respublica

A dog in the brush, 3 guys with a chipper and chainsaw, one boss

We had a big tree taken down in our front yard and for a week or so the limbs and branches stayed put on the ground because the snow and rain came. Today 3 seminary students-David, Kevin and Matt along with their boss-Gayle, came with the chipper. They started early and finished very quickly. Very efficiently done. Our students learn fast and well.

But, during the week the limbs laid on the lawn the brush became a shelter for rabbits and birds which in turn caught Ferdie's eye every time he went out the door. As the limbs decreased, Ferdie's interest in what was underneath increased.

There's the pile the day the tree was taken down.

And then today

Ferdie watched as the guys started chipping

It wasn't long before he decided he better check on those rabbits 

Deeper and deeper he went

He never found even one rabbit or bird, they'd all headed for the hills

Meanwhile the chainsaw got cranked up to cut the bigger limbs and trunks into firewood.

Gayle called a meeting to go over how to proceed.

With Lutherans, there is always discussion

Gayle points something out to Kevin and then

Cut them down to size he sure did.

It has gotten much colder as the day has gone on. Nice job!

 

A Chicago primary

So there was a primary yesterday in the Illinois 2nd congressional district to fill Jesse Jackson, Jr's seat. Robin Kelly won the democratic primary with the help of a 2.2 million dollar donation from New York City Mayor, Michael Bloomberg.

What the heck is Bloomberg doing helping a Chicago democrat?

Anyway, Kelly will face a man the Tribune describes as an ex convict and states the way it will go: "Republican voters are suggesting the 2nd Congressional District replace one felon with another after picking ex-convict Paul McKinley as the candidate to run for the seat recently ceded by former U.S. Rep Jesse Jackson, Jr."

Oh Chicago politics, it never changes.

Republican voters are suggesting the 2nd Congressional District replace one felon with another after picking ex-convict Paul McKinley as the candidate to run for the seat recently ceded by former U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. - See more at: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-2nd-district-republican-nominee-20130228,0,3550456.story#sthash.P0G8q5xD.dpuf

Republican voters are suggesting the 2nd Congressional District replace one felon with another after picking ex-convict Paul McKinley as the candidate to run for the seat recently ceded by former U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. - See more at: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-2nd-district-republican-nominee-20130228,0,3550456.story#sthash.P0G8q5xD.dpuf

Republican voters are suggesting the 2nd Congressional District replace one felon with another after picking ex-convict Paul McKinley as the candidate to run for the seat recently ceded by former U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. - See more at: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-2nd-district-republican-nominee-20130228,0,3550456.story#sthash.P0G8q5xD.dpuf

Republican voters are suggesting the 2nd Congressional District replace one felon with another after picking ex-convict Paul McKinley as the candidate to run for the seat recently ceded by former U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. - See more at: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-2nd-district-republican-nominee-20130228,0,3550456.story#sthash.P0G8q5xD.dpuf

Republican voters are suggesting the 2nd Congressional District replace one felon with another after picking ex-convict Paul McKinley as the candidate to run for the seat recently ceded by former U.S. Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. - See more at: http://www.chicagotribune.com/news/local/ct-met-2nd-district-republican-nominee-20130228,0,3550456.story#sthash.P0G8q5xD.dpuf

The best part of the Woodward story is

It now puts to rest idea there isn't media bias. No, not because Bob Woodward has taken on the White House and the White House has pushed back. Interesting, though, isn't it, that the horrible, culture destroying sequester was the White House's idea afterall.

But back to Woodward. As soon as the news hit late yesterday that someone in the WH screamed at him for half an hour and then told him he'd regret it if he went public with the story, other journalists jumped in to belitle him. It was astounding actually, I mean, this is Bob Woodward, a journalistic icon, someone all these other reporters wanted to be some day.

Well, they didn't make it, instead they became part of the Greek chorus for everything Obama, no curiousity, not tough questions on anything. Take the morning WH talking points and run with them. The first talking point came last night and went something like this:

Make Bob Woodward look old, senile and past his prime. He was once great but now is just an old loony.

Then, someone at Talking Points Memo tried to make Woodward into a birther. 

This morning it's "oh for pete's sake, every WH has torn into reporters getting too close to a story, this is nothing. 

I'm old enough to remember when reporters took a breaking story like this and tore into it with no holds barred and would not let go. Now we have reporters who instinctively turn their head away or go after the bearer of bad news. 

The new journalistic code is see no story, hear no story, tell no story..if it makes Obama look less than the perfect man they want us to see.

This is so infuriating, but in the end, Americans never have and never will, adore one person or one party forever. Eventually all the adoration tarnishes.

And now a few common sense ideas from Senator Coburn

In regard to the sequester mania, Senator Tom Coburn has a list of things the defense department could well do away with before scaring people about furloughing essential personnel.

Eliminate unnecessary jobs and programs that have little or nothing to do with defense

• Eight employees who serve on the Board of Geographic Names, which names streams, mountains, hills, and plains across the United States. 
• A 46-minute video production called Grill It Safe featuring grill sergeants showing off their own recipes.
• $1 million on developing a plan to send a space ship to another solar system.
• $1.5 million to procure beef jerky advancements from France.
• 
  
• $6 billion on questionable, duplicative and unnecessary research, including $5.2 million to determine what lessons about democracy and social decision-making could be learned from fish.

Unbelieveable

Mayoral election in Clayton

The St. Louis side of the river will be holding local elections on April 2nd as opposed to the Metro East which will vote on April 9th. In Clayton, city residents will only be voting for mayor as none of the aldermanic seats expire this year. The current mayor, Linda Goldstein is term limited out. But, for the first time since we've lived here there is actually a competitive race for mayor with 3 people on the ballot. Other election years there has been only one person running for that position.

The 3 are:

Michelle Harris-current alderman

Alex Berger,III-currente alderman

Harold Sanger-former alderman

As far as I can see, there are no school board races in Clayton this time.

There will be a mayoral candidate forum tonight at 7 p.m. at Wash U's Umrath Formal Lounge

Now it's time for the local elections

April 9th voters in Collinsville will have a ballot listing 6 people running for 3 open positions on the city council. 2 are incumbents-Nancy Moss and Jeff Kypta while the other 4 are newcomers. One council seat will run for only two years as it is an election to fill the unexpire term of Liz Dalton who is now on the Madison County board. One thing about Collinsville's local elections is that there are always many people who run for council and school board, the seats are always competitive. This isn't the case in many cities.

The candidates running for the two year term are: Robert Graham, Bob Dorman and Karen Woolard

Candidates running for the full 4 year term are: Jesse Hoskin, Jeff Kypta and Nancy Moss.

Interesting to me are Graham and Hoskin, two men who have long been active in the American Legion. Did something happen with the legion to have two involved officers decide to run for the city council?

I would assume that there will be the traditional pre-election candidate forum so voters could get to know them all before voting.

Ten annoying coffee trends

From Zagat the restaurant and foodie news which put together a coffee survey that asked what was most annoying about current coffee trends. Some answers were about things I never knew about coffee being sold these days. Such as 'animal defecated coffee' which is made from beans eaten and passed through by an obscure animal named the civet. After they have passed through the civet, they're roasted, ground, brewed and served under the name of Kopi Luwak.

And here's one I agree with and have tasted: "Burning the bean and calling it dark roast" did not impress the surveyors, who said that the result is usually "over-priced bitter crap."

Each of the ten annnoying trends are explained under a photo.

So tired of winter clothes

We have so many items of outerwear around that we shrug in and out of everyday. We have cold weather jackets, snow jackets, mid cold jackets, mild temperature jackets, scarves, hats, gloves for snow and gloves for driving, gloves for dog walking, gloves for using the iphone. We have boots for wet, shoes for cold, shoes for going to the store, and shoes for church. Not to mention sweaters, sweatshirts, plain jeans and flannel lined jeans, cords and khakis... and umbrellas. All within reach and all making everything as cluttered as can be.

And, it's exhausing having to put on and and take off so many times a day.

I'm ready for spring and summer.

I'ts official-MSNBC is worse

Or the worst or the best depending on your point of view.  

Spotlight on the Media writer David Zurawik writes that with MSNBC's new hiring of David Axelrod and Robert Gibbs that cable news outlet is now "worse" than Fox. Now he did preface this remark with "MSNBC has long been as bad as Fox News when it comes to ideological bias". But hen added: 

"The cable channel that flies under the banner of NBC News is now all but a bona fide organ of state propaganda, an information channel that speaks in the same dominant voice as the folks running the government–and tries to mask what it is up to."

IMO, MSNBC has long been far worse, but I do have a bias. Zurawik continues: 

"What is this if not exactly the spin Team Obama seemed to be working on all week? And the White House doesn’t even have to bring in a bunch of out-of-town anchormen for quickie interviews with Obama so that they can carry his message back to their local audiences in the heartland.

Now the message can go forth from the president’s mouth straight to our ears–via Axelrod, the so-called analyst, and MSNBC, the so-called news channel."

72 is the new 30

Um. I don't think so.

Scientists in Germany see that longevity rates have jumped so rapidly a case can be made that 72 years old is now the new 30. 

Whatever.