Day 96. After going out for a haircut in heavy rain, getting dry and changed, and preparation for tomorrow’s prison volunteer work, there was no time left to do research. I hope to post tomorrow, before leaving for prison.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:17 (average 4:30). To di it, click here. How did you do?
Cartoon:
Almost every week, Republicans join a competition to see who can say the most outlandish things, and in the process, they push the envelope on just how nuts InsaniTEA can become. I trust that you will believe it, when I tell you that last week was no exception.
New GOP Senator: Food workers must be free not to wash their hands!
Amongst the outstanding freshman class of Senators is one Thom Tillis, a Republican who bills himself as a "free market conservative" from the great state of North Carolina. He thinks health and hygiene laws are a little overblown and are a good example of government over-reach. He told a story this week during a speech at the Bipartisan Policy Center about how he was having latte with a friend at Starbucks recently when inspiration struck. Why should people who serve food be required to wash their hands after using the bathroom? It’s just this sort of onerous regulation that is killing American business.
So, perfect timing and soiled finger right on the pulse of the whole public health zeitgeist right now, what with the measles outbreak and the flu busting out. How ‘bout a little fecal dusting with your latte? As Jon Stewart suggested, maybe we could get a cholera epidemic going here. Boy, that’d be good for business!
Tillis has a solution at the ready, though. Restaurants would just have to put up a sign saying they do not require employees to wash their hands, and then the free market would just work its magic.
So amused was he at his own cleverness that he showed not one glimmer of recognition that this would also be a kind of regulation…
Inserted from <Alternet>
Dang! Watch out for Republicooties!!
This is just the first of six nutjob Republican moments from last week alone. Click through for the other five.
Day 95. This is going to be a busy week, because tomorrow is haircut day, Tuesday is a volunteer day in prison. And Wednesday is grocery delivery day. I also just learned that a close personal friend has breast cancer, so I’m spending some time on the Johns Hopkins site to learn enough to listen intelligently. Thoughts and prayers, please.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:42 (average 4:53). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From Daily Kos: It’s all so easy if you’re part of the one percent.
(Reuters) – I asked a financial services executive recently how our retirement saving system can be considered a success, considering that all but the highest-income households are approaching retirement with next to nothing saved.
His reply: "They don’t have any money while they’re working, so why would they have any money in retirement?"
It’s just that simple. If, like 45 percent of Americans, you’re of working age and you don’t have a retirement plan, well that’s your problem.
This is how Republicans REALLY care for the rest of us.
From Haaretz: Beware: Republican Jews on the warpath
A campaign of intimidation is underway to stop Democratic lawmakers from skipping Netanyahu’s upcoming Congress speech. God, save us from our Jews.
Note that this is an Israeli source. Israelis should also beware Republican Supply-side pseudo-Christians, whose support for Israel stems from their desire to inspire an apocalyptic conflict and see all but 144,000 Jews transformed into crispy critters in their premillennial tribulation.
From Politico: The Republican 2016 presidential field includes three politicians — George Pataki, Jim Gilmore and Bob Ehrlich — who last won election when the flip phone was hot technology. Also making moves to run are John Bolton, who is best remembered as an architect of George W. Bush’s WMD strategy and has never held elected office, and Peter King, the longtime Long Island congressman who’s made his biggest headlines hitting conservatives.
And don’t forget about former Hewlett-Packard CEO and failed California senatorial candidate Carly Fiorina — another accomplished figure who’s perceived to have next to no chance of becoming the Republican standard-bearer.
Bring on the clowns! All aboard!!
Cartoon:
The Republican Party thinks it still exists.
When Barack Obama attended the National Prayer Breakfast, something every President has done every year, since Dwight D. Eisenhower, he set off a national furor from the rabid extreme right, that is, the Republican Party. Obama suggested that there have been examples of atrocities in all religions, so we should not be overly prideful in condemning others. Obama was right. We don’t have to go back that far in our own history.
They burned him alive in an iron cage, and as he screamed and writhed in the agony of hell they made a sport of his death.
After listening to one newscast after another rightly condemn the barbaric killing of that Jordanian air force pilot at the bloody hands of ISIS, I couldn’t sleep. My mind kept roaming the past trying to retrieve a vaguely remembered photograph that I had seen long ago in the archives of a college library in Texas.
Suddenly, around two in the morning, the image materialized in my head. I made my way down the hall to my computer and typed in: “Waco, Texas. Lynching.”
Sure enough, there it was: the charred corpse of a young black man, tied to a blistered tree in the heart of the Texas Bible Belt.
Sure enough, there it was: the charred corpse of a young black man, tied to a blistered tree in the heart of the Texas Bible Belt. Next to the burned body, young white men can be seen smiling and grinning, seemingly jubilant at their front-row seats in a carnival of death. One of them sent a picture postcard home: “This is the barbeque we had last night. My picture is to the left with a cross over it. Your son, Joe.”
The victim’s name was Jesse Washington. The year was 1916. America would soon go to war in Europe “to make the world safe for democracy.” My father was twelve, my mother eight. I was born 18 years later, at a time, I would come to learn, when local white folks still talked about Washington’s execution as if it were only yesterday. This was not medieval Europe. Not the Inquisition. Not a heretic burned at the stake by some ecclesiastical authority in the Old World. This was Texas, and the white people in that photograph were farmers, laborers, shopkeepers, some of them respectable congregants from local churches in and around the growing town of Waco.Here is the photograph. Take a good look at Jesse Washington’s stiffened body tied to the tree. He had been sentenced to death for the murder of a white woman. No witnesses saw the crime; he allegedly confessed but the truth of the allegations would never be tested. The grand jury took just four minutes to return a guilty verdict, but there was no appeal, no review, no prison time. Instead, a courtroom mob dragged him outside, pinned him to the ground, and cut off his testicles. A bonfire was quickly built and lit. For two hours, Jesse Washington — alive — was raised and lowered over the flames. Again and again and again. City officials and police stood by, approvingly. According to some estimates, the crowd grew to as many as 15,000. There were taunts, cheers and laughter. Reporters described hearing “shouts of delight.”…
Inserted from <Bill Moyers>
Obama was right. This travesty took place less that 100 years ago. Republicans objected so strongly because the Republican Party has chosen chose to represent the same racist hatred that inspired this act, when they adopted the Southern Strategy. And when they claim that there is nothing like this today, they are lying. The same organization that sponsors the National Prayer Breakfast also sponsored an attempt by US Senators and Representatives to draft legislation for Uganda to execute their citizens for being gay. They almost got away with it.
That brings us to the thing Obama did wrong. No US President should attend an event sponsored by such a hate-filled organization.
Day 94. I’m feeling quite tired, so I’ll try to be brief, so I can rest.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 5:26 (average 6:51). To do it. click here. Hoe did you do?
Short Takes:
From Daily Kos: The Guardian has posted an article about FOX New’s embedding ISIS’s latest snuff film, unedited on their webpage:
Fox News has chosen to embed on its website the video of Islamic State burning a hostage to death, a move which makes them the only US media organisation to broadcast the video in full.
The extremely graphic 22-minute video shows Muadh al-Kasasbeh, a Jordanian pilot, being set on fire and burned to death in a cage. Fox News did not post the videos of the killings of previous Isis hostages, and no other media company has hosted this video.Rick Nelson, a senior associate in homeland security and terrorism at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, said that posting the video actually empowers Isis.
… “These groups need a platform, and this gives them a platform,” he added.
Malcolm Nance, the executive director of the Terror Asymmetrics Project on Strategy, Tactics and Radical Ideology thinktank and an expert on counter-terrorism and radical extremism told the Guardian that by posting the video Fox News was propagating “exactly what Isis wants to propagate”.
…..
“[Fox News] are literally – literally – working for al-Qaida and Isis’s media arm,” he added.
“They might as well start sending them royalty checks.”
Considering the extent to which both ISIL and the Republican Reichsministry of Propaganda, Faux Noise, hate Obama, they are natural allies.
From The New Yorker: The reanimated corpse of Dr. Jonas Salk, the medical researcher who developed the first polio vaccine, rose from the grave Friday morning on what authorities believe is a mission to hunt down idiots.
The zombie version of Salk, wearing a tattered white lab coat and looking “incredibly angry” according to one eyewitness, was seen advancing on the U.S. Capitol building at approximately 11 A.M.
While Senator Rand Paul, of Kentucky, hid in the Senate cloakroom, armed security forces repelled the zombie virologist, who, seemingly unharmed, moved on in search of new prey.
According to law enforcement, the reanimated Salk then stole a car and headed off in the direction of Trenton, New Jersey.
Dang Andy!! He should have persisted until he got Idiot, Son of Idiot, Named after Idiot. Rand Paul is the idiot trifecta!!
From Crooks and Liars: On March 4th, the United States Supreme Court will hear a case that they should never have agreed to take, brought by an organization funded by the Kochtopus and raising issues which are completely bogus. If Chief Justice John Roberts has his way, they will rule on this bogus case and gut the Affordable Care Act.
Here’s the kicker: Three of the four plaintiffs in the case aren’t even eligible to participate on the exchanges, rendering this case even more bogus than it was when they started it.
As much as I hope the author is wrong about this, I fear she is spot-on.
Cartoon:
You need to go a long, long way to find someone, who is a bigger fan of Rachel Maddow than I am, but last night she was so dismissive of my home state, that I feel I should take a few minutes to reply to her, tongue in cheek, even though I’m sure I will remain a Rachel fan without interruption. Let’s begin with some video.
On the Republicans and their brand of InsaniTEA, she is accurate, but I have already covered everything she brought up, here, except for the idiot with the buzzer. I will add, however, the money that propels such TEAbuggery to the forefront comes from out of state.
Now we come to Kitz. There is certainly the appearance of impropriety there, and if the investigated does reveal quid pro quo, he should resign, and I would have no trouble supporting his successor, Kate Brown. Either way, it’s time for Kitz to get a new girlfriend. He should not accept the first person to apply for that position, either. I know who tat would be. The last thing Oregon needs is for Monica Wehby to become First Mistress.
On the owl, it’s certainly understandable that the bird is angry. How would you like to live in a park with Bush in the name. If only there were two, Oregon could brag about the most aggressive pair of hooters in the country.
At least Rachel ended on a high note, and I hope Oregon’s bear couple does appear on her show. I just hope she does not ask them what they do, or don’t do, in the woods.
Day 93. I slept in, which is good. I needed it. This afternoon my building is having a community meeting in which management will be going over the steps they are going to start talking to help us recycle and lower our carbon footprint. While that may see like a pain in the ass, I’m glad they care. You folks back east had betted get ready for some nasty weather. Although it has been unseasonably warm here, it’s been raining nonstop for over a day and is forecast to continue for two – three more. When that mixes from cold air out of Canada, watch out!!
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today;s took me 2:59 (average 4:14). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From Daily Kos: Florida Attorney Steve Medina has been working on a case, pro bono, to expose the environmental corruption which has been taking place in Tallahassee and Putnam County, Florida.
Tons of toxic waste is being dumped into St. Johns River, daily, by the Koch Brothers company, Georgia-Pacific. Aspects of the deal allowing Georgia Pacific to massively assault the environment, were misleading, sometimes illegal, and unbeknownst to the local citizens. Florida Governor Rick Scott and former Governor (and Republican presidential hopeful), Jeb Bush, are also involved.
Click through for the dirty details. Those four are peas in a pod.
From Reuters: A senior Israeli official suggested on Friday that Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had been misled into thinking an invitation to address the U.S. Congress on Iran next month was fully supported by the Democrats.
Netanyahu was invited by the Republican speaker of the house, John Boehner, to address Congress on March 3, an invitation Boehner originally described as bipartisan.
The move angered the White House, which is upset about the event coming two weeks before Israeli elections and the fact that Netanyahu, who has a testy relationship with President Obama, is expected to be critical of U.S. policy on Iran.
I don’t doubt that Agent Orange lied. After all, his mouth was open, and there was no inflow of whiskey. However, if Butcher Ben were truly concerned, he would cancel the trip. He says he has no such plans.
From Right Wing Watch: Creationist leader Ken Ham is incensed that the state of Kentucky is supposedly abridging his organization’s “fundamental rights” by declining to provide around $18 million in tax incentives to his Noah’s Ark theme park. The park is a planned addition to Ham’s Creation Museum and is intended to be, according to Ham, “one of the greatest evangelist outreaches of our day.”
Since Ham’s group plans to discriminate on the basis of religion in its hiring practices, it is no surprise that it won’t get public funds. But Ham claims that he has a “right” to receive taxpayer money and has filed a lawsuit [pseudo-Christians delinked] against Kentucky, insisting that his organization, Answers in Genesis, is the real victim of discrimination.
He took his case to “Washington Watch” [pseudo-Christians delinked] yesterday, where he told host Tony Perkins that Kentucky’s decision somehow violates his organization’s right to the freedom of speech: “Anyone who wants to have freedom of speech in this nation, freedom of religion, free exercise of religion, needs to stand with us as we do this because that is what we are standing for.”
In short this Republican Supply-side pseudo-Christian is saying that failure to fund his attempt to proselytize others in a manner that violates the US Constitution violates his freedom of speech and freedom of religion. He is free to spread the Republican gospel of greed, lies and hate to his heart’s content, and I defend his right to do so. But, if government pays for it, that violates our rights.
Cartoon:
It’s not that often that I get to share good news, so I’ll bask in the pleasure of doing so. It wasn’t long ago that the FCC was talking about a dual tier Internet system, ruled by giant corporations. But the public outcry, urged and abetted by so many people like you and me, followed by Obama’s string stance for net neutrality, seems to have worked.
The chairman of the Federal Communications Commission just said he’s proposing the "strongest open Internet protections" the Web has ever seen.
In a Wired op-ed, FCC Chairman Tom Wheeler announced he wants to regulate Internet providers with the most aggressive tool at his disposal: Title II of the Communications Act. In addition to covering fixed broadband providers such as Comcast and Time Warner Cable, the draft rules would cover wireless providers such as T-Mobile and Sprint. The rules would also make speeding up or slowing down Web traffic — a tactic known as prioritization — illegal. And it would ban the blocking of Web traffic outright.
It all adds up to the most significant intervention ever undertaken by federal regulators to make sure the Web remains a level playing field. It is, depending on your ideology, either an unprecedented example of government overreach that will ruin the republic or the most egalitarian, pro-competitive thing the FCC may do in the 21st century.
"My proposal assures the rights of Internet users to go where they want, when they want," Wheeler wrote, "and the rights of innovators to introduce new products without asking anyone’s permission."
The FCC is expected to vote on Wheeler’s proposed rules on Feb. 26… [emphasis added]
Inserted from <Washington Post>
Al Franken, a long time Net Neutrality champion, explains.
While we should keep the pressure on and our eyes open until 2/26, kidos to yjr people that made this happen: YOU!
