Image: source.

Congress continues to edge closer to putting the control of tobacco products under the FDA's purview.

Left: from Frank Kameny's collection of gay rights memorabilia, on display in Washington D.C.

Women, negotiate your salary! Thanks to LL and BB for enlightening me to the lack of bargaining done by women when it comes to getting the salary we deserve.

Tarantino and Pitt to adapt "Girl With A Dragon Tattoo" (a book I enjoyed)?

  
I'm Done Asking. It's Time to Tell. No, make that "Demand": "I'm sick and tired of "asking" for our civil rights. I am appalled at LGBTQ kids getting murdered or committing suicide because they are "queer" to their classmates. I am more than disgusted at having the "voters" decide who I can and cannot love, all the while taking our tax dollars to pay for our nation's schools, infrastructure and ever-expanding needs."

Image: source.

Black Keys working with Mos Def?  Interesting....

Youth Behind Bars: "In this 100-page report, Human Rights Watch found that in many cases where juveniles were prosecuted with an adult, the youth received heavier sentences than their adult codefendants. There are 227 inmates in California sentenced as juveniles to life in prison without parole."

Choose Your Own Adventure turns 30.

New Sarah Haskins! 'Target Women' on Fairytale-Themed Food Commercials: "So ladies, just relax; someday your prince is gonna come and he's gonna bring a fun product and when he does you'll live happily ever after!"

A Brief History of the Radical, Violent Right: How Racist Hate Groups Joined Up with Abortion Terrorists: "Alleged murderer Scott Roeder was once a white separatist before he became an anti-choice zealot -- many others have followed the same deadly path."

Above: I want to go to there.

I like this idea: "What can you teach me?"

"There is invisible writing on the back of the diploma you will receive, and in case you didn't bring lemon juice to decode it, I can tell you what it says: YOU ARE BRILLIANT, AND THE EARTH IS HIRING. The earth couldn't afford to send any recruiters or limos to your school. It sent you rain, sunsets, ripe cherries, night blooming jasmine, and that unbelievably cute person you are dating. Take the hint. And here's the deal: Forget that this task of planet-saving is not possible in the time required. Don't be put off by people who know what is not possible. Do what needs to be done, and check to see if it was impossible only after you are done." - Paul Hawken, University of Portland, May 3, 2009.

"The world shifts under our feet. The rules change. Not the Bill of Rights, or the rules of tenting, but the big unspoken truths of a generation. Exhaled by culture, taken in like oxygen, we hold these truths to be self-evident: You get what you pay for. Success is everything. Work is what you do for money, and that’s what counts. How could it be otherwise? And the converse of that last rule, of course, is that if you’re not paid to do a thing, it can’t be important. If a child writes a poem and proudly reads it, adults may wink and ask, “Think there’s a lot of money in that?” You may also hear this when you declare a major in English. Being a good neighbor, raising children: the road to success is not paved with the likes of these. Some workplaces actually quantify your likelihood of being distracted by family or volunteerism. It’s called your coefficient of Drag. The ideal number is zero. This is the Rule of Perfect Efficiency.

Now, the rule of “Success” has traditionally meant having boatloads of money. But we are not really supposed to put it in a boat. A house would the customary thing. Ideally it should be large, with a lot of bathrooms and so forth, but no more than four people. If two friends come over during approved visiting hours, the two children have to leave. The bathroom-to-resident ratio should at all times remain greater than one. I’m not making this up, I’m just observing, it’s more or less my profession. As Yogi Berra told us, you can observe a lot just by watching. I see our dream-houses standing alone, the idealized life taking place in a kind of bubble. So you need another bubble, with rubber tires, to convey yourself to places you must visit, such as an office. If you’re successful, it will be a large, empty-ish office you don’t have to share. If you need anything, you can get it delivered. Play your cards right and you may never have to come face to face with another person. This is the Rule of Escalating Isolation.

And so we find ourselves in the chapter of history I would entitle: Isolation and Efficiency, and How They Came Around to Bite Us in the Backside."

Barbara Kingsolver, May 11, 2008, Duke University.

Make your own recycled t-shirt necklace (after all my praise).

There is only one clinic in Mississippi where a woman can obtain a legal abortion - and, of course, it's being protested.

Awesome brews coming out this summer, especially those from Dogfish.

And on that note, upcoming beer fests in Boston.

Berlin by bike.

Image: left, William Merritt Chase.

NYTimes: the value of education in a recession.

I love the use of jars for outdoor lighting.

James Franco as Allen Ginsburg in the upcoming Howl.  Interesting...

Time for a 90's revival!

Yay!  New Poirot surfaces.

Sounds yummy: Nilla wafer s'mores.

Santogold speaks out in support of mixtapes.  Sweet.

"I'm Confused": Dance Homophobia, Gender Rigidity, and "So You Think You Can Dance"

Image: source.

Image: source.

Gay marriage legal in The Sims 3.

Driving the Alaska Highway - ultimate roadtrip!

More than a dozen charges dropped in the Shepard Fairey case.  

Image: the epitome of cool.

Very interesting criticism of Sotomayor, from Mother Jones: "[W]hile [Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor] is clearly a bright and talented lawyer, she unfortunately lacks one of the key qualities of a successful Supreme Court justice: writing skills. To put it bluntly, Sotomayor doesn’t write very well. . . . Sotomayor’s opinions read like she’s still following a formula she learned in college and show little of the smart narratives employed by the federal judiciary’s brightest lights."

Have federal student loans? "If you have a bunch of variable rate Federal student loans, July 1st could be your lucky day. July 1st is when the interest rates on Federal student loans changes, and one financial id expert is predicting they're going to drop to "historic lows." What this means is you will have an opportunity to consolidate your variable rate Federal student loans together at the new, lower, rate, and save yourself some cash."

Police Swarm Tiananmen Square to Bar Protests: China appeared determined to prevent commemoration of the 20th anniversary of the military crackdown.

Unreal: "This week Chelsea Sarvis, a female student in Chapin, SC, won the right to wear pants to her high school graduation. No, seriously, this really happened this past week, and at a public school. It only feels like 1950. Apparently the principal, Mike Satterfield initially backed the school’s antiquated dress code, which forbids girls from wearing pants, even dress pants, at the commencement ceremony."

Left: saw this pic and immediately recognized it - this is from a corner in Miami's up and coming Design District.  Very cool.

Ricotta donuts?  Oh yum...

Noooo! They are going to start charging for Hulu! Boo. I get that it seems crazy to offer the service for free, but really Hulu has gotten me hooked on so many shows I might never have watched otherwise, AND there is advertising on the site so it's not like it's profit-less...

On the spiritual benefits of anger.

Yay for pedestrian-only zones in Times  Square - great idea.

A gorgeous bag from the awesome online shop Bona Drag.

Nothing says summer like America's best barbeque.

The anti-choice playbook, if you can stand to read it.

How celebrity weight battles hurt women everywhere.

Make your own body scrub.

From the NY Review of Books, America's Prisons, Is There Hope?

Moneygami!

Donate to the National Network of Abortion Funds in honor of the life and service of assassinated abortion provider, Dr. Tiller. h/t Rogue Femme.

Image: great movie.

I'm not entirely convinced of Sonia Sotomayor's excellence (it seems to me that Obama had some more exciting and intellectually accomplished nominees to choose from), but the media coverage of her nomination has been fascinating.  When I read it this morning I thought this excerpt from an interview with Judge Calebresi (who has known Sotomayor since she was a first-year law student in his torts class and has served with her on the 2nd Circuit for 12 years) was interesting:

LAW TRIBUNE: People have criticized Judge Sotomayor as being brusque.

CALABRESI: When she first came on, there were some lawyers who said that about her manner on the bench. I started keeping track of what she was saying and what my male colleagues were saying. [What they were saying] was identical. There are some lawyers who don't like to be questioned hard by a woman. It's just as simple as that. It's a sign that Sonia will just be herself.

It's nice to see someone as established as Calabresi observing the obvious sexism still rampant in the legal world.  I'll definitely be tuned in for the entirety of the nomination process.

Great artists sketchbooks.

Cheap eats in London.

Left: source.

Fending Off the Mortgage Industry: Savvy Activists Are Winning in Court and on the Streets, Keeping People in Their Homes: How one Detroit community group is saving homes and protecting human rights over the right of a corporation to make a profit.

A guide to literary Paris.

A collection of posters from the Works Progress Administration.

"Self-loathing is not a fucking character-builder. It doesn’t make you stronger. It doesn’t make you better. It’s just an ever-deepening, creepy-ass trap; a trap that is a huge moneymaker for corporations that do not have and never will have good intentions. You’re not disgusting. You’re not freakish. You’re not ugly. And you’re never going to be perfect. And holy shit, that is so okay." —Jane from Casual Blasphemies, in an awesome post about Kirstie Alley (h/t the awesome Shapely Prose).

Yay, New Hampshire!

"A lot of New Hampshire families have come to know people in their families who are gay -- co-workers, former classmates -- and that's what really made this difference. We are no longer talking about an issue. We are talking about people."

- Rt. Rev. Gene Robinson, Episcopal bishop of New Hampshire, the church's only openly gay bishop

Five transwomen have been killed in Memphis since 2006.

Sarah Haskins recommends one of my favorite books, The Magus.

Harvard endows first LGBT studies chair at a U.S. university.

Bars with photobooths in NYC!

Left: source.

Fancy!  Lego does Falling Water.

On homeless people and the internet.

Hold Bill O'Reilly accountable for his war against Dr. Tiller.  Read Dr. Tiller in his own words.

Study shows that communication between fathers and daughter affects the daughters' romantic relationships.

I was supposed to go to Tupelo last night for dinner but it was a two hour wait!  Instead, we headed to Hungry Mother, and I have absolutely no complaints!  I had a wonderful dinner of cheesy grits, perfectly cooked greens, sweet cornbread, a cold pint of beer, etc....Delicious food and perfect service, for a pretty reasonable price.  I'll definitely be back.

Above: good advice.

Do "Hispanic" and "Latina" mean the same thing? Short answer: no.

From Salon, Sotomayor on abortion. Related? Sotomayor may be the 6th Catholic sitting on the Court, if confirmed.

Left: the WONDERFUL Musee D'Orsay.

The PS22 Chorus takes on "Landslide" (one of those guaranteed weepy songs...)

Awesome jewelry from Laura Lombardi.

Yay! Amy Poehler's Smart Girls added to Hulu.

Find out how far your food traveled to get to your plate.

Animators, how about a female heroine who's not a princess?

"Life size blue whale website: The site slowly loads and scrolls down the body of a blue whale in life size proportion, as if it it were swimming right behind your laptop. Just looking at it’s eye I felt helplessly tiny."

Love it: Legal Aid Lawyer Wins New Yorker Caption Contest for Third Time.

Image: source.

"As long as the promise of equality for all remains unfulfilled, all Americans are affected. If we can work together to advance the principles upon which our Nation was founded, every American will benefit. During LGBT Pride Month, I call upon the LGBT community, the Congress, and the American people to work together to promote equal rights for all, regardless of sexual orientation or gender identity." -President Barack Obama

Nice talk, let's see you walk the walk, President.