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Friday, August 18, 2017

How Islam Began - In Ten Minutes

Are You Above Or Below Average?

Children of Catholic Priests - Part 2

Please see the post entitled "Secrets and Sorrow" from August 16th that features the article "Children of Catholic priests live with secrets and sorrow" By Michael Rezendes for Part 1 of this extraordinary story.

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An excerpt from the Boston Globe -

A priest’s son takes his case directly to the Pope
By Michael Rezendes

ONE BRIGHT MORNING three years ago, Vincent Doyle joined the thousands of Catholic faithful jamming St. Peter’s Square for a chance to see Pope Francis make his weekly public appearance and bestow his blessing on the crowd.

Unlike most of those standing in the searing Roman sun, Doyle was headed to a front-row seat in a reserved section very close to where the pope would emerge, and he was already silently rehearsing an urgent message in the pontiff’s native language.

“I am the son of a Catholic priest in Ireland,” he repeated in Spanish, praying he would not become tongue-tied or overcome with emotion when he met the Holy Father.

Doyle learned at the age of 28 that the beloved godfather he grew up calling “J.J.” — a Catholic priest from a rural diocese in central Ireland — was, in fact, his biological father.

J.J. had died years before, leaving Doyle with many unanswered questions. But, after discovering his true father and meeting a woman whose father was also a Catholic priest, one question in particular would drive him: Just how many children of Catholic clergy are there?

Though there had been notorious scandals in the 1990s involving Irish clergy who fathered children, there was little reliable information on the larger subject of priests and their offspring, Doyle found. So he came up with his own solution: He built a website he called Coping International and invited anyone who was the daughter or son of a priest to contact him.

http://www.bostonglobe.com/metro/2017/08/17/father-father-priest-son-takes-his-case-directly-pope/g8ObYa0NATZy3itVSzdflM/story.html


He Has Already Resigned

An excerpt from the NY Times -

The Week When President Trump Resigned
By Frank Bruni

As the worst week in a cursed presidency wound down, I spotted more and more forecasts that Donald Trump would resign, including from Tony Schwartz, who wrote “The Art of the Deal” for Trump and presumably understands his tortured psyche.

They struck me not as wishful or fantastical.

They struck me as late.

Trump resigned the presidency already — if we regard the job as one of moral stewardship, if we assume that an iota of civic concern must joust with self-regard, if we expect a president’s interest in legislation to rise above vacuous theatrics, if we consider a certain baseline of diplomatic etiquette to be part of the equation.

By those measures, it’s arguable that Trump’s presidency never really began. By those measures, it’s indisputable that his presidency ended in the lobby of Trump Tower on Tuesday afternoon, when he chose — yes, chose — to litigate rather than lead, to attend to his wounded pride instead of his wounded nation and to debate the supposed fine points of white supremacy.

He abdicated his responsibilities so thoroughly and recklessly that it amounted to a letter of resignation. Then he whored for his Virginia winery on the way out the door.

https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/18/opinion/sunday/president-trump-resignation.html?action=click&pgtype=Homepage&region=CColumn&module=MostEmailed&version=Full&src=me&WT.nav=MostEmailed

And Then There Was One

From the Washington Post - 

Pence is the last man standing in this photo (besides Trump himself)
By Callum Borchers


This Jan. 28 photo shows President Trump speaking by phone with Russian President Vladimir Putin in the Oval Office, surrounded, from left, by then-White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus, Vice President Pence, then-chief strategist Stephen K. Bannon, then-press secretary Sean Spicer and then-national security adviser Michael Flynn. (Photo by Drew Angerer/Getty Images)

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-fix/wp/2017/08/18/mike-pence-is-the-last-man-standing-in-this-photo-besides-trump-himself/?hpid=hp_hp-cards_hp-card-politics%3Ahomepage%2Fcard&utm_term=.8ef577a76f45

Honoring the Typewriter

From the NY Times -

Review: ‘California Typewriter’: Preserving the Past, Key by Key
CALIFORNIA TYPEWRITER Directed by Doug Nichol
By JEANNETTE CATSOULIS





https://www.nytimes.com/2017/08/17/movies/california-typewriter-review.html?emc=edit_ca_20170818&nl=california-today&nlid=38867499&te=1&_r=0

Bakers. This One's For You.

From the LA Times -

How to make the best brownies ever, plus a recipe
By Noelle Carter

http://www.latimes.com/food/la-fo-great-brownies-chocolate-recipe-20170803-htmlstory.html#nws=mcnewsletter

An Unlikely Convert

A riveting article about the rise of a white nationalist and his ultimate decision to denounce that way of thinking.  It's long but well worth the read.

From the Washington Post -

The white flight of Derek Black
By Eli Saslow

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/the-white-flight-of-derek-black/2016/10/15/ed5f906a-8f3b-11e6-a6a3-d50061aa9fae_story.html?utm_term=.2e86498d4c66

Making an Impact

An excerpt form he Washington Post -

Her #OscarsSoWhite campaign changed how Hollywood deals with race. Now she’s taking on HBO.
By Sonia Rao

When April Reign joined Twitter back in 2010, she was met with the familiar frustration of a taken username. But instead of tacking random numbers onto the end, she opted for a simple play on words: @ReignOfApril.

“I decided I was royalty,” she said.

Reign has lived up to her commanding name. Since she cheekily tweeted “#OscarsSoWhite they asked to touch my hair” in response to an all-white slate of Academy Award acting nominees in 2015, Reign, 47, has been at the epicenter of the online conversation about representation in Hollywood. Her viral hashtag transformed the way we talk about entertainment, and she’s now using another to try to take down the “Game of Thrones” creators’ next TV show — all from her home office in Ellicott City, Md.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/her-oscarssowhite-campaign-changed-how-hollywood-deals-with-race-now-shes-taking-on-hbo/2017/08/16/50cf5606-8100-11e7-902a-2a9f2d808496_story.html?utm_term=.130c0a720166&wpisrc=nl_rainbow&wpmm=1

Using Math to Fight Gerrymandering

An excerpt from the Associated Press -

Math experts join brainpower to help address gerrymandering
By COLLIN BINKLEY

MEDFORD, Mass. (AP) — Some of the brightest minds in math arrived at Tufts University last week to tackle an issue lawyers and political scientists have been struggling with for decades.

They came from colleges across the country for a weeklong conference on gerrymandering, the practice of crafting voting districts in a way that favors voters from a certain political party or demographic. It’s a topic of growing interest among many math and data experts who say their scholarly fields can provide new tools to help courts identify voting maps that are drawn unfairly.

Among those working to bridge the classroom and the courtroom is Moon Duchin, a math professor at Tufts who orchestrated the gathering at her Boston-area campus. The workshop was the first in a series being organized at campuses nationwide to unite academics and to harness cutting-edge mathematics to address gerrymandering.

https://apnews.com/5f1defde7bf74d0ea8c9688d8d3ab51b

Better Late Than Never?

Excerpts from the Huffington Post -

Why Your ‘Apology’ For Defending Trump’s Racism Isn’t Enough
Listen up.
By Zeba Blay

“American Idol” alumnus Clay Aiken tweeted an apology Tuesday that was, frankly, too little and too late.

“Remember all those times I defended [Donald Trump] and believed he was not actually racist?” Aiken wrote. “Well ... I am a f*****g dumbass.”

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It’s convenient to ignore racism when you are not affected by it. It’s presumptuous to declare that something or someone is not racist when you have not experienced racism yourself.

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For the people of color who are directly affected by Trump’s actions and Trump’s rhetoric, who recognized all along that Trump has stoked dangerous ideological fires among white supremacists in America, the fact that some white people like Aiken are now just acknowledging this is incredibly frustrating.

It is, obviously, a good thing that Aiken has recognized he was wrong about Trump, and is willing to admit this in a public space. Few people are. But hopefully Aiken, and other white people who either supported, defended or voted for Trump in spite of his racist track record, will do more than just say they’re sorry ― they’ll make up for it by actively working to dismantle white supremacy.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/why-your-apology-for-defending-trumps-racism-isnt-enough_us_5995ac68e4b0d0d2cc84ebbd

Terminate Hate

From the Good -

This Map Reveals The True Value Of $100 In Each State
by Penn Collins

https://money.good.is/articles/one-hundred-dollars


Thursday, August 17, 2017

Six Words

Check out Six Word Memoirs at the links below.

https://www.sixwordmemoirs.com

http://ew.com/books/2017/08/17/mila-kunis-aziz-ansari-fresh-off-boat-six-word-memoirs/

New at ALCU

An excerpt from the Wall Street Journal -

ACLU Will No Longer Defend Hate Groups Protesting with Firearms
Executive director says violence and guns at Charlottesville rally spurred new stance
By Joe Palazzolo

The American Civil Liberties Union, taking a tougher stance on armed protests, will no longer defend hate groups seeking to march with firearms, the group’s executive director said.

Following clashes over the weekend in Charlottesville, Va., the civil-rights group also will screen clients more closely for the potential of violence at their rallies, said Anthony Romero, who has been the ACLU’s executive director since 2001.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/aclu-changes-policy-on-defending-hate-groups-protesting-with-firearms-1503010167

Pro-Choice Victory

An excerpt from the Washington Post -

Oregon approves sweeping bill expanding abortion access
By Sandhya Somashekhar

Oregon Gov. Kate Brown (D) on Tuesday signed into law what advocates called the nation’s most progressive reproductive health policy, expanding access to abortion and birth control at a time when the Trump administration and other states are trying to restrict them.

Called the Reproductive Health Equity Act, the measure requires health insurers to provide birth control and abortion without charging a co-pay. It also dedicates state funds to provide reproductive health care to noncitizens excluded from Medicaid.

Antiabortion groups swiftly condemned the new law, saying it will force taxpayers to foot the bill for a procedure many consider to be a form of murder, and that it cements Oregon’s status as the most liberal state when it comes to abortion.

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The Pro-Choice Coalition of Oregon, which helped write the law, said it will benefit hundreds of thousands of Oregonians, not only by increasing access to abortion but also birth control and postpartum care for low-income women.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/post-nation/wp/2017/08/15/oregon-approves-sweeping-bill-expanding-abortion-access/?utm_term=.55a56b371de9

Saving the Dead Sea From Sink Holes, One Man's Mission

For the Best Food in Bangkok, Try This Chef’s Home

Roller Derby - Texas Style

Gelato shop opens to create jobs for deaf, educates community too