Sampler Platter 07.16.09

this was interesting (4.00 / 2)

Sweden is introducing climate labels for food.

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by: desmoinesdem @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 01:24:23 AM UTC

What a fine day (4.00 / 1)

Not the Bull but the Edict of 1054. On this day, after negotiations broke down between Humbert of Mourmoutiers and with Constantinople on differences between the Christian East and Rome, Old Humbert got a little carried away.

"So finally with his patience exhausted, Humbert and his colleagues strode into the Church of Santa Sophia on Saturday, July 16, 1054, right before the chanting of the afternoon liturgy and laid on the altar a bull excommunicating Cerularius, Emperor Michael Constantine, and all their followers, and then departed, ceremonially shaking the dust off their feet."

Thus began the 'Great Schism' between the Western and Eastern churches. It only took 911 years until Pope Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras buried the hatchet but things will never be the same.

It may not be as bad as it sounds. On this day in BrainyHistory there is an entry for July 16, 1099 "Crusaders herd Jews of Jerusalem into a synagogue and set it afire." But according to Wikipedia's History of the Jews and the Crusades during the Massacre of Jerusalem the synagogue may have been empty when the Crusaders torched it for shits and giggles.

From The List of The Banned, on July 16, 1439, kissing is banned in England. They did have a better reason than the usual crap.

The Connecticut Compromise was forged on July 16, 1787. Presented by Roger Sherman and Oliver Ellsworth of the Connecticut delegation, a dual system of congressional representation was a victory for the smaller states. There would be an "Upper House" with two representatives from each state chosen by state legislators. The "Lower House" members would serve two year terms and be elected by the people based on population. A census would be taken every ten years and although women would not be allowed to vote they would be counted. African Americans didn't do as well. They could not vote and each would be counted as three fifths of a person.

When George Washington signed the Residence Act of July 16, 1790 an area called the District of Columbia on the banks of the Potomac River was turned into a swamp.

On Dec. 1, 1800, the capital was moved to the newly named city of Washington. The 1800 census counted 14,103 residents of the U.S. capital, composed of 10,066 whites, 793 free black people and 3,244 slaves.

On this day in 1911 Ginger Rogers "who did everything Fred Astaire did, except backwards and in high heels" was born.

The blond, blue-eyed actress, who came out of Charleston contests and the vaudeville circuits to win notice as a cherub-faced flapper with a piping voice and a sassy air in early musicals like "42d Street" and "Gold Diggers of 1933," went on to win acclaim for her dramatic portrayals and an Academy Award for best actress for her depiction of a lovelorn career woman in the 1940 film "Kitty Foyle."

On July 16, 1918, Russia's Czar Nicholas II, his wife, their five children, their doctor, cook, valet, maid and even the family dog were executed by the Bolsheviks. The youngest human to die was the thirteen year old son of Nicholas and Alexandra, Alexei Nikolaevich.

On July 16,1927 "a respected spokesman for right-wing extremism and religious prejudice" and the only American mentioned by his admirer Adolph Hitler in Mein Kampf, that respected captain of industry, Henry Ford, settles a $1 million libel suit brought by labor organizer Aaron Sapiro. Ford's newsweekly, The Dearborn Independent, had accused Sapiro of being part of a conspiracy of "Jewish bankers" to seize control of national wheat production and hand it over to the Communists.

On this day in 1945 British Prime Minister Winston Churchill, US President Harry S Truman and leader of the Soviet Union Josef Stalin gather at Potsdam to discuss the rebuilding of Europe.

Truman must have hustled home because on that same day in 1945 "Fat Boy" went off at Alamogordo Air Base. All life within a mile radius was killed or obliterated as the fireball rose 8,000 feet in a fraction of a second and mushroom-shaped cloud made 41,000 feet above the New Mexico desert. Three weeks later the atomic bomb was used for its intended purpose, twice!

Did you know that ZIP stands for Zone Improvement Plan? There are 43,000 5-digit zip codes. On this day in 1963 the U.S. Postal Service began using ZIP codes.

One Great day in 1967! Surprisingly far from Thanksgiving, the son of Woody "This Land Is Your Land" Guthrie, twenty year old Arlo, attended the Newport Folk Festival and found himself promoted to the closing-night concert on the main stage, performing "Alice's Restaurant Massacree" to 20,000 folk fans on July 16, 1967.

They got a building down New York City, it's called Whitehall Street,
where you walk in, you get injected, inspected, detected, infected,
neglected and selected.  I went down to get my physical examination one
day, and I walked in, I sat down, got good and drunk the night before, so
I looked and felt my best when I went in that morning.  `Cause I wanted to
look like the all-American kid from New York City, man I wanted, I wanted
to feel like the all-, I wanted to be the all American kid from New York,
and I walked in, sat down, I was hung down, brung down, hung up, and all
kinds o' mean nasty ugly things. And I waked in and sat down and they gave
me a piece of paper, said, "Kid, see the phsychiatrist, room 604."

And I went up there, I said, "Shrink, I want to kill.  I mean, I wanna, I
wanna kill.  Kill.  I wanna, I wanna see, I wanna see blood and gore and
guts and veins in my teeth.  Eat dead burnt bodies. I mean kill, Kill,
KILL, KILL."  And I started jumpin up and down yelling, "KILL, KILL," and
he started jumpin up and down with me and we was both jumping up and down
yelling, "KILL, KILL."  And the sargent came over, pinned a medal on me,
sent me down the hall, said, "You're our boy.

For many the song and famous lyrics have become a Thanksgiving tradition.

In 1969, We have Ignition. An estimated one million live viewers and almost everyone with a television watched as Apollo 11 took off for the first manned exploration of the moon.
Watch it again here!

July 16,1973 was a dark day in music. At the age of 38, folk-rock balladeer 38 year old Harry Chapin died in a car crash in New York. Besides being an organizer for efforts to provide food to the needy, a champion for the hungry and homeless, Chapin's was some of the finest ballads of his day. Taxi, W-O-L-D and Cat's in the Cradle.

July 16,1973 was a good day for truth. While the Senate Armed Services Committee began probes into allegations that the US Air Force had made 3,500 secret B-52 raids into Cambodia in 1969 & 1970, at the Senate Watergate hearings, former White House aide Alexander P. Butterfield publicly revealed the existence of President Richard Nixon's secret taping system. Tricky Dicky must have been buggin' out.  

July 16,1980 was a very bad day for truth. Ronald Reagan won the Republican presidential nomination at the party's convention in Detroit.

Ten years ago: Such a sad day. John F. Kennedy, Jr., his wife Carolyn, and sister-in-law Lauren die in a plane crash in the Atlantic Ocean off the coast of Martha's Vineyard. The Piper Saratoga aircraft was piloted by Kennedy.

Five years ago: What does all the other rich have that Martha Stewart didn't? On this day she was sentenced to five months in prison and five months of home confinement by a federal judge in New York for lying about a stock sale.

"Yes! We finally captured Martha Stewart. You know, with all the massive and almost completely unpunished fraud perpetrated on the public by companies like Enron, Global Crossing, and Tyco we finally got the ring leader. Maybe now we can lower the nation's terror alert to periwinkle."-Jon Stewart

One year ago:Bush Invokes Exec Privilege to Block CIA Leak Testimony. And the Hits just keep on coming.

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by: Eddie C @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 01:56:29 AM UTC

Zip Codes & Woody Guthrie... (4.00 / 1)

Did you know that ZIP stands for Zone Improvement Plan

Man, we're finding all the same stuff lately!  I just came across an article on that like 3 days ago... and no, I did not know what "ZIP" stood for, and for that matter I also realized I never even thouhgt about that before!  Interesting...

Re: Woody Guthrie - he spent 5 years at Greystone towards the end of his life, and I worked on environmental cleanup there on the grounds of the hospital back in the early 2000's prior to demolition of the main buildings.  I probably ate my lunch one of those days under one of the very same trees that he used to hang out under...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 02:09:21 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Yea but... (4.00 / 1)

Does a young guy like you know Alice's Restaurant Massacree?

And do you need to hear it on Thanksgiving?

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by: Eddie C @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 02:20:48 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Nah... (4.00 / 1)

Had to look it up, I was minus-10 in 1969.

:)

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 02:31:12 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Try giving it a listen (4.00 / 1)

As songs go, it is a bit long but it is history, comedy and just about everything else. Click Here. I promise you will be glad you did.  

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by: Eddie C @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 02:37:52 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

here in Philadelphia (4.00 / 2)

its played on WXPN Thanksgiving day at noon. We always listen to it while we prepare food including
http://www.freshtofu.com/produ...

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by: LeeN @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 11:54:46 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

Late Afternoon (4.00 / 1)

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by: Eddie C @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 02:01:18 AM UTC

The Tug and Barge competition (4.00 / 1)

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by: Eddie C @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 02:05:32 AM UTC

Sundown (4.00 / 1)

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by: Eddie C @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 02:08:43 AM UTC

I always (4.00 / 2)

love seeing the pics you post. Thanks for those!

Regarding locavores as elitists - explain to me how supporting local business is elitist....

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by: Joanne Rigutto @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 06:14:35 AM UTC

[ Parent ]

I saw the blob story on Rachel Maddow the other night (4.00 / 1)

Scary stuff! They found just the bones and feathers of some kind of goose tangled up in it, which suggests that it might be able to actually digest stuff.

When my other half and I were listening to the RM show, he said, "Uh oh! What's Monsanto done now?" :)

I wish I knew half what the flock of them know
Of where all the berries and other things grow,
Cranberries in bogs and raspberries on top
Of the boulder-strewn mountain, and when they will crop.
--"Blueberries" by Robert Frost

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by: wide eyed lib @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 13:42:05 PM UTC

Wow, really? (0.00 / 0)

I didn't even hear that!

Damn...

Some of the comments in that piece were funny, btw - "is it Rush Limbaugh?"

Lol...

"The essence of the independent mind lies not in what it thinks, but in how it thinks." - Christopher Hitchens

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by: JayinPortland @ Fri Jul 17, 2009 at 14:28:49 PM UTC

[ Parent ]