News you can use

Some noteworthy stories appeared on the web today.

They include:

1) Oregon's Crater Lake is considered one of the 10 most sacred spots on earth along with Mount Sinai in Egypt and Uluru/Ayers Rock in the Australian Outback.

Here's an excerpt from the MSNBC story:

"The Native American Klamath tribe has long considered the lake a sacred site: Their legends say a battle here between the Chief of the Above World and the Chief of the Below World led to the destruction of Mount Mazama (which formed Crater Lake)."

I tend to believe that most natural wonders like Crater Lake are sacred places and should be preserved as long as possible.


2) Birther craziness takes root in New Jersey as 400 turn out in Morris County to hear an author of a book titled, "Where's the Birth Certificate."


From the news item: "Morris Republican chairman John Sette (said) ... 'There’s lots of people who might have outlandish views in every spectrum in politics. We’re open to everybody and we believe in freedom of speech.' "


Okay. Move over Arizona, birthers live on the East Coast, too.


3) Also on the East Coast, in the wake of the Trayvon Martin killing, a Fox affiliate in Florida referred to a neo-Nazi organization as a "another civil rights group."

4) Which leads to a new study pointing out that "low-effort thinking" is linked to conservative politics.

Ya think?

I mean if you watch Fox News, listen to Rush Limbaugh and pore over the Wall Street Journal editorial page, then you have all the information you ever need.

Still, the study's author, Dr. Scott Eidelman noted on The Huffington Post, "Our research shows that low-effort thought promotes political conservatism, not that political conservatives use low-effort thinking."

5) Which leads to the GOP's "war on women" campaign:

After killing an Equal Pay law in Wisconsin, recall-targeted Gov. Scott Walker signed three more bills that restrict abortion and access to contraceptives. As Republicans say, "nothing to see here. There is no war on women."

6) If your blood isn't percolating yet, there is always executive pay to rail against as this New York Times story shows.

Here's an excerpt:

• Among the 100 top-paid C.E.O.s, overall pay last year rose a scant 2 percent from 2010.

• The median chief executive in this group took home $14.4 million — compared with the average annual American salary of $45,230.

• In all, the combined compensation of these 100 C.E.O.s totaled $2.1 billion, the rough equivalent of the estimated annual economic output of Sierra Leone.

7) After item No. 6, it's best to leave on a comedic note provided, of course, by Stephen Colbert. Take particular note of the hilarious bit on Mitt Romney's task of appealing to (Hispanic) voters.