Welcome! "What's Happenin'?" is a casual community diary (a daily series, 8:30 AM Eastern on weekdays, 10 AM on weekends and holidays) where you can hang out, talk about what is going on with you, listen to music, talk about the news and the goings on here and everywhere.
Maybe you have seen some news stories that you think are not receiving enough attention and you'd like to post links to them. Maybe you'd like to just chat among friends about your life, your health, your family or social circle, your pets, etc. You can also post links to your own writings here on dkos or elsewhere. Perhaps you want to share some pictures or music or links to other things. This is your kind of place to talk about what's happening.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. If that is what you want, find another place to do it. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact. This diary series is produced by the TeamDFH group but anyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is welcome.
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The Apology
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Think me not unkind and rude,
That I walk alone in grove and glen;
I go to the god of the wood
To fetch his word to men.
Tax not my sloth that I
Fold my arms beside the brook;
Each cloud that floated in the sky
Writes a letter in my book.
Chide me not, laborious band,
For the idle flowers I brought;
Every aster in my hand
Goes home loaded with a thought.
There was never mystery,
But 'tis figured in the flowers,
Was never secret history,
But birds tell it in the bowers.
One harvest from thy field
Homeward brought the oxen strong;
A second crop thine acres yield,
Which I gather in a song.
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News
Russian opposition activist sentenced to 10 more days of arrest on day of planned release
A prominent Russian opposition activist had barely half an hour of freedom Sunday before being sentenced to 10 more days in jail — making it the 14th time this year he’s been detained.
The decision by a Moscow court late Sunday to find Left Front leader Sergei Udaltsov guilty of a charge of resisting police came a day after Russia witnessed the largest protest rally in its post-Soviet history. As demonstrators vented frustration Saturday with the scandal-marred parliamentary election of Dec. 4 that left Vladimir Putin’s United Russia party in control, many prominent figures called for Udaltsov’s release.
China jails dissident 10 years for "subversive" essays
A court in China sentenced on Monday a veteran dissident, Chen Xi, to 10 years in jail for subversion, his wife said -- one of the heaviest sentences given for political charges since Nobel Prize winner Liu Xiaobo was jailed two years ago.
The court in Guiyang, southwest China, swiftly tried Chen and declared him guilty of "inciting subversion of state power", and said he deserved a tough sentence of a decade in prison, his wife, Zhang Qunxuan, told Reuters.
Iran says woman's stoning case might change to hanging
An Iranian woman sentenced to be stoned to death for adultery could be hanged instead, the students news agency ISNA reported.
A court sentenced Sakineh Mohammadi Ashtiani to be stoned in 2006 but the sentence was suspended last year after an international outcry. However, under a judicial review being carried out she still could be hanged.
"There is no rush ... our Islamic experts are reviewing Ashtiani's sentence to see whether we can carry out the execution of a person sentenced to stoning by hanging," said Malek Ajdar Sharifi, head of judiciary in the East Azerbaijan province.
'Anonymous' hackers target US security think tank
The loose-knit hacking movement "Anonymous" claimed Sunday to have stolen thousands of credit card numbers and other personal information belonging to clients of U.S.-based security think tank Stratfor. One hacker said the goal was to pilfer funds from individuals' accounts to give away as Christmas donations, and some victims confirmed unauthorized transactions linked to their credit cards.
Anonymous boasted of stealing Stratfor's confidential client list, which includes entities ranging from Apple to the U.S. Air Force to the Miami Police Department, and mining it for more than 4,000 credit card numbers, passwords and home addresses.
"Not so private and secret anymore?" the group taunted in a message on Twitter, promising that the attack on Stratfor was just the beginning of a Christmas-inspired assault on a long list of targets.
Foreclosure Relief? Don’t Hold Your Breath
THROUGHOUT the foreclosure crisis, Washington has done little to help people hang on to their homes. All those programs that were supposed to help — HAMP, HARP, Hope for Homeowners — have mostly failed.
So many were skeptical when the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency announced yet another program in April. This one was intended to provide reparations to homeowners who’d been hurt financially by foreclosure abuses at banks.
As the details trickle out, the program looks like more of the disappointing same. “This is just the next program that’s getting people’s hopes up,” said Alys Cohen, staff attorney at the National Consumer Law Center in Washington. “Not only will it not help people, it could easily harm them.”
For One Ala. Farmer, Workers Are Still Scarce
Earlier this year, Alabama passed a tough immigration law that prompted thousands of migrant workers to flee the state.
Shortly after, NPR spoke with Jamie Boatwright, a fourth-generation tomato farmer in Steele, Ala. When the law was passed, about 20 of Boatwright's farmhands — all of them from Mexico — left and his business was devastated.
Boatwright tried to hire legal workers, but of the 11 Americans he hired that came and sought work, only one returned the for a second day of work.
Flight home a nightmare for parents of dying boy
Nicholas Dainiak of Bedford was just trying to come home from what his parents said may have been the last trip the dying 8-year-old would ever take to Disney World in Orlando.
The trip down to Florida on a Southwest Airlines flight last week, in which Nicholas, who is suffering from Batten disease, sat in a protective travel chair, had been no problem. But coming back on Thursday, the Dainiak family was told by Southwest staff that the boy would either have to forgo the protective seat or get off the plane because the chair was not compliant with Federal Aviation Administration rules.
Blind dog, lost last month and thought dead, makes it back to San Antonio family for Christmas
A blind dog that was lost and believed to be dead is reunited with his San Antonio family for Christmas, thanks to Craigslist, a school teacher and an animal care agency.
Nearly a month after Stevie Oedipus Wonder disappeared — and was reported dead — the cairn terrier mix puppy is home for the holiday, the San Antonio Express-News reported Saturday.
“This is my Christmas miracle,” Stevie’s owner Belinda Gutierrez said. “I actually thought I was going to have a sad end of the year and a sad Christmas.”