Okay, pet stories start tomorrow morning, because loyal commentor SiubhanDuinne reminded me that today is the official Eid al-Fitr (“breaking of the fast”) holiday marking the end of Ramadan. I’m already lagging behind most of our Muslim readers on the opposite side of the globe (hello, Amir!) but it’s never too late to celebrate hopes for happiness, charity, forgiveness, and general fellowship!
Per HuffingtonPost:
One of the most joyous days in the Islamic calendar, Eid al-Fitr, also known as Eid ul-Fitr or Eid, is a celebration that marks the end of Ramadan (a holy month of fasting observed by Muslims)… It is celebrated on the first day of Shawwal, the 10th month of the Islamic lunar calendar. Traditionally, the observance begins with the sighting of the new moon…
***********
Apart from the holiday, what’s on the agenda for the start of another week?
OzarkHillbilly
Somehow or other I don’t think they are celebrating much in Mosul:
The Prophet Jirjis mosque and shrine, dating to the 14th century, join list of mosques blown up by militants in Iraq
Some things I.just.do.not.understand.
Phylllis
876 work days until retirement.
Amir Khalid
Hello Anne Laurie! I just got back from visiting relatives. Given events in recent months, the latter of which was just 11 days ago, the celebration is a bit subdued here in Malaysia.
@OzarkHillbilly:
I think one should speak of the self-styled Islamic State, because there’s not a lot that’s Islamic about what they’re doing.
OzarkHillbilly
Just got done looking over yesterday’s work and I got to say, you were swinging the bat with authority yesterday Anne. Both the Alamo post and the Cruz post were just crushing home runs.
I think this week I will just sit back and enjoy the weather. 59 right now and it’s gonna hit a high of 80 today. In fact, all week long we will remain below 85. I don’t remember ever having a summer this cool. I can count the +95 days on one hand and the +90 days on 2. Normally at this point in the summer, our lows are mid 70s, the highs are mid 90s, and I am praying for a hurricane to stir up the atmosphere and drag a little Canadian cool down this way. If this is what global warming has in store for the Ozarks**, I can handle it.
**IIRC, the biggest culprit is a more southern oscillation in the jet stream this year due to El Nino. In other words, weather happens.
OzarkHillbilly
@Amir Khalid: Agreed. This is Insanity, not Islam.
John M. Burt
Two of my five children are converts to Islam. I ought to have known when Eid al Fitr is. Shame on me.
Ramalama
One thing I learned when working with Muslim researchers (Pakistan) was that Ramadan was a time when one controlled what went in the mouth, yes, but also what words went out.
Maybe this is mentioned everywhere and I just haven’t used my computer to full advantage to learn this but: does everyone start swearing a lot when Eid al Fitr comes round?
rikyrah
Blacks shouldn’t be fooled by Rand Paul
Stephanie Rawlings-Blake 6:05 a.m. EDT July 25, 2014
(Stephanie Rawlings-Blake is the mayor of Baltimore and the secretary of the Democratic National Committee.)
Over the past few months, Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., has been traveling across the country, speaking to African-Americans in urban communities, pitching himself and the GOP’s ideas.
He thinks the GOP’s ideas are in our community’s best interest, and today he’s in Cincinnati to speak at the National Urban League Conference to try his spin out yet again.
While I applaud anyone’s efforts to reach out to the black community and share ideas that would improve our families’ lives, Paul doesn’t understand a very important piece of the puzzle: earning our trust.
For Paul to claim to stand up for our values while opposing policy after policy that advances our community is not the way to do this.
Paul’s long and troubled history with civil rights issues is generally well known around Kentucky and in Washington, D.C., but for many Ohioans, it’s time to take a closer look.
http://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/contributors/2014/07/25/rand-paul-at-odds-with-black-community/13131979/
rikyrah
A poor messenger with a dubious message
07/25/14 04:31 PM—UPDATED 07/25/14 05:02 PM
By Steve Benen
If persistence mattered more than accuracy, then Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) would be extremely well positioned to expand his base of support to traditional Democratic constituencies. After all, the Kentucky Republican rarely misses an opportunity to make his pitch to organizations committed to civil rights and the interests of minority communities.
Benjy Sarlin reports today, for example, that Paul talked up his agenda at a civil rights conference in Ohio this morning.
“I say we take a stand and fight for justice now,” said the Republican senator from Kentucky. The speech to the National Urban League’s conference in Cincinnati was part of a broader campaign by Paul to engage with minority voters ahead of a likely presidential run. […]
“Not only do I support the Civil Rights Act and the Voting Rights Act, I’m a Republican who wants to restore a federal role for the government in the Voting Rights Act,” Paul said.
On a surface level, that sounds like exactly the kind of message progressives and proponents of civil rights find appealing.
It’s what happens when we look just below the surface that Rand Paul runs into trouble.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/poor-messenger-dubious-message
rikyrah
House GOP leader leaves presidential impeachment on the table
07/28/14 08:00 AM—UPDATED 07/28/14 08:06 AM
By Steve Benen
House Republicans recently had to elect new leaders, and rank-and-file conservatives insisted that at least one far-right Tea Partier join the team. They succeeded: Rep. Steve Scalise (R-La.), a fan of debt-ceiling crises and a lawmaker who believes President Obama may be trying to create a “dictatorship,” was chosen as the new House Majority Whip.
Yesterday was something of a coming-out party for the Louisiana Republican: Scalise sat down with Chris Wallace on “Fox News Sunday,” his first Sunday show appearance of this Congress. It didn’t go especially well. As Adam Serwer noted, the congressman, recently chosen as the third-ranking GOP official in the House, refused to take presidential impeachment off the table.
Wallace: Will you consider impeaching the president?
Scalise: This might be the first White House in history that’s trying to start the narrative of impeaching their own president. Ultimately, what we want to do is see the president follow the laws. But the president took an oath to faithfully execute the laws of this land, and he’s not. In fact, the Supreme Court, unanimously, more than 12 times, unanimously said, the president overreached, and actually did things he doesn’t have the authority to do.
First, that’s not even close to what the Supreme Court said, and the fact that a member of the House Republican leadership team would repeat such nonsense on national television – in response to a question he was no doubt prepared for – is alarming.
Second, and perhaps more important, was the fact that Scalise didn’t answer the question. To his credit, Wallace followed up, asking, “So if he overreaches again on executive action to defer more deportations, what will the House do?” Again, the new House Republican leader dodged. So Wallace asked again whether or not impeachment is “off the table.”
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/house-gop-leader-leaves-presidential-impeachment-the-table
mai naem
Someone posted on my twitter feed that clothing store female mannequins in Mosul have to wear burkas. WTF? I know the reason given by whackjob muslims for the burkas is because men are weak and would give in to temptation. Are muslim men so wea so weak that mannequins would tempt muslim men
satby
I also am going to enjoy the cooler weather today, our high is supposed to be 70 or so. Planned on getting yard work done and catching up on my neglected Etsy biz, but the muffler dropped off the car last night on the way to the grocery store, so getting that fixed is job 1.
Just hope it doesn’t blow too much of the day, I have so much to finish.
Oh, and I need to look for another job, because my part time one ain’t gonna cut it as far as paying all the bills goes. GAH!
Amir Khalid
@mai naem:
I think the Islamic State is afraid that Muslim male mannequins are weak and might give in to temptation.
satby
@Amir Khalid: Happy Eid anyway Amir.
debbie
@rikyrah:
When will Obama announce his countersuit against Congress for dereliction of duty?
Ferdzy
Happy Eid to everyone, especially Amir Khalid.
Amir Khalid
@debbie:
And against the Supreme Court for those politicised rulings?
debbie
@Amir Khalid:
Sure, toss ’em in there too.
Elmo
File under Things I Didn’t Know:
Apparently you have to replace all four tires at once on a AWD vehicle, lest you blow up the transfer case. So yesterday’s flat tire is going to cost me $700 even though the rear tires were in perfectly good shape.
Le sigh. #firstworldproblems
Cervantes
Thanks for the post.
“Eid” (Aramaic, Syriac, Arabic) is “solemn festival.” In Islam there are two major ones: Eid-al-Fitr and Eid-al Adha. Amir Khalid can correct me on this but I think both have to do with sacrifice, the former marking the end of the fasting period (Puasa in Malay) and the latter marked by pilgrimage to Mekkah (Haji in Malay).
WaterGirl
@Elmo: I’m sorry, Elmo! 700.00 is a big chunk of money, unless you have a lot more money than I have!
OzarkHillbilly
@Elmo:DINGDINGDING!!! That was my bullshit detector going off. The only vehicles with full locking differentials are the heaviest of heavy duty 4x4s. ALL vehicles come stock with either slip differentials or limited slip differentials because the mechanics of making a turn demand it. The outside tires on your car HAVE to turn at a higher rate during a turn than the inside tires do because they have to travel further. The same mechanics apply to new tires vs older tires.
Check with the manufacturer of course, but I suspect somebody is blowing smoke up your ass with that one, probably a tire salesman.
OzarkHillbilly
@OzarkHillbilly: The outside tires on your car HAVE to __ROTATE__ at a higher rate during a turn than the inside tires do because they have to travel further.
for clarity.
Cervantes
@OzarkHillbilly: It depends on which car and how worn the other tires are compared to the new one. At one extreme: if the car is not a Lamborghini, say, and the three old tires are not much more worn than the new one, you can just put the one new one in. In general, however, if you have an AWD vehicle, it is best to change all four tires at the same time; and it helps to rotate the four tires regularly as well. There is only so much the on-board computer can do to compensate.
Amir Khalid
@OzarkHillbilly:
I thought all of a car’s tyres were on the outside, except maybe the spare.
Kristine
@Elmo:
I knew I had to get them all changed at once, but assumed it was a wear/balance issue. Good to know the reason.
Kuro-shinju is due for new tires sooner rather than later. Better feed the repairs kitty.
OzarkHillbilly
@Amir Khalid: Heh!
@Cervantes: Rotating tires has always been a good idea because then they wear evenly. As to
I am not an automotive engineer and that is why I said elmo SHOULD check with the manufacturer, BUT….
I still say bull hockey. And on the chance it is true? He should sell that damn piece of junk and buy a real car. There is no way a computer should be concerned with differing rotations on wheels for one very simple and compelling reason: They already all turn at different rates.
You could well be correct and they do recommend such a thing, but in that case my argument is not with you, but with them and the stupid and wasteful things they do.
Chris
My first memory of Eid came from sophomore year of college back in DC. A friend from my Arabic class invited me over to the fast-breaking meal the Muslim Student Association was hosting. At the time, I’d recently started going to a church down the street with my roommate… who, when I casually dropped into the conversation that I was going to that event, absolutely freaked the fuck out about how I’d be “legitimizing a false god.”
That was the first outburst that clued me in that there was something wrong with that church. There would soon be many, many more. I’d been raised in Christianity before, but never had any exposure to Christian fundamentalism, or any firsthand exposure to anti-Muslim bigotry, so in that sense, it was an education.
Paul in KY
Wishing a Happy Eid Mubarack to all our Muslim Juicers!
Suffern ACE
@Elmo: No. No. No. Don’t do it. You don’t have to. At most, if the other tires are in good shape, you can buy 2 tires. Not all four at once. Put the new tires on the front. Then when rotate, its always just front to back.
Cervantes
@Suffern ACE: Changing-two-tires-at-a-time works OK for non-AWD vehicles (provided the two tires are on the same axle, of course).
Pogonip
@Amir Khalid: Hi Amir–so what IS Islamic, as far as respectable folk such as yourself are concerned?
Paul in KY
@Elmo: You might want to check up on that. Sounds self-serving, if the tire place is telling you that.
Suffern ACE
@mai naem: Its about setting up as many arbitrary rules that come with violent retribution as possible. Yeah, it has a religiously fanatic feel, but it is more about determining who is going to offer up resistance to the new thugs.
So far, has any place where they have taken over managed to throw them out? We keep hearing that there are only a few thousand of them, yet they are able to hold all their territory and carry out victorious assaults in both Syria (where they recently took another town plus gas fields) and Iraq. These arbitrary rules are about identifying sources of resistance. Everyone who may resist so far is fleeing or just giving up. I doubt many shopkeepers will risk crucifiction over this.
Tone In DC
Definitely.
Amir Khalid
@Pogonip:
Notions of what’s properly Islamic may vary as much among Muslims as notions of what’s properly Christian do among Christians. But I reckon the mainstream in both faiths, or for that matter any faith, would reject the nihilistic extremism that leads to blowing up houses of worship. And the interpretation of scripture to place the prejudices and superstitions of past millennia above decency and common sense.
a hip hop artist from Idaho (fka Bella Q)
@OzarkHillbilly: It’s the tire manufacturers blowing the smoke, by having a single tire change void the warranty. Or perhaps the car manufacturers; I can’t recall. But it’s a warranty void issue that gets folks to comply. Never mind whether the mechanical issue is correctly defined. Fuckers.
Suffern ACE
Annoying. Sure. Not always very professional. Definitely. But terrorists? Hardly.
People have to make a living somehow. I find it confusing when I see 3 Elmos on the same street corner, but I think it would be more annoying to see no Elmos.
elmo
@OzarkHillbilly: @Paul in KY:
I thought it sounded self-serving too, so I did a quick Google on the iPhone before I committed to the purchase. Everything I could read in a quick search said the same thing – the AWD system will burn out if you make it work too hard, and it will work too hard if it has to constantly react to tires of a different circumference – even by as much as a quarter of an inch.
I’d rather buy new tires now than risk a transmission burnout in a year. I drive a prodigious amount – my RT commute is 110 miles – so I have to be extra super careful with the strains I put on my wheels.
Scamp Dog
So is the Mubarak in Eid Mubarak the same the one that’s the family name of Hosni Mubarak? Given the varieties of Arabic between different countries and the numerous ways of transliterating words, I hate to guess.
Pogonip
@Amir Khalid: How many Islamic sects are there? There are at least 30,000 Christian sects (Martin Luther opened up a real can of worms, no pun intended). What is the mainstream Islamic view on separation of religion annd state? Is there an equivalent of the idea of rendering unto Caesar and otherwise ignoring the whole business?
Cervantes
@elmo:
Right.
But it does depend on what car you’re driving, and even how old it is. Do you know if yours has true AWD, or does it use a viscous coupling to drive an otherwise unpowered axle when it needs to (“on demand”)?
If you see any of these slogans — “real-time AWD,” “intelligent AWD,” “automatic AWD,” “active AWD,” etc. — then it’s not true AWD and you may need to look further into how it actually works. For example, if, like many an Audi, your car uses a Haldex coupling — these are not as vulnerable.
As others have said, unless you know your car well, ask the manufacturer. Failing that, and in general, it is best to use four identical tires (same brand, same tread, same age), and rotate them every 5K miles.
And incidentally, you should not be too concerned if your car does not have “true AWD.” Most drivers don’t need it.
SiubhanDuinne
@Scamp Dog:
I should probably leave the definitive answer to someone who actually knows Arabic, but yes, it’s my understanding that Barak, Barack, Mubarak, however they are transliterated, all mean “blessed” — cognate with Baruch in Hebrew (which is also both a word and a surname, e.g. Bernard Baruch).
Cervantes
@SiubhanDuinne: Exactly right.
glory b
NYMag says it looks like maybe Hamas isn’t responsible for the kidnapping and murder of the 3 Jewish kids after all.
Sounds like the WMD thing, huh?
Glocksman
@Elmo:
I found the same information that you did.
How stuff works: replacing all four tires on AWD cars.
@Cervantes:
This just reinforced my determination to never buy an AWD vehicle.
Cervantes
@glory b: That’s been known for some time.
Also known for some time: the Israelis knew the kids were dead before going on a murderous rampage to “rescue” them.
None of which should be read as excusing what was done to those Israeli kids, no matter who did it.
Mnemosyne
@Cervantes:
So is Israel planning to rebuild the houses of the two Hamas leaders that Israel tore down in retaliation for the killing of the teenagers since it turns out Hamas didn’t do it?
Man, I crack myself up sometimes.
Suffern ACE
@Mnemosyne: Oh lordy, no. Hamas would just use it to dig tunnels. Apparently, when you have a known enemy who levels your buildings at whim, building tunnels in response is somehow nefarious.
elmo
@Cervantes:
This thread is probably long dead, but I just wanted to say how cool it is that you know this stuff. I find stuff like this absolutely fascinating but I have no idea how to learn it. It’s just cool, that’s all.
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@Elmo:
Probably too late, but only have to replace the other three if they are significantly worn. The other option is to get a USED tire to replace the flat…one that is about as worn as the three remaining ones.
2/32 difference on a subaru is within tolerance, for instance.
GHayduke (formerly lojasmo)
@Glocksman:
Meh. I just know the rules. If I got a flat, I would simply find a tire with the same tread depth…barring that, there are TONS of Subaru take-offs out there. I got BOTH my winter and summer sets RIMS AND TIRES used for about $375 per set.
Paul in KY
@elmo: Glad you checked it out.