Good morning!

I grew up as a little girl watching my favorite little girl –  Shirley Temple. Every weekend a Shirley Temple movie was playing, I would  watch it with my mother. It was one of my favorite things that I looked forward to doing. I loved the stories, the singing, the dancing…I adored it all. Each movie transported me into a fantasy that I couldn’t get enough of. When I think back of those lazy Sundays propped in front of the television, it brings a smile and many fond memories.

Shirley Temple Black died Monday night.

Here’s the write from the NY Times:

Shirley Temple Black, Hollywood’s Biggest Little Star, Dies at 85

Shirley Temple Black, who as a dimpled, precocious and determined little girl in the 1930s sang and tap-danced her way to a height of Hollywood stardom and worldwide fame that no other child has reached, died on Monday night at her home in Woodside, Calif. She was 85.

Her publicist, Cheryl Kagan, confirmed her death.

Mrs. Black returned to the spotlight in the 1960s in the surprising new role of diplomat, but in the popular imagination she would always be America’s darling of the Depression years, when in 23 motion pictures her sparkling personality and sunny optimism lifted spirits and made her famous. From 1935 to 1939 she was the most popular movie star in America, with Clark Gable a distant second. She received more mail than Greta Garbo and was photographed more often than President Franklin D. Roosevelt.

The little girl with 56 perfect blond ringlets and an air of relentless determination was so assured that the usually unflappable Adolphe Menjou, her co-star in her first big hit, “Little Miss Marker,”described her as “an Ethel Barrymore at 6” and said she was “making a stooge out of me.”

VIEW SLIDE SHOW

When she turned from a magical child into a teenager, audience interest slackened, and she retired from the screen at 22. But instead of retreating into nostalgia, she created a successful second career for herself.

After marrying Charles Alden Black in 1950, she became a prominent Republican fund-raiser. She was appointed a delegate to the United Nations General Assembly by President Richard M. Nixon in 1969. She went on to win wide respect as the United States ambassador to Ghana from 1974 to 1976, was President Gerald R. Ford’s chief of protocol in 1976 and 1977, and became President George H. W. Bush’s ambassador to what was then Czechoslovakia in 1989, serving there during the fall of Communism in Eastern Europe.

After winning an honorary Academy Award at the age of 6 and earning $3 million before puberty, Shirley Temple grew up to be a level-headed adult. At a time when operations for cancer were shrouded in secrecy, Mrs. Black held a news conference in her hospital room after her mastectomy to discuss her experience and to urge women discovering breast lumps not to “sit home and be afraid.” She is widely credited with helping to make it acceptable to talk about breast cancer.

Shirley Jane Temple was born in Santa Monica, Calif., on April 23, 1928. From the beginning, she and her mother, Gertrude, were a team (“I was absolutely bathed in love,” she remembered); her movie career was their joint invention. Her success was a result of both her own charm and her mother’s persistence.

In “Child Star,” her 1988 autobiography, Mrs. Black said her mother had made a “calculated decision” to turn her only daughter into a professional dancer. At a fee of 50 cents a week, Mrs. Temple enrolled 3-year-old Shirley in Mrs. Meglin’s Dance Studio.

In 1932, Shirley was spotted by an agent from Educational Pictures and chosen to appear in “Baby Burlesks,” a series of sexually suggestive one-reel shorts in which children played all the roles. The 4- and 5-year-old children wore fancy adult costumes that ended at the waist. Below the waist, they wore diapers with oversize safety pins. In these heavy-handed parodies of well-known films like “The Front Page” (“The Runt Page”) and “What Price Glory” (“War Babies”), Shirley imitated Marlene Dietrich, Mae West and — wearing an off-the-shoulder blouse and satin garter as a hard-boiled French bar girl in “War Babies” — Dolores del Río.

When any of the two dozen children in “Baby Burlesks” misbehaved, they were locked in a windowless sound box with only a block of ice on which to sit. “So far as I can tell, the black box did no lasting damage to my psyche,” Mrs. Black wrote in “Child Star.” “Its lesson of life, however, was profound and unforgettable. Time is money. Wasted time means wasted money means trouble.”

“Baby Burlesks” was followed by five two-reel comedies and a year of casting calls and bit-part auditions that which garnered young Shirley half a dozen small roles. By Thanksgiving 1933 she was growing older. She was 5 ½, and in the previous two years she had earned a total of $702.50. Her mother did the sensible thing: she shaved a year off her daughter’s age. Shirley would be shocked to discover, at a party for her 12th birthday in April 1941, that she was actually 13.

Her career began in earnest in 1934, when she was picked to play James Dunn’s daughter in the Fox fantasy “Stand Up and Cheer,” one of many films made during the Depression in which music chases away unhappy reality. She was signed to a two-week contract at $150 a week and told to provide her own tap shoes.

Within an hour of completing her song-and-dance number “Baby, Take a Bow,” she was formally placed under contract to Fox for a year at $150 a week. The studio had an option for seven more years and would pay Gertrude Temple an additional $25 each week to take care of her daughter.

On ‘The Good Ship Lollipop’

In its review of “Stand Up and Cheer” (1934), Variety called Shirley Temple a “surefire potential kidlet star.” She made eight movies in 1934 and moved from potential to full star in February, when Fox lent her to Paramount for “Little Miss Marker,” based on a Damon Runyon story.

Playing a child left with a bookie (Mr. Menjou) as a marker for her father’s gambling debts, Shirley reforms a gang of gamblers, bookies and horse dopers. She would play a similarly wise and maternal miniature adult, dominating the adults around her and solving their problems with unbounded optimism and common sense, in most of her films.

She brought peace to a British regiment fighting rebels in India in “Wee Willie Winkie” (1937) and to white men and Indians in “Susannah of the Mounties” (1939). She was frequently cast as an orphan, the better to show adults how to cope with adversity: her father committed suicide in “Little Miss Marker”; her aviator father crashed and her mother was killed by a car in “Bright Eyes” (1934); she was the sole survivor of a shipwreck in “Captain January” (1936).

“People in the Depression wanted something to cheer them up, and they fell in love with a dog, Rin Tin Tin, and a little girl,” Mrs. Black often said in appraising her success.

It is no surprise that Shirley Temple dolls were the best-selling dolls of the decade (and are valuable collectibles now). In many of her films she was a living doll, adored by entire groups of men: aviators in “Bright Eyes,” a Yankee regiment in “The Little Colonel” (1935).

No Shirley Temple movie was complete without a song — most famously “On the Good Ship Lollipop” and “Animal Crackers in My Soup” — and a tap dance, with partners including George Murphy, Jack Haley and Buddy Ebsen. But her most successful partnership was with the legendary African-American entertainer Bill (Bojangles) Robinson. She may have been the first white actress allowed to hold hands affectionately with a black man on screen, and her staircase dance with Mr. Robinson in “The Little Colonel,” the first of four movies they made together, retains its magic almost 80 years later.

Not everyone was a Shirley Temple fan. The novelist Graham Greene, who was also a film critic, was sued by 20th Century Fox for his review of “Wee Willie Winkie” in the magazine Night and Day, which he edited. In the review, he questioned whether she was a midget and wrote of her “well-shaped and desirable little body” being served up to middle-aged male admirers.

After the failure of “The Blue Bird” (1940), a film version of the Maeterlinck fantasy that Fox had expected to be the bonanza MGM’s “The Wizard of Oz” had been a year earlier, the studio dropped the 12-year-old actress’s contract. Even before the movie was released, her mother had decided it was time for Shirley, who had been educated in a schoolroom at Fox, to go to a real school.

She entered the private Westlake School for Girls in seventh grade, with little idea of how to cope. She had sat on 200 famous laps and found J. Edgar Hoover’s the most comfortable. Amelia Earhart had shared chewing gum with her. She had conversed with Eleanor Roosevelt. The Brown Derby restaurant in Hollywood had created the Shirley Temple — a nonalcoholic drink of lemon-lime soda, grenadine and a maraschino cherry — in her honor. (She didn’t care for it.) But her playmates had been few and carefully chosen.

At Westlake, after months of being given the cold shoulder, she decided she might as well be herself. She eventually spent a happy five years there.

What Fox had dropped, MGM picked up eight months later. But the little girl was now entering adolescence. On her first visit to MGM, Mrs. Black wrote in her autobiography, the producer Arthur Freed unzipped his trousers and exposed himself to her. Being innocent of male anatomy, she responded by giggling, and he threw her out of his office.

Curls and Girlish Magic Fade

She made “Kathleen” (1941) for MGM and “Miss Annie Rooney” (1942) for United Artists; played supporting roles for David O. Selznick in two 1944 films, “Since You Went Away” and “I’ll Be Seeing You”; and made “Kiss and Tell” on loan to Columbia in 1945.

But her golden hair had turned brown, and, as the film historian David Thomson observed, she had become “an unremarkable teenager.” After nearly four dozen films, the public had lost interest.

By then she was a strong-willed, chain-smoking 17-year-old. Determined to be the first in her Westlake class to become engaged, she had accepted a ring from a 24-year-old Army Air Corps sergeant, John Agar Jr., a few days before her 17th birthday. They were married on Sept. 19, 1945.

Unable to handle being Mr. Shirley Temple, Mr. Agar began drinking excessively. While his wife was appearing in “The Bachelor and the Bobby Soxer” with Cary Grant and Myrna Loy and “That Hagen Girl” with Ronald Reagan, Mr. Agar began an acting career of his own. He appeared in several low-budget movies, in support of John Wayne in a few westerns and war films, and on television. But he failed to achieve anything close to her success.

They were divorced in December 1949, a year after the birth of their daughter, Linda Susan. Less than 60 days after her divorce, Miss Temple, 21, met and became engaged to Mr. Black, then the 30-year-old assistant to the president of the Hawaiian Pineapple Company, who claimed he had never seen a Shirley Temple movie. They were betrothed after a 12-day courtship. Their marriage lasted almost 55 years, until his death in 2005.

Mr. Black, who was dropped from the San Francisco Social Register for marrying an actress, told a reporter in 1988: “Over 38 years I have participated in her life 24 hours a day through thick and thin, traumatic situations, exultant situations, and I feel she has only one personality. She would be catastrophic for the psychiatric profession. You can wake her up in the middle of the night and she has the same personality everybody knows. What everybody has seen for 60 years is the bedrock.”

Shirley Temple had left the movies for good by Dec. 6, 1950, when she married Mr. Black. A son, Charles Jr., was born in 1952; a daughter, Lori, in 1954. They survive her, as does her daughter, Linda Susan.

During the Korean War, Mrs. Black followed her husband to Washington, where he was stationed at the Pentagon as a Navy lieutenant commander. In later years he would follow her to her diplomatic postings.

Late in the 1950s, with her old movies being shown on television all over America, she briefly returned to show business. From 1958 to 1961 she was the host and an occasional performer on the television series “Shirley Temple’s Storybook” (also known as “The Shirley Temple Show”), an anthology of fairy-tale adaptations.

By the early 1960s she was president of the Multiple Sclerosis Society and co-founder of the International Federation of Multiple Sclerosis Societies, raising funds to fight the disease that struck her brother George. She was representing the federation in Prague on Aug. 21, 1968, when Soviet tanks rolled in and brought a premature end to Alexander Dubcek’s effort to remodel the Communist system.For many years the Black family lived in the San Francisco area, where Mrs. Black was active in civic and community affairs. She worked particularly hard for the development of the San Francisco International Film Festival, but quit the festival’s executive committee in 1966 to protest a decision to show the Swedish film “Night Games,” which she called “pornography for profit.”

A Conservative Republican

Mrs. Black had become interested in politics when she lived in Washington. In 1967 she ran for Congress to fill a seat left vacant by the death of the Republican J. Arthur Younger. She hoped to emulate the California political successes of George Murphy, her dancing partner in “Little Miss Broadway,” who had become a United States senator, and Mr. Reagan, who had become governor.

A backer of the Vietnam War, she lost to a more moderate Republican, Pete McCloskey, in the suburban 11th Congressional District south of San Francisco. It probably did not help that the bands kept playing “On the Good Ship Lollipop” at her campaign stops.

But Mrs. Black pressed on with her goal of a career in public service. In 1969, President Nixon appointed her to the five-member United States delegation to the 24th session of the United Nations General Assembly. She acquitted herself well by all accounts, speaking out about the problems of the aged, the plight of refugees and, especially, environmental problems.

When she was appointed ambassador to Ghana in 1974, some career diplomats were outraged, but State Department officials later conceded that her performance was outstanding.

Among her duties as the government’s chief of protocol was heading a training program for new envoys. She flashed her wit in describing it: “We teach them how to get used to being called Ambassador and having Marines saluting. Then, on Day 3, we tell them what to do if they’re taken hostage.”

When she arrived in Prague as ambassador — a post usually reserved for career diplomats — she discovered that there had been a Shirley Temple fan club there 50 years earlier. Officials brought “Shirleyka” old membership cards to autograph. Having been Shirley Temple was extremely helpful to Shirley Temple Black, she told reporters, “mainly because it provides name identification,” although it had no bearing on her future success or failure. Mrs. Black succeeded beyond almost everyone’s expectations, winning praise during her three years in Prague from, among others, Henry Kissinger, who called her “very intelligent, very tough-minded, very disciplined.” It was a fitting tribute to a woman who had left the screen at 22 saying she had “had enough of pretend.”

*****

RIP Mrs. Black. 

Readers: I already knew quite a bit about Shirley Temple Black’s life…but some of these tidbits in the write made me raise my brow. They are shocking, but I shouldn’t be surprised. After all it is ”Hollywood.” Still…Really? “Baby Burlesk?” Pretty sickening. Leave it up to two males – a Hollywood Producer, and a Director,  of “Educational Pictures” (Yeah? Not sure I like what you’re films are teaching.) to come up with a series of sick short films that featured a bunch of toddlers in diapers acting out creepily grown-up plots. Child exploitation at its finest. Yuck. Not to mention these shorts were sexist and racist. And when the children “misbehaved” they were locked in a windowless sound box with the only thing to sit on, a block of ice? Hello…isn’t that child abuse?

And shouldn’t we be surprised that an MGM exec,  Arthur Freed, freed himself and exposed his little willy to little girl Shirley? No doubt her innocent giggling of his “male anatomy” left him feeling insecure enough for him to throw her out of his office. Can you imagine? What did he expect her to do, jump on it and start sucking away at it like a pacifier? Men. They were sick then and they continue to be.

Calm down boys…not all men. 

Something to say? Blog me.

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

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“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

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Good morning!

The Great Lakes Go Dry: How One-Fifth Of The World’s Fresh Water Is Dwindling Away

The frozen opalescent lake and thin, gray sky fade together into white light where the horizon should be. Tall, skeletal grasses shiver on the beach in a wind that makes any sliver of exposed skin burn. The Arni J. Richter, an icebreaking ferry, is about to pull away from Northport Pier for its second and final trip of the day to Washington Island. It’s loaded with food and fuel for the more than 700 hardy residents who call the remote island, just north of Door County peninsula in Wisconsin, home.

People have lived on Washington Island for over 160 years. They’re proud of their tight-knit community and their Icelandic heritage. But life on the island is threatened. For the past 15 years, islanders have watched Lake Michigan slowly disappear. Last January, the lake hit a record low, 29 inches below the long-term average as measured since 1918. The Richter Ferry was just inches away from grounding in some spots along its increasingly treacherous six-mile route to the island.

The Great Lakes, which contain one-fifth of the world’s above-ground fresh water supply, are sometimes referred to as America’s “northern coast.” As communities along the rest of the nation’s shorelines brace for rising waters brought by climate change, however, and spend billions on replacing sand swept out to sea in storms, the communities of the Great Lakes find themselves with more and more sand and less and less water.

“The island depends on the ferry for everything,” said Hoyt Purinton, President and Captain of theWashington Island Ferry Line and great grandson of the ferry’s first captain. “If the ferry can’t get to the island, the island won’t survive. Even if you could find another way to get food and fuel over there, if there’s no easy way for tourists to make the trip, the fragile island economy dies and the community and culture goes with it.”

As the lake retreats, some people blame the Army Corps of Engineers for dredging projects that widen channels leading out of Lake Michigan. Others wonder if the watershed can no longer support the 40 million people in the U.S. and Canada who now rely on the lakes for their drinking water.

Increasingly, scientists believe that climate change is driving the warming waters and setting up a new regime in the Great Lakes that may lead to lower lake levels and a permanently altered shoreline.

Ever since the 1990s, Lake Michigan has been predominantly below its long-term water level average, and trending downwards. Water levels plummeted precipitously in the late 1990s, after a strong El Niño event warmed up the waters.

“That event drastically increased water temperatures,” explained Drew Gronewold, a physical scientist at NOAA’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory (GLERL). “Over the course of just one year, water temperatures went up by 2.5 degrees Celsius. That’s huge. And the cycle is reinforcing; one really warm year led to more than a decade of dropping lake levels.”

Grelickville, Traverse City, MI – Low Water

CREDIT: NOAA

As the lake warms, it’s changing the water levels, as well. Most evaporation on the Great Lakes occurs in the fall when the lake is still warm from the summer, but the air has turned cold and dry. When the water is warmer than usual, the peak evaporation season begins earlier and lasts longer into the early winter. Warmer water also leads to less ice formation and fewer days of ice cover.

Ice cover also impacts lake levels. It prevents evaporation from the lakes during the winter and for as long as it lasts into the spring. And it affects how warm the water will be that year, and thus the rate of evaporation — the more ice cover, the colder the water stays into the summer and fall, leading to less evaporation. The reverse is also true — less ice cover will lead to warmer water and more evaporation.

“The 1998 El Niño gave us a taste of what we can expect to see on the Great Lakes in a changing climate,” said Don Scavia, Co-Director of the Great Lakes Integrated Sciences and Assessments (GLISA). “The El Niño-driven warmer temperatures are a surrogate for what the future climate might be. The lower lake levels during that time may be a signal of what might be happening under longer term climate change.”

In other words, last winter’s record low lake levels are a glimpse of what a warmer climate in the region would do to the lakes — a glimpse that so far has lasted 15 years, set off by one hot summer.

At Newport State Park, one of five state parks in Door County, the vanishing water has changed the shoreline dramatically. The beach, once a wide expanse of silky mustard-colored sand that on a hot summer day would be crawling with a hundred sunscreen-smeared tourists, is now covered in tall reeds, marsh grasses, mud and exposed rocks sheathed in slick green slime. There is no inviting sand, just a marshland down to the water’s edge and the water is clogged with tangled clumps of matted algae like something pulled out of a shower drain.

“I used to constantly get complaints about the appearance of the beach,” said park manager Michelle Hefty. “I’ve been confronted about the grasses encroaching onto the sand and berated about the quantity of insects near the water. It just doesn’t look like that postcard perfect beach anymore.”

Financially, Newport has struggled to keep afloat as tourists seek more manicured picnic spots.

“We’ve had the same budget for the past decade,” said Hefty. “But our costs keep on going up with the increasing price of gas and electricity, while our revenue is shrinking with fewer numbers of visitors.”

Tourism is big business on the Door County peninsula and surrounding islands. According to the Door County Visitors Bureau, tourists pumped $289 million into the local economy in 2012 and supported 2,498 jobs.

State funding only accounts for about 20 percent of the park’s budget; 80 percent of management expenses are supposed to be provided for by park sticker sales and campsite fees.

“We’ve cut back wherever we can,” stressed Hefty. “We don’t plough unless we absolutely have to, we groom the cross-country ski trails less often to save on gas, we turn the thermometer down in the office and pile on the sweaters, but we’re barely breaking even.”

According to Jim Sarkis, founder and principal broker at Sarkis & Associates Realtors, waterfront property values in Door County are also taking a hit — declining by 30 to 35 percent over the last five years.

“Of course, it’s impossible to tease out how much of that decline is because of the lower lake levels and how much of that is just a reflection of the recession and the struggles of the U.S. housing market in general,” said Sarkis, who has been a realtor in Door County for 37 years.

There are some clues, however. Ten years ago, a small private dock would add around $150,000 to the value of a waterfront home. Today, the added value is nothing. That’s because across the county docks which once stood in several feet of water, now appear suspended in the air, legs out of water, sometimes reaching out across nothing but sand and tall grasses.

“The value of those docks was the water around them,” said Sarkis. “Now that that’s gone, they’re really not much more than an elevated bench. If you own a boat, you’ll have to rent a slip in a harbor where they’re dredging.”

Sarkis explained that more and more the phrase “water view” is more appropriate than “waterfront.”

“People can still enjoy the sunsets, even if the water isn’t exactly lapping at their back door,” said Sarkis. “But I have definitely taken clients to properties and had people jokingly say ‘I thought you were showing us a waterfront property’ as they walk the two hundred, maybe four hundred feet down to where the water now sits.”

Grelickville, Traverse City , MI – Low Water

CREDIT: NOAA

The winter of 2013-2014 is shaping up to be very different from what the Great Lakes have become accustomed to over the last 15 years. Thanks to the polar air drifting down from Canada, Lake Michigan saw some of its earliest ice in years. Scientists are predicting that if the ice lasts, the lake level could go up by as much as a foot this year. And the colder water could be setting up the lakes for a couple years of recovery.

“The good news is that while in some ways there is a lot of inertia in the Great Lakes system, there is also a lot of interannual variation in the water levels,” said GLISA’s Scavia. “The Great Lakes probably have some time to prepare for the lower lake levels we suspect will come in the future. The key is to use the time, not hope that problem has gone away.”

While this winter’s cold will buy some time for the Great Lakes, scientists emphasize that many concerns and unanswered questions remain. One of the great unknowns in the story of water levels on the Great Lakes is how precipitation patterns will change in the years to come. Some models suggest that precipitation is actually expected to increase, which may help to offset declines caused by increased evaporation.

“The general consensus right now, looking at a broad range of models that have been developed for the Great Lakes, is that there is a big range of variability, but there appears to be a decreasing trend in water levels over the next century,” said Gronewold.

One well-studied aspect of changing precipitation patterns in the Great Lakes is the increasing frequency and severity of spring storms. These powerful downpours, which occur around the same time as farms are being prepared for planting, mean that vast amounts of phosphorus are being washed into the lakes, leading to toxic algae blooms and massive dead zones.

“We’ve seen this mostly on Lake Erie so far,” explained Scavia. “But the problem is starting to be seen in Lake Michigan, as well, and we should expect it to get worse.”

Back at Northport Pier where the Washington Island Ferry loads, a massive dredging project is underway to alleviate some of the stress on the boats and communities that depend on their regular arrival. Work began in September to deepen and widen the half mile channel that leads into Detroit Harbor where the ferry docks on the island. The project will cost about $7 million, $5.2 million of which is being provided byWisconsin’s Harbor Assistance Program. Washington Island is responsible for the rest of the expenses which will be made up for by removing the dredged sediments.

The project will deepen the channel by three feet to bring it to a total of 17 feet below the low water line, widen the channel by 20 feet and remove 134,500 cubic yards of sediment.

Despite the temporary respite this winter, ferry boat captain Purinton remains concerned about the long-term changes he’s observing on the lake. “I hope people don’t look at the last nine months of cold weather and stop planning for low lake levels,” he said. “That would be a huge mistake. This is the first what I like to call ‘real’ winter that we’ve had in years and years. I think what’s happening now is the anomaly, not the years before.”

*****

Blog me.

Black History: Thanks for reminding me that it is Black History Month. I never seem to remember or be reminded, until it is almost mid-month. Thanks for opening with a little history lesson on Colonel Ruth Alice Lucas. 

Peace out. 

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

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All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

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Good morning!

Zaria: Speaking of showers, and privacy…and Mike, TM…speaking of computers and cell phones being hacked…

…a write From Think Progress:

Russian Officials Defend Decrepit Facilities By Citing Surveillance Footage Inside Hotel Showers

Russian Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Kozak

Journalists, spectators, and athletes in town for the Sochi Olympics (which start today) have been reacting to their unfinished hotel rooms, dirty water, andunfamiliar lavatory setups with a mix of amusement and frustration on social media. Less genial are the Russian officials tasked with running the games, who have begun accusing their detractors of deliberately sabotaging the Olympic village in an effort to embarrass Russia. And they can prove it too, thanks to the surveillance cameras installed in visitors’ showers.

At least that seemed to be the admission from Dmitry Kozak, a deputy Prime Minister who is responsible for overseeing the Sochi Olympics. He spoke with theWall Street Journal about the endless stream of criticism, and was eager to offer his evidence that much of it is fabricated.

“We have surveillance video from the hotels that shows people turn on the shower, direct the nozzle at the wall and then leave the room for the whole day,” he told the paper. Before the Journal could inquire as to how Russian officials were able to see inside the showers of hotel guests, an aide stepped in and pulled the reporter away from Kozak.

Whether or not the claim by Kozak is true, Russia’s Olympic games are already rife with privacy concerns. NBC News reporter Richard Engel filed a report from Sochi on Tuesday documenting how hackers in Russia were able to gain access to both of his computers and his cell phone in a matter of minutes, and the U.S. State Department has issued a warning to anyone traveling to the games that they should have “no expectation of privacy, even in their hotel rooms.”

Not every Olympic venue is a disaster area. Most of the facilities being used by the athletes — both their accommodations and the event facilities themselves — were completed ahead of schedule and without missing doorknobs, ceilings or hot water. But the overall lack of preparedness has many wondering what became of the $51 billion that was spent on the Sochi games, more than every other winter Olympics combined.

Readers: Now…time to get off of my computer, which I am HOPEful it hasn’t been hacked, and off to go jump in the shower myself, which to my knowledge is sans cameras. Blog me.

Peace out.

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"

Good morning!

Howie: I see you are up and running again. I look forward to the 3rd installment. It will be interesting to see what beings will respond to the Emperor’s sanction and who will risk not abiding by it. From what I remember, you don’t want to go against the Emperor, a being that has been unconquerable, not to mention a favorite of the Gods.

Mike, TM: Your comment was pretty disturbing. There seems to be so much effort put forth to harm. Wouldn’t it be a lot easier to just be nice, care, and do the right thing? Oh yeah, there’s no money in that.

From Mother Jones:

Update 1, Friday, February 7, 12:45 PM EST: An airliner from the Ukraine was forced to make an emergency landing in Turkey due to a hijacking attempt, AFP reports. Turkish officials told CNN that a passenger, believed to be of Ukrainian nationality, “said that there was a bomb on board” and wanted the plane to land in Sochi. AFP says that he was “brandishing a detonator.”

Update 2, Friday, February 7, 4:30 PM EST: The AFP reports that the man, born in 1969, was “apparently drunk” and only said that he was brandishing a detonator. According to Istanbul’s governor, the man did not have a gun or explosives. Ukrainian security services reportedly said, “The man will answer for his hooligan behavior.”

This week, Americans nervously descend upon Sochi, Russia, to cheer on their favorite athletes in the 2014 Winter Olympic Games. Members of the US team who have already arrived in the city say that with an estimated 100,000 security force members protecting the games, they feel safe. But US officials said on Tuesday that they are tracking “specific threats” to the games. And counterterrorism experts argue that the terrorism risk in Sochi is largely unprecedented, due to recent threats from active terrorist groups. They fear that attacks could take place outside of thesecured perimeter surrounding the event sites, particularly on public transportation or at checkpoints. While the Daily Beast notes that terrorism coverage could overshadow the successes of US athletes—and give terrorists free publicity—experts say that it’s warranted. “This is a very serious threat. It’s not overblown,” says Victor Asal, a terrorism expert at the University of Albany. He adds that if he knew people who were planning a trip to Sochi, he’d tell them, “Don’t go.” Without further ado, here’s everything you need to know:

​Who are these terrorists, and what do they want? 
The main threat to the Olympic games is the Caucasus Emirate, a loose network of Islamist terrorist groups that is located between the Black and Caspian seas in Russia. The Caucasus Emirate, established in 2007, aims to establish Shariah law in the region, but it only has suspected ties with Al Qaeda. The terrorist network is a partly an outgrowth of the First and Second Chechen wars, conflicts that began when Russia invaded Chechnya. “The human rights abuses committed by the Russians in the invasion of Chechnya were really extraordinary​, and the violence has come from these grievances,” Asal says. Initially, the group’s aims were nationalistic—secession from the Russian federation—but now, there is a growing jihadist component.

The group’s self-appointed leader is Doku Umarov, nicknamed “Russia’s bin Laden” (photo below). He’s seen only rarely, and Ramzan Kadyrov, the president of Chechnya, recently claimed that Umarov is dead. (He’s said this many times before, so terrorist experts aren’t convinced.) As of this month, that report has not been confirmed by the Russian government or the US State Department. While the network’s primary target is Russia, Umarov has also issued threats against the United States and Israel in the past, according to the US State Department. 

When has the Caucasus Emirate carried out attacks before? 
Terrorists affiliated with the Caucasus Emirate are believed to have carried out about two terrorist attacks per year since 2008, killing hundreds of civilians. Here are some of their more notable attacks:

• June 2008: A Caucasus Emirate militia group claimed responsibility for a suicide bomb attack that killed 14 and injured dozens in Vladikavkaz, less than 500 miles from Sochi.
• November 2009: The group bombed a train en route to Moscow from St. Petersburg, killing more than 25 people, including high-ranking government officials.
• March 2010: Two female suicide bombers connected to the group bombed the Moscow Metro, killing at least 40 people. 
• January 2011: Umarov ordered a suicide bombing at Domodedovo International Airport in Moscow, killing 37 people.
• February 2011: The Caucasus Emirate conducted an attack at the Mt. Elbrus ski resort, located a little more than 100 miles from Sochi, in which terrorits shot tourists and bombed a cable car. 
• October 2013: A woman associated with Islamic militants bombed a bus in Volgograd, about 600 miles from Sochi, killing at least six. (It has been suspected that she was associated with the Caucasus Emirate, but not confirmed.)
• December 2013: A subgroup of the Caucasus Emirate claimed responsibility for a suicide attack on a train station, also in Volgograd, killing at least 16. The group also claimed responsibility for bombing a trolley bus in the same city 24 hours later, killing 18. (On Wednesday, Russia state media reported that Russian police had killed a suspected mastermind of the December Volgograd attacks.)

Have the Caucasus Emirate explicitly said they want to target the Olympic games?  
Yes. In July 2013, Umarov published a video urging rebels to ”do their utmost to derail” the Olympics. He characterized the games as “satanic dances on the bones of our ancestors.” Late last month, a subgroup of the Caucasus Emirate posted a video (below) showing men they said were the bombers responsible for the December attack on Volgograd, and threatened to give Russia a “present” at the Olympics.

Who are the “Black Widows” I’m hearing about? 

An alleged “black widow” suicide bomber Whitehotpix/ZUMA

“Black Widows” refers to women who have committed suicide attacks, reportedly to avenge spouses or family members killed by the Russian military. According to NPR, Russian police have been circulating fliers over the last few weeks, searching for suspected female terrorists—including a 22-year-old wife who police say was recently spotted in central Sochi. While women have successfully pulled off terrorist attacks associated with the Caucasus Emirate, some experts say the threat has been overstated, because just as many, if not more, men are committing attacks.

Can these terrorists really pull off an attack on the Olympic sites? 
Counterterrorism experts say that it would be very difficult, given the security lockdown known as “the ring of steel”—an area about 60 miles long and 25 miles deep around the Olympic sites. Putin has militarized the areas surrounding the games, with 100,000 police and members of the armed forces on hand, including special-ops forces to guard the mountains outside of Sochi. Only vehicles that are registered in Sochi are being allowed through the city’s checkpoint, and that’s after they’ve been searched. Drones are being deployed to survey the sites from the air, and the government will be snooping on tourists’ electronic devices. (On Tuesday, the Boston Globe reported that some of these security measures could be overstated, noting that a reporter’s bag wasn’t searched.)

What about outside of the ring of steel?
Experts say the risk is high. “The checkpoint has to stop somewhere, and if bombers get anywhere close to a checkpoint, it could have the same political effect in the media as getting into the Olympics themselves,” says Aki Peritz, a senior policy adviser for Third Way and a former CIA counterterrorism analyst. He notes that transportation to and from Sochi is particularly vulnerable, considering the attacks on buses and roadways by the Caucasus Emirate in the past. Daniel Treisman, a Russian politics expert at the University of California-Los Angeles, agrees: “The network will seek to stage attacks in order to demonstrate their capabilities. It is possible [a subgroup] could succeed. But I think they are much more likely to succeed somewhere outside Sochi than inside the security area.”

The State Department warns that while Americans aren’t being targeted specifically in Russia, “there is a general risk of U.S. citizens becoming victims of indiscriminate terrorist attacks.” The British government has been more explicit about the potential threat, putting out a map recommending that tourists avoid many areas outside of Sochi (bottom far left):

The United Kingdom’s Sochi advisory map

What weapons might be used?
Counterterrorism experts say that suicide bombers are likely the biggest threat. ”I think anyone who is going to be attacking the Olympics is going to have to assume that they’re going to be dead. It’s a suicide mission however you look at it,” says Asal, from the University of Alabany. However, in 2012, Russian security forces claimed that they’d found a number of sophisticated arms that they believed were planning to be used in an attack on Sochi—including “grenades, portable surface-to-air missiles, explosives, rifles and other weapons​,” NPR reported. Gordon Hahn, a counterterrorism expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies​, also told Foreign Policy to not rule out the possibility that regional terrorists have obtained chemical weapons from Syria.

How does this threat compare to those posed to Olympics in the past?
According to the New York Times, US officials haven’t been this concerned about security at the Olympics since the 2004 Summer Games in Athens. The paper notes however, that “the Greeks were far more receptive to help from American law enforcement and intelligence officials, who ultimately played a significant role in the security for the Games.” Treisman, from UCLA, says the most recent case that is comparable would be the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, which occurred at a time when the terrorist Basque separatist organization ETA was still active. Peritz, from Third Way, jokes that “it would be safer if we had the Olympics in North Korea. At least they don’t have an active terrorist group blowing things up.” (The most recentdeadly terrorist attack on the Olympics was orchestrated by an American at the 1996 Atlanta Summer Olympics.)

What is the United States doing about all this? 
The United States has stationed two warships, which can launch helicopters into Sochi in case an evacuation is needed, in the nearby Black Sea. The United States is also stationing at least two dozen FBI agents in the area and may be sharing sophisticated counterbomb equipment with Russian authorities. US athletes have also been warned not to wear their uniforms outside of the secured perimeter. Several US congressmen, including House Intelligence Committee Chairman Mike Rogers​ (R-Mich.) have expressed anger that Russia is not cooperating fully with US security efforts.

Is anyone actually staying home?
Several US athletes have said they are asking their families to stay home from the Olympics because of security concerns, including speed skater Tucker Fredricks, Minnesota Wild ice hockey defenseman Ryan Suter, and Wild forward Zach Parise.

Tucker Fredricks

Who says it’s safe?
Some US athletes who have arrived in Sochi already told ABC News on Monday that they feel safe there. “”We’ve had a lot of fun, and I don’t anticipate us being in any more harm’s way than going down the mountain in a bobsled at 85 miles per hour,” said US bobsledder Dallas Robinson. And last month, President Obama confirmed that he felt the games were secure, noting that ”the Russian authorities understand the stakes here.” However, he will not be attending with the first family.

******

Readers: Of course there are more men committing attacks. Do the “Black widows” have any choice? My guess is no. The men are behind the women making sure that they “do as told.” Like so many other women on this planet who have to succumb to the sick ways of men, “or else,” Russian women are being treated no differently.

Raina, Nadine, Tatyana, Nakkita, Zaria, Madina, et al: Reading your comments breaks my heart. Everyday I give gratitude for being born a woman in the US. One who can HOPEfully do something. The abuse all of you girls experience is palpable. I promise you are not forgotten. Be strong and be safe. Sending lots of love.

Igus: It is a sad state for gay men too, but at least you are a man. You have an edge that the women don’t. My suggestion would be for you to ban with the women, and support them. The women need more men on their side in support. If more women had a voice and a place of power in Russia, the gay men in your country would not be in fear of what is currently happening to you. But unless you help the women, why would they support you when it is men who are holding them hostage and abusing them. No doubt they are going to look after themselves first and who would blame them. Support your sisters to rise, and I believe change will happen for you too.

Ooohh…got to go now.

Peace & love: “Live it, Give it.”

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"

Good morning!

I found this interesting. Let me know if you do too.

What’s In A Name?

*****

Thoughts? Blog me.

Lastly, greed over a great story is surfacing from my “loyal”(?) readers. With all this back and forth about who owns what, that appears on my blog, let me reiterate that all material posted on my blog becomes the sole property of my blog. If you want to reserve any proprietary rights don’t post it to my blog. I will prominently display this caveat on my blog from now on to remind those who may have forgotten this notice.

Gratefully your blog host,

michelle

Aka BABE: We all know what this means by now :)

If you love my blog and my writes, please make a donation via PayPal, credit card, or e-check, please click the “Donate” button below. (Please only donations from those readers within the United States. – International readers please see my “Donate” page)

Or if you would like to send a check via snail mail, please make checks payable to “Michelle Moquin”, and send to:

Michelle Moquin PO Box 29235 San Francisco, Ca. 94129

Thank you for your loyal support!

All content on this site are property of Michelle Moquin © copyright 2008-2012

“Though she be but little, she be fierce.” – William Shakespeare Midsummer Night’s Dream 

" Politics, god, Life, News, Music, Family, Personal, Travel, Random, Photography, Religion, Aliens, Art, Entertainment, Food, Books, Thoughts, Media, Culture, Love, Sex, Poetry, Prose, Friends, Technology, Humor, Health, Writing, Events, Movies, Sports, Video, Christianity, Atheist, Blogging, History, Work, Education, Business, Fashion, Barack Obama, People, Internet, Relationships, Faith, Photos, Videos, Hillary Clinton, School, Reviews, God, TV, Philosophy, Fun, Science, Environment, Design, The Page, Rants, Pictures, Church, Blog, Nature, Marketing, Television, Democrats, Parenting, Miscellaneous, Current Events, Film, Spirituality, Obama, Musings, Home, Human Rights, Society, Comedy, Me, Random Thoughts, Research, Government, Election 2008, Baseball, Opinion, Recipes, Children, Iraq, Funny, Women, Economics, America, Misc, Commentary, John McCain, Reflections, All, Celebrities, Inspiration, Lifestyle, Theology, Linux, Kids, Games, World, India, Literature, China, Ramblings, Fitness, Money, Review, War, Articles, Economy, Journal, Quotes, NBA, Crime, Anime, Islam, 2008, Stories, Prayer, Diary, Jesus, Buddha, Muslim, Israel, Europe, Links, Marriage, Fiction, American Idol, Software, Leadership, Pop culture, Rants, Video Games, Republicans, Updates, Political, Football, Healing, Blogs, Shopping, USA, Class, Matrix, Course, Work, Web 2.0, My Life, Psychology, Gay, Happiness, Advertising, Field Hockey, Hip-hop, sex, fucking, ass, Soccer, sox"