2015 FINAL POTPOURRI

Just some unimportant Potpourri to close out the year.

As we end 2015, this Washington Post cartoon  is the prefect statement of the candidates actions  as expected  for

The next 5 weeks.

Did you know that the latest poll of Republican candidates now has Christie in 4^th place? So startling that on the penultimate day of 2015 the Ledger did not have a bad word about Christie.

From various news media sources:

The UPI notes that, The twin birth rate has been rising for white, African-American and Hispanic women since 1980. But while rates didn't change for white or Hispanic women in 2013-2014, the rate continued to rise another 4 percent for African-American women. The reason is not specifically known, however more women are giving birth later in life, which has a higher occurrence of twins,

What do Obama, Trump and the pope have in common?

They're at the top of the annual Gallup Poll of most admired men. President Obama is first with 17%, and The Donald and the pope make for an intriguing tie for second place with 5% each. Also on the list: George W. Bush, Billy Graham and Bill Gates. Hey, why no women? There's a separate poll for that, and Hillary Clinton is at the top for the 14th straight year and 20th time overall.=

The full-body scanners now used at all commercial airports use millimeter-wave technology to create the image of a generic avatar on a screen. If the scanner discovers a lump on the passenger that could represent a weapon, the machine shows a yellow box on the screen avatar, indicating where the lump has been spotted

This is scary!: In public classrooms across the country, the corporate name that is fast becoming as common as pencils and erasers is Google.

More than half of K-12 laptops or tablets purchased by U.S. schools in the third quarter were Chromebooks, cheap laptops that run Google software. Beyond its famed Web search, the company freely offers word processing and other software to schools. In total, 

Google programs are used by more than 50 million students and teachers around the world, the company says.

But Google is also tracking what those students are doing on its services and using some of that information to sell targeted ads, according to a complaint filed with federal officials by a leading privacy advocacy group.

TO ALL A HAPPY, HEALTHY, SANE and SAFE 2016

SAD REPORT

As I sit down to write this for the first time in this family’s 12 days of X-mas there is quiet in Chez Moi. Dawg is sleeping by my feet, he has ignored me since last Thursday evening when the Richmond gang arrived for a 2½ day stay and the Ohio gang arrived the next day. The great dispersal occurred on Sunday and Monday.

I am reluctant to give an Oh Hell report since the sample of only 5 games is too small to be significant, however some have shown an interest. I did learn during that time that perhaps due to “liquid reinforcements” one should be entirely oblivious of the number of cards there play and who bid what.

This as pointed out by the record of one individual who won the first nights only 2 games, and the next night’s 3 resulted in 1last and 2 next to last.

I was the fifth. My excuse of course was the worst dealt hands in the history of the game.

I was last only one game; the first where I the first two hands were the greatest I had ever seen and from there on all were impossible to bid.

The best example of my luck was the last game. I was in first place after 9 hands. Only one card is dealt for the 10^th hand. I am sitting in the second seat and have the Queen of trumps. My opponent to my right  bids one and I of course with potentially  the highest trump since there are only two cards out of 52 in the deck that could beat me have to also bid ONE. Guess what! Old unconscious held the Ace. I ended third.

As an old time Brooklyn Dodger fan  I can say “Wait till next time”.

Happy Kwanza

To all celebrants

a HAPPY KWANZAA

WISHING EACH AND EVERYONE OF YOU

A

JOYOUS

CHRISTMAS 

AND

A HEALTHY-WEALTHY-HAPPY

2016 

FROM 

THE RICHMOND GANG AND I  

 

Madilyn,Max, Amber,Logan,Reid

Dawg and me.  

TODAY'S POTPOURRI

Starting late tonight and for the next 10 or so days I will be so lucky to have visiting grandchildren and great grandchildren plus all my kids and spouses including “Oh-Hellers” here for the holidays. Fortunately not all at the same time, but Dawg will also have company. Obviously I will not have time to blog

As fillers today some notes from print/internet media:  "Today’s world!" USA Today  “San Bernardino came on the heels of Colorado Springs, which came on the heels of Roseburg, Ore., which came on the heels ... It's been a year. We're edgy. But it was a bit of a gut check for many Thursday when the happiest place on Earth announced it was installing metal detectors. The three major theme parks in Orlando have installed metal detectors for the holiday season, reflecting heightened security nationwide, Roger Yu reports . Additionally, Disney said it will have more uniformed law enforcement officers and specially trained dogs on patrol in key areas. They will also stop selling toy guns and won't allow them brought into the parks. Tom Schroeder, a spokesman for Universal, said the company is "testing metal detection because we want our guests to feel safe when they come to our theme parks." No one would disagree. Safety? Yes. The sad feeling at the end of an era? Perhaps.”

As reported in the Times : “The trial of the first Baltimore police officer in the death of Freddie Gray ended in a hung jury on Wednesday, an unexpected twist that complicates the cases against five other officers facing charges in a fatal police encounter that prompted violent unrest here last spring.

“a weary-looking jury of seven women and five men filed into his (the Judge’s) wood-paneled courtroom. They had sent him a note after 16 hours of deliberations to inform him they were deadlocked on all four charges, including manslaughter”.

The mistrial could complicate the other prosecutions; Officer Porter is considered a material witness in their case against the driver of the van, Officer Caesar R. Goodson Jr., who is scheduled to go on trial Jan. 6 with the other cases to follow.

The trial of the officer, William G. Porter, was to be the opening to — and a critical building block for — a six-part legal proceeding on the fatal encounter between the police and Mr. Gray

The Porter trial was closely watched by Black Lives Matter activists across the country, who viewed it as a barometer of whether it is possible to convict police officers. Yet its racial dynamics were complex. Officer Porter is black; so are Judge Williams, who made a career of prosecuting police officers as a lawyer with the Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division, and Marilyn J. Mosby, the tough-talking state’s attorney who brought charges against the six officers, three black and three white. Seven of the 12 jurors were black.”

Although there was some attempt to incite the crowd waiting for the verdict; common sense prevailed and the city remained quiet that night. Some of the quoted comments:

“DeRay Mckesson, a national leader in the Black Lives Matter movement who lives in Baltimore, said he was heartened by the outcome. “This is a hung jury, it’s not an acquittal,” he said. “That’s important. The prosecution resonated with the jury in some capacity — and that is undeniable.”

“Justice is not a verdict,” the mayor said. “Justice is a process that we have to protect.”

A lawyer for the Gray family, Billy Murphy, called the outcome “a bump on the road to justice.”

My opinion, this was not a failure of the legal system to produce justice which all too often to aggrieved minorities “justice” only means a guilty verdict, otherwise right or wrong the system as failed.

Instead, it proved that an American Jury can come to mixed conclusions and not be swayed by emotion or racial prejudices in finding a verdict