Posted inCurrent affairs

Are you better off today than when Mitch McConnell said…?

Listening to POTUS (great political talk programming) on satellite radio recently, a caller had a great response to the usual Republican line, "Are you better off today than four years ago, when Obama was elected president?" He said the question should be: Are you better off today than two years ago, when Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell said, "The single most important thing we want to achieve is for President Obama to be a one-term president"? The biggest problem our country has is Republican obstructionism. The not-so G.O.P. dislikes Obama and his policies so much, it seems that Republicans would…
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Posted inHome life Travel

“You look like Richard Branson.” Nice compliment.

Though I'm irked at Hawaiian Airlines for dropping its non-stop Portland, Oregon to Maui flight, on our return from Honolulu a few days ago a Hawaiian employee made me feel really good. I'd forked out an extra $70 for two seats in an exit row, where I'd stretched my legs in comparative comfort for the five hours it took to cross the western Pacific. As we started our descent into Portland, a flight attendant sat down in the jumpseat that faces backwards across from the exit row. Looking at me, she said, "I've been thinking for the whole trip that…
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Posted inEntertainment

“Real-life Barbie” does appear to be a real woman

When I came across mention of a real-life Barbie on my Twitter feed, naturally my curiosity was aroused. I've always thought Barbie was hot (though my most ardent attraction is to a more mature, yet similarly curvaceous comic strip character, Blondie). A 21-year-old girl, who has become an internet sensation in her home country of Russia, claims on her blog to be the most famed woman on the Russian-language internet. Valeria Lukyanova's doll-like features, long blonde hair and 'perfect' body make her look like a real life Barbie.In fact, with her tiny waist and large breasts, she bears such a resemblance to the…
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Posted inHome life Salem

Hawaiian Airlines drops non-stop Portland-Maui flights, so we drop Hawaiian

Most likely, yesterday we took our last flight on Hawaiian Airlines. For about twenty years we've flown direct from Portland, Oregon to Maui. In January 2012 Hawaiian dropped non-stop Portland-Maui flights.  So my wife and I are going to drop Hawaiian. We had lots of frequent flyer miles accumulated through our usually-annual flights to Maui, supplemented by our habitual use of a Hawaiian Airlines VISA card, which gave us one mile for every dollar charged. This year we used up almost all of our frequent flyer miles to buy "free" tickets for a flight to Maui that required a plane change in…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Marijuana

Marijuana rolls into center of Oregon Attorney General race

Ellen Rosenblum would be a much better Attorney General for Oregon than Dwight Holton, not least because of her respect for our state's voter-approved medical marijuana act, which Holton almost certainly would continue to undermine -- notwithstanding politically-inspired attempts to downplay his previous attacks against the act. I hope she wins tomorrow in the Democratic primary. Rosenblum is the choice of progressives, while a poll showed that Holton is favored only by the most conservative Democrats. A few days ago I got an email from a US News and World Report editor who wrote a story analyzing the impact marijuana…
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Posted inSalem Sustainability

1000 Friends of Oregon urges Salem to preserve Sustainable Fairview

Today the Salem City Council has a choice to make: preserve cutting-edge Green zoning requirements for the highly touted Sustainable Fairview mixed use development, or show once again why Oregon's capital deserves it's nickname, "So-lame." I'm not wildly optimistic, given the Salem Planning Commission's disappointing go-ahead to Simpson Hills, LLC that would allow it to build a bunch of average apartments on what should be an exceptional piece of property. But if the City Council listens to those in the know, as opposed to those with the biggest short-term profit motive, it will stick with the Sustainable Fairview Master Plan.…
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Posted inHumor Salem

My (cynical) ideas for a Salem, Oregon city slogan

Yesterday Michael Rose, a business reporter for the Statesman Journal, asked in a Twitter tweet, "What would be a good city slogan for Salem Ore.?" Oh, great question. My mind is cynically-inclined when it comes to describing Salem's positive qualities, or more accurately, lack thereof. So it didn't take me long to respond to Michael with quite a few suggestions. Waking up this morning, after my brain had unconsciously incubated additional embryonic seeds of cynicism, I came up with some more. This is my current Salem city slogan oeuvre. Salem, the blandburger sandwiched between Portland and Eugene's spicy buns Salem, after you…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Home life

Thanks to Obama, I’m going to stop saying “that’s so gay!”

Yesterday I was thrilled to learn that President Obama has come out (so to speak) in favor of gay marriage. This is a good move ethically as well as politically.  Homosexuals are people too, Mitt Romney and fellow gay-bashing Republicans. Recognizing the obvious will energize Obama's base, and it won't cost him many votes since homophobes already plan to vote against him. Eugene Robinson ends his column on this subject with: Politically, Obama may have taken a big step toward reclaiming the future. The magic of hope and change that suffused his 2008 campaign has dissipated after 40 grueling months…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Economic austerity humorously ridiculed in Fiore animation

Austerity to bring about prosperity is a ridiculous economic idea. So I liked how Mark Fiore makes fun of this notion in his News in a Nutshell animation, "Assaulting Austerity," or: "Why events an ocean away matter to you." Check it out. You'll never again believe Mitt Romney or other Republicans who say that cutting spending and jobs in a recession is the way to... here's the joke... get more spending and jobs! (Not that you ever should have believed them.) Hilarious. Or it would be, if right-wingers weren't so serious about pursuing wacked-out policies that would only benefit the rich.…
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Posted inPhilosophy Scootering

Why biking and other risky activities are dangerous, but not fearful

Thank you, Tim Krieder, for writing such a marvelous New York Times essay, "Cycle of Fear." You wonderfully described why I love riding my maxi-scooter (a Suzuki Burgman 650) so much. Also, why I like boogie boarding on the biggest waves I can find on a Hawaii vacation so much. Krieder talks about riding his bicycle in New York City. But his explanation of why risky activities are so enjoyable applies to lots of pursuits: motorcycling, downhill skiing, rock climbing, skateboarding, horse riding, many others. After speaking about our modern-day hypervigilance to mostly imaginary threats, the worries and anxieties of…
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Posted inEntertainment

Video of father-daughter wedding dance I’m envious of

When my daughter, Celeste, got married, I wasn't the dancing fool that I am now. By "fool," I mean that my dancing is more fun for me than it is artistic to look at; also that I now feel foolish for not having started to take ballroom lessons earlier than my wife and I did, because we really enjoy dancing. If I had my father-daughter wedding dance to do over again, I'd love it to look like this one. I think I could handle most of the moves this fellow gray-haired guy throws out on the dance floor so engagingly.…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

European Union is a success, no matter what U.S. conservatives say

With the French elections happening today, Adam Gopnik's "Vive La France" piece in the May 7 The New Yorker is timely reading.  Like so much else in the magazine, it's wonderfully written and soundly reasoned. The piece touches on a question that baffles me: why conservatives/Republicans in our semi good-old USA have such a distaste for European social democracies. Those nations do a lot of things better than we do. Like health care. Modern transportation. Making it possible to move up the economic ladder. Providing essential social services to all of their citizens. At the end of his essay, Gopnik…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Science

Heartland Institute compares global warming believers to “murderers”

As if we needed more proof that anti-science global warming deniers are wackos, here it is: Well, when facts, reality, and 98% of the world's leading climate scientists aren't on your side, it looks like the global warming deniers are reduced to disgusting fearmongering and personal insults. Here's what part of the Heartland Institute's press release announcing the billboard campaign said: May 3, 2012 – Billboards in Chicago paid for by The Heartland Institute point out that some of the world’s most notorious criminals say they “still believe in global warming” – and ask viewers if they do, too. Heartland’s first digital…
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Posted inHome life Salem

Oregon weather breaks my May heart… then heals it

Oregon weather, I'm fed up with you. I've had enough abuse. This afternoon I realized that I can't stand you anymore. Driving around in south Salem, I just had to pull over, grab my iPhone, and document what a crappy companion you've become.  Come on! You're ridiculous! My Mini's thermometer doesn't lie. The warmth between us is gone. You're giving me 43 degrees. That's cold any time. Especially... When the time is 12:50 pm -- middle of the freakin' day! -- on May 4. Spring. In fact, late spring. Yeah, I'd been listening to the "Chill" station on Sirius satellite…
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Posted inSalem Sustainability

Salem City Council, preserve the vision of “Sustainable Fairview”

Please, Salem (Oregon) City Council. Pretty please. Don't allow the beautiful property in south Salem to become less than the world-class Green development that Sustainable Fairview currently is zoned as. A few days ago I learned that the Salem Planning Commission is OK with turning the undeveloped portion of the property from a vibrant green to a blah gray, architecturally speaking. On May 14 the City Council meets to decide whether to allow Simpson Hills, LLC to build a bunch of typical apartments on 43 of the 104 acres it owns at the site that used to house the Fairview…
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Posted inWeb/Tech

Dark Sky tells me if it’s going to rain soon. Great iPhone app.

Here in Oregon it's super important to know for me to know if rain is coming in the next hour. Even though I'm retired, I have many crucial things to do -- such as taking our oldest dog for a semi-slow motion walk every afternoon. Our walk takes about an hour though it's less than two miles. Serena is twelve and a half. She doesn't move nearly as fast as she used to, unless a CAT! grabs her attention. So this morning, when I learned about Dark Sky through my iPhone's AppAdvice app, almost instantly I decided to fork out $3.99…
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Posted inHome life Salem

My photographic evidence that the world’s alright

There's a lot wrong with the world. No doubt about that. But I've accumulated some photographic evidence on my iPhone which shows how alright things are also. Along with some fellow Trader Joe's-loving friends, we've been worried about how well the recently-opened Salem, Oregon store is doing. Seems like it isn't very crowded whenever I shop there. But when I glanced into the blue/green glass bin at the D&O Garbage recycling center a few days ago, I thought Alright!  Tossing my own Charles Shaw (Trader Joe's famous $2.49 wine) bottles into the bin, I was struck by how many similarly labeled…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

So true: Republicans are the problem in American politics

Thank you for saying it, Norman Ornstein and Thomas Mann. The Republicans are the problem. These respected centrists (Ornstein is with the American Enterprise Institute; Mann with the Brookings Institution) have written a terrific piece in the Washington Post that's based on their forthcoming book. It's clear, truthful, undeniable. One major political party in the United States has gone wacko, and it isn't the Democratic Party. Below are some of my favorite parts of the essay. The mention of habitual Republican use of the filibuster, something new in Senate politics, is right-on. Why does the media say "The Democratic proposal…
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Posted inCurrent affairs Sustainability

Global warming deniers are “merchants of doubt”

Facts are facts. Cigarettes cause lung cancer. Coal-fired power plants cause acid rain. Fossil fuel emissions cause global warming. There's scientific consensus on the causes of lung cancer, acid rain, and global warming. Unfortunately, there also has been, and still is, a systematic effort to spread lies about these serious problems. In her book "Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming," historian Naomi Oreskes documented how this happened. A review says: Merchants of Doubt might be one of the most important books of the year. Exhaustively researched and documented, it…
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Posted inCurrent affairs

Get high on Rosenblum to be Oregon A.G., not Holton, fellow Democrats

The more I learn about Dwight Holton, candidate for Oregon Attorney General in the May 15 primary, the less I like him. Ellen Rosenblum seems like a much better choice.  Holton, during his stint as United States Attorney for Oregon, tried to undermine our state's medical marijuana law. It irks me how the Obama administration is raiding medical marijuana providers around the country, desperate to take away a drug that relieves chronic pain and helps cancer sufferers feel better. So why would Oregon want to elect somebody who supports a crazy federal law which equates marijuana with heroin and erroneously…
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