Some times when you create a problem, it can be redefined to create a profit. Here is a case in point:
Above, The Leaning Tower of Pisa, is a remnant of Renaissance architecture and poor rendition. The tower began leaning to the southeast soon after the onset of construction in 1173 due to a poorly laid foundation and loose substrate that has allowed the foundation to shift direction. The maximum tilt, before realignment was performed from 1990 through 2001 was 5.5 °. Its tilt was the basis of rabid tourism for the city of Pisa (Lemonade from lemons).
This was partially “corrected” to a tilt of about 4 °. Why was the tower not rendered to a perfect vertical? Think about it – Pisa would have been left with a lemon.
This is our open thread. Please feel free to offer your own comments on this or any other topic.
TheZoo 
What is odd is that the builders just kept on building even though the tower was leaning during construction. Were they prescient enough to know that this leaning tower would draw tourists?
Mason-Dixon Shows Alex Sink Up By Seven Over Healthcare Crook Rick Scott For Florida Governor
That last part sounds like RCP is indulging in wishful thinking. Scott may get a pass from registered Republicans for his past criminal activity, but Dems and Independents are not likely to be as forgiving.
I would submit that voters preferred Charlie Crist because he is a moderate, and Sink is much closer to Crist than is Scott. Plus, even though Florida didn’t allow drilling off their own coast, Republican policy nearly ruined their beaches and a shift is taking place because of it.
Still, having a Democrat as governor of Florida could only be overshadowed a bit by having one here in Alabama!
The first fall flooding I have seen in Wisconsin in 50 odd years. The northern part has peaked and the southern areas should peak today. Totally bizarre.
Off to my Geography exam — wish me luck!!!
Good luck, Zooey!
Good luck Zoo – hope you have a map to where your exam is….. (the cheap shots are the best!)
Hooda, I’ve only lived in the upper midwest for 20 years now, but this is certainly the worst fall flooding I’ve seen in that time as well.
Just crazy. The Minnesota River is expected to crest in my area over next few days. On the way in, I could definitely see it’s near the top of it’s banks already.
Bill Maher’s New Rule: Rich People Who Complain About Being Vilified Should Be Vilified
Wow…
Thanks ‘Muse, that was funny! I had to ditch HBO as a cost-reducing measure, so I only get the Real Time clips that are allowed on the ‘tubes.
Muse that was good. Read a few comments too – the a**clown going on about whether goverment could use the money…. I thought that balancing the budget and reducing the deficit was the idea – shouldn’t Ben Stein cough up and be a patriot to do his bit on deficit reduction?
Ben Stein is a lying sack of… and like Glenn Beck, needs to be c***-punched.
“Freedom isn’t free.” So why do so many refuse to pay their fair share of taxes? The rich rarely fight the damned wars, the least they could do is pay for them.
Looks like Lindsey Lohan is back in jail, this time, she’s there until at least Oct. 22, when her next hearing is scheduled. Four weeks! Maybe more.
Poor little dope fiend. In other news, Paris Hilton was denied entry to Japan because of a recent drug conviction. What a bunch of charmers we have as “celebrities.”
I’ve always been a cheapskate when it comes to political donations, especially to out-of-state candidates. This is the first year when I’ve made multiple contributions in response to emails–just now made a contribution to Chris Coons in Delaware. I’m deeply concerned about the GOP/tea party taking over both houses of Congress. Voting isn’t enough, especially in Oregon, where no Democrat is at risk, at least on the federal level. Ron Wyden and Earl Blumenauer? I’m surprised anyone bothers to run against them.
Besides, this time Al Franken asked.
Walt, coming back to your Leaning Tower… apart form your ‘follow the money’ trail, there may be an engineering reason why the tower was not straightened…. the builders knew they were in trouble as they were building it and they tried to compensate for the lean by leaning the upper floors the other way.
Didn’t work of course, but the statics of the building may now suggest that 4 degrees is actually the right lean for the building….
Nope, I read up on it – Walt’s right. There’s no Lire in straightening the tower…..
I think what troubles me most about the current political situation is the fact that the only thing that counts anymore is accumulation of wealth — money and the power that goes with it. The well-being of The People in general counts for nothing among the monied, the powerful; in fact, those who need help to survive, to eat, to fight off disease, to find a roof are deemed lazy bums by those who care for nothing but money.
And worse are the politicians who pay homage only to those with the big bucks; worse are the court justices who rule that corporations are people and thereby entitled to further line the pockets of the already powerful with as much money as they care to invest. It’s fine to piss away a trillion per year on the American war machine — on the potential for mass murder — even as it’s a wasteful travesty to help people pay for medical care, to pay for educating children, to pay for maintaining infrastructure, to pay for research into alternative energy sources in order to secure a vibrant future.
Funny how things work. Two years ago I had the distinct feeling that the majority of Americans had finally figured it out, that they had managed to conclude that it’s The People, not the reservoirs of money and power that define the worth of a nation. When those priorities are reversed, the nation immediately starts to sink into the mire of corruption — as had been the case the previous eight years. So, there was an outpouring of votes for Change. And after two years, the focus has again been diverted back to the enduring Greed is Good philosophy even as unemployment remains frighteningly high, as technology flees these shores, as what once was an amazingly innovative nation becomes little more than haven for political and financial scam artists, as the middle class revisits the Grapes of Wrath yet one more time.
And a sizable percentage of The People have come to believe that that’s the way things should be.
Praise Jesus and privatize Social Security.
Disappointing.
Hey Frugal! Your post made me think of this:
Thanks for the link, Muse. Why is it that Comedians speak the truth to lies and the press just promotes the lies?
frugal… I’m beginning to believe that America is in the decline. All empires fall at some point. There was a saying that the sun never sets on the British Empire and look at the British Empire now. We, too, may beginning to feel the price of an over extended military and the widening of the gap between the rich and the poor. I’ve left out mentioning the middle class because the middle class is shrinking faster than a deflating balloon.
I’ve put a lot of energy into politics in the last 8 years and I’m beginning to feel too old to continue fighting the battle to save democracy. It is time for the younger generations to wake up and stop whining. It is their future that is truly on the line. If I lose my Social Security, then I’m moving in with my children. This may happen to many other families. The younger generations are the ones that will live with the negative consequences of living in a corporatacracy instead of a democracy.
Cats, yes, I agree down the line. The last fifty years have brought forward a lot of changes — some very good — but the advent of ‘conservatism’ seemed to reverse the course of the nation from one that had learned how to care about ALL of its people to one destined to care only about the greedy, the wealthy, the privileged, etc. That, to me, signaled the beginning of the end of the good times, of prosperity for most. And it’s been downhill ever since. The sun is, indeed, setting on America, and for good reason.
And to think it’s all happened in spite of my never having voted for the buggers.
Frugal, found this appeal from Alan Grayson over on HuffPo.
Thanks to Citizen’s United allowing corporations to spend unlimited funds on elections, big corporations are *already* outspending, by a factor of 3:1, his Republican opponent.
Caligula’s Horse
And I should add, they are outspending on attack ads against Grayson, not the Repub challenger.
And yet Grayson is 13 points ahead. In a district that was Republican for the last 25 years until 2008!
Grayson is future presidential material.
Christine O’Dipshit wants to stop
the worldAmerica from having sex…Christine O’Dipshit wants to stop the world from having sex…
If only her parents had held those same beliefs…
I spent a little time with my Republican salesman buddy today. He said to me “Just name me one thing the Dems have proposed or tried to do in the last two years.”
Took me ten minutes to stop laughing.
I spent a little time with my Republican salesman buddy today. He said to me “Just name me one thing the Dems have proposed or tried to do in the last two years.”
Took me ten minutes to stop laughing.
It’s funny to hear the righties whine about Obama not doing anything, and in the next breath whining that he’s trying to do too much too fast.
The good thing about Hissy Chrissy’s beliefs is that at least she is out of the gene pool.
Fair foods…I feel sick.
Christine O’Dipshit wants to stop the world America from having sex…
“I’m a young woman, I’m in my 30s and I’m chaste… therefore, everyone else should do it exactly the way I do.”
Or else.
Hooda: The good thing about Hissy Chrissy’s beliefs is that at least she is out of the gene pool
Something that’s always puzzled me: viewed from strictly a biological point of view, the sole ‘job’ of ANY organism that exists anywhere on the planet is to reproduce itself. All else is secondary.
One would think that religiosos would consider sex to be, then and in that context, not only a gift from God but a mandate from God. But no, it’s a sin somehow. Sex is dirty. Gender parts are dirty and evil. Secondary sex characteristics on women are dirty and evil (breasts), but on the male beards and hairy chests are signs of … well, something. Not sure what. Virility maybe. But that’s gotta be evil, doesn’t it?
Hmmm. Does god have a hairy chest? A beard? Where’s the BVM when you need her!
Anyway, I’ve asked several religiosos over the years to explain to me the dirt in sex and have yet to get an answer that makes a nickel’s worth of sense.
I’ve actually come to believe that sex isn’t all the dirty after all, that it’s…..BZZZZZZZZAPPPPPPPPPPP!
Ouch. Fucking lightning.
According to their own legend, Jesus never married or had kids. They should work REAL hard to follow that example.
hooda – yeah, thank her god that she is out of the gene pool. She must be a real turn off for men and maybe women, too. Do men get a limp johnson when she opens her mouth?
frugal, Jim Hightower told of how a friend of his from Lubbock (a Church of Christ stronghold I guess) told him he was raised to believe sex was evil, dirty and nasty and should therefore be saved to share with someone you really loved.
No wonder I don’t go to fairs. Yeck.
Do men get a limp johnson when she opens her mouth?
Depends. If it is a fundigenical tea bagger type, no. If it is a normal male it probably goes turtle and has to be coaxed back out to pee.
Is Christine O’Donnell a Shaker? We know what happened to that religious group. No sex, no offspring and in the case of Ms Chrissy pants, that is a good thing.
Hooda on Lubbock: Been there many times, could never ‘wait’ till it was time to leave! Now I know why. The Hightower tale sums it.
Still laughing!
hooda – 😆
Next Chrissy will be all about subsidizing cabbage farms.
By now I would think it would be obvious about Christine O’Donnell, that while she’s against sex for lust, she should be perfect for politics, because that requires being a whore, ie. emotionless sex for money. No lust, no problem.
Pristine O’Dipshit = frigid
That’s all there is to it.
My temp just dropped below 90 degrees. They dropped tomorrow’s high to 87 on the forecast. I may have seen the last temp in the 90s until next summer. Boy would that be great!
house,
At first, I thought you were talking about body temp. Don’t do that to an old man! Here in Florida, by Crescent Beach, it is 79° and tomorrow’s high is supposed to get up to 84°. Only 77 more days to go in the hurricane season.