The Daily Drift

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Today in History

1555		The Protestant martyrs Bishop Hugh Latimer and Bishop Nicholas Ridley are burned at the stake for heresy in England.
1701		Yale University is founded as The Collegiate School of Kilingworth, Connecticut by Congregationalists who consider Harvard too liberal.
1793		Queen Marie Antoinette is beheaded by guillotine during the French Revolution.
1846		Ether was first administered in public at the Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston by Dr. William Thomas Green Morton during an operation performed by Dr. John Collins Warren.
1859		Abolitionist John Brown, with 21 men, seizes the U.S. Armory at Harpers Ferry, Va. U.S. Marines capture the raiders, killing several. John Brown is later hanged in Virginia for treason.
1901		President Theodore Roosevelt incites controversy by inviting black leader Booker T. Washington to the White House.
1908		The first airplane flight in England is made at Farnsborough, by Samuel Cody, a U.S. citizen.
1934		Mao Tse-tung decides to abandon his base in Kiangsi due to attacks from Chiang Kai-shek's Nationalists. With his pregnant wife and about 30,000 Red Army troops, he sets out on the "Long March."
1938		Billy the Kid, a ballet by Aaron Copland, opens in Chicago.
1940		Benjamin O. Davis becomes the U.S. Army's first African American Brigadier General.
1946		Ten Nazi war criminals are hanged in Nuremberg, Germany.
1969		The New York Mets win the World Series four games to one over the heavily-favored Baltimore Orioles.
1973		Israeli General Ariel Sharon crosses the Suez Canal and begins to encircle two Egyptian armies.
1978		The college of cardinals elects 58-year-old Karol Cardinal Wojtyla, a Pole, the first non-Italian Pope since 1523.
1984		A baboon heart is transplanted into 15-day-old Baby Fae–the first transplant of the kind–at Loma Linda University Medical Center, California. Baby Fae lives until November 15.
1995		The Million Man March for 'A Day of Atonement' takes place in Washington, D.C.
1995		Skye Bridge opens over Loch Alsh, Scotland
1998		General Augusto Pinochet, former dictator of Chile, arrested in London for extradition on murder charges
2002		Inaugural opening of Bibliotheca Alexandria in Alexandria, Egypt., a modern library and cultural center commemorating the famed Library of Alexandria that was lost in antiquity

Non Sequitur

Did you know ...

About climate change? Try catastrophic climate breakdown

That Americans like witches, the IRS and hemorrhoids better than congress

That this is where your old electronics go

That cheaters take all

The soaring number of U.S. women live in extreme poverty

And here's the 10 worst states for women

That NY comic con takes over twitter feed of attendees to praise itself

A science blog asks science blogger to blog for free. Blogger tells blog no. Blog calls her a whore

Ziggy

China Calls For a ‘De-Americanized’ World Thanks to the repugican cabal Shutdown & Default Threat

China’s official news agency wonders why America is in charge when it’s creating mayhem in the financial markets, according to International Business Times. They write, “… the cyclical stagnation in Washington for a viable bipartisan solution over a federal budget and an approval for raising debt ceiling has again left many nations’ tremendous dollar assets in jeopardy and the international community highly agonised.”
IBT continues:

The official news agency of China, which is seen as the pretender to the world’s superpower crown, then rubbed in more salt, calling American economic pre-eminence just a seeming dominance.
It asks why the self-declared protector of the world is sowing mayhem in the financial markets by failing to resolve political differences over key economic policy.

This led the Xinhua news agency to gleefully call for a “de-Americanised world”, noting that the world would be better off in the hands of folks with a functioning government.
This isn’t just political posturing, as IBT reports that per the Treasury, “China is the biggest foreign owner of US Treasuries at $1.28 trillion as of July.”
According to the Treasury, next up to feel the pain of repugican economic terrorism would be Japan, Carib Banking Centers, and Oil Exporters. Good going, repugican cabal.
This will impact more than just large holders of our bonds. According to PolitiFact, your mutual fund could be invested in what used to be considered “safe” t-bills.

If you hold a savings bond your grandmother gave you on your 10th birthday, or if you go to www.treasurydirect.gov to purchase Treasury bills, then you are loaning money to the government, with the promise of receiving your principal plus interest at a specified future date. Alternately, if your mutual fund buys a Treasury bill, you indirectly own that security. Investment banks, sovereign wealth funds and other large investors purchase Treasury debt all the time in auctions held by the Treasury. If you hold a U.S. security in this way, “it means that you have loaned money to the U.S. government, and it has borrowed from you,” said Neil H. Buchanan, law professor at George Washington University and author of The Debt Ceiling Disasters.

This is what the President meant when he explained that the the bond market is boss. President Obama told reporters, “Ultimately, what matters is: What do the people who are buying Treasury bills think?”
The answer?
The Xinhua news agency called for an end to the US dollar as the international reserve currency in order to protect the international community from repugicans’ economic jihad.
This must be what wingnuts mean by “USA! USA! USA!” Kill the exceptionalism, violate the Constitutional mandate to pay our debt, and turn America into an international joke, causing America to lose its world standing even when W isn’t in office. Check, check, check and check.
This is WINNING, tea party style. Meanwhile, tea partiers are calling for a non-violent revolution against this President and demanding that he put his “Quran” down.
Political Ticker reported on the folks repugicans brought to the dance:

“I call upon all of you to wage a second American nonviolent revolution, to use civil disobedience, and to demand that this president leave town, to get up, to put the Quran down, to get up off his knees, and to figuratively come out with his hands up,” said Larry Klayman of Freedom Watch, a conservative political advocacy group.

This country had better get a handle on these repugicans, or they are going to do what Al-Qaeda never managed to do to the US.

The truth be told

During the Obama Presidency repugicans Have Not Made a Single Concession to Help People

The inordinate desire to possess goods, or objects of abstract value with the intention to keep it all for one’s self beyond the dictates of basic comfort is greed, and it also applies to the desire for, and a pursuit of, wealth and power. The repugicans exhibit inordinate greed for power over the government, and it explains their four-and-a-half year drive to take everything they can get their greedy hands on from the American people to give to their wealthy corporate and millionaire supporters.
It can hardly be disputed that throughout Barack Obama’s tenure as President, repugicans have not made one concession or presented one piece of legislation to benefit the people, and they have blocked every single attempt by the President and Democrats to help Americans with jobs and sustaining social programs. Despite that Democrats have not asked for, or won, any concessions from the repugican cabal to help the people, a repugican Senator accused Democrats of being greedy for not paying a ransom for repugicans to do the jobs they were sent to Washington to do; fund the government and pay the nation’s debts.
The other day, Kentucky Senator and teabag hero Rand Paul accused President Obama and Senate Democrats of not negotiating to open the government or raise the debt limit because they were “getting greedy about this whole thing.” Paul was referring to Democratic demands that repugicans pass a clean continuing resolution to open the government and raise the debt limit unconditionally. It was a typical wingnut ploy to project on Democrats and the President what repugicans are doing in holding the government and borrowing limit hostage in their war to control the government.
The truth is that Senate Democrats already conceded to repugican demands and gave them their austerity budget for fiscal 2014, including keeping sequestration level spending cuts in place for the sole purpose of keeping the government open. It was insufficient for greedy repugicans who demand that Democrats concede more and they are keeping the government shuttered and threatening a credit default unless the President gives them more power over government and wealth from the American people. At issue for repugicans accusing Democrats of being greedy is Paul Ryan’s demand that Democrats “compromise” and cut Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid in exchange for repugicans raising the debt limit, but not funding the government. Ryan is also demanding that the President give repugicans the right to allow christian employers to withhold contraception from their employees because greed for power is part and parcel of the repugican mindset.
According to the Washington Post, in a private meeting with House repugicans Ryan was livid and railed against a repugican Senate proposal to fund the government through March at sequester levels and raise the debt ceiling through January. Ryan said the “House could not accept either a debt-limit bill or a government-funding measure that would delay the next fight until the new year” because repugicans are desperate to beat the January 1^st deadline to stop the Affordable Care Act’s individual mandate. The repugicans at the meeting said Ryan needed leverage to delay the ACA, add a “conscience clause” to stop contraception coverage, extract entitlement cuts, and tax cuts for the rich in exchange for opening the government and raising the debt limit before the first of the year. All Democrats have asked for is that House repugicans do their job and fund the government with the Senate’s austerity budget and raise the debt limit to pay for their two wars, tax cuts for the rich, and subsidies for the oil, religious, and agricultural industries.
One wonders where Rand Paul finds greed in Democratic demands that repugicans do their jobs, when repugicans will crash the economy and keep the government closed unless their greed for power is satisfied by enacting the Romney-Ryan platform that cost them the 2012 general election. If one takes stock of the repugican demands since the start of the 113^th Congress, and particularly over the past three weeks, they would understand the depth and true meaning of abject greed inherent in an assault to strip everything the people’s tax dollars pay for. Just the repugican demands to do their Constitutional duty and pay the bills they incurred is stunning in its blatant robbery of the American people.
The repugicans first offer to raise the debt limit included eliminating Planned Parenthood funding, privatizing Medicare,  defunding the Affordable Care Act, eliminating insurance coverage for birth control, slash food stamps, eliminating  EPA authority,  eliminate social service block grants, means-testing Social Security, restricting the child tax credit for families, and trillions of dollars in other budget cuts affecting all Americans. It does not take a quantum physicist to figure out that every repugican demand is predicated on taking as much as possible from the American people and it is the definition of sheer greed for power and wealth to give the rich tax cuts according to the Ryan budget. Add to those demands the House repugican votes to eliminate overtime pay, healthcare for poor women and children, food stamps, and now a concerted effort to slash Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid under the guise of deficit reduction. As an aside, Americans are still waiting for one Democrat, any Democrat including President Obama, to tell the American people that under no circumstance does Social Security take or add one penny to the nation’s deficit, but there is the very real possibility that Democrats will give away elderly Americans’ retirement to the greedy repugicans to prevent a credit default.
Rand Paul was absolutely correct that there is rampant greed in Congress, but it is all on the repugican side because Democrats, up to now, have been terrified to tell greedy repugicans they have taken enough from the American people in their inordinate desire for wealth and power to rule America. To be fair to the beleaguered repugicans, their greed is not solely for the desire for and pursuit of wealth to keep for themselves, but for the ruling power to take everything from the American people. Since they won control of the House in 2010, repugicans have attempted to rob the people of social programs, education, women’s reproductive rights, food and healthcare, housing assistance for the poor, unemployment benefits, sick leave, overtime pay, Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, and jobs with their manufactured debt ceiling crisis in 2011 and the resulting sequestration cuts they are desperate to keep in place for nine more years.
What is telling about repugicans is that despite their pathetic disapproval numbers from Americans sick-to-death of being economically raped and deprived of programs paid for with their tax dollars, the repugican cabal is clamoring for more and they are willing to keep the government shut down and cause a credit default to extract more from the people. It is long-past time for Democrats to be greedy to preserve what little wealth the American people have left and save America’s vanishing representative democracy because in their inordinate desire for power, greedy repugicans will take that from Americans; if it even still exists.

The Zombie Apocalypse is Here and it is Called the tea party

Zombies, like tea partiers, exist only to spread their contagion. They serve no useful purpose but are driven by mindless hate…

 

Zombies are mindless killers. Everybody agrees on that. They just do what they do, which is bite people in order to spread their contagion. They serve no useful purpose. They are not interested in the common good because they don’t think. It seems, rather, that they are driven by a mindless hate. Hmmm, sounds familiar, doesn’t it?

Zombies and Zombie apocalypses are popular in our culture. But they’re popular not because the zombies eat your face, but because you get to shoot the zombies. Or hit them with baseball bats.
Kill the zombies; end the apocalypse.
The problem is, we cannot so easily deal with our real zombie apocalypse, which we know as the tea party.
Yes, zombies have overrun Washington, D.C.. The White House and the Senate chamber are safe zones but they are under siege, and other than those havens, the nation’s capital is mayhem, and as they say in the zombie thriller World War Z, about to “go dark.”
But where did the Zombie apocalypse come from? What can we do? These are questions that is always asked by people facing a zombie apocalypse.
The first thing to understand is that zombies are not born, but made. As in another thriller, Resident Evil, these zombies were manufactured, and as in Resident Evil, by big business. In Resident Evil the culprit is the Umbrella Corporation. In the real world, it is Koch Industries.
The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) present as a public service zombie preparedness 101. If you can deal with a zombie apocalypse, the reasoning goes, you can deal with any catastrophe. The CDC examines potential disease vectors:

In movies, shows, and literature, zombies are often depicted as being created by an infectious virus, which is passed on via bites and contact with bodily fluids. Harvard psychiatrist Steven Schlozman wrote a (fictional) medical paper on the zombies presented in Night of the Living Dead and refers to the condition as Ataxic Neurodegenerative Satiety Deficiency Syndromecaused by an infectious agent. The Zombie Survival Guide identifies the cause of zombies as a virus called solanum. Other zombie origins shown in films include radiation from a destroyed NASA Venus probe (as in Night of the Living Dead ), as well as mutations of existing conditions such as prions, mad-cow disease, measles and rabies.

But in real life, the cause of the disease is much easier than this and far more frightening: the vector is fear and anger. Well, and catastrophic levels of ignorance. And sadly, these things are as contagious as any fictional agent, as contagious as cholera. Victims are everywhere; sadly, we have about as much chance of finding Patient Zero and manufacturing a cure as the protagonist did in the film World War Z.
And attractive as the thought is (imagine the House chamber sealed for all time to become the problem of future archaeologists), we cannot isolate and quarantine the infected as the CDC recommends.
In World War Z, Brad Pitt found a way to make people “invisible” to zombies but that won’t help us here. They have the means to hurt us even if they don’t see us. We can run, but we cannot hide.
The only real measure available to us is to stop the spread of the contagion. This means education. But as anyone knows, zombies are education resistant. It turns out that being mindless is a real impediment to learning.
As a result, we can’t save those already infected. All we can do is to immunize those people who have not succumbed. Facts immunize against ignorance and without ignorance fear and anger are helpless to effect change.
So please, as a public service, help those around you. Introduce them to something other than Faux News. Present them with facts and help us stop this disease while there is still time. We need to stop it before to save itself the rest of the world is forced to perform triage on the United States.
Zombies don’t have Big Brothers; sad as it is, it is too late for them. But it is not too late for the rest of us; there are others we can save. So please, do whatever you can to help. Let’s take away the zombie’s food source: ignorant people. Let’s save America from the zombie apocalypse.

Million Vet March Organizers Condemn Sarah Palin, Ted Cruz, and the tea party

The tea party, Sarah Palin, and Ted Cruz tried to hijack the Million Vet March for political and personal gain, and event organizers condemned them for politicizing the march.
According to a message on their website, the problem began when a local DC organizer turned the march into a tea party rally, “The political agenda put forth by a local organizer in Washington DC was not in alignment with our message. We feel disheartened that some would seek to hijack the narrative for political gain. The core principle is about all Americans honoring Veterans in a peaceful and apolitical manner.”
In a post on their Facebook page, organizers went into more detail,

It is our official position that the purpose of this march and the accompanying rallies is focused on the re-opening of the Veterans memorials and keeping them open. While we understand that a Constitutional republic requires the equilibrium of checks and balances to maintain the democratic process, the memorials, monuments and parks built in honor of Veterans should NEVER be closed, blocked or restricted from use. We take the official position that no government office holder shall have ability to abridge the freedom of access to these hallowed grounds.
We have, as a group, been prevented from certain groups that have piggy-backed off our grassroots efforts, to effectively create a comprehensive media message campaign. We made the mistake of trying to partner with some Washington insiders that thwarted many of our genuine concerns for keeping this apolitical and grassroots. While we support many of those groups common causes for Veterans, we do not support the manner in which they go about it. We chose instead to not incite or create panic.
We chose to listen to all Americans and all Veterans that have asked us to keep going on despite the disingenuous politicians, political action committees, talking heads on the televisions and press reports attempting to hijack the message. This included many threats of personal and political attacks on our group’s character, businesses, colleagues and our true intentions. While our hearts were heavy by the disheartening acts of a few powerful Washington elite and political extremists jumping on the opportunity to make money, we decided to stay true to our message of a non-partisan effort to assist Veterans.

Here are Palin and Cruz making the march all about Obama hate:

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

A few powerful Washington elites? I believe that would be Sens. Ted Cruz and Mike Lee, and the political extremists are Sarah Palin and the tea partiers. The “incite or create panic” line refers to those tea partiers who tore down the barricades at the WWII memorial and marched to the White House. The extremists waved the confederate flag in front of the White House and chanted things like impeach Obama.
I suspect that Cruz and Palin were not invited, and a Facebook account of their behavior for one vet who was there fits the description of using the event for political gain, “I was disappointed when Ms. Palin and Mr. Cruz walked up to us to say hello but then walked down to the center to try to use us for they’re own purpose so I left to visit the viet nam memorial ty Brats.”
The tea partiers are proud of themselves for taking an event about veterans and turning it into another platform to showcase their hatred of this president, but they should be ashamed of themselves. The people who turned the march into an anti-Obama rally shamed and humiliated our veterans. Every vet knows that it doesn’t matter what political party a president is from, they are still the Commander in Chief. The organizers of this event may or may not be conservatives, but it is clear that they didn’t want the tea party mob, or Palin and Cruz’s grandstanding at their event.
Veterans are about honor and sacrifice. The repugicans who politicized the event brought dishonor to the very values that our veterans embody. To self-promoters like Palin and Cruz, veterans are nothing more than props to be used for political and financial gain, and they are proud to have tarnished our nation’s veterans with their selfish extremism.

The Religio-Wingnuts Attempt to Circumvent the Constitution By Claiming Academic Freedom

The latest attempt by the religio-wingnuts to circumvent the Constitution involves claiming that prohibiting teachers from teaching the bible as science infringes on their academic freedom.

Academic freedom is the concept that free inquiry by faculty members is essential to the mission of the academy, and that scholars should have freedom to teach or communicate ideas or facts without being targeted for repression, job loss, or imprisonment. It cannot be disputed that in America the “mission of the academy” (public schools) is not teaching christianity or that substituting the bible for science is the “communication of facts.” As far as academic freedom to teach religion, that is the purview of private religious schools and has no place in the taxpayer-funded public school system. However, a new bill was introduced in the Pennsylvania legislature that supporters claim will protect the “academic freedom” of christians who teach the bible as science in public school classrooms. It is another assault on the Constitution in the long-standing war against science by the religio-wingnuts, and an overt attack on the secular nature of the Constitution’s separation of cult and state.
The Pennsylvania measure is not the first time christians have attempted to defy the Constitution despite the most recent ruling prohibiting teaching creationism as science that a federal court ruled unconstitutional. In Kitzmiller v. Dover, the court ruled that “teaching ‘intelligent design’ aspires to change the ground rules of science to make room for religion, specifically, beliefs consonant with a particular version of christianity;” the ruling should have put an end to attempts to teach the bible creation myth as science in public schools. In 1987, the Supreme Court invalidated another “academic freedom” claim of Louisiana’s Balanced Treatment Act that required public schools to teach creation myth alongside evolution because according to the court; it did not advance academic freedom “but has the distinctly different purpose of discrediting” evolution” and because its “primary purpose was to endorse a particular religious doctrine.” The court ruled the Louisiana law “violated the separation of church and state” and was patently unconstitutional.
The Pennsylvania measure is being promoted by a preacher, Donn Chapman, who claims teaching evolution is a triumph of secularists and “neo-Darwinists” who are “driving god from the marketplace and keeping us from being able to give god the glory for what he’s done.” According to Chapman, “secularists are getting our kids and saying, ‘You feed them, you take them to cult on Sunday, but if they’re going to be intelligent, if they are going to get into a good school, they are going to learn to think like us. Heil, Hitler.’ That’s what it’s about.” It is ironic Chapman invokes Nazi Germany while fervently declaring that his religious freedom has been “suppressed” because science is taught in public schools while pushing to force the christian religion down the throats of America’s children.  He claims  that anyone who even suggests teaching creationism as science is exterminated academically, and that since christians are the “spiritual children of the founders of this nation, we need to take it back and give it back to god” by teaching the bible as science.
The Pennsylvania legislation follows laws passed in Louisiana (2008) and Tennessee (2012), and was set aside or killed in Kansas, Montana, Oklahoma, Colorado, and Indiana. The real issue according to Chapman is not about the bible as science, but about a clash of worldviews between secularism and theocracy.  The clash was evident in another religious right legal challenge in Kansas where the Christian group, Citizens for Objective Public Education (COPE) argued that by teaching science in public schools “the state is ‘indoctrinating’ impressionable students” they claim is a violation of the 1st Amendment. COPE exists to “promote the religious rights of parents, children, and taxpayers” and claims that public schools “promote a ‘non-theistic religious worldview’ by allowing only ‘materialistic’ or ‘atheistic’ explanations to scientific questions.”
COPE’s mission is creating “religiously neutral” public schools that do not promote “pantheistic and materialistic religions, including Atheism and Secular Humanism” (christianity is exempt) and it informs their incredibly naïve understanding of atheism and secular humanism. Atheism is simply rejection of belief in the existence of deities, and secular humanism is a nontheistic philosophy embracing reason, ethics, and social justice while specifically rejecting religious dogma, supernaturalism, and superstition as the basis of decision making. Secularism, by its nature, is precisely the necessary approach public schools have to take to avoid being transformed into christian madrassas, and yet a significant number of teachers are wary of following the Constitution or curriculum that is not bible-oriented.
In a 2011 study of high school biology teachers, the authors found that pro-creationist teachers are not reluctant to teach their religion as established science, and that too many teachers are mortified at the backlash from wingnuts for teaching evolution that is a violation of their academic freedom the religio-wingnuts are so intent on protecting for bible advocates. According to the study, there is “a pervasive reluctance of teachers to forthrightly explain evolutionary biology,” and only 28% of teachers actually follow current standards, 13% openly teach intelligent design or creationism, and 60% avoid the topic altogether because of undue and unconstitutional pressure from the religious right on a crusade to put an end to secular academic freedom.
As if Americans are not besieged enough by conservatives waging war on every demographic in society, they have to defend themselves against the real and present danger of having their children indoctrinated into the christian religion in the public school system. This country’s population is already scientifically retarded as evidenced by such outrageous claims that climate science is a hoax and the absurd proclamation by Ted Cruz at the Values Voters Summit that birth control pills are abortifacients.
The last thing America needs is an entire generation of 14^th century peasants clinging to religious mythos as science they were taught using taxpayer dollars. It is the long-term goal of the religio-wingnutst in their war on education, science, and the secularism inherent in the U.S. Constitution. If the religio-wingnuts demand academic freedom to teach the bible as science, there is a proliferation of religious schools across the nation that will give any halfwit with a bible a job indoctrinating children to believe fairy tales are science, but they will not be “academics” and they damn sure better not get one penny of taxpayer money to do it.

Disasters in the Dakotas

First it was the freak blizzard that hit South Dakota, killings hundreds of thousands of cattle.

Now it's a huge oil spill in a North Dakota wheat field.

A farmer discovered a huge oil spill — several times bigger than the recent Mayflower, Ark., spill – nearly two weeks ago in North Dakota. but because of federal government furloughs, we’re only just learning about it.- grist

Why should we care about the dakotas' food?
There was one courageous South Dakotan who cared about our nation's food and americans' access to it..

The disasters are too immense for the states to handle themselves. They need the governments help...and quick. senator McGovern wouldn't call those farmers needing aid.."moochers"...senator McGovern wouldn't call those needing snap benefits "moochers" like a current South Dakotan politico.

If you haven't done so already, call your congresscritters and tell them to grow up and get the government going again. Better yet, call Thune's office and ask him if he has told those farmers affected by the shutdown and the disasters that "they are on their own."

Daily Comic Relief

Woman clinging onto drawbridge rescued by firefighters

Firefighters in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, rescued a breast cancer walk participant on Saturday morning after she got stuck on a railway bridge as it was lifting into the air. The 55-year-old Dania Beach woman, whose identity was not released, ended up hanging onto the bridge by her hands and feet as it moved into an upright position. Witnesses said she stayed calm as she held on for half an hour, about 22 feet above the train tracks, until her rescue.

Many of those who watched the situation unfold were, like the woman, wearing pink shirts from the Making Strides Against Breast Cancer 5K walk. Firefighters responded to multiple 911 calls about the woman, who told firefighters she took part in the cancer walk earlier in the morning, Fort Lauderdale city spokesman Matt Little said.

The people that the woman was with were crying and begging for people to call police for help and for their friend to hold on, Powell said. “They harnessed the ladder up against the actual tracks and a firefighter went and got her and we were all clapping, like we were just amazed," Powell said. A crowd of spectators cheered when firefighters rescued the frightened woman using the 24-foot ladder, Little said. She was not injured.

YouTube link.

It's not known why she was on the railroad bridge, Little said. Signs say "No Trespassing, " and there is a pedestrian walkway on the nearby Andrews Avenue bridge. Witness Philip Glazebrook said he was surprised that she crossed the bridge in the first place because it gives a loud warning before it rises. “This bridge is controlled from Tallahassee. There’s not a bridge minder here anymore,” Glazebrook said. “So she’s stuck on the bridge and she’s going up. The next thing is, she’s stuck, straddled like Jesus Christ.”

Burglar threatened to sue his victim for stopping him from fleeing the scene of break in

A burglar threatened to sue his victim for stopping him from fleeing the scene of a break in. Lee Johnson was disturbed by landlord Paul Clare as he tried to raid the Waterside pub in Eccles, Salford, Manchester Crown Court heard.
But because his escape was foiled by a struggle which ended with a fall through a window, the burglar decided that he was the victim. Mr Clare, 45, who lives above the pub, was woken by loud banging in the middle of the night. When he went downstairs to investigate, Johnson, who was high on crack cocaine, leapt from behind the bar and vaulted to a window to escape.

The intruder managed to force it open and get half his body through. But Mr Clare grabbed his legs in a bid to stop him getting away. In the struggle that followed Mr Clare was struck in the mouth, causing him to bite his own tongue.

But he refused to give up and one of Johnson’s shoes fell off in the tussle. The court heard Johnson then shouted ‘I’ll sue you’ as he fell through the window before cutting his head. Police were there within seconds of Johnson landing on the ground, and arrested the burglar at the scene. Johnson was jailed for 15 months.

Man shocked to find 28-inch curly fry in his takeout

Tuscaloosa resident Gary Young scored what he calls a "one-in-a-million" curly fry at an Arby's in Cottondale on Oct. 4.

Young discovered the 28-inch french-fried potato with his beef and cheddar meal when he arrived home.

"I was shocked," he said. "That's like the biggest fry I've ever seen. I thought it was a snake."

Young has resisted eating his tasty find, deciding instead to store it in a Ziploc bag in his refrigerator.

What The World Would Look Like If Countries Were As Big As Their Online Populations

A map showing what the world would look like if countries were as bif as their online populations. The map, created as part of the Information Geographies project at the Oxford Internet Institute, has two layers of information: the absolute size of the online population by country (rendered in geographical space) and the percent of the overall population that represents (rendered by color).

Thus, Canada, with a relatively small number of people takes up little space, but is colored dark red, because more than 80 percent of people are online. China, by contrast, is huge, with more than half a billion people online, but relatively lightly shaded, since more than half the population is not online.

Twenty-Six Maps That Show How New Yorkers Really Feel About Each Other

A Business Insider poll asked New Yorkers to pick which neighborhoods have the best food, the best bars, and the most attractive people, among many other things. The poll was carried out using SurveyMonkey's Audience feature, which was more accurate predicting the 2012 election than numerous traditional pollsters.

They asked 414 New Yorkers - someone who lives and/or works in New York City - to answer 26 questions about the neighborhoods. They've mapped the percentage of people who named each area for different questions.

Landlocked Navies Of The World

It might seem odd that nations with no access to the ocean would maintain naval forces, but many do. Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan, for example, keep many naval vessels on the enormous Caspian Sea. Switzerland and Burundi have armed patrol boats on their border lakes.

These forces, however, are not separate military entities, but integrated into the other armed forces. What makes these nations unique is that they maintain separate military organizations identified as navies, but these forces have access only to inland rivers and lakes.

Random Photos

How Aging Changes Our Appearance

It's always amazing to see childhood photos of old people you know and see how they looked when they were our age (or younger). Sometimes they look almost identical, sometimes they look like 2 different people. Here are 10 GIFs of elderly people to match a photo taken of them 50-60 years earlier.

The Century Old Color Photographs Of Prokudin-Gorsky

In 1909 a remarkable project was initiated by Russian photographer Sergey Mikhaylovich Prokudin-Gorsky. His mission was to record - in full and vibrant color - the vast and diverse Russian Empire. Here, with his story, is a selection of his amazing century old full color pictures.

Kuşköy

The Turkish Bird Village

The people of Kuşköy, a small village in Turkey, have invented a brilliantly simple way of communicating over long distances, by whistling. This fascinating means of communication was created over 400 years ago as a consequence of working in the fields of the Pontic Mountains.

The terrain is irregular making travelling very difficult even on short distances, and because of this, the villagers felt the need for an alternative to speaking and shouting. Inspired by the songs of birds, they started whistling the syllables of Turkish words which proved to be much more effective and less energy-consuming than yelling or walking all the way to the person they needed to speak with.

Anthropology News

Did Humans Arrive in Americas 30,000 Years Ago?

Cave art depicting early Americans’ sex lives suggests people inhabited Americas 18,000 years earlier than believed.

Living Relatives of Iceman Mummy Found

The Austrian ice mummy has at least 19 living male relatives, according to a genetic study.

What is the Higgs?

The Higgs boson or Higgs particle is an elementary particle initially theorised in 1964, and tentatively confirmed to exist on 14 March 2013. Peter Higgs from England and François Englert from Belgium, two theoretical physicists who suggested that an invisible ocean of energy suffusing space is responsible for the mass and diversity of the the universe, were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2013.

But what exactly is the Higgs?

Astronomical News

'Gravity' and Reality: History's Worst Space Disasters

The blockbuster movie 'Gravity' sheds light on actual space disasters in our spacefaring history.

Epic Space Photos of the Week 

Enjoy some of the most inspiring, beautiful and down-right stunning photos from our adventures in space this past week.

Mysterious Missile Launch Seen From Space Station

Last night, an unannounced Russian ICBM test gave space station astronauts a shock. 

Hebes Chasma: Mars Express Stares into Martian Abyss

Sitting at the northern edge of Mars' famous Valles Marineris canyon complex is a strange gouge in the landscape called Hebes Chasma -- this is its story.

Thieving owl is terrorizing joggers

Joggers in the Highpoint neighborhood of East Memphis are living in fear after a large owl has reportedly attacked at least two joggers the past few days. Joe Parks runs through the neighborhood everyday. A few days ago, he felt what he thought was a branch knock him on the head. "He was coming at me at eye level," Park said. "It was very dark. There was a little bit of fog, and he was dead silent. I happened to turn around when he was coming at me and I hit the deck. He landed in a tree.

Will A Chicken That's Fed Lemons Taste Like Lemons?

High-end chickens are chickens fed with produce that's out of the price range of most humans. David Burke, one of New York City's most prominent chefs chimed in with this head-scratcher.

He says: 'If the chickens ate ginger and lemon, you would have a gingery, lemony chicken, I think.' A ginger-lemon chicken sounds fantastic! But, um, wait a second. Is that scientifically possible?

Animal News

DNews: Dogs Have Feelings, Too

Dog owners have been saying it for years: "Dogs are really just four-legged, furry humans." And now science backs it up! Researchers trained dogs to lay still in an FMRI machine and what they found is sure to make you go "awwwwww."

Amazing Animals of the Week: Photos

This week's gallery includes a mole with a flower nose, butterflies trying to be owls, and a supersized moth.

'Spirit Moose' and Other Sacred Animals

Hunters in Nova Scotia made the mistake of killing an albino moose, a rare animal revered by a local tribe.

Aninmal Pictures