I’m feeling completely wiped out today. After a very busy day yesterday, a small kitchen fire on the 5th floor set off the alarms, waking me from a sound sleep at 1:30 AM. By the time anyone knew there was nothing to worry about, as always, I had dressed, gotten up, put on George, and prepared to be evacuated. I was back in bed by 2:30, but was wide-awake and could not get back to sleep.
Nameless Update:
As I commented last night, Nameless is in the hospital and requests your thoughts and prayers. He expects to be allowed to return home after his echo-cardiogram, so he may be on-site before I publish this.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:44 (average 4:48). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From YouTube (Inequality Media Channel): The Monopolization of America
I fully agree. There’s nothing in the presentation that I didn’t already know, but few do and all need to learn in order to RESIST!!
From CNN: National security officials and some Republicans are preparing contingency plans in case President Donald Trump’s nominee to lead the CIA, Gina Haspel, falters amid questions about her past role in the George W. Bush-era extreme interrogation program and destruction of videotapes of waterboarding, five sources familiar with the matter tell CNN….
…Haspel’s 33-year CIA career is controversial for several reasons. She oversaw a CIA black site in Thailand in 2002 where harsh interrogations were conducted, although she was not at the site when al Qaeda suspect Abu Zubaydah was waterboarded at least 83 times. She was also chief of staff to the director of the National Clandestine Service, Jose Rodriguez, in 2005 when the CIA tapes of interrogations were destroyed. Rodriguez wrote in his memoir that he asked Haspel to prepare a cable granting permission to destroy the tapes, though he made the decision.
National security officials say they still believe she can survive a Senate confirmation hearing — but some say there contingency plans if she doesn’t.
At that time, the majority of Americans believed Republican lies that torture works, and it was legal. Most Americans did not know we hung Japanese officers for waterboarding GIs. Torture was "legal", so it is not reasonable to blame her for her oversight. However, she must not be confirmed because she participated in a cover-up by destroying tapes she was legally required to safeguard. Her apparent intent to obstruct the investigation that resulted in outlawing torture. RESIST!!
From NY Times: A group of student activists sat in the library at George Mason University this past week feeling both vindicated and violated.
The group, Transparent GMU, had sued the university and its fund-raising foundation last year after it was denied requests for documents that it suspected showed how deep-pocket donors were given undue influence over academic affairs. After a recent court hearing in the case, the university released those documents, some of which appeared to affirm the group’s suspicions.“It feels like transparency Christmas,” said Kailey Adkins, a sophomore at George Mason and a Transparent GMU member. But, she added, “I mostly feel deceived and disappointed. GMU breached my trust and sense of security in my education.”
The documents reveal in surprising detail that for years, as George Mason grew from a little-known commuter school to a major public university and a center of libertarian scholarship, millions of dollars in donations from conservative-leaning donors like the Charles Koch Foundation had come with strings attached.
As early as 1990, entities controlled by the billionaire brothers Charles G. and David H. Koch were given a seat on a committee to pick candidates for a professorship that they funded, the records show. Similar arrangements that continued through 2009 gave donors decision-making roles in selecting candidates for key economics appointments at the Mercatus Center, a Koch-funded think tank on campus that studies markets and regulation. The appointments, which also created faculty lines at George Mason, were steered to professors who, like the Kochs, embraced unconstrained free markets.
If Republican Billionaires want to control the agendas of colleges to teach their bullshit propaganda to turn students into Koch suckers, it is their right to do so, no matter how distasteful I consider it. However, it is NOT their right to do it secretly, hiding it from the students. Caveat discipulus! RESIST!!
Cartoon:
