ONE MORE WEEK NOW, AND OUR BELOVED MINNESOTA WILL BE CELEBRATING ITS 150-YEAR ANNIVERSARY of statehood--even if Governor Pawlenty's zeal in playing along with the Club for Growth's "low taxes=jobs=social stability" meme means a somewhat subdued celebration.

Said meme failing to address how, and by what means, such reductions in taxes would be compensated for vis-a-vis government revenue short of the obviously pathetic answer conservatives always have: Privitisation as tends, alas for it! to favour certain weird and unwholesome droogs expecting reward for Good and Loyal Service to the campaign.

Privitisation which only leaves the Lower Classes all the more in misery without adequate "safety net" provisions (for which these same specimens of Zealotry and True Belief--Good Christians All, remember?--would likely recommend "mutual self-help," as in "cashflow gifting" under such "feel-good" names like "Friends Helping Friends" and other affinity-based permutations such as "Christians Helping Christians" and "Women Helping Women," let alone "Æroplane," "Pit Stop" and "Dinner Party" as, in effect, amounts to a Ponzi scheme which this same ilk is forever claiming State Social Security is).

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IF YOU THOUGHT IN-PACK GIFT OFFERS WITH CERTAIN BREAKFAST CEREALS WERE A BIT ON THE TACKY SIDE, consider what gave the Azerbaijanis a bit of indigestion. As the BBC reports:

The Swiss-based multinational food company, Nestlé, has apologised to Azerbaijan after a gift attached to a breakfast cereal backfired.

The CD-ROM featured information about countries around the world but the data on Azerbaijan caused outrage there.

It said that Azerbaijan had started a war against neighbouring Armenia and that the hotly disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh belonged to Armenia.

Nestlé has withdrawn the cereal and promised to seize the offending CDs.

Tense and volatile

Conflict between Azerbaijan and Armenia in the early 1990s over Nagorno-Karabakh killed an estimated 30,000 people.

Hundreds of thousands of refugees were created on both sides.

And despite a peace deal in 1994, the situation remains tense and volatile.

Nestlé inadvertently stumbled into a minefield.

The Azeri government vowed to take action, and there has been widespread talk of a public boycott.

Nestlé has now issued a formal apology but some Azeris are still not happy.

They accuse Nestlé of playing Armenia's hand, and are demanding more than just an apology to chew on.

Now imagine what the situation would be like if either General Mills, Kellogg's or Post Cereals attempted a similar promotion in the United States as above, only to include inaccurate information about the ur-RAHOWA in Iraq and the "stateless nationals" status of so-called "Confederate Southern Americans" as doesn't legally exist as a Protected National Minority.

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NOT MANY KNOW IT, BUT A CYCLONE IN 1970 AS DEVASTATED EAST PAKISTAN LED TO RIOTING which would eventually result in its independence as Bhangladesh. Said rioting having been aggravated by the Indian Government's denying flyover permission to Pakistani relief agencies.

Now comes word of a devastating cyclone in the so-called "Union of Myanmar" as has killed (according to official estimates) some 350 people, mostly in and around the Irrawaddy River Delta and the Yawgon (f/k/a Rangoon) metropolitan region ... which, Your Correspondent thinks, could, under the right circustances, be enough to undermine the hypersecretive military regime, especially considering its want of preparedness in distributing relief supplies.

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IT USED TO BE THAT "DEVELOPING A HEALTHY AND PROPER CHRISTIAN MORAL COMPASS" was about the dominant reason many parents decided to homeschool their children, never mind the lack of healthy social interaction ensuing.

Now, it's emerged that a new reason is compelling some parents to remove their children from established schools and homeschool their children: Schoolyard bullying, and schools failing to take proper corrective measures.

@ least in Scotland, according to The Sunday Post over there; they report where @ least 632 former state school students across Scotia are now being homeschooled, cf. only 352 five years ago. What's more, Scotland has no formal mandate requiring parents homeschooling their children to explain the reasons therefor to local educational authorities.

But then again, children's advertising can no longer make any suggestions or implications that those not having certain products so advertised will not be considered "in" or otherwise consider themselves targets for rejection, neglect or harrassment. Witness clause 47.3 of the CAP Non-Broadcast Advertising Code in Great Britain, for example (Clause 47, in general, deals with advertising targeting children):

Marketing communications addressed to, targeted at or featuring children should not exploit their credulity, loyalty, vulnerability or lack of experience:

a) they should not be made to feel inferior or unpopular for not buying the advertised product

b) they should not be made to feel that they are lacking in courage, duty or loyalty if they do not buy or do not encourage others to buy a particular product

c) it should be made easy for them to judge the size, characteristics and performance of any product advertised and to distinguish between real-life situations and fantasy

d) adult permission should be obtained before they are committed to purchasing complex and costly products.

And, in much the same vein, these provisions of clause 47.7 from the same code:

b) Marketing communications should neither try to sell to children by directly appealing to emotions such as pity, fear, or self-confidence nor suggest that having the advertised product somehow confers superiority, for example making a child more confident, clever, popular, or successful.

c) Marketing communications addressed to children should avoid high pressure and hard sell techniques; they should neither directly urge children to buy or persuade others to buy nor suggest that children could be bullied, cajoled or otherwise put under pressure to acquire the advertised item.

Meanwhile, in Canada, children's advertising is subject to clause 12 of the Canadian Code of Advertising Standards, per Advertising Standards Canada:

Advertising that is directed to children must not exploit their credulity, lack of experience or their sense of loyalty, and must not present information or illustrations that might result in their physical, emotional or moral harm.

Child-directed advertising in the broadcast media is separately regulated by the Broadcast Code for Advertising to Children, also administered by ASC. Advertising to children in Quebec is prohibited by the Quebec Consumer Protection Act.

The specific clauses of the aforementioned Quebec Consumer Protection Act banning children's advertising are clauses 248 and 249 of Section P-40.1_A, to wit:

Subject to what is provided in the regulations, no person may make use of commercial advertising directed at persons under thirteen years of age.

[***]

To determine whether or not an advertisement is directed at persons under thirteen years of age, account must be taken of the context of its presentation, and in particular of:

(a) the nature and intended purpose of the goods advertised;

(b) the manner of presenting such advertisement;

(c) the time and place it is shown.

The fact that such advertisement may be contained in printed matter intended for persons thirteen years of age and over or intended both for persons under thirteen years of age and for persons thirteen years of age and over, or that it may be broadcast during air time intended for persons thirteen years of age and over or intended both for persons under thirteen years of age and for persons thirteen years of age and over does not create a presumption that it is not directed at persons under thirteen years of age.

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IF THE RATHER CLOSE RESULT OF THE GUAM DEMOCRATIC CAUCUSES YESTERDAY IS ANY INDICATION, the likely result of who would win the Democratic Presidential nomination, Barack Obama or Hillary Rodham-Clinton, is still no clearer as the Indiana and North Carolina primaries approach on Tuesday.

In any case, the Pacific territory's Democratic caucuses saw Obama win by but seven votes over Rodham-Clinton, meaning both win two delegates each come the Democratic convention in Denver.

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RECOMMENDED READING FROM THE BLOGOSPHERE among such still hard-wired in their Zealotry and True Belief in energy self-sufficency: This particular item from Shakespeare's Sister, as seeks to deflate conservative talking points and memes about American petroleum self-sufficency with facts.

And Another Thing:

For those who see Abundant American Coal as the magic key to energy self-sufficency (especially as the basis of an ersatz gasoline, South African stylee), maybe it was time to ask how much longer before America sees "peak coal"--that point @ which American coal reserves have reached their plateau, only to go into decline thereafter. (Particularly so in the Appalachian coal-belt region and the lignite-coal fields of Montana, Wyoming and North Dakota; after a Major Mining Disaster in early 1959, the anthracite belt in northeastern Pennsylvania was written off as a major coal-production centre as mine after mine closed.)

Especially considering such a Grand Delusion as coal-derived ersatz gasolines requiring plenty of coal to produce profitable quantities without odour.     

PREVIOUSLY, READERS, YOUR CORRESPONDENT MENTIONED WHERE HE HAD DESIGNS ON RELOCATING THE LION'S SHARE OF ONLINE SHOPPING on this weblog to a new and dedicated site in the interest of improving download times.

(Meaning, in effect, that the online shopping on this weblog might be limited to the Chitika and Amazon.com facilities.)

I admit, though, that I'm looking for the right sort of place as would be willing to accomodate such an online mall. As in a free host with generous space, yet without forced banner or other advertising and decent uptime rates.

As for the likely name and stylee, I am thinking of these possibilities:

• Cybermallratz
• Cybermallrat Heaven
• Cybermallrat Paradise
• Cybermallrat Paradiso
• Calling All Cybermallratz
• Welcome Cybermallratz

Please let me know in the comments section what you think would be the best such before proceeding further. Even if the name turns out being a subdomain on a free host.

In the interim, your patience would be greatly appreciated.

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SOME OF YOU READERS OF THIS BLOG ARE LIKELY TO AGREE THAT THIS PARTICULAR SENTIMENT APPLIES TO YOUR CORRESPONDENT, especially those who see "society" qualified by a concept based on Neocon/Fascisti models (think Fox Prolefeed here) as excuse certain crude and offensive stereotypes being played against minorities and the vulnerable.

Among them such with psychoemotional disorders not rabbiting in the sheltered-workshop system (as if hoping such will "keep their mouths shut" towards a Greater Collective Good based on a deliberately ignorant brand of orthodoxy epitomised by the Newspeak term "goodthoughtful").

Such stereotypes essentially suggests that the Lower Classes can find work, but "aren't making any reasonable efforts" to do so, knowing that jobs are out there in the community when facts suggest otherwise. Or, put another way, are you expecting such who can't find work to consider selling Quixtar/Amway, unaware that the pyramid's likely to collapse any time now?

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SEEMS AS IF G-D CAN'T LEAVE THE "BIBLE BELT" ALONE, AND THEN SOME--as in the same areas of Arkansas, Mississippi and Alabama as were devastated by tornadoes back in February seeing a new round of tornadic destruction over the last couple of days.

As if He doesn't take too kindly for such supporting the Pseudoreligiopolitical Right and its articles of faith, never mind their agenda probably crossing the line into blasphemy and sacrelige--and worse.

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FIRST, IT WAS THE DANISH GAZETTA JYLLANDS-POSTEN ... LOOKS AS IF WORLDNETDAILY COULD BE THE NEXT target of Islamic wrath over displaying the "graven image" of the Prophet Muhammad (peace be upon him) in connexion with a forthcoming book release.

ConWebWatch explains how such targeted provocation is nothing short of deliberate on WorldNetDaily's part:

Joseph Farah certainly knows how to milk outrage for maximum publicity effect. Why else would he try to turn an incorrect claim made about him into a way to plug WorldNetDaily's newest book?

An April 21 WorldNetDaily article detailed WND Books' upcoming title, "Why We Left Islam," edited by Susan Crimp and Joel Richardson. The article eagerly points out that it's "the first U.S. book ever to feature an image of Muhammad on the cover." WND claims the book "contains brutally honest testimonies from former Muslims who have left the religion despite the threat of death. 'Why We Left Islam' shows the potentially ugly realities of living under the Islamic yoke." The article then goes on to cite some pre-emptive criticism of the book (repeated in an April 22 article):

"This book is put out by WND Publishing (sic), which promotes hate every day on its extremist anti-Muslim hate site," Ibrahim Hooper, spokesman for the Council on American-Islamic Relations, told the New York Daily News. "The editor is a guy who suggested air-dropping pig's blood over Afghanistan. There are 7 million American Muslims and over a billion worldwide who love Islam and practice it peaceably on a daily basis."

Joseph Farah, an Arab-American and the only person ever to serve as editor of WND, said, in response, he has never advocated air-dropping pig's blood over Afghanistan.

"CAIR can always be counted upon to make wildly untruthful and reckless claims about others, while maintaining a hypersensitivity about its own concerns," said Farah. "Here, for example, Hooper makes this claim that WND promotes anti-Muslim hate on its site every day, offering only one example – and that one is totally untrue. Why other responsible media outlets continue to offer CAIR a platform for making such outrageous statements is beyond me. How many CAIR staffers and officials need to be indicted and convicted before my colleagues recognize these people as the extremists they are?" 

But CAIR's claim is not as "totally untrue" as Farah portrays it. While Farah did not personally make the statement Hooper alleged, on Sept. 27, 2001, WND did publish a column by then-WND reporter Paul Sperry offering the following plan on how to defeat the Taliban:

Few in Washington want to admit it, but these Islamic fanatics have baited us into a holy war. And like it or not, we'll have to use their religion against them to win.

U.S. forces should start by dropping leaflets over Kabul, the capital of Afghanistan, warning residents, in their native Persian tongue, that we've enlisted Afghani moles to contaminate their water supplies with pig's blood.

The propaganda would also warn that American soldiers have greased their bullets with pork fat. We could tell them, while we're at it, that we've ordered special pigskin-lined fatigues for this mission.

At night, we could bombard bin Laden's camps with recordings of hog-snorting. If he and his fellow terrorists won't come out of their caves, send pen-loads of trotters in to nuzzle them.

Can't find bin Laden? Force-feed Taliban clerics pork rinds until they give up his location. If that doesn't work, air-lift pigs into their homes.

In the meantime, airlines could reupholster plane seats with pigskin, and cover cockpit yokes with the "unclean" hide to repel future Islamic hijackers. For insurance, serve passengers bacon bits instead of peanuts.

If their religion is driving them to hate Americans, and rewarding them to kill our people, then it's hardly indecent to use their faith against them to protect us.

Hit them where it hurts. They hit us where it hurts – and they're already planning to do it again.

They're not afraid of death. However, they are afraid of pigs. Send in the porkers, lock them out of Paradise, and watch them surrender.

Editor's note: Letters threatening physical harm to WorldNetDaily.com staffers will be forwarded to FBI Deputy Director Tom Pickard, who is heading the PENTTBOM investigation at the Special Information and Operation Center in Washington. 

For Farah to narrowly defend himself and portray CAIR's claim as completely baseless is disingenuous and a cynical attempt to sell books. Since WND is, for all practical purposes, less a "news" website than a platform to advance the personal views and agenda of its founder and editor--Farah--it's a logical assumption that Farah condones, if not approves, such actions, however much he tries to invoke some sort of plausible deniability.

Farah then went on to add: "If Muslims rioted around the world after a Danish newspaper published a political cartoon making fun of Muhammad, what will they do in response to this?"

Of course, the only reason to put Muhammad on the cover of a book is to be provocative--and, thus, gin up book sales from the controversy. Seeing the Danish controversy with dollar signs in his eyes, Farah obviously wanted to get the same reaction for WND Books' latest title, and what better way to generate some cheap publicity than a little religious blasphemy? (Hey, it worked for Madonna.) It seems that Farah is almost begging for those riots so he can sell more books.

Farah ratcheted things up in an April 24 column, declaring that "I never suggested, stated, hinted or even thought about air-dropping pig's blood over Afghanistan," announced he was "publicly demand[ing] a correction be issued" and asking his readers for advice on whether he should sue CAIR and the New York Daily News for libel--but never mentioning Sperry's WND column.

But then again, there's always the possibility that such outrage by Muslims as Mr. Farah imagineth could be a blessing in disguise, so to speak, for such critics of the conservative perversion of "new media," based all the more upon misguided ideological convictions reinforced by lies, doublethink and offensive stereotypes.

Especially considering where the likely target, ultimately, is a conservative "news portal" holding Islamophobia as a Holy of Holies in serving the (howbeit warped) defence of such a failed concept as the White Male Christian Power Structure, fuelled for the most part by alcohol, drugs, gaming debts and/or failing to come to terms with childhood psychoemotional or psychosexual abuse.

Besides, how would psychoemotional abuse help with "character development"?

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MR. "NO-SPIN ZONE," CAUGHT IN HIS OWN LIE (AGAIN!), with thanks to Think Progress for the hat tip:

[On the 29th ultimate], Fox News host Bill O'Reilly made the incredible claim that the United States never invaded Iraq: "We didn't invade Iraq." He added, "It was a declaration of war, it was a declaration to enforce the first Gulf War Treaty."

[***]

Despite O'Reilly's revisionist history, the United States did invade Iraq. The U.S. military forcefully entered the country in order to overthrow that nation's leader. That's an invasion. During a 2006 speech, President Bush discussed his administration's "two major invasions as a part of the war on terror."

Even O'Reilly himself has, in the past, admitted that the United States invaded Iraq:

NEWSHOUNDS (MOTTO: "WE WATCH FOX SO YOU DON'T HAVE TO") HAD WHAT AMOUNTS TO A SCOOP THE OTHER DAY as revealed a serious lapsus linguæ on Bill "No-Spin Zone" O'Reilly's part which, under normal circumstances, could be enough to arouse scandal.

As it should:

O'Reilly states the obvious, but just in case some of the "no-spin" true believers still don't get it:

He gives OPINIONS. Contrary to what the ad says, he doesn't deal in "only facts," he gives OPINIONS. So the grand title of "Number One show in cable NEWS" is pretty much a misnomer; he's got the Number One show in cable news-related OPINION.

O'Reilly wants to present himself as the ultimate trustworthy source, bashing other networks and individuals in journalism (Bill Moyers, for example). But all he's got are his opinions, and you know what they say: they're like assholes - everybody's got one. Why is his trumpeted all over the nation? Because he presents it in a bombastic, some say entertaining, manner, and he preaches to a like-minded audience. He and Jeremiah Wright actually have much in common, in that regard.

So where's the outrage?

(Better yet: Why not whip up some outrage, come to think of it, by sharing this item with your friends and contacts? Just remember to do so responsibly.)

CONSERVATIVE TALKBACK RADIO HOST NEAL BOORTZ IS NOT THE KIND TO TAKE TOO KINDLY TO THE LOWER CLASSES IN PARTICULAR, especially such forced out of New Orleans thanks to Hurricane Katrina in 2005: Media Matters for America has duly noted where Mr. Boortz suggested that a Hurricane Katrina refugee in Atlanta consider Mrs. Warren's Profession as her meal ticket out of State welfare, and has dismissed the Lower Ninth Ward diaspora as "worthless parasites" (yes, he did use that phrase; hear the recording and/or read the transcription if you don't believe me).

The former item is enough to wonder if Mr. Boortz has in mind as a cheap and cheerful way to wean "chronic and habitual" welfare families off "failed and failing" systems of State welfare and towards self-reliance and personal responsibility the likes of what the following recent "WaiWai" item per the Mainichi Daily News of Tokyo recorded, questions of its general credibility notwithstanding:

There's nothing particularly new about the problem of enjo-kosai--or "compensated dating," as teen prostitution has been euphemistically referred to by its practitioners since first observed around 1990. But even Shukan Taishu (3/24) was aghast over the events that took place in Kuki City, Saitama Prefecture, last month.

On Feb. 21, the city's juvenile police section pounced on--sorry, let's make that "apprehended"--a 17-year-old girl we'll call "Eiko," on suspicion of violating the several statutes related to abetting prostitution by minors.

Police allege that over a period of two months, Eiko and several male cohorts operated a ring that peddled three girls, all runaways, to an estimated 70 johns, who paid approximately ¥1.6 million for sex.

The system was set up as a deri-heru ("delivery health," i.e. outcall sex), with Eiko's male confederates driving the teen hookers to hotels for assignations with waiting johns. The men also served as the girls' bodyguards.

"The johns paid ¥30,000 to ¥50,000 a session," said the police source. "The girl's share of the take ranged from ¥5,000 to ¥10,000." Peanuts, considering the nature of the work involved.

Eiko's profitable arrangement had operators of professional "delivery health" services shaking their heads in astonishment.

According to Shukan Taishu, Eiko--a runaway and hooker herself--started as a rank-and-file floozy, achieved some upward mobility and moved up to managing madame. Using a cell phone to oversee operations, she worked out of the home of a 22-year-old construction worker with whom she cohabited, and who was also arrested.

"All together she recruited three runaway girls via her cell phone, ages 13, 14 and 15," says the police source.

Reiji Toono, author of romantic novels read by teenage girls, including one titled "Another Love--The 'Enko' Life of a Middle-school Hooker," tells Shukan Taishu that such a case, of a teenage madame running teen hookers, is so rare that even he was astonished.

"It's not unusual to see a man living with a young woman force her into prostitution and rake off a portion of her earnings," says Toono. "But it's quite remarkable for a 17-year old girl to be so astute and wind up running the operation."

"That type of self-operated teenage hooker operation is probably just the tip of a huge iceberg," says the operator of an Internet site. "New regulations have forced the most obvious offenders, like the 'encounter' sites, to shut down or monitor activities to avoid penalties, but the compliance is merely what's visible on the surface."

The operator goes on to explain that the action has shifted to password-protected sites or blogs where the participants can exchange information. "Even on what appears to be ordinary electronic bulletin boards, people with sex for sale will drop in special code words. Parents and teachers who review the sites for harmful contents don't really have any idea of what they're reading--the naughty stuff is there, it's all over the place."

There is, moreover, ample evidence that girls have started selling sex from an increasingly earlier age. "Of police busts of juvenile prostitution, the ratio is about 50-50 between middle school girls and high school girls, but for some years the middle schoolers slightly outnumber their elders," says a reporter for a nationally circulated daily.

The current law banning sex with females under age 18 provides for imprisonment of up to two years and/or a fine of up to ¥1 million for offenders. These penalties, however, do not seem to be much of a deterrent.

"When, as an experiment, staff at a certain social research organization went into two encounter sites posing as a teenage girl, they attracted 138 private messages from men in the first hour," says the aforementioned site operator. "Of these, 64 were blatant invitations to engage in enjo kosai."

But lust for budding young bodies has another downside for the men, as it is also making them increasingly vulnerable to entrapment and extortion by teen gangs, as well as physical assaults.

Girls in these "enko circles" tie up with boyfriends and scheme to set up commuters by tantalizing them into groping a girl on a crowded train.

"For example, a girl wearing a school uniform will intentionally rub up against some man and encourage him to grope her," explains Toono. "Then afterwards a team of several youths will tail the man to a park or somewhere and put the squeeze on him. It's a new kind of badger game."

Since the man did, in fact, actually grope the girl on the train, the chances his being successfully extorted are even greater, since a payout of ¥50,000 is still getting off cheaper than fighting criminal charges and time in jail.

So watch out, Shukan Taishu warns its male readers. These new teen shakedown operations--running in packs, at ever-younger ages, and with increasingly vicious extortion methods--portend nothing but trouble.

Sounds almost like an exploitation film plot coming from the minds of, say, Russ "King Leer" Myers, Samuel L. Bronkowitz and those of the giallo genre.... 

THOUGH IT MAY BE WELL OVER THREE MONTHS NOW BEFORE THE 2008 EDITION OF THE GREAT MINNESOTA GET-TOGETHER, otherwise known as the Minnesota State Fair, throws open its gates to the world for Twelve Days of Fun Ending Labour Day, maybe it was time to offer up some challenges to not just the management of TGMnGT, but also to visitors thereof.

Anyway, here goes:

• The 53rd consecutive State Fair to see a run-of-fair admission of over 1 million visitors through the turnstiles.
• Having @ least 100,000 visitors through the turnstiles every day of the run, especially so Opening Day.
• @ least one single-day attendance record broken.
• Every vendor of "on-the-stick" foods as are deep-fried in hot oils using trans-fat-free such. And recycling such for use in biodiesel.
• "Throwing down the gauntlet," so to speak, in challenging the Mall of America and The Dales (Southdale, Brookdale, Rosedale and Ridgedale) to see if they can generate more retail sales and leads for future sales than TGMnGT does across its 12-day run, considering where TGMnGT's retailing space encompasses several buildings throughout the State Fairgrounds--to wit:
  • Varied Industries (two levels under the Grandstand);
  • Merchandise Mart;
  • Home Improvement;
  • Modern Living Building;
  • Heritage Square;
  • Progress Centre;
  • the New International Bazaar;
  • Machinery Hill;
  • the several Livestock Pavilions;
  • Warner Coliseum;
  • Creative Activities Building;
  • the MSF Gift Shop in Visitor Plaza;
  • Steichen's Grocery;
  • the Food Building; and
  • various stand-alone booths, tents, etc., throughout the Fairgrounds.
• One "breakaway" among the new "on-the-stick" foods as are introduced during TGMnGT 2008.
• Getting some serious rehabilitation work for once done beforehand on the ramp heading to the Grandstand. Even if such is of Depression-era WPA vintage.
• Sales of bottled water surpassing those of soft drinks during the run of fair.
• @ least one "viral video" off YouTube and suchlike as was taken on the Minnesota State Fairgrounds.
• Some serious press attention being given Fairchild and Fairborne, TGMnGT's mascots, beyond the twice-daily "meet-and-greets" in Visitor Plaza and subsequent cut-ups along the Fairgrounds, which can get to be interesting in their own right.
• Increased numbers of TGMnGT visitors using Metro Transit regular-route and special services, particularly so considering the high prices of gasoline and oil. Especially so the State Fair Express services from park-and-ride lots on the periphery.

Care to take up the challenge, TGMnGT?

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(OR MAYBE NOT, @ LEAST HERE IN THE MINNWISSIPPI--ESPECIALLY SO AMONG farmers and planters wanting to get their planting in. Or as much as they hope to get in, unless they have designs on taking land out of production because of high fuel and fertiliser prices in exchange for Federal subsidies to that effect.)

Some thunder rumbled through before midnight last evening, but it's mostly just a haze as I write you here in the Minnwissippi. In any case, rain is being called for thru the day, and maybe the odd residual shower into tomorrow.

Still, though, trees and shrubs are starting to show their buds as we welcome the world, or as much of it as is willing to pay $3.50/gallon for gas of late, for the 100 Mile Garage Sale this weekend (encompassing the area along both sides of the Mississippi between Winona and Red Wing on the Minnesota such ... and, on the Wisconsin, between Fountain City and Diamond Bluff.

(Which, if you ask, is across the Mississippi from Red Wing, just past the Hager City/Bay City ur-connurbation.)

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FINALLY! RESULTS FROM ZIMBABWE'S MARCH PRESIDENTIAL ELECTIONS--and they're not pretty for pretty much anybody involved.

For starters, opposition Presidential candidate Morgan Tsvangirai (Movement for Democratic Change) won the majority of votes ... but the Zimbabwean Electoral Commission qualified the result, noting where Mr. Tsvangirai did not have the requisite 50.1% majority necessary to avoid a runoff round.

The runoff involving, more than likely, the longtime dictator Robert Mugabe (ZANU-PF) ... and in any case, expect a rather nasty brand of Katzenjammer ensuing in the runup. Unless some class of a power-sharing agreement can be brokered to avoid further violence and disorder as would make the Rwandan Genocide of the mid-1990's look like Six Flags.

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WHY YOU CAN'T EXACTLY TRUST ANYTHING LABELLED "MADE IN MACAU" TO BE THE REAL McCOY: Your Correspondent was listening this morning to the BBC World Service this morning, and took note of an item where the European Union announced imposition of penalty tariffs on shoe imports from the former Portugese colony-turned-Special Administrative Region of the so-called "People's Republic of China" per the "One China, Two Systems" doctrine.

The item noted in hindsight where Macau, whose economy has long been reliant on gaming-related tourism (especially after the long-standing monopoly on casinos by Stanley Ho's STDM group was abolished in 2002), has also been a rather convenient port by which Chinese manufacturers (and, to a minor extent, those in Hong Kong) can get around import quotas and tariff restrictions by having the surplus production of export goods shipped to special warehouses in Macau and then relabelled "Made in Macau" for the sake of deception. After all, Macau has never had much of a manufacturing base, even during its nearly 400 years of Portugese colonial rule; as just noted, gaming-related tourism (particularly so from across the Asia-Pacific region) has long been Macau's socioeconomic foundation, with the revenues surpassing those of Las Vegas in 2006 thanks, no doubt, to a weak and undermining dollar.

In any case, Macau has long been one of those "gray areas" in the foreign-trade arena as have been nothing short of embarrassment to customs inspectors and collectors over the years--particularly so as a "back door" by which China could secretly export goods to the United States between the start of Communist rule in 1949 and the abolition of trade restrictions in the early 1980's by relabelling such as "Made in Macau" when such wasn't the case. Especially so the likes of goods made under forced or convict labour, which are always denied entry into the United States.

Has anybody considered studying this potentially embarrasing "bait-and-switch" in Chinese trade by which China used and useth Macau to bypass trade restrictions and interception risks through clever relabelling?

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HOW FITTINGLY APROPOS FOR A CITY REBUILDING ITSELF FROM TORNADIC DEVASTATION exactly one year ago today:

Greensburg, Kansas has decided to take advantage of its name and, in rebuilding and reinventing itself after tornadic devastation, has taken a "green" (environmental) approach, and then some.

As in mandating the use of energy-efficent construction techniques and appliances and making the widest possible use of renewable energy sources, especially so wind and solar power, in Greensburg's reconstruction. Not just residentially, but also @ the local school and commercial and government buildings.

So much so, in fact, that local officials are hoping to use envirotourism as a socioeconomic tool to attract business, not to mention hoping to keep the local kids in and around Kiowa County and not move to "the big city" (as in the likes of Wichita, Oklahoma City, Tulsa, Denver or even Kansas City) just to find decent jobs.

Not exactly Radiator Springs, Arizona ... but certainly, for Greensburg, the name is an apt fit. Even if their original claim to fame is being home to the World's Largest Hand-Dug Water Well.)

(As for driving down that way, it's off I-70, Kansas exit 159 @ Hays and then south along US 183 for 95 mile or so. And along the way, there's opportunity for worthwhile detours such as the Barbed Wire Museum in LaCrosse and Fort Larned National Historic Site.

(Traffic coming from the south and east should consider the Kansas Turnpike, a/k/a I-35, to Exit 53 on the east side of Wichita, thence following US 54/400 [known in Wichita as Kellogg Drive] westerly for about 111 miles.

(From the west, take I-25 to Colorado exit 100A in Pueblo, then following US 50 easterly via LaJunta, Rocky Ford, Lamar [whence US 400 picks up], Garden City and Dodge City [taking some time to stroll around Historic Front Street and other sites of note in the Queen of the Cow Towns], whence you continue on US 400 into Greensburg; 320 miles being the net distance.)

As for more specific driving directions from your particular neck of the woods towards Greensburg, try MapQuest for starters.