Month: May 2023

The GOP Debt Plan

After a couple of weeks of no progress on the debt ceiling thing the GOP has come up with a plan (they always have a plan that does little to solve the problem…..as usual it will involve benefits for business and of course the inevitable tax cuts.

Here is a look at this ‘plan’…..

With the U.S. careening toward a default crisis that they manufactured, House Republicans are reportedly crafting a major tax cut package that would overwhelmingly benefit the rich and corporations while blowing a multitrillion-dollar hole in the federal deficit.

The fresh push for tax cuts, according to Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.), further shows that “this hostage crisis has never been about deficits for the GOP.”

“It has always been about wealth transfer—taking away food and healthcare from the poor and middle class to give away $3 trillion more in tax cuts to their rich friends,” Omar, the deputy chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, tweeted Tuesday.

Politicoreported earlier this week that Republicans on the House Ways and Means Committee hope to finish work on their emerging tax legislation by June 16, just over two weeks after the so-called “X-date”—the day on which the Treasury Department expects the federal government to run out of money to cover its obligations unless Congress raises the debt limit or President Joe Biden acts unilaterally.

“Key parts of the [tax cut] package… will likely include a full restoration of research and development deductions, full bonus depreciation, removing caps on business interest expensing, and a doubling of the $1.08 million limitation on the section 179 deduction (which, like bonus depreciation, allows a company to deduct an asset’s cost up-front),” Politico noted.

The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) estimated last week that extending the individual provisions of the 2017 tax cuts—which are currently set to expire in 2025—would add $2.5 trillion to the deficit over the next decade. The original law made the cut to the corporate tax rate from 35% to 21% permanent.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/gop-tax-cuts-debt-limit

Let me ask you….if you have a debt problem would cutting your income help solve your problem?

GOP wants to cut the revenue that the country gets….but they want to keep spending on stupidity like wars…..I cannot see our debt ceiling problem being solved by these plans from the Right.

They keep doing this horrible plan so that they can attack social safety nets while giving a helping hand to those that need no help.

But these plans do keep the dollars rolling into their coffers….and that is what it is all about.

Pay attention!

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

A Day For Sad News

Wednesday was a day for sad news….

First the ‘Queen of Rock and Roll’ has died…..

The world has lost one of the most beloved recording artists of all time. A spokesperson says Tina Turner has died peacefully at her home near Zurich, Switzerland, after a long illness, the Telegraph reports. Turner, who was born Anna Mae Bullock in Tennessee, was 83 years old. She was known as the “Queen of Rock ‘n’ Roll,” with massive hits including “What’s Love Got to Do with It” and “(Simply) The Best,” per Reuters. “With her, the world loses a music legend and a role model,” the spokesperson says.

Turner had been in poor health in recent years, the Guardian reports. She was diagnosed with intestinal cancer in 2016 and received a kidney transplant from her second husband, former EMI record executive Erwin Bach, in 2017.

She will be missed and may she rest in peace.

Dammit!  It’s official!

The second piece of sad news came in the evening…..

Most thinking people have been dreading the possibility that the mini dictator from Florida would try to bring his form of mind control to the nation.

We can stop our dread…..DeSantis made it official yesterday.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis is officially running for president. The Republican filed paperwork with the Federal Election Commission on Wednesday, hours before a 6pm ET Twitter Spaces session with Elon Musk in which he is expected to launch his campaign, the AP reports. DeSantis enters the race behind front-runner Donald Trump in the polls but well ahead of other challengers. Today’s move puts DeSantis “in direct competition” with Trump for “the heart of the Republican Party,” per Politico.

Twitter was not polite to the announcement…

A DeSantis campaign official tried to cast the glitches as a positive, saying “Governor DeSantis broke the internet—that should tell you everything you need to know about the strength of his candidacy,” per CNBC. Although DeSantis couldn’t be heard for a while, Twitter employees were audibly complaining about the situation. “That was insane, sorry,” Musk said after having to borrow another account because his crashed. Musk had told the audience Twitter’s servers were straining under the demand.

Glitches or not, DeSantis’ audio announcement lacked the usual trappings of a presidential campaign announcement—no soaring music, uplifting rhetoric, or cheering crowds. “I don’t care about fanfare,” he said. DeSantis promised his audience that come January 2025, “I will be taking the oath of office as the 47th president of the United States.” Trump answered DeSantis with a couple of videos mocking the governor on Truth Social, as well as the gibe, “His collar is too big!”

We now have DeSantis, Trump and Scott for the GOP nomination….there is one thing we can be sure of….the lies will flying and the truth will be suppressed.

Now is the time for any real conservative out there to start looking for a ‘real’ candidate that has the best interests of the country at heart.

If there are any left….that is….

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Rot At SCOTUS

The recent events around the dealings of Justice Thomas and his closeness with some billionaire who seems to be paying the bills for Thomas.

I read a piece written by Bill Astore that sums up what is happening within our Supreme Court……a good piece and should be read…..

A big part of the American experiment is the idea we are a nation of laws as defined by the U.S. Constitution. The law is supposed to apply equally to all, and disinterested, impartial, justices are supposed to make rulings that are unaffected by money or race or religion or any other factor other than the law itself and what’s right and what isn’t.

That doesn’t describe today’s Supreme Court of the U.S. (SCOTUS).

Justice Clarence Thomas has accepted all kinds of undeclared gifts from a billionaire supporter, including tuition for his great-nephew at private boarding schools. Justice Neil Gorsuch profited from a real estate transaction with a rich law firm CEO with extensive business before the court. Apparently, SCOTUS polices itself here, and so far the SCOTUS cop on watch is asleep.

Justice Brett Kavanaugh gained his seat under a storm of controversy. I wrote in September 2018 that he should withdraw his name from consideration, based on the demeanor he showed at his Senate hearing, but of course he didn’t. Justice Amy Coney Barrett was specifically “saved” by President Trump to replace Ruth Bader Ginsburg; everyone knew she was a conservative Catholic opposed to abortion with a clear record of being pro-business to boot.

You’d think the #1 criterion for a SCOTUS justice would be unassailable integrity, but today it seems to be predictable partisan positions (both political parties are guilty here, though Republicans are more blatant). Allegiance to moneyed interests is a big plus. The latter point is why these justices see no problem with accepting “gifts,” otherwise known as bribes (for that is what they are, in plain speak).

https://bracingviews.substack.com/p/rot-at-the-supreme-court

Integrity in the court has left the building many years ago…..the rot within the court is all pervasive….the only for sure about the court is it is as corruptible as the rest of DC and our elected officials….the only difference is these political hacks have a lifetime to have their palms greased.

It is beyond time to make some much needed SCOTUS reforms…..like term limits, mandatory retirement and stop allowing political hacks on the highest court in the land.

Thoughts?

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

All Those School Shootings

There has been a rash…no that is the best word….and epidemic of shootings in our schools with massive deaths and injuries and all ask what the hell has happened?

Today is the anniversary of the horrible Uvalde school massacre….

Why is this happening with such frequency?

That question has an answer….but few will heed or even care as long as daddy gets to strut around wearing his pistol….

This is a study that tries to answer some of the questions (an interesting read but sadly it will go unread) ….

High school students who experience violence or bullying at school are more likely to bring weapons like a gun, knife, or club to school than those who have not experienced violence, according to a new study in the American Journal of Preventive Medicine.

Because weapons increase the potential for injury and death when there is interpersonal conflict, developing a better understanding of the relationship between exposure to violence and weapon carrying is essential for developing effective public health interventions.

“With 93 school shootings in the US just the 2020-21 period alone, and an average school shooter age of 19.7 years (in since 1970), the issue of school violence couldn’t be more pressing. The occurrence of violence in is an urgent and complex public health problem,” explained lead investigator Richard Lowry, MD, MS, Office of the Director, National Center for Viral Hepatitis, STD, and TB Prevention, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Atlanta, GA, U.S..

“Our research examined the link between exposure to violence and weapon carrying. We found students who experienced violence at school were much more likely to carry weapons than those who had not experienced violence,” he noted.

Data on 28,442 participants from the CDC’s National Youth Risk Behavior Surveys from 2017 and 2019 were analyzed to calculate sex-stratified, adjusted prevalence ratios, which were also adjusted for race/ethnicity, grade, , current substance use, suicidal thoughts, and history of concussion. The research is novel because it used recent data available, has results for males and females, and is adjusted for important demographic factors.

Overall, 3.3% of US carried a weapon at school. Among all students, 6.6% were threatened or injured with a weapon at school, 19.3% were bullied at school, 8.3% were in a physical fight at school, and 7.7% were absent from school due to safety concerns.

Nearly half of males (48.8%) who experienced all of these forms of violence, and nearly a third of females (31.4%) who did, carried at school. Males and females were respectively 3.5 and 3.9 times more likely to carry a weapon if they had been threatened or injured with a weapon at school, and 3.4 and 3.7 times more likely following a physical fight at school. Males who felt unsafe were twice as likely to miss school, while females were three times more likely than those who didn’t report feeling unsafe.

https://phys.org/news/2023-05-reaction-school-violence-compounds-crisis.html

Did this answer any of your questions about schooling shootings?

Another post on the mass shootings will be forthcoming….watch for it.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Do You Remember the ‘Domino Theory’?

Of course you do not if you are younger than 40.

For those too young to remember a controlling policy of the US foreign policy then I shall explain it to you.

The Domino Theory was a prevailing belief that communism was an internationalist movement that would spread from one country to the next until it dominated the world, much as a row of dominos collapses one after the other. The Domino Theory was accepted by a succession of United States presidents and Western policymakers. As a result, it shaped the foreign policy of the US and its allies during the Cold War.

Western leaders believed that once communism gained a foothold in a nation, its neighbors would quickly be infiltrated, overrun and seized by communists – much like a row of standing dominos topples, one knocking over the next until all have fallen.

Take Southeast Asia….if Vietnam fell then all countries around it would as well….Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, Burma, etc on and on until it consumed the world….it being Communism.

The first public mention of it was made by US president Eisenhower in a speech in 1954, where he explained why America would aid the French in their struggle against communists in Indochina (Vietnam).

“[There are] broader considerations that might follow what you would call the ‘falling domino’ principle. You have a row of dominoes set up, you knock over the first one, and what will happen to the last one is the certainty that it will go over very quickly… But when we come to the possible sequence of events, the loss of Indochina, of Burma, of Thailand, of the Peninsula (Malaysia and Singapore) and Indonesia following, now you begin to talk about … millions and millions and millions of people.”

Apparently the theory is making a resurgence…..the tale is the Russia will not be happy with Ukraine….thoughts from a post by Ted Galen Carpenter

…

The notion that a country with an economy just modestly larger than Spain’s and a military budget less than one-tenth the size of the US military budget could pose a threat of that magnitude should seem absurd on its face. Even without Washington’s involvement, Russian forces would have difficulty conquering even one major European power, much less NATO Europe as a whole.

Moreover, the assumption ignores extensive evidence that Ukraine is uniquely important to Russia for both cultural and security reasons. In particular, Russian leaders were not about to allow the United States to turn Ukraine into a NATO military asset directed against their country. It does not follow at all that they would make a similar effort or incur comparable risks to conduct a geo-strategic offensive against other portions of Europe. Even if Ukraine falls to the Kremlin’s current military operation, there is no credible reason to assume that Poland, the Baltic republics, or Slovakia – much less such major powers as Germany, France, or Italy – would be next on an expansionist agenda.

A similar simplistic formulation is beginning to influence thinking in the United States regarding policy toward China, especially among the growing roster of anti-PRC hawks. The underlying assumption is that if Beijing successfully uses coercion to gain control of Taiwan, the PRC will then pose an expansionist threat to all of East Asia and become a candidate for global hegemony. Just as analysts who embrace a refurbished domino theory with regard to Russia ignore Ukraine’s exceptional importance to Moscow, people who contend that Beijing’s acquisition of Taiwan would trigger an expansionist binge ignore the island’s unique status for PRC leaders and China’s population. For many Chinese, Taiwan is the last unresolved territorial issue from the civil war that ended on the mainland with a communist victory in 1949. The island also is seen as territory that a foreign power (Japan) stole during China’s “long century of humiliation.”

…

The domino theory was simplistic nonsense when Eisenhower presented it in the 1950s. The current zombie version is equally detached from reality. It needs to be rejected emphatically, lest it entangle the United States in even larger unnecessary, disastrous conflicts than the original version did.

(antiwar.com)

The US and its War Department will clutch at old straws to keep the cash flowing and the people in fear.

STOP! believing the hype!

Especially if it comes for the War Department and its civilian agents.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Counteroffensive–Not So Fast

For months we have been told of the coming Ukrainian counteroffensive in Eastern part of the country….there been a few delays like weather, waiting for more and better weapons, etc.

It is being reported that the Biden posse expects nothing out if the proposed counteroffensive….instead a long drawn out frozen conflict.

The Biden administration is preparing for the war in Ukraine to turn into a frozen conflict for years or possibly even decades, similar to the situation on the Korean peninsula, POLITICO reported on Thursday.

US officials have been discussing the possibility, including potential options for where to draw the lines for a frozen conflict that either side would agree not to cross. The report said the idea of freezing the fighting could be a “politically palatable long-term result.”

The administration is considering the possibility because they don’t expect Ukraine to regain much territory in its long-awaited counteroffensive. According to POLITICO, the US is expecting that the assault “won’t deal a mortal blow to Russia.”

A US official said the administration is preparing to support Ukraine for the long term, whether the conflict is frozen or not. “We are planning for the long term, whether it looks frozen or thawed,” the official told POLITICO.

Since one of Russia’s main motives for invading Ukraine was its alignment with NATO, and its main demand during short-lived negotiations in the early days of the war was Ukrainian neutrality, a frozen conflict that involves NATO continuing to arm Kyiv would likely not be acceptable to Moscow. While Russian officials have expressed an openness to negotiations, the Kremlin has said it believes Russia’s goals can only be achieved through military means.

If the conflict is frozen along the current battle lines, Ukraine would lose significantly more territory than if it negotiated a deal with Moscow shortly after the invasion. But the peace talks were discouraged by the US and its allies, and the Biden administration still shows no interest in pushing for a lasting diplomatic solution.

(antiwar.com)

Does that sound at all familiar to anyone but me?

But wait…..are those F-16s going to be a game change?

Mostly likely not.

Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall said Monday that the provision of F-16 fighter jets to Kyiv will give Ukraine’s military an “incremental” boost but said it wouldn’t be a “game-changer” in the conflict.

“The F-16 is a reasonable option for them for a whole bunch of reasons,” Kendall said. “It will give Ukrainians an increment of capabilities that they don’t have right now. But it’s not going to be a dramatic game-changer, as far as I’m concerned, for their total military capabilities.”

The US announced on Friday that it would sign off on European deliveries of F-16s for Ukraine, but there’s still a long way to go before the planes reach Kyiv. No countries have officially committed to sending their F-16s, and the current focus is on supporting training for Ukrainian pilots.

We do this all the time….that is why I say we are addicted to endless war.

The only winners in this conflict are the arms industries….they will continue to make their profit (a post to come) until the last Ukrainian.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

The Office Of Perception Management

The War Department’s clever name for a propaganda machine.

But they do not need it for we have clarity and transparency in our democracy. (that is sarcasm in case you missed it)

Would our government use propaganda?

You bet your ass they would especially when public approval is needed they will lie and misinform to keep the public dazed and confused makes acceptance of crappy policies palatable.

But let’s go back to the 1980s and the Reagan admin……

Not long after the 9/11 attacks, the Bush administration launched what it called the Office of Strategic Influence, which would seek to “counter the enemy’s perception management” in the so-called war on terror. But it quickly became clear that the office, operating under Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, would be managing those perceptions with its own disinformation.

As the New York Times reported at the time, its work was to “provide news items, possibly including false ones, to foreign journalists in an effort to influence overseas opinion.” In the nascent Internet age, observers worried the propaganda could boomerang back on Americans.

“The question is whether the Pentagon and military should undertake an official program that uses disinformation to shape perceptions abroad,” the Times reported in 2004. “But in a modern world wired by satellite television and the Internet, any misleading information and falsehoods could easily be repeated by American news outlets.”

Now, two decades later, “perception management” is once again becoming a central focus for the national security state. On March 1, 2022, the Pentagon established a new office with similar goals to the one once deemed too controversial to remain open. Very little has been made public about the effort, which The Intercept learned about through a review of budget documents and an internal memo we obtained. This iteration is called the Influence and Perception Management Office, or IPMO, according to the memo, which was produced by the office for an academic institution, and its responsibilities include overseeing and coordinating the various counter-disinformation efforts being conducted by the military, which can include the U.S.’s own propaganda abroad.

Inside the Pentagon’s New “Perception Management” Office to Counter Disinformation

I have been saying this for decades….[lus with social media I am sure that some of us have been a target for the trash spread by the Pentagon and its contractors.

Americans bad mouth Joseph Goebbels and his Ministry of Truth…..looks like we have some that are following the textbook to a tee.

Pay attention or be stupid your choice.

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Ukraine News Round-up

All the ‘minor’ news from around a small web on the doings in the conflict between Ukraine and Russia.

After months and months of begging Zelensky seems to be getting the aircraft that he has said will make all the difference in the conflict.

The US will allow its European partners to transfer F-16s to Kiev, according to the Washington Post. Earlier this week, the UK and Netherlands began forming a coalition to send the American-made fighter jets to Ukraine.

A person “familiar with the decision” told the Post that the White House informed its allies it would not block their plans to provide Kiev with F-16s. When Washington sells F-16s, the buyer must agree that the US government can block the planes from being transferred to a third country.

A senior administration official said the plan would include training “on fourth-generation fighter aircraft, including F-16s, to further strengthen and improve the capabilities of the Ukrainian Air Force.”

In January, during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron, Biden ruled out sending F-16s to Ukraine. Macron said Paris would only be open to transferring fighter jets to Ukraine if Kiev pledged not to carry out attacks on Russian soil.

(antiwar.com)

Money is running out from the US and Ukraine has 5 moths to do something…..

US media is reporting that Ukraine has five months to show demonstrable and significant gains or Western allies fear financial and military support from the US may wane and pressure will mount on the country to enter into peace negotiations.

US media reported on the matter, citing several senior European officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

The United States is entering an election cycle and it is important, one European official says, that the American public can be sold on the idea that the more than $113 billion in taxpayer aid given to Ukraine has been effective and “to prove that all of those aid packages have been successful in terms of Ukrainian advances.”

US officials contend that the current $48 billion package which was authorized last year, is enough to sustain Ukraine for roughly five more months, but European allies are concerned future aid packages from the US will come close to matching that level.

But not to worry….an accounting error has been found and there is more cash available than first thought…..

The Pentagon says it has overestimated the value of the weapons it has sent to Ukraine by at least $3 billion—an accounting error that could be a boon for the war effort because it will allow the Defense Department to send more weapons now without asking Congress for more money. The acknowledgment comes as Pentagon is under increased pressure by Congress to show accountability for the billions of dollars it has sent in weapons, ammunition and equipment to Ukraine and as some lawmakers question whether that level of support should continue, the AP reports.

It also could free up more money for critical weapons as Ukraine is on the verge of a much anticipated counteroffensive—which will require as much military aid as they can get. The error was caused when officials overvalued some of the systems sent to Ukraine, using the value of money it would cost to replace an item completely rather than the current value of the weapon. In many of the military aid packages, the Pentagon has opted to draw from its stockpiles of older, existing gear because it can get those items to Ukraine faster.

“During our regular oversight process of presidential drawdown packages, the Department discovered inconsistencies in equipment valuation for Ukraine. In some cases, ‘replacement cost’ rather than ‘net book value’ was used, therefore overestimating the value of the equipment drawn down from US stocks,” said Pentagon spokeswoman Sabrina Singh. She added that the mistake hasn’t constrained US support to Ukraine or hampered the ability to send aid to the battlefield. A defense official said the Pentagon is still trying to determine exactly how much the total surplus will be. To date the US has provided Ukraine nearly $37 billion in military aid since Russia invaded in February 2022.

Could be some ‘creative accounting’ going on….but that is just my thought.

A group of security people have said that Ukraine is a disaster…..on the diplomatic front…..

An open letter calling for a swift diplomatic end to the war in Ukraine was published on Tuesday in the New York Times. The letter’s 14 signatories consisted mostly of former U.S. military officers and other national security officials, including Jack Matlock, Washington’s former ambassador to the Soviet Union; Ann Wright, a retired U.S. Army colonel and former diplomat; Matthew Hoh, a former Marine Corps officer and State Department official; and Ret. Col. Lawrence Wilkerson, who served as Secretary of State Colin Powell’s Chief of Staff.  

Many are longtime critics of U.S. foreign policy and post-9/11 war policies.

The letter calls the war an “unmitigated disaster” and cautions that “future devastation could be exponentially greater as nuclear powers creep ever closer toward open war.”

While condemning Vladimir Putin’s “criminal invasion and occupation,” the letter, which notes the serial invasions of Russia by foreign adversaries, encourages readers to understand the war “through Russia’s eyes.”

“In diplomacy, one must attempt to see with strategic empathy, seeking to understand one’s adversaries,” according to the letter. “This is not weakness: it is wisdom.”

There is more….there is always more….but due to time constraints I need to move on…..

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”

Sex And The Debt Debate

I read a headline while I was surfing last week and came across one that made me just have to read…..The debt ceiling deal could make America’s STD problem much worse”….I immediately thought….what does sex have to do with the debt deal?

And yes I had to read the story and I would like to share it here…..

Senior Biden administration officials and public health leaders are warning that debt ceiling negotiations around clawing back unspent Covid-19 money would have an unintended consequence: increasing sexually-transmitted diseases.

The potential cuts — one of the few seeming areas of agreement between House Republicans and the White House — could sap as much as $30 billion from state and local public health departments that are struggling to rebuild as Covid-19 wanes. Funding clawbacks would undermine work to slow the spread of syphilis, chlamydia, gonorrhea, HIV and hepatitis, and leave the country weaker in the face of future pandemics.

States and cities are counting on unspent Covid funds to support the ranks of local public health workers who test people for sexually transmitted infections, find and contact others who were exposed, and direct people to treatment, efforts crucial to limiting the spread of STDs.

“There’s no doubt” the cuts would hurt efforts to “rebuild our public health infrastructure,” Leandro Mena, director of the CDC’s Division of STD Prevention, told POLITICO at the annual conference of STD Directors in New Orleans. “If we don’t have a robust workforce ready, who’s going to be there when we have our next outbreak?”

https://www.politico.com/news/2023/05/19/debt-ceiling-std-covid-00097758

Now you know what sex and the debt ceiling deal have in common.

Are you not pleased that you asked?

As long as we are talking about STDs….

I always post about what is happening in my state of Mississippi…..my state made another list…this tine it is STDs….

Mississippi’s capital city has the second-highest rate of sexually transmitted diseases in the U.S., according to a new study. Innerbody used data from the Center for Disease Control (CDC) to determine the list of cities with high rates of STDs. Jackson was the only Mississippi city to make the list and is second to Memphis. New Orleans ranked sixth. With 1,358 cases per 100,000 people the state capital city ranked second in the U.S. Jackson reported 105 HIV cases, 6,144 chlamydia cases, 3,587 gonorrhea cases and 607 syphilis cases. Jackson has a population of about 149,761.

Read more at: https://www.sunherald.com/news/health/article275559481.html#storylink=cpy

There you go all the fornicating news I have to offer on this Sunday for those inquiring minds.

Enjoy the rest of your weekend….be well and be safe….

I Read, I Write, You Now

“lego ergo scribo”

IST Saturday News Dump–20May23

Mercifully the work week has ended and the jocularity of the weekend can begin.

Let us jump into the meat of this post.

On the food front….I true enjoy using olive oil when I cook….but there may be a pricing problem on the horizon….

If you’re on a Mediterranean diet kick, you might want to be judicious with how much olive oil you use in your meals. That’s because the monthslong drought and sweltering temps in the Mediterranean, especially Spain, have dried out olive trees, causing prices to spike and a looming shortage of the condiment. Quartz cites stats from the International Monetary Fund that put the worldwide price tag for olive oil at about $6,000 per metric ton—a level not seen since 1997, when the price hovered at around $6,225.

In Spain the top olive oil producer on Earth, churning out a million-plus tons of the stuff in a typical year—the most recent five-month olive harvest that ended in February eked out just half of what it usually does. The driving factor behind the current slippery scene: “exceedingly poor” weather, a Mintec analyst tells CNBC, which notes that olives thrive when the mercury is between 60 and 80 degrees Fahrenheit. Per the Telegraph, recent temperatures in the south of Spain recently broke the 100-degree mark. Farmers union officials in Spain say lack of rainfall is also hurting crops, with barely a drop since January—and it doesn’t look like it will be getting better anytime soon.

“Looking at the forecasts, it’s almost a given—it’s going to be another grim year,” Rafael Sanchez de Puerta, who heads up the Spanish olive cooperative Dcoop, tells the paper. One farmer who belongs to the UPA union in Andalusia says he hasn’t seen things this bad in the two decades he’s been working the fields. “If something doesn’t change radically in the next few weeks, it’s going to be a catastrophe,” he says. Quartz notes that while olive oil production has also dipped in other parts of western Europe, including Italy, nations with better weather are trying to pick up some of the the slack, including Greece and Turkey, the latter of which nearly doubled its olive oil production last year.

Have you ever wondered if your food is past the “use by” date can it still be consumed….here is a guide for you concerned….

When that bag of languishing lettuces starts to go a little limp or an old carton of yogurt is discovered in the depths of the fridge, most Americans will look for guidance from the date printed neatly on the food label.

But with the exception of infant formula, these labels are not actually a gauge of food safety. In the US, the marked dates are only intended to indicate quality and they are not regulated by any federal agency.

“Food date labels are really like the wild west – there are no standards,” said Jeffrey Costantino, a spokesperson at ReFed, a non-profit advocacy organization working to reduce food waste.

Consumer confusion can take a toll on the climate and on household budgets.

https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2023/may/13/food-labels-expiration-dates-safe-to-eat

Here is one for the books….those self-checkout units in stores….now some are asking for tips…..

Consumers already contending with a squeeze on their bank accounts due to inflation are now facing more pressure as businesses introduce new tipping features at self-checkout machines.

Companies, including airports, bakeries, coffee shops and sports stadiums, have now introduced the self-serve tipping option, where customers can leave tips including the typical 20%, despite facing minimal to no interaction with any employee, according to a recent report by The Wall Street Journal.

Customers report feeling obligated to leave a tip as they question where and to whom the extra money is actually going, but businesses are increasingly embracing the option to boost pay for workers outside of salaries, according to WSJ.

https://www.foxbusiness.com/retail/self-checkout-machines-ask-tips-latest-squeeze-customers

Seriously?

I do the work and I am expected to tip?

My response to that is….BITE ME!

I live in a small town in Coastal Mississippi and it was recently given an honor by realtor.com…..

A Mississippi Coast city was recently rated the most affordable beach town in the United States. Gulfport topped Realtor.com’s 2023 list of the most affordable beach towns, beating out cities like Newport News, Virginia; Corpus Christi, Texas; and Navarre, Florida. Gulfport Mayor Billy Hewes was thrilled to see the city recognized. “Our ability to offer affordable housing options – whether beachfront properties or homes nestled in our charming neighborhoods – alongside a high quality of life is a testament to our commitment to sustainable growth,” he said. “Gulfport stands out for its natural beauty and affordability and thrives as a dynamic community enriched by a deep cultural heritage, historical significance and a pervasive spirit of unity.”

Read more at: https://www.sunherald.com/news/business/article275269466.html#storylink=cpy

It use to be a sleepy city on the Gulf of Mexico….but since casinos have moved into the area and we have become a mini Vegas it has become more popular….but it is good to see it get a bit of recognition.

Time for me to go out and tend to the garden….enjoy your Saturday and Be well and safe….

I Read, I Write, You Know

“lego ergo scribo”