justify an attempted coup and to incite an insurrection on January 6. Crenshaw's main role in all of that, as Todd pointed out, was joining a lawsuit filed by Texas' Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton which leveraged false accusations of "fraud" in a failed attempt to get the Supreme Court to throw out the results of the election. During the interview, Crenshaw hid behind a line that is increasingly popular among Republicans who are trying to wave off questions about their support for Trump's attempted coup: "It's time to move on."
....(snip)....
The problem with this "water under the bridge" approach is twofold. First, it should be self-evident that seditious behavior should not be so easily forgotten or forgiven. Second, Republicans themselves have not moved on from the attempted insurrection or the lies that Trump used to justify it. On the contrary, Republican leaders have spent the past four months actively moving not just to turn Trump's Big Lie into GOP canon but to use it to justify laying the groundwork for Trump or some other GOP nominee to successfully steal the 2024 election.
....(snip)....
This has all happening a mere four months into Biden's presidency. Republicans still have three and a half more years to keep building the political will and infrastructure necessary to steal the election in 2024, and clearly have every intention of doing so. .........(more)
https://www.salon.com/2021/05/17/no-the-media-cant-move-on-from-trumps-big-lie--not-until-republicans-end-their-war-on-voting/
No, the media can't "move on" from Trump's Big Lie -- not until Republicans end their war on voting
No, the media can't "move on" from Trump's Big Lie — not until Republicans end their war on votingJournalists should not give into GOP bullying to ignore the full-scale war Republicans are waging on democracy
By AMANDA MARCOTTE
PUBLISHED MAY 17, 2021 5:00PM
(Salon) Texas Rep. Dan Crenshaw was pretty angry with NBC's Chuck Todd on Sunday's episode of "Meet the Press." Todd was uncharacteristically determined to hold the Republican's feet to the fire, calling him out for his support of Donald Trump's Big Lie.
"Why should anybody believe a word you say if the Republican Party itself doesn't have credibility?" the host asked. When Crenshaw, clearly annoyed at being called out for his B.S., retreated by whining that "the press is largely liberal," Todd was rightly contemptuous, retorting, "There's nothing lazier than that excuse!"
At stake: Crenshaw's support for Trump's false claims that Joe Biden stole the 2020 election, claims that Trump used to justify an attempted coup and to incite an insurrection on January 6. Crenshaw's main role in all of that, as Todd pointed out, was joining a lawsuit filed by Texas' Republican Attorney General Ken Paxton which leveraged false accusations of "fraud" in a failed attempt to get the Supreme Court to throw out the results of the election. During the interview, Crenshaw hid behind a line that is increasingly popular among Republicans who are trying to wave off questions about their support for Trump's attempted coup: "It's time to move on."
....(snip)....
The problem with this "water under the bridge" approach is twofold. First, it should be self-evident that seditious behavior should not be so easily forgotten or forgiven. Second, Republicans themselves have not moved on from the attempted insurrection or the lies that Trump used to justify it. On the contrary, Republican leaders have spent the past four months actively moving not just to turn Trump's Big Lie into GOP canon but to use it to justify laying the groundwork for Trump or some other GOP nominee to successfully steal the 2024 election.
....(snip)....
This has all happening a mere four months into Biden's presidency. Republicans still have three and a half more years to keep building the political will and infrastructure necessary to steal the election in 2024, and clearly have every intention of doing so. .........(more)
https://www.salon.com/2021/05/17/no-the-media-cant-move-on-from-trumps-big-lie--not-until-republicans-end-their-war-on-voting/
May 17, 2021
MIAMI BEACH, Fla. — That’s one way to stop traffic.
A Florida man climbed atop a traffic light pole in Miami Beach on Friday, the Miami Herald reported. Todd Fitzroy Boothe, 29, of Miramar, inched along the structure while dangling his legs astride the pole in the busy South Beach entertainment district, the newspaper reported.
https://twitter.com/BillyCorben/status/1393387085957062662?s=20
Boothe was arrested and charged with misdemeanor counts of disorderly conduct and resisting an officer without violence, according to Miami-Dade County online court records. ........(more)
https://www.fox23.com/news/trending/traffic-stop-florida-man-arrested-after-climbing-onto-signal-pole-south-beach/GRIO2TH7W5C43O56IW6RT7DCTM/
Florida man arrested after climbing onto signal pole in South Beach
MIAMI BEACH, Fla. — That’s one way to stop traffic.
A Florida man climbed atop a traffic light pole in Miami Beach on Friday, the Miami Herald reported. Todd Fitzroy Boothe, 29, of Miramar, inched along the structure while dangling his legs astride the pole in the busy South Beach entertainment district, the newspaper reported.
https://twitter.com/BillyCorben/status/1393387085957062662?s=20
Boothe was arrested and charged with misdemeanor counts of disorderly conduct and resisting an officer without violence, according to Miami-Dade County online court records. ........(more)
https://www.fox23.com/news/trending/traffic-stop-florida-man-arrested-after-climbing-onto-signal-pole-south-beach/GRIO2TH7W5C43O56IW6RT7DCTM/
May 16, 2021
Two-thirds of California’s counties are in a drought emergency. Get used to it.
Water scarcity is now a permanent feature.
Nathanael Johnson
Sr. Staff Writer
(Grist) From a rise overlooking the unusually low San Luis Reservoir, California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a drought emergency for 39 of the state’s 58 counties on Monday. This was the second stop on his dry lake tour: Less than a month earlier, Newsom had stood on the cracked bottom of Lake Mendocino, a spot normally 20-feet underwater, and announced a drought emergency in Sonoma and Mendocino counties. Not far from where he spoke in April, an early wildfire raged, where spring grasses had prematurely yellowed to tinder.
“That’s unprecedented for this time of year, said Grant Davis, general manager of Sonoma Water, who spoke at the same lectern as Newsom that day. “We’ve had big fires three out of the last five years. Believe me this is climate change and extreme weather all rolled into one.”
As California’s not-so-wet season draws to a close, half the state is already in ‘extreme drought.’ That means that thousands of wells could go dry in the poorest rural areas in the coming months, and fish populations will suffer as rivers heat up. In the northern half of the state, reservoir levels are already as low as they were three years into the last major drought that ran from 2011 to 2017. But California emerged from that long spate of dry weather with hard-won skills that make it better prepared this time around.
The entire West has suffered from droughts in recent years, but there’s something that captures the public imagination when disaster hits California, the most populous state, that promised land of sunshine, fruit trees, and celluloid dreams. Whenever drought grips California, elements of the media fall into an ecstatic doom loop, producing headlines that make the state sound like an apocalyptic wasteland. ............(more)
https://grist.org/climate/two-thirds-of-californias-counties-are-now-in-a-drought-emergency-get-used-to-it/
Two-thirds of California's counties are in a drought emergency. Get used to it.
Two-thirds of California’s counties are in a drought emergency. Get used to it.
Water scarcity is now a permanent feature.
Nathanael Johnson
Sr. Staff Writer
(Grist) From a rise overlooking the unusually low San Luis Reservoir, California Governor Gavin Newsom declared a drought emergency for 39 of the state’s 58 counties on Monday. This was the second stop on his dry lake tour: Less than a month earlier, Newsom had stood on the cracked bottom of Lake Mendocino, a spot normally 20-feet underwater, and announced a drought emergency in Sonoma and Mendocino counties. Not far from where he spoke in April, an early wildfire raged, where spring grasses had prematurely yellowed to tinder.
“That’s unprecedented for this time of year, said Grant Davis, general manager of Sonoma Water, who spoke at the same lectern as Newsom that day. “We’ve had big fires three out of the last five years. Believe me this is climate change and extreme weather all rolled into one.”
As California’s not-so-wet season draws to a close, half the state is already in ‘extreme drought.’ That means that thousands of wells could go dry in the poorest rural areas in the coming months, and fish populations will suffer as rivers heat up. In the northern half of the state, reservoir levels are already as low as they were three years into the last major drought that ran from 2011 to 2017. But California emerged from that long spate of dry weather with hard-won skills that make it better prepared this time around.
The entire West has suffered from droughts in recent years, but there’s something that captures the public imagination when disaster hits California, the most populous state, that promised land of sunshine, fruit trees, and celluloid dreams. Whenever drought grips California, elements of the media fall into an ecstatic doom loop, producing headlines that make the state sound like an apocalyptic wasteland. ............(more)
https://grist.org/climate/two-thirds-of-californias-counties-are-now-in-a-drought-emergency-get-used-to-it/
May 16, 2021
An apparent dispute between members of the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang has left three men dead and one man in jail on federal gun charges.
"A suspected white supremacist is facing charges after allegedly ditching a bullet-riddled car containing three dead men in the parking lot of an Albuquerque hospital this week," The Daily Beast reported Saturday. "Richard Kuykendall, a 41-year-old with an "apparent association" with the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang, was charged Friday with being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition for his role in the Wednesday triple homicide, according to a criminal complaint filed Friday in the U.S. District Court for New Mexico."
"Prosecutors allege that after a deadly shootout in a nearby alley, Kuykendall drove to Presbyterian Kaseman Hospital with the victims, removed his shirt and told a security officer 'that there were three dead guys in the Chevy' before he walked away," The Beast reported. "The criminal complaint—first obtained by Seamus Hughes, a researcher at George Washington University's Program on Extremism and a Daily Beast contributor—notes that authorities only believe Kuykendall 'may be responsible for the death of one of the three men.'" .......(more)
https://www.rawstory.com/aryan-brotherhood-albuquerque-shooting/
Neo-Nazi arrested after dumping 3 dead bodies at Albuquerque hospital: FBI
An apparent dispute between members of the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang has left three men dead and one man in jail on federal gun charges.
"A suspected white supremacist is facing charges after allegedly ditching a bullet-riddled car containing three dead men in the parking lot of an Albuquerque hospital this week," The Daily Beast reported Saturday. "Richard Kuykendall, a 41-year-old with an "apparent association" with the Aryan Brotherhood prison gang, was charged Friday with being a convicted felon in possession of a firearm and ammunition for his role in the Wednesday triple homicide, according to a criminal complaint filed Friday in the U.S. District Court for New Mexico."
"Prosecutors allege that after a deadly shootout in a nearby alley, Kuykendall drove to Presbyterian Kaseman Hospital with the victims, removed his shirt and told a security officer 'that there were three dead guys in the Chevy' before he walked away," The Beast reported. "The criminal complaint—first obtained by Seamus Hughes, a researcher at George Washington University's Program on Extremism and a Daily Beast contributor—notes that authorities only believe Kuykendall 'may be responsible for the death of one of the three men.'" .......(more)
https://www.rawstory.com/aryan-brotherhood-albuquerque-shooting/
May 15, 2021
Richmond, Texas (CNN) A Bengal tiger is still at large somewhere in the Houston area, police say, but the man last seen with the big cat is now behind bars.
Victor Hugo Cuevas was taken into custody Friday after a Fort Bend County judge revoked his bond on a pending, unrelated murder charge from 2017.
The judge set a new bond for $300,000 and asked the state and defense teams to figure out a trial date on the murder case.
Victor Hugo Cuevas' attorney Michael Elliott provided photos of Cuevas and the missing tiger named India. He said the cat would visit Cuevas a couple times a month. ...........(more)
https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/14/us/tiger-missing-houston/index.html
Man last seen with missing Houston tiger jailed on unrelated charge
Richmond, Texas (CNN) A Bengal tiger is still at large somewhere in the Houston area, police say, but the man last seen with the big cat is now behind bars.
Victor Hugo Cuevas was taken into custody Friday after a Fort Bend County judge revoked his bond on a pending, unrelated murder charge from 2017.
The judge set a new bond for $300,000 and asked the state and defense teams to figure out a trial date on the murder case.
Victor Hugo Cuevas' attorney Michael Elliott provided photos of Cuevas and the missing tiger named India. He said the cat would visit Cuevas a couple times a month. ...........(more)
https://www.cnn.com/2021/05/14/us/tiger-missing-houston/index.html
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