Today is the Ides of March or Idus Martiae in Latin, a day for religious observances in ancient Rome, but also an inauspicious day for Julius Caesar. He was assassinated in 44 BCE on the Ides of March. Let's hope your day goes much better for you than it did for Caesar all those years ago!
Well tonight, we are having thunder and lightning which is relatively unusual for here. It was very close to my house, just north in the mountains, and the house shook with the display. TC is still feeling significantly under the weather but he did post an Open Thread today.
Short Takes
Maclean's — As for who first noticed that Moscow was gunning for Freeland, that’s something that has yet to show up in any banner Canadian headlines. It was the European Union’s East StratCom Task Force, a unit of the External Action Service (the EU’s foreign ministry and diplomatic branch). The Task Force was set up in March 2015 as a kind of early warning system to detect incoming Kremlin disinformation campaigns.
In its January 26 Disinformation Digest, the Task Force specifically identified the “Freeland Lied About Her Family’s Nazi Past” hoax, which by then was already circulating within the nether regions of the pro-Kremlin web, under the category of “pro-Kremlin disinformation” and “fake media stories that support Russia’s policies.” The Task Force flagged the Freeland smear project under the campy headline “And you are a Nazi, too!” along with several ongoing efforts to affix the Nazi tag to “anyone opposing the Kremlin’s interests,” especially in Ukraine and the Baltic states. Canadian Forces personnel are active in both arenas.
Usually, Moscow enjoys a degree of marginally plausible deniability by circulating its nastiest propaganda via merely Kremlin-admiring webzines and usefully idiotic “anti-imperialist” pseudo-news operations. But the effort to attack Freeland’s character and undermine her credibility first came straight out of Russia’s embassy in Ottawa, on January 11, the day after Prime Minister Justin Trudeau appointed Freeland to the foreign-affairs post.
In Squatch’s Open Thread 10 March 2017, I included another Maclean's article about how Russia was turning its predatory disinformation sights on Canada, and I made reference to an article in the Ottawa Citizen about Chrystia Freeland, Canada's Minister of Foreign Affairs. Maclean's has now covered this aspect beginning with how some western journalist aided and abetted Putin's disinformation ritual. But why Freeland? The article goes into detail on that point. I urge you to read the entire article. The new Russian Czar, Vladimir Putin, is certainly busy trying to destabilise western nations.
CBC — Girl Guides of Canada has announced it will not be taking any trips to the United States in the near future, citing concerns about inclusivity.
"While the United States is a frequent destination for Guiding trips, the ability of all our members to equally enter this country is currently uncertain," international commissioner Sharron Callahan and director of provincial operations Holly Thompson wrote in a joint advisory issued Monday afternoon.
"This includes both trips that are over or under 72 hours and any travel that includes a connecting flight through an American airport," the advisory says.
The statement does not directly mention — but appears to be a reaction to — the executive orders U. S. President Donald Trump has signed restricting travel to the United States.
More fallout from Drumpf's travel ban. Interesting that a group of young Canadian girls can show up Drumpf when it comes to ethics, loyalty and inclusivity.
YouTube — Trump Can’t Even Watch TV Correctly | The Resistance with Keith Olbermann | GQ
Kudos to Keith! Spot on as usual! Is this what the "age of television" has become?
CBC — For the second time, a federal court on Wednesday blocked President Donald Trump's efforts to freeze immigration by refugees and citizens of some predominantly Muslim nations, putting the president's revised travel ban on hold just hours before it was to take effect.
This time, the ruling came from a judge in Hawaii who rejected the government's claims that the travel ban is about national security, not discrimination. U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson also said Hawaii would suffer financially if the executive order constricted the flow of students and tourists to the state, and that Hawaii was likely to succeed on a claim that the ban violates First Amendment protections against religious discrimination. …
U.S. President Donald Trump held a rally at Municipal Auditorium in Nashville on Wednesday, vowing he would not stop defending the security of Americans despite the latest legal setback, which the government will likely appeal. (Jonathan Ernst/Reuters)
Trump called the ruling an example of "unprecedented judicial overreach" and said his administration would appeal it to the U.S. Supreme Court. He also called his new travel ban a watered-down version of the first one, which he said he wished he could implement. …
The hearing was one of three held Wednesday in federal courts around the country. U.S. District Judge James Robart in Seattle, who blocked the initial travel ban last month, did not immediately rule on a request from an immigrant-rights group to block the revised version. Neither was there a ruling from U.S. District Judge Theodore Chuang in Maryland in a challenge brought by the American Civil Liberties Union and other groups.
In all, more than half a dozen states are trying to stop the ban. A case brought by Washington state argues that the new order harms residents, universities and businesses, especially tech companies such as Washington state-based Microsoft and Amazon, which rely on foreign workers. California, Maryland, Massachusetts, New York and Oregon have joined the claim.
Judicial overreach? What a load of horse pucky! It is only judicial overreach to Drumpf because he isn't getting his way! I am glad that there are some members of the judiciary and legal profession that see this Muslim travel ban for what it is — outright discrimination on ethnic and religious grounds. As Drumpfenfarten said when US District Judge Robart of Washington state turned aside the first ban, "See you in court!" While Robart and US District Judge Chuang of Maryland both heard arguments today, neither has announced their ruling.
My Universe
OK, so I am almost 3 months behind the times but this commercial for Temptations cat treats is "so cat"!
5 Responses to “Squatch’s Open Thread 15 March 2017”
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Hope your Ides of March ended with no more than a thunderstorm display, Lynn. Ours ended with Geert Wilders (PVV) being put in his place again, but with election results favoring another right-wing government (to Dutch standards), but which will only slightly off-center to for example American standards. But forming a coalition government with four parties, as is expected now, will take a long time, so we'll see. I hope we're not going to emulate Belgium in this regard; it took them close to a year, if I remember correctly.
MacLeans: Yes, Europe has felt how Putin is messing with its affair too an that is why they have set up the East StratCom Task Force which apparently has a broader scope than Europe and shares its information with other Western nations. There may have been some attempts to influence our election with smear campaigns, but apart from the attack on Van Bommel (SP) which TomCat reported through a Short Take of a New York Times article, nothing much happened here. That attempt on smearing Van Bommel died before it got off the ground, so the task force seems to be doing a good job. The fear of hacking however did force this election to go "manual" again at the last minute, counting votes and preferential votes from paper-and-pencil ballots and prohibiting some Dutch expats from casting their vote in time. You can imagine Russia is about as popular as Turkey here right now.
CBC: Kudos for your stance, Girl Guides of Canada. But it is also for practical reasons, I guess. Why risk being detained at the border for hours on end, or risking not making it to your connecting flight in time, when you're only going there for a short trip. Close to (my) home, my husband is also reconsidering trips to the US or Canada and Mexico with connecting flights in America, and so do many of his colleagues. The proof of the pudding for him will be his trip to Austin next month.
Keith Olbermann: Excellent suggestion, Keith, pulling the cable plug on President Emily Litella. And follow that up with impeachment, imprisonment, institutionalization or all of the above. But see it through, because Drumpf isn't only illiterate, he's also digitally illiterate , so Bannon will then have his full attention when keeping him up to date. And that may even be worse than having Emily Litella displaying his television addiction to the whole world in tweets. Talking about TV addiction: I have no such cravings for the tube, but I'm sure getting hooked on Keith.
RESIST & PERIST!
CBC: As this was clearly Muslim ban 2.0, it was to be expected that it would be blocked on the same grounds as version 1.0. Kudos to U.S. District Judge Derrick Watson. He also ruled that it would endanger the economy of Hawaii, a case many other states made before other courts. It would serve the resistance against this ban and make a stronger case before SCOTUS if other judges would also announce their ruling, but they seem hesitant. The question is why. Drumpf obviously counts on Neil Gorsuch getting through his hearing in one piece next week and being sworn in soon after, so it is imperative that there is more than one court blocking this damned ban.
My Universe: Never mind being late, Lynn. I'd never seen it and I loved it. Did you notice that TomCat was out first?
Great job, Squatch, Great minds fell in the same ditch again.
You reminded me of an excellent snack!!
Yes, thunder and lightning is relatively rare all up and down the left coast. Growing up there, I only saw it once or twice. Sorry you are seeing it now! The Ides were a device of Romans to make modern students of Latin crazy (or crazier). They never, ever said a day was the "second" or the "twenty-first" of a month; they always counted backwards, so any day was either a Kalends, a Nones, or an Ides, or X days BEFORE a Kalends, a Nones, or an Ides. The Kalends was always the beginning of a month, but the Ides was only the 15th in March, May, July, and October – in all other months it was the thirteenth. The Nones was the ninth if the Ides were the fiftennth, otherwise the seventh. And when they counted days, they included both ends. So the 14th of March, which I would think was one day before the Ides, they would have said was two days before the Ides. Hopefully this will make us all feel better about American date conventions vis-a-vis Canadian/European dating conventions.
Maclean's – If they are just starting this, hopefully you (Canadians) can get a handle on it early before it mushrooms, as it did for Hillary, into a life-destroying morass. It helps, I think, that you don't have Fox there. But I wouldn't be over-confident.
CBC – Good for the Guides. Soon they won't be able to breathe here anyway. Keep them home and safe.
Keith # 47 – "President Emily Latella" – Stunning. I also like the "pulling the cables" idea. Here's my plan: we cut Fox's access to every cable provider, and don't tell anyone. We let all the talking heads keep showing up for work every day, and getting paid, but no one hears them but each other. Do you suppose there's a chance?
CBC II – Credit where it is due, to Brian Schatz, the AG of Hawaii, for bringing the suit so promptly and tenaciously, as well as to the judge.
Universe – Adorable (if it's not YOUR decorations.)
Cute video – but I don't get the ending. Why did they all leave at once? (Must be some audio thing – there was no CC).
Someone outside one of the doors (the one they all went through) was shing a containter of the sponsor, "Temptations." Personally I have never known a cat treat that would have that effect on cats; it's all I can do to find one they won't turn up their noses at: but, you know, advertising.