Day 97.  This is extreme hurry mode, as I’m posting articles and distributing links, before leaving for volunteer work in prison.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:31 (average 5:56).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From Daily Kos: Bill Maher had a field day with both Sarah Palin and her Republican critics. “Now that many Republicans have come forward in the last week to finally admit that, ‘okay, you were right, Sarah Palin is a crazy person, they have to ask themselves, ‘What else might I have been completely wrong about all these years?’ In case you missed it, Palin made a speech in Iowa a couple of weeks ago that cryptologists are still working on,” Maher explained on his show Real Time with Bill Maher.

 
Bill to Republicans slamming Sarah Palin… by ewillies

I think Bloody Bullseye Barbie went all the way to Baggerville. Bill was classic.

From The New Yorker: On Monday, the state of Alabama lost yet another fight to remain in the eighteenth century, extending a losing streak that dates back to the nineteenth century.

Alabama, whose first attempt to remain in the eighteenth century took place between 1861 and 1865, has never shown signs of giving up the fight, even after being dealt a string of stunning defeats in the nineteen-fifties and nineteen-sixties.

According to historians, Monday’s loss brings the number of failed attempts by Alabama to more than four thousand.

But even with this latest defeat, some of the state’s residents, such as Chief Justice Roy Moore, of the Alabama Supreme Court, remained resolute in their fight to return to a time before electricity and indoor plumbing.

Dang!!  Andy’s back to straight news, again!!

From YouTube: ‘Bears’ have own plan for Jeb Bush campaign site / LGBT, Equality

We still don’t know what bears do or don’t do in the woods, but they certainly do on the Bush!!  😀

Cartoon:

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.

Day 92.  My barber just called.  She has the flu, so I’m not getting my haircut until Monday.  I’m very grateful to her for not trying to work through it and infecting me.  I’m still feeling very tired, but I’ll try to catch up on sleep, after I get my articles posted and uploaded.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 2:19 (average 4:08).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From Daily Kos: Jon Stewart masterfully used Mike Huckabee’s own words to make a broader point after Huckabee used the Bible to show the hypocrisy of those that oppose gay marriage. He first played a clip to lay the groundwork of Mike Huckabee’s general intolerance and head in the sand stance. Huckabee called women who use the f-bomb trashy after implying that women in the South and Midwest do not do that.

 
Mike Huckabee’s marriage position challenged by ewillies

He sure doesn’t know the same southern gals I knew in my youth! They just teamed the F-bomb with Y’all!!  Sadly, I don’t think Upchuck Huck has much of a chance to win the Republican nomination. Oh well, he probably wouldn’t legalize ownership of a Canadian anyway, despite my Biblical permission to do so. 😉

From PRWatch: In addition to unprecedented budget cuts to the University of Wisconsin (UW) system, Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker struck "the search for truth" and the Wisconsin Idea from the university’s mission in his executive budget bill unveiled last night.

First summed up by UW President Charles Van Hise in 1904, the Wisconsin Idea means that "the borders of the University are the borders of the state." Van Hise declared that he would “never be content until the beneficent influence of the university reaches every family in the state” and this has long been the core philosophy of the UW System, which has worked hard over the decades to generate programs that serve people and communities all over the state.

Walker’s executive budget (see below) amends Sec. 1111 of the statutes to remove language specifying that the UW system has a public service mission to “extend knowledge and its application beyond the boundaries of its campus" and to "serve and stimulate society." He strikes language ensuring that the mission of the UW is to extend "training and public service designed to educate people and improve the human condition," as well as the language specifying that "the search for truth" is "basic to every purpose of the system."

Click through for much more on how the Fartfuhrer of Fitzwalkerstan is trying to destroy their university system.

From NY Times: A still-classified section of the investigation by congressional intelligence committees into the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks has taken on an almost mythic quality over the past 13 years — 28 pages that examine crucial support given the hijackers and that by all accounts implicate prominent Saudis in financing terrorism.

Now new claims by Zacarias Moussaoui, a convicted former member of Al Qaeda, that he had high-level contact with officials of the Saudi Arabian government in the prelude to Sept. 11 have brought renewed attention to the inquiry’s withheld findings, which lawmakers and relatives of those killed in the attacks have tried unsuccessfully to declassify.

“I think it is the right thing to do,” said Representative Stephen F. Lynch, Democrat of Massachusetts and an author of a bipartisan resolution encouraging President Obama to declassify the section. “Let’s put it out there.”

Mr. Lynch and his allies have been joined by former Senator Bob Graham of Florida, who as chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee was a leader of the inquiry. He has called for the release of the report’s Part 4, which dealt with Saudi Arabia, since President George W. Bush ordered it classified when the rest of the report was released in December 2002.

Mr. Graham has repeatedly said it shows that Saudi Arabia was complicit in the Sept. 11 attacks. “The 28 pages primarily relate to who financed 9/11, and they point a very strong finger at Saudi Arabia as being the principal financier,” Mr. Graham said last month as he pressed for the pages to be made public.

Click through. I fully agree that the pages should be made public, and have believed the Saudi’s were complicit, since September 2001. They helped arrange for the Bush family to make a ton of money from 9/11, due to their joint involvement in the Carlyle Group. In addition GW ChickenHawk arranged a secret flight out of the country for Bandar Bush and his associates, before the FBI could question them.

Day 90.  I’m waiting for Store to Door to  call and take my grocery order.  Correction: They just called.  Today I get to configure Mailwasher Pro, the software I use to filter the hundreds of SPAM email I get daily to work with my new Comcast email addresses.  Also, the building managers will be around sometime today for their quarterly sanitation and maintenance inspection, so I’ve been house cleaning to prepare for that.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:13 (average 4:42).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From The New Yorker: President Barack Obama’s increasing popularity is forcing congressional Democrats to consider admitting that they know him, a leading Democratic staffer revealed on Monday.

After months of denying ever having been in the same room as the President, some Democrats are tentatively rethinking that position now that his approval rating has hit fifty per cent, the staffer said.

“We’re watching that number very closely,” the Democratic staffer Robinson Petrack said. “We could be looking at a scenario where it’s safe to acknowledge his existence again.”

Petrack said that while many congressional Democrats have not used the word “Obama” in a sentence since the President’s approval rating dropped to thirty-nine percent last year, they are toying with the idea of resuming that practice now.

But even as Democrats contemplate admitting that they have met Obama or even shaken his hand, some worry that such moves could have perilous consequences if his approval rating drops again.

Andy may be on to something here. People love to whine about Obama. But, while I fully admit Obama has done many things I don’t like, consider the alternative. If McConJob had won six years ago, there is only one thing that would have prevented nuclear global destruction to the tune of Bomb Bomb Iran.  A Teabagger might have Second Amendment Solutioned him, giving us President Drill Baby Dingbat, instead!

From Daily Kos: This has happened to me a few times through my lifetime, but I just can’t stop giggling like a teenager. I can just hear the comedians now. Enjoy-we need it.

FOMCROTFPIMPLMAO!

From YouTube: Rachel Maddow 03*02*2015 Vaccine questions trip up Christie, Paul

PIGnocchio can probably pull his fat from the fire after his gaffe. However, this could be curtains for Idiot, Son of Idiot, Named after Idiot. His internal Bircher, that he tries to hide, rose to the surface.

Cartoon:

Too bad this only happens to the poor and middle classes!