It could have been worse

That's what should be our mantra, in the wake of yesterday's water main break North of the UCLA campus.  No one died.  While there was significant damage to the campus, nothing irreplaceable was lost (so far).  We lost 10 million gallons of water during a major drought, but when you consider that the City of Los Angeles uses many times that amount daily, it isn't as bad as it seems.

Or is it?  I don't drive Coldwater Canyon but I hear that it still isn't completely back to the condition it was in before the major water main break it suffered in 2009.  A Department of Water and Power spokesman was asked how long it is expected to take before the entire underground system of water mains is replaced and his response was "300 years." 

The water main that blew yesterday was installed in 1921.  It is going to take a custom-made piece of pipe to repair the break.  That piece can't be installed until DWP manages to stop the last two leaking pipes.  They estimate that Sunset will reopen on Friday.  I think they are entirely too optimistic.

Our local system of roads was operating at capacity during rush hour before this mishap.  Now that one major East-West thoroughfare is temporarily eliminated, it's causing near gridlock conditions on other adjacent arteries that flow East-West.  I saw the traffic on Wilshire Boulevard as I left the VA this morning and it looked like an utter nightmare.

Infrastructure matters.  Delay its repair and upgrade for too long and you pay a much heavier price.

* * *

Accidentally shooting yourself in the leg.  Stomping another player.  Being accused of but never charged with sexual assault.  Missing a drug test.  Gambling.  Taking illegal benefits while playing football in college.  What do they have in common?  All of them are things that NFL players were suspended for doing, for more games than Ray Rice was suspended for domestic violence.

We hear about how professional athletes are supposed to be role models.  So why is it that people sometimes refer to the NFL as the National Felony League?  Is that the behavior we want modeled for youth?  I think not.

The fact that a suspension for using a performance enhancing drug is four games and Ray Rice only got a two game suspension tells me that the league is a lot more worried about cheating than it is about women being abused and assaulted.  That's a particularly poor set of priorities.

If the NFL wants to be a responsible organization and take action against players and coaches for their behavior off the field, it needs to make sure that penalties for such behavior are at least as harsh as those for things done on the field.

* * *

Just to clear things up, most veterans are not happy with what Jesse Ventura did in choosing to continue his lawsuit against the widow of Chris Kyle.  Upon reflection, I'm with them.  Once Kyle had been murdered, there was no reason to continue the lawsuit.  Ventura is already worth millions and he could choose to make more if he wishes.  He doesn't need the money.

His reputation wasn't seriously damaged by Kyle's claims.  He should have leveraged the lawsuit to get the publisher to remove the reference to him in the book.  That's happening now anyway.  That would be sufficient to "restore" the truth.

I don't know if what Kyle claimed happened or not.  I really don't care.  You don't torture the widow of a veteran who has been murdered by forcing her to continue defending a lawsuit.

Just so we're clear, Jesse Ventura was never a Navy SEAL.

* * *

Random Ponderings:

The last member of the crew of the Enola Gay has died.  The end of a link to the dawn of an era.  For those who didn't know, the Enola Gay was the plane that dropped the first atomic bomb, on Hiroshima.

Kind of sad that what Congress is busiest doing at the moment is raising money for the November elections.  Doing their jobs rather than worrying about keeping them would be nice.

I would lose all respect and admiration I have for Miranda Kerr if it turned out she had slept with Justin Bieber.

When I owned a dog, I loved him dearly.  But I wouldn't have taken him with me on a vacation to a foreign land.

How generous of Governor Moonbeam to volunteer our state to house more of the children entering the nation illegally...NOT.

Did the rebels really lay mines near the wreckage of MH-17?

People who write "informative" articles about the so-called Social Security trust funds are either delusional, or don't understand accounting.  If we as a nation are $17 trillion in debt, the $2.8 trillion supposedly in the trust funds is a myth.  Our profligate Congress already spent that money.

I'm thinking that the resume that has the email address of "DominantMistress@sadomasochism.com is probably not going to generate any interview invitations.

It has to really suck to be dealt pocket aces when you're playing head-to-head with someone who also has pocket aces and then lose.  Especially when you ponied up $1 million to enter the tournament.

If there was an iconic fiction role that was written as female and a man was cast in the role, there would be outrage all over.  But cast a woman to play Peter Pan, and no one says a word.

Lois Lerner calling conservatives "crazies" doesn't help support the argument that her actions while working at the IRS weren't politically motivated.

* * *

July 31st in History:

30 BC – Battle of Alexandria: Mark Antony achieves a minor victory over Octavian's forces, but most of his army subsequently deserts, leading to his suicide.
781 – The oldest recorded eruption of Mount Fuji (Traditional Japanese date: July 6, 781).
1009 – Pope Sergius IV becomes the 142nd pope, succeeding Pope John XVIII.
1201 – Attempted usurpation of John Komnenos the Fat.
1423 – Hundred Years' War: Battle of Cravant – the French army is defeated by the English at Cravant on the banks of the river Yonne.
1451 – Jacques Cœur is arrested by order of Charles VII of France.
1492 – The Jews are expelled from Spain when the Alhambra Decree takes effect.
1498 – On his third voyage to the Western Hemisphere, Christopher Columbus becomes the first European to discover the island of Trinidad.
1588 – The Spanish Armada is spotted off the coast of England.
1655 – Russo-Polish War (1654–67): the Russian army enters the capital of the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, Vilnius, which it holds for six years.
1658 – Aurangzeb is proclaimed Moghul emperor of India.
1667 – Second Anglo-Dutch War: Treaty of Breda ends the conflict.
1703 – Daniel Defoe is placed in a pillory for the crime of seditious libel after publishing a politically satirical pamphlet, but is pelted with flowers.
1715 – A Spanish treasure fleet seven days after 12 ships left Havana, Cuba for Spain, 11 of them sink in a storm off the coast of Florida. A few centuries later, treasure is salvaged from these wrecks.
1741 – Charles Albert of Bavaria invades Upper Austria and Bohemia.
1763 – Odawa Chief Pontiac's forces defeat British troops at the Battle of Bloody Run during Pontiac's War.
1777 – The U.S. Second Continental Congress passes a resolution that the services of Gilbert du Motier "be accepted, and that, in consideration of his zeal, illustrious family and connexions, he have the rank and commission of major-general of the United States."
1790 – The first U.S. patent is issued, to inventor Samuel Hopkins for a potash process.
1856 – Christchurch, New Zealand is chartered as a city.
1865 – The first narrow gauge mainline railway in the world opens at Grandchester, Queensland, Australia.
1913 – The Balkan States sign an armistice in Bucharest.
1919 – German national assembly adopts the Weimar Constitution, which comes into force on August 14.
1930 – The radio mystery program The Shadow airs for the first time.
1931 – New York, New York experimental television station W2XAB (now known as WCBS) begins broadcasts.
1932 – The NSDAP (Nazi Party) wins more than 38% of the vote in German elections.
1938 – Bulgaria signs a non-aggression pact with Greece and other states of Balkan Antanti (Turkey, Romania, Yugoslavia).
1938 – Archaeologists discover engraved gold and silver plates from King Darius the Great in Persepolis.
1941 – The Holocaust: under instructions from Adolf Hitler, Nazi official Hermann Göring, orders SS General Reinhard Heydrich to "submit to me as soon as possible a general plan of the administrative material and financial measures necessary for carrying out the desired Final Solution of the Jewish question."
1945 – Pierre Laval, the fugitive former leader of Vichy France, surrenders to Allied soldiers in Austria.
1948 – At Idlewild Field in New York, New York International Airport (later renamed John F. Kennedy International Airport) is dedicated.
1948 – USS Nevada (BB-36) is sunk by an aerial torpedo after surviving hits from two atomic bombs (as part of post-war tests) and being used for target practice by three other ships.
1954 – First ascent of K2, by an Italian expedition led by Ardito Desio.
1956 – Jim Laker becomes the first man to take all 10 wickets in a Test match innings as he returns figures of 10/53 in the Australian 2nd innings. This combined with his 9/37 in the first innings gave him match figures of 19/90 in the 4th Test at Old Trafford.
1961 – At Fenway Park in Boston, Massachusetts, the first All-Star Game tie in Major League Baseball history occurs when the game is stopped in the 9th inning because of rain.
1964 – Ranger program: Ranger 7 sends back the first close-up photographs of the moon, with images 1,000 times clearer than anything ever seen from earth-bound telescopes.
1970 – Black Tot Day: The last day of the officially sanctioned rum ration in the Royal Navy.
1971 – Apollo program: Apollo 15 astronauts become the first to ride in a lunar rover.
1972 – The Troubles: In Operation Motorman, the British Army re-takes the urban no-go areas of Northern Ireland. It is the biggest British military operation since the Suez Crisis of 1956, and the biggest in Ireland since the Irish War of Independence. Later that day, nine civilians are killed by car bombs in the village of Claudy.
1988 – 32 people are killed and 1,674 injured when a bridge at the Sultan Abdul Halim ferry terminal collapses in Butterworth, Penang, Malaysia.
1991 – The United States and Soviet Union both sign the START I Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty, the first to reduce (with verification) both countries' stockpiles.
1992 – Georgia joins the United Nations.
1999 – Discovery Program: Lunar Prospector – NASA intentionally crashes the spacecraft into the Moon, thus ending its mission to detect frozen water on the moon's surface.
2006 – Fidel Castro hands over power to brother Raúl Castro.
2007 – Operation Banner, the presence of the British Army in Northern Ireland, and the longest-running British Army operation ever, comes to an end.
2009 – Three members of the popular South Korean group TVXQ, (Kim Jaejoong, Kim Junsu, and Park Yoochun), filed lawsuit against their Korean management S.M. Entertainment.
2012 – Michael Phelps breaks the record set in 1964 by Larisa Latynina for the greatest number of medals won at the Olympics.

Famous Folk Born on July 31st:

Emperor Nijo of Japan
Philip the Good, son of John the Fearless
William S. Clark
Fred Quimby
George Liberace
Milton Friedman
Bryan Hextall
Bill Todman
Curt Gowdy
Ahmet Ertegun
Jimmy Evert
Ted Cassidy
France Nuyen
Geoffrey Lewis
Lobo
William Bennett
Gary Lewis
Evonne Goolagong Cawley
Faye Kellerman
Michael Biehn
Dirk Blocker
Wesley Snipes

Pat Finn
John Laurinaitis
Jim Corr

Dean Cain
Peter Rono
Ben Chaplin

Money as a motivator

Do you remember this song?

 

 



 
It's relevant because of a recent report from the Government Accountability Office about U. S. Defense Department employees.  Apparently there are nearly 100,000 of them who have very high level security clearances (above Top Secret), who owe over $700 million in delinquent income tax to the federal government.

This is very scary because of MICE.  That's an acronym that I may have mentioned before in this space.  It stands for Money, Ideology, Coercion, Ego.  The four primary reasons why people make the choice to violate the rules and give classified information to another nation.

The Coercion factor can also be interpreted as Compromised.  There is no easier way to compromise a potential intelligence source than to discover that you can exploit their need for funds.  This is articulated quite clearly in Inside The Aquarium:  The Making of a Top Soviet Spy by "Viktor Suvorov" (a pseudonym). 

Now there is a difference between having clearance and having access.  Just because someone has one of these very high clearance levels doesn't mean that they have access to highly classified information.  So if someone wants to propose that people with high clearances and big money problems merely have their access revoked, and allow them to retain the clearance while they work to resolve their finances; that would be fair. 

Something has to be done.

* * *

I had to go to a meeting early this morning and on my way home needed to run in to 7-11.  As I did, I saw another 7-11 customer emerging from the store and being confronted by a young woman.  She was in her early to mid 20s, very nicely dressed, clean and perfumed.  So when she asked the customer "do you have any spare change" I was taken aback.

I don't see a lot of panhandling these days, aside from people holding signs at freeway on-ramps and off-ramps.  What little I do isn't done by well-dressed, "clean" people.  It led me to wonder why in the world this young woman was asking for handouts.  If she's homeless, she is managing to somehow get clean and obtain nice clothing. 

Then as I was in the store and expecting to be confronted by her question when I exited, I thought about how I might reply.  "I have change, but none to spare" sounds harsh.  So I toyed with the idea of discussing the meaning of the word "spare" as it relates to her request.  I own a spare tire that I carry in my trunk, but it isn't there to be given to someone else.  It's there for a future time of need.  Which is how I treat the change I have in my pockets.  Each day it goes into a container, which is eventually redeemed every six months or so.  My harsh statement is actually the truth.  I have change, but none I am willing to spare.  I have paper currency as well, which I'm also not willing to spare.  Especially to someone who appears able to work to earn a living.

I got lucky.  She was gone when I walked out of the 7-11.

* * *

A 24 year old Chinese grad student at USC was murdered.  Now four teens have been arrested and charged with capital murder.  Five families destroyed. 

The quartet ranges in age from 16 to 19.  Why in the world did they need to rob and kill anyone?  Oh wait.  They didn't need to.  They chose to.  They wanted to.  I'm working on a novel when I get time, and the draft of the first paragraph is relevant here:

"With the exception of self-preservation, the hardest part of killing another human being is making the choice to kill.  Once you've made this choice, the rest is just planning and logistics.  The strange thing is that it actually doesn't get easier to make that choice a second or third time.  Only when killing becomes a profession or vocation does it get easier to make that decision."

I doubt any of the four teens involved in this incident have killed before, although I could be wrong.  What I do know is that for all four of them, their lives are essentially over if they are convicted of capital murder.  Two face being placed on Death Row, while the two younger ones may spend the rest of their lives in prison without possibility of parole.  Cops and lawyers call it LWOP, Life With Out Parole.

Was it just easier and more expedient to kill others in order to get some money?  Was it just for the thrill of taking a life?  To see the spark that is humanity fade from the eyes of another?  I doubt we'll ever know the truth.  What we do know is that five families are in ruin and there was no reason for any of them to be in such a state.

* * *

Random Ponderings:

It may only cost $1 million to add anti-missile defense systems to new passenger jets, but most U. S. carriers are going to fly their current fleets of planes until they are no longer flyable.  Worse yet, jumbo jets are particularly unsuited to the type of moves known as ACM (Air Combat Maneuvering).  Being able to dispense chaff and flares is not much help if you can't make the right moves in conjunction with the launch of these things.

I crack up whenever I hear Geoff Witcher of KNX radio doing a sportscast, if he plays the theme to the TV show "Cops."  It means it is time for the "Athlete Arrest of the Day."

Just how many farewell tours is Cher going to embark on?

What is it with the insane demands of celebrities who tour?  I can think of three or four who insist that a brand new toilet seat be installed in their suite.  You can't sit where others have sat before?

This one probably cost someone in marketing their job:

(An exploding building with a 9/11 release date?  Whoops!)

Kevin Smith may not be Jennifer Garner's favorite person, but he needs to get over it.

Jay Leno as mentor on "Last Comic Standing"...I can see that.

Shania Twain's pending departure from her Vegas residency at Caesar's Palace makes me wonder, what is Mutt Lange up to these days?

Jesse Ventura's win in his defamation suit against "American Sniper" author, the late Chris Kyle, reminds me that Ventura was never a true SEAL.  Yes, he did complete BUD/S and he was assigned to an Underwater Demolition Team (UDT).  But he never completed SEAL Qualification Training, and was never awarded the gold Navy Special Warfare insignia commonly known as "The Budweiser."

I hope Donald Sterling lives forever, but whenever it becomes "his time" I'd love to see a tally of just how many millions he will spend between now and then suing everyone under the sun.

Doesn't matter how many stars a hotel has, charging $127 for three small bottles of sparkling water is way out of bounds.

Stephen A. Smith got off too easy.  Worst case of foot in mouth disease in some time.

* * *

July 30th in History:

634 – Battle of Ajnadayn: Byzantine forces under Theodore are defeated by the Rashidun Caliphate near Beit Shemesh (modern Israel).
762 – Baghdad is founded by caliph Al-Mansur.
1419 – First Defenestration of Prague: a crowd of radical Hussites kill seven members of the Prague city council.
1502 – Christopher Columbus lands at Guanaja in the Bay Islands off the coast of Honduras during his fourth voyage.
1608 – At Ticonderoga (now Crown Point, New York), Samuel de Champlain shoots and kills two Iroquois chiefs. This was to set the tone for French-Iroquois relations for the next one hundred years.
1619 – In Jamestown, Virginia, the first representative assembly in the Americas, the House of Burgesses, convenes for the first time.
1629 – An earthquake in Naples, Italy, kills about 10,000 people.
1635 – Eighty Years' War: The Siege of Schenkenschans begins; Frederick Henry, Prince of Orange, begins the recapture of the strategically important fortress from the Spanish Army.
1656 – Swedish forces under the command of King Charles X Gustav defeat the forces of the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth at the Battle of Warsaw.
1676 – Nathaniel Bacon issues the "Declaration of the People of Virginia", beginning Bacon's Rebellion against the rule of Governor William Berkeley.
1729 – Foundation of Baltimore, Maryland.
1733 – The first Masonic Grand Lodge in the future United States is constituted in Massachusetts.
1756 – In Saint Petersburg, Bartolomeo Rastrelli presents the newly built Catherine Palace to Empress Elizabeth and her courtiers.
1811 – Father Miguel Hidalgo y Costilla, leader of the Mexican insurgency, is executed by the Spanish in Chihuahua, Chihuahua, Mexico.
1825 – Malden Island is discovered by captain George Byron, 7th Baron Byron.
1859 – First ascent of Grand Combin, one of the highest summits in the Alps.
1863 – American Indian Wars: Representatives of the United States and tribal leaders including Chief Pocatello (of the Shoshone) sign the Treaty of Box Elder.
1864 – American Civil War: Battle of the Crater – Union forces attempt to break Confederate lines at Petersburg, Virginia by exploding a large bomb under their trenches.
1865 – The steamboat Brother Jonathan sinks off the coast of Crescent City, California, killing 225 passengers, the deadliest shipwreck on the Pacific Coast of the U.S. at the time.
1866 – New Orleans, Louisiana's Democratic government orders police to raid an integrated Republican Party meeting, killing 40 people and injuring 150.
1871 – The Staten Island Ferry Westfield's boiler explodes, killing over 85 people.
1912 – Japan's Emperor Meiji dies and is succeeded by his son Yoshihito, who is now known as the Emperor Taishō.
1916 – Black Tom Island explosion in Jersey City, New Jersey.
1930 – In Montevideo, Uruguay wins the first FIFA World Cup.
1932 – Premiere of Walt Disney's Flowers and Trees, the first cartoon short to use Technicolor and the first Academy Award winning cartoon short.
1945 – World War II: Japanese submarine I-58 sinks the USS Indianapolis, killing 883 seamen.
1956 – A joint resolution of the U.S. Congress is signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower, authorizing In God we trust as the U.S. national motto.
1962 – The Trans-Canada Highway, the largest national highway in the world, is officially opened.
1965 – U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson signs the Social Security Act of 1965 into law, establishing Medicare and Medicaid.
1969 – Vietnam War: US President Richard Nixon makes an unscheduled visit to South Vietnam and meets with President Nguyen Van Thieu and U.S. military commanders.
1971 – Apollo program: Apollo 15 Mission – David Scott and James Irwin on the Apollo Lunar Module module Falcon land on the Moon with the first Lunar Rover.
1971 – An All Nippon Airways Boeing 727 and a Japanese Air Force F-86 collide over Morioka, Iwate, Japan killing 162.
1974 – Watergate scandal: U.S. President Richard Nixon releases subpoenaed White House recordings after being ordered to do so by the Supreme Court of the United States.
1974 – Six Royal Canadian Army Cadets are killed and fifty-four are injured in an accidental grenade blast at CFB Valcartier Cadet Camp.
1975 – Jimmy Hoffa disappears from the parking lot of the Machus Red Fox restaurant in Bloomfield Hills, Michigan, a suburb of Detroit, at about 2:30 p.m. He is never seen or heard from again, and will be declared legally dead on this date in 1982.
1978 – The 730 (transport), Okinawa Prefecture changes its traffic on the right-hand side of the road to the left-hand side.
1980 – Vanuatu gains independence.
1980 – Israel's Knesset passes the Jerusalem Law
1990 – George Steinbrenner is forced by Commissioner Fay Vincent to resign as principal partner of New York Yankees for hiring Howie Spira to "get dirt" on Dave Winfield.
2003 – In Mexico, the last 'old style' Volkswagen Beetle rolls off the assembly line.
2006 – The world's longest running music show Top of the Pops is broadcast for the last time on BBC Two. The show had aired for 42 years.

Famous Folk Born on July 30th:

Samuel Rogers
Emily Bronte
Henry Ford
Casey Stengel
Russell Van Horn
Henry W. Bloch
Joe Nuxhall
Bud Selig
Eleanor Smeal
Peter Bogdanovich
Patricia Schroeder (she was a good interview)
Paul Anka
David Sanborn
Arnold Schwarzenegger
Frank Stallone
Ken Olin
Rat Scabies
Delta Burke
Anita Hill
Kate Bush
Richard Linklater
Laurence Fishburne
Lisa Kudrow
Vivica A. Fox
Christopher Nolan
Tom Green
Hilary Swank
Misty May-Treanor
Jaime Pressley
Yvonne Strahovski

Be careful...you never know who is monitoring

Barry Friendly had amassed a fortune in excess of $50 million before his 25th birthday.  So when he met Suzy and fell in love, his people insisted that there be an ironclad prenuptial agreement.  He gave her money to hire a lawyer of her own and allowed that person to draw up the agreement.  His own lawyers worked with her guy and eventually an agreement was worked out that satisfied all.  If they divorced before their tenth anniversary, she would get $30,000 a year for five years.  After ten years, the figure went up to $50,000 a year for the rest of her life.

But there was one catch.  If it could be proven that Barry had engaged in marital infidelity, Suzy would be entitled to the greater of 25% of Barry's net worth, or 50% of what he'd earned during their marriage.  Barry never worried about that.  He travelled, was very discrete and his bodyguards ensured no sleazy private detectives were following him.

Barry's last mistress, Angelique, was ready, willing and able at any moment.  Not only would she go anywhere in the world at the drop of a hat to please her man, she also did something for him none of his prior mistresses would do.  She would sext with him via cellphone.  Barry made sure that they had the latest in iPhones, and also instructed Angelique to always delete their sexting conversations after they had finished.  Something he did himself.

So when Barry finally filed for divorce a few months ago, he was convinced his spousal support to Suzy would be limited to $150,000.  He was wrong.  Why?  Because it turns out that Apple collects data from every iPhone out there, including copies of texts, numbers dialed and more.  At least that's the assertion of one IT professional.  Worse yet, apparently users cannot disable the data collection.

That's frightening.  It would be far more intrusive than anything the National Security Agency has been accused of thus far. Every number dialed.  Every text sent and received.  We need to know more about this accusation.

Just in case it wasn't clear, Barry and Suzy aren't real.

* * *

The House and Senate say they are close to an agreement on a bill to reform the VA healthcare system.  In the long run, it probably won't address the underlying issues at VA facilities all over the nation.

While veterans of WWII, Korea and now Vietnam are dying off in ever-increasing numbers, the veterans who served in the two wars in Iraq and in Afghanistan raised the patient pool at the VA, significantly.  The change to a space-available basis for providing care for military retirees at military hospitals on bases all over the U. S. also added to the burden of the VA.

I got a card from the VA on Thursday.  It said to call and make an appointment with my primary care physician.  I don't have one at the moment.  The resident in the primary care clinic (PCC) who was following my care finished her residency in June.  A replacement doesn't start until late next month.  In the interim I've been seen by the walk-in-basis primary care doctor.

So I called on Friday, July 25th.  The earliest appointment available was for September 2nd.  Now if I needed to be seen, I could walk in and they'd get me in at some point that day.  But it wouldn't be my primary care doctor.  The whole notion of having a PCC doctor is so that one doctor is managing the care provided to you by all of the specialists you see.  Not being able to see the same doctor consistently is one of the problems of the VA system.

I had an appointment week before last at the Allergy clinic.  My appointment was for 2:00 p.m.  But there's a catch.  The Allergy clinic only operates this particular type of appointment one afternoon each week.  There were a bunch of people scheduled at 1, 1:30, 2, 2:30 and so on.  I got my vital signs taken by a nurse at 2:05 and it was nearly 3:30 before one of the Allergy clinic fellows, along with her resident and a med school student took me back to examine me.  The system is simply overloaded. 

Waiting an hour for care that is essentially free wouldn't bother me, except that the VA Medical Center is a major concentration of infections.  There were several people coughing in that clinic waiting room incessantly.  I've been through one MRSA infection hospitalization that I'm sure was caused by treatment at the VA, I don't want another.

Solving the waiting list problem is important.  So is solving the VA's other problems.  One way to prevent this kind of thing from happening in government is offering financial incentives to people to outperform expectations.

* * *

Random Ponderings:

I doubt that cosmetics companies are supportive of a female Indiana University student's experiment of going a year without makeup.

Joe Torre shouldn't be so hard on himself for leaving George Steinbrenner out of his Hall of Fame acceptance speech.

Making a 120 point word in Words With Friends is usually satisfying, but if I'd noticed I was already ahead in that game by 200+ points, I'd have made a lower point word.

Sarah Palin has launched her own online TV network.  Great, more crap online that I won't bother with.

Reading the polls that claim more Americans wish Mitt Romney were President than President Obama may be interesting, but it isn't helpful or informative.

I used to enjoy watching "Shark Tank" but the more I read and hear about how the deals actually do go down, the less I'm interesting in seeing any more of it.

Still can't believe the National Football League gives out longer suspensions for performance enhancing drug use than it does for domestic violence.  I will get to that topic eventually.

Chick Fil-A is probably guilty of religious discrimination in how it hires franchise operators.  Since they aren't owners, just operators, they seem to me to be employees.

I'd love to ask Kendra Wilkinson if she's more upset by the fact her husband was unfaithful in and of itself, or if it's the fact that he was unfaithful with a transgender woman.

Maybe while Governor Moonbeam is in Mexico on his trade mission, he could get that Marine Sergeant released from prison.

The members of Congress who are asking the Federal Communications Commission to step in and resolve the dispute involving Time-Warner Cable and other outlets who don't have access to the new Dodgers network need to shut up.

* * *

July 28th in History:

1364 – Troops of the Republic of Pisa and the Republic of Florence clash in the Battle of Cascina.
1540 – Thomas Cromwell is executed at the order of Henry VIII of England on charges of treason. Henry marries his fifth wife, Catherine Howard, on the same day.
1571 – La Laguna encomienda, known today as the Laguna province in the Philippines is founded by the Spaniards as one of the oldest encomienda/province in the country.
1794 – French Revolution: Maximilien Robespierre and Louis Antoine de Saint-Just are executed by guillotine in Paris, France.
1809 – Peninsular War: Battle of Talavera – Sir Arthur Wellesley's British, Portuguese and Spanish army defeats a French force led by Joseph Bonaparte.
1821 – José de San Martín declares the independence of Peru from Spain.
1854 – USS Constellation (1854), the last all-sail warship built by the United States Navy, is commissioned.
1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Ezra Church – Confederate troops make a third unsuccessful attempt to drive Union forces from Atlanta, Georgia.
1866 – At the age of 18, Vinnie Ream becomes the first and youngest female artist to receive a commission from the United States government for a statue (of Abraham Lincoln).
1868 – The 14th Amendment to the United States Constitution is certified, establishing African American citizenship and guaranteeing due process of law.
1896 – The city of Miami, Florida is incorporated.
1914 – World War I: Austria-Hungary declares war on Serbia after Serbia rejects the conditions of an ultimatum sent by Austria on July 23 following the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand.
1932 – U.S. President Herbert Hoover orders the United States Army to forcibly evict the "Bonus Army" of World War I veterans gathered in Washington, D.C.
1933 – Diplomatic relations between the Soviet Union and Spain are established.
1935 – First flight of the Boeing B-17 Flying Fortress.
1938 – Hawaii Clipper disappears between Guam and Manila as the first loss of an airliner in trans-Pacific China Clipper service.
1942 – World War II: Soviet leader Joseph Stalin issues Order No. 227 in response to alarming German advances into the Soviet Union. Under the order all those who retreat or otherwise leave their positions without orders to do so are to be tried in a military court, with punishments including duty in a penal battalion, imprisonment in a gulag, or execution.
1943 – World War II: Operation Gomorrah – The Royal Air Force bombs Hamburg, Germany causing a firestorm that kills 42,000 German civilians.
1945 – A U.S. Army B-25 bomber crashes into the 79th floor of the Empire State Building killing 14 and injuring 26.
1948 – The Metropolitan Police Flying Squad foils a bullion robbery in the "Battle of London Airport".
1955 – The Union Mundial pro Interlingua is founded at the first Interlingua congress in Tours, France.
1957 – Heavy rain and a mudslide in Isahaya, western Kyushu, Japan, kills 992.
1965 – Vietnam War: U.S. President Lyndon B. Johnson announces his order to increase the number of United States troops in South Vietnam from 75,000 to 125,000.
1973 – Summer Jam at Watkins Glen: 600,000 people attend a rock festival at the Watkins Glen International Raceway.
1974 – Spetsgruppa A, Russia's elite special force, was formed.
1976 – The Tangshan earthquake measuring between 7.8 and 8.2 moment magnitude flattens Tangshan in the People's Republic of China, killing 242,769 and injuring 164,851.
1993 – Andorra joins the United Nations.
1996 – The remains of a prehistoric man are discovered near Kennewick, Washington. Such remains will be known as the Kennewick Man.
2001 – Australian Ian Thorpe becomes the first swimmer to win six gold medals at a single World Championships.
2002 – Nine coal miners trapped in the flooded Quecreek Mine in Somerset County, Pennsylvania, are rescued after 77 hours underground.
2005 – The Provisional Irish Republican Army calls an end to its thirty year long armed campaign in Northern Ireland.
2005 – Tornadoes touch down in residential areas in south Birmingham and Coventry, England, causing £4,000,000 worth of damages and injuring 39 people.
2008 – The historic Grand Pier in Weston-super-Mare burns down for the second time in 80 years.
2010 – Airblue Flight 202 crashes into the Margalla Hills north of Islamabad, Pakistan, killing all 152 people aboard. It is the deadliest aviation accident in Pakistan history and the first involving an Airbus A321.

Famous Folk Born on July 28th:

Ballington Booth
Beatrix Potter
Lucy Burns
Marcel Duchamp
Barbara La Marr
Carmen Dragon
Baruch Samuel Blumberg
Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis
Alberto Fujimori
Bill Bradley
Jim Davis
Jonathan Edwards
Sally Struthers
Georgia Engel
Vida Blue
Peter Doyle
Bruce Abbott
Hugo Chavez
Rachel Sweet
Lori Loughlin
Alexis Arquette
Elizabeth Berkley

Leader of Florida shoplifting ring busted and other eye-catching headlines

A woman known as "Puffy" was the leader of a shoplifting ring in Polk County, Florida was caught in the act by cops who followed her.  The police shared their investigation with ABC News who did an in-depth story on the ring she led.  Reporter's Note:  Estimates are that $35 million worth of goods are shoplifted in the U. S., every single day.

At the recent World Women's 19 and under Volleyball Championships, held in Taipei, a woman on the Kazakhstan national team became an internet sensation.  Coaches and other players claim Sabina Altynbekova is so beautiful she distracts fans.  Judge for yourselves.

Andrej Pejic was a male model who was androgynous enough to model women's clothing in fashion shows.  Now, you can call her Andreja, as she has undergone sex reassignment surgery.

When she was 11, Natalie Portman won the part of "Mathilda" in "Leon:  The Professional" beating out over 1,000 other aspiring actresses.  Among those who tried and didn't get the part, Liv Tyler.

New details are being released in the shooting death of a Florida State University law professor.  Daniel Merkel was just 41 years old when he was shot in the head at his Tallahassee home.  Police have offered a $3,000 reward for information leading to an arrest.  Reporter's note:  Only $3,000???

In Darby, PA, a doctor shot and critically wounded a man who had allegedly just murdered a case worker.

When "Dawn of the Planet of the Apes" opened, trainers from a nearby wildlife park took two of their chimps to the multiplex to watch the film.  The chimps purchased their own tickets and drank sodas in the theater.

At 7:00 p.m. on Saturday night during the weekend of the "Century Crush," reports are that work is ahead of schedule.

The U. S. Marine being detained in a Mexican prison for driving across the border with guns in his vehicle has a new lawyer, and the new lawyer says his prior representation blew it.  Attorney Fernando Benitez says that Sergeant Andrew Tahmooressi could have been released during his first four days in jail.

Adam West says Ben Affleck will make a great Batman.  Hey, he should know.

They call him a "cardsharp" but in fact Jubreal Chahine isn't all that sharp or he wouldn't have been busted for cheating in a Pennsylvania casino for "past-posting."

In Florida, a pharmacist serving a 30 month sentence in home confinement is asking for the last seven months of the sentence to be eliminated via "compassionate release."  His attorney argues that given 70 year old Steven Goodman's 551 lb weight; which prevented him from going to prison, keeps him homebound anyway.  Goodman was convicted of involvement in a scheme where 1 million oxycodone tablets were illegally distributed.

Interesting how some media outlets refer to Kourtney Kardashian as a "socialite" while her sisters are referred to as "reality stars."  She's been spotted showing off her latest baby bump and trying to mend fences with boyfriend Scott Disick.

Baseball, the Baseball Hall of Fame, Tony La Russa and PEDs

There's no question that Tony La Russa belongs in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, NY.  He will be so enshrined this coming Sunday, along with players Greg Maddux, Tom Glavine and Frank Thomas.  All three players were elected in their first year of eligibility.  Managers Joe Torre and Bobby Cox will also go into the Hall.

That's fine.  La Russa is a great manager, but as an ethicist he leaves something to be desired.  At least he does when he advocates that players like Roger Clemens, Mark McGwire and Barry Bonds belong in the Hall of Fame.  He says that maybe they should have an asterisk, indicating that their achievements could possibly be tainted; but they still deserve recognition.

Rules are rules and they are particularly rules when it comes to athletics.  Track and field has standards that prevent a performance from being recognized as a record if there's too much wind.  Since the wind can impact the performance that is obviously fair. 

Let's go back to Don McCune.  He was a virtual unknown on the Professional Bowler's Tour until 1973 when he discovered that soaking a plastic bowling ball in Methyl Ethyl Ketone (MEK) made its surface softer.  Softer means more hook.  More hook meant more power.  That season he won six titles, finished in the top 10 on the money list and was named Player of the Year.  He went back to being an also-ran after that season.  Why?  They changed the rules.  McCune may have taken advantage of a flaw in the rules, but he didn't break any rules.

Any MLB player who used performance-enhancing drugs when they were against the rules, does not deserve to be in the Hall of Fame, with or without an asterisk.  They talked about giving Roger Maris an asterisk when he hit 61 home runs in one season, because he had eight more games in his season than Babe Ruth had in 1927 when he hit 60.  Truth be told, in 1932 Jimmie Foxx should have been credited with 60 home runs, but he lost two to rain-outs.  He also lost five or six more to a screen erected in St. Louis that wasn't there in 1927.

Just one man's opinion.  Maybe the veterans committee will choose to put those PED superstars in the Hall someday.  But don't hold your breath.

The height of cruelty

This is the text of the Eighth Amendment of the United States Constitution:  "Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted."

The courts have ruled that because it takes so long for an inmate on California's "Death Row" to finally get to the execution chamber; that the uncertainty involved makes execution in our state a cruel and unusual punishment.  But that doesn't come close to the level of cruelty that took place in an execution in Arizona this week.

Joseph Wood was given the so-called "lethal injection" and it took over 100 minutes for him to die.  He was gasping for air most of that time.  That's just unacceptable.  It is the very personification of cruel and unusual.  If we're going to make people suffer for nearly two hours, perhaps we should just go back to drawing and quartering.  Or the stocks, or the rack.

We already know the death penalty is a bad decision from a fiscal standpoint.  It costs far more to execute a prisoner than it does to keep that prisoner behind bars for 40 or 50 years.  Adding lawsuits against state governments for the kind of execution that Mr. Wood went through only exacerbates the financial issue.

Is the death penalty a deterrent to murder or other crimes punishable by death?  Depends on who you ask.  If you ask the proponents of the death penalty, they're convinced it is a deterrent.  Ask those opposed to the death penalty and they'll tell you all day long is it NOT a deterrent.  Numbers can be manipulated to do almost anything, but there are some numbers that I find interesting when it comes to determining if the death penalty is a deterrent.

In 1990, the murder rate in states with a death penalty was 9.5 per 100,000.  States without a death penalty had a slightly lower rate that year, 9.16 per 100,000.  That was a 4% difference.  Now we know that murder has been on a sharp decline.  If we move forward to 2006, death penalty states had a murder rate of 5.9 per 100,000 while the states that do not have a death penalty rate were at 4.22 per 100,000.  The differential widened from 4% to 40%.  Based solely on those numbers, it would seem the death penalty is not deterring murders in the states that still have a death penalty.

If a state wants to continue using the death penalty, that's the choice of its residents.  But a better way has to be found to avoid any more situations like that suffered by Joseph Wood.

* * *

When I was very young and people would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up, I'd often tell a joke I had thought up all on my own.  I'd tell them whatever I was fascinated with at the time and then add "but I don't want to be President of the United States."  They would ask why and I'd retort "because there's no room for advancement."

In this era of hyper-partisanship, why would anyone want to take on the task of following Barrack Obama in the White House, which is a worse no-win scenario than the Kobayashi Maru as shown here.

Ronald Reagan was the oldest man to be inaugurated as President, back in 1980.  He was 69.  Joe Biden is going to turn 72 this November, and would be 74 at his inauguration if he were to win the 2016 presidential election.  Hillary Clinton is almost exactly five years younger than Biden, which would make her roughly Reagan's age were she to win in 2016.  Not all people who are old, are truly "old" and no longer capable of doing a difficult job.  But the Presidency is by definition the most important job in the nation.  Yet whoever win the election in November of 2016 will be vilified by the other party, criticized harshly in the media for every position they take and that's just what will go on before the inauguration.

I'd cast my ballot for Pat Paulsen, but he stopped running for the Presidency when he died about 17 years ago.

* * *

Cory Tschogi owns a 600 square foot condo in the Palm Springs area and she'd heard good things about AirBNB.  www.airbnb.com if you want to see their website.  A renter was found who wanted to stay for 44 days.  It went well the first month, but then the renter refused to pay the balance due.  Worse yet, when the 44 days was up, the renter (identified as Maksym Pashanin) refused to leave.

So she should have just had the cops remove them, right?  Wrong.  In California, a rental of 30 days or more creates tenancy and tenants have rights.  Now Ms Tschogi is going to have to evict these squatters and that will take time and money.  Her electricity bills have more than tripled.  AirBNB didn't respond to her at first, but has now promised to pay the full amount of the rental and they are working with her to provide legal support.

Rule #1.  Never rent out your home to anyone for 30 days or more in California.  Anaheim and Buena Park are just two examples of cities that have ordinances preventing motel owners from renting a room to someone for more than 30 days in a row.

Rule #2.  If you're going to rent out your home on a short term with a business like AirBNB, make sure to have your contract with them reviewed by a competent attorney to make sure your rights are protected.

BTW, if you rent out your home for more than 14 days in any calendar year period, the rent you receive is taxable income.

* * *

Billy Joel has received a very prestigious honor, the Gershwin Prize, which is awarded by the U. S. Library of Congress.  He is clearly deserving of this honor.

When the Library of Congress begins to decide who will be thusly honored next, they need to consider someone you may not be familiar with.  However, I am convinced you are familiar with her music.  She's written six songs that were nominated for the Academy Award for Best Original Song (yes, one of them was co-written with Albert Hammond).  She has won a Golden Globe award and an Emmy.  A partial list of the hit songs she's written includes:

Can't Fight the Moonlight
Nothing's Gonna Stop Us Now
Because You Needed Me
How Do I Live
I Don't Want to Miss a Thing
There You'll Be
Live for Loving You
Solitaire
Rhythm of the Night
I Get Weak

I'm referring to the brilliant Diane Warren, who should be the next recipient of this honor.

* * *

Random Ponderings:

Snoop Dog has no good excuse for lighting up a blunt in a White House restroom.  Now if you want to blaze up with the President in his quarters and he's willing, that's different.

Eddie Murphy's girlfriend, model Paige Butcher is hot!  But she shuns the spotlight.  Good for her.

I'm a big fan of Frank Caliendo.  The video below is damn funny.

Would someone tell Britney Spears that just because she looks good again doesn't mean she'll be successful with a line of lingerie?

I feel bad for that doctor who was fighting Ebola in Africa and contracted the disease himself.  Ebola is nasty.  There are mixed reports, some claiming the doctor has died and others that he is responding well to treatment. 

I don't care that Olivia Munn loves to dress up as Wonder Woman.  The question is can she fill out Lynda Carter's old bustier?

A Chinese multimillionaire used his American Express Black card (http://creditcardforum.com/blog/american-express-black-card-requirements/ if you want to know more) to buy a $36 million vase at auction.  The bonus is he earned over 422 million rewards points with his purchase.  Pretty neat.

Robert Samuel earns up to $1,000 a week as a professional line sitter.  After finding the need, he's hired his friends.  One of them stood in line 43 hours for an audition for "Shark Tank" and brought in $800 in revenue for that one job alone.  I'd hire someone to stand in a long line for me.  It's worth the expense.

San Francisco has a new ordinance making it much more expensive for a landlord to exit the rental real estate business.  It vastly increases how much a property owner must pay a tenant they evict under the state's Ellis Act.  The ordinance is bad law and almost certainly unconstitutional.  I hope the family challenging it now prevail in court.

Did a donut shop in Connecticut really ban a 4 year old boy from its premises because he asked a female patron if she was expecting?  If so, that sucks!

The two women accused of second degree murder in the Kim Pham beating death were found guilty, but of the lesser charge of voluntary manslaughter.  Given the confusion surrounding the case, that seems fair.

I don't always agree with her columns, but Robin Abcarian of www.latimes.com nailed it today with her column on the conviction of former L. A. City Councilman Richard Alarcon and his wife on charges they lied about their address and thusly committing fraud.  More on this in my next blog.

A poll says 74% of the population polled is opposed to lowering the national drinking age back to 18.  I agree, with one exception.  Members of the U. S. armed forces on active duty should be allowed to drink, on military installations.  If you're old enough to die defending your country, then you deserve a drink; and bases are controlled environments.

It is high time that Weird Al Yankovic had the #1 album on the charts.  He's been churning out quality parodies for decades.  In fact, his first single was "My Bologna" in 1979.

A hospital is being sued for amputating a man's penis instead of circumcising him.  The hospital claims "...the suit lacks merit."  Reporter's note:  How do you make that mistake???

In Gainesville, FL, a man who was engaged in road rage was run over by his own truck.  Joseph Carl plowed into a vehicle stopped at a red light and got out and began banging on the driver's window.  The frightened woman sped away and with nothing holding his truck, it ran him down.  He suffered fractures in the feet and hands.

* * *

July 24th in History:

1132 – Battle of Nocera between Ranulf II of Alife and Roger II of Sicily.
1148 – Louis VII of France lays siege to Damascus during the Second Crusade.
1411 – Battle of Harlaw, one of the bloodiest battles in Scotland, takes place.
1487 – Citizens of Leeuwarden, Netherlands strike against a ban on foreign beer.
1534 – French explorer Jacques Cartier plants a cross on the Gaspé Peninsula and takes possession of the territory in the name of Francis I of France.
1567 – Mary, Queen of Scots, is forced to abdicate and replaced by her 1-year-old son James VI.
1701 – Antoine de la Mothe Cadillac founds the trading post at Fort Pontchartrain, which later becomes the city of Detroit, Michigan.
1783 – The Kingdom of Georgia and the Russian Empire sign the Treaty of Georgievsk.
1814 – War of 1812: General Phineas Riall advances toward the Niagara River to halt Jacob Brown's American invaders.
1823 – Slavery is abolished in Chile.
1823 – In Maracaibo, Venezuela the naval Battle of Lake Maracaibo takes place, where Admiral José Prudencio Padilla, defeats the Spanish Navy, thus culminating the independence for the Gran Colombia.
1847 – After 17 months of travel, Brigham Young leads 148 Mormon pioneers into Salt Lake Valley, resulting in the establishment of Salt Lake City. Celebrations of this event include the Pioneer Day Utah state holiday and the Days of '47 Parade.
1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Kernstown – Confederate General Jubal Early defeats Union troops led by General George Crook in an effort to keep them out of the Shenandoah Valley.
1866 – Reconstruction: Tennessee becomes the first U.S. state to be readmitted to the Union following the American Civil War.
1901 – O. Henry is released from prison in Columbus, Ohio after serving three years for embezzlement from a bank.
1910 – The Ottoman Empire captures the city of Shkodër, putting down the Albanian Revolt of 1910.
1911 – Hiram Bingham III re-discovers Machu Picchu, "the Lost City of the Incas".
1915 – The passenger ship S.S. Eastland capsizes while tied to a dock in the Chicago River. A total of 844 passengers and crew are killed in the largest loss of life disaster from a single shipwreck on the Great Lakes.
1922 – The draft of the British Mandate of Palestine was formally confirmed by the Council of the League of Nations; it came into effect on 26 September 1923.
1923 – The Treaty of Lausanne, settling the boundaries of modern Turkey, is signed in Switzerland by Greece, Bulgaria and other countries that fought in World War I.
1924 – Archeologist Themistoklis Sofoulis becomes Prime Minister of Greece.
1927 – The Menin Gate war memorial is unveiled at Ypres.
1929 – The Kellogg–Briand Pact, renouncing war as an instrument of foreign policy, goes into effect (it is first signed in Paris on August 27, 1928 by most leading world powers).
1931 – A fire at a home for the elderly in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania kills 48 people.
1935 – The Dust Bowl heat wave reaches its peak, sending temperatures to 109°F (43°C) in Chicago, Illinois and 104°F (40°C) in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.
1937 – Alabama drops rape charges against the so-called "Scottsboro Boys".
1938 – First ascent of the Eiger north face.
1943 – World War II: Operation Gomorrah begins: British and Canadian aeroplanes bomb Hamburg by night, and American planes by day. By the end of the operation in November, 9,000 tons of explosives will have killed more than 30,000 people and destroyed 280,000 buildings.
1950 – Cape Canaveral Air Force Station begins operations with the launch of a Bumper rocket.
1959 – At the opening of the American National Exhibition in Moscow, U.S. Vice President Richard Nixon and Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev have a "Kitchen Debate".
1963 – The iconic Bluenose II was launched in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia. The schooner is a major Canadian symbol.
1966 – Michael Pelkey makes the first BASE jump from El Capitan along with Brian Schubert. Both came out with broken bones. BASE jumping has now been banned from El Cap.
1967 – During an official state visit to Canada, French President Charles de Gaulle declares to a crowd of over 100,000 in Montreal: Vive le Québec libre! ("Long live free Quebec!"). The statement, interpreted as support for Quebec independence, delighted many Quebecers but angered the Canadian government and many English Canadians.
1969 – Apollo program: Apollo 11 splashes down safely in the Pacific Ocean.
1972 – Bugojno group is caught by Yugoslav security forces.
1974 – Watergate scandal: The United States Supreme Court unanimously ruled that President Richard Nixon did not have the authority to withhold subpoenaed White House tapes and they order him to surrender the tapes to the Watergate special prosecutor.
1977 – End of a four day long Libyan–Egyptian War.
1980 – The Quietly Confident Quartet of Australia wins the Men's 4 x 100 metre medley relay at the Moscow Olympics, the only time the United States has not won the event at Olympic level.
1982 – Heavy rain causes a mudslide that destroys a bridge at Nagasaki, Japan, killing 299.
1983 – The Black July anti-Tamil riots begin in Sri Lanka, killing between 400 and 3,000. Black July is generally regarded as the beginning of the Sri Lankan Civil War.
1983 – George Brett batting for the Kansas City Royals against the New York Yankees, has a game-winning home run nullified in the "Pine Tar Incident".
1990 – Iraqi forces start massing on the Kuwait-Iraq border.
1991 – Manmohan Singh presents his budget speech to the Indian Parliament which led to economic liberalisation in India
1998 – Russell Eugene Weston, Jr. bursts into the United States Capitol and opens fire killing two police officers. He is later ruled to be incompetent to stand trial.
2001 – Simeon Saxe-Coburg-Gotha, the last Tsar of Bulgaria when he was a child, is sworn in as Prime Minister of Bulgaria, becoming the first monarch in history to regain political power through democratic election to a different office.
2001 – Bandaranaike Airport attack is carried out by 14 Tamil Tiger commandos, all died in this attack. They destroyed 11 Aircraft (mostly military) and damaged 15, there are no civilian casualties. This incident slowed down Sri Lankan economy.
2002 – Democrat James Traficant is expelled from the United States House of Representatives on a vote of 420 to 1.
2009 – The MV Arctic Sea, reportedly carrying a cargo of timber, is allegedly hijacked in the North Sea by pirates, but much speculation remains as to the actual cargo and events.
2011 – Digital switchover is completed in 44 of the 47 prefectures of Japan, with Iwate, Miyagi[disambiguation needed], and Fukushima television stations terminating analog broadcasting operations later as a result of the Tōhoku earthquake.
2013 – A high-speed train derails in Spain rounding a curve with an 80 km/h (50 mph) speed limit at 190 km/h (120 mph), killing 78 passengers.

Famous Folk Born on July 24th:

Emperor Suzaku of Japan
Simon Bolivar
Alexandre Dumas

Vicente Acosta
Ernest Bloch
Amelia Earhart
Bella Abzug
John Aniston
Ruth Buzzi
Dan Inosanto
Walt Bellamy
Dan Hedaya
Chris Sarandon
Gallagher
Robert Hays

Michael Richards
Gus Van Sant

Pat Finn (he hosts Shop Til You Drop and I met him when my now ex-girlfriend and I were contestants on it)
Julie Krone
Karl Malone
Barry Bonds
Kadeem Hardison
Kristen Chenoweth (she may stand only 4'11" but her talents are at least 8' tall)
Laura Leighton
Rick Fox
Jennifer Lopez
Stephanie Adams
Rose Byrne
Elisabeth Moss
Anna Paquin
Joey Kovar
Mara Wilson

Private school in Wisconsin goes under and other eye-catching headlines

The Wisconsin International School, located in De Pere, has closed and filed for bankruptcy protection.  Some of the families who had already paid their tuition for the upcoming year will almost certainly not receive a refund.  So will teachers and administrators who are owed unpaid wages of more than $165,000.

An American was among the Israel Defense Forces personnel killed in the Gaza strip last week.  There are more than 100 Americans from the Los Angeles area serving in the IDF.

McDonald's sales and foot traffic are down and it doesn't seem likely they will pick up again anytime soon.

Actress Pauley Perrette has warned others to be careful of hair dye allergies after she had to be hospitalized for the condition.  She stars on "NCIS" on CBS.

The 12 year old Wisconsin girl who was stabbed 19 times by some classmates has received a Purple Heart in the mail.  Her family members asked that well-wishers send her hearts, colored purple.  A military Purple Heart medal was sent to her anonymously.

Sarah Palin got pulled over for speeding in Alaska and said "I wasn't speeding, I was qualifying."   Reporter's note:  Qualifying for what?  She isn't qualified to do much of anything.

Sherri Shepherd continues to try to avoid having to pay child support for a baby from her egg and her soon to be ex-husband's sperm that is being carried by a surrogate mother.  Reporter's note:  If a man was trying to avoid financial responsibility for a child that he was biologically connected to, people would be going bat-shit.  A woman is trying to do it and no one has anything to say.

The early Oscar buzz now is coming from the list of films set for this September's Toronto International Film Festival and include "Foxcatcher," "The Equalizer," "Black and White" and "Maps to the Stars."  Those are just a few of the films generating Oscar speculation.

Paul Hogan got to keep his house in Venice, CA and the rights to his Crocodile Dundee character, but he had to write his now ex-wife a check for $5.77 million to settle the case.

A passenger on Southwest Airlines was booted from a flight before it took off, because he had tweeted that the airline's agent at the gate was very rude.

Justin Bieber was photographed sitting in a wheelchair at Disneyland and some said he was doing it to jump lines.  However reps for the Biebs say that he is allowed to go to the front of lines when he visits the park already, to avoid having large crowds gather once he's been sighted.

President Obama is in the L. A. area this afternoon (Wednesday) for a fundraiser, but it appears he won't be buying a house in Rancho Mirage as he'd been rumored to be doing.

California wants more tax revenue

There is an Iowa corporation that does not do business in California.  No operation or presence in CA at all, with one very minor exception. This Iowa Limited Liability Corporation (LLC) owns 2/10ths of one percent of a California LLC as an investment.  They have no control over operations or anything else.  Somehow, the Franchise Tax Board found a way to prevail in court, and now this Iowa LLC is considered to operate in California, and must pay the $800 annual tax on LLCs.

It's bad enough that the governors of other states make bold bids to businesses in CA to move elsewhere, but when the state itself is seeking to impose this tax on businesses that shouldn't be paying it, they will drive away corporate investment in CA businesses.  What's next, if I own stock in a business with a presence in CA will I have to pay tax on the unrealized gain in the value of my shares?  Or an annual fee because I have an investment in the Golden State?

Once again, the nanny state of Governor Moonbeam has run amok.

* * *

Will Rogers once said "Congress is the best government money can buy."  Well, there's a billionaire who is out to prove that dictum.  Sheldon Adelson, who according to Forbes Magazine is worth $28.5 billion, plans to spend as much as $100 million backing candidates in the upcoming November elections.  At least that is what some sources are reporting.

What is his ultimate goal?  I suspect it's a two-stage project.  Return the Senate to Republican control in 2014 and then put a Republican in the White House in 2016.  Can he succeed?  Maybe.  Maybe not.  He clearly has the cash.  He's clearly motivated.  He stands to reap vast amounts in tax reductions if he succeeds in this plan.

Is this a good argument over limiting Super-PACs?  Oh yes!

* * *

There's a Dear Abby column about young couples and handling of money.  If I were ever to marry again, I would suggest that we take our total combined income and determine what percentage of the total each of us is contributing.  So if one of us were bringing in 63% and the other 37%, that would be the percentage of our joint bills we would each be responsible for.

I may have mentioned this before, but when my second wife and I moved in together, we opened a joint checking account.  I managed the money and paid all the bills and I never said "no" to any spending she wanted to do.  I merely asked that she let me know if she was going to spend more than $40 or $50, so I could make sure there was money in the joint checking account to cover the purchase.

Eventually she grew tired of this and wanted to have separate accounts and each pay 1/2 the bills.  I had no problem with that.  I was bringing in somewhere between 65% and 75% of the total income (depending on whether or not I was working a part-time job at the time) so I wound up with lots of extra money and she was always broke.

* * *

Random Ponderings:

Pretty interesting that Robert Downey, Jr., was the top earning actor on the Forbes list, even though he didn't star in any movies released during that period.

President Obama says Vice President Biden would make a "superb president" which seems to indicate that plagiarism is not something Obama cares much about.

Donald Sterling's loans are being called in by some banks?  Aw, too bad for him.

In the race to unseat Minnesota's Senator Al Franken, there are two Republican candidates.  One who is too conservative to have a chance of winning, and the other is too moderate for the taste of the Tea Party members in the state.  Tough choice for voters.  Why do Republicans keep nominating people who won't win?

When I heard they were doing a "Facts of Life" reunion film, I knew immediately George Clooney would not be involved.

Over 8,000 women are going to get a share of $190 million because a male gynecologist took pictures and voice recordings of his examinations of them.  Less than $25,000 each seems a bit low.

I've tried a couple of suggested methods to send texts from my computer rather than my smartphone but so far none of them have worked.  Frustrating.

As you can see below, this is the anniversary of the arrest of Jeffrey Dahmer when police found human remains in his apartment.  They found a colon in his typewriter.  And Head and Shoulders in his shower.  The first private lawyer he tried to hire said "it'll cost you an arm and a leg for this trial" and Dahmer responded "I've got that in cold storage."  www.instantrimshot.com

* * *

July 22nd in History:

838 – Battle of Anzen: The Byzantine emperor Theophilos suffers a heavy defeat by the Abbasids.
1099 – First Crusade: Godfrey of Bouillon is elected the first Defender of the Holy Sepulchre of The Kingdom of Jerusalem.
1209 – Massacre at Béziers: The first major military action of the Albigensian Crusade.
1298 – Wars of Scottish Independence: Battle of Falkirk – King Edward I of England and his longbowmen defeat William Wallace and his Scottish schiltrons outside the town of Falkirk.
1456 – Ottoman Wars in Europe: Siege of Belgrade – John Hunyadi, Regent of the Kingdom of Hungary, defeats Mehmet II of the Ottoman Empire
1484 – Battle of Lochmaben Fair: A 500-man raiding party led by Alexander Stewart, Duke of Albany and James Douglas, 9th Earl of Douglas are defeated by Scots forces loyal to Albany's brother James III of Scotland; Douglas is captured.
1499 – Battle of Dornach: The Swiss decisively defeat the Imperial army of Emperor Maximilian I.
1587 – Colony of Roanoke: A second group of English settlers arrives on Roanoke Island off North Carolina to re-establish the deserted colony.
1686 – Albany, New York is formally chartered as a municipality by Governor Thomas Dongan.
1706 – The Acts of Union 1707 are agreed upon by commissioners from the Kingdom of England and the Kingdom of Scotland, which, when passed by each countries' Parliaments, led to the creation of the Kingdom of Great Britain.
1793 – Alexander Mackenzie reaches the Pacific Ocean becoming the first recorded human to complete a transcontinental crossing of Canada.
1796 – Surveyors of the Connecticut Land Company name an area in Ohio "Cleveland" after Gen. Moses Cleaveland, the superintendent of the surveying party.
1797 – Battle of Santa Cruz de Tenerife: Battle between Spanish and British naval forces during the French Revolutionary Wars. During the Battle, Rear-Admiral Nelson is wounded in the arm and the arm had to be partially amputated.
1805 – Napoleonic Wars: War of the Third Coalition – Battle of Cape Finisterre – An inconclusive naval action is fought between a combined French and Spanish fleet under Admiral Pierre-Charles Villeneuve of Spain and a British fleet under Admiral Robert Calder.
1812 – Napoleonic Wars: Peninsular War – Battle of Salamanca – British forces led by Arthur Wellesley (later the Duke of Wellington) defeat French troops near Salamanca, Spain.
1864 – American Civil War: Battle of Atlanta – Outside Atlanta, Georgia, Confederate General John Bell Hood leads an unsuccessful attack on Union troops under General William T. Sherman on Bald Hill.
1894 – The first ever motor race is held in France between the cities of Paris and Rouen. The fastest finisher was the Comte Jules-Albert de Dion, but The 'official' victory was awarded to Albert Lemaître driving his 3 hp petrol engined Peugeot.
1916 – In San Francisco, California, a bomb explodes on Market Street during a Preparedness Day parade killing ten and injuring 40.
1933 – Wiley Post becomes the first person to fly solo around the world traveling 15,596 miles (25,099 km) in seven days, 18 hours and 45 minutes.
1934 – Outside Chicago's Biograph Theater, "Public Enemy No. 1" John Dillinger is mortally wounded by FBI agents.
1937 – New Deal: The United States Senate votes down President Franklin D. Roosevelt's proposal to add more justices to the Supreme Court of the United States.
1942 – The United States government begins compulsory civilian gasoline rationing due to the wartime demands.
1942 – Holocaust: The systematic deportation of Jews from the Warsaw Ghetto begins.
1943 – World War II: Allied forces capture the Italian city of Palermo.
1944 – The Polish Committee of National Liberation publishes its manifesto, starting the period of Communist rule in Poland
1946 – King David Hotel bombing: A Zionist underground organisation, the Irgun, bombs the King David Hotel in Jerusalem, site of the civil administration and military headquarters for Mandate Palestine, resulting in 91 deaths.
1951 – Dezik (Дезик) and Tsygan (Цыган, "Gypsy") are the first dogs to make a sub-orbital flight.
1962 – Mariner program: Mariner 1 spacecraft flies erratically several minutes after launch and has to be destroyed.
1963 – Sarawak achieve independence.
1976 – Japan completes its last reparation to the Philippines for war crimes committed during the imperial Japan's conquest of the country in the Second World War.
1977 – Chinese leader Deng Xiaoping is restored to power.
1983 – Martial law in Poland is officially revoked.
1991 – Jeffrey Dahmer is arrested in Milwaukee after police discover human remains in his apartment.
1992 – Near Medellín, Colombian drug lord Pablo Escobar escapes from his luxury prison fearing extradition to the United States.
1993 – Great Flood of 1993: Levees near Kaskaskia, Illinois rupture, forcing the entire town to evacuate by barges operated by the Army Corps of Engineers.
1997 – The second Blue Water Bridge opens between Port Huron, Michigan and Sarnia, Ontario.
2003 – Members of 101st Airborne of the United States, aided by Special Forces, attack a compound in Iraq, killing Saddam Hussein's sons Uday and Qusay, along with Mustapha Hussein, Qusay's 14-year old son, and a bodyguard.
2005 – Jean Charles de Menezes is killed by police as the hunt begins for the London Bombers responsible for the 7 July 2005 London bombings and the 21 July 2005 London bombings.
2011 – Norway is the victim of twin terror attacks, the first being a bomb blast which targeted government buildings in central Oslo, the second being a massacre at a youth camp on the island of Utøya.
2013 – A series of earthquakes in Dingxi, China, kills at least 89 people and injures more than 500 others.

Famous Folk Born on July 22nd:

Joan of England, Queen of Scotland
Emma Lazarus
James Whale
Rose Kennedy
Edward Hopper
Karl Menninger
Alexander Calder
Amy Vanderbilt
Alan Stephenson Boyd
Bob Dole
The Fabulous Moolah

Orson Bean (Andrew Breitbart's father-in-law)
Oscar de la Renta
Terence Stamp
Alex Trebek
George Clinton
Kay Bailey Hutchinson
Bobby Sherman
Danny Glover
Albert Brooks
Don Henley
S. E. Hinton
Alan Menken
Lonette McKee
Willem Dafoe
David Von Erich
David Spade
Patrick Labyorteaux
Shawn Michaels

Rhys Ifans
Keyshawn Johnson
Rufus Wainwright
A. J. Cook
Fandango
Selena Gomez