Category: news

News

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Sad News

Despite knowing this news was coming, it’s still sad to get it.

Gianna Israel passed away last night after going into a coma last week. She had been very ill for months, and at the very least, she has found relief from her suffering.
I’d like to dedicate last night’s panel to Gianna.

If you don’t know much about her, she is the co-author of Transgender Care. She wrote numerous essays about various aspects of transgender life. She conducted interviews and wrote a column for www.tgforum.com.

She was a giving, generous, insightful spirit, and a group of us who were meant to contribute to her next book are working to see that book happen despite her death.
She overcame so much adversity to be who she was, and then turned around and helped others the minute she could – and even sometimes when she couldn’t.

Rest in peace, Gianna. You did good.

Gianna Eveling Israel

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Betty Friedan, 1921-2006

Betty Friedan died at her home of congestive heart failure today.
bf
She was the author of the much-heralded The Feminine Mystique.
She was 85. She founded NOW (the National Organization for Women) in 1966.
The Feminine Mystique is still a great book, calling as it did for women to have a life and personality independent of being a wife & mother. Sadly, a lot of what she had to say about women being autonomous is still quite relevant today.
Though there’s a part of me that hopes, somewhere in the universe, Susan B. and Cady Stanton and Wendy Wasserstein and Coretta Scott King and now Betty Friedan are conspiring to get these boys to stop pulling these stupid-ass moves.

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At This Rate, We'd Be Better Off With Tammany Hall

What is wrong with the IRS? They froze the refunds of lower-income people – and often with no cause whatsoever.
Because it’s those people making $13K that are really ruining the economy, you know.

Ms. Olson said the I.R.S. devoted vastly more resources to pursing questionable refunds by the poor, which she said cannot involve more than $9 billion, than to a $100 billion problem with unreported incomes from small businesses that deal only in cash, many of which do not even file tax returns.

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Toxic Dog Food

Unfortunately, many dog owners have not yet heard about the fact that toxic dog food is in circulation, and dogs keep dying.
Please make the extra effort to tell anyone you know who owns dogs that Diamond, Country Value, and Professional brand dog foods have been recalled and to date have caused at least 100 dog deaths.
Please especially warn them that if their dogs are rejecting their food, THERE’S A REASON.
Here’s a link to a ScienceDaily article that has more information about the toxic food, what to do if you suspect you’ve fed it to your dog, and other details that are relevant to the recall.

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Condolences

I can’t even begin to imagine how those families feel – getting the good news last night and today getting the correction.
I find a report of Bush’s condolences about the miners in a Chinese paper – not surprising, really, as coal miners die in China pretty much every month and their deaths go unreported or under-reported.
My condolences to the families, and a wish for freedom from guilt for that one guy who survived.
(If you haven’t worked it out, my grandparents & much of their generation were anthracite miners around the turn of the century.)

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NYC MTA Transit Strike is On?

At the very least, an awful lot of New Yorkers will be taking tomorrow off; a lot will also be stuck in traffic or walking long distances or waiting too long for cabs.
But I expect the Governor and Mayor will step in somehow and demand the striking workers get back on the job. Just my prediction, but Pataki especially is not labor-friendly (which he amply demonstrated with his recent veto of the minimum raise increase).
The official word hasn’t come in yet at 1:58am, but NY1 News is predicting it’ll come through shortly.