Bobcats in LA

Seems that Bobcats in LA have found new homes in foreclosed houses.

With real estate values plummeting and foreclosed homes sitting empty, a family of bobcats apparently decided the time was right to pounce.

So last week, they slipped out of the parched foothills of Lake Elsinore and into a spacious, vacant home in well-groomed Tuscany Hills.

Residents of the development got their first look Aug. 27 when the feline squatters -- at least two adults and three kittens -- lolled atop a wall outside the Spanish-style house.

Someone called 911, reporting mountain lions. Four police cruisers showed up and officers ordered everyone inside. But soon they were out snapping photos along with the neighbors.

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Screen capture above for one of my favorites.

WTF ... Our Government is Broken

How in the world could this be legal? Our government does not have our best interests in mind only that of the large corporations. It is illegal for a company to make sure it's product is safe for its customers. Mindboggling.

A federal appeals court says the government can prohibit meat packers from testing their animals for mad cow disease.

Because the Agriculture Department tests only a small percentage of cows for the deadly disease, Kansas meatpacker Creekstone Farms Premium Beef wants to test all of its cows. The government says it can't.

Larger meat companies worry that if Creekstone is allowed to perform the test and advertise its meat as safe, they could be forced to do the expensive test, too.

The U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit on Friday overturned a lower court ruling that would have cleared the way for the testing. The appeals court said restricting the test is within the scope of the government's authority.

Via dailykos

Photo by Flickr user Maggie Osterberg used under a Creative Commons License

White shark 2008

Thought I had posted this and then realized that I had not, but the Monterey Bay Aquarium has a new white shark on exhibit.

For only the fourth time since 2004, Monterey Bay Aquarium has a young white shark in the Outer Bay exhibit. The shark--a 4 ½ foot-long female, weighing 55 ½ pounds—arrived on August 27, and will remain with us as long as her health is good and she’s small enough for us to handle safely when it’s time to return her to the wild.

Huh?

Very little in this story makes sense (10ft?, sure it wasn't bigger) but a reminder to handle larger snakes with someone else around.

A college student working the night shift at a Venezuelan zoo is dead after letting a 10-foot python out of its enclosure.

Javier Hernandez manages the small zoo at Caracas' General Francisco de Miranda Park. He said Monday that 29-year-old Erick Arrieta violated park rules by letting the Asian python out early Saturday.

The biology major was found strangled to death, with a snake bite on his left wrist.

The python turned up down the hall.

Photo by Flickr user Tambako the Jaguar used under a Creative Commons lisence.

When Conservation Does Not Work ... Pray

Seems that when drought strikes and you refuse to conserve water the only solution is to go to the capitol and pray to God for rain. Hell, you can even schedule the prayer session for the day before a rain forcast to increase the odds it appears that God listens to you. Too bad he still didn't. Still no rain in Georgia.

Perdue won't be the first governor to hold a call for public prayer during the epic drought gripping the Southeast. Alabama Gov. Bob Riley issued a proclamation declaring a week in July as ''Days of Prayer for Rain'' to ''humbly ask for His blessings and to hold us steady in times of difficulty.''

The loudest opposition to Perdue's move has come from the Atlanta Freethought Society, a secular group that is expecting about a dozen of its 125 members to protest at the vigil.

''The governor can pray when he wants to,'' said Ed Buckner, who is organizing the protest. ''What he can't do is lead prayers in the name of the people of Georgia.''

Meanwhile the people of North Carolina have decided that they will try their luck with conservation/reduction. And it appears to be working. Or you could just ask 4th graders to solve your problems for you.

A press release from the Governors office today unveiled a contest for 3rd, 4th and 5th graders to develop a water conservation plan for their community. The contest winner will receive $2000 to implement the plan in their area.

Photo by Flickr user digitalens used under a Creative Commons license

Volcanic Yellowstone

The Yellowstone Caldera is rising at a rate 3 times faster than ever recorded before. The volcano responsible for the geysers and mudpots covers much of the area under Yellowstone National Park.

But that doesn't mean Yellowstone is about to go the way of Mount St. Helens.

"There's no evidence of an imminent eruption or hydrothermal explosion," said Robert Smith, a geophysics professor at the University of Utah who co-authored the study.

...

Yellowstone is situated on a giant, geologically active feature known as a supervolcano.

"It's hundreds of times bigger than Mount St. Helens," Smith said, referring to the active volcano in Washington State.

Much of the park sits in a caldera, or crater, some 40 miles (70 kilometers) across, which formed when the cone of the massive volcano collapsed in a titanic eruption 640,000 years ago.

Photo by Flickr user statico used under a Creative Commons license.

Heckuva Job FEMA

People better lose their jobs for this one, but knowing the current administration they will probably all get promotions. Fake news conferences to show how great of a job FEMA is doing in SoCal. Stay classy FEMA.

The White House scolded the Federal Emergency Management Agency on Friday for staging a phony news conference about assistance to victims of wildfires in southern California.

The agency — much maligned for its sluggish response to Hurricane Katrina over two years ago — arranged to have FEMA employees play the part of independent reporters Tuesday and ask questions of Vice Adm. Harvey E. Johnson, the agency's deputy director.

The questions were predictably soft and gratuitous.

"I'm very happy with FEMA's response," Johnson said in reply to one query from an agency employee.

White House press secretary Dana Perino said it was not appropriate that the questions were posed by agency staffers instead of reporters. FEMA was responsible for the "error in judgment," she said, adding that the White House did not know about it beforehand and did not condone it.

"FEMA has issued an apology, saying that they had an error in judgment when they were attempting to get out a lot of information to reporters, who were asking for answers to a variety of questions in regard to the wildfires in California," Perino said. "It's not something I would have condoned. And they — I'm sure — will not do it again."

She said the agency was just trying to provide information to the public, through the press, because there were so many questions.

Photo by Flickr user imorgan73 used under a Creative Commons license.

UPDATE: He indeed falls upwards just like all the rest.

Tuesday, while “wildfires raged” in California, FEMA staged a live press conference at which agency staffers posed as journalists and asked softball questions. One of those staffers, Director of External Affairs John “Pat” Philbin, has now resigned. He has instead landed an “amazing opportunity” to head public affairs at the Office of the Director of National Intelligence.

Planet in Peril

On October 23 and 24th at 9pm Eastern CNN will be showing a special report of Anderson Cooper 360 titled "Planet in Peril" examining Global Warming, Species Loss, Deforestation/Habitat Loss and Overpopulation. Anderson Cooper, Sanjay Gupta and Jeff Corwin will host. From the website this special looks very interesting and informative, tackling some of Earth's real problems. Plus this might be the sexiest CNN special ever. I mean look at the metrosexuality. In HD!

Full body AC sexiness...


Photos from CNN.com

Michael Vick

Let's hope Michael Vick goes to jail for a very long time if he is convicted of these horrendous crimes. It hurts to even read the indictment. The cruelty is more than I imagined. Some of the gross details of the indictment are paraphrased by the smoking gun.

The 27-year-old Vick, whose nickname is listed as "Ookie" in the indictment, allegedly established the Bad Newz Kennels in early-2001 in Smithfield, Virginia. It was this property, for which Vick paid $34,000, that the star athlete and his codefendants used as the "main staging area for housing and training the pit bulls involved in the dog fighting venture and hosting dog fights." According to prosecutors, Vick and his cohorts began purchasing pit bull puppies in late-2001 and would eventually "sponsor" individual dog fights with purses as high as $26,000. In the indictment's most harrowing parts, federal investigators describe what happened to some Bad Newz Kennels dogs that either lost matches or did not perform well in test fights. After a March 2003 loss by a female pit bull, codefendant Purnell Peace, "after consulting with Vick," electrocuted the animal. In April, prosecutors allege, Vick, Peace, and Quanis Phillips, "executed approximately 8 dogs that did not perform well in 'testing' sessions." These animals, the indictment claims, were killed "by various methods, including hanging, drowning, and slamming at least one dog's body to the ground."

Hopefully his sponsors will start dropping him soon. There is such thing as innocent until proven guilty in this country, but the Fed's don't bring an indictment they aren't very confident in. Maybe this case will bring dog fighting to the attention of the masses and more people will realize that it is a very real issue. If you feel so obliged send Ron Mexico's sponsors a little note saying you do not appreciate their using a dog fighter as a role model.

Photo by Flickr user littlerottenrobin used under a Creative Commons license

Celebrity Dog Fighting

It appears there was another federal raid on a property owned by Falcon's QB Michael Vick in a suspected dog fighting case.

On June 7, federal law enforcement officials descended on a home owned by Vick armed with a search warrant that suggests they're taking over an investigation into the Falcons quarterback's possible involvement in dogfighting.
More than a dozen vehicles went to the home early that day and investigators searched inside before turning their attention to the area where officials found dozens of dogs in late April and evidence that suggested the home was involved in a dogfighting operation.
Surry County officials had secured a search warrant in late May based on an informant's information to look for as many as 30 dog carcasses buried on the property. The warrant never was executed because Commonwealth's Attorney Gerald G. Poindexter said he had issues with the way it was worded.

Photo of fake dog fighting by Flickr user / juL / used under a creative commons license.

Racism in America is Alive and Well

This story via Atrios sounds like it should have been from 1956, and not 2006. We still have a lot of work to do in this country. Very sad and sobering. Brown v. Board of Education did not fix everything, even though our current Supreme Court thinks otherwise. The Bay Area certainly is not perfect, but stories like this make us very thankful we run a business and live here, in a freer society, than many other places in this great country.

Photo by tizzie used under a Creative Commons license.