Perfect Days

And what is so rare as a day in June? Then, if ever, come perfect days...

- James Russell Lowell

                                          

                                                                                                                                                            "...dancing up a storm," Kelly says. It's a beautiful day, not a cloud in the sky. There's a little bit of mist in the distance hanging over the river. But it's a nice time."

This 1846 painting made George Caleb Bingham's career. Known around Missouri primarily as a portrait painter, he went national with The Jolly Flatboatmen with help from an East Coast arts group. Judith Brodie, curator of prints and drawings at the National Gallery, says, "If it weren't for the American Art Union, this painting may never have been painted."

READ MORE HERE...

The Toilet Laws #5 - Rebuking Target

I am at a loss for words. So I will let you see what is going on at Target and say nothing. Tell what you think, if you please. Or not. Shaking my damn head.

Okay, I lied. These folks seem to be trained carefully. They say "You cannot touch me." They leave before the cops come.

What other group can take a bullhorn and do this? Maybe we should think about doing this kind of stuff at their churches?

Seems like a dance. It is The Dance of the Sugar Plum Fundamentalists.

SuperBugs

I wrote two articles on SuperBugs. Sometimes I hate to be right. This is one of those times. I wrote one in 2013 and one in 2014.

The Poster Art comes from the WPA. I am just a small voice crying in the wilderness. 

SuperBugs in Our Food

and

A Vast Wasteland May Soon Be Upon Us

Guess what. SuperBugs are here now.

Superbugs are routine bacteria that have learned how to avoid being killed by antibiotics. When this ability extends across multiple different types (classes) of antibiotics, the bugs are deemed multi-drug resistant (MDR) and qualify as “superbugs”.

We are now entering a dangerous time in the control of superbugs. For each of the four superbug categories we know the control solutions but ensuring these get implemented is a key challenge to our health system and society.
-. M. Lindsay Grayson, Professor of Infectious Disease, University of Melbourne

Our government as a whole dithers around worrying about who pees where and does nothing. Worst Congress ever. To be fair, I must commend Obama for his actions during the Ebola crisis. But then, Obama is not Congress.

The pharmaceutical industry works only to develop drugs they can market quickly and make a huge profit on before the inevitable class action suits arrive. Many of these superdrugs, quickly developed and marketed on TV, kill and maim people. 

Work on new antibiotics, do they? GO HERE for a report on that and maybe tell me what you think. I think the large pharmaceutical companies are little more than legal drug dealers.

Congress works on keeping people from having drugs they need as a solution in the War on Drugs. See Mike Evans for how well that is working.

The Toilet Laws #4 - Some Sanity Enters the Scenario

Some sanity here from a Hispanic Republican. Good to see. We need more of this. More Hispanics in government and more sanity in Republicans.

I remember sane and dignified Republicans like Howard Baker and Margaret Chase Smith. Before LePage they were sane in Maine. Nice to be reminded that Republicans can be sane and intelligent. And bilingual. This woman is amazing. I can only repeat her sentiments in my second language. La famiglia è tutto

I am not far from the immigrant experience. My Grands emigrated from Italy. My Nonna never spoke English well. Many Americans are like me. We do not respond well to folks who trash immigrants. The KKK burned crosses in Italian neighborhoods when my Father was a toddler.

Art by Favianna Rodriguez.