Associated Press recently reported for MSNBC that, although white-skinned Americans make up 2/3rds of the US population, there will be more minority babies born in 2010 than white-skinned babies. This is partially due to the rise in the Hispanic population and the decision many white-skinned women are making to wait to have children.

Catch the full article at www.msnbc.msn.com .

And don’t forget to fill out your US Census - we’ll find out all sorts of good stuff about the 120 million households that finally fill it out.

Let’s face it - aside from some slight gains in security in Iraq - there wasn’t much good news in the news in the middle east in 2009. But let’s not forget that media will always show you the scary stuff (and as they sometimes should).

However, here are 2 interesting happenings that UK’s Telegraph wanted to remind us about:

Both Saudi Arabia and Iran appointed their first female ministers. (And we got all the attention for the President!) Now, we aren’t saying that these women are liberal feminists, but it is rather interesting. To learn more about each, click on their names:

Female Health Minister - Nominated by President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad:

Marzieh Vahid Dastjerdii

and

Deputy Education Minister for Female Education Affairs nominated by King Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud:

Norah al-Fayez

Read the Telegraph’s article Middle East Review for a look back at the Middle East in 2009.

I don’t follow politics as much as I should, so when trying to wrap my head around it I often relate it to things I have a much better understanding of. Here’s my interpretation of Senator Arlen Spector’s defection from Republican to Democrat:

 It was quite a scene the other night as the Senate met for a sold out crowd at New York’s historic Madison Square Garden. Crowds from all sides held up signs some with jeers like; “McCain in the Ass” and “Biden’s Nuts!” but all in all it was a calm and everyone ready for a entertaining night of good ole fashion politicking.
 
Everyone was pumped for the night, but nobody was expecting the curveball Senator “The Spectacular” Arlen Spector had coming later that evening. During a Lumberjack Match between Harry Reid “My Fists” and Mitch “Machismo” McConnell, Spector interceded with a hand full of salt apparently blinding McConnell by accident.
 
After the match as Machismo verbally berated Spector in front of a sold out crowd slapping him across the face, then turned to walk away. As he did Spector became enraged and locked in his famous “Spectator” sleeper hold. As the rest of the G.O.P. attempted to stomp Spector off “Mad Man” Biden lowered from the rafters wearing his face war paint and proceeded to save Spector with the help of his Louisville Slugger.

[Read more →]

Goldman Sachs - which owns Burger King - used part of their bailot money to pay their employees some of the highest bonuses in the industry. If they’d shared their bailot money with their Burger King workers they could have given every employee in America an extra $18,000.

This is kind of old news by now. But Goldman Sachs has actually screwed over many, many people in all sorts of companies and Brave New Films wanted people to have their say. They had a video competition asking people how they would SACK it to the people at Goldman Sachs (ehh..heehhh…).

Carolyn Bear’s husband was one of the people screwed over by Henry Kravis at Goldman. After working for 30 years, he lost his pension and all. Carolyn had a great idea for how to get a little of her pride back - rather creative, too:

Brave New Films, which made this documentary, sits at www.warongreed.org - a truly awesome website sent to me by my very aware friend, Jessica.

Anti-Advertising Agency.com wants you to understand this -

“New York City is a READ-ONLY City”

“You’re free to read advertising, business signs, and city signs. But dare you write or hang anything of your own; you will be labeled as a criminal - a graffiti vandal….If you happen to have several thousand dollars, you might be able to say what you want - as long as it’s not too political.”

The MTA hopes to bring in an additional 20 million dollars in ad revenue by selling the space on the outside of subway cars through Titan Outdoor Media Agency.  When I returned from France last year I was appalled to see the new ads. When I enter the subway, it’s my moment to myself - away from work and friends and street hawkers. I don’t want to be shouted at by prophesiers, I don’t want people to beg me for money because they just got out of the hospital (and didn’t you just get out the hospital last month and the month before that?) and I don’t want my senses overloaded by public space clutter. [Read more →]

Here’s one good thing about the mortgage crisis - we all had to admit we know nothing about finance. Here’s one bad thing about the mortgage crisis - it freakin’ sucks.

More on NPR’s radio show- [Read more →]

Just to keep you all informed, President Bush and his administration are finally getting to work and doing stuff. Unfortunately, most people may think it’s bad stuff. (I think the “time out corner” should replace the oval office, right Supernanny?!). President Bush wants to relax building regulations which require sign-off from wild-life biologists before major federal building projects begin. Before building bridges and dams, biologists stall projects in order to modify designs that might endanger local species. [Read more →]

Photo from Defamer.com

1. After the fall of the economic dream bubble, the death of Bernie Mac and Estelle Getty and Madge deciding to divorce whats-his name - SOMETHING ACTUALLY GOOD HAPPENED THIS YEAR .
2. America finally got fired up about something, and in my friend Brie’s words, “How can we ever doubt our abilities to do something? How can we refuse to deny ourselves anything ever again?”
3. People in other countries have to stop with that “But they were stupid enough to vote for George Bush TWICE, line.“The Brits on Obama Story”
4. New Yorkers find YET another reason to scream and honk in the streets at 12am. Click for The Brooklyn Blog to see photos .
5. While voting in Obama, Massachusetts citizens did some multi-tasking and said yes to Question 2 - Decriminalizing the ownership of less than 1 ounce of marijuana - SERIOUSLY, you still gotta pay a fine though! ouch.(DAILYKOS , and Boston.Com) Can’t say Californians are so good with those questions…they voted to ban gay marriage….huh? were they ON something? Marijuana? from Massachusetts?errr…
6. Senator John McCain still looks like a smart, tough dude, and most people will attempt to forget all the mudslinging in the next 4 years. In his concession speech -
   “Tonight — tonight, more than any night, I hold in my heart nothing but love for this country and for all its citizens, whether they supported me or Sen. Obama, I wish Godspeed to the man who was my former opponent and who will be my president.” (click for The Speech on NPR)
7. Amanda Jones , who was born the daughter of a former slave in 1899, lived long enough to vote for an African American. See what happens in only 1 generation? We’re thinking by the time we’re 100…I don’t know…the USA joins the European Union?
8. The Democrats now hold a majority in the Senate and the House of Representatives, and whether you’re Dem or Republican, we at least don’t have to listen to all those lame-ass excuses as to why politicians can’t do stuff.
9. I just got back from living in France for 5 months, and I can say to all my friends and family over there…YES, America IS pretty damn cool. SHO NUFF! (This list is just opinion, add yours or comment below)
10. And Tina Fey showed, once again, that the power of comedy really can sway a nation .

On September 5th, 2008 the folks at PBS’s NOW-political series launched an online Sarah Palin Poll. The Poll asks: “Is Sarah Palin qualifed to become Vice President?”

After taking the poll, some readers were so disturbed to find the poll in Palin’s favor, that they launched an email campaign asking people to log-on and vote against her. A massive email chain ensued with people both for and against Palin’s competency. According to NOW’s executive producer, John Siceloff, the entire PBS.org website received massive overload due to the response. That finally pushed them to equip the poll with a cookie-registration system which allows a person to vote only once per computer (something CNN and others do NOT do). They had reservations about “cookies” because the folks at PBS feel it’s a violation of privacy, but they feel the cookie was one thing they could do to help control “bad pollster behavior”.

However, the poll was taken off the homepage of PBS’s NOW, and can’t even be navigated to from the website. The decision was not made to act against the poll, but rather becuase PBS’s NOW simply likes to publish a new poll each week. However, the poll remains online, and emailers continue to send mass emails linking to the site. You can only vote on the Palin Question if you’ve got the exact address - (which I got from my friend Bi and Gloria - thanks!).

http://www.pbs.org/now/palin-poll.html

The Poll has now taken on a life of its own and has sparked debate and major interest for the folks at PBS and readers across the internet. It has clearly demonstrated the power of “email” when used for good. People can take back their email from SPAM and chain-letters and assert theirrights to media ‘by the people and for the people’.

Last I checked, the poll was still 50 to 46 in favor of Palin.

Whether you’re voting yes or no on Sarah Palin, go the above site to take the poll (PBS is still monitoring) or go to the articles about the crazy success of the ‘poll-with-a-life-of-its-own’ published by PBS here-

http://www.pbs.org/now/palin-poll.html

http://www.pbs.org/ombudsman/2008/09/ombudsmans_mailbag_26.html

Blog about Alaska in support of Palin-

http://sarahpalin4vp.wordpress.com/2008/09/25/pbs-poll-for-sarah-palin-draws-millions-of-votes/