On Vacation, Be Back Soon . . .

Paris:
Blois:

Great Art: The Egg's Nest, High Falls, NY

The Egg's Nest Restaurant, High Falls, NY:Outside Entrance:Inside Entrance: Outside Parking Lot:Getting ready to hike up Belleayre Mountain in search of magical rainbows:Do you see the rainbow in this picture?:

People & Power: Extraordinary Antics

The CIA is on trial in Italy for the use of 'extraordinary rendition'.
Part I:

Part II:

Consumer Activism: Sunscreen Causes Cancer

CONSUMERS BE WARNED: Most sunscreen products actually *promote* cancer and do not prevent it. The sunscreen marketing machine is in full swing this summer, trying to convince people to put cancer-causing chemicals on their skin while blocking the absorption of sunlight that generates vitamin D in the skin (a nutrient that prevents more than 75% of all cancers). Get the truth about sunscreen and cancer in this eye-opening report, and please forward this to your friends. Also in the article: a recommendation for a natural, alternative sunscreen product containing no toxic chemicals.

NewsTarget/Mike Adams article here.

Consumer Activism: ? Non-Organic May Soon Be Organic

The USDA is considering a list of 38 non-organic ingredients that will be permitted in organic foods.

"The list includes 19 food colorings, two starches, casings for sausages and hot dogs, fish oil, chipotle chili pepper, gelatin and a host of obscure ingredients."

Organic food advocates have been fighting to block approval of some or all of the proposed ingredients, saying consumers would be misled.

"This proposal is blatant catering to powerful industry players who want the benefits of labeling their products 'USDA organic' without doing the work to source organic materials," said Ronnie Cummins, executive director of the Organic Consumers Assn. of Finland, Minn., a nonprofit group that boasts 850,000 members."

Read the full story here.

Great Art: Women In Art

500 Years of Female Portraits in Western Art:

Sent to me by the most beautiful man in Greenwich Village.

Film: Connecticut Is Helping the Movie Industry

From The Hartford Courant today:

Lawmakers voted to extend a popular tax credit for the movie industry in Connecticut to include businesses that produce music recordings, digital media and sound recordings for movies. The state Senate was expected to adopt the measure later in the night.

"The talk is out there that Connecticut can truly become 'Hollywood East,' said House Speaker James Amann, the bill's leading proponent. "We have the incentives, creativity and location to develop a long-term industry here and add billions of dollars to Connecticut's economy."

Since the original incentives took effect last July 1, the state has reaped more than $96 million from film, television and commercial production, according to the Connecticut Commission on Culture and Tourism. Most recently, ESPN's "The Bronx is Burning," a television mini-series about the 1977 New York Yankees, was shot in Norwich.

Filming begins in Darien on June 11th for "Revolutionary Road" starring Leonardo DiCaprio, Kate Winslet and Philip Seymour Hoffman.

The film is based on the Richard Yates novel.

Health Care: 22 Arrested After Health Care Sit-Ins

Quotes from The Hartford Courant today:

Activists Shake Up Capitol With Sit-Ins For Health Care

On one of the busiest days of the year at the state Capitol, 22 demonstrators were arrested Friday as they called for universal health care and a single-payer health system.

The activists were taken into custody at various locations throughout the building, prompting the heaviest police presence at the Capitol this year.

The activists noted that Governor Jodi Rell has not embraced universal health care as a way to provide coverage for an estimated 400,000 uninsured.

"We have to get universal health care," said Brian Petronella, who was among those arrested.

I wish I had been invited to this . . . damn.

What would your health care providers say about this?

I wonder how many of them think like this? :

"There is no right to benefits or a right to health care," Senate Republican Minority Leader Louis C. DeLuca once said after an anti-Walmart demonstration in Connecticut. "We have what is called the free enterprise system in this country. People are not forced to work for anybody."

Sadly, many health care professionals actually feel this way too.

But what about the people who can't work at all because they are too ill? How do they survive in this 'free enterprise system'?

I say health care for everyone in Connecticut . . . click here.