Stuff below the fold

The UN is "worried" because the HIV rate in the Philippines went up 25 percent over the last few years. But the numbers show that only 1300 cases of HIV were diagnosed last year, 80 percent in our gay population...

(and gays are better accepted here than in the US...when "pious" politicians steal millions of pesos and exploit the poor, MSM seems a minor sin...).

It's not really about HIV of course, it's part of the propaganda campaign by foreign NGO's to limit population...

No problem like this in Japan: Their population is shrinking.

Lots of caregiver jobs for Filipinos, although the Japanese are inventing robot caretakers too.

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Haiti's cholera epidemic continues: it is now 3000 plus dead, and the disease was probably imported by UN peacekeepers from Nepal...but folks are now lynching voodoo priests to protest.
Sigh.

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Muslim women feel empowered in the US.
and tired of fighting stereotypes.

It's not the veil, ladies, it's the radical imams...not everyone can pretend they don't exist...alas Glenn Beck et al exploit these worries, so innocent Muslims feel threatened by his radical rhetoric.

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The rich are different..it's now official:..they lack empathy.

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You could say the same about the Boomer generation:

“It created a sense of entitlement that had not existed before,” Mr. Gillon said. “We became more concerned with our own emotional well-being, whereas to older generations that was considered soft and fluffy.”.... They came to expect, even demand, freedom of choice; options in life...“But the pig has moved through the python, and is moving to the final stage,” Mr. Gillon said. “And we won’t describe what that stage is.”

ironically, they us as an example of the "boomer" generation a man who belongs to the type of person usually ignored by the press: a non yuppie members of the generation, a working man who cared for his kids and grand kids, worked at a factory, and cared for his wife with Alzheimer's for years....
Not a typical self centered materialistic "boomer" at all...

a more typical "boomer" is described in this article: The happy marriage is a "me" marriage.

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In a related item, the latest Tolkien professor chat (number 8) is about mortality versus immortality themes in Tolkien's writings.

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and Lifechainblog has recommendations for coping with you, if you are a boomer and just realized it's not all about you:

Here are some great ways of dealing with the burdens of life:

* Accept that some days you’re the pigeon, And some days you’re the statue.

* Always keep your words soft and sweet, Just in case you have to eat them.

* Always wear stuff that will make you look good If you die in the middle of it.

* Drive carefully. It’s not only cars that can be “recalled” by their maker.

* Never put both feet in your mouth at the same time, Because then you won’t have a leg to stand on.

* If you can’t be kind, at least have the decency to be vague.

* It may be that your sole purpose in life is simply to be kind to others.

* Birthdays are good for you. The more you have, the longer you live.

* You may be only one person in the world, But you may also be the world to one person.

*A truly happy person is one who can enjoy the scenery on a detour.