Friday Reads
Posted: October 11, 2013 Filed under: morning reads | Tags: CIA, clandestine services, cocoa shortage, U.S women and longevity 105 Comments
Good Morning!
I think most of us that have lived awhile can attest to the fall in lifestyle and standards of living in the country. I think it’s been rather obvious that it’s much more difficult to “get ahead” more than at any other time in recent U.S. history. I ran across some interesting articles that sort’ve validated my gut feeling so I thought I’d share them with you. I hope you don’t find them too depressing. The first one indicates that the longevity of U.S. women just isn’t what it used to be. Why are U.S. women dying younger than their mothers?
Whether you think the Affordable Care Act is the right solution or a dangerous step toward tyranny, it’s hard to dispute that the U.S. health-care system is broken. More than 48 million people lack health insurance, and despite having the world’s highest levels of health-care spending per capita, the U.S. has some of the worst health outcomes among developed nations, lagging behind in key metrics like life expectancy, premature death rates, and death by treatable diseases, according to a July study in theJournal of the American Medicine Association.
For some Americans, the reality is far worse than the national statistics suggest. In particular, growing health disadvantages have disproportionately impacted women over the past three decades, especially those without a high-school diploma or who live in the South or West. In March, a study published by the University of Wisconsin researchers David Kindig and Erika Cheng found that in nearly half of U.S. counties, female mortality rates actually increased between 1992 and 2006, compared to just 3 percent of counties that saw male mortality increase over the same period.
“I was shocked, actually,” Kindig said. “So we went back and did the numbers again, and it came back the same. It’s overwhelming.”
Kindig’s findings were echoed in a July report from University of Washington researcher Chris Murray, which found that inequality in women’s health outcomes steadily increased between 1985 and 2010, with female life expectancy stagnating or declining in 45 percent of U.S. counties. Taken together, the two studies underscore a disturbing trend: While advancements in medicine and technology have prolonged U.S. life expectancy and decreased premature deaths overall, women in parts of the country have been left behind, and in some cases, they are dying younger than they were a generation before. The worst part is no one knows why.
I’ve always thought that the American Lifestyle that you find touted on TV and at most restaurants and stores is really at odds with living well. Here’s an interesting 
list of items that also reminds me why I always wanted to just stay in Europe whenever I visited there. Are Europeans better at just living life? Here’s one of the statistics that makes me realize how overworked the U.S. worker is and why we all just sort’ve wear out at some point in time.
Europeans:
The top seven nations in the world, in terms of time off? All European. Austrians get 35 (35!) paid days off per year. Nobody criticizes them for being lazy.
Americans:
Meanwhile, the U.S. is the sole developed nation that requires no paid vacation time or holidays by law.
There’s a lot of fun comparisons there including cars, cheese, and sports. The link is good for a few smiles.
So, I lot of people subscribe to the idea of peak oil. I’ve always thought I’d really rather go solar or some alternative for energy in the future since fossil fuels have such incredible problems. I’m not all that concerned about an oil shortage, but a cocoa bean shortage? That’s a completely different matter!!!
The world will officially run out on October 2, 2020.
Industry experts met in London last week to discuss the impending meltdown.
Confectionery giants revealed there are just not enough cocoa plantations across the globe to feed the demand.
They warned we would need the equivalent of another planet Earth to fill the gap needed to keep the chocolate industry going.
Prices are set to soar over the next few years as chocolate becomes harder to get hold of.
As a result many big-name companies are expected to fill bars that are smaller in size with more nuts and fruit because they are cheaper to produce.
Chocolate taster and expert Angus Kennedy said: “There will be a chocolate shortage and there isn’t a solution to the problem. Seven years is what we think we have left.
“Experts have worked out we need 2.3 globes to accommodate man’s needs for chocolate in terms of forestry and space.
“We need another Earth basically if we carry on at this rate. We are destroying the whole thing.
“The problem we’ve got is that much of the space that was used for cocoa plantations is no longer there.
“The Chinese love their cars and they have found that rubber makes more money than cocoa and at a much quicker pace.
“Cocoa farms are being chopped down and turned into rubber plantations because they get a better yield.
“If you plant a cocoa plant you get cocoa beans in four years, which means the farmers are waiting four years for a profit so obviously they think ‘What is the point?’”
Manufacturers from all over the world including Iran, Belgium, Lebanon, Germany and Switzerland met at the British Library last week for the annual Chocolate Industry Network Conference where they heard the worrying news.
At all curious about real US CIA agents in clandestine service? Try reading this article at Newsweek.
After a stint in the Marines, Archibald began his CIA career as a weapons man in the agency’s special activities division – the “knuckle-draggers,” as they’re known around headquarters – during the Bosnian civil war. From there, he made it into the agency’s elite spy corps, rising to the rank equivalent of general in Pakistan.
How Archibald got his new job remains a mystery to everyone Newsweektalked to. One source thought he’d caught the eye of David Petraeus, whose brief tenure as CIA chief was short-circuited in 2012 by an extramarital affair. Other agency veterans think current CIA director John Brennan liked the former Marine’s non-confrontational style. Bonus points: There was not a whiff of scandal in his background, unlike that of the acting chief, who was closely identified with harsh interrogations and passed over in favor of Archibald. She stayed on as his deputy.
One agency veteran has a more nuanced take on the appointment: “Brennan is his own clandestine ops chief.” Another added, “[Brennan] doesn’t like anyone to argue with him much.”
But there are plenty of things to argue over, insiders say, starting with the layers upon layers of assistants to deputy assistants that clog the agency’s chains of command. Many agency old-timers are also dismayed that the CIA’s core mission of spying on major adversaries seems to have been eclipsed by constant commando raids and drone strikes against terrorist targets. All that, they contend, diverts the agency’s finite resources, time and attention from finding out what’s really going on inside Vladimir Putin’s Kremlin, China’s weapons labs or Iran’s nuclear program.
What does Frank Archibald think? Sorry. We can’t ask him.
Today is payday for hundreds of thousands of federal workers. What will they get?
The paycheck federal workers have been dreading hit bank accounts across the region Friday, representing salaries cut in half for most idled employees. The next payday will be all zeros, and with furloughs dragging on, civil servants are settling into a financial crouch, slashing expenses, canceling vacations, tapping retirement savings and taking second jobs.
“We have no income coming into the house right now, but the bills haven’t stopped,” said John Ferris of Falls Church. He is in a two-furlough marriage; both he and his wife, Lena, are locked out of jobs at the Environmental Protection Agency. With both of their paychecks dwindling, the family of six has put a scalpel to the household budget.
They’ve cut out restaurants and expensive groceries. Gone are the motel stays at their kids travel softball tournaments; instead, they drive all night. But the most painful cut has been a furlough of their own, laying off their autistic son’s longtime reading specialist.
“He’s been with our family for years, and I love him to death, but I thought, ‘Wow, how am I going to pay him if we don’t have paychecks coming,’ ” Lena Ferris said. She worries that one of the shutdown’s lasting aftershocks could be her son’s having to adjust to a new tutor. “He needs money, too,” she said of the tutor. “I’m worried he’s going to start working for another family.”
Federal workers say they were hugely relieved by last week’s House vote toguarantee the missed pay after the furlough’s over. But that hasn’t eased their anxiety over the bills stacking up in the meantime. Some parents are stretching to pay for day care they don’t need just so they don’t lose their slots while waiting to go back to work. All around the region, the furloughed are looking for money to satisfy their creditors or begging
them for more time to pay their bills.
“A lot of our members have been asking to skip a payment,” said Pamela Hout, chief executive of the Census Federal a Credit Union. Her staff has been working a few hours a week at the nearly deserted Census Bureau headquarters in Prince George’s County to meet the demand. “We’ve been accommodating them; all they have to do is show us their [furlough] letter.”
I need to add one more thing before I sign off this morning. This is the month that we need to renew our domain and our ability to customize things here. The bill is about $100 per year so just a bit of a donation to the blog would be much appreciated. The specialized font comes due in about a month after that so any thing above that will be held until that comes due!!! Thanks so much!!!
So, that’s my little bit of this and that on a Friday. What’s on your reading and blogging list today?
peej
Carissa
bostonboomer
ecocatwoman
mablue2
peggysue22
quixote
skydancingguestblogger
Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
They are going to get their way.
Somehow, someway they are going to “eke” out some kind of a deal that will allow them to take another step forward and smash the New Deal into bits because that has been the plan all along. Slow and steady wins the race.
You can’t “negotiate” with people who deny climate change. Who refuse to understand what a financial crisis will do to the global economy. Who believe they are acting on “god’s will” even if it means leaving children hungry as they do it. Who loathe the word “government” and refer to the bible as their source for justification. How is it possible to find common ground when dealing with this mindset? It isn’t.
To get the government back up and running there must be a compromise bargain struck with the 60 to 80 intransient lawmakers who view their position as the “Holy Grail”. And a self absorbed Speaker of the House whose only goal is to maintain the title he believes is his alone.
So a “deal” of sorts will be worked out and the “winners” will be those who hold the government in contempt assured that this is their chosen duty while the rest of us “make do” until the next crisis comes along and we must watch more of our “entitlements” heaped upon the burn pile.
This is how it works nowadays.
Breaking: After viewing new polls, House GOP not only planning on reopening government but considering opening second government for good measure.
That is funny, but one thing, how they gonna pay for that second government?
Same as the first, I guess 🙂
Obama gave the GOP enough rope and they hung themselves this time. The new NBC/WSJ poll is jaw droppingly bad for the Republicans. I hope those attitudes hold a little for 2014 and it’ll be Bye Bye GOP House.
Geez, I hope so. If that happened, and with Yellen in the Fed…I would actually be able to breathe.
If the polls stay this way, the GOP will lose the House, no matter how much gerrymandering they do.
Oh gawd, what the fuck am I going to do!
I’m gonna panic next year or so!
Yeah, that little tidbit of information is more stressful to me than the debt ceiling…if you can believe that! No more chocolate? We need a whole other fucking planet full of cocoa plantations to meet the demand? Geez, I need a paper bag, some buspar and a hershey bar…stat!
😉 we need a cocoa commune
Doomsday preppers? Hell, I gotta start my cocoa stash now!
Me too!!
I’m looking on the bright side it. The average life expectancy age and my age at the official cocoa runout date of 2020, are not that far apart. I don’t think that’s an accident. 🙂
That’s a new emoticon for me. What does it mean?
A wild guess: “I’m smiling but I just had a tooth pulled and one side of my face is still numb”?
Bell’s palsy emoticon? 😉
So if I do this:
;/
it means I feel like shit….but I am smiling and winking at you?
Or maybe this looks better:
;\
Jon Stewart to red states: ‘What do you hate more? Poverty or Obama?’
That’s an easy question to answer, Obama!!!
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/10/11/jon-stewart-to-red-states-what-do-you-hate-more-poverty-or-obama/
😉
I laughed so hard at that, I’m crying now. I think I may be hysterical.
I need to go lie down. BBL.
The video is gone. What day was that from?
WTF? I watched that just this morning, Pacific time.
BB….I think that was from his show yesterday
Ah, Republican civil wars, how lovely.
tpm: Establishment GOPers Assail Tea Party On Shutdown
Really, because it was only a few years ago they were seeking some of the dumbest people on the planet to run in their primaries and succeeded as more idiots volunteered to step up to the plate.
They then managed to redraw the district lines to ensure that success would last for generations and we are now stuck with the likes of Steve King and a few other morons whose districts are considered “safe”.
As it is the nation is currently in the grasp of the most stupid people to have ever run for office in one faction alone – the Tea Party.
These people could not pass a high school civics test if their lives depended upon it yet they are at present – and possibly the future – elected lawmakers who do not possess a clue.
Just goes to show you better be careful what you wish for, cause you might get it.
You are right about that Pat, these politicians are stupid…and they were put there by a bunch of stupid people….but these politicians are also are forcing their stupidity on everyone else and that is bullshit. Oh, I might also add that those politicians also got funding help from the rich ass people who want to rule over the stupid people who voted for those politicians.
Are Europeans better at living life than Americans? Yes but so are Australians and just about everyone else Down Under. I don’t think it’s hard to live better though since our Puritan ancestry and flawed work ethic make us a ridiculous people on the whole.
Too true. And now with the government shutdown idiocy, the USA is a laughingstock to the rest of the world.
That’s the same thing I was thinking. I think we suffer from our Puritan roots as well as the wild west individualism of people who settled the frontier. You can really see the Puritan, Calvinist influences here in New England. It’s amazing how culture can persist over centuries.
BB, don’t forget the Irish Jansenist heresy influence, which was really what many Irish immigrants believed and is an offshoot of Calvinism. Calvin, Roman Catholic style. Those were a large percentage of the Irish immigrants, and that is what makes the American R.C. church so extremely anti-woman…the body is evil heritage.
True. French Canadians too.
Ted Cruz is on TV right now FRC Action. He’s getting cheered & heckled
Brghahahaha!!!! And the FRC crowd roars back at the hecklers, USA, USA.
What a bunch of dumbasses
Do the Daytime Emmy’s give a Demagoguery Award? If so Cruz should get it.
Should have a nomination a;ready for his MTP appearance. He does a number of lies per minute to rival Willard Romney.
Ted Cruz Heckled During Speech, Calls Protesters ‘Obama’s Paid Political Operatives’ | Mediaite
Hey, Bebe passed her written driver’s test. She got her learners permit! Yay!
YAY! Once my kids got drivers license and started going out, my sleep cycle fell off for years. Hope it doesn’t have the same effect on you 😉
Congrats Bebe!!!!!!!! I am getting this in before my battery charge dies
Uh,Oh. Now the problems really begin.
Glad to hear it’s a happy occasion!
Excellent! Congrats to Bebe!
Very interesting post.
I think this is the link to the Newsweek article on the CIA.
http://mag.newsweek.com/2013/10/11/nice-invisibility-cloak.html
This should be good…
tpm: Now You Can Go Window Shopping For Obamacare Coverage
Amazing that it took them until now to realize people want to know the price and what’s covered first. Better late than never.
Right? I went and tried to get estimates on the first day, and I was expecting there would be high traffic, so I didn’t mind *that* kind of glitch–to me that glitch is good, it says expand healthcare 🙂
But, I wasn’t expecting not to be able to get an estimate first. Good they fixed it.
It’s one of the nuttier things about the original rollout design. Chances are there are bugs with the backend databases which look like front end errors as well. Some of the error messages I’ve seen in stories on the net are low level Oracle errors which have been caught and propagated out without any translation. Certainly fixable but not overnight in some cases,
I’m not surprised there are multiple glitches. I’d be surprised if there weren’t.
Me 2, Probably designed by committee and built by multiple contract companies. An error waiting to happen.
Ha ha ha!
John Sununu tells Ted Cruz it’s time for someone to act like a grownup.
Establishment GOPers Assail Tea Party On Shutdown
Pot meet kettle 🙂
Too bad the Tea Party got rid of Dick Lugar, one of the few grown-ups left in the GOP, in the 2012 primary. And how did that work out for the Tea Party? ( Hint: A Democrat won Lugar’s seat in the Senate. )
Yes, he was a grown-up, so he had to go.
No one on the right with skin tags or brains can beat a TeaParty candidate. The Koch brothers must be wetting their pants over this nightmare that they financed.
Check this out:
The Kochs Can’t Control the Monster They Created
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2013/10/the-kochs-cant-control-the-monster-they-created/280435/
Thanks, That looks interesting. This one looks interesting too.
The Last Days of the GOPWe could be witnessing the death throes of the Republican Party
http://www.newrepublic.com/article/115134/gop-death-watch-final-days-republican-party
One thing to remember about the federal workers going without paychecks, only the people who actually work for the government are going to get back pay. There are many thousands of contract workers out there who work for consulting firms and the like who are just screwed. They are going without paychecks and nobody is going to make that up to them. Fuck the Tea Party. A pox on all their houses.
Surprise, surprise. But nice to see this get in the MSM.
I wpuldn’t trust a report by the Committee to Protect Journalists any further than I could throw Glenn Greenwald to be anything more than spin.
BTW, I saw on twitter that Greenwald and the Guardian may have released personal details about undercover British agents. I haven’t found details yet.
That the Obama admin. is secretive has been discussed heavily in the corporate media, which isn’t at particularly supportive of Obama anymore.
With the leaks they have had, I don’t blame them for cracking down. There are loads of Bushies left all through agencies.
I just think it’s a good thing that the non-transparency and whistleblower targeting of this administration gets more publicity.
Yes, and I’m saying it has been getting a lot of publicity and for a long time–especially lately. Even in 2008, the media was writing that Obama’s campaign was the most secretive ever. And it’s true. My biggest complaint is that Obama won’t release the rest of the JFK files, which were supposed to be available this year. The CIA just won’t let go.
But in fact the “whistle-blower targeting” has been exaggerated beyond belief. None of the whistle-blowers everyone is crying about has gotten heavy jail time (like Ellsberg–his case was dropped). Bradley Manning is in a different category because he was active military, but he is going to be out in 6-7 years at the most. Others have had their cases dropped or gotten brief jail sentences.
Another brilliant remark from Ted Cruz: Obama will ‘start quartering soldiers in people’s homes soon’
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/10/11/ted-cruz-obama-will-start-quartering-soldiers-in-peoples-homes-soon/
Raw Story on a roll…
Levin tells Values Voter Summit: ‘America is a blue state’ so change the Constitution
Mockery is wonderful.
Democratic group sends lovely fruit basket to Ted Cruz as GOP popularity plummets
OMG, this guy is a doctor!
Fox News’ Ben Carson: ‘Re-educate the women’ because ‘they get all riled up’ over abortion
Dr. Ben Carson was one of the country’s top neurosurgeons before he retired from Johns Hopkins. He once looked at my MRIs. Sad that his emotional and political intelligence doesn’t match his skill as a surgeon.
That’s the understatement of the Century. I’m glad to know he was a good surgeon anyway.
“cute little baby inside of them”
Has he ever looked at a fetus? Apparently not.
Yeah, that was bizarre.
Ben Carson was known for performing some amazing neurosurgical operations on pediatric patients at Johns Hopkins. I completely agree, however, that his publicly stated views are truly bizarre. Very strange coming from someone who was so brilliant in his field of neurosurgery.
Went to change the Facebook page BB and I saw my friend out in Iowa singing this mans praises…I feel sick right now.
“Greg Abbott has a single-digit lead over Democrat Wendy Davis in the likely matchup for governor next year,
a new poll of registered voters shows.” — Dallas News, 10/2/2013
— with 50% reporting they are “undecided.”
What’s your take on that poll Mona? Is it good news, or is it typical that the candidates are that close this far out? I know nothing about TX politics.
Conventional wisdom here would have Abbot way ahead. It’s really good news for Wendy!
Terrific news!
Ok…That gives us something to feel good about today.
Paul Burka in Texas Monthly: What the NBC-Wall Street Journal Poll Means
Check this out. It’s nice to see Burka admit it. Bet it felt like getting a tooth pulled for him.
Very interesting questions. I hope the issue won’t be forgotten when Texans vote.
Abbott made him solicitor general of the state. Without Abbott, there is no Crtuz. I doubt Wendy will let people forget, since Cruz poll numbers are now upside down here.
Bob Woodward: Obama Needs to Get on With ‘Entitlement’ and Tax ‘Reform’
Never mind jobs. Those are just for the hoi polloi. What we really need is to give more tax cuts to rich people and and throw old folks, mothers, and children into the streets to starve. And Jake Tapper isn’t a journalist. What an asshole.
Now I even regret buying All the President’s Men and The Final Days. And seeing the fawning movie.
They really are the “Courtier Press” for the wealthy.
What’s really interesting is the huge difference between Carl Bernstein and Woodward. I’ll bet they agree on absolutely nothing!
I don’t hear much about them hanging out together. Woodward is incredibly full of himself and he was always a Republican. I think Bernstein is still a liberal.
Definitely.
Report: Tea party group FreedomWorks is in deep financial trouble
http://www.rawstory.com/rs/2013/10/11/report-tea-party-group-freedomworks-is-in-deep-financial-trouble/
Is there a SMIRK emoticon? If so I’d like to use it because I’m smirking right now.
There’s the razz emoticon … 😛
Or maybe cool ,,, 😎
The ACA seems to be doing pretty damn well here…
Bending the curve
This sounds good, but you have to figure in the co-pays and deductibles and out-of-pocket costs. Those can add significantly more.
Don’t employer plans have those too? The problem is that in state like Indiana that won’t expand Medicaid, the subsidies won’t be as good for poorer people. And that Medicaid expansion is paid for 100 percent by the Feds.
Sure, and that’s what has to be figured in. It’s like advertising sale items as “up to 80% off” when there is one 80%-off item and zillions of 20%-off items.
Comparisons are also difficult to make quickly, due to differences in what providers and hospitals are covered. Most of the new plans for 2014 coverage here in my state don’t include the region’s tertiary children’s hospital (which is odd, because it was covered under nearly all previous plans.)
Oh, definitely things are better with the ACA, but I’m still going to critique it 😉
My friend’s brother is visiting next week……….he quit his job after learning that he had colon cancer, and he doesn’t want anything, no doctors, no surgery, disability, or medical help………he wants nothing, but to die with dignity. I’ve been invited per family friends to encourage him to seek help, but I don’t know, I told them, they should be prepared if he doesn’t have the will to live, or is caught up in this medical revolution to the point, that no one can help. I’ve got all the numbers (phone), and I am trying to get a case manager/social worker to come in and advocate for him. After thinking about him & his alternatives, I’ve been taking power naps to help me deal with this…………..not to mention that Social Security is shut down.
That is a tough situation. And damn stressful on you Fannie, power naps are good.
I would also say, don’t bring a talking pillow into the room…whatever you do. 😉
Thanks – I don’t intend on doing a lot of talking……….but listening, and repeating what I hear them say. What I can do is offer some resources for the family (including hospice), and a lot of hugs. What works for others, may not work for him. I hope he doesn’t further isolated because of his health status, and that they keep communications open between the families.
Talking it out with those he loves is where it’s at, and hospice can help keep him in the home.
Wow Fannie. That sounds really stressful. Please take care of yourself.
Don’t make yourself sick trying to help, Fannie. You can only do so much.
I can understand how your friend’s brother feels. Perhaps what he wants is right for him – to die with dignity. I believe that is a legitimate choice. Maybe he would accept hospice help if nothing else.
Peace be with you all.
So beautiful…………….