31 May 2009
up/down in detroit...
As Motor City stalls, Hockeytown's Red Wings soar...
46 minutes ago
By Nick Carey
DETROIT (Reuters) - All that separates the headquarters of U.S. automaker General Motors Corp and the hockey arena where the Detroit Red Wings play is a 10-minute walk along the banks of the Detroit River.
But the two organizations are worlds apart.
The Red Wings are on the cusp of renewed glory, vying for a second consecutive Stanley Cup, the trophy symbolizing the National Hockey League championship.
They have won it four times since 1997.
The team is playing the Pittsburgh Penguins in a rematch of last year's best-of-seven finals that Detroit won four games to two.
The Red Wings won the first game in this year's series on Saturday.
GM, on the other hand, is headed for an expected bankruptcy filing on Monday as the U.S. recession and the lack of easy credit have hammered sales.
Faced with a slumping economy -- Michigan's 12.9 percent unemployment rate, in April, was the nation's highest -- the Red Wings have become a rare symbol of hope and success for the greater Detroit area of several million people.
"We've grown numb from the job losses and bad news," said unemployed auto worker Scott Watkins, while watching Saturday's game at a bar in suburban Madison Heights.
"Without the Red Wings, what else would Detroit have to cheer about?"
Hockey is America's fourth most popular professional sport, behind football, baseball, and basketball.
In Detroit -- sometimes dubbed Hockeytown, and which borders on the hockey hotbed of Canada -- the game is huge.
The Red Wings have enjoyed more recent success than Detroit's other professional teams.
The basketball Pistons last won a championship in 2004.
The baseball Tigers played in the 2006 World Series, but have not won it since 1984.
The National Football League Detroit Lions failed to win a single game last season.
After the Red Wings' championship last year, several hundred thousand people poured into Detroit's largely depopulated downtown to celebrate.
'SWEATING THE DETAILS'
The contrasts between the Red Wings' success and GM's failure are stark.
GM has been in a downward spiral for years, dependent on trucks and large sport-utility vehicles, losing market share to foreign competitors like Japan's Toyota.
"I think at some point, GM forgot they actually had to sell cars to people," said automotive historian, Bob Elton.
"They just kept talking to themselves and didn't notice they had actual competition."
The Red Wings could not be more different.
Bought in 1982 by Mike Ilitch -- founder of the Little Caesars pizza chain, and owner of the Detroit Tigers -- the organization has built one of the NHL's strongest dynasties.
Stuck with poor draft picks -- in the NHL draft system, poorer-performing teams get the first pick of promising young players while better teams get what's left -- the Red Wings spend years turning those players into stars.
The team has also been creative, picking up strong performers from countries like Russia, Finland, the Czech Republic, and Sweden.
They also acknowledge their fans' yearning for a success story in a city devastated by decades of decline and decay.
"If we can spread a little joy in the world, we're happy to do that," said Henrik Zetterberg, a Swedish star on the team and last year's most valuable player in the playoffs.
"We'll do all we can to bring the Stanley Cup back."
Elton said unlike the Red Wings, GM failed to give consumers what they want, while blaming missteps on external factors.
"Whenever GM failed, they had an excuse... like high gas prices," he said.
"But at the end of the day, there is no substitute for sweating the details," he added.
"The Red Wings sweat the details.
"Toyota sweats the details.
"GM doesn't."
(Editing by Peter Cooney)
grains...
Nutrition & Fitness
Healthy grains for a healthy life...
The important thing to remember about whole grains is they provide good sources of fibre, vitamins, minerals, and protein.
Whole grains are low in fat and can be prepared and eaten in a variety of ways.
But in our fast-paced lives, it is much easier to grab something on the go.
Unfortunately, most fast food options seldom offer nutritional benefits like those found in whole grains.
Most busy people are not planning what to eat before they go shopping, which leads to poor food choices at the grocery store.
What does this mean to you and how can you get more healthy whole grains into your diet?
There are some very easy ways that you can take action today, and with very little time and effort, which will give you immediate benefits.
- Always check the label for the word "whole grain".
- If it lists any variations, then it is not the real thing.
- Check that the hot or cold breakfast cereal you eat contains at least 4 g of fibre per serving and lists whole grain among the ingredients.
- There are a variety of breads, bagels, muffins, and rolls that contain whole wheat, bran, oatmeal, and multigrains, which offer great nutritional value.
- Store-bought pancakes and waffles are available in whole grain versions that offer much more nutritional value than other highly enriched wheat alternatives.
- Whole rye crackers, flat breads, or multigrain crackers offer great sources of high fibre for your diet.
Marlene Veloso
Ingredients: Descriptions and Photos
Grains and Bread Making Ingredients...
(Amaranth)
Amaranth is a very small grain which is a native of South America.
The actual size of the amaranth grain can be seen in the photo to the left.
Amaranth is high in protein, calcium and iron.
From our experience, amaranth is only available in health food stores and from food cooperatives.
Amaranth can be used in its whole grain form like rice, or in other dishes, or it can be ground into flour and used in many baking recipes, as multi-grain bread.
Baking powder is used in baking non-yeast breads, cakes, and muffins, and causes the dough to rise by producing tiny bubbles of carbon dioxide that get trapped in the dough, just as yeast does.
It is a leavening agent composed of different chemical formulations of an acid salt (various), and an alkaline salt, usually baking soda (sodium bicarbonate).
There are two types of baking powder: single acting, which contain such chemicals as calcium hydrogen tartrate (cream of tarter), calcium phosphate, or calcium citrate, which begins to work at room temperature as soon as the wet ingredients are added to the dry ingredients; and double acting, which also reacts at higher temperatures during the baking process, and usually contain an aluminum salt, such as calcium aluminum phosphate, which may be harmful to health because of its aluminum content.
To keep baking powder fresh and to prevent the moisture in the air from starting the chemical reaction, it is best to store baking powder in a tightly sealed container in the refrigerator or freezer.
If you wish to avoid the aluminum, and use only the single acting baking powder, a less expensive substitute can be used: for every teaspoon of baking powder called for in the the recipe, add 1/2 teaspoon of baking soda to the dry ingredients, and 1-1/2 teaspoons of lemon juice or vinegar to the wet ingredients.
Happy baking!
(Barley)
Most people are familiar with pearl barley, but whole grain barley has a much fuller flavor, as well as being more nutritious.
Barley was also an important grain in Biblical times, being the grain Ruth gleaned in Boaz's field, some 3,000 years ago.
We purchase our whole grain barley from the co-op or from a health food store.
We use whole grain barley as one of the ingredients in bread and in other recipes containing barley.
Pearl barley is a barley that is polished to give it "market appeal".
Barley is an ancient grain, being mentioned in early historic writings.
33 grams of barley (1/4 cup, dry) contains no fat, 24 grams of complex carbohydrate (96 calories), 3 grams of protein (12 calories), and 5 grams of dietary fiber.
Most people probably think of corn on the cob as a vegetable, but it is really a grain.
There are several common varieties of corn on the cob: yellow, white, and mixed white and yellow, which is pictured here.
In our experience, we have seen only the yellow variety sold frozen either on the cob or cut.
We found a variety of flavors in corn on the cob depending on where it is grown and how long it has been since it was harvested.
The longer it has been since the corn was harvested, the more bland the flavor, and the more "gummy" the texture.
We have found it best to buy only fresh corn on the cob that has a nice green husk.
We could not find any nutritional information for bicolor yellow and white corn on the cob, but estimate it should be somewhere in the middle of the nutritional information we have for white corn on the cob and yellow corn on the cob.
To enlarge the photo, click on the photo or link.
Most people probably think of corn on the cob as a vegetable, but it is really a grain.
There are several common varieties of corn on the cob: yellow, mixed white and yellow, and white, which is pictured here.
In our experience, we have seen only the yellow variety sold frozen either on the cob or cut.
We found a variety of flavors in corn on the cob depending on where it is grown and how long it has been since it was harvested.
The longer it has been since the corn was harvested, the more bland the flavor, and the more "gummy" the texture.
We found it best to buy only fresh corn on the cob that has a nice green husk.
See the enlarged photo and the nutritional chart for raw white corn on the cob by clicking on the photo or link.
We could not find any nutritional information for cooked white corn on the cob, but it is probably very similar to the differences between the raw and cooked information for yellow corn on the cob.
Most people probably think of corn on the cob as a vegetable, but it is really a grain.
There are several common varieties of corn on the cob: white, mixed white and yellow, and the yellow, pictured here.
In our experience, we have seen only the yellow variety sold frozen either on the cob or cut.
We found a variety of flavors in corn on the cob depending on where it is grown and how long it has been since it was harvested.
The longer it has been since the corn was harvested, the more bland the flavor, and the more "gummy" the texture.
We found it best to buy only fresh corn on the cob that has a nice green husk.
Corn masa flour is made from dehydrated, finely ground whole grain corn and lime.
It's primarily used for making tortillas and other Mexican, and Central and South American recipes.
We also use the corn masa flour as a coating and dusting flour, as a thickening agent, and in baking.
We could not find the nutritional information for the whole grain masa flour with lime.
Since we use only whole grains, we could not be completely sure of the actual nutritional content of this flour, which we believe is somewhere in between the nutritional information for whole-grain and masa flours, which can be seen by clicking on the photo or link.
Popcorn is usually considered a snack food, but when air-popped, it is quite a healthful food, unlike oil-popped and candy coated popcorn, and potato chips.
We usually air-pop our popcorn in our microwave oven in a special container we purchased specifically for this purpose, or in a hot air popping machine.
While the so-called gourmet popcorn may produce slightly larger volumes of popped corn, we have found the price difference is unjustified, and usually purchase store, or either organic or non-organic off-brand popping corn seed.
Unfortunately, we have found some very poor quality organic popcorn, and, as a result, usually purchase a store brand at a local supermarket at about $0.50/lb.
For popcorn recipes, go to our Snacks sub-section.
Carob powder is produced by grinding the roasted beans from the pods of a Mediterranean evergreen leguminous tree.
For many people, including us, carob has taken the place of cocoa and chocolate.
Unlike cocoa and chocolate, carob has no caffeine and almost no fat.
Since carob is sweet, it requires much less sweetener than chocolate and cocoa.
(Kamut)
Kamut brand wheat is the registered trade name of Kamut International, Ltd., who cultivated a viable grain supposedly found in a jar in a pyramid in Egypt and planted it in the United States.
The nutritional values of kamut are compared with conventional wheat (Kamut).
We primarily us soy lecithin as an emulsifier in our bread recipes.
It is also used as an ingredient of dough enhancers: for every cup of flour, we use 1 tsp. of soy lecithin, 1/8 tsp. vitamin C (ascorbic acid), and 1/8 tsp. of ground ginger. Lecithin is a mixture of fats: glycolipids, triglycerides, and phospholipids.
It also produced naturally in our livers, when the person is eating a healthful diet.
Every cell in the body requires lecithin for building the cell walls, for without it, the walls would become hardened.
Soy lecithin is extracted from soy beans using hexane and then refined.
(Lentils)
Lentils are legumes (beans) that have been cultivated for thousands of years.
The actual size of a lentil is about 1/4 inch.
Nutritional information: a 1/4 cup (dry) serving of lentils (32 grams) has no fat, 19 grams of complex carbohydrate - 10 grams of which is digestible (40 calories) and 9 grams in the form of dietary fiber - and 8 grams of protein (32 calories). A serving of lentils also provides 15% of our daily requirement of iron.
Yellow Millet is an ancient grain grown in Biblical time.
The actual size of a grain of millet is approximately 1/16 inch across.
A 1/4 cup (dry) serving (46 grams) of millet has no fat, 26 grams of complex carbohydrate (104 calories) of which 14 grams are dietary fiber, and 13 grams of protein (52 calories).
A serving of millet also provides the following daily requirements: vitamin C - 4%, calcium - 2%, and iron - 25%.
Rolled oats are a processed form of the whole grain produced by steaming and passing between steel rollers.
This helps it cook faster.
A 1/2 cup (dry) serving of rolled oats (39 grams) contains 3 grams of fat (27 calories) of which 0.5 grams is saturated fat, 26 grams of complex carbohydrate of which 22 grams are edible (88 calories) and 4 grams are dietary fiber, and 5 grams of protein (20 calories).
One serving of oats also supplies 10% of our daily requirement of iron.
(Oats, Irish/Scots (Steel-Cut))
Steel-cut oats, also called Irish or Scots oats, particularly when made into oatmeal.
They are a cut, but otherwise unprocessed form of whole grain oats, which have a more robust flavor than rolled oats when making oatmeal, though they do take more time to cook.
Steel-cut oats differ from rolled oats which are flake oats steamed, rolled, re-steamed and toasted.
Due to all of this additional processing they have lost some of their natural taste, goodness and texture, which the steel-cut oats retain.
(Quinoa)
Quinoa (pronounced keen-wah) is a native "grain" or seed of a high Andes pig weed widely used for food in Peru.
It is high in protein, calcium, and iron.
The actual size of quinoa can be seen in the photo to the left.
From our experience quinoa is only available in health food stores or from food cooperatives.
Quinoa can be used whole like rice, or in soups, or ground and used in baking, as in multi-grain bread.
Black sticky rice, or kao niow dahm (kao is rice; niow, sticky; dahm, black), as it is known in Thailand, is also called black sweet rice, black glutinous rice, and Indonesian rice.
The wonderful flavor of black sticky rice makes it a favorite in Southeast Asia, where it is primarily used for breakfast, puddings and other desserts, but we have found it also makes a great bed for cooked Oriental fruit and veggie recipes.
We could not find any specific nutritional information for black sticky rice.
We buy and eat only whole grain brown rice, like this or other varieties.
Brown rice retains the bran and germ which contain many of the nutrients and the fiber.
Brown rice also has more flavor, which some people describe as "nutty".
This is really the natural flavor of rice, which has been removed from "white rice" along with many of the nutrients.
(Rice, Brown Basmati) Brown basmati rice is a stronger flavored whole grain rice that is a native of India.
Recently, we have seen brown basmati rice grown in the United States.
It is a great addition to curry flavored dishes.
We purchase our brown basmati rice from health food stores, or from a food co-op.
As its popularity grows, we expect that it will become available in most supermarkets. The photo to the left shows the actual size of the rice.
Brown basmati rice is more nutritious than the polished white variety; and we believe it is always better to eat whole grains, rather than processed grains.
Wild rice is a native American grain as old as recorded history.
The harvesting of wild rice traditionally was done along streams and lakes where it was growing naturally.
In more recent years, wild rice has been "naturally cultivated" to increase the yield.
However, wild rice is still several times more expensive than any of the other types of rice we have encountered.
At more than $3.00 (US) per pound, it remains a gourmet delicacy.
Wild rice takes a little longer to cook than brown or basmati, but if cooked together with other types of rice and allowed to remain in the pot for another 15 minutes after cooking, it will be tender.
(Rye)
Rye is a relatively modern grain of unknown origin; there is no mention of it in ancient writings.
The food value of rye consists of 1.5% fat, 73.9% complex carbohydrate, and 12.2% Protein.
The balance of the rye grain consists of 1.9% ash and 10.5% water.
Sesame seeds come from the seed pods of Sesamum indicum.
They were used by the Assyrians as far back as 1,600 - 3,000 B.C.E., depending on the reference source.
We use sesame seeds as an outer coating for some of our bread and roll recipes, and as an ingredient in dips, dressings, and other recipes.
(Spelt)
Spelt is another of the ancient grains mentioned in the Bible.
A 2 oz. (56.7 grams) dry serving of spelt contains 216 calories, consisting of 1.67 grams of fat (15 calories), 42.25 grams of complex carbohydrate (169 calories), and 8.1 grams of protein (32 calories).
Even though wheat is mentioned in ancient writings, it is not the same as the commercial wheat we have today.
Our present day wheat is a variety of hybrid wheat grains which were developed from about 1920.
From what we have learned, this hybrid wheat is more allergenic than the traditional "wheat".
A 100 gram (dry) portion of wheat contains 1.9 grams of fat (17 calories), 72.7 grams of complex carbohydrate (291 calories), and 12.3 grams of protein (49 calories).
(See Kamut for a detailed comparison of nutritional values between our modern day wheat and Kamut.)
At first thought, it might seem strange to include vitamin C powder as a recipe ingredient; however, vitamin C has been found to be a dough enhancer when used in conjunction with Ginger and Soya Lecithin.
The ascorbic acid strengthens the gluten bonds so the rising dough is better able to retain the gas bubbles.
The ginger accelerates the yeast, and the soy lecithin acts as an emulsifier.
Typically, for every cup of flour, add 1 tsp. soy lecithin, 1/8 tsp. ground ginger, and 1/8 tsp. ascorbic acid powder.
We purchased our vitamin C powder (ascorbic acid) in the health food store.
(Yeast)
Yeast are single-celled plants.
They are fungus that ferment starches and sugars.
One of the by-products of this fermentation process is carbon dioxide gas which forms little bubbles in bread dough and causes it to rise.
These fungus plants are killed during baking.
We purchase our yeast in bulk (1 or 2 pound packages) and store in tightly sealed glass jars in our refrigerator .
We have found two forms of commercial yeast: the one pictured above left is an enlargement of the "bead" or granular form of dried yeast clusters, and the other, (Yeast 2), pictured right in an enlargement, is the extruded form of commercial yeast.
Note, the "cylinders" of yeast have become polarized, and the static electricity and magnetic field causes them to stick together end to end.
As far as performance in baking, there is no difference in various forms of yeast.
slowdowns looming...
27 May '09
A Customs and Border Protection officer checks passports at the control booth as people enter the United States through the Miami International Airport in 2007, in Miami, Florida.
The United States and Canada agreed Wednesday to increase security along their shared border -- once trumpeted as the longest un-militarized boundary in the world -- and work to jointly counter threats, officials said. Photo:Joe Raedle/AFP
Businesses prepped for new land-sea passport rules but expect delays at borders...
31 May '09
By Brenda Bouw, The Canadian Press
Operators of the Victoria Clipper have been warning potential passengers for months they'll need more than just their sea legs when boarding the fast ferry to Seattle, starting Monday.
But the real test will come when the boats pass through customs as of 01 June, the day new passport regulations kick in for people traveling into the U.S. by land or water.
"Right now I think we are feeling pretty good," said Darrell Bryan, president and CEO Clipper Navigation Inc., which operates the ferry service between Victoria, BC, and Seattle, Wa.
He said about 90 per cent of people traveling on his ferries today have the proper identification required to make the cross-border trip.
Bryan said the decision to delay the regulations until now, which is about 18 months after the rules for air travel took effect in 27 Jan. 2008, helped smooth potential problems for his business.
In particular, it gave them more time to communicate the pending change.
"Certainly, if this had happened earlier as they originally proposed, it would have been devastating," Bryan said.
As of Monday, people travelling to the United States by land or water will need a passport or other approved documents such as the NEXUS card used by frequent travelers, the Free and Secure Trade (FAST) card used by truckers, or one of the enhanced driver's licenses offered in such provinces as British Columbia, Manitoba and Quebec.
The rules are part of the U.S.-imposed Western Hemisphere Travel Initiative intended to enhance border security.
Businesses that travel cross-border by boat, train or truck say they have been preparing their customers and staff for months about the new rules, and agree the delay has helped prevent potential chaos.
However, some business groups worry that individuals who still may not know about the new regulations could cause tie ups at the border.
The Canadian Trucking Alliance, which represents about 4,500 trucking companies across Canada, said the majority of its members are ready for the new rules.
"Our concern more is that passenger traffic is not prepared and the secondary impact will be a backup and lineups at the border and how that will contribute to delayed trucks," said Jennifer Fox, the CTA's assistant vice-president of customer and cross border operations.
The CTA also worries about a government decision to begin distributing new and improved FAST cards to truckers at the same time as the new identification rules kick in.
Fox said the concern is that old cards, which are still valid, may not be accepted by certain front-line customs officers who may not recognize them.
"We are hopeful that there will be no surprises come Monday, but a lot depends on matters that are out of our control at this stage," the CTA stated.
Jayson Myers, president of the Canadian Manufacturers & Exporters, said he hopes any delays will be short-lived.
"It's the last thing we need right now given the fragility of the manufacturing system," he said.
Myers said many businesses are making contingency plans in case of border delays as a result of the new rules, such as stocking up on inventory.
Canadian National Railway Co. (TSX:CNR), Canada's biggest rail company and a major freight hauler in the United States, said its train and engine crew members who work at cross-border locations have been "amply notified" of the change.
"We do not expect any impact on CN's trans-border operations," CN spokesman Mark Hallman said.
Catherine Swift, president and CEO of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, said businesses are prepared for the change.
"It's not like they have a choice," she said.
However, Swift called the U.S. move more about "protectionism" and "just one more thing" that businesses have to deal with when trying to work with their American customers.
International Trade Minister Stockwell Day said Ottawa is "putting increased resources into the infrastructure changes at the border so people can get across faster."
"We want a border that certainly takes care of security issues but it has to be efficient to let people and transport get across quickly."
John Winter, president and CEO of the B.C. Chamber of Commerce, believes the biggest impact will be from Americans in Canada who are returning home.
"It's the Americans we are concerned about," he said, saying fewer of them hold passports when compared to Canadians.
In Canada, about 54 per cent of the population held a valid passport as of 01 April, according to Passport Canada.
In the U.S., the number is reportedly about 20 per cent.
Winter said if fewer Americans have passports and they aren't aware of the new restrictions placed by their government they could be turned away at the border, or not make a trip into Canada at all.
He said that could impact tourism, which is already suffering as a result of the recession, which has hit especially hard in the U.S.
"There is a negative impact on Canadian business, but it's the business that relies on the U.S visitors," Winter said.
"It's going to be a little chaotic."
Ian Robertson, a spokesperson for the Rocky Mountaineer, which offers train trips through the Canadian Rockies, said while the new rules might create problems for some tourism operators, his business won't be impacted.
Robertson said most of his clients are well-travelled.
"For them, a passport is just something they would already have," he said.
Roberston also believes that because the move was delayed the tourism industry has had time to prepare for the new rules and pass on the information to potential visitors.
Copyright © 2009 Canadian Press
holt report...
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Homophobia? At Amazon?
18 May 2009THEY’RE AT IT AGAIN...
I keep thinking about that delicious homophobic snafu that stuck it to Amazon last month, and demonstrated the growing power of Twitter, however deliberately flash-in-the-pan it was.
The incident roared to life a month ago and died so fast that it didn’t seem important, but for me, something oddly familiar about it kept pinging away at the old postmenopausal memory.
Finally I remembered an event 10 years ago in which Amazon behaved in an even more bizarre and homophobic manner that still has relevance today.
The Latest Episode
Last month Amazon abruptly removed gay/lesbian-themed titles from its powerful sale ranking system.
In a weekend, thousands of books were ineligible for certain title searches, best seller lists and other critical functions.
An author sent a query to Amazon’s customer-service department asking why the books were being removed.
Ashley D of Amazon.com Member Services replied that “we exclude ‘adult’ material from appearing in some searches and best seller lists.”
Well, “adult” is hardly the category to dump an entire classification of books, since the term signifies “pornographic” (think: “adult’ bookstores).
But it is the correct term to use if Amazon officially believes that everything homosexual is offensive and needs to be removed from, you know, normal people’s eyes.
(A thoughtful explanation of why a sales ranking on Amazon is so important, along with a list of explicitly sexual hetero books that were not censored and non-explicitly sexual gay books that were, can be found here.)
The First Irony
According to Lisa Derrick in the Huffington Post, after the purge, if you searched for books under the category of “homosexuality”, the first title to pop up was the anti-gay self-help book, “A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality”.
This title (which teaches “gender esteem,” tee hee, what a concept) continued to have a sales ranking, while a long-established book for children about lesbians raising kids, “Heather Has Two Mommies”, was pulled from the ranking and search functions.
This made Amazon look twice as bigoted (or dumb) as before.
(Go here for a lengthy list of LGBT books whose sales rankings were similarly removed.)
Enter Twitter
And just as suddenly an outpouring of outrage against perceived homophobia at Amazon flooded into Twitter so immediately and furiously (and delightfully) Amazon felt pressed to make an official statement.
Oh, it wasn’t just gay books that were affected, the company said - the problem “impacted 57,310 books in a number of broad categories”.
Amazon blamed the whole thing on a “glitch in our systems” and an “embarrassing and ham-fisted cataloging error”.
Now wait, the Tweeters asked: Would a “glitch” understand the difference between a book that says homosexuality is good (”Heather Has Two Mommies”) and a book that says homosexuality is awful (”A Parent’s Guide to Preventing Homosexuality”)?
No, answereth the Tweeters, growing even more appalled in new discussions with such wonderfully Twitter hashtags (discussion subjects) as “#glitchmyass”, “#apologyfail”, and “#amazonfail”.
The Boycott Virus
The gist of most responses was that Amazon got caught censoring gay books and betrayed customers by trying to lie its way out of the problem.
More outrage erupted all over the Internet in which so many writers swore they would never use Amazon again that a “boycott virus” spread like, well, a disease.
Egad, not a boycott! responded Amazon as it scrambled to reposition all the books in question in a very short period of time.
And that, the company thought, was the end of it.
Some discussions now say the Tweets overreacted because they’re all young, they want to rebel, they’ve confused gay marriage with gay anything and are looking for a parent figure to pull down.
Or, as one thoughtful response suggested: This sort of confusion happens in large corporations all the time: A department at Amazon decided to defang sexually explicit books so they wouldn’t offend the general readership, but “the directive mutated from ‘let’s discreetly unrank the really raunchy stuff’ to ‘we’d better be careful to put an “adult” tag on anything that could imaginably offend anyone.’ “
That would mean it was a glitch in the system, but of the human kind, and nobody’s responsible because Amazon covered it up.
The Other Episode
For the last month, though, I’ve kept thinking about another occasion that occurred in 1999 when Amazon legally, officially (and delightfully) embarrassed itself by deciding to “out” the co-owners of the Amazon Bookstore in Minneapolis.
You can read the deposition transcripts from one of my old columns here.
In this case the co-owners of Amazon Bookstore, an independent feminist bookseller founded in 1970 (i.e., decades before Amazon.com came along), asserted their brick-and-mortar store had been losing money in the ’80s and ’90s because the online book retailer in Seattle had taken the Amazon name.
Indeed, vendors, customers, reporters and online readers so often confused Amazon.com with Amazon Bookstore that the co-owners in Minneapolis spent as much time resolving mistakes as they did running their store.
Attempts to find a peaceful solution through talks with Amazon.com were rebuffed, so the co-owners sued, citing trademark infringement.
The Second Irony
You’d think depositions in a case like this would focus on what happens when a new company takes on an existing company’s name, yes?
Questions might be: Who was damaged and who should be responsible when the established bookstore name gets confused with the new online name?
But no. Noting that Amazon Bookstore in Minneapolis identified itself as a feminist bookstore, lawyers for Amazon.com began asking the co-owners questions like this:
Q: Have you had any interest in promoting lesbian ideals in the community?
Q: I’ll ask you this, are you gay?
Q: In the email it states, all the owners at this time of Amazon Bookstore Cooperative and historically have been lesbians …
Is that an accurate statement, to your knowledge?
Q: Are any of the employees at the Bookstore gay… ?
Q: Are any of the women at the bookstore married to a woman?
You can imagine the farcical tone of this scene.
The lawyer for Amazon Bookstore was objecting vociferously but getting nowhere.
The shocked co-owners found themselves having to remind Amazon.com’s lawyer “it’s not legal (for a woman) to be married to a woman”.
(Remember this was 1999 when gay marriage wasn’t even a gleam in Gavin Newsom’s eye)
And the Amazon.com lawyer kept saying, well, if the women at Amazon Bookstore can’t marry, “do they have [women] partners?”
As to what sexual orientation had to do with trademark infringement, the Amazon.com lawyer said as far as he was concerned, being gay was as unimportant as the color of a person’s hair, but “obviously from the perspective of my client (italics mine), we think [sexual orientation is] important to the case, the defense’s case, and that is one of the grounds for relevance.”
And why would it be relevant?
I admit I had a little fun in my column imagining these attorneys planning their strategy before the trial.
At some point the lightbulb went off and somebody said, “Wait a minute - these women are dykes!
"If we base our defense on proving they’re a bunch of lezbos, we’ll walk away with the trial!”
But the irony was, the co-owners were too nice: Their lawyer half-humorously suggested that if Amazon.com could get away with harassing the Amazon Bookstore co-owners about whether they were lesbians, the co-owners should be allowed to ask Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos if he were gay.
That would have been terrifically good copy for the media, but also a cheap shot, so Amazon Bookstore never sank to the level of Amazon.com.
The co-owners did try to explain that Amazon.com sold many more gay books than Amazon Bookstore did andAmazon Bookstore sold many more general books than gay books, but neither point made much impression.
Eventually the co-owners settled for what I hoped was a thoroughly obscene amount of money (never disclosed), and bless ‘em, that bookstore has continued on its feminist way (see 2007 interview here).
How Amazon Works
Why go through all this again?
Well, first, to understand how Amazon.com worked 10 years ago.
If the company thought it was playing hardball by disclosing the sexual identity of the staff of Amazon Bookstore, we need to know.
We should know that the gay-themed questions were being asked not just by some attorney fishing for bait he could use later but “from the perspective of my client,” which is to say the people who own and operate Amazon.com.
Is There a Pattern?
So our question today might be: Could those homophobic people still be calling the shots at Amazon after 10 years?
Could they be setting policy?
Are they capable of screwing up the sales rankings for gay and lesbian books and using the term “adult”, i.e. porno, as a reason?
I think these two very bizarre episodes suggest a pattern inside Amazon of people acting negatively toward anything gay or lesbian (don’t even ask about transsexual or bi).
And I wish Bezos, who has made a career out of being jus’ folks in his “customer-centric” way, would have given an interview or answered the phone or come forward in some way to sort out the matter in person.
bc fire...
Cariboo B.C. fire forces 54 from homes, hundreds on alert...
30 May '09
By The Canadian Press
100 Mile House, B.C. - Firefighters managed Saturday to contain a wildfire that destroyed two homes in the Cariboo region of British Columbia, but 54 people remain out of their homes, and hundreds more are on alert.
The Buffalo Creek fire, that blazed up Friday, destroyed two houses about 10 kilometres northeast of 100 Mile House, along with several out buildings, and forced the evacuation of 20 other homes.
Another 800-900 people remain on alert to evacuate the sparsely populated Forest Grove area if necessary, said Shelly Burich, a spokeswoman for the Cariboo regional district.
"We are keeping our evacuation order and alert in place overnight," she said.
The 54 evacuees include residents of the burned out homes, though Burich said one of them was newly completed and it's not clear if the owners had moved in.
Regional district chairman Al Richmond said the evacuees were being helped at an emergency social services centre set up at 100 Mile House city hall.
"(We're) providing them with a variety of services, some needing accommodation, some needing food vouchers, some needing medication because they had to leave their homes quickly," he said.
Some evacuees were staying with friends or relatives but others were being put up in hotels.
Richmond estimated residents had about an hour's notice to evacuate after it became clear the fire was headed their way.
"Emergency personnel moved very quickly to assist people in getting out," he said.
Spokeswoman, Shelly Pickell, of the B.C. Forest Service's operations centre, said crews working with heavy equipment throughout the night succeeded in surrounding the 150-hectare blaze with a fire guard.
Work was difficult because the fire was burning in hilly, forested terrain on both sides of Buffalo Creek, she said.
"An additional 28-person unit crew has been assigned to the fire today, which will make a total of 60 wildfire fighters on site," Pickell said.
Three helicopters and aerial tankers will be on standby in case the fire jumps the guard.
No more homes were under immediate threat, Pickell added.
"We're just monitoring the situation, taking the weather into consideration and if anything changes we will be allocating resources accordingly to try and keep structures from harm's way," she said.
Richmond said it had been hoped temperatures and winds would drop, but said winds picked up Saturday again afternoon, and warmer weather was predicted for Sunday.
"The Ministry of Forests team believes it's not safe to have people go back to their homes," he said.
Traffic was also being controlled on a road adjacent to the fire area to make it easier for crews to gain access to hot spots and monitor the fire guard.
Copyright © 2009 Canadian Press
don't.. .
Don't patronize
the chain bookstores.
Every time I see
some author
scheduled to read
and sign
his books
at a chain bookstore,
I feel like telling him
he's stabbing
the independent bookstores
in the back!
~Lawrence Ferlinghetti
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