Not Truly a Divided Country

Three of the blogs I've followed for a long time are: Kevin Drum, Life on a Colorado Farm, and Northview Dairy.  

They're in California, Colorado and New York; Kevin's a liberal, the two farm women are more conservative (though they don't mention politics much).   Kevin seems to be urban, the other two rural.  So you assume they don't have much in common?

Wrong.  All three of them like photography and photography of hummingbirds, as you can see by the links above.  Kevin, however, has the advantage of  a new and expensive camera, but all three appreciate the same thing.

Qualifications for President: Not Quite the Most Versus the Least

From a piece challenging Obama's description of Clinton as the most qualified person to be president,  a few sentences:

With the sole exception of Henry Wallace, she is the most qualified person to seek the office since Reconstruction. Moreover, she is the most qualified Democratic nominee since Lewis Cass and since the first American women’s rights convention in Seneca Falls, New York in 1848. By contrast, Donald Trump, having never held public office nor served in let alone commanded the US military, is the least qualified presidential nominee in American history. However, Trump is tied for this distinction with another dark horse corporate executive. In the 1930s, Wendell Willkie was CEO of the Commonwealth & Southern Corporation, an electric utilities holding company known today as Southern Company (the parent corporation of Alabama Power, Georgia Power, Gulf Power, and Mississippi Power).

 (The analysis is based on different types of positions held and years of service.)

Sugar Alert: Cuteness Ahead

What's cuter than a red-headed kid?  How about threered-headed kids?  What's cuter than three red-headed kids? How about a kitten?  What's cuter than one kitten?  How about several kittens?  What's cuter than several kitttens?  How about several kittens and red-headed kids?

Photo Friday

Via Chris Blattman here's the site of a photographer who has a series on "bureaucratics"--nice pictures.

Snow and Foxhounds

Baldwinsville, NY is in the snowbelt--meaning they get the lake effect snow off the Great Lakes, at least until the lakes freeze over.  But this year they haven't had much, if any, snow.  But the day after I got back to Reston we started to get snow, snowed most of the day yesterday, 5 inches or so of the wet, pretty stuff.

I got some nice photos this morning on my usual walk for Starbucks, but none as great as this first photo from the Post, showing the Middleburg hunt leading the Christmas parade.  The rest of the photos in the show are worth viewing as well.

Initial Friday Cat Blogging

The first time I've added a photo to my blog. (Takes us old people time to get caught up with new-fangled ideas. Coffee is vital to me so I wear out coffee carafes. Carrie decided the box the latest one came in was just the right size for her: