The Angry Bear

In 2006, Joel Garreau (Smithsonian) wrote: “The United States’ population is growing at the rate of almost 1 percent per year, thanks in part to immigration and its secondary effects. Not only does the United States accept more legal immigrants as permanent residents than the rest of the world combined, but these recent arrivals tend to have more children than established residents—until, as their descendants attain affluence and education, the...

Memorial Day . . . I am sure everyone is out cooking burgers and hot dogs except in the desert where the temperature is triple digit. And what is this old Marine Sergeant gonna do? Certainly not get out in the heat. I will drink a beer to honor the friends I lost and in the silence of my home. No parades, no John Wayne movies, just silence and thinking of the times I drank a beer with them. Robert Reich has an interesting commentary up about...

Can you spare 21 minutes of your time? [embedded content] Ken Burns, H’24 Keynote Address to Brandeis University’s 2024 Graduates, youtube.com.Some easy listening . . . Tags: Ken Burns

Tom Dispatch site commentary suggested by Dale Coberly . . . Tom: It’s not complicated. This country, as TomDispatch regular and co-chair of the Poor People’s Campaign Liz Theoharis makes clear today, is simply unprepared — unprepared, that is, to keep all too many Americans even reasonably healthy and well. It matters little that this may be the wealthiest country on the planet . . . The Great Unwinding by Liz Theoharis TomDispatch.com...

I seldom eat at chain restaurants, and I’ve never set foot in a Red Lobster. So the latest bankruptcy of Red Lobster doesn’t affect me personally, but it does serve as yet another illustration of pernicious consequences of vulture capitalism.When the private equity firm Golden Gate Capital bought Red Lobster, the chain was already beaten down by the COVID pandemic and rising operating costs. “Typically, when a private-equity firm takes over a company,...

Some history: For the longest time Michigan districts were gerrymandered in favor of Republicans. Since the 1980s, Republicans had control of the Michigan Senate. On and off, Republicans had control of the House for 22 times. A trifecta in favor of Republicans was in place 14 times. It was not until voting districts were decided by Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission. made up of citizens were the districts competitive. For the first time in...

by Ten Bears Homeless on the High Desert Mormon Militia Moves To Take Over Central, Eastern Oregon Government Note that the link is to an article in The Guardian, a British publication that is to my observation the straightest, least bias / most honest reporting today. Bear in mind as you read these happenings out on the Oregon High Desert that people are reading about them in England, and around the English-speaking world Sometimes...

SUMMARY: The 2024 presidential election has turned into a crash course in gerontology. On Election Day, former president Donald Trump will be 78 years old, and President Biden will be a couple weeks shy of 82. Never have two people of such advanced age been the nominees of the major political parties, nor has there been a campaign so rife with suspicions and allegations that candidates are showing signs of age-related cognitive decline. The...

by Merrill Goozner GoozNews How high-deductible health insurance plans, touted by free marketeers, caused the medical debt crisis and degraded public health. ~~~~~~~~ The 2003 Medicare Modernization Act, best known for its senior citizen drug plans, also encouraged the rapid expansion of high-deductible health plans (HDHPs). It allowed people, mostly well-off, to put pre-tax earnings into health savings accounts (HSAs) – the equivalent of...

Let’s be very clear: in vitro fertilization (IVF) results in far more zygotes than will ever be implanted. Further, pre-implantation testing means that some zygotes will be rejected. In the end, this means that millions of fertilized eggs will be discarded. That was always baked in the IVF cake. For reasons that escape me as a PhD geneticist, some people believe that the cluster of cells that we call “zygotes” are the moral equivalent of a fully...