hot.

ah. a commission. fabulous. and more hearings.

In many ways, the frenzy resembles last year’s multiple congressional inquiries into the causes of the 2008 financial meltdown or the taxpayer bailouts for GM and Chrysler. Or this year’s hearings on Toyota, Goldman Sachs and Lehman Brothers.

“It’s about evenly divided between stagecraft and statecraft. They have a job to do. They’re showing constituents they `get it’ in a year when many voters think they don’t,” said Larry Sabato, a University of Virginia political scientist and the author of books on political “feeding frenzies.”

“A lot of it is just for show. You rake the bank executives or the BP bosses over the coals. And everybody gets outraged and feels better.”

Can we, as a nation, make the transformational conversion to New Clean Renewable Energy, with a goal of eliminating those energy monsters sources that foul our oceans, gulfs, lakes, waters, mountains, valleys, and  planet? Can we as communal inhabitants of this great earth, the only one we have, choose to nurture and honor her in our global decisions to milk her energies?

Yes. We Can. But only if our leaders will.

So Im trying to hatch ideas for some summer brainwashing enlightenment of my kid and her little (soon to be) 8th grade friends. {rubs hands together wickedly} Thinking “Movie Night”? maybe? or something. Still very vague…. brainstorming phase.

Asking DharmaBums for recs, suggestions for sci-fi movies and/or books that would be age appropriate for very smart middle school kids, yet interesting, and more so … that have some redeemable underlying “message” … yes, I admit it, I want subversive, political, eco, whatever.

A few for starters below the hump.

Open Thread.

AP: WASHINGTON — The Supreme Court ruled Monday that federal officials can indefinitely hold inmates considered “sexually dangerous” after their prison terms are complete.

The high court reversed a lower court decision that said Congress overstepped its authority in allowing indefinite detentions of considered “sexually dangerous.”

go read the whole article here at WaPo

I’m a little confused. Help me out here, folks.

NOTE to admins/editors: I could probably use a little help with the pics formatting! 6PM: thanks ek! 😉

OTW = Off The Wall, is my Thursday ongoing series

Davidseth’s essay last night made me cry: “But BP’s not pouring oil directly on me, or my family, or my house, or my land.” (excellent essay, & he says it much better than me… my sentiments)

Yes, yes they are. They are pouring oil on us… My house, my beach, my land, my Gulf, my ocean, my planet. And yours too.

“We came to the beach just in case we can’t come next week or in the next 20 years…”

{Dad, family of 4}

The winds Sunday gusted to 25 mph, blowing from the Gulf toward the coast, but coming a bit from the east. That helped keep the huge oil slick from coming closer to Florida.

“Currently, there are no impacts to the state projected through Wednesday,” said Florida Department of Environmental Protection spokeswoman Amy Graham. “Florida continues to make preparations to safeguard the state’s shoreline.”  

“We wait for summer so we can go to the beach,” {16 year old boy, Pensacola Florida}.

“This could ruin our summer.”

source

Ya think…?

got a late start this morning… live webcast here

UPDATE #3: almost noon (moved updates 1 & 2 below the fold)

Beginning Q & A now, but Senators may leave to go vote  and come back. Hearing to continue without interruption. Will add notes, updates down below.

12:04PM… RECESS.

12:16PM … they’re back but I’m not!

12:33PM: Wyden up.

12:39PM: oh jeezuz. Menendez leads in with: “We are sitting in the exact same room where hearings/inquiries (?) were conducted after the sinking of the Titanic.”

RESCHEDULED FULL COMMITTEE HEARING:

The purpose of the hearing is to review current issues related to offshore oil and gas development (SR-325). OVERFLOW ROOM, SD-366.

Tuesday, May 11, 2010

10:00 AM

Watch this hearing live!

The purpose of the hearing is to review current issues related to offshore oil and gas development including the Department of the Interior’s recent five year planning announcements and the accident in the Gulf of Mexico involving the offshore oil rig Deepwater Horizon (SR-325). OVERFLOW ROOM, SD-366.

Note: originally scheduled for May 6, 2010.

Witnesses

Panel 1

Dr. F.E. Beck – Associate Professor, Texas A&M University

Mr. Danenberger – Former Chief, Offshore Regulatory Program, Minerals Management Service

Panel 2

Mr. Lamar McKay – President and Chairman , BP America, Inc.

Mr. Steven Newman – President and Chief Executive Officer, Transocean Limited

Mr. Tim Probert – President, Global Business Lines; Chief Health, Safety and Environmental Officer, Halliburton

WASHINGTON – The Pentagon Thursday banned four reporters, including one from McClatchy Newspapers, from covering future military commissions at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, charging that they’d violated ground rules by publishing the name of a former Army interrogator who was a witness at a hearing there this week.

The news organizations – McClatchy, the Toronto Star, the Toronto Globe and Mail and CanWest Newspapers of Canada – said they’d appeal the Pentagon’s decision and that their reporters hadn’t violated the ground rules.

Col. David Lapan, the director of Defense Press Operations, said the ban affects only the individual reporters and that their organizations would be allowed to send others to future hearings. The banned reporters were Carol Rosenberg of McClatchy’s Miami Herald, Michelle Shephard of the Toronto Star, Paul Koring of Toronto’s Globe and Mail and Steven Edwards of CanWest Newspapers.

Read more: http://www.mcclatchydc.com/201…

(UPDATES x 2 at the end)

Okay I admit it. I don’t get it. Sorry.

Show You Care, Send Your Hair

I saw this group get a quick mention on GMA this morning and it seems to be making the rounds, this idea. Spearheaded by matter of trust dot org, they have flyers,posters, and a youtube, along with this announcement:

Apparently its all the rage…

Now at the Gulf Coast, people are stuffing booms. Hair and fur coming in from our thousands of member salons and groomers into recycled nylons coming in from all 50 states and around the world! Salons and beachlovers all over the Gulf Coast are organizing Boom making parties – They’re calling them BOOM B QUE’s – We love the South!

Uhm…. Okay. I’m sorry, I really kinda just don’t get it.

funny cartoon video here

I mean, good on them, I guess, but… huh? In fact, I wondered the same thing this person did:

What do they do with the oil soaked hair

…afterwards?

by {redacted} on Wed May 05, 2010 at 12:27:12 AM CDT

On? or Off? the Island. Who decides?

San Nicolas Island, off the coast of California

“According to an 1850 report by the U.S. Coastal and Geodetic Survey, San Nicolas Island “is slightly the farthest from the mainland, and is the driest and most sterile. It is 890 feet high, with bold, precipitous sides of coarse sandstone on 3 sides … Two thirds of the surface of the island is covered with sand and the remainder with coarse grass.” The report also said it was nicknamed “Otter Island” due to the large numbers of sea otters on its beaches, and the “Indian name was said to be Ghaiashat.” An 1899 L.A. Times article says San Nicolas Island is a flat island, “almost as bare as a floor,” with 500 foot jagged rock canyons leading down to its beaches, which are covered with sea lions and seals. The article goes on to say the island is approximately 8 miles long, and 4 miles wide, it sits in the middle of the Pacific Ocean west of Los Angeles, CA, and the island is known for its heavy winds, “surrounded on all sides by ocean waves, sometimes 30 feet high,” so powerful they shake the ground. source

It was her island. Her home. This woman.

She had a name.

A name given to her in youth by her family, a mother and father who loved her, surely.

It was not “Juana Maria”. They decided to call her that … because they couldn’t pronounce hers. They. They decided.

All my “essays” are Open Threads… lol.

I’m sick of “politics”. Put a fork in it.

My house is a wreck of a mess.

I hate most people and I dislike the rest. Except for a few choice lucky ones. heh.

Tired of spinnin’ my wheels. My focus has been shifting, since I figure about last August actually, but more and more….

Wandering off in search of food for the soul… follow…

Earth Day… see also… Robyn, AndyS, Jamess and Eddie C. (so far!)