March 4, 2012 archive

Today on The Stars Hollow Gazette

Our regular featured content-

These featured articles-

our weekly features-

The Stars Hollow Gazette

Cartnoon

Crusader vs. the Pirates

Crusader Rabbit – Crusade 2 / Episode 01.

Open Thread

Health and Fitness News

Welcome to the Health and Fitness weekly diary which is cross-posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette. It is open for discussion about health related issues including diet, exercise, health and health care issues, as well as, tips on what you can do when there is a medical emergency. Also an opportunity to share and exchange your favorite healthy recipes.

Questions are encouraged and I will answer to the best of my ability. If I can’t, I will try to steer you in the right direction. Naturally, I cannot give individual medical advice for personal health issues. I can give you information about medical conditions and the current treatments available.

You can now find past Health and Fitness News diaries here and on the right hand side of the Front Page.

Smoothies for Grownups

Photobucket Pictures, Images and Photos

   I never thought about adding vegetables to smoothies until I tasted a lunchtime smoothie my sister made that included spinach, pear and walnuts. These are ingredients I like in a salad, and it turns out they still work well together after taking a trip through the blender – especially with fresh ginger added to the mix.

   So this week I explored fruit and vegetable smoothies. I’d picked several pounds of oranges from a friend’s tree, so I used fresh orange juice as the liquid, and for each drink I combined one or two fruits with a vegetable. I didn’t use bananas, which so often go into my smoothies, as I don’t really like them with orange juice, and I didn’t add dairy to many of them. I was thinking the smoothies would make great snacks, but in fact these make satisfying meals. When I was testing and tasting, they were all I needed for breakfast and lunch. They’re packed with vitamins, especially C and A, beta carotene, and antioxidant-rich flavonoids.

Martha Rose Shulman

Mixed Berry and Beet Smoothie

The color alone is enough to cause cravings for this smoothie.

Pear and Arugula Smoothie With Ginger and Walnuts

Arugula may seem like a strange ingredient for a smoothie, but this combination is a real winner, a great lunchtime smoothie.

Pineapple, Orange, Granola and Carrot Smoothie

A small amount of granola contributes great texture to this tangy smoothie.

Arugula Piña Colada Smoothie

Pineapple and coconut milk are traditional partners in piña colada, so why not combine them in something that’s really good for you in this lunchtime smoothie?

Red Berry, Cabbage and Almond Smoothie

A high-anthocyanin red smoothie that also delivers the benefits of red cabbage, a cruciferous vegetable high in antioxidant-rich sulfur compounds, and almonds, a very good source of manganese and vitamin E.

Six In The Morning

On Sunday

U.S. officials: Iran is stepping up lethal aid to Syria

By Joby Warrick and Liz Sly, Sunday, March 4, 10:41 AM

U.S. officials say they see Iran’s hand in the increasingly brutal crackdown on opposition strongholds in Syria, including evidence of Iranian military and intelligence support for government troops accused of mass executions and other atrocities in the past week.

Three U.S. officials with access to intelligence reports from the region described a spike in Iran­ian-supplied arms and other aid for Syrian leader Bashar al-Assad at a time when the regime is mounting an unprecedented offensive to crush resistance in the key city of Homs.




Sunday’s Headlines:

Chinese military spending increases by 11.2% in latest budget

Robert Fisk: The fearful realities keeping the Assad regime in power

Sudan’s Bashir thumbs nose at ICC

U.S. Backers of Israel Pressure Obama Over Policy on Iran

Russia election: Vladimir Putin seeks third term

On This Day In History March 4

Cross posted from The Stars Hollow Gazette

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

March 4 is the 63rd day of the year (64th in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 302 days remaining until the end of the year.

In this day in 1933, at the height of the Great Depression, Franklin Delano Roosevelt is inaugurated as the 32nd president of the United States. In his famous inaugural address, delivered outside the east wing of the U.S. Capitol, Roosevelt outlined his “New Deal”–an expansion of the federal government as an instrument of employment opportunity and welfare–and told Americans that “the only thing we have to fear is fear itself.” Although it was a rainy day in Washington, and gusts of rain blew over Roosevelt as he spoke, he delivered a speech that radiated optimism and competence, and a broad majority of Americans united behind their new president and his radical economic proposals to lead the nation out of the Great Depression.

The only American president elected to more than two terms, he forged a durable coalition that realigned American politics for decades. FDR defeated incumbent Republican Herbert Hoover in November 1932, at the depths of the Great Depression. FDR’s combination of optimism and activism contributed to reviving the national spirit. Working closely with Winston Churchill and Joseph Stalin in leading the Allies against Germany and Japan in World War II, he died just as victory was in sight.

Starting in his “first hundred days” in office, which began March 4, 1933, Roosevelt launched major legislation and a profusion of executive orders that gave form to the New Deal, a complex, interlocking set of programs designed to produce relief (especially government jobs for the unemployed), recovery (of the economy), and reform (through regulation of Wall Street, banks and transportation). The economy improved rapidly from 1933 to 1937, but then went into a deep recession. The bipartisan Conservative Coalition that formed in 1937 prevented his packing the Supreme Court or passing much new legislation; it abolished many of the relief programs when unemployment practically ended during World War II. Most of the regulations on business were ended about 1975-85, except for the regulation of Wall Street by the Securities and Exchange Commission, which still exists. Along with several smaller programs, major surviving programs include the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, which was created in 1933, and Social Security, which Congress passed in 1935.

As World War II loomed after 1938, with the Japanese invasion of China and the aggressions of Nazi Germany, FDR gave strong diplomatic and financial support to China and Britain, while remaining officially neutral. His goal was to make America the “Arsenal of Democracy” which would supply munitions to the Allies. In March 1941, Roosevelt, with Congressional approval, provided Lend-Lease aid to the countries fighting against Nazi Germany with Great Britain. He secured a near-unanimous declaration of war against Japan after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, calling it a “date which will live in infamy“. He supervised the mobilization of the US economy to support the Allied war effort. Unemployment dropped to 2%, relief programs largely ended, and the industrial economy grew rapidly to new heights as millions of people moved to new jobs in war centers, and 16 million men (and 300,000 women) were drafted or volunteered for military service.

Roosevelt dominated the American political scene, not only during the twelve years of his presidency, but for decades afterward. He orchestrated the realignment of voters that created the Fifth Party System. FDR’s New Deal Coalition united labor unions, big city machines, white ethnics, African Americans and rural white Southerners. Roosevelt’s diplomatic impact also resonated on the world stage long after his death, with the United Nations and Bretton Woods as examples of his administration’s wide-ranging impact. Roosevelt is consistently rated by scholars as one of the greatest U.S. Presidents.

More fun with Rush and his sponsors.

LaLast evening I posted a rant about an email exchange with a company I didn’t name for fear that I might be wrong about there support of Rush.  Well today I received more email from said company which confirms the fact that they are… Carbonite is the company and they have sent me two more emails claiming that they do not agree with Rush’s statements and that they were but poor advertisers only trying to get to a desired demographic.  

All of this would be believable if they’d stop giving Rush money.  By paying for advertising on his show they by default support him and hence his views.  

The hoot is Mr. Friends equating calls for dropping advertising from Ed Shultz to calls to drop Rush.  I don’t remember Ed ever calling a young college student a slut or all but a whore.  Now admittedly I don’t read or watch all that much MSM anymore but from what I’ve seen and heard I can’t think of any ‘lefty’ commentator on or in any serious media outlet calling anyone a slut or all but a whore.  I may have missed it if anyone has but I’m sure MSNBC, Salon, The New York Times or even Ruperts Journal would fire anyone who did.  

The tone deafness of Mr. Friend and Carbonite is unreal.  Disagreeing with Rush or Ed or anyones political views are not in my opinion reasonable cause to stop supporting their shows.  Lude, sexsist,noxious commentary that by any standard of civility is beyond the pale is cause enough for me.

Mr. Friend is gonna schedule a meeting with Rush next week and berate him LOL sure right

Now I’m sorry, Carbonite can advertise with anyone they wish to and it is their right to do so it is of course the public’s right to stop buying the products and services offered by Carbonite.  

I’ve pasted Mr. Friends post along with the email exchanges below In reverse order.