Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Carole Cadwalladr: "Michael Moore: 'Trump inspires his side. It's like Munich in 1932'" (The Guardian)
The documentary maker reveals how illness, divorce and his father's death changed him and why Donald Trump really is a fascist.
Paul Krugman: A Pause That Distresses (NY Times Column)
After a disappointing jobs report: Don't panic, but do worry.
Christina Cauterucci: Brock Turner's Father Shows Us Why His Victim Had to Write Her Powerful Statement (Slate)
In the few days since ex-Stanford swimmer Brock Turner was given a six-month jail sentence for sexually assaulting an unconscious woman, much of the internet's chatter has converged on a heart-wrenching, beautifully argued, deeply felt statement
Watch: Is masturbation good for you? (Science Alert)
You know you want to.
Michele Hanson: Traffic lights in the ground? Come on, just look up from your smartphone(The Guardian)
New technology aims to stop pedestrians wandering blindly into the road while texting - but they should put down those gizmos and pick up the Highway Code.
Matthew Dessem: Taylor Swift Crashes a Wedding in New Jersey (Slate)
Taylor Swift seems to have started a new career as a wedding crasher, dropping by the Brant Beach Yacht Club over the weekend to surprise Max Singer and Kenya Smith. People broke the news Saturday when pictures of Swift with the newlyweds started showing up on social media, including Swift's Instagram feed: …
Andy Meek: "Walking Dead creator: 'Optimism doesn't always show in my work'" (The Guardian)
Robert Kirkman on the enduring attraction of zombies, why exorcism fascinates - and how he doesn't let social media chatter drive him crazy.
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wrote:
took the day off.
has returned to semi-retired status.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
David E Suggests
Video Surveillance
David
Thanks, Dave!
from Marc Perkel
Patriot Act
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
"I THINK IT'S INSANE!"
POOR HELPLESS WHITE GUY.
I WANT MY MAMA!
THE U.K. IS NOT A CHRISTIAN COUNTRY.
THE DRAFT DODGERS!
TRUMP IS NOT HITLER, YET!
IS THIS SHARIA LAW?
"SPINNING THE OLDIES"
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Bit o' June gloom.
No T-rump Ads
BuzzFeed
BuzzFeed has terminated an advertising deal with the Republican Party, saying presumptive presidential nominee Donald Trump (R-Mendacious Racist) is "hazardous to our health," the digital news group said Monday.
A memo from BuzzFeed chief executive Jonah Peretti reproduced on the news site said it had informed the Republican National Committee "that we would not accept Trump for President ads and that we would be terminating our agreement with them."
"The Trump campaign is directly opposed to the freedoms of our employees in the United States, and around the world, and in some cases, such as his proposed ban on international travel for Muslims, would make it impossible for our employees to do their jobs," Peretti said in the memo to staff.
"We certainly don't like to turn away revenue that funds all the important work we do across the company," Peretti said, adding that "in some cases, we must make business exceptions: we don't run cigarette ads because they are hazardous to our health, and we won't accept Trump ads for the exact same reason."
Although BuzzFeed did not estimate the amount of revenue lost, rival news organization Politico said the deal would be worth some $1.3 million.
BuzzFeed
Majority Favors Legal Use
Medical Pot
A large majority of American voters say doctor-prescribed medical marijuana use should be legal and U.S. veterans suffering from PTSD should be able to get prescriptions for it, a Quinnipiac University National poll showed on Monday.
About 89 percent supported legal use of medical marijuana among adults if prescribed by a doctor, Quinnipiac said. The support topped 81 percent among every party, gender, age or racial group.
About 87 percent support doctors prescribing marijuana in pill form for veterans suffering from PTSD, the poll found.
Eighty-two percent of those living in households with at least one veteran or member on active duty support marijuana for PTSD. Support was 79 percent or more among every group, Quinnipiac said.
Medical Pot
The Boy Next-Door
Playboy Mansion
Hugh Hefner's Playboy Mansion is about to acquire a new owner - the wealthy businessman who lives next door.
Representatives for Playboy Enterprises and Daren Metropoulos confirmed Monday that Metropoulos' bid to buy Hefner's man cave is in escrow.
Both sides declined to reveal the sale price until escrow closes, but a representative for Metropoulos said terms would allow Playboy Magazine's 90-year-old founder to remain in the mansion for the rest of his life.
Metropoulos bought his current home next door to the mansion from Hefner in 2009 for $18 million.
The 32-year-old executive is the former co-owner and co-CEO of Pabst Brewing Company and co-owner of Hostess Brands, maker of Twinkies and other popular snacks. With his father and brother, he's a principal in the family investment firm Metropoulos & Co.
Playboy Mansion
Stone Age Migrants Brought Agriculture To Europe
Aegean Sea
Stone Age people from the Aegean Sea region moved into central and southern Europe some 8,000 years ago and introduced agriculture to a continent still dominated at the time by hunter-gatherers, scientists say.
The findings are based on genetic samples from ancient farming communities in Germany, Hungary and Spain. By comparing these with ancient genomes found at sites in Greece and northwest Turkey, where agriculture was practiced centuries earlier, researchers were able to draw a genetic line linking the European and Aegean populations.
The study challenges the notion that farming simply spread from one population to another through cultural diffusion. The findings were published Monday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.
Joachim Burger, one of the study's authors, said genetic analyses of the samples showed that the ancient farmers in central Europe and Spain were more closely related to the Aegean group than to each other. This suggests that farmers came in two separate waves - northward into the continent and westward along the coastline to Spain.
Researchers were also able to deduce some characteristics of the ancient Aegean farmers based on their DNA, he said. They were relatively fair-skinned with dark eyes and didn't yet have the genes necessary to digest milk after childhood - a trait that only developed in Europe later.
Aegean Sea
Quid Pro Quo?
Florida
Florida's attorney general personally solicited a political contribution from Donald Trump (R-Grifter) around the same time her office deliberated joining an investigation of alleged fraud at Trump University and its affiliates
The new disclosure from Attorney General Pam Bondi's spokesman to The Associated Press on Monday provides additional details around the unusual circumstances of Trump's $25,000 donation to Bondi.
The money came from a Trump family foundation in apparent violation of rules surrounding political activities by charities. A political group backing Bondi's re-election, called And Justice for All, reported receiving the check Sept. 17, 2013 - four days after Bondi's office publicly announced she was considering joining a New York state probe of Trump University's activities.
After the check came in, Bondi's office nixed suing Trump, citing insufficient grounds to proceed.
The timing of the donation by Trump is notable because the now presumptive Republican presidential nominee has said he expects and receives favors from politicians to whom he gives money.
Florida
Family Fight
Viacom
The daughter of Sumner Redstone appeared to strengthen her control over media giant Viacom on Monday amid continued court skirmishes over the 93-year-old tycoon's mental competence.
Redstone's vehicle for his 80 percent control of Viacom, National Amusements Inc., announced that it was changing Viacom's bylaws to prevent the company from selling its valuable film unit Paramount Pictures without unanimous board support.
That gave Redstone's daughter Shari Redstone, who is vice chair of Viacom and has opposed other board members and Viacom's management on selling Paramount, the power to block the deal.
Through an official spokesman, Sumner Redstone has previously objected to the Paramount sale, which is aimed at strengthening Viacom's finances.
But Viacom's management led by chief executive Philippe Dauman and board member George Abrams have alleged in court that Shari Redstone effectively controls her ailing father and is using that control to grab power of his $40 billion media empire, which also includes CBS television.
Viacom
'Conflict Jewels'
Afghanistan
The illegal mining of some of Afghanistan's most important minerals is funneling millions of dollars into the hands of insurgents and corrupt warlords, according to activists and officials who say the money is fuelling the conflict.
The mountains of Afghanistan hold as much as $1 trillion to $3 trillion in mineral resources, according to estimates by the U.S. and Afghan governments, including world-famous lapis lazuli, a deep blue, semi-precious stone that has been mined in northern Afghanistan's Badakhshan province for thousands of years.
"In the current circumstances, where 50 percent of the mining revenue is going to the Taliban, and before that it was going to armed groups, by any reasonable definition lapis is a conflict mineral," said Stephen Carter, a researcher for Global Witness, a non-profit watchdog that investigates the links between natural resources, corruption and conflict.
Since 2014, at least 12,500 tonnes of lapis worth about $200 million have been extracted, much of it illegally or in a way that avoided nearly $30 million in government taxes, according to a report released on Monday by Global Witness.
Global Witness says not only are the Taliban continuing to profit from the illegal mining of lapis and other jewels in Badakhshan, but that senior players in the Afghan government may have direct involvement.
Afghanistan
Japanese Plutonium Arrives
South Carolina
A shipment of plutonium from Japan arrived Monday at a South Carolina nuclear site, despite objections from Gov. Nikki Haley to her state being used as storage for such materials.
In a news release, the National Nuclear Security Administration confirmed that 331 kilograms of plutonium had arrived at the Savannah River Site near Aiken. Federal officials also said that a shipment of highly enriched uranium has also been transferred to the Y-12 National Security Complex near Oak Ridge, Tennessee.
Savannah River Site Watch, a watchdog group that monitors activity related to the site, had estimated the plutonium would arrive in South Carolina last month. The shipment consists of plutonium supplied to Japan in the 1960s and 1970s for nuclear reactor research purposes.
Haley, whose office did not immediately respond to requests for comment Monday, has a long-running dispute with the federal government over the long-term storage of nuclear materials. Earlier this year, she demanded that U.S. Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz stop or reroute the shipment, writing, "It is imperative to the safety of our citizens and our environment that South Carolina not allow this to happen. ... God bless."
About a week after that letter, Haley claimed victory when Moniz told her that 6 metric tons of plutonium stored at the site would ultimately be permanently stored at a New Mexico facility that is slated to be up and running later this year. The shipment that arrived Monday is part of that amount.
South Carolina
Monte Carlo To Be Split In Two
Las Vegas
The enormous Monte Carlo Resort and Casino on the Las Vegas strip is being split into two distinct hotels that will feature an Eataly Market and a new restaurant by Michelin-starred chef Daniel Humm.
It's a $450 million rebrand that will see the Monte Carlo Resort -- one of the most iconic hotels on The Strip -- re-baptized as the Park MGM and the NoMad Las Vegas, the latter modeled after the NoMad in New York.
The announcement comes as the property fetes its 20th anniversary this month.
The Park MGM is designed to attract "a younger, well-traveled demographic," with an emphasis on social interaction, connectivity and culture.
The NoMad Las Vegas, on the other hand, is being developed to attract the high rollers in Sin City and will be significantly smaller than its counterpart, at 292 guestrooms and suites.
Las Vegas
In Memory
Helen Chavez
Helen Chavez, widow of civil rights and farm labor leader Cesar Chavez, died Monday at age 88.
Chavez died at a hospital in Bakersfield, California, surrounded by many of her children, grandchildren and great grandchildren, according to a family statement released through the United Farm Workers, the union her husband founded. No cause of death was given.
Born in the town of Brawley in the California desert near the Mexico border, she met Cesar Chavez in the mid-1940s and married him in 1948, after he left the Navy.
In the early 1960s, the couple left a comfortable middle-class existence in East Los Angeles to organize farm workers in California's Central Valley. There, Chavez, along with Dolores Huerta, founded the National Farm Workers Association, which later became the UFW. His work would make him a deeply revered figure for Mexican-Americans and activists.
Cesar Chavez died in Arizona in 1993.
The couple had eight children, and Helen Chavez had to care for them alone for long stretches while he was traveling, his speaking and organizing skills in great demand. They lived in Delano, California, where she often did farm field work herself while he was gone, sometimes with her children working alongside her.
Helen Chavez generally kept a low profile and did not speak often in public or in the media. But she made public appearances to honor her husband and his cause.
Last year she appeared at her husband's graveside and accepted a folded flag as he was bestowed with military honors he had not been given at the time of his death.
Helen Chavez
In Memory
Peter Shaffer
British playwright Peter Shaffer, whose durable, award-winning hits included "Equus" and "Amadeus," has died. He was 90.
Shaffer's agent, Rupert Lord, said the playwright died Monday while on a visit to southwestern Ireland with friends and family.
Born in Liverpool in 1926, Shaffer made his London and New York stage debut in 1958 with the simmering domestic drama "Five Finger Exercise," directed by John Gielgud. He had a huge hit in 1964 with "The Royal Hunt of the Sun," a spectacular imagining of the Spanish conquest of Peru that was staged by Britain's newly founded National Theatre.
Shaffer went on to write many of his plays for the National, from where they often moved on to commercial West End runs and Broadway.
For much of his long career Shaffer achieved the often-elusive goal of combining commercial and critical success, writing thoughtful, cleverly crafted plays that became box-office hits in London and New York.
His 1973 play "Equus," about a troubled stable boy who inexplicably blinds horses, won a Tony Award for best play and was filmed in 1977 by director Sidney Lumet with Peter Firth as the boy and Richard Burton as a psychiatrist who tries to help him.
It was revived in 2007 as the stage debut of "Harry Potter" star Daniel Radcliffe.
Shaffer's 1979 play "Amadeus," about the rivalry between Mozart and less-talented composer Salieri, won five Tonys in its Broadway run - which starred Ian McKellen as Salieri - and was turned into a 1984 film by Milos Forman that won eight Academy Awards, including best picture.
Shaffer returned to comedy with "Lettice and Lovage," which premiered in London in 1987 with Maggie Smith as an imaginative stately home tour guide. It, too, went to Broadway, winning Smith a best-actress Tony.
Shaffer was knighted by Queen Elizabeth II in 2001 and inducted into the American Theater Hall of Fame in 2007.
Lord said Shaffer was "one of the true greats of British theatre as well as a wonderful friend, wickedly funny man and sparkling raconteur whose lifelong passion for his own art was matched by his love for music, painting and architecture."
Shaffer is survived by his brother Brian, nephews Milo and Mark and nieces Cressida and Claudia. His twin brother Anthony Shaffer, a playwright who wrote the 1970s hit thriller "Sleuth," died in 2001.
Peter Shaffer
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