I honestly tune that thing out. But my friend Rita, who is diabetic, asked me if I'd looked at the recipes there. I had not. They have a lot of good ones.
Here is one for crockpot spinach lasagna:
Ingredients
lasagna noodles (gluten-free) 9
jarred pasta tomato sauce (lower sodium) 24 1/2 oz
frozen spinach (10-ounce, chopped, thawed and drained) 1 package
part skim mozzarella cheese (shredded, divided) 1 1/4 cup
low-fat ricotta cheese 1 cup
nonstick cooking spray 1
Parmesan cheese (freshly grated) 1/4 cup
tomato sauce (8-ounce, no-salt added)
Directions
Spray a crock pot with cooking spray.
In a medium bowl, mix together ricotta cheese, Parmesan cheese, 1/4 cup mozzarella cheese and spinach.
Spread 1 cup pasta sauce on bottom of crock pot. Arrange 3 noodles side by side on top of sauce, break noodles apart to fit, if needed.
Spread about 1/3 cup of ricotta-spinach mixture on top of noodles. Repeat layering with pasta sauce, noodles and ricotta spinach mixture 2 more times. Top with remaining pasta sauce and canned tomato sauce. Sprinkle top with 1 cup mozzarella cheese.
Place cover on crock pot. Cook on low setting for 2-3 hours or until done (cooking times vary based on crock pot).
*This recipe was tested with gluten-free lasagna noodles, but whole-wheat lasagna noodles could be used.
Let me do one more. This is for 4-layer stuffed avocado:
Ingredients
US Metric
black beans (drained and rinsed)
1/3 cup avocados
2 Plain Nonfat Greek yogurt
4 tbsp salsa
4 tbsp reduced-fat shredded cheddar or Mexican-style cheese
4 tsp salt
1/4 tsp lime (quartered) 1
Directions
Place the beans in a small bowl. Using the back of a fork, mash until they reach an almost smooth consistency.
Cut avocados in half and remove the pits. In the center of each avocado, layer 1 tablespoon of the beans, 1 tablespoon of Greek yogurt, and 1 tablespoon of salsa and sprinkle with 1 teaspoon of cheese. Sprinkle the salt evenly over the avocados. Serve each avocado half with 1 slice of lime to squeeze over the dish.
I've got eight large avocados that are about to be ripe so I'll be using that recipe tomorrow or the day after.
On avocados -- a super food. Thanks, Joe Biden. That's sarcasm. Have you seen how much the price of an avocado has sky rocketed.
Joe sent all our money to Ukraine and now we suffer. You know what, Joe, you pay your own bills first before you dig into the family funds for charity.
What an idiot.
The US Bureau of Labor Statistics says we are now paying 7.6% more food than this time last year. Thanks, Joe.
This is from Kevin Reed (WSWS):
With the June 30 contract expiration just four weeks away, Michigan Medicine management has made it clear it intends to force through attacks on the pay and staffing levels of the 6,000 nurses who work for the University of Michigan-affiliated hospital system.
The hospital administration said it had hoped to have a tentative agreement by May 20, but that date came and went without a resolution of the major issues facing nurses. Instead, on May 16, Michigan Medicine presented a package of contract terms which would result in a reduction in real income for nurses and does not address the chronic understaffing throughout the Ann Arbor-based health system.
In a May 20 bargaining update from the University of Michigan Professional Nurses Council (UMPNC), which is affiliated with Michigan Nurses Association (MNA), the nurses union said that management’s wage proposal for Nurse Practitioners (NPs) contained an offer of salaries that are $10,000 to $25,000 less than Physician Assistants (PAs).
The union said, “In their own statements, Michigan Medicine acknowledges that NPs and PAs do comparable work and yet brought a shameful offer that has egregiously disproportionate rates of pay.” According to a study of national trends by the University of St. Augustine, the wages of NPs and PAs are within $1,000 of each other across the country, yet Michigan Medicine “management has chosen to disrespect the profession of Nurse Practitioners with this insulting offer.”
Management proposed annual wage increases for RNs of 5 percent, 4 percent, 4 percent and 3 percent across four years, along with a one-time $1,000 “lump sum” to be paid in 2023. If the current inflation rate of 8.3 percent were to hold over the next four years, these raises would lead to an effective pay reduction of between 4 and 5 percent annually.
On May 20, Nancy May, Chief Nurse Executive at the University of Michigan Health System—who has an annual salary of $454,480—published a communication asserting that management has proposed no changes to nurses in the Central Staffing Resources (CSR) unit. However, on May 12, a proposal was submitted during bargaining containing language that would remove the guarantee that an appropriate number of CSR nurses would be maintained based on “variable needs.”
This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for Wednesday:
Wednesday, June 1, 2022. US President Joe Biden continues to persecute Julian Assange though some hope a new government in Australia may mean the end of that, Iraq continues to be hit hard by climate change and much more.
US President Joe Biden continues to tank in the polls leading to the chatter that, after the mid0terms, he'll be getting a new chief of staff and making other changes. After. In the meantime, while over 50% of Americans think he;s doing a bad job, he continues to persecute Julian Assange in his never-ending war on the First Amendment. Julian's 'crime' remains reporting the truth. It's a sad country that goes after someone for telling the truth. Joe needs to drop his demand that the UK turn Julian over to US authorities.
Julian did not commit treason -- as an Australian citizen, he cant carry out treason against the United States. Australia's recent election has some hoping that Julian's ordeal might come to an end. Last week, Brendan Mounter and Adam Stephen (Australia's ABC) reported:
The family of Julian Assange is hopeful the election of a federal Labor government will pave the way for the WikiLeaks founder's eventual release and a return to Australia.
It has been almost a decade since Mr Assange, who originally hails from Townsville in north Queensland, has been a free man.
For the past three years, he has been in high security detention at Belmarsh Prison in the United Kingdom, after seven years of asylum within London's Ecuadorian embassy in a bid to avoid arrest.
United States authorities have sought Mr Assange's extradition from the UK so he can stand trial on charges of espionage and computer misuse relating to hundreds of thousands of leaked cables from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.
His brother, film producer Gabriel Shipton, said Mr Assange had been persecuted for publishing the ugly truths of war.
"Julian is accused of what investigative journalists do all the time, which is sourcing and publishing materials from a source, Chelsea Manning," Mr Shipton said.
Rachel Evans (GREEN LEFT) adds:
Free Julian Assange activists took action outside Prime Minister Anthony Albanese's Marrickville office on May 26 and asked him to “Make Julian Assange’s freedom top priority”.
While in opposition, Albanese told a Labor caucus meeting in February last year that “enough was enough” and “I don't have sympathy for many of his actions but essentially I can't see what is served by keeping him incarcerated”.
Latika Bourke (SYDNEY MORNING HERALD) reports:
Government MP Julian Hill has urged Prime Minister Anthony Albanese to stick to his principles and encourage the United States to drop its extradition of Julian Assange.
When opposition leader, Albanese declared Assange’s incarceration in the United Kingdom – pending his extradition to the United States, where he faces spying charges – had gone on long enough and he wanted him freed.
Asked during Tuesday night’s press conference if he would match his rhetoric as opposition leader now he is prime minister and encourage the United States to drop the charges, Albanese said “my position is that not all foreign affairs is best done with the loud hailer”.
Government backbencher Julian Hill, a member of the bipartisan Bring Julian Assange Home parliamentary group, on Twitter attacked the use of “weasel words”.
“I hope one of the first acts of our new cabinet will be to speak up for our fellow citizen and demand the US government drop the shameful prosecution of Julian Assange,” he wrote.
The US charges are thus an attack on journalism, done by a non-US citizen, not on US soil, and published, after months of cooperative work, on US soil by The New York Times, whose editors and publishers have not been charged with anything.
The Morrison government made no objection at all to extradition, trusting in “the British justice system”, and implicitly supporting US prosecution through silence. Albanese Labor looks like it will be little better.
“As an Australian citizen, he is entitled to consular assistance,” Penny Wong stated in April. “We also expect the government to keep seeking assurances from both the UK and US that he’s treated fairly and humanely … Consular matters are regularly raised with counterparts, they are regularly raised and this one would be no different.”
This is pathetic and gutless. Labor should honour the basic commitment to free speech and the investigation of hidden power that was an essential task of the labour movement in establishing its right to exist, and its capacity to succeed. The government is not required to stand with every citizen in trouble abroad, but this case is clear: an Australian citizen is being threatened with decades of prison for activities that are essential to the sort of journalism that is constitutive of a pluralist and open society, built on free speech and free inquiry.
Labor is being completely hypocritical in its silence on Assange. In 2018 and 2019, it was very happy to use the leaks-based story by Annika Smethurst on the increased surveillance of Australian citizens by reorganised spy agencies to attack the Coalition government, and then to attack them for the federal police raid on, and threatened prosecution of, Smethurst, calling it the mark of a “tin pot autocracy”.
Will Australia continue to be the lapdog of the US and UK or will it find the courage to stand up for one of its own citizens? Looks like the new prime minister will have his defining moment early in his term.
In Iraq, still no new government. Elections were held October 10th. In nine days, it will be eight months since those elections took place. Trevor Filseth (THE NATIONL INTEREST) states:
Although Sadr’s faction, the Sadrist Movement, won 73 out of 329 seats, making it the largest party in parliament, it has been unable to expand its coalition to include two-thirds of the parliament, the number required to elect a president and therefore to form a government. Sadr’s bloc, the Saving the Homeland alliance, now includes the Sadrist Movement, the Sunni Sovereignty Alliance, and the Kurdish Kurdistan Democratic Party; its cross-sectarian nature has given it significant support in each of Iraq’s regions and a majority of 180 seats in parliament, but it remains well short of the 220 needed for a presidential election. Most legislators not in the Sadrist camp or the pro-Iran camp have boycotted legislative sessions, waiting for concessions from either Sadr or the CFA in exchange for their support.
Under Iraq’s post-2003 governing system, the country’s ceremonial presidency is typically given to a Kurd, while the prime minister is normally a Shia and the speaker of parliament a Sunni. Sadr’s alliance has placed its support behind Rebar Ahmed, the current interior minister of Iraq’s autonomous Kurdistan region, for the presidency, while the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK), the main competing Kurdish party, has supported the re-election of current president Barham Salih. Outside commentators have suggested that Sadr’s alliance might partner with the PUK, which has not aligned with the pro-Iran bloc, if the question of the presidential nomination could be resolved.
Although the parliament should have been dissolved after the initial failure to elect a president, some legislators have opposed the dissolution out of concern that they could lose their seats in a rematch, and have raised concerns that a second election with similar results would simply lead to a recurring failure to form a government.
Last fall, the western press (espeically the US press) insisted Moqtada was a "king maker." Oops.
Mustafa Shilani (KURDISTAN 24) reports:
A "new initiative" to end the political impasse in Iraq will be announced in June, said Arafat Karam, the official in charge of the government and parliamentary file at Barzani Headquarters, on Tuesday.
In an interview with Kurdistan 24, Karam revealed that a new initiative is expected to be announced on June 11 to end the political deadlock in Iraq.
He added that the Iraqi situation is "very complicated" without a president. Iraq has failed to select a new president and prime minister even though it has been seven months since the last parliamentary elections.
In a few days, Iraq will probably break a record. But it's not necessarily something for the country to be proud of. Iraq has now been without an official government for just over 200 days.
Although the Middle Eastern nation isn't close to breaking the world record for the longest period without an elected government — that's held by Belgium, with well over 500 days — the last time this happened in Baghdad was in 2010, and the record for Iraq back then was 208 days.
The outlet, apparently in the midst of a nasty bender, then goes on to speculate that this might be a good thing. In essence, it states, "Don't think of the car as totaled, think of it as just pulled out of the race."
Salah Nasrawi (AHRAM) explains:
On 5 May, a powerful desert storm passed through most of Iraq, with the dust turning skies orange over many of the country’s major cities. By the end of the following day, it had sent 4,000 people to hospital with breathing problems.
Government offices and schools were shut, and airports in Baghdad and several other cities suspended flights for hours as a thick sandstorm blanketed the country.
It was the fifth powerful sandstorm to engulf Iraq within a month, with the storms occurring on an almost weekly basis and totalling ten by the end of May with more expected.
Sandstorms usually hit Iraq in the spring and scour large swathes of the country, flood the streets of major cities with sand, hamper visibility, blow down electricity poles, uproot trees, and reduce air quality.
But a typical spring would see only about one to three storms per month.
This year, as well as their frequency, their impact has also been more severe, particularly in health terms, with more casualties caused by plummeting air quality generated by wind thick with sand and other particles.
While sandstorms are common at this time of year in Iraq, they are now more powerful, sweep across larger areas, and occur with unprecedented frequency.
Iraq’s Environment Ministry has warned that over the next two decades the country could endure an average of 272 days of sandstorms a year, rising to above 300 by 2050.
Oh, c/an't we all be like DW and ignore the suffering and look for that silver lining (that really doesn't exist)
Sure, people are suffering in the drought but, hey, ancient city revealed, right? ::quality(70)/s3.amazonaws.com/arc-authors/thenational/8561a50f-2395-4f92-8dcd-786210936b5e.png)
Let's all be DW and ignored the suffering from the drought and just focus on the lost city. Not on Salam Zidane's report for AL-MONITOR:
On May 8, the Iraqi Ministry of Agriculture warned that 90 percent of Iraqi agricultural land has been desertified or is at risk of desertification in the near future, due to climate change and water disputes with Iran and Turkey.
In 2020, the ministry had warned that the rate of desertification in Iraq had risen to 53%. This poses a great danger not only to the environment, but also to food security, which has become threatened after the harvest of strategic crops such as wheat, barley, and rice has dropped.
The ministry has also stated that Iraq ranks fifth in the world in severity of climate change effects.
Rawya Mazal, the official in charge of the desertification dossier at the Ministry of Agriculture, told Al-Monitor that issues contributing to the problem include global warming, drought, excessive use of water by farmers and citizens, in addition to wars and military operations.
“Iraq urgently needs to negotiate with Turkey and Iran to release water, reduce water consumption and eliminate excessive use, and establish a canal to harvest rainwater, with desert oases,” she explained. Also, reducing air pollution would mitigate the rise in temperatures.
Mazal stressed that if urgent measures are not taken, the Iraq scenario will be the worst in the region. She said that 92% of Iraq suffers from desertification or is at risk, and that Sawa Lake in Samawah has completely dried out.
Adel al-Mokhtar, Adviser to Parliament’s Agriculture Committee, told Al-Monitor that Iraq’s water reserves amount to 20 billion cubic meters, and the country may consume all of it this year. Turkey, Iran, and Syria are also suffering from a water crisis, which will require cooperation to overcome.
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