text:
Obama to Open for SXSW, Carson Kinda Dropping Out, Bob Dylan Archives Head to Tulsa: P.M. Links
Ed Krayewski | 3.2.2016 4:30 PM
President Obama will be giving a keynote speech at the opening of SXSW.
Ben Carson admits his campaign has no "political path forward" and won't attend tomorrow night's presidential debate.
Police in Connecticut want to be able to use armed drones.
Russia and Syria are deliberately targeting civilians to encourage mass migration to Europe, a NATO commander told a Senate committee hearing today.
Gen. John Nicholson will be the new commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan.
The United Nations imposed new sanctions on North Korea.
Bob Dylan's archives will be housed in Tulsa.
NEXT: How to Beat the DMV Bureaucracy
March.2.2016 at 4:30 pm
He was at the others?
Rufus The Monocled Derp Slayer
Is it the A.M. links already?!
Hyperbolical
You slept through the PM links, Rufus?
Sleeping Beauty Canadian style.
Ted S.
Interesting football results.
Los Doyers
Gorgeous free kick just now by Juan Mata.
Jerry on the rocks
10pts 10games. Should be doable.
Oh definitely. I might actually wake up for the game against Man $hitty.
Certified Public Asshat
Fucking Spurs.
*pretends to angrily throw something*
Brett L
Arsenal trying to aggressively lock up fourth place.
Rhywun
The Liverpool result is the opposite of what I expected.
Controllers to be installed at the Dunkin' Donuts.
Better invest in that anti-drone drone company. I forsee a market trend...
foresee, dammit!
My money is on counter anti-drone drone technology.
Anyway, it's just the same concept but in a different state.
I think I saw this show already. (It's not working out well for the civilians.)
Domestic Dissident
Sounds a little kinky. Is that link safe for work?
Keynote address at goatse?
He is so cool. *sigh*
I hope he crowd surfs! Would be totes awesome.
Shirley Knott
I don't know. It's pretty clear he's already been dropped on his head at least once.
Trouser-Pod (The blowhard)
Onto his own head?
"Ben Carson admits his campaign has no "political path forward"
Maybe he needs to leap?
SilentCal
That was great.
And then on to Trumpalooza. Trumpith Fair. Trumping Man.
Lady Bertrum
I hear they're making a movie called Triump of the Trump.
cavalier973
Drumpfkoff
Trumpie's Choice
"You're fired, Eva!"
Enough About Pailn
It's hard to stop giggling.
Trump Hard 2: Trump Harder
Trump with the Wind?
Lady and the Trump
Jerryskids
Silence of the Trumps
"I ate his liver with some fava beans and a nice chianti. A great chianti. A very classy chianti, nothing like it in the world, just the best, the absolute finest, let me tell you."
"I think it's important not to limit law enforcement or public safety's ability to protect the public," Berlin Police Chief Paul Fitzgerald testified. . .
Funny, a lot of people think that it *is* important to limit law enforcement or public safety.
HeteroPatriarch
Funny that the police chief of a town called Berlin said this...
Berlin? Wasn't it renamed Kitchener long ago?
Just say Nikki
Not the one in CT (which has the stress on the first syllable).
MSimon
BE rlin?
Not a Pennsylvania potato chip consumer, I would guess.
http://www.snyderofberlin.com/index.html
The chief of Berlin? Yeah, I have No More Words.
"public safety's ability to protect the public"
What does that even mean?
F**k you that's why.
Always and forever.
Public safety is what they do to you.
Our ability to spy on you and kill you via remote controlled machinery.
Atanarjuat
Officers have to go home safely, after all.
Prediction: damaging a drone results in a 'assault on a LEO' charge.
[Obama's] topic will be "civic engagement in the 21st Century before an audience of creators, early adopters and entrepreneurs who are defining the future of our connected lives."
Uhh ....
Derp-o-Matic 5000
It'll be a lecture about how we need to all vote Democrat because "some people" (i.e., TEATHUGLIKKANZ) believe various strawman arguments or something.
Pan Zagloba
Well we had our laughs with PM Zoolander, but now the joke is done and the fucking begins.
Justin Trudeau started his day touting Canada's plans to lower greenhouse gas emissions at a clean technology conference in B.C.
Trudeau announced more than $125 million for two new clean tech funds in an effort to spur faster industry growth.
The Federation of Canadian Municipalities is getting $75 million from Infrastructure Canada for climate change initiatives in communities, he announced during his speech.
The federal government is also spending more than $50 million "to improve climate resilience in design guides, and building and infrastructure codes."
Note that this is announcement before he meets with provincial premiers, where the objective is to get the rest of the country to do stupid green shit, and of course give Quebec money.
To be fair, $125 million in Canadian money is like 50 bucks now.
Juvenile Bluster
If they give Quebec more money, will the half the population of Quebec that moves down here for the winter go back? If so, I'm all for it.
Once settled they don't move.
Yeah, he was in a downtown building where my wife works. When one of her co-workers told her Trudeau was around, she replied "Not close enough for me to spit."
I think the co-worker was genuinely shocked. Trudeau's handlers managed to sell The Hair That Walks Like A Man so hard in B.C. based on the fact that his last real job was here, as a Snowboard Instructor.
I shit you not.
As for giving Quebec more money, when has a Federal Liberal government in Canada ever had a different objective?
And a drama school teacher.
Plus he likes dictators because they get shit done.
Yeah, he's definitely gonna get a LOT of "shit" done to Canada...
Good grief, I'm not the only H&Rer; from Vancouver?! Libertarian Moment is real!
There's quite a few "libertarian-lites" out here in the Boonies (*cough*Pitt Meadows*cough*). In fact, the further east you go from that wretched hive of scum and villainy known as the municipality of Vancouver, the more likely you'll find people who, should a bright flash and a mushroom cloud appear in the far west, would walk outside with a cold one and hold it up in salute.
Russia and Syria are deliberately targeting civilians to encourage mass migration to Europe...
You know who else fired at their own people when they resisted marching toward Europe?
... Russia?
Walmart?
Hannibal?
Damn you!
Xerxes?
Trshmnstr, terror of the trash
Dammit, Is it Hannibal or not?
DenverJ
Suleiman the Great?
I mean Hannibal?
Damn. Those are some boring links. Working part-time now, Ed?
It's a poor craftsman that blames his tools.
craftsman ?
You've othered me twice with this word. The correct usage is 'craftsze'. And, I don't need to submit to the patriarchy's concept of craft. You fucking shitlord.
A Cynic's Guide to Zen
Preach, zurlfriend. Zhe just didnt zake zhur conziderazions into account. It's zhicks like this that give zhudes a zad zame.
Zhat zre zou zoing zut zf zhe zitchen, zitch?
No, no, no! That's too much SS agent and not enough.... well, on second thought, I guess you're right.
True. I'm a poor craftsman and I blame all of you.
Seriously weak. I had assumed they were Rico's until I saw your comment.
jesse.in.mb
Pft. These were on time. Couldn't be Soave's.
Someone's going to be acting out again.
New sanctions? I assumed they were the used sanctions we took off of Iran. Nobody wants to wear hand-me-down sanctions, but if they're new I can't see where the Norks can complain. Wrong size, wrong color, they don't like the stripes because it makes them look fat? What've they got to complain about?
Abe Lincoln didn't have to go through this many generals.
Abe Lincoln's war didn't last a generation (and counting).
I miss the days when there were still some generals who were like "Here's my strategy: we're going to keep killing the SOBs until they surrender."
Uh - that's been the strategy of *all* the generals so far. And of all the politicians sending those generals out.
Strangely enough that policy has not been effective. It might be that the people running the war on our side don't actually understand the type of opponent they're facing - its not a nation-state with a nation-state's goals.
Basically we're the Republic from 'Singularity Sky' facing an out-of-context problem.
No the strategy is to kill only the ones currently shooting at us. The rest we treat like special flowers until they decide to start shooting.
Ah - one of those 'pro-genocide' types.
You should be pleased to know that the Russians are killing indiscriminately then.
http://foxtrotalpha.jalopnik.c.....1759289467
Gray Ghost
But with more women's rights, SHARP training, and fewer ship-eating antibodies.
(What an interesting universe and characters. I don't care that he painted himself into a corner with the Re-Mastered, I'd still like another story with Rachel and Martin.)
What badly needs to happen with whoever takes the Presidency---Trump, Clinton, Cruz, or a candidate to be named later---is an overarching discussion to figure out just what the U.S.'s strategy is, what we want to have happen, what we don't want to have happen, and how much we want to spend to achieve the first three. From what I can see, none of the above has happened for a long time: we just keep lurching from grease fire to dumpster fire, often making things worse.
For Afghanistan, what do we want? Is it to eradicate Al Qaeda? Is it to kill off all Taliban or people who sympathize with them? And how much do we want to spend in blood and treasure?
It'll never happen. For the simple reason that if you nail down policy objectives then someone can point out when and where you're failing to achieve them.
If you never have a concrete policy, you can never fail - you just haven't succeeded yet - and anything useful that happens (even if just by happenstance) you can claim credit for.
"Heeeeeere's Johnny!"
I've been watching the old Tonight Show every night and man, is it fascinating. Jackie Gleason chain-smoking during the entire interview, Wm. F. Buckley, Jr. discussing the final days of the Carter administration and the upcoming Reagan admin. And a couple of nights ago, a 1973 episode where Joe Namath Says that George Wallace is a tremendous man. It's like bizarro world.
My favorite episode of Carson is when he is interviewing Eva Gabor. She has a cat on her lap and asked Johnny if he would like to pet her pussy.
He replied that if she would move the cat he would.
Pretty racy stuff for its' day.
Another episode had the Rat Pack on all at the same time. They were drinking for real and one of them was smoking. The smoker kept dumping his ashes in the others drink everytime the drinker turned his head to face Johnny. The audience burst out laughing every time and it went on for a while without the drinker catching on. It did not look planned. I think the drinker was Dean Martin but it was a long time ago.
Definitely worth a youtube search if you want a laugh.
Didn't see this but my uncle told me there was lawsuit over this (not verbatim).
Johnny: Do you do anything for good luck before a match?
Mrs Arnold Palmer: I kiss his balls.
Johnny: I bet that makes his putter stiff.
Greg Loves His Woodchipper
Oliver Reed and Shelley Winters is another classic Carson moment.
This Machine
If the president is speaking at your art & music festival, congratulations, you're The Man.
"President Obama will be giving a keynote speech at the opening of SXSW."
Dude is so freakin' cool. What band was he in again?
"The World's President." They started out great, but fizzled out pretty quickly.
Krabappel
I liked his old stuff better, before he sold out.
The Presidents of the United States of America?
highly underrated band btw
MJGreen - Docile Citizen
SXSW has speeches?
Diane Reynolds (Paul.)
Yep, Lena Dunham has done some.
Because God forbid anything that is fun not turn into a fucking tiresome SJW fest. UGH!!
Nothing is more fun than hanging around with a few thousand cops.
Weird. I understand having panels, but a "keynote speech" sounds weird in the midst of a music and film festival.
Well, whatever. It's good for some Twitter jokes. "Aging rock stars desperately clinging to their cool factor."
To be fair to Mx Dunham, she got her start at SXSW with an indy low budget film. So having a keynote speech from a notable 'SXSW artiste' doesn't seem that unusual.
However - the President of the United States? That's . . . Vice President work at best.
SFC B
March.3.2016 at 9:28 am
Nah. the VP is for sending to funerals for members of the supreme court.
Technically, Lena Dunham doesn't speak. She queefs through her mouth.
I suddenly feel flush.
Fucking savage, Lady B.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ymghlVKMwZ0#t=19s
+1 stick of Doublemint
No snark: is there still a parallel event called FuckByFuckWest there? It used to have punk and underground bands.
They're a new sensation.
http://variety.com/2014/biz/ne.....201128689/
Medical Physics Guy
Snowden did one.
Well, if they'd done better in high school ....
Oh, you.
*** blushes ***
coloraDOOM
Burn.
Sevo
Sorta like a Madonna concert; how much to miss it?
So last night in history book discussion, I mentioned the German plan to infect civilians with typhoid so that they'll spread it to Red Army, and Sevo was asking for details.
According to the book in question (Total War by Michael K Jones), staff of German Ninth Army prepared a plan to herd civilians into huge, open-air enclosures as an "anti-partisan action." There's some usual German stuff like shooting anyone who falls behind (according to a witness, shooting a child who stumbled, then shooting her brothers who stopped to glare and then finally finishing off their screaming mother), and then the claim is made that typhoid patients were brought in to spread the infection, so that liberating Red Army troops would catch it. He states that on March 20, commander of German Army Group Center was given a report, operation was deemed a success and other camps were established.
Result was that Soviet 56th army had to quarantine its XIX Rifle Corps, but were able to bring in supplies of recently (December 1943) developed vaccine, inoculate the troops, then move the sick into hospitals where the disease was contained.
There it is...
Hitler had poison gas ammo, but decided not to use it (or didn't decide *to* use it), but that's the first I heard of Nazi biological war.
BTW, "Absolute War", Bellamy ( http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb.....wa,aps,209 )
isn't apologetic about either side and makes no mention of that.
The head of the Blitzableiter Program.
Still the Germans had nothing on the Japanese, they did some crazy shit.
It wasn't technically biological war.
The civilians were sick. There was a general evacuation of civilians into enclosures to prevent partisan activity. Now, if some sick civilians got into enclosure, well...
It's not like German troops spread the disease. They just...you know...concentrated people in one place.
Just like, they didn't deliberately murder about 2 million PoWs in first eight months of the war. Just, you put the PoWs into camps, there's not enough food to go around, you shoot any civilian who tries to bring them food, and... after thaw, you have a lot fewer of them around.
The crazy fringe stuff that was tried in WWII would probably make most people go pale.
KeithC
History book discussion? Damn, wish I'd seen that. Was it in last night's PM links?
I think someone here recommended Richard Pipes' "The Russian Revolution", which I finally got through (I'm a bit of a slow reader, unfortunately) after about 10 months. Very good, quite detailed. I think the thing I'll remember most is his description of the Kornilov affair as well as the chapter on the murder of the Romanovs.
It was in the Trump Super Tuesday mega-thread and was probably about 15% of the whole thing. Which made me smile.
Mazakon
Animated Genitals Teach Consent in New Ad in Canada
Honestly, it's probably the weirdest ad I've ever seen.
The most confusing, too -- that breast said "Yeah".
I was hoping for animated gentiles.
Just tell a Trump supporter that the Protocols of the Elders of Zion is fake history.
Did I miss Trump's anti-semitism?
Trump supporter
I've seen weird animation.
Which one is Trudeau?
We are all Trudeau now.
He said so.
My move is to strut around a woman while whistling and then rubbing myself against her bottom, so that video really hit home.
Ah, yes...the good ol' "Crusty Strut". I would imagine it's put a lot of backs on mattresses, eh?
Shine on, you crazy diamond.
If these fingertips could talk.
Or, just whisper.
This reminds me of Johnny Dangerously and "Your Testicles and You".
The circle will be complete when Obama opens for Burning Man.
No way Obama is hanging out in the desert with a bunch of dirty hippies. Obama is five star or nothing.
Obligatory.
So it's undeniably amusing when ? as soon as the consequences of liberalism actually impact them ? they sound like a bunch of raging right wingers. Suddenly, low taxes are vital to the growth of their organization, and they're indignant when government overseers get pushy. Hey - maybe the federal government controlling so much of Nevada's land doesn't seem like such a great idea.
(If various Republican Party organizations were smart, they'd make a concerted effort to court these counter-culturists while they're still smarting from having been mugged by reality. Alas...)
I guarantee you those guys think the rangers who got into with the FBI last month are terrorists who should have been bombed. So, good luck.
Hey, Burning Man is a place of taxes, fees, a very large, armed police presence, tickets for hundreds of infractions, a tight regulatory environment and some occasional nudity.
So, a place of peace and tolerance.
Somehow that doesn't surprise me. Nothing is ever as fun as it seems.
The people who pretend to be into TED talks and say shit like "I fucking love science" will be thrilled!
Free Market Socialist $park?
Neil Degrasse Tyson is a national treasure.
We should put him in the same warehouse where we store the Ark of the Covenant.
Can't you folks just open the Ark, let Tyson stare into it, and then let his head melt while he screams?
I want my Carl Sagan back!
I've enjoyed going and seeing great acts at small venues for almost 20 years off and on, probably conceived my eldest there, but the bullshit around it has been getting harder to avoid.
And so the penguin wipes his mouth and says "nah, that's just vanilla ice cream".
So then the duck says, " I don't know; maybe he was a lawyer, after all."
Given how hard Reason is going after Trump will they be painted into a corner whereby they start making libertarian cases for Hillary?
I visit Reason for the entertainment value. Same reason I support Trump.
Private Chipperbot
They've already done a bunch for Sanders, so I'll go with yes. Several.
crazyfingers
According to veteran shady political operative Roger Stone, the Koch's are making a last ditch attempt to bash Trump and prop up Rubio, and if that doesn't work (Rubio fails to win the Florida primary), they'll attempt to bring in Mitt Romney to save the day, which would be hilarious.
http://www.infowars.com/koch-f.....s-warning/
I like the Jimi Hendricks version. So does Bob. That is the one Bob plays at concerts I have attended since 1975.
John Nicholson is the Army shitbag that falsely accused Marines of slaughtering civilians. Fuck him.
http://dailycaller.com/2016/02.....r-general/
I thought that was John Winger?
Hillary to skeptical African-American voter: "Why don't you go run for something?"
Hmmm. Doesn't exactly sound like the kind of "love and kindness" she was talking about last night.
Tough love.
I still cannot believe anyone thinks she is going to win. She is just awful.
Once again John, it's nothing to do with her and everything to do with how we know Team Red is going to find a way to blow the most easily winnable election for them since 1984.
The only way they do that is if they fuck Trump and run Rubio or someone in a brokered convention. And that might happen. But I still doubt it.
Right, because there's no way Trump will say something stupid or let an accidental truth slip out and fuck up the election.
He has been quite adept at saying stupid things and letting "accidental truths" slip and getting away with it. In the former case he simply doubles down until everyone stops caring and in the latter he walks around claiming that he didn't say what you think he said.
He says something the media calls "stupid" every day and no one cares. That isn't going to change.
Every time Trump says something stupid, his percentage of the blue collar Democratic vote goes up around 1%.
Did she saw it in her down-home southern mammy accent?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaDQ1vIuvZI
"Why don't you go run for something?"
"Somali when you say that!"
I...uh...hmmm...
Hillary is lucky to escape that encounter unscathed. That voter might have been a super-predator.
"I think it's important not to limit law enforcement or public safety's ability to protect the public," Berlin Police Chief Paul Fitzgerald testified at Tuesday's hearing, according to the Hartford Courant. "You don't want to get into an arms race, I understand that, but we have to be prepared to handle unforeseen situations ? at a public event, a crime or a terrorist incident."
To quote sarcasmic, the Public is everyone but you. When the chief here talks about protecting the Public, he means everyone except you. Because there's an unlimited number of ways that the Public may be threatened, they need to have limitless means to address those threats! And if you get schwacked by a police drone during one of these "unforeseen situations," well, too bad, it was for the public good!
Because the Public is everyone but you.
GILMORE?
"BUT I DON WANNA GO TO SCHOOL!"
"A 16-year-old high school student from Nashville shot and injured his grandmother after she and his mother tried to get him out of bed to go to school
The teen's sister and nephew suffered graze wounds and were taken to the hospital along with the grandmother. "
How are there no common sense laws against this?
Really! I thought multi-generational households had gone the way of over-the-counter opium.
Irish ?s ESB
So you all know about my love - nay - vulgar lust for Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig. Unfortunately, I feel that our romance is beginning to wane, since for the last few months her articles have been so fucking boring.
What happened to the hilariously awful Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig who wrote several thousand words about Suey Park?
What about the Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig who basically blamed the UVA rape hoax on right wing tactics?
It's like she's phoning it in and no longer reaches the heights of insanity that drew me to her in the first place. It's a goddamn shame.
There's always Idris Elba.
Able, Sir Di...
Looks like it's time for a new obsession and a handle change, man. Maybe "Irish
Irish Breaks Up W/ ESB
I'm way ahead of you.
It's like you can see inside my mind.
bacon-magic
Nice, you could've played off the racist schtick that's been thrown at you lately and Reasonoids would have eaten it up.
She is a Catholic, so you knew it could never work since a man of my sensibilities could not stand engaging in relations with a goddamn Papist of all fucking people.
And that's unacceptable, because Irish can go down the road any time he wants and walk into Harry's and hold his head up high and say in a loud, steady voice, 'Harry, I want you to sell me a condom. In fact, today, I think I'll have a French Tickler, for I am a Protestant.'
Rubber are only for filthy sailors.
Does ESB know that you have broken up with her ?
If not , she should !
You know exactly what happened to her, Irish.
Also, my favorite paragraph Elizabeth Stoker Bruenig ever wrote:
"Tracing Park's life online, I occasionally got the feeling I was looking at a picture in a high school yearbook taken before its subject could pose. Growing up has never been easy. Nor has it ever been something that definitively stops. I am reminded of Yeats's meditation on aging, "Among School Children": "O chestnut-tree, great-rooted blossomer, / Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole? / O body swayed to music, O brightening glance, / How can we know the dancer from the dance?" A person's life is, of course, comprised of all its moments, and a person comprised of all his or her experiences taken together. But the Internet, with its instantaneous responses and global reach, tends to make the passage of phases harder than ever. Each of us, it increasingly seems, is one selfie-stick-snap or ill-considered tweet away from being permanently crystallized in a single moment of our immaturity, like insects preserved in amber."
^^ BEHOLD THE MOST PRETENTIOUS MILLENNIAL BULLSHIT EVER PUT ON THE INTERNET
*begins to quake with inchoate rage*
"Yo, I just wrote a bunch of platitudinous nonsense for pseudo-intellectual navel gazers. How do I go about making this even more irritating? Google 'William Butler Yeats' quotes and jam a random out of context line into the middle of the paragraph with the worst segue possible? Fuck yeah. That's how ESB rolls!"
Now, now. I pause and slowly contemplate your fleeting passion for Ms. Stoker Bruenig's prose like a Buddhist ruminating his mantra, and I'm reminded of Macbeth's observation that "Life is but a poor player who struts and frets his hour upon the state and then is heard no more". These passing childhood fancies are stolen moments preserved for the amusement forever in the neverworld of the H&R comment section.
A person's life is, of course, comprised of all its moments, and a person comprised of all his or her experiences taken together.
Lets count the ways that sentence is horrible Lady. It is a run on sentence. It makes a mundane and circular point.
She missed the unit in creative writing class covering Hemingway titled 'Just get to the point already, Bitch'.
That is pretty hard when you have no point. Not to be snarky, but I don't see where she is saying anything.
Her point is: The stupid shit you do maybe permanently exposed on the internet. But why use 10 word when 100 will do?
"Her point is: The stupid shit you do maybe permanently exposed on the internet. But why use 10 word when 100 will do?"
You didn't even quote Yeats, you fucking philistine.
She's hilarious because she's incredibly pretentious and is always trying to make sure you're aware of all the books she's read, but she doesn't appear to have learned anything about writing from any of those books.
This is a woman who once compared Dzhokhar Tsarnaev to Raskalnikov from Crime and Punishment.
It's especially funny because it completely ignores the impact of radical Islam on the Tsarnaev brothers. Her explanation is that they, like Raskalnikov, did this out of some weird existential angst, as if there is no actual philosophy currently in existence that justifies this.
So she is a super cute 20 something female version of Otto from a Fish Called Wanda.
You really should give her another chance. She's only one intense think piece away from some deep human insight.
You know who else is a terrible writer? Naomi Wolf. That didn't prevent her from becoming rich and famous.
My God Wolf is an idiot.
The EU is apparently calling for the building of a wall.
http://ace.mu.nu/archives/361872.php
I guess that article in the Post yesterday about there being all of these underground Trump supporters is really true.
But are they going to make ME and North African countries pay for it?
Only if they want Europe to be great again.
I am sure they would if those countries had any money, which they don't.
ant1sthenes
There are ways to make people pay. Personally, I think force marching 2 million desperate people into Saudi Arabia would produce entertaining results.
Obama will be giving a keynote speech at the opening of SXSW.
"I'm pleased to be the first president to appear at Sex-Sew."
Sex-Shew
I was only in there to get directions on how to get away from there!
As in "We've got a really great sex-shew tonight"?
Are you old or something? Me too!
Ed Sullivan - off the air since 1971
Me too. 🙁
WHERE MY SYRUP GONE?
"These groups say "maple" is understood to refer to "maple syrup," much as "mayo" is understood to refer to "mayonnaise." They pointed to an FDA warning letter last August to the maker of "Just Mayo," which unlike mayonnaise contained no eggs."
My ruling is = Eggs are part of a commonly understood consumer definition of Mayo. Maple Syrup is not part of the definition of Instant Oatmeal. Its just the name we give to a kind of sugar flavoring. Suck it, Canada.
What's Vermont, chopped liver?
They don't hold a candle to The Canadian Big Corporate-Maple-Syrup Conglomerates.
"Maple syrup" is syrup. "Maple" by itself is just a flavor, like "cinnamon."
Yum! Cinnamon syrup!
Is "cinnamon" a spice obtained from the inner bark of certain trees, or just a flavor?
""Maple syrup" is syrup"
Actually if you bothered to READ THE STORY (ugh!?) you'd know its not an argument about "maple syrup", but the use of the term "Maple" by Oatmeal companies to describe their sugar-sweetened instant products they've been selling for decades (*no word "Syrup" anywhere)
Which is rarely made from cinnamon.
"Maple syrup" is syrup. PEOPLE!!!!
Are they going to sue Maypo into changing its name? Or does the intentional misspelling absolve them of this fraud?
The theme of the speech will be, "Why Consumer Encryption Needs to Be Outlawed"
"Privacy Laws and the Evils They Cause"
" the new commander of U.S. and NATO troops in Afghanistan."
He plans to bring a new strategy to the war that's been over since 2014.
"I order you to be vigilant for insider attacks."
So an interesting bit of history came up on instapundit this afternoon. This is what Jonah Goldberg, the man who now says he can't vote for Trump because Trump is not a "conservative" was saying about Romney in 2012.
A President Romney would be on a very short leash. A President Gingrich would probably chew through his leash in the first ten minutes of his presidency and wander off into trouble. If elected, Romney must follow through for conservatives and honor his vows to repeal Obamacare, implement Representative Paul Ryan's agenda, and stay true to his pro-life commitments. Moreover, Romney is not a man of vision. He is a man of duty and purpose. He was told to "fix" health care in ways Massachusetts would like. He was told to fix the 2002 Olympics. He was told to create Bain Capital. He did it all. The man does his assignments. In this light, voting for Romney isn't a betrayal, it's a transaction. No, that's not very exciting or reassuring for those who'd sooner see monkeys fly out their nethers than compromise again. But such a bargain may just be necessary before judgment day comes.
Read more at: http://www.nationalreview.com/.....h-goldberg
Words really do fail.
the man who now says he can't vote for Trump because Trump is not a "conservative"
This isn't why I've read Goldberg has a problem with Trump.
That Trump U degree not working out for him?
Is it because Goldberg cannot buy a pair of pants?
I didn't know you were such a fan of conservative magazines.
And his objections boil down to the same thing "Trump is really a Democrat and not a conservative and he is mean and his supporters are icky". Maybe you find that case compelling and not utterly ridiculous in light of his support for Romney, but I don't.
No, they don't:
I'll be as honest as I can about why I dislike Trump. A big part of it is I think he's a fraud. I think he's part of the grand and glorious tradition of bunk artists in American history. I think he's always lied about how rich he is and is lying to this day. And bear in mind, I don't care how much money he has. The point is he cares. Specifically, he cares that other people think he's really rich. In fact, that's his business model. Most long cons require convincing marks that the conman doesn't actually need the mark's money. That's his schtick to a T.
But I can actually get past that. That con-man aspect of him is also kind of charming. It's not remotely presidential, but as an American character, I can see why some people are amused by Trump, and on occasion I am as well.
The thing I don't find amusing is that he's an insecure bully. He really does strike me as Biff from Back to the Future (Part II). His cheap macho posturing and boasting is simply tacky. I see him as a sad and insecure man. And what I truly find so depressing is that millions of Americans see the same blowhard overcompensation and mistake it for strength.
Paragraph number 1 is all about how Goldberd thinks Trump is lying and is a Democrat. Remember, this is the same guy who admitted that Romney had a "late in life conversion" to conservatism and that was totally okay.
The thing I don't find amusing is that he's an insecure bully.
Need I remind you that Goldberg supported John McCain in 2008. The John McCain who is the most notorious insecure bully in Washington and has been for years.
Unlike you, I have been reading Goldberg for years. And I actually like a lot of his stuff. Perhaps it is just my frail masculinity talking but your quote makes Goldberg look even more ridiculous.
Paragraph number 1 is all about how Goldberd thinks Trump is lying and is a Democrat.
Actually it's about how he's lying about how rich he is.
Which is a reflection on his character for truthfulness. And Goldberg goes on to say he doesn't mind that. Why he feels the need to tell us about it, remains a mystery.
Again, it is not about Trump. It is about Goldberg and NRO's willingness to support anyone the party through up for years now claiming they can't support Trump because of their principles. What principles?
Romney was and is more conservative than Trump. I see no problem if NR pundits could support the former but not the latter. Tell us on which issue Romney was less conservative than Trump.
I am pretty sure signing the state version of Obamacare and being proud of it wasn't exactly conservative. Romney was about as conservative as Chris Christie. I voted for the guy and he was better than Obama. He was by no reasonable definition a conservative.
And even if you think he was, explain how John Mccain, the guy who wanted to repeal the 1st Amendment was "conservative". NRO loved him too.
These people are clowns.
Yes, it was certainly not "conservative" to push for Romneycare, but Trump wants universal health care, whatever that means. I doubt that it's any better. I agree with you on McCain though.
I've been saying for years (4 or 5 now) that the Republicans were insane to nominate Romney. Remember how pissed off the country was about Obamacare? So they nominate the guy who signed the blueprint into law at the state level, thus taking the issue off the table.
They don't call the Republicans the Stupid Party for nothing.
US DoT Bans Vaping on Planes
Classic rationale! =
""The department said the airline industry should not be able "to adopt its own standards with respect to the inclusion of electronic cigarettes within the prohibition on smoking."
The regulation said: "We recognize that the industry has generally banned the use of electronic cigarettes on flights," but added that "we believe that without a clear, uniform regulation, some carriers may feel free to adopt policies that allow the use of e cigarettes onboard aircraft.""
Can't have people thinking they're "free" to make their own decisions now.
"Feel" free? It's always teh feeelz! with you regulator assholes...
After suspected drug overdose deaths, Fairplex has no plans to host raves in 2016
Glowstick-loving Reason commenters hardest hit.
Glowsticks are gay
http://www.washingtontimes.com.....ers-suppo/
The Bernie supporters are revolting. If the GOP fucks Trump, they should form a Trump Sanders unity 3rd party ticket. It would totally win. Yeah, it would be insane but the tears and butt hurt it would cause would be wonderful.
That is a *great* idea, John.
It's not just great, it's ... it's ...
Christ. It's genius!
My prediction is that the Bernie supporters will mostly vote for the Hillbot. IT will be as empty as Hillary's PUMA movement in 2008.
Tornado16nb
Exactly. They will pull the lever for the d. His supporters are just having an emotional reaction
Look, even if you think 90% of the below people are completely full of shit?
Its noteworthy that they at least pretend to reject their party's candidate.
That distaste aint going away, and it will hurt D turnout in the general election.
"If Sen. Bernard Sanders of Vermont loses the Democratic presidential nomination, a group of his supporters will either write in his name in the general election or consider casting their ballot for a Republican.
The one thing they certainly won't do: Vote for Hillary Clinton.
More than 50,000 people already have signed up at the Revolt Against Plutocracy, pledging to vote for the Green Party candidate in the general election or write in Mr. Sanders' name if Mrs. Clinton wins the Democratic nomination. Other groups, such as Grassroots Action for Bernie, are taking to social media, using Facebook and Twitter to try to get the "Bernieorbust" hashtag trending.
Er, I said this a couple of weeks back!
WHERE'S MY BUM TAP!?
That was a *great* idea, Rufus.
San Francisco deputies charged with running prison 'fight club'
The gladiator-style fights allegedly took place in the downtown jail of the city's Hall of Justice court while deputies watched.
Other alleged abuses were mentioned, including forcing inmates to exercise, gamble for food, and clean clothing and bedding.
I am not sure why "forcing them to exercise" was included.
"I am not sure why "forcing them to exercise" was included."
There is a rule at some prisons that inmates have to be out of their cells for at least an hour or so per day - as in, they are not permitted to just sit in their bed all day long. That period of mandatory cell-exiting may be called "exercise" in some written policy, even if they were not actually forced to do any exercise.
Before we get all upset that Obama is going to be a sxsw, didn't rand Paul have a speech there?
NYT: University of Albany: Apparently, the three black women who accused white men of attacking them in a bus are actually the perpetrators. Very amusing justifications by "scholars".
Behind the rush to declare the matter a hoax, they say, is an ingrained prejudice against taking the concerns of minority women seriously."
Hilarious. People rushed to believe the three, the entire damn campus was changed ("A sign on the University at Albany campus that reads, "I pledge to value diversity and be more inclusive at UAlbany."" In the middle of the article. I find that very funny.), Clinton commented, and, with great "sincerity" (is that even possible?), they get it completely backwards.
Sami Schalk, an assistant professor in the university's English department, who has devoted class time since the bus episode to talking through the implications with her students, said she was concerned that the women's detractors had failed to consider the prejudice and "racialized language" the young women may have encountered on campus or before the bus ride that could have played a role in provoking the fight.
They attacked a white person on video (there is audio as well), and then they calmly dialed 9-1-1 to say they were attacked because of their race.
One of the women has a brother in the NFL who threatened some kid over twitter about all of it, and the kid eventually had to leave the school. It is a crazy story.
I can't see how this shit ends well. We used to have no kidding race riots in this country. And they killed hundreds of people and happened in some cases less than a hundred years ago. I see shit like this and I think we are pretty close to going back to that. White people are not going to remain docile and stupid forever.
White people are not going to remain docile and stupid forever.
Is there some sort of newsletter I can subscribe to so I can follow this uprising?
I don't know. Maybe you should learn how to read and do a google search.
Who has time to read articles? Amirite?
Why have you become a troll Jesse? You didn't used to be like this.
Bring our Jesse back!
MAKE JESSE GREAT AGAIN
Where my Jesse gone?
Those are both specialty occupations. So, I'd rather roll the dice and offer the jobs to some Mexicans and hope they get that sweet sweet H1B visa. Do you have any contacts in DHS that can help me with this?
Los Doyers,
What does your 5:42 post mean? Could you give some background? Maybe a link to one of your newsletters or youtube channel or something?
My newsletter, baby.
Two words Los.
Mary Stack.
You are such a sad person. And it always becomes obvious who you are.
Entropy Drehmaschine Void
Sausagefingers.com?
paranoid android
The people need a leader, John. Someone who can stand up and force society to recognize just how hard it is to be a white person in America. Someone who can bring about a reckoning of how despicably this country treats its most numerous and affluent demographic group.
Will you be that man, John?
Maybe you missed the part where I said, "this is not going to end well". I am not really sure why the person who sees the coming train wreck is assumed to want it to occur.
Is there some logic to you thinking that or do you just say whatever makes you feel good?
Woosh.
So yes, you do just post whatever makes you feel good and are not really big on thinking.
Do you think I am a racist? If so, say way. If you don't or can't articulate why, then what are you doing her other than jerking off?
"I walked away saying, 'I can't tell you what happened in that video; you haven't shown me anything to confirm what these young women are saying, and I can't deny it either, because it's just not clear to me,'" said Alice Green, a social justice activist and the director of the Center for Law and Justice, based in Albany. She was one of several community and university leaders whom the district attorney invited to review the evidence before charges were brought. "But once you lodge charges against someone," she added, "in the minds of most people, that's guilt."
Where was my invite?
"But once you lodge charges against someone," she added, "in the minds of most people, that's guilt."
What do you mean -- "most people"?!
What does she mean against "someone"? I suspect she means the charges brought against the three black women. It's some kind of crazy exercise in "victim" blaming, claiming, and believing. Not quite sure of the rules. But it's an excellent parody. And an argument for due process. Plus, the two women who twittered are being prosecuted, in court, for false reports -- something I haven't seen any university doing (apparently titles VII and IX are read to exclude "male" and "white" as victims, or off-campus behavior by black women).
Aww, c'mon, Crusty! You know why you weren't invited... They figured that, hands down, you would have fingered the three for the assault!
So basically its like Jackie/UVA, only instead of destroying the credibility of Rolling Stone/Jackie.... everyone is rushing to ask, "WHY IS THIS STORY BEING EXPLOITED BY RACISTS?"
""Many feared that the hard-won dialogue over racism on campus, the fragile moment of unity, would disappear under a wave of finger-pointing"
"People were forced to think about things that they didn't think about, maybe, before," said Amberly Carter, a coordinator at the university's Multicultural Resource Center who helped organize the rally. "So do we now stop defending black women because of what happened?"
"OMG, If we don't accept the lies of these three, Does This Mean We Have Failed All Black Women??"
The story seems to be a scramble to find justifications for 'well, how can we spin their own 'attack' and subsequent lies about it into ...."This only happened as a reaction to years of prejudice!"
e.g. """Activists have also noted that the footage the authorities have released so far is incomplete, offering the possibility that 'something' happened to provoke the young women into a physical confrontation before the videos begin."""
The video can never capture the years of microaggressions leading to that moment.
The 9-1-1 audio of those girls calling to say they were attacked because of their race is chilling because of how calm they were.
One doesn't expect female psychopaths.
Yes one does. Women manifest their terrible behavior is less obviously violent ways usually. Stating the obvious, women are as awful (or wonderful) as men.
I don't, and most people don't. Statistics/science don't.
Not saying there aren't any. I'd give some credence to mythology, fairy tales, and folk psychology, too. I find that women are differently evil, in part due to a relative lack of physical power. Naturally, my understanding of women is fairly limited.
People clearly are unsettled by any psychopath. Check Hare, Snakes in Suits, if you care.
I think he's saying men don't expect it....probably accurate
It's like: bitches be cray, and everyone bitches be cray, but when bitches actually are cray, it cray-cray.
That's intriguing. We - men - may well be bad at this. Any insights to share?
chilling?
in the "We know we can use this race-stuff to hurt people"-sense?
I think its a sign of the widespread immaturity that we can't simply acknowledge that if you give people special perma-victim status? That status will immediately be abused. Because that's what people do
Everyone wants to keep pretending that somehow these women were actually "in the right" some way. They will bend space and time to try and find some way to believe that.
Chilling may have been a step too far. I heard the calls on NPR the other day. They were completely calm, and said they were attacked on a bus because of their race, while in reality they attacked someone, and were using racial slurs against them. I WAS CHILLED!
I've seen the idea before. Probably read it in Daphne Patai's Heterophobia. It goes something like this: If a woman makes a false accusation, then this both validates feminism as well as her, because she would not make that false accusation if she wasn't oppressed. ... This was a rather high profile controversy, don't recall the name.
The book is from 1998, by the way. We now pretty much have Antioch's code, and the concept of micro-aggressions - which the book foreshadowed - has found acceptance. A 2nd edition would be convenient.
The concept of microagression dates all the way back to 1970.
Brevity. Not intended to dispute, but to refer to reception and implementation,
Bob Dylan Archives Head to Tulsa
I initially took that to mean he was donating his head to be cryogenically archived at Tulsa.
He looks like he's already done it once or twice.
Jackand Ace
Guess I'll have to put Tulsa as point for visitation.
More in 'Identity-Politics' as Legal Defense =
Man Accused in Gay-Bias Killing Tells Jury He Is Bisexual
"Mr. Morales said he could not remember yelling gay slurs at the men before the shooting, as several witnesses recalled. He testified that he was bisexual and had had relationships with transgender men. Asked if he harbored animosity toward gay people, he said, "Absolutely not.""
His defense includes calling trannies to the stand to testify, "Yes, your honor = this man goes both ways"
Why isn't the fact that he shot them enough to put him in jail for life?
Also = ugh, "transgender *men*"? SO INSENSITIVE, NYT.
They juggle their terminology throughout the piece
"On Tuesday, a 38-year-old transgender person, testifying behind a screen and under an alias, took the stand to say she had had a long-term sexual relationship with Mr. Morales that went back a decade. The witness, who was born with male genitalia but takes female hormones, said she had never known Mr. Morales to disparage gays, lesbians or transgender people."
"Do you believe Elliot Morales to be a person who hates gays?" Mr. Morales, acting as his own lawyer, asked the witness, who appeared under the name Jane Smith, and works at an H.I.V. clinic. "Absolutely not," she answered.
Damn son, that's salting the earth right there.
Dear Lord, he hates lawyers.
Jesus. It used to be enough to say "but I have a black friend". Does one now have to have sex with that friend, for that to work? (I'm asking so I can soon enough replace the Asian guy, black guy, and Jewish guy with a the corresponding woman.)
I talked to someone today who claimed NPR was unbiased. The conversation didn't go much farther than that because I work with her and didn't know what to say that wouldn't be offensive.
I think I said something about, "Well, I think all news organizations have some bias because humans are biased" She disagreed. I guess NPR lucked out and got the only purely objective journalists
What do you do for work, if I may ask?
Graphic/ web design
Ah, I see. I'm guessing she's a "creative" type.
(Blah, was busy) Oddly enough, she isn't. It surprised me because she is a very practical person, but apparently naive.
Does she think academia is biased? More broadly, what organizations does she think are biased, any criteria, and any dynamic she bases that on (such as "power corrupts")?
She has complained a lot about the bureaucracy at her old job, so she has some skepticism. Maybe only with things she has directly experienced.
Mr Drew
Help me friends, is there a polite way to ask John to stop talking about trump so much?
I think I've heard his viewpoint pretty clearly. I've considered and discarded his reasons.
Can it please just stop now?
Just filter him out if it bothers you. Isn't there an ignore option?
Well, I don't want to banish him from my view, that seems too far.
Also, if there are any controls whatsoever on this site, I'm unaware of them. The lack of functionality here is stunning. In my vast comment board experience across the intertubes (well, one other, maybe two) I've never seen anything like it.
If the is a secret control panel or options page somewhere I'd love to hear about it.
This a link to a firefox extension that can solve your problems. The link also has a link to the chrome extension.
Hmm, and I'm just supposed to naively click this link am I?
The last time I feel for this I wound up reading SF's blog.
Will Playa or HM vouch for you?
"Well, I don't want to banish him from my view, that seems too far." Kudos for nuance.
/blush
Let me stake my position. Trump is an orangutan with a billion dollars. There's nothing libertarian or conservative about him. Yet he probably wouldn't be as horrible as Hillary. Yes, he can win the general election. And that doesn't say anything good about the American people.
If you figure out how to make someone shut up about Trump, please use it against the Reason staff too.
I am pretty sure the world's sorriest troll has returned. Have you ever seen this nick before? I haven't. Strange name. Odd obsession with me.
It is Mary. Crazy bitch.
No, he can't be Mary, because I am, and I don't remember seeing him at the last meeting of the Marys.
Tulpa, you're Tulpa. Los is Mary. I'm Kurt Russell.
*Have you ever seen this nick before? I haven't. Strange name. Odd obsession with me.*
To whom are you referring?
We're all Tulpa, or something like that, but who specifically do you think is Mary, John?
Because I'm pretty fast with the Reasonable "filter Name" button, and I consequently haven't seen anyone that's tripped my Mary alarm recently.
I will say that, just because people disagree with you, or do what Tulpa used to call The Axis of Glib on you, doesn't make them Mary. That woman has a stink of craziness that permeates even through 12 pt Arial.
^lolthis
Fuck off Mary. You are not fooling anyone
It is Mary Stack folks. She is also Los above.
Los has been showing his true, crazy woman colors recently. You may be on to something.
Wow, at first I thought you were calling me gay. 🙂
I was just trying to rib you a little, John. Don't get me wrong, it is wearying to read the same rants several times in a single thread, but I was trying to be as inoffensive about it as possible.
I'm pretty sure I'm no sock puppet, though I have heard it opined that we are all, in the end, Tulpa. Tupla? Something.
Click on my name to hear my dulcet tones as I narrate real estate inspection videos. Try to control your pulse, they can be quite stimulating.
Oh. Drew or Los Doyers?
Nope, neither of them strike me as Mary. I mean, I could be wrong, but it's not like her to hold it together for any time longer than about a day and a half.
Notorious UGCC
To say I'm not a fan of Trump would be an understatement.
But to hand the Supreme Court over to the Democrats in a fit of pique would be to unfairly punish the entire country for the Trump's assholery.
My present suggesiton, if he wins the Republican nom, is to vote for him in the general, find some reason to impeach him and remove him from office, and thus turn the country over to Trump's VP, who will probably be better than Trump.
Way too many moving parts. I guess a guy can dream though, hmmmm?
My plan *does* presuppose that Trump will commit some kind of impeachable offense, but last few Presidents have, albeit only one got called on it (unsuccessfully).
Just as an example, wait until he starts a war without Congressional approval. For instance.
"We let the others get away with it, but with one difference - they weren't you!"
Trump/Supreme in 2016!
Obama is a warmonger and enemy of freedom.
Fuck him and all his supporters.


Cadmium is a potentially toxic heavy metal that hampers plant productivity by interfering with their photochemistry. Cd causes disturbances in a range of physiological processes of plants such as photosynthesis, water relations, ion metabolism and mineral uptake. Cd pronouncedly affects photosynthesis by alteration of its vital machinery in all aspects. Photosynthesis is a well organised and sequential process fundamental to all green plants and microorganisms which involves various components, including photosynthetic pigments and photosystems, the electron transport system and CO2 reduction pathways. Any damage at any level caused by Cd, critically affects overall photosynthetic capacity. Present review focuses on key effects of Cd on photosynthetic apparatus including chloroplast structure, photosynthetic pigments, Chl-protein complexes and photosystems resulting in overall decrease in efficiency of carbon assimilation pathway.
The unprecedented increase in heavy metal pollution has become a matter of major concern over the globe (Jamali et al. 2007). Cadmium (Cd) stands 7th out of the 20 toxins and has no known biological function except in marine diatoms (Morel 2008). Cd is used and traded internationally as a metal and as a chemical compound throughout Asia, America, Europe, Australia and Africa (UNEP 2010). Indeed, Cd concentration is progressively increasing at an alarming rate (7 to 43 percent over the period of 100 years) in several European countries such as Austria, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Ireland and the United Kingdom (UNEP 2010). It has been estimated that major source of Cd release into the air are the production of nonferrous metals followed by iron and steel production, fossil fuel combustion, cement production and waste incineration (Pacyna and Pacyna 2001). Cd is constantly added and gets accumulated to the plough layer of soil through various natural and anthropogenic activities such as volcanic eruptions, mining, smelting, mismanagement of industrial waste and use of phosphate fertilizers (Grant 2011) and its addition to the arable land is a widely recognised problem. Cd is potentially toxic to all organisms including plants, animals and humans as well. Cd exposure, for instance, is associated with cancers of the prostate, lungs and testes, kidney tubule damages, rhinitis, emphysema, osteomalacia and bone fractures in humans (Nawrot et al. 2006). In plants, it results in many toxic symptoms such as inhibition of growth and photosynthesis, activation or inhibition of enzymes, disturbances in plant-water relations and ion metabolism, and formation of free radicals (Valentoviova et al. 2010).
Phytotoxicity induced by Cd has been well established and comprehensively studied (Wahid et al. 2009). Cd is taken up by roots through plasma membrane transporters such as ZIP (ZRT-IRT like protein; Zinc regulated transporter, Iron-regulated transporter) and NRAMP (natural resistance associated macrophage protein) in competition to the essential nutrients of plants (Kim et al. 2002) and consequently it is translocated to shoots thereby leading to growth diminution which in due part emanates from disturbed photosynthesis (Bazzaz et al. 1974). Figure 1 illustrates the effects of Cd as a potent inhibitor of photosynthesis. Photosynthesis inhibition may be attributed to diminished chlorophyll biosynthesis (Shukla et al. 2008), interrupted O2 - evolving reactions of PSII and altered electron flow around PSI and PSII (Mallick and Mohn 2003). Cd hampers Calvin cycle by slowing down activity of various enzymes hence resulting in decreased photosynthesis (Ying et al. 2010). Cd has also been known to show inhibitory effect on various enzymes such as ribulose-1,5-biphosphate carboxylase oxygenase (Mobin and Khan 2007), phosphoenolpyruvate carboxylase (Latif 2008), aldolase (Sheoran et al. 1990), fructose-6-phosphate kinase (Malik et al. 1992), fructose-1,6-bisphosphatase (Sheoran et al. 1990), NADP+-glyceraldehyde-3-phosphate dehydrogenase (Sheoran et al. 1990) and carbonic anhydrase (Mobin and Khan 2007).
An overview of effects of Cd exposure to plants at different levels in photosynthetic machinery. (a) Cd uptake in cells through plasma membrane transporters. (b) Alteration in organisation of oxygen evolving and light harvesting complexes, Cd also binds with QB pocket thus slows down electron flow from QA to QB.(c) Incorporation of Cd in chlorophyll molecule.
Stomatal closure due to entry of Cd into the guard cells in competition to Ca+2 (Perfus-Barbeoch et al. 2002) and reduction in stomata count per unit area are also characteristic symptoms of Cd stress resulting in lesser conductance to CO2 (Pietrini et al. 2010) which consequently leads to overall inhibition of photosynthesis.
The present review is an attempt to develop an orchestrated understanding of the mechanisms involved in altering and damaging various components of photosynthetic machinery by Cd thereby leading to effective loss in the anabolic reactions of plants.
Cd convincingly resulted in marked distortion of chloroplast ultrastructure leading to disturbed shape and inflated thylakoids (Najeeb et al. 2011). Chloroplast structure disturbance has been partly manifested by a notable decrease in chloroplast number and size, grana stacking, starch grain content and accumulation of plastoglobuli observed in various plants such as Picris divarticata (75 μM, 14 days after treatment (DAT)), Hordeum vulgare (5 μM, 15 DAT) and Brassica (Ying et al. 2010; Wang et al. 2011; Elhiti et al. 2012). Further, plants show differential aggregation of grana in young and older leaves. For instance in willow, older leaves showed swollen but organised thylakoids whereas young leaves appear to be more dense structured accompanied by tannin precipitation. Reed plant chloroplasts displayed a disturbed shape, wavy appearance of grana and stroma thylakoids and swollen intra thylakoidal space owing to lipid peroxidation, a consequence of increased lipid accumulation in thylakoids (Hakmaouia et al. 2007).
Disruption in chloroplast structure is also ensued due to increased peroxidation of membrane fatty acid and lipid contents resulting from enhanced lipooxygenase (LOX) activity (Remans 2010). LOX mediates polyunsaturated fatty acid oxidation including chloroplast membrane lipids such as monogalactosyldiacyl-glycerol (MGDG), digalactosyldiacyl-glycerol (DGDG) and phosphatidyl glycerol (PG) hence resulting in production of free radicals. LOX activity has been positively correlated with increased lipid peroxidation in plants such as Arabidopsis, Barley, Lupine and Phaseolus under Cd stress (Maksymiec and Krupa 2006; Tamas et al. 2009). A significant decrease has also been reported in the content of polaracyl lipids especially MGDG, DGDG and PG in tomato chloroplasts membranes (Djebali et al. 2005) which is considered to be indispensable for maintenance of membrane integrity.
Grana disorganization can be attributed to reduced MGDG level, as well as the decrease in 16:1 trans fatty acid content in MGDG and PG. In Brassica napus (50 μM, 15 DAT) leaves, remarkable decrease upto 80–84 % was observed in DGDG and MGDG respectively (Nouairi et al. 2005), which may possibly be a reason in disintegrated grana.
Among the photosynthetic pigments enormous studies have been conducted till date on reduction in chlorophyll and carotenoids in plants exposed to Cd stress. Chlorophyll destruction in older leaves and its biosynthesis inhibition in newer ones have been known to be prime cause in leaf chlorosis in plants growing in Cd treated soils (Xue et al. 2013). Inhibition of chlorophyll biosynthesis enzymes and activation of its enzymatic degradation plays crucial role in net loss in chlorophyll content (Somashekaraiah 1992).
Aminolevulinate (ALA) is a crucial compound in chlorophyll biosynthesis and its synthesis is the rate-limiting and regulatory step. Cd inhibits ALA synthesis at the site of availability of glutamate for ALA synthesis and interferes by interacting with SH group of enzymes, δ-aminolevulinic acid dehydratase (Mysliwa-Kurdziel and Strzalka 2002) and porphobilinogen deaminase, (Skrebsky et al. 2008) leading to the accumulation of chlorophyll biosynthesis intermediates like ALA and porphyrins. In fact ALA accumulation is considered to be a reason for generation of reactive oxygen species which alters redox status of plants and thus disturbing plant homeostasis as reported in Soybean (0-100 μM, 10 DAT) and Cucumis (0-1000 μM, 10 DAT) (Noriega et al. 2007; Goncalves et al. 2009). Additionally Cd reacts with protochlorophillide reductase, which causes photoreduction of protochlorophillide into chlorophyllide thus diminishing the raw material for chlorophyll synthesis (Stobart et al. 1985).
Cd also decreases uptake of nutrients such as Mn, Fe and Mg, hence a comparatively higher amount of cellular Cd interferes with Mg2+ insertion into protoporphyrinogen or may cause Chl destruction as consequence of Mg2+ substitution in both Chl a and b (Gillet et al. 2006).
Carotenoid content in plants exposed to Cd do not exhibit a set pattern and may either increase or decrease. The increase has been observed in many cases as in Cucumis sativus L. (Burzynski et al. 2007) and Zea mays L. (100 μM, 10 DAT) (Chaneva et al. 2010). On the contrary decrease was also observed in a few cases e.g. Pisum sativum (7 mg/kg, 20 DAT) (Hattab et al. 2009). Other leaf pigments including neoxanthin, lutein, violaxanthin were found to decrease in Lycopersicon esculentum and Spinacea oleracea plants (López-Millán et al. 2009; Fagioni et al. 2009).
In lower organisms, Cd exposure caused a significant drop in the amounts of phycobiliprotein viz. allophycocyanin, phycocyanin, and phycoerythrin e.g. Chlamydomonas (50 μM, for 24 hrs), Gracilaria (300 μM, 16 DAT) and Hypnea musciformis (300μM, 7DAT) that led to decrease in photosynthetic efficiency (Perrault et al. 2011; Santos et al. 2012; Bouzon et al. 2012).
Chl-proteins can be described as Chl a and Chl a/b multicofactor proteins for both photosystems (PS) bound to chlorophylls and carotenoids (Fromme et al. 2001). Cd effects on both the PS as well as degree of damage vary in the plant species even among cultivars and populations, depending on genotypic and ecotypic differences (Prasad 1995).
Immunoblotting of Chl-protein complexes did not depict any changes in the level of polypeptides of PSII complexes comprising of CP 47, CP 43, D1 and D2 under Cd stress as demonstrated in rice (75 μM Cd, 28 DAT) and spinach (100 μM Cd, 30 DAT) (Pagliano et al. 2006; Fagioni et al. 2009). The same pattern was also observed in lower organisms i.e. Chlamydomonas reinhardtii (50 μM, for 24 hrs) too (Perreault et al. 2011).
Cd toxicity may be attributed to both acceptor and donor side of PSII thus preventing photoactivation (Sigfridsson et al. 2004). On the donor side due to high affinity, Cd exchanges with Ca++ in Mn++/Ca++ cofactor present in oxygen evolving complex (Faller et al. 2005; Pagliano et al. 2006); the exchange leads to reduced kinetics of Hill reaction. On acceptor side Cd decreased the rate of electron transfer from QA to QB due to interaction with nonheme Fe and conformational modification of QB pocket (Geiken et al. 1998).
Further decrease in lipid content in chloroplasts specifically MGDG and DGDG (Nouairi et al. 2005), considered to be indispensable for PSII activity, causes structural disorganisation of PSII supramolecular structure (Quartacci et al. 2000).
LHCII is the principle light harvesting pigment-protein complex of PSII which absorbs light energy and transfers it to the reaction centre. The native form of LHCII is a trimer composed of three Lhcb proteins: Lhcb1, Lhcb2 and Lhcb3 (Lucinski and Jackowski 2006). These LHCII aggregates play dynamic role in triggering the thermal dissipation of extra energy for efficient excitation quenching and display photoprotective role in case of overexcitation of reaction centre and antenna (Barros et al. 2009). Cd exposure results in dissipation of total mass of Lhcb1 and Lhcb2 and accounts for disorganization of trimer-forming monomers resulting in diminished LHCII aggregation complexes. This was indicated by infrared studies on Secale cereale exposed to Cd (50 μM, 7 DAT) where aggregate/trimeric ratio remained 73% of the control (Janik et al. 2010). Cd toxicity resulted in constrained dissipation of excitation energy which may have been induced by alterations in the quenching centre formation or inhibition of vibrational transfer of thermal energy between pigments and the protein skeleton (Gruszecki et al. 2009). In Spinacia oleracea L. Lhcb1.1 isomers of Lhcb1 were highly affected even in small exposure to stress (75 μM, 5 DAT) whereas others i.e. Lhcb2 and Lhcb3 were less affected (Fagioni et al. 2009). Differential level of expression in Lhcb2 was observed in case of two ecotypes of Sedum (hyperaccumulating and non-hyperaccumulating) which suggested temporal regulation of gene expression. Upon 24 hrs of Cd (2μ M) treatment non-hyperaccumulating ecotype exhibited higher expression level than hyperaccumulating, followed by a reversal of the situation after 8 days (Zhang et al. 2011).
Proteomic studies on Oryza sativa L. (7.5-75μM, 24 DAT) suggested contrasting results where LHCII content is not adversely affected suggesting that antenna complexes of PSII are less affected (Pagliano et al. 2006).
Lipid profiling of chloroplast is conducive to suggest that decrease in 16:1 trans fatty acid content in MGDG and PG, diminished LHCII oligomerization due to its specific binding in sn-2 position in the chloroplastic PG (Vassilev et al. 2004). Cadmium due to its high affinity gets substituted in pigment protein complexes causing conformational changes (Küpper et al. 2002) leading to incorrect binding of chlorophyll molecule to the protein matrix.
In some plants exposed to cadmium stress PSI instead of PSII is the prime site of damage. Previous studies suggested that Cd induced iron deficiency in cell organelles is possibly a reason for greater damage to PSI (Siedlecka and Baszyński 1993; Timperio et al. 2007). Prolonged deficiency of iron resulted in generation of reactive oxygen species in thylakoids which principally destroys iron-sulphur centres (PSI) and Lhca antennae (Michel and Pistorius 2004). In fact, observations suggesting damage to PSI have been reported in Cucumis sativus L. (10 μM, 35 DAT) (Sárvári 2005; Sárvári et al. 2008) and wheat (Atal et al. 1991). However in Pisum sativum extended stress treatment of Cd (0–10 mM, 12 DAT) led to equal damage to both PSI and PSII (Chugh and Sawhney 1999).
Proteomic and expression studies conducted on basal leaves of Spinacia oleracea L. (100 μM, 0–15 DAT) revealed presence of modified amino acids in polypeptide chains of PsaA/PsaB proteins corroborating the accumulation of incomplete monomeric units leading to disruption of PSI supercomplexes, reaction centre I and LHCI (Fagioni et al. 2009).
The main effect of Cd, studied to date is hampering the photochemical activity of both PSI and PSII. The reports regarding this have always been contradictory in deciding the principal site of damage i.e. PSI or PSII. As observed in peas, Cd affects both the photosystems over a long period of stress (Chugh and Sawhney 1999). However, during initial stages Cd had more pronounced effect on the activity of PSII as observed in Thalspi caerulescence (Kupper et al. 2007) stating higher sensitivity of PSII to Cd toxicity (Wang et al. 2013).
The chlorophyll fluorescence induction parameters represent the use of non-invasive tool to understand the photosynthetic performance in vivo and to assess effects of stress on plants photochemistry (Baker et al. 2008). Table 1 depicts effects of Cd on some of the photosynthetic parameters [Chl (chlorophyll content), Fv/Fm (maximum quantum efficiency of PSII) and PN (Net photosynthetic rate)] which reflect lesions in plants photosynthetic yield as a consequence of damage to the photosystems and pigments (Wang et al. 2009). It is evident from the Table 1 that Cd decreased chlorophyll content, FV/FM and PN indicating impeded photosynthesis. However, PSII disruption as a consequence of Cd toxicity is reported to depend on the irradiance conditions. During high light intensity, direct damage to the PSII reaction centre occurs instead; this was termed as the 'sun reaction'. On the contrary, LHCII disruption due to exchange of Mg2+ with Cd in chlorophyll pigment is the prime cause of diminished PSII activity during dark phase and is referred as 'shade reaction' (Kupper et al. 2007).
* Values are not available.
1Effective concentration of Cd causing reduction in chlorophyll pigments viz. Chl a and Chl b and non-invasive parameters viz. photosynthetic yield (Fv/Fm) and net CO2 assimilation rate (Pn).
Comparatively less information is known to us in case of PSI but still data exists which shows higher sensitivity to PSI photochemistry as in Pisum sativum plants (Wodala et al. 2012).
In conclusion, Cd affects photosynthesis either directly or indirectly thus decreasing the crop yield. We reviewed its inhibitory effect on pigments, lipids, photosystems proteins and chloroplasts. Summing up all we investigated net loss in photosynthesis. It can be said that much has been known about Cd toxicity to plants but numerous mechanisms remains debatable about its interaction with photosynthetic proteins i.e. D1 and D2 and oxygen evolving complexes. In particular, we should extend our knowledge towards PSI measurements to get an intricate knowledge on effect of Cd on photosynthesis. Strategies must be evolved on understanding the mechanism of Cd hyperaccumulation to uphold various phytoremediation strategies.
PP and NK surveyed the literature and prepared the draft. VS provided guidelines for the review, modified and wrote the final version. All authors read and approved the final manuscript.


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This brief examines the persistence and attainment of students who enrolled in postsecondary education for the first time in 2003–04, focusing on subbaccalaureate students (those seeking a certificate or associate's degree) and, among subbaccalaureate students, those who pursue occupational education (sometimes referred to as career and technical education).
Subbaccalaureate students have a lower rate of persistence and attainment than baccalaureate students.
Students seeking a subbaccalaureate credential in an occupational field of study have a persistence and attainment rate that is not measurably different from that of subbaccalaureate students in other fields of study.
Attainment is defined as having earned a postsecondary credential as of 2009, whether or not it is the same credential the student initially sought. Persistence is defined as being enrolled in postsecondary education in 2009, without having earned a credential.
A national review of community colleges and their graduates' financial return on investment finds that California and Texas have the most institutions with graduates in the top tier of wage earners. Thirty states have some community colleges whose graduates' median net lifetime earnings trail those of the state's high school graduates.
The bachelor's degree has been seen as the doorway to the middle class for most Americans, but the recent rise of sub-baccalaureate credentials has been transforming higher education. In this video series, "Breakthroughs in Education and Social Mobility," expert Mark Schneider examines the value of such credentials.