Good morning on what may be a snowy day today.  The weather people predict falling temperatures (from mid to low 30s to low 20s) over the day and for our area--lake effect snow.  As much as 6-8 inches.  We are going to make a trip to the gas station to top off the tank.  We want a full tank just in case.

I have found three or four needles the hard way over the years, Nicola.  Now, when I loose one,  I search until I find it.  And any spent needles are put in either a paper shroud or into a vial that is being thrown away also.

I have to ask--what the hell is going on?  Saw this story this morning and have seen 3 or 4 in Chicago over the last month.  I think every one of them involved a drunk driver.

Well, the banks, the states, and the Federal Government have reached an agreement in the mortgage mess.  I am glad the big five banks will have to pay something.  However, the payment of $1500 to $2000 for those who lost their homes when the banks wrongly foreclosed may be a lot of money until compared to what those homeowners lost.  It is nice that the banks have to start renegotiating with homeowners to refinance and may even have to reduce the principle for some.  But they have three years to do so.  That is a kick the can down the road provision that keeps people in mortgage limbo.  And I wonder how long before the banks lobbyists go to their tame congress critters to get relief.  The only really good thing--the agreement did not grant an immunity from criminal charges.  At least from what I have read so far.  Only one commenter last night noted a big potential problem--the homeowner who has been trying to refinance only to be told by his bank that he 'doesn't qualify' but sees his neighbor getting the refi.  How long before such homeowners just flip them the bird and walk away?  For a better discussion on which criteria should determine how good this deal is (or is not), see this piece from Crooks&Liars.

The local news had a small segment this morning that I didn't hear all of but had some interesting aspects. Health insurance companies are resisting measures, whether on state or federal level I didn't hear, that require them to tell their customers in plain language what procedures are covered.  They say it would be too onerous a burden on them.  Really??  It is too burdensome to deal honestly and plainly with the people whose money you are taking.  What bullshit.

And here is another example of the eyeball level of bullshit in our economic/political system.  The politicians who yell the loudest about 'waste' in government will gladly subsidize big businesses that are already highly profitable.  Worse, the federal agencies which are supposed to protect our health and welfare are thoroughly subverted by the businesses they 'regulate.'  And, though I agree with the sentiment in the last paragraph that we protest the incestuous mess by not buying the products, how can we do that when the FDA decides that the industry doesn't have to list certain ingredients (like neotame) or the industry tries to mask their ingredients under innocuous labels (like calling high-fructose corn syrup 'corn sugar')??

I have already used the term bullshit twice so I am going to have to find something else to describe this. Another health threat that our FDA chose not to make public.

When we went out (and yes we completed the errands I mentioned at the beginning) we decided to stop and renew our supply of Excedrin.  I had put a dent in it when I had that infected, broken tooth just before Christmas.  Well, the local Walgreens had none.  They have a blank spot and a notice of the recall from January 9.  I would have thought a month would have been sufficient to get things straightened out and new supplies in.  We settled for the Walgreens version which is almost the same.

Good morning to you all.  Looks like clear skies today but frosty for now.  They say the temperature should reach 40 today--again.  Sorry for the messy look to yesterday's post.  I thought I had set things up for nice, tidy columns but, evidently, the actual post is several spaces narrower than the composition space.  Oh, well, next time I will know better.  Let's see if there is anything worth commenting on this morning.

Yes, indeed, Nicola.  It will be busy and it is rewarding, as you say, to the eye and the tummy.  It is also rewarding spiritually and intellectually.  It is far better than a therapist.

I have read a couple of stories lately about law enforcement using drones in U.S. skies.  This Washington Times story indicates that it may become very common before this decade is out.  I had heard that the FAA reauthorization had passed but as usual our useless mainstream media totally failed to cover what was hidden in it.  Just as they have failed to cover the use of drones.  Ties in nicely to the story on our local news concerning the approval by the Illinois state legislature of a bunch of new traffic cameras in Chicago.  We are quickly becoming have become a highly surveilled society.  What is next?  Travel permits issued by the local or national police?  We are very near that with the TSA's 'Trusted Flier' program.  Simply give then all your private information and endure a 10 minute interview and they will issue you an identity card allowing you to bypass TSA scanners and gropers.

And here comes Monsanto yet again.  So they have tweaked aspartame, called it neotame, and have gotten the FDA to approve it without anyone having to list it on the ingredients label.  Isn't that loverly.  And I did go to the link for the FDA pdf and, frankly, it is incomprehensible gobbledygook.  I really don't care how 'onerous' it would be for a producer to list all his ingredients because I should have the right to know what is in the 'food' I eat.

For another installment in 'Pity the poor businessman' bull$hit look at this article.  They say the minimum wage is 'killing' them so they decide to push the legislature to let them pay starvation wages to their employees.  Or I should say pay less than the starvation wages they are required to pay now.  And having worked as a waitress a long time ago I can testify to the fact that the tips don't make up the difference for most servers.

These two stories (here and here), found by way of the Oil Drum, are disturbing.  It would seem that so-called 'targeted' measure directed against unfriendly governments are about as surgical as the drones targeting 'terrorists.'  There is always collateral damage.  I wonder if Elizabeth I would have described embargoes the same way she did wars: I do not like wars. Their outcomes are unpredictable.

I found this interesting story by way of Confessions of a Remedial Stitcher.  I would say we should all give thanks to our humble tools when they have outlived their usefulness.  Perhaps, even before.

Morning, All.  Yes, indeed, the weather has been amazing, Kay.  Get ready though--we expect more winter like temperatures over the weekend.  You should have something similar soon after.  It has been an unusual day because we had to be out early for a medical appointment and we ate breakfast out afterward.  We did most of our computer browsing early before we left and I didn't see much to comment on then.  I still don't see much now.  So I will shift gears and talk about the garden planning which I have worked on for a bit now.

So far I have the following planned:

In the greenhouse--Lettuce (lollo rossa, petite rouge, sanguine ameliorate, heat wave mix)
                              spinach (bloomsdale longstanding)
                              radish (purple plum)
                              beet (bull's blood)

In 5gal pails--tomatoes (brandywine, big rainbow, chocolate cherry, supersweet 100, fresh salsa)
                      peppers (albino bullnose, lipstick)
                      cabbage (cabbage babies)--after salsa and cherry tomatoes spent

In large tubs--corn (ruby queen)              sage                                               roses--miniature
                      pyrethrum mum                 winter squash (butter bush)           lemon balm
                      stevia                                 cabbage (cabbage babies mix)       blueberries (top hat)
                      German thyme                  sunflower (teddy bear)                  
                      kale (red Russian) after corn

In large pots--cucumber (dragon's egg)   summer squash (lemon squash)     potatoes

In individual mid sized pots--                poppy (black peony)       mint  (spearmint, orange)
                     lemon verbena                  rosemary                         bean (dragon tongue)
                     basil                                  love-in-a-mist                  bachelor buttons
                     mums

in small pots on fence--                         marigold (embers)           lemon balm
                     oregano                             lavender        

In small tub--strawberries

It seems like a lot but some items are planned for a late crop after some of the summer plants have finished producing.  And the plans are subject to change depending on what happens.  I have already changed one and removed the tansy from my list.  After all the effort to find a supplier, I discovered this morning that it is poisonous for pets.  Kuma hadn't bothered plants until he went for the blueberries.  I wanted it because the Colorado potato beetles don't like it and lady bugs do.  I will rely on the pyrethrum mum to help discourage the pests.  I also have plenty of room for small plants in the greenhouse.

Hello, Everyone, on this cloudy Tuesday.  Our temperatures are on a roller coaster going between well above normal and about normal.  The forecast today has the possibility of lake effect snow but not much or long lasting with about normal temps in the low 30s.

Well, the news last night and this morning say Germany and France have issued an 'ultimatum' to Greece: reduce government spending or no new funds.  Their action reminds me of some of the scifi movies where the guys with guns blaze away, and blaze away, and blaze away with weapons that don't have any effect or may make the situation worse.  Greece has cut government spending repeatedly and then, because the cuts actually reduce economic activity, failed to meet deficit reduction targets because the tax revenue also fell.  This is a downward spiral with no go end in sight.  But something that intrigues me is the coverage of this Greek tragedy.  The stories always allude to 'necessary' budget cuts without specifying those needed cuts.  I have seen only a couple of stories which said anything specific on the matter and those were in bloggers who did not link to their sources.  They said the demands included a 25% cut in the minimum wage (translate that to going from $7.50/hour here in the U.S. to just over $5/hour), cutting the pension benefits by 35%, and eliminating 100 government agencies throwing another large number of Greeks into unemployment.  What effect do you think that would have on tax revenues and how likely do you think it that Greece will meet the next deficit reduction target?  This piece  in the Financial Times explains some aspects of the situation and confirms the numbers cited by the bloggers.  Maybe they would like to make the proposed changes retroactive to all of the employees who have neither been paid (some for as much as 18 months) nor laid off (so the employer could escape paying unemployment and severance.)  Here is the link I provided a couple of days ago.

This is an intriguing story I have been reading about for a little while now.  Interesting that the number of states contemplating legislation to authorize gold and silver coins as payment of debts has gone from 3 three years ago to 13 this year.

I hear your sentiments on religion, Lois.  I think my comments on history yesterday (that each generation reassess the interpretations in light of their own circumstances).  I said before that I am not much of a gambler.  Well, I am not much of a joiner either and churches are among the institutions I resist joining--vigorously.  I remember a very apt line at the end of Angles and Demons where a cardinal asks Langdon to treat the church gently when he writes of it because religion is flawed 'because men are flawed.'  What ever deity I believe in it isn't the deity of organized religions/churches--any of them.

A few weeks ago the news announced Sears Holdings planned to close 100+ stores across the country. It caused a furor because it came on the announcement that Chicago and Illinois had come up with a package of bribes tax relief measures Sears demanded to keep its headquarters in Chicago.  I noticed that no Chicago stores were slated to close but just a bit ago Mom was reading an article which listed two local stores on the chopping block.  Today, on our way to our favorite year-round farm market, we passed one.  It is the largest local K-Mart and, I think, the only 24-hour store.  It is also right across the road from the Super Wal-Mart.

Good foggy, frosty Monday morning.  The weather people say it should clear out and we will see partly sunny skies today.  They are warning us of a change toward more normal temps for a couple of days.  I was amused when the news anchor observed that normal now feels cold because it has been so warm lately.

Glad you enjoy the commentary, Gina.  I don't often listen to talk radio but I know the kind of comments you wrote about.  They don't surprise me, again, because of my readings in history.  Most people have heard of Malthus and Darwin, and most can give a sketchy outline of their theories.  What most don't remember, however, is that Malthus was an English clergyman and Darwin, between discovering how unsuited he was to study medicine and making his mark as a naturalist, was sent to Cambridge to prepare for a career in the clergy.  The moral foundation of Malthus' economic ideas are most often overlooked.  He saw the plight of the poor as resulting from their moral failings.  Unlike the upright middle-class, the poor were unable to control their baser urges and limit their family size thereby ensuring they would have far more children than they could care for and continuing their impoverished state.  It is more difficult to see the same foundations in Darwin but they are there.  Some years ago science historian James Burke produced an episode of his series The Day the Universe Changed titled Fit to Rule.  There Burke traced the influence Darwin's theories, especially the part concerning the 'survival of the fittest,' on the three dominant -isms of the 20th century (Capitalism, Communism, and Nazism.)  In all of them, the struggle for survival and domination were raised to a moral imperative and those individuals, societies, states that failed in this struggle did so because of natural law which was, for Christians, a reflection of God's will and law. Even Christians who revile Darwin's notion of descent from an ancestral form of life embrace his struggle for existence.  And that idea meshed very nicely with the 'Puritan Work Ethic' that so many of our pundits trot out every now and then.  Calvinist doctrine, from which a number of Protestant varieties trace their origin, insisted that Christians had a duty to work hard in a socially beneficial calling.  Work became a religious imperative.  But John Calvin's followers were beset with severe anxiety.  The doctrine of predestination held that God had decided at the beginning of time the fate of each individual, damnation or salvation.  It was entirely in God's hands and the individual could do nothing to change that fate.  Even the most faithful and observant member of the church may harbor a failing that would condemn them and, worse, neither they nor their companions in the church could ever be absolutely assured of their postmortem fate.  Calvin did throw out a tenuous lifeline: a believer who worked hard in his calling and prospered may be favored by God and likely saved.  Calvin never absolutely equated prosperity with salvation; after all, many of the unGodly prospered in this world.  Others would do that for him.  And I can't blame Calvin; after all, Christ himself said 'by their fruits ye shall know them'.  I think you can see where this is going.  Though morphing over time, the connection between morality and prosperity, or fitness, or success has remained.  And we have people blasting the poor for being lazy, the foreclosed homeowner for gaming the system, the long term unemployed for preferring handouts to honest work, etc.  And of course, those condemning their fellow citizens are bolstering their own fragile egos because the implicit comparison is 'how good am I that I am not them.'

Oh, yes, Nicola.  Greece is in deep and not likely to get out any time soon.  I find it interesting that the pundits have gone from discussing whether Greece will default to when Greece will default and what the ramifications will be among the other fragile Eurozone countries.  Very few really note how pervasive debt has become over the last thirty or so years.  When the total debt of a country (individual, corporate, sovereign) amounts to several times the GDP, you are in trouble.  Most of the advanced economies around the world are in exactly that position.  I read a bit ago that U.S. debt last year equalled GDP.  Of course, government officials claim that we are still below that by excluding the debt owed between government agencies--but that is fiddling the books.

This interesting read comes from Club Orlov.  I am not much of a gambler and so it fascinates me to watch various aspects of gambling in our society.  I had to look up the 'Legion of Thebes' and the notion of repeated decimations is interesting albeit frightening.

For those who are, like me, always on the lookout for frugal living tips, check out Rhonda's latest post at Down to Earth.  We immediately bookmarked the Budget101 site.  It has a wonderful, long list of seasoning mixes you can make yourself.

Good morning.  We woke to heavy fog that is lifting now.  I hope, looking out at what look at the moment like clear skies, to see the sun today.  That storm that buried Colorado lost its steam out in Iowa somewhere so we got just a dusting of snow and some rain.  The weather people say our temperatures over the next week will be closer to normal.  I think I will go ahead and prepare the milk jug 'greenhouses' and winter sow some spinach.  I am in the process of going through all the seeds, left overs and new, to plan when I will start what.  My list looks absolutely too much for my containers but then some (like the cabbage and kale) will be started in the summer for late fall harvest.  I am still debating putting in a few potatoes and have some time to decide.  I noticed that the edges of my containers have started to thaw a bit.  The interiors are still frozen but the plants still look good below the dead foliage.

Welcome, Gina.  I am glad you came by.  I think Mark Twain is credited with the quip that 'history doesn't repeat but it does rhyme.'  He was totally right.

On the notion that we never learn, Lois, Robert Reich in his 2011 book Aftershock says that part of that comes from 'loss of generational memory.'  Few now remember the devastation of the Great Depression and those that remember World War II are getting fewer in number every year.  Those were times when Americans agreed, to a very large degree, that we were all in the soup together and we had to get out of it together.  This time a significant part of our society seems to have decided that everyone is on their own.  Also, each generation reassesses history in the light of the cultural and social values of its time.  I noticed the beginning of such a shift about fifteen years ago when I was a teaching assistant in a university history department.  I was assigned to work with a professor temporarily hired for the year who had decided that slavery had absolutely nothing to do with the coming of the Civil War and totally dropped it from the curriculum.  A friend, also assigned to work with this fellow, was totally outraged by this historical myopia and made sure her students were thoroughly informed on how intertwined slavery, politics, and economics were.  And, in case you wondered, the idiot also totally ignored aspects of northern labor history as well.  In other words, labor unions played no roll in U.S. history either.  The so-called titans of industry (Rockefeller, Carnegie, and Ford, et al.) however were thoroughly covered.

NPR featured this article on the Greek disaster.  There isn't any other way to describe their fiscal mess.  I noticed over the last week that hitches in the negotiations with employers and labor were stalling the long anticipated agreement on the next installment of bailout money the government needs.  Talk about a Catch-22.  Employers don't pay their employees but don't lay them off either.  That way they don't shell out the owed wages and avoid the severance pay they are legally obligated to pay workers they lay off.  And for those who are unemployed the government is having difficulty keeping up with the stipends they system promised.  And getting a new job in the current depressed economy--not likely.  I just love the Repthuglican argument that our 'overly generous' unemployment benefits encourages workers to stay out of the workforce and on their lazy butts.  It reminds me of the arguments slave holders in the Old South trotted out to justify their harsh treatment of African slaves.  The congenitally lazy and immoral slaves wouldn't work hard unless they felt the bite of the lash.  Well, obscene compensation for the our financial whiz kids and top CEOs really yielded good results for our economy, didn't it?

Talke about deja vu--this story seems to come back to life like a vampire in the dark of every winter.  If I were a head of state of any European country one of my top priorities would be finding a way to do without Russian gas.

It is interesting that al Jazeera asks the question most in American politics refuse to ask.  I saw one of the interviews with Buddy Romer, former Louisiana governor, which may be the one the author is citing.  He came out and stated directly that our system 'isn't broken. It's been bought.'

Good Saturday morning, All.  A dusting of snow fell over night.  It looks like we are catching the northern edge of that system that dropped snow by the foot on Colorado and points east.  Kuma cried so pitifully that I let him out.  He was't happy when he came in and is now skulking upstairs.  Glad to see you are back, Lois.  Hope your internet problems are solved.  Given the snow out your way I gathered your boys would be sulking, also.

There isn't much in the news I really feel like commenting on so I will go off on a tangent.  Every now and then I get a feeling of deja vu looking at the events of today.  Not that I feel that I have been in the same place personally but rather that as a society we have been here before.  It comes I think from having studied history for way too much of my adult life.  As I watched the Occupy movement take shape and the 'official' response (i.e., sending in the 'troops,' a.k.a. police) the deja vu feeling was especially strong.  It didn't take long to recall my readings on the Great Depression and the Bonus Army.  In 1932, a bit over 30k people (men, women, and children) including 17k veterans of WWI camped on the Mall in Washington, D.C. demanding that the government honor immediately the bonus certificates given veterans in lieu of part of their military pay.  The certificates were not due to mature until 1945 when the government was obligated to pay the back pay plus interest.  However most of the veterans had been unemployed since the beginning of the Depression 2+ years earlier.  After the city police met with resistance during which some of the veterans were killed, Hoover sent in the army which cleared the National Mall and set fire to the tent city.  Commanding officer was General Douglas MacArthur with junior aid Major D.D. Eisenhower supported by 6 tanks under General John.

The military roll in the suppression of the Bonus Army tickled another memory in my mind and I finally tracked it down:  Coxey's Army of 1894.  In the wake of the depression of 1894, Jacob Coxey inspired several groups of varying sizes across the U.S.  All demanded government help for the unemployed and others hurt during the severe economic crisis.  Coxey led a band from Ohio through a large swath of Pennsylvania while another band took over a train in the Northwest which they rode through Montana.  Large numbers of supporters prevented U.S. marshals from arresting the party so the government sent in the army which succeeded in intercepting and ending the ride in Missoula.  The army was used to disband other segments of Coxey's 'Army' providing the blueprint for the use of Federal troops against the demonstrations during the Pullman Strike in Chicago a few months later.  Though all of these groups intended to carry their protest and demands to Washington itself,  none made it that far.

I guess we have been there and done that.