What The Hell Is Going On Here?

NOTE TO ALL READERS, I SUPPORT A MOM’S RIGHT TO BREAST FEED IN PUBLIC

At first when I saw the story of two air force moms breastfeeding their kids while in uniform I thought well, you gotta do what you gotta do.  Unfortunately the more I keep reading about it the more I keep saying to myself that really all they are doing is seeking out attention for themselves, I don’t know am I wrong here?  Literally you have to ask, what the hell is going on here?  This is because over the last year mothers seem to make it a point to kind of show off the fact that they are breastfeeding in public.  The first time I heard of this was last year when some mom was told she couldn’t breast feed while at Target.  In response a bunch of moms decided to go and challenge Target by breastfeeding in public and daring them to do something about it.  I thought then that Target was out of line and if the kid needed to eat then it is what it is.  I still feel that way now, but I swear somethings changed, these moms now seem to going around breast feeding in public with the hope that someone does say something so they can turn it into an issue.  Or they just appear to like going out in public to show off their breast feeding like these two air force ladies.  It’s almost the equivalent of somebody dropping f-bombs left and right and then claiming freedom of speech, kind of like doing it just because you can.  Somebody let me know if I’m wrong here?  Link to story below.

Pic of breastfeeding servicewomen sparks debate

100 Year Old Color Photographs

 

 

The title says it all, today when combing around for something to post about I found these photographs taken over 100 years ago in Russia.  Hardly seems possible, but you have to admit that the photographs do seem pretty old based on the way people dressed and the lack of paved roads, etc.  Anyway, the pictures are neat to look at.  Here is a quote from the original story to give you some background info.

“With images from southern and central Russia in the news lately due to extensive wildfires, I thought it would be interesting to look back in time with this extraordinary collection of color photographs taken between 1909 and 1912. In those years, photographer Sergei Mikhailovich Prokudin-Gorskii (1863-1944) undertook a photographic survey of the Russian Empire with the support of Tsar Nicholas II. He used a specialized camera to capture three black and white images in fairly quick succession, using red, green and blue filters, allowing them to later be recombined and projected with filtered lanterns to show near true color images. The high quality of the images, combined with the bright colors, make it difficult for viewers to believe that they are looking 100 years back in time – when these photographs were taken, neither the Russian Revolution nor World War I had yet begun. Collected here are a few of the hundreds of color images made available by the Library of Congress, which purchased the original glass plates back in 1948.”

Note to reader, there are more photos to view here Russia in color, a century ago.

 

 

Polish Pride

When I got word that the prime minister of Poland was demanding an apology from President Obama because he had referred to the Nazi death camps in Poland as Polish death camps my first thought was the Poles really needed to get over it.  To me the white house saying they had misspoke seemed to be good enough.  Then I was reminded of all the slights this white house has made towards Poland since taking office and I began to think that maybe the Polish reaction was not just because the president misspoke.  The article I was reading was over at www.economist.com and they pointed out how this administration had reneged on our missile defense commitment to Poland, and we still had not lifted visa requirements.  So I still think that the Poles need to get over the whole death camp debacle but I also think this president needs to start living up too what we have already promised we would do for the Poles.  Link to story below.

“Polish” death camps: Mind your language

Moveon.org Is Running Out Of Money

 

Following fresh on the heels of the news earlier that republicans were set to enjoy a huge fundraising advantage comes word that the infamous liberal fundraising group www.moveon.org is running out of money.  With that warning also came what sounded like a desperate plea for money to help in some of this years biggest battles in congressional elections.  Saying that they might have to pull funding from races like the Wisconsin recall election and the Massachusetts Senate seat being fought over by Scott Brown and Elizabeth Warren.  If this were to be true it would be a major blow to democrats looking to take back the House and retain their majority in the Senate. Link below for the full story.

MOVEON.ORG WARNS ‘MIGHT HAVE TO PULL PLUG’…

Chinese Stimulus = Empty Ghost Towns

Chinese ghost town

With news slipping out of China earlier in the month that its economy was slowing down much faster than had been anticipated the Chinese Communist government felt it was forced to intervene.  Just as they had in 2008 when the global economy ground to a halt the Chinese government would once again flood the economy with stimulus spending much as Obama had after his election to the white house.  The Chinese government feels immense pressure to keep the economy growing at double-digit rates, which allows for the huge influx of rural Chinese to move to the cities to take part in the growing economy.  Add in the once a decade political power hand off and this explains the problem for the current government.   Many outside of China have taken note and see trouble on the horizon as they question the emphasis on stimulus spending by pointing out that sooner or later this will come back to haunt the Chinese government.  This is because often this stimulus is spent on things the government decides should be done.  That sounds reasonable enough until you realize that the government is building entire cities with the capacity to hold hudreds of thousands but yet have only several thousand living there years after construction ends. They have also ordered unneeded steel factories only to see them converted into pig farms.  Yeah, I really did say that just as it was reported in this article below

China’s stimulus addiction

Empty cities, unused factories, property bubbles, all this makes you think that there is probably even more disturbing news not making its way out of China.  Time will tell, hopefully when it does finally go bust over there we all won’t be drug down with China.

Ghost towns of China: Satellite images show cities lying …

 

China keeps on building cities but nobody ever moves in, why?

Germany And Russia

The german news publication http://www.spiegel.de/international/ just did an article about Germany’s odd relationship with Russia.  The article gives you some background information which demonstrate why the relationship is so important for both countries.  They mention that Russia supplies Europe with most of its energy needs and also point out that Germany is Russia’s second largest trading partner behind only China.  However, the truly interesting part comes when the article describes how both sides view the other.  It is a fairly long article so here is a good quote that shows what I mean.

“From the German perspective, leaders in Moscow still don’t understand that Russia is no longer a global power and that it needs Europe as a reliable partner. The administration in Berlin views the Russian crusade against NATO’s planned missile-defense system in Europe as a last, desperate effort at power-posturing — Russia pretending to be strong because it is actually weak.

The Kremlin sees the situation differently. Not without some schadenfreude, Putin and his advisers view the West’s influence on global politics as waning. They point out that, over the last 30 years, the EU member-states’ share of the global economy has been steadily sinking. “Putin is convinced that the Western model already has the zenith of its global allure behind it,” says political scientist Nikolai Slobin.”

The part I found most amusing is that when you think about it both sides are correct when they think that the other’s global significance is waning.  One other part I found interesting in the article was when the author relayed a story about the two leaders of Russia and Germany, Vladimir Putin and Angela Merkel.  Below is an excerpt describing when the two leaders met in 2007.

“During a meeting at Putin’s vacation residence in the Black Sea resort city of Sochi in January 2007, Putin allowed his black Labrador Koni to sniff his guest’s pants (photos here). Merkel has been afraid of dogs since being bitten by one as a child. Putin only smiled.”

Sure makes you think what a nice guy Putin is.

Chilly Peace German-Russian Relations Enter a New Ice Age

GOP Regains The Fundraising Advantage

There is a great article over at www.politico.com about how republicans are set to significantly out raise democrats in this years presidential election.  The article is pretty long so I have a quote below that sums it up fairly well.

“It’s important to step back for a moment to understand the currents racing through the money chase right now. Republicans, back in the era of soft money, dominated fundraising, thanks in large part to big business donors. But when soft money was outlawed in 2002, a lot of business donors got uneasy about feeding their money through outside groups. Many sat out. At the same time, liberals got into the business of using tax-exempt and other groups to build their own web of think tanks, media monitors, vote-trackers and advocacy groups to influence politics. Rich liberals such as George Soros and union leaders funded much of it.

By the time 2008 rolled around, Obama and the Democrats were rolling over Republicans in the race for campaign cash raised in limited chunks, and Obama largely discouraged big-money outside efforts. Things have changed rapidly – and, in some respects, radically — since then”.

With an economic recovery that has been fairly weak at best coupled with a serious fundraising advantage the only thing republicans have to worry about now is if Mitt Romney is the right man to sell the message to the American people.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0512/76849_Page4.html#ixzz1wMmqTe7y

NASA Humbled

Instead of setting off on some grand adventure like sending humans to mars NASA has been reduced to doing school science projects at the International Space Station, or worse issuing a plea for future astronauts who visit the moon to not disturb the Apollo landing sites.  Indeed, the most exciting thing to have involved NASA as of late was the recent docking of the private company SpaceX’s supply ship called the Dragon.  With a budget of billions of dollars and not much to show for it one has to ask what happened to our once proud space program?  Original story and picture courtesy of New York Daily News.

NASA to future moon explorers: Don’t ruin our Apollo landing sites

Weird Science on Private SpaceX Capsule | Dragon Capsule | Space…

US Quietly Deployed Air Assets To Gulf

 The US Airforce has recently deployed both F-22 and F-15 fighter aircraft to undisclosed locations in the Persian Gulf region.  The move is likely a precaution against Iranian retaliation attempts if Israel decides to strike Iran.  I see this as a significant deployment for several reasons.  First, the US navy currently does not have any stealth capability so the addition of the F-22 is a significant upgrade to US capabilities in the region.  Second, this demonstrates how serious the situation with Iran is deemed by the pentagon because this marks the first time F-22’s, the US Airforce’s most advanced fighter jet, have ever deployed for a possible real world mission.  It appears many of the pieces required for war with Iran are already in position, lets hope they don’t have to be used.  Link to story below.

U.S. Amasses Stealth Jet Armada Near Iran

Top US General Threatens Syria With Military Intervention

Commander of the Joint Chiefs of Staff US Army General Martin Dempsey bluntly warned Syria that it could face US military strikes if the regime did not refrain from killing civilians.  The warning was in response to the massacre of around 100 people by the Syrian military this weekend.  The Syrian situation was fast turning into a campaign issue for the Obama administration with his opponent Mitt Romney calling for greater US action to control Syria.  Link to story below.

Houla massacre: US military warns Syria as pressure builds on Obama