Sunday, December 20, 2020
Tuesday, December 15, 2020
Sunday, December 13, 2020
Beware of Mad Men
An excerpt from OkayPlayer -
Chris Rock On Joe Biden’s Election Win: “I Wasn’t Jumping For Joy”
By Elijah Watson
“You know, Donald Trump did this thing… Like, when security companies build new locks or security systems, they hire crooks to show you the weaknesses of the system. Well, Donald Trump showed us the weakness of our government,” Rock said. “Now, it’s up to Joe Biden and Congress and the Senate to get rid of those weaknesses—to instill safeguards that actually protect us from unqualified, mad men and mad women, so that we never have to be at the mercy of a person that does not exhibit empathy and competence.”
https://www.okayplayer.com/news/chris-rock-joe-biden-election-win-fargo.html
Thursday, December 10, 2020
We’ve teamed up with @Kaepernick7! Introducing Change the Whirled Non-Dairy, the flavor that's supporting the fight to dismantle systems of oppression and empower Black and Brown people. Coming to freezers in 2021! Learn more: https://t.co/7c0Se2vut4 pic.twitter.com/LY90ObEwCj
— Ben & Jerry's (@benandjerrys) December 10, 2020
A Dog Walks Into A Walmart . . .
An excerpt from the Washington Post -
A dog was missing for weeks. Then it wandered into Walmart and found its owner working at the register.
By Sydney Page
June Rountree and her husband circled their neighborhood night after night looking for their beloved lost dog Abby.
Rountree, 60, realized the dog was missing Nov. 8, when she went to the backyard of their home in Dothan, Ala., and instead of seeing her 4-year-old black-and-white dog, she was horrified to see only Abby’s collar and leash, which was secured to a ground stake.
Despite their efforts, there was no sign of Abby, and the Rountrees were beginning to lose hope.
Three weeks later, an unlikely and perhaps miraculous turn of events left them convinced Abby is either the luckiest or the smartest dog in town.
Rountree, a longtime cashier at Walmart, was busy working her regular shift at register No. 6 on Nov. 28.
She heard a commotion, then looked up and saw a dog inside the store over by the ice machine. People were trying to catch the dog as it ran around.
“I said, ‘It can’t be,’ ” said Rountree, who then watched staff members trail the dog as it darted through the aisles.
“I was like, ‘What in the world is happening?’ ” said Danielle Robinette, 42, a customer service associate at the Walmart. “I’m a huge animal lover, so I just followed her, and she ran up to register No. 6.”
It was Abby.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/2020/12/04/missing-dog-walmart-reunion/
Tarantino's Top 12 Films. Do You Agree?
From Far Out -
From Scorsese to Spielberg: Quentin Tarantino picks the 12 greatest films of all time
By the Far Out Staff
50 Rarely Seen Historical Photos
From Bored Panda -
50 Rarely-Seen Historical Photos That Might Change Your Perspective On Things
By Liucija Adomaite and Austėja Akavickaitė
https://www.boredpanda.com/amazing-rare-historical-photos/
Advice for Teens
From Buzzfeed -
Adults Are Sharing Things That Teenagers Today Should Avoid, And It's Actually Helpful
TBH, good advice for any age...
by Ryan Schocket, BuzzFeed Staff
https://www.buzzfeed.com/ryanschocket2/adults-share-things-teens-should-avoid
Wrongfully Imprisoned
An excerpt from Unilad -
Man Who Was Wrongfully Imprisoned For 8 Years Overturned His Own Conviction And Became A Lawyer
BY: EMILY BROWN
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| A man who was wrongly imprisoned for sexual assault aged 17 managed to overturn his conviction and now works as a defense lawyer to free other people who have been wrongly convicted. |
He explained:
Everyone has a constitutional right to an effective attorney. And so therefore, my constitutional right was violated by not having an effective attorney.
Using newspapers he had access to in prison, Adams identified attorneys litigating cases that could support his argument and managed to work with one to begin drafting a habeas petition. In 2004, Adams’ case was taken on by the Innocence Project, who told him they didn’t understand ‘how on Earth you are in here with 28 years’.
Eight years after his arrest, the Innocence Project argued Adams’ case to the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals in Chicago. The court unanimously overturned Adams’ conviction on the grounds of ineffective assistance of counsel, and in February 2007 he had all charges against him dismissed.
Following his release, Adams enrolled in college and received his associate’s degree, followed by a bachelor’s in criminal law. In May 2015 he graduated from Loyola University Chicago School of Law and went on to be hired by the Innocence Project.
He now works for his own private practice and uses his power as a lawyer to prevent people facing the same fate he did.
https://www.unilad.co.uk/news/man-who-was-wrongfully-imprisoned-for-8-years-overturned-his-own-conviction-and-became-a-lawyer/
The Sacrificial Lambs
An excerpt from the NY Times -
How Black People Learned Not to Trust
Concerns about vaccination are unfortunate, but they have historical roots.
By Charles M. Blow
The unfortunate American fact is that Black people in this country have been well-trained, over centuries, to distrust both the government and the medical establishment on the issue of health care.
In the mid-1800s a man in Alabama named James Marion Sims gained national renown as a doctor after performing medical experiments on enslaved women, who by definition of their position in society could not provide informed consent.
He performed scores of experimental operations on one woman alone, an enslaved woman named Anarcha, before perfecting his technique.
Not only that, he operated on these women without anesthesia, in part because he didn’t believe that Black women experienced pain in the same way that white women did, a dangerous and false sensibility whose remnants linger to this day.
When he finally got his experiments to be successful, he began to use them on white women, but he would begin to use anesthesia for those women.
As medical writer Durrenda Ojanuga wrote in the Journal of Medical Ethics in 1993: “Many white women came to Sims for treatment of vesicovaginal fistula after the successful operation on Anarcha. However, none of them, due to the pain, were able to endure a single operation.”
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/06/opinion/blacks-vaccinations-health.html
Have Yourself a Merry Little Christmas (Official Music Video) - Black Vi...
Black Brass
An excerpt from the NY Times -
‘Is Austin on Your List?’: Biden’s Pentagon Pick Rose Despite Barriers to Diversity
With retired Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III’s nomination to be the first Black defense secretary, the Pentagon comes face to face with its record as a place where people of color struggle to climb.
By Helene Cooper
WASHINGTON — Retired Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III, who is on the brink of becoming the first Black man to be secretary of defense, rose to the heights of an American military whose largely white leadership has not reflected the diversity of its rank and file.
For much of his career, General Austin was accustomed to white men at the top. But a crucial turning point — and a key to his success — came a decade ago, when General Austin and a small group of African-American men populated the military’s most senior ranks.
As a tall and imposing lieutenant general with a habit of referring to himself in the third person, General Austin was the director of the Joint Staff, one of the most powerful behind-the-scenes positions in the military. His No. 2 was also a Black man, Bruce Grooms, a Navy submariner and rear admiral. Larry O. Spencer was a lieutenant general who was the arbiter of which war-fighting commands around the world got the best resources. Dennis L. Via was a three-star general who ran the communications security protocols across the military.
And Darren W. McDew, a major general and aviator with 3,000 flight hours, was a vice director overseeing the plans the Joint Staff churns out.
At one point in 2010, the men thought they should capture the moment for posterity since nothing like that had happened before and likely would not happen again. They summoned the man who had made it happen, their boss, Adm. Mike Mullen, President Barack Obama’s chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, into a room for a photo.
“What is this about?” Admiral Mullen asked when he walked in.
“History,” General McDew replied.
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| From left, Brig. Gen. Michael T. Harrison, Lt. Gen. Larry O. Spencer, Lt. Gen. Dennis L. Via, Adm. Mike Mullen, Lt. Gen. Lloyd J. Austin III, Rear Adm. Bruce Grooms and Maj. Gen. Darren W. McDew in 2010. Most of these men went on to higher ranks.Credit...via Darren W. McDew |
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/09/us/politics/biden-lloyd-austin-defense-secretary.html?referringSource=articleShare