| 48 Days left until the November midterm elections
Early voting begins this week and next in some states |
Today’s comic by Jen Sorensen is Kavanaugh's oath:
• As predicted, EPA’s replacement for Scott Pruitt proves to be another fossil-fuel puppet: Delaware and Maryland have for years asked the Environmental Protection Agency use the Clean Air Act to deal with smog pollution caused by coal-fired power plants in other states. In an 111-page notice, Acting EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler, who used to be a coal industry lobbyist, rejected their plea Friday. He said there isn’t enough evidence to prove that upwind sources are a significant cause of the two states’ problems smog from nitrogen oxide releases.
• Floating islands of fire ants form post-Florence hazard:
The problem with rafts of fire ants became apparent after Hurricane Katrina when many evacuees who had waded through floodwater showed up at field hospitals with bands of unexplained rashes around their legs and waists. It was determined that the evacuees had suffered fire ant stings.
Experts say a floating colony can contain as many as 100,000 ants. The bites are extremely painful and can cause a serious allergic reaction for some people.
• Texas board pulls Hillary Clinton, Barry Goldwater, and Helen Keller from third-grade curriculum: Billy Graham gets to stay. It’s a preliminary decision, based on the recommendations of working of volunteers. The board will take a final vote in November:
The 15-member work group came up with a rubric for grading every historical figure to rank who is “essential” to learn and who isn’t. The formula asked questions like, “Did the person trigger a watershed change”; “Was the person from an underrepresented group”; and “Will their impact stand the test of time?”
Out of 20 points, Keller scored a 7 and Clinton scored a 5. Eliminating Clinton from the requirements will save teachers 30 minutes of instructional time, the work group estimated, and eliminating Keller will save 40 minutes.[...]
By contrast, local members of the Texas Legislature (whom fourth-graders learn about) got a perfect score, as did Barbara Jordan, Sam Houston, Stephen F. Austin and Henry B. González. President Donald Trump isn’t included in the list by name, but students are required to learn about the current president, governor and mayor.
xI feel like this is a good time to mention that the president has at least 19 sexual assault allegations against him, there have been no hearings and GOP + much of the media has decided this is not worth discussing/investigating further bc he won election.
— Tim Miller (@Timodc) September 18, 2018• Stormy Daniels’ book compares Donald Trump’s penis to annoying character in Mario Kart.
• Billionaire Yusaku Maezawa will go to the Moon aboard SpaceX’s Big Falcon Rocket vehicle. The trip could happen as soon as 2023. He wants to take artists with him:
Maezawa, who is 42, reportedly has a current net worth of $2.9 billion, according to Forbes. He is also an avid art collector, and he spent $110.5 million on a 1982 painting by Jean-Michel Basquiat called Untitled last year. As an artist, he wants to invite other artists to come along with him on his ride. Maezawa says he has “bought all the seats” on the BFR and will be looking for others to join him on a week-long mission around the Moon.
“These artists will be asked to create something after they return to Earth, and these masterpieces will inspire the dreamer within all of us.” Maezawa says he hasn’t decided which artists he’d like to invite yet, but he would like them to represent many different fields, such as painters, musicians, film directors, and more.
• For most people “family farm” may conjure up images of, say, “Places in the Heart.” But while the operations like the one in that 1984 movie still exist, they are far from typical. Under the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s definition, small farms with limited acreage are included, but so are corporate entities using automated machinery to grow genetically engineered corn on farms of thousands of acres. The Iowa Center for Public Affairs Journalism scrutinized how the definition plays out in that state:
Under that definition, 79,550, or 89.7 percent, of Iowa’s farms can be considered family farms.
But lost in that, particularly when it comes to the research and policy, is that, according to an estimate done by IowaWatch, less than 7 percent — 5,636 operations — of Iowa’s farms are on small or medium acreages and run and owned by one family. The breakdown for states bordering Iowa is similar.
On today’s Kagro in the Morning show: The Kavanaugh nomination is sinking fast. What could and should happen next? Also, remember the Mueller investigation? It's still out there! Could Trump block release of Mueller’s report? Maybe. Are there ways around that? Yes. Is Wikipedia right? No.
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