“It is the duty of every citizen according to his
best capacities to give validity to his
convictions in political affairs.”

- Albert Einstein

As long as you rub it with rosemary or rosemary extract, that is.

To Block The Carcinogens, Add A Touch Of Rosemary When Grilling Meats
ScienceDaily (May 24, 2008) — Rosemary, a member of the mint family and a popular seasoning on its own, also has benefits as a cancer prevention agent. Apply it to hamburgers and it can break up the potentially cancer-causing compounds that can form when the meat is cooked.

J. Scott Smith found out about rosemary’s strength against the compounds while researching ways to reduce them as part of a long-term Food Safety Consortium project at Kansas State University. Smith, a KSU food science professor, has been looking into the carcinogenic compounds known as HCAs (heterocyclic amines).

“Put a little bit on the surface,” Smith advised grillers. “Rosemary extracts shouldn’t have much of an aroma to them. Most people don’t want a rosemary-flavored burger. So if you get the extract you don’t really know it’s there.”

The full article has details on the research and how and why the natural anti-oxidant properties of rosemary break up the formation of HCAs (heterocyclic amines), thought to be linked to cancer.

Similar studies have shown that marinating steaks with common, high anti-oxidant herbs and spices such as basil, mint, sage, savory, marjoram, oregano and thyme also reduces HCAs. These herbs and spices are on your grocery shelf, while rosemary extract is reportedly available on the internet.

I think this news definitely calls for some grilling this weekend; all in the name of science, of course!

HT: The Evangelical Outpost.

Q: What do these three events have in common:

• Golf on April 28.


• Golf on May 13.


• Softball on May 19.

A: At each event I wore three layers of clothing and gloves that had nothing to do with the sport at hand — and I still froze.

Also, this past weekend I went into Cub for few groceries. They had corn-on-the-cob for sale on a big table. In the past, in high season, you could buy a dozen ears here for $2; last year you could buy 8 for $2. Yesterday the price for bag-your-own, unshucked corn-on-the-cob was 5 ears for $3.

I'd say it's time to cut back on the ethanol and kick-start that global-warming again.

Another great one from Scrappleface yesterday:

Feds to Raid Isolated, Black-Robed California Sect
by Scott Ott for ScrappleFace ·

(2008-05-16) — Federal agents and National Guard troops surrounded the gleaming white temple-like San Francisco enclave of an isolationist sect after the black-robed “high priests” of the group yesterday declared themselves to be above the laws of the state of California.

In a move reminiscent of recent raids on polygamist compounds elsewhere, authorities prepared to seize documents and computers, and to rescue any young interns or clerks who might have fallen victim to the cult’s bizarre, extra-legal rituals.

Yesterday, the “Supreme” leaders of the sect briefly emerged from hiding to issue a declaration overriding two state laws and loosening the definition of marriage to include “any practice or lifestyle the prohibition of which might make one feel discriminated against.”

“We’d like this siege to end peacefully,” said a Justice Department spokesman, “but these people need to know that this is still the United States of America. You can’t set up your own sovereign nation within its borders, and make up your own set of rules that counter the will of the people and violate the law of the land.”

OK, this is more of a Jroosh post even though he's into movies more than automobiles lately, but I have too much integrity to claim to be a real motorhead. Nevertheless, these new VWs will catch your eye.

And they're not electric - they're turbo-diesel.

One thing you can’t question is the unbeatable fuel economy of this new line-up.

We’re talking 74.3mpg for the VW Polo, more than 60mpg for a Golf and more than 55mpg for the Passat, thanks to new aerodynamics and turbo-diesel engines.

The Polo and Golf models escape new London congestion charges this October and are at the bottom of the new road-tax bands.

...

I’ve just had a first drive of the new Passat BlueMotion and the fuel economy is sensational.

Combined economy jumps 5mpg from the standard model to 55.4mpg, giving a maximum range of 851 miles – which means you could drive from London to Glasgow - AND BACK - on only one fill-up of the 70-litre tank.

Engineers have tweaked the 1.9 diesel engine, making the car much cleaner. Carbon dioxide emissions fall 15g/km to 136g/km, which drops the Passat’s company car tax band from 19 per cent to 15 per cent.

And while the Passat’s body is already fairly sleek, it has had some aerodynamic updates, too.

The brake discs and rear suspension components have been covered, while the car has been lowered 15mm at the front and 8mm at the rear, allowing it to cut through the air more cleanly.

Too bad they're only available in the UK for now. Furthermore, having driven on many of the British "Motorways", I can tell you that regardless of mileage, driving 851 miles from London to Glasgow and back will still take you week.

All across the country tonight, and right here in the state of Minnesota, parents played with their children, tucked them in, listened to their prayers, kissed them, and told them they loved them. And tomorrow they'll do it all over again, even though it never makes the newspapers.

I have to believe that.

I have to because the stuff that does make the papers is enough to make you despair of the madness in this world. A "hunter" father who stocks up on beer and pot for a hunting trip but can't be bothered to buy a hunting license and forgets, apparently, what a turkey looks like, shoots and kills his 8-year-old son. A mother puts her 2-year-old son and 11-month-old daughter in a bathtub full of water and leaves them alone while she shops on-line for new shoes, needing the 2-year-old to come and tell her "something's wrong" as the infant girl drowns. A massive professional football player decides to play a game of "let's see if you can get out of a plastic bag" with his two year old son, who is fortunately rescued by his mother. A couple of weeks ago I read about a mother in Chicago who drowned her baby girl in the bathtub because having to care for the baby was cutting into her partying.

In the first two cases, anyway, the reports are that the so-called adults are devastated by what happened, and some people even suggest that the legal sanctions be limited because the perpetrators are already suffering. And to that a little piece of me deep down inside says, "Good," even though I know I should be compassionate and prayerful.

What I don't know is what happened to the parental wiring in each of these cases to short-circuit certain instincts. I know that kids can be very frustrating and time-consuming and can wreak havoc on your neat little existence. That is not a capital offense, however, even if it seems as if our culture treats being able to do what you want to do as a sacred thing.

You know, I like doing my own thing too, but I knew the first time I held my first-born that I would willingly die for her; literally if called upon and figuratively every day as I adjusted my life in countless ways big and small to make a place for her (and later her sister) in this world. And I don't say that to suggest that I'm exceptional in any way; in fact, I think that that is or should be the norm even though the headlines increasingly suggest that that is not the case.

Every so often, however, another headline proves the opposite.

CHICAGO — Chicago police say a man died as he tried to shield his four-year-old daughter from an auto allegedly driven by a man under the influence of a controlled substance.

Joseph Richardson was walking his daughter Kaniyah to a McDonald's for burgers late Monday when a car jumped the curb. Police say the 39-year-old Richardson grabbed his daughter and held her up out of harm's way just before the car slammed the two into a fence.

Richardson was pronounced dead at the scene. Kaniyah was taken to Comer Children's Hospital in serious condition.

Police say the driver of the car, 32-year-old Angelo Thomas of Chicago, was charged with two felony counts of aggravated DUI. Witnesses say the man was driving erratically before the accident.

Richardson, a church musician, was the father of three, two girls and a boy, all under the age of 10.

Now that's a father, willing to leave himself in the path of danger in an effort to move his child out of harm's way. In fact, he probably didn't even have to think about it, he just did it. The sad irony is that this little girl will grow up without getting to know this man, while in 3 of the other cases the parent is still here and it is the child that is gone.

Tomorrow, do this in their memory, and in honor of Joseph Richardson: play with your children, tuck them in, listen to their prayers, kiss them. Tell them that you love them.

There's been a lot of discussion on the radio the last couple of days about whether NBC should or shouldn't show the video of Eight Belles breaking down after crossing the finish line (and being euthanized right on the track) at the Kentucky Derby. It's almost a quaint discussion in this age of YouTube, which probably had the footage up before the filly's body was moved off of the track.

I hadn't watched the race, but assumed the replay would show the incident in its entirety when I got around to watching SportsCenter that night. I was a little surprised but not disappointed when ESPN didn't show it. In fact, I was a little relieved. Thinking it was coming up had me steeling myself kind of (but not as intensely) in the same way I had prepped myself for the opening moments of Saving Private Ryan the first time I watched that movie. I knew it was an important news story, but I don't typically get a lot of entertainment value out of seeing animals suffer.

The discussions the next day reminded me of 1978 when I was in Journalism School at the University of Missouri. It was right after Karl Wallenda had fallen to his death during a high wire stunt in San Juan. The fall had been taped and the networks showed him falling but cut away before impact. A group of my fellow J-schoolers and I were sitting at the Old Heidelberg, arguing over whether or not they should have stayed with the image all the way down (I was on the side of cutting away). Some argued that it was "news" and therefore legitimate to be shown, no matter how grim. Others of us said the point was made and the story was told without the final moment and that to show the ending was gratuitous and sensational. Yet another person suggested that the whole reason a news camera was there in the first place was because of the chance that he might fall. Nothing was resolved then (do college arguments ever resolve anything?) but I think I could feel myself already withdrawing from what I thought was going to be my profession.

It's not as though I, and my generation of television viewers, hadn't already been sensationalized with a number of startling scenes. Already I'm sure we'd seen Evel Knievel break himself a couple of times on Wide World of Sports, and I also remember living in Indianapolis in 1973, during what was perhaps the grimmest year in the history of the Indy 500. That May we saw Art Pollard crash during practice or time trials, his car flipping and sliding upside down along the back straightaway, killing him. The start of the actual race that year saw another crash in the front rows, with Salt Walther's car driving up over the wheel of another racer and flipping into the air, losing it's nose cone and it, too, landing upside down near the infield with Walther's legs and feet sticking out of the remaining shell of the car (Walther would live, but endured a long and painful rehabilitation). Even more dramatically than that, later in the race, driver Swede Savage crashed off the outside wall then the inside wall and his car literally disintegrated around him leaving him sitting in the middle of the track, beating at the invisible alcohol flames with his arms and hands while rescue workers raced to his side, with one would-be rescuer being hit and run over by an emergency vehicle driving the wrong way out of Pit Row. I remember seeing that man's body laying crumpled in the infield as well. (Savage would ultimately die nearly a month later from complications arising from his injuries). All of these images were brought into our homes, over and over, via the magic box.

Still later in my life I would be watching the night Joe Theisman's leg was snapped on live television, and I've seen things done to Moises Alou's and Robin Ventura's legs that legs aren't supposed to do. I wasn't watching these events in the hopes of seeing these things, but there they were and I couldn't look away.

I suppose there is a percentage (likely a small one) of auto-racing fans that go to races hoping to see a crash, just as there are those who go to (or watch) hockey games hoping to see a fight (or a player nearly be decapitated by a skate such has happened earlier this year). Similarly, I know that "gawker slow-downs" around a traffic accident scene don't have much to do with drivers suddenly becoming very attentive and careful with their driving and there are probably cave paintings somewhere of slow-running hunters being trampled by mammoths, too.

There's just a vicariousness, and sometimes empathy, about us that draws us to the unusual and even painful. Sometimes it can ultimately be helpful. The '73 Indy crashes led to dramatic safety changes in the engineering and fuel capacity of the cars and there's talk that last weekend's events at Churchill Downs will spur greater strides in horse safety ranging from breeding to more use of synthetic track surfaces that are easier on the horses' legs. The one thing that wont change is that we'll still like to look.