Friday, October 06, 2023

Instant Pot Penne Pasta Recipe in the Kitchen

Rachel notes that I haven't had a vegetarian recipe this week "and I hope you're not going to make it through this week of Instant Pot recipes without offering a vegetarian one."  Thanks to Rachel, we'll note this recipe from The Herbeevore:


Ingredients
  

  • 2 tablespoons olive oil
  • 1 sweet onion diced
  • 3 cloves garlic minced
  • 1 cup diced zucchini
  • 1 cup bell pepper chopped
  • 1 (14 ounce) can No-Salt-Added Diced Tomatoes
  • 3 tablespoons No-Salt-Added Tomato Paste
  • 1 tablespoon balsamic vinegar
  • 1 tablespoon Italian Seasoning Spice Blend
  • 1/4 teaspoon Himalayan sea salt
  • 1/4 teaspoon Crushed Red Pepper Flakes
  • 8 ounces dried penne use gluten free
  • 2 cups No-Salt-Added Vegetable Stock


Instructions
 

  • Set your Instant Pot to Sauté Mode. Add the olive oil, onions, garlic, bell pepper, and zucchini. Sauté for 6 to 7 minutes until the vegetables begin to soften.
  • Add the tomatoes, tomato paste, balsamic vinegar, Italian spices, and stir.
  • Add the pasta to the Instant Pot. Pour the vegetable stock over the pasta. Do not stir.  Lock lid, and set to Pressure Cook for 5 minutes.
  • Quick release the steam, taking care not to put your hands or face near the steam valve.
  • Once steam has vented and the pressure valve has gone down, stir the pasta.  It will continue to thicken for a few minutes.
  • Serve with a side of fresh garlic bread and top with parmesan cheese if desired.  Enjoy!


I'll do more instant pot recipe next time.  


Now for some news.  This is from The Advocate:


The nonprofit group Pride and Less Prejudice is holding its third annual Banned Together virtual auction between October 5-8. The organization is looking to raise $15,000 to send more than 1,000 LGBTQ-inclusive books to elementary schools across the country.

This year’s auction features a variety of donations from actor Neil Patrick Harris, fashion designer Christian Siriano, performer Frankie James Grande, singer Hayley Kiyoko, actor Daniel Radcliffe, tennis legend Billie Jean King, actress Sally Field, singer Melissa Etheridge, drag queen Latrice Royale, and many more.

Pride and Less Prejudice — also known as PLP — was founded in 2019 and looks to provide queer-themed books to pre-K through third-grade classes. In a release, the group said it raised more than $175,000 and donated more than 10,000 books to classrooms in all 50 states.

If you're interested in bidding or just in checking out what's being bid on, click here for where the items to be auctioned are listed.


This is C.I.'s "Iraq snapshot" for Thursday:


Thursday, October 5, 2023.  Barbara Lee may be popular in the offices of JACOBIN but she's not in the state of California (check the numbers), THE VANGUARD finds time to give voice to the neglected White male (that was sarcasm), destroying ROE was just the beginning for the crazies on the right who hate everyone but hate democracy most of all, and much more.






As Stevie Nicks sings in "Wild Heart," "You say don't even know/How to start, how to start."  

Let's start with the new fact-free group.  It's on the left or at least the faux left.  They're called Whiners For Elderly Barbara Lee.  If you missed it, for the JACOBIN fakes, the worst thing in the world was that California Governor Gavin Newsom didn't pick Barbara Lee to fill Dianne Feinstein's Senate seat.  Why would he?  She's useless and California doesn't want her.

Oh, I'm sorry, did liar John Nichols not tell you that in his wordy column yesterday? Time for all those baseless whines but no room for facts?  Marcia called Nichols out in "John Nichols, shut up already."  The only thing I'll add to that is that Barbara Lee is not popular within the state of California.



Is that confusing to anyone?  

Gavin (who I've known for years and consider a friend) did not back Barbara Lee for the Senate spot.  In other words, pay attention here, Gavin didn't back the candidate that most of the left in California refuses to back.  As the start of last month, Sarah Fortenski (THE HILL) noted:


Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) and Rep. Katie Porter (D-Calif.) lead a new poll measuring voter preferences ahead of the 2024 U.S. Senate race in California, but a plurality of likely primary voters in the state are still undecided. 

In a Berkeley IGS poll released Thursday, Schiff led with 20 percent support among likely voters, Porter followed with 17 percent support, Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) had 7 percent support and Democratic tech executive Lexie Reese had 1 percent support. Among Republican candidates, James Bradley received 10 percent support and Eric Early received 7 percent support. 



Do you get that?  It's too damn hard for John Nichols to understand -- or he pretends it is.  Three Democrats are declared -- three are seeking the seat that Dianne Feinstein occupied (no "puddles" jokes, please).  Of the three, Barbara Lee trails badly behind the other two.  Not only do Schiff and Porter have double the support that Barbara does, Adam has almost three times as much support.  She single digit.  No one wants her.  She can't win a statewide race because she is so disliked.

B-B-But, she's our great left hope!

Yes, you deluded idiots who read John Nichols can believe that.  

But those of us in California are fully aware that she is a do-nothing who accomplishes zilch.  Nationally, the 'independent' media has created this fantasy about her and possibly if you don't live in California it's easier to be foolwed about reality.  But, again, when she wants to talk her 'big' 'success' she has to go back to a vote from 22 years ago.  You've all bought her mythology -- which includes a lot of lies including about her birth. 

She's not impressive.  She's a fake ass.  She has no leadership skills and never has.  

Most important, she's elderly.

The US government needs another elderly person serving in it?

No. 

As Marcia made clear:


Equally true, she's too damn old.  Let me repeat for the old girl, "YOU'RE TOO DAMN OLD!"  She's 77 right now.  She'd be running in 2024 when she's 78.  Her first year on the job, 2025, she's be 79.  It's a six year term meaning she'd be 85 if she lived that long.  She's too damn old.  And her crusty face is cracking, get that loser out of here.

Barbara, you're a loser.  John Nichols can lie all he wants (like he usually does) but nobody wants you.  



She's a loser.  The Democrats in the state don't want her.  (Redistricting ensures she can remain in the House until she dies. She just can't get elected outside that House district.)  And she's too damn old.  In fact, she needs to apologize to the country for even wasting her time pursuing the seat.  78 when she would be sworn in?  Oh, hell no.  Dianne refused to step down and she was too old.  We don't need a 78 year old filling Dianne's seat.  (The puddles will never dry!!! Okay, one puddles joke.) 


And back to liar and hack John Nichols.  Am I weighing in on who should run for the Senate from Wisconsin?  No, I'm not.  Why are you butting into the politics of my state?  If you idiots and liars hadn't done so back in 2018, Dianne might not have run in which case she wouldn't have died in office and might not have lived such a pathetic and embarrassing life.  She could have used the last five years to try to give her life some real meaning.


Next up, the post of Speaker of the House.



Tuesday, the Speaker of the House was expelled from that position.  Anthony Zurcher and Sam Cabral (BBC NEWS) remind:


Kevin McCarthy has been toppled in a right-wing revolt - the first time ever that a US House of Representatives Speaker has lost a no-confidence vote. 

The final tally was 216-210 to remove the congressman as leader of the Republican majority in the lower chamber of Congress.

Hardliners in his party voted against him after he struck a deal with Senate Democrats to fund government agencies. 

There is no clear successor to oversee the House Republican majority.




On Tuesday, all Democrats and eight Republicans voted to remove Kevin McCarthy as House Speaker in a historic 216-210 vote. This is the first time something like this has ever happened, leaving the House in disarray and confusion.

Though an interim speaker was named, the fact that Republicans joined in with their opposition to take down McCarthy reiterates a strong underlying message:

The right remains downright messy as hell.



No clear successor yet some deluded fools thought they (finally) had an answer.  And did someone say "messy"?   Marjorie Taylor Greene, step on down, and bring those flabby upper arms with you.  Yesterday, Rachel Sharp (INDEPENDENT) noted:


A growing number of far-right Republican lawmakers including Marjorie Taylor Greene are calling for Donald Trump to become the next House speaker – following Kevin McCarthy’s ousting after less than nine months in the role.
The Georgia congresswoman and MAGA Republican took to X, formerly Twitter, on Tuesday night to claim that the former president is the “only candidate” she will back to take the gavel.



While Trump would be eligible to become speaker since House rules do not require the position to be filled by a member, he has previously indicated that he is not interested in the role.


If the former president were to accept his nomination and managed to become the next speaker, it would represent an extraordinary turn of events as he campaigns to regain the presidency in 2024.




But critics poured cold water on the idea. Sherrilyn Ifill, the former president of the NAACP legal defense fund, warned that electing Trump speaker would "accelerate the 14th amendment Sec 3 showdown" because "Trump returning to the House - the literal scene of the insurrection - to try & serve as Speaker might be an even more grotesque Section 3 violation than trying to be President." Rep. Sean Casten, D-Ill., pointed to a GOP conference rule requiring leaders to step down if they are indicted for certain felonies.





But even if Trump had full Republican support in the House, Rule 26 of the GOP Conference states, "A member of the Republican Leadership shall step aside if indicted for a felony for which a sentence of two or more years imprisonment may be imposed." The conference's rules are voted on by all members in the November before each congressional session.

Trump has been indicted four times in the past six months. He is facing charges in two federal cases—one related to the classified documents held at his Mar-a-Lago estate and the other in connection to his election interference efforts, culminating in the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot.

He has also been indicted in Manhattan in connection with a hush money payment to an adult film star and in Georgia in a case involving efforts to overturn the 2020 presidential election results there. In total, he's been charged with 91 felony counts, many of which carry sentences greater than two years of imprisonment.


 




A fan of THE VANGUARD e-mailed that this is the must stream video and "so important."



I don't see anything important about it.  Nice tat they finally realized Bri-Bri is a bit of a con artist and that she's not as smart as they've made her out to be.  If that's what you're talking about, they seem to tip-toe around it.  And if that's what the person who wrongly -- wrongly! -- gave them ten dollars was talking about, he was right.  

The ten dollars?  That's reason enough to sour me.  You're on air begging for money, someone gives you ten dollars and you give a lecture about how they're wrong and about how they should try watching the show more.

You begged for money.  Someone was nice enough to give you ten dollars and all you can do is insult him?  That's pretty much gqrbge behavior and I can't imagine most parents raise their children to take money from others and then to insult the people who hand over money.  

And then David Griscom.

Never heard of him before and why the hell should I care now?

That's their guest.  Friday, they'll have Ryan Grim.  Monday, people will pretend like they don't always bring on White males as their guests.

I don't know how they think they come off.  They love to toss the name of some dead African-American activist out there in conversations.  They just don't seem to like to bring guests of color who might speak for themselves.  

I don't know who David is, never saw him before the segment.  After watching?  He's a White man with a bad speaking voice.  He's not particularly attractive so I kept waiting for him to share some deep insight.  It never came.  At the end of the segment, the only reason to bring him on appeared to be he was another White man in their White Man Circle Jerk.  

Do Zac and Gavin not realize that the two of them are already presenting the White male perspective and that a third man doing so only makes it more superfluous (and vapid)?

Apparently the way White YOUTUBE likes people of color is dead so that they can tell you what they would have said (even when the YOUTUBER gets it wrong) and what they would have done (ibid) if they were alive.  In other words, the only people of color that White YOUTUBE likes are the people of color who can't comment back.  How very Norman Finkelstein of them.


And on that, we get to work our way back to note (again) one of the best segments on YOUTUBE this week.



Also check out the discussion about the above in the episode below of THE REMIX MORNING SHOW (approximately 40 minutes in).  It's a perspective of Norman you don't get when White YOUTUBE fawns over him (see especially the nonsense of Chris Hedges and Katie Halper).












Now let's continue coverage of Banned Book Week.  Michael Hiltzik (LOS ANGELES TIMES) reports:


Over the last year, according to Deborah Caldwell-Stone, director of the association's Office for Intellectual Freedom, what has been most striking is the pivot of censorship advocates from books in school libraries to books in public libraries.

"Last year, about 16% of demands to remove books involved public libraries," Caldwell-Stone says. "This year, to date, it's 49%."


That's a sea change, she told me, because "public libraries are the places that we've created for freewheeling inquiry, for the marketplace of ideas. Demands to remove books because they don't comport with someone's beliefs or their political or religious agenda are attacks on the very thought of a library as a place that protects 1st amendment rights to access a wide variety of views."

These amount to demands that "the government tell us what to read, what to think, what to believe," she says.



That's how it always starts, with Moms For Bigotry pretending their efforts are about children.  They never are.  We'll come back to that.  In the meantime, Joe Chaisson, Abigail Murillo Villacorta and Andrew Evans  (WGGB) report:


Town by town is taking you to Agawam, Springfield and Chicopee.

It’s day two of banned book week at the Agawam Public Library with displays of challenged and banned books over the past 50-plus years.

“Let Freedom Read” is the official 2023 campaign from the American library association and the Agawam Library is encouraging visitors to learn about banned books and what it means to have the freedom to read.





Let Freedom Read events are taking place around the country. Moms For Bigotr?  They don't believe in freedom so they won't be celebrating Let Freedom Read.  They will be scolding and nagging and doing whatever else the sexually frustrated do in order to give their pathetic lives meaning.  When Ronald DeSantis started his "Don't Say Gay" policy in Florida, he stood beside Kyle Lukoff's book CALL ME MAX.  The book offended Ronald because Max identifies as a boy.

This was upsetting to Ronald DeSantis because he's never been able to identify as male at any point in his life -- to this day.  So he attacks others and wants them to be just as miserable as he is.


 Scottie Andrew (CNN) speaks with author Kyle Lukoff:


Kyle Lukoff, the author of “Call Me Max” and the Newbery Honor book “Too Bright to See,” among others, said the national publicity did little to nothing to improve sales of “Max.” Instead, it introduced his work to people who want to remove it from bookshelves in their local schools and libraries.

“I’ve had this said to me many times — ‘I wish my book would get banned because that’s the best way to get it on the best-seller list,’” Lukoff said in a phone interview. “That certainly never happened for me.”

Lukoff hasn’t yet earned royalties from “Call Me Max” or the other two books in its series, he said. His advances were $2,500 per book, and he won’t earn those royalties until all of them earn the money back.

Lukoff’s experience — and the experiences of hundreds of authors whose books have been banned in the last school year — contradicts a common refrain among some authors and anti-censorship proponents that banning a book results in a sales surge.

“When books get banned, even when authors do see a spike in sales, it is much more devastating for careers in the long run,” Lukoff said. “If your book is kept out of libraries and schools in entire states — that does translate to a long-term consistent drop in sales.”

Phil Bildner, a children’s book author and advocate for fellow writers, said that “having a book banned is not a badge of honor.”

“I still don’t think most people grasp just how financially devastating this book banning era is to queer authors and authors from marginalized communities,” said Bildner, who runs the Author Village, a group that represents authors and illustrators for school visits. “And I know most people don’t grasp the emotional toll it’s having on the authors in the crosshairs.”

Up until recently, a list of banned books was a blend of the usual suspects — “The Catcher in the Rye,” “To Kill a Mockingbird,” “The Bluest Eye” — and newer favorites like “The Hate U Give” and “Thirteen Reasons Why.”

But book bans have surged in the last year. PEN America, an organization that supports and protects First Amendment rights for writers, journalists and other communicators, reported that more than 3,300 books were banned in the 2022-2023 school year, a 33% increase from the previous school year. These bans “overwhelmingly” target books about race and racism, as well as books with LGBTQ characters, PEN America said in its September study on school book bans.

There are concentrated efforts from groups like Moms for Liberty and LaVerna in the Library, an offshoot of Utah Parents United, to ban dozens of books at once. These groups compile comprehensive lists of books that contain what these groups point to as objectionable material. Websites like Rated Books and BookLooks grade books based on their content and highlight potentially objectionable paragraphs on their sites, posting entire pages out of context.

Vocal individuals have also had immense power in banning books: The Washington Post reported in May that 60% of book challenges in the 2021-2022 school year came from just 11 people.  



Wadzanai Mhute (OPRAH DAILY) speaks with author Isabel Wilkerson about being banned:


It’s been three years since Caste, by Isabel Wilkerson, was published, and in the intervening years, political, cultural, and racial divisions have intensified. According to a report by PEN America, from 2021 to 2022, more than 1,600 books were banned in school districts across the nation. The impact on children, the educational system, and culture will reverberate for years to come.


Oprah Daily spoke to Isabel Wilkerson about book bans, including that of Caste, which has been removed from some libraries. A film version of Caste, titled Origin and directed by Ava DuVernay, premiered at the Venice Film Festival last month.


How did you find out that your book was banned?

My name came up in social media when The Washington Post ran a piece last spring about a library system in Texas that shut down all its libraries, and when the libraries reopened, Caste had “mysteriously vanished.”

How did it make you feel? What did you do? Is there anything you can do?

I was saddened but not surprised. These bans only affirm the forewarnings in the book. We’re in a period of backlash and retrenchment, which the book attests to and foreshadows. The only thing I can do is to keep pressing forward in my work, knowing that we can’t run from history and that the truth will win out in the end.

Putting aside your own work, what do you think of the situation overall?


In writing Caste, I had to do a tremendous amount of research into India and Germany during the Nazi era. The Nazis studied the United States’ Jim Crow laws in creating the Nuremberg laws. We are coming perilously close to the spirit of what they were doing in another century with the banning of books. It’s revisiting a past that we should never want to experience again.

This is coming at the worst possible time for us as a nation. We have an existential crisis in our demographics, politics, policing, and women’s reproductive rights. We’re a country on parallel tracks, and from responses to my books (The Warmth of Other Suns and Caste), I can see that some people are hungry and thirsty to understand the history of how we got here and what we can do. Then you have another segment that’s closing the door as quickly as others are pushing it open. It becomes yet another symbol of how deeply divided we remain and how these enduring divisions have managed to intrude upon us in this century. As we’re looking back at previous centuries to understand this one, we are, at the same time, replicating much of what we thought was in the past.










I was in shock when I read the 2023 list of banned books. I have to be honest in  saying I have not been paying close attention with the news and conversation around band books. I guess, since I am an older person it didn’t really apply to me. But then I thought about  my  young nieces and nephews along with other children who might have challenges reading some of the classics  and best sellers I’ve enjoyed reading.

[. . .]

One of my favorite readers,  LeVar Burton  is the Honorary Chair of Banned Books Week. I listen faithfully to his podcast   where he reads a short story. Some years ago, I had the privilege of hearing him live doing a wonderful reading from a local author. He is a reading advocate, writer, and television and film star

Now, for the main event-the list of banned books. Some of the books I have read and enjoyed. As I said before, I was in shock  and even  saddened because I don’t think these books should be banned. I will list mine here but to get the whole list visit the American Library Association’s website.


For my blind and low vision  readers the Perkins School for the Blind listed them too along with their availability in braille, large print and audio.

My Books on the List

1. The Bluest Eye by Toni Morrison

Challenged for depiction of sexual abuse, EDI content, claimed to be sexually explicit

2. Charlotte’s Web by E.B. White

Banned due to themes of death and the fact that the main characters are talking animals.

3. Diary of A Young Girl by Anne Frank


Banned mostly in regard to passages that were considered “sexually offensive,” as well as for the tragic nature of the book, which some felt might be “depressing” for young readers. The passages in question regarded Anne describing her anatomy, sexual feelings, and homosexual descriptions of her friend. 

[. . .]

After you read the list, make a plan. Find a way to get involved. You can sound the alarm. You can read these books to know why they are banned in the first place. You can participate in events like Library Card Sign Up Month. You can start a banned book club. For more suggestions check out the ALA website or talk to your local librarian for help.

The list continues beyond the books above, use the link to read in full. 


That's how it starts, we said we'd come back to it.  THE NEW YORKER published David D. Kirkpatrick's "The Next Targets for the Group That Overturned Roe" earlier this week.  I keep trying to work it into a snapshot but so far no luck.  ROE was destroyed and it was from years of planning.  The same groups have plans for further destruction.  

They've invented jargon that you need to listen for so you will know if it's friend or foe.  They know that they can't continue beating up on lesbians and gays so they're trying to hide it as 'concern for children' and pretending that they're going after pornography.  It's smoke and mirrors.  

You should pair Kirkpatrick's article with Bethany Carlson's for WHOWHATWHY where she documents a specific case of how they twist language to try to destroy a library -- a historic one at that -- how it's about their hatred of LGBTQ+ people and of reproductive rights and how they'll cheat and lie and whore to destroy our liberties.




The following sites updated:

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