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Face Your Food On UN World Food Day, October 16

Tomorrow is World Food Day , and FairFood International, which “encourages sustainability in the food industry, contributing to the fight against poverty and hunger around the world.” is trying a new form of very social media to promote it. They have set up a websit… Read the full story on TreeHugger

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For Many People, The Stars Don’t Come Out Any More

Credit: Stellarium Click image to enlarge Neil deGrasse Tyson of the Hayden Planetarium has complained that kids growing up where he did (in the Bronx) don’t even know that there are stars. This image, generated by Stellarium software, shows the dramatic difference…. Read the full story on TreeHugger

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Apple to hold ‘Back to the Mac’ event on October 20th, we’ll be there live!

Oh boy. New Air? Verizon iPhone? Jobs grows a huge beard? Probably not. Apple wants to talk about “what’s new for the Mac,” which could mean some hardware — but the company definitely wants to talk software too. See that lion sneaking around behind the logo? Apple is bringing the media out to Cupertino to discuss (amongst other things) the next version of OS X. That’s right — a non-mobile product. If you think it’s too early for 10.7, don’t worry — last time we did this dance, the company previewed Snow Leopard about a year before it hit your screens. The whole thing goes down at 10AM PT on October 20th , and we’ll be covering the news live! Stay tuned. Apple to hold ‘Back to the Mac’ event on October 20th, we’ll be there live! originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 13 Oct 2010 11:06:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds . Permalink

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A major part of the Barack Obama narrative when he ran for president was his international roots, the global sweep of his life, and how much more cosmopolitan he would be as president than the pedestrian George W. Bush. So it's a little weird to watch Obama yelling from the campaign podium that foreigners are funding political commercials and stealing our elections. Obama's now stooped to accusing the U.S. Chamber of Commerce of being a tool of foreign operatives. He doesn't produce any evidence to make the charge; but since when has this stopped him? Obama's Organizing for America clones are promoting this quote of his: “This is a threat to our democracy….And if we just stand by and let the special interests to silence anybody who's got the guts to stand up to them, our country's going to be a very different place.” So Obama's critics are now “threats to our democracy.” That, folks, is desperation. Barack Obama clearly doesn't have the guts to stick to the global-village narrative his liberal base in the media and elsewhere adore. The Washington Post now laments that his critique smacks of xenophobia. read more

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Actors Demonstrate How To Save Energy- In a Glass-Walled Shipping Container

BC Hydro Here’s a great gig for your typical marginally employed actor: sit in a shipping container all day to demonstrate how to save energy. BC Hydro converted two shipping containers into lovely little apartments with glass walls; In one, an actor has blazing lights, big TV and a computer running, while in the other, the actor follows the typical TreeHugger recommended regime of turning off lights, reading by the plentiful natural light. Giant meters display their respective consumption; truly a power struggle…. Read the full story on TreeHugger

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‘Brace’ for No Change: AP Frets Steady Social Security Payments Mean Seniors Forced to Buy ‘Cheap Whiskey’

The consumer price index is holding steady, so that means no “cost of living adjustment” upward in Social Security payments in 2011, prompting the Associated Press to distribute on Monday night a lengthy dispatch reciting complaints from seniors about the supposedly intolerable situation: “ Senior citizens brace for Social Security freeze .” Without mentioning how recipients received a very generous 5.8 percent hike in 2009 , Florida-based AP reporter Matt Sedensky ominously led: Seniors prepared to cut back on everything from food to charitable donations to whiskey as word spread Monday that they will have to wait until at least 2012 to see their Social Security checks increase. If no change means cutting back on food, imagine the media's hyperbole over victims if anyone ever suggests reducing payments in any federal program. That's what the Tea Party will be up against. As for the threat to the ability of our nation's seniors to imbibe whisky, Sedensky stopped by “St. Andrews Estates North, a Boca Raton retirement community,” where “Bette Baldwin won't be able to travel or help her children as much. Dorcas Eppright will give less to charity. Jack Dawson will buy cheap whiskey instead of his beloved Canadian Club.” Another year without an increase in payments while costs hold even and Dawson will be forced to eat dog food! read more

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Marantz expands AirPlay support to four devices, keeps on charging for the privilege

If you liked the idea of paying

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Daily Kos Already Lamenting How ‘Corporate Media’ Will Tell Obama to Move to the Center

As you might expect, the bloggers at the Daily Kos are already rationalizing away about large liberal losses. This can only mean that true liberalism hasn’t been tried, declared one Laurence Lewis , and the media are mean-spirited centrist elites: No matter what happens this November, we know what will be at least one aspect of the corporate media’s response: they will tell us that President Obama and the Democrats must move more to the center…. The truth is that neither President Obama nor the Democratic Congress has been particularly liberal. They have been liberal relative to the extreme right that the corporate media largely accepts, rationalizes, and enables as the new iteration of the Republican Party, and they have been marginally liberal relative to the corporatist conservatism of most in that media, but on an honest scale, that is not really liberal.  Weird enough? Then there’s the belief that global warming is not just some kid sticking the mercury in hot cocoa, says  DarkSyde , but then cocoa gives way to oral sex analogies: If your child is sick and you want to check for fever, you use a thermometer. You don’t care what Rush Limbaugh says, or what Al Gore says, you care what that thermometer says. And if you want to be super careful, you might use more than one thermometer, or different kinds of thermometers, just in case that kid is dipping it in hot chocolate. That’s what two climatologists did when they wanted to check on the earth’s past temperature. Just to be safe they used several different kinds of thermometers. Doesn’t matter what Rush says, doesn’t matter what Gore says, all that matters is what those thermometers say. And guess what they said? The earth has a fever, that fever is rising, and it’s approaching delirium . The work was so exquisitely done, and it’s been so well supported by independent studies, that in any other nation the researchers involved would be up for major recognition. But not in teabagger America, where corporate rent-boys bought and paid for by fossil fuel johns drop to their knees on command to kiss some Koch . Or there’s weird Nuremberg trial analogies for bankers from  Drawline : Justice in the 21st century is determined by billionaires. Capitalism unchecked brings you to another holocaust: First the holocaust of the environment and then the holocaust of the weak and powerless. If we lose the house and senate, we will not be able to replace far right judges in the court system, and justice will keep on being for sale in this country and other countries that follow our lead.

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Krauthammer Smacks Down Inside Washington Panel Over GOP Campaign Contributions

Charles Krauthammer on Friday called the entire panel of PBS’s “Inside Washington” a bunch of whiners for complaining about anonymous campaign contributions Republicans are receiving this election cycle. After host Gordon Peterson briefly explained the impact of the Supreme Court’s Citizens United ruling earlier this year, NPR’s Nina Totenberg called it a “scandal in the making…this is the kind of thing that led to Watergate.”   Peterson then surprisingly asked, “Are you aware of any Democrats turning down soft money like this?” Totenberg hypocritically answered, “No, but the Democrats aren’t getting – it’s eight to one is the, is the disproportion here.”  Krauthammer marvelously jumped in, “So in other words, it’s whining,” and that’s when the fun started (video follows with partial transcript and commentary):  GORDON PETERSON, HOST: Thanks to the Supreme Court Citizens United ruling earlier this year, 501(c) nonprofits can pump millions of dollars into our elections and they don’t have to tell us where the money is coming from. The best government money can buy, Nina. NINA TOTENBERG, NPR: Well, you know, really, this is the next scandal. It’s a, the scandal in the making. They don’t have to disclose anything. And eventually, this is the kind of thing that led to Watergate. PETERSON: Are you aware of any Democrats turning down soft money like this? TOTENBERG: No, but the Democrats aren’t getting – it’s eight to one is the, is the disproportion here. CHARLES KRAUTHAMMER: So in other words, it’s whining. After Totenberg and the other panelists – the Washington Post’s Colby King and PBS’s Mark Shields – made mostly similar points about how terrible these anonymous contributions are, Krauthammer struck back: KRAUTHAMMER: This is whining squared. First of all, eight to one, well, there is a “one” obviously. Democrats are also in the game, but they are losing the game, so they are very unhappy. Secondly, the law came from the Supreme Court. It decided that this kind of disclosure is not required. I am not a fan of the ruling, but it is the law, so it’s within the law. Secondly, you know, Democrats are complaining about how much Republicans are raising. In the last election cycle, Obama alone raised $600 million, breaking all records in the galaxy, and he raised another 300 for the DNC. TOTENBERG: But we know from where. KRAUTHAMMER: When he runs next time, I’m saying the Supreme Court has decided it’s not required. TOTENBERG: The question is we know from where. KRAUTHAMMER: The question is what’s affecting, the implication is that the President, you showed that clip of the President, and the implication is that the Republicans are purchasing this election. This is nonsense. One example: Rove has raised $50 million; the unions have set aside $100 million in this election, and the difference is… PETERSON: I think it’s more like $200 million. KRAUTHAMMER: …that a union member doesn’t have a say in whether it goes to a Democrat or Republican even if he is a Republican. So let’s not hear this whining about how the money is (unintelligible). That’s not why Republicans lost in ’08 and not why Democrats are going to lose in ’10. Indeed. Obama and the Democrats set all kinds of campaign finance records during the last election cycle, and now that these numbers are favoring Republicans, liberal media members are crying “foul!” As Krauthammer also pointed out, the press never seems to have any problem with contributions made by America’s labor unions which almost exclusively go to Democrats. As such, Krauthammer properly identified what all this media hyperventilation is concerning this year’s campaign finance issue: whining squared.

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With low poll approval ratings and the prospect of his congressional allies in Congress taking a drubbing in November, it’s hardly surprising the liberal media are looking for any silver lining for Obama that it can find. Enter Time magazine’s Kate Pickert, who on the magazine’s Swampland blog yesterday claimed that a ruling upholding ObamaCare’s constitutionality yesterday was a “significant victory for the Obama administration.” A temporary boost, perhaps, but significant? The ruling was at the District Court level, and the public interest firm representing the plaintiffs plans to appeal to the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals . Plus Pickert herself noted that there are plenty of other court challenges against ObamaCare, and they are not all bound to come down the same way District Court Judge George Steeh ruled yesterday. What is significant is how Judge Steeh’s reasoning profoundly obliterates the scope of the Constitution’s interstate commerce clause to define refraining from commerce as commerce. It’s an open question if appellate courts agree. From the ruling (emphasis mine): The health care market is unlike other markets. No one can guarantee his or her health, or ensure that he or she will never participate in the health care market. Indeed, the opposite is nearly always true. The question is how participants in the health care market pay for medical expenses – through insurance, or through an attempt to pay out of pocket with a backstop of uncompensated care funded by third parties. The plaintiffs have not opted out of the health care services market because, as living, breathing beings, who do not oppose medical services on religious grounds, they cannot opt out of this market. As inseparable and integral members of the health care services market, plaintiffs have made a choice regarding the method of payment for the services they expect to receive. The government makes the apropos analogy of paying by credit card rather than by check. How participants in the health care services market pay for such services has a documented impact on interstate commerce. Obviously, this market reality forms the rational basis for Congressional action designed to reduce the number of uninsureds. [P]laintiffs in this case are participants in the health care services market. They are not outside the market. While plaintiffs describe the Commerce Clause power as reaching economic activity, the government’s characterization of the Commerce Clause reaching economic decisions is more accurate. With that reasoning, Judge Steeh thoroughly unmoors the commerce clause from its concern with actual economic activity that Congress can regulate to a more amorphous realm of “economic decisions” which apparently include the decision to NOT enter into commerce at all. That’s the true significant aspect of yesterday’s ruling, and it will prove interesting to see how the 6th Circuit Court of Appeals would handle Judge Steeh’s reasoning and conclusions. But a significant victory for Obama? It’s far too early to tell, although it’s understandable why Obama cheerleaders in the media would like to paint it that way.

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