Sunday Reads: Old Photos, Coastlines and Cavemen
Posted: December 9, 2012 Filed under: morning reads, Women's Rights | Tags: New York City Ballet, Pearl Harbor, WWII 24 Comments »
Good Morning
It has been a crazy weekend, and honestly…I am out of the loop…I don’t know what is going on in the world. Hopefully, the links I have to share with you today are new to you!
Friday was December 7th, anniversary of the attack at Pearl Harbor. So let’s start this post with stories remembering World War II and the day that lived in infamy.
This link from the Washington Post is something indeed. Betty McIntosh is 97 years old, and finally her story is being told, or should I say read.
On Dec. 7, 1941, when Japanese planes attacked Pearl Harbor, I was working as a reporter for the Honolulu Star-Bulletin. After a week of war, I wrote a story directed at Hawaii’s women; I thought it would be useful for them to know what I had seen. It might help prepare them for what lay ahead. But my editors thought the graphic content would be too upsetting for readers and decided not to run my article. It appears here for the first time.
There is also a video at that link…so please be sure to take a look at Betty’s story.
Our first group of photographs today are a list of 10 Lesser-Known Iconic Photos from WWII
This WWII era photograph was used to show Americans that women were doing their part to fight the war – even when they really weren’t. The four women pictured here, in front of the famous “Pistol Packin’ Mamma” aircraft, were part of the Women’s Airforce Service Pilots program – better known as the WASPs. One of the four – the farthest on the right – is Blanche Osborn Bross. The WASPs were a very exclusive club. Over 25,000 women applied for the program, and only 2,000 were selected of which barely 1,000 graduated and became pilots. Though they did not see wartime action, some of them did die in airplane accidents. After the war, Blanche Osborn Bross continued to fly, and later served with the Red Cross in China. She died at the age of 92.
This picture of women pilots is my favorite, but there are some disturbing images you must see at that link.
Women were doing their part during the war, working in factories, nursing in hospitals, fast forward to today…and take look at women in the news.
The news abounds that England is expecting a new member to the royal family, and that the Duchess of Cambridge was recently hospitalized for hyperemesis gravidarum, a brutal form of excessive nausea related to pregnancy that can often require medication, IV fluids and nutritional supplement to combat. As royalty, Kate will get the best of care. For everyday women, however, even standard symptoms, never mind complications, aren’t treated with nearly as much deference, especially not if you are a woman in the workplace.
Bathroom breaks for pregnant women are a privilege, not a right.
So claims National Processing of America, a call center being sued for unlawful termination after firing a pregnant employee, whom they believed took too many trips away from her desk to either vomit or just urinate. Their solution to her needing to run to the lavatory to be sick? She was provided with her own wastebasket to keep at her desk. So, besides being expected to vomit in front of her coworkers, apparently she and they were all expected to cope with the post-puke smell as well.
Nausea and the need to frequently urinate are pretty common when pregnant, and the employee had a high risk pregnancy as well. The company, however, was less than sympathetic.
Maddening isn’t it?
Also in the news this week, more crap from Fox News: Fox Nation’s Incredibly Dishonest Attack On An Anti-Domestic Violence PSA
Fox Nation dishonestly accused Planned Parenthood of teaching teenagers how to use makeup to cover up facial marks left from domestic violence. But the video they use as evidence is in fact an anti-domestic violence public service announcement that explicitly implores victims of domestic violence not to cover it up but to seek help.
The source of Fox Nation’s dishonest smear is a PSA called “How to look your best the morning after” that was posted on Planned Parenthood’s Facebook page. The PSA shows a woman using makeup to conceal facial bruises. Fox Nation posted the video and a section of a LifeNews.com article under the headline “Planned Parenthood Shows Teens How to Hide a Beating with Makeup.” The article accompanying the video also claimed Planned Parenthood “shows how to cover up those nasty cuts and bruises that result from a beating”
But contrary to Fox’s deceptive campaign to smear Planned Parenthood, the PSA very clearly urges women not to cover up the effects of domestic violence. The video portrays a woman with facial bruises discussing ways to conceal her bruises. Responding to the sound of a door closing off-screen, the woman abruptly ends the recording with a panicked look on her face. At that point, on-screen text reports that 65 percent of women who suffer domestic abuse try to keep it hidden. The PSA then urges women: “Don’t cover it up.”
Here is another story to get pissed off about: Priest stripped of duties for celebrating Mass with woman priest
A Milwaukee-area Catholic priest was stripped of his priestly duties after he presided over a Mass with a woman priest last month in Georgia.
On Nov. 17, the Rev. Bill Brennan, a 92-year-old Jesuit, performed a liturgy in Columbus, Ga., at which Janice Sevre-Duszynska, an ordained member of Roman Catholic Womenpriests, an advocacy group that is not sanctioned by the Vatican, was a participant.
The Archdiocese of Milwaukee and his religious order, the Society of Jesus, ordered Brennan not to perform any priestly duties in public or present himself as a priest publicly.
“I was really angry when I found out … that his faculties were suspended, too, because for God’s sake, he’s 92 years old,” the Rev. Jerry Zawada, a Franciscan and a friend of Brennan’s who has also led liturgies with Sevre-Duszynska and was suspended for it, told NBC News. “But he’s so faithful to what needs to happen.”
“He’s willing to take risks at that level,” Zawada, a 75-year-old Franciscan, added.
Yup, a priest molest a kid…he gets a transfer…a priest holds a Mass together with a woman priest…he gets fired. Anyway, read the rest of the story at the link.
I’ve got another long read here, via Pro Publica: Cutting through the Controversy about Indefinite Detention and the NDAA
On Tuesday, the Senate passed the National Defense Authorization Act, or NDAA, a yearly military spending bill.
Last year, the bill affirmed the U.S.’s authority to hold suspected terrorists indefinitely and without charges. The provision had generated plenty of controversy, particularly about whether U.S. citizens could be detained indefinitely. This year, the Senate bill says that citizens can’t be detained in the U.S. – but concerns remain about the scope of detention powers.
Time for more photos, this time from West Virginia during the years of the New Deal. Appalachian History » Review: New Deal Photographs of West Virginia, 1934-1943
Coming home from school. Mining town. Osage, Scotts Run, West Virginia. Marion Post Wolcott. September 1938. LC-USF34-050352-E.
Up for more history? Check this out…from LG&M: This Day in Labor History: December 6, 1865
On December 6, 1865, the legislature of Georgia ratified the 13th Amendment to the Constitution, ending slavery. Arguably, the single most important event in the history of American labor, the official end to slavery closed a chapter in the nation’s race-based labor system, a system that still remains in important forms to the present.
That is just a taste, give that essay a read.
Did you know that Hurricane/Winter Storm Sandy made drastic changes to the landscape along the New York coast. Sandy caused 30 years of change to NY coastline, study shows
In late November, 2012 the U.S. Geological Survey released before and after images showing the devastating impact that Hurricane Sandy had on coastal dunes along the Fire Island National Seashore Long Island, NY. The images show widespread dune erosion and overwash. In some areas, coastal dunes lost as much as 5 meters (15 feet) in elevation, while suffering other forms of extensive coastal erosion. Cheryl Hapke, a coastal geologist with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS), commented on the findings in a press release, saying:
We found that there was widespread dune erosion and overwash. On average, where the dunes were not completely overwashed, they eroded back 70 feet — the equivalent of 30 years of change.
Yes, more pictures for you, but these are recent images.
Before and after lidar images of coastal dunes on Fire Island, NY that were impacted by the storm surge from Hurricane Sandy. Image Credit: USGS.
ARGH!!!
I am so fucking pissed off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
WordPress did something to the rest of my post. It deleted at least 2000 words, and I am so disgusted right now.
I’ve been working on this thing for at least 2 hours…so here are the links I had, without all the words and quotes and pictures.
Cavemen Were Better at Drawing Four-Legged Animals | Geekosystem
Decorate Your Christmas Tree Right Using Math | Geekosystem
Dugout Dick’s Idaho Caves | Tiny House Design
75 Awesome “Looking Into The Past” Pictures
Photos: Henry Leutwyler’s All-Access Pass to the New York City Ballet | Vanity Fair
It is so upsetting, and I was saving my post all during the time I was writing it. Seriously, over 2000 words gone…poof!
Sima
fiscalliberal
grayslady
JJ Lopez Minkoff
mablue2
peggysue22
quixote
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Great post, as usual, jj. Sorry WordPress ate part of it I still write my blog posts in Word & then copy/paste into blogger. Thought I’d share a post I did on the WASPs in 2010, http://ecocatwoman.blogspot.com/2010/03/women-can-do-anything.html They were/are truly amazing women.
PS – hope ya’ll can help Denny get through his healing process without too much stress on all of you. It must be terribly frightening & confusing for him.
Kent Conrad is being interviewed on NPR this morning, flinging the poo about how we MUST cut SocSec/Medicare since there’s both a lack of revenue problem and a spending problem. No mention of illegal and ever increasing wars and aggressions around the world. But his only mention of spending was…SocSec and Medicare!
Makes we want to throw up.
Just before this segment, there was a discussion of how John Boehner has been calling the current fake crisis, lovingly referred to by the MCM as the “fiscal cliff ” (a Republican designation, iirc), as a “debt crisis.” They then played clips of Repub pols and supporters referring to it as a “debt crisis.” As part of the intro, the reporter stated that normally the words “debt crisis” refer to something such as Argentina’s genuine inability to pay off its debts. The reporter did no say the US has NO such inability.
But, I wanted to scream at the radio, why do you keep using terms which are incporrect just because some politicians insist on using them incorrectly for politicial propaganda purposes???
If the MCMers said, each time Boehner was quoted as talking about a non-debt crisis as a debt cirisis, that he was using the term incorrectly, how long would Mr. Tan Man insist on using his incorrect wording?
However, the MCMers won’t call him on this, they’ll gradually all adopt Boehner’s terms, and thus be part of the problem.
As Dave Johnson said recently, if someone is using the wrong tems for a situation, just because one side insists on using words falsely or incorrectly, then they are TAKING SIDES. And working to confuse the public.
Amen.
Kent Conrad is a nominal Democrat at best and has been absolutely owned by Pete Peterson for years, In the next congress, Patty Murray will replace him as chair of the Budget Cmte and it can’t happen soon enough for me. Good riddance to that creep.
He’s not even a nominal Democrat, imo. I’d pay to see a video of the door hitting Conrad on his way out. I appreciate good entertainment.
Kent Conrad knows a lot about budgets, so when he chooses to favor one set of false ideas he is doing it very deliberately. As a good Peterson captured pol ought to do….
Dak had a piece up about numbers the rich don’t want the rest of us to know — I posted on the article, at Corrente,. My search terms didn’t pull it up, but here’s Dakinikat’s post with the full article..
Maybe we should call Ol’ Kent and read him some of these numbers? Aslk why those who did not benefit must now pay through the nose? Or spend their retirements in deeper penury?
Conrad has to know about these numbers; how dare he play on the side he’s taking? Grrrrr.
http://correntewire.com/hey_mittens_only_3_of_your_job_creators_are_entrepreneurs_9_more_great_numbers
My link is n’t working, or at least didn’t work for me, so here it is.
Here’s dakinikat’s link.
http://skydancingblog.com/2012/11/24/something-to-think-on-from-common-dreams/
Jawbone, those are great facts to know. I memorized them after kat’s post.
I heard that. It made me want to throw up too. But what made me the most angry was that Conrad referred to the “Bowles Simpson committee report,” which he claimed had been produced by a bi-partisan group of legislators. The NPR interviewer didn’t correct him, but in fact there never was a Catfood commission report, because the committee members couldn’t agree on one. Afterward, the two co-chairs wrote their own report, but there was no official one. I’m so fed up with the lies!!
The Election Is Over. Now What?
Joseph Stiglitz has some fine suggestions!
Armando has a legal analysis of a debt ceiling crisis and this would be the real crisis, not a fake fiscal cliff.
DKos: Public debt of the United States shall not be questioned: the 14th Amendment and the debt ceiling
Love the links, JJ. And I sympathize about when technology screws things up. I thought I was being canny by saving my document in Word and then pasting into the other program. But no, the other program took the text as an image of blurry text. Arrgrrrh.
Why not to use spray flocking:
Luna, I had stuff written about our little commune…connected to the tiny house links. I am still angry about it.
I spent the day decorating the tree and doing other holiday chores. Hope everyone is having a great day.
Waaaah! I want to read what you wrote about our Sky Dancing commune. I’d hoped I might get at least a few interested in hanging out in the country on the rational side of Washington state. Though it’s not a Grecian Island, but we can pretend during August.
Hey, you’ve peaked my interest …
She wrote about it here a couple days ago, http://skydancingblog.com/2012/12/07/friday-morning-reads-7/#comment-108635
Me too!!
Me too! Where is our commune going to be located? That island that Ralph likes seems very intriguing and the Greeks do know about good food, yet with climate change being so close to the equator might be a bad decision.
JJ, whenever you can stand to do another re-write, sounds like lots of us want to hear your ideas!
Gov. Howard Dean emailed me asking for a donation to help fight the Republicans’ attempts to cut Medicare.
My reply:
Dear Gov. Dean,
Needs editing, but, hey, no space limits on email….
Very, very succinct and on point. Well done jaw, well done.
Very nice, jawbone. You don’t mind if I paraphrase your letter?
I am sick of this “shared sacrifice” shit which means we, the ones who didn’t take obscene gambles with other people’s money, are supposed to suck up and pay out for their mistakes.
Besides which, MC & SS are not in trouble as we very well know.
Mandela is not doing well: Nelson Mandela second day in hospital
Nelson Mandela ‘has stopped talking’ – Telegraph
Oh, sorry to hear that. Another lion of a role model, with compassionate heart and brain close to passing on.