OGIM!! (Oh God, it’s Monday!!) I’m off to see Christine, my Ophthalmologist, to devise a plan for restoring my vision. When I get home, I’ll be fully dilated and even blinder than I already am, so I will complete this now. When I upload it, you will know that I have arrived safely. I should be able to post normally tomorrow.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:56 (average 5:02). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Cartoon:
Wendy was here this morning. She shined and polished the TomCat, cleaned the counters and floors, remade the bed, and took a Mug Shot of me for you. Today is the hottest day of the heat wave, with mid 90°s forecast. Here’s that Mug Shot.
A Better View of the Logo:
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 4:19 (average 5:26). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Our Next First Lady?
Short Takes:
From NY Times: Donald J. Trump said on Wednesday that he hoped Russian intelligence services had successfully hacked Hillary Clinton’s email, and encouraged them to publish whatever they may have stolen, essentially urging a foreign adversary to conduct cyberespionage against a former secretary of state.
“Russia, if you’re listening, I hope you’re able to find the 30,000 emails that are missing,” Mr. Trump said during a news conference here in an apparent reference to Mrs. Clinton’s deleted emails. “I think you will probably be rewarded mightily by our press.”
Mr. Trump’s call was another bizarre moment in the mystery of whether Vladimir V. Putin’s government has been seeking to influence the United States’ presidential race.
His comments came amid questions about the hacking of the Democratic National Committee’s computer servers, which American intelligence agencies have told the White House they have “high confidence” was the work of the Russian government.
Now that he’s actually committing a crime, I’ll speculate some more. Is Rump Dump making this request, because Putin (R-RU) delivered on a previous hacking request? Why did Rump Dump tell GOP Pootie that, if elected, he will recognize the Crimea as Russian Territory, and lift US sanctions against him for invading Ukraine, of which the Crimea is part? For what does Trump owe Putin?
From Crooks and Liars: Before the show is broadcast, Stephen Colbert usually takes questions from the audience. His reaction to a question by a female college student, "if you have Donald Trump on your show tonight, what would you ask him?” had the audience in stitches.
Great answer. It wouldn’t surprise me, if, asked the same question about hecklers at the Democratic National Convention, he responded, "What does Trump’s taste like?"
From Alternet: President Obama and VP Biden both spoke on the third night of the Democratic National Convention. But it was Senator Tim Kaine (D-VA) who really caught John Oliver’s eye.
We Democrats are not so thin-skinned that we cannot laugh at our own.
Cartoon (originally posted 7/28/2014):
Two years ago, I actually thought this was the absolute worst it could get. Ha!
I can get this today and maybe tomorrow, but I’ll definitely need the Squatch to do it Saturday and possibly Sunday. I’m still hurting. Second surgery is tomorrow. Hugs to all!! This is my only article today:
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 2:44 (average 5:06). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Julie will kill me for this:
Short Takes:
From Daily Kos: When Pastor Roger Jimenez’s hateful rant against the LGBT community went viral, there was (and continues to be) a well-deserved backlash from people such as myself who don’t worry too much about what people love what people, as long as they love one another. Pastor Roger Jimenez has a pastor buddy down in Texas whose name is Donnie Romero. Pastor Donnie Romero spends his waking hours thinking about men kissing men and touching their penises together and it drives him mad. This “madness” makes him think and say terrible terrible things and like most narcissists, he must blame everybody else for making him think and feel these terrible things. After opening with how his son loves the lion in the Bible (and we all love Narnia!), he goes into saying that he agrees with Pastor Jimenez’s homophobia “100 percent.”
These 50 sodomites are all perverts and pedophiles, and they are the scum of the earth, and the earth is a little bit better place now," Romero said in his sermon. "And I’ll take it a step further, because I heard on the news today, that there are still several dozen of these queers in ICU and intensive care. And I will pray to God like I did this morning, I will do it tonight, I’ll pray that God will finish the job that that man started, and he will end their life, and by tomorrow morning they will all be burning in hell
Yet another view of how Republican Supply pseudo-Christians express "love".
From The New Yorker: In what some are calling a sign of its desperation to raise cash, the Presidential campaign of Donald J. Trump is auctioning off New Jersey Governor Chris Christie on the popular e-commerce site eBay, campaign officials have confirmed.
Christie, who is described on the site as being in lightly used but good condition, is believed to be the first sitting governor ever to be auctioned on the Internet.
Andy, he might get a better deal selling PIGnocchio by the pound.
From Alternet: On Foreign Policy
“It all started with her bad judgment in supporting the war in Iraq in the first place. Though I was not in government service, I was among the earliest to criticize the rush to war, and yes, even before the war ever started. But Hillary Clinton learned nothing from Iraq, because when she got into power, she couldn’t wait to rush us off to war in Libya.”
This claim has been debunked time and time again. While Clinton certainly voted to authorize the war in Iraq, there is no evidence that Trump criticized it “before the war ever started.” In 2002, Trump offered tepid support for the war in an interview with radio host Howard Stern. Immediately after the invasion again, Trump told Fox’s Neil Cavuto the war “looks like a tremendous success” from a military standpoint.
Trump did speak out against the war in July 2004—a full 16 months after the war began. Pressed on these facts by CNN’s Jake Tapper, Trump promised to provide evidence of opposition to the war, saying:
“No, no, but I was against it from before it started. And if you go back and look at that interview, and I’ll get it for you if you want, but that interview was substantially before the war started. It was the first time I was ever asked the question. And even that, it wasn’t like, oh yeah, we should go in. It was a very, like yeah, maybe.”
Tapper told Trump he’d “love” to see evidence of Trump’s vocal opposition to the war. So far, that wish seems to remain unfulfilled.
1st of 5 Biggest Lies in Trump’s Hillary-Attack Speech. Click through for the other four.
Cartoon:
Factory is in China
Yesterday I was still in a lot of pain. I'm not allowed to hold Killer Dawg, because he might glow in the dark. When I had my surgery, Julie didn't like her scrubs so she did some styling.
I’m waiting for Julie to arrive, so I’m sure I’ll finish this after she is gone. This weekend I want to do two things: rest and hydrate.
Julie has come and gone. She made me a primped Puddy Tat, and I fed her baby back ribs.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:31 (average 5:53). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Killer Dawg Update (taken Wednesday):
Short Takes:
From Daily Kos: Consider this: John McCain has just said something just as, if not even more insane and offensive than Donald Trump:
John McCain: Obama is ‘directly responsible’ for Orlando attack
Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.), the elder Republican statesman, said President Obama was “directly responsible” for the terror attack in Orlando due to his failure to combat the rise of the Islamic State terror group.
McConJob has now whored himself so far that he’s aping Rump Dump Trump.
From NY Times: Senator Marco Rubio of Florida is leaning heavily toward running for re-election to the seat he swore he was giving up after six often frustrating years and a failed presidential run, associates said on Friday, a reversal that would upend one of the most competitive races in the country.
Mr. Rubio could make his decision public early next week after he spends the weekend with his family in Florida weighing the personal, political and financial considerations of another campaign. One adviser who described the senator as “all in” said Mr. Rubio’s staff members had already begun scouting a site for a possible announcement.
The last thing we need in the Senate is a Border Booter Bot, a Republican racist Latino, bigoted against his own people.
From Washington Post: Bernie Sanders could offer an endorsement of presumptive Democratic nominee Hillary Clinton before the party’s convention next month, depending on the outcome of ongoing policy talks between the two campaigns, Sanders’s campaign manager said Friday.
Jeff Weaver, a longtime Sanders confidant, said that he has been encouraged by discussions over several policy issues important to Sanders — including a plan for tuition-free college — that Sanders would like to see as part of the Democratic legislative agenda going forward. Clinton and Sanders began talks in earnest over such issues during a meeting Tuesday in Washington.
“The resolution of those issues are important to determining any timetable” for a potential endorsement, Weaver said, adding that the outcome could also determine “how closely the campaigns work together” heading into the fall to defeat Donald Trump, the presumptive Republican nominee.
During an address live-streamed across the country Thursday night, the senator from Vermont did not concede the Democratic nomination to Clinton but told supporters that he plans “in a short period of time” to start working to see that “Donald Trump is defeated and defeated badly.”
Thank you, Bernie!
Cartoon:
Republicans want to repeal US support for it.
It’s another busy day as I had to find a replacement fort Julie. A woman she recommended has agreed to take the job, and another woman she recommended, has agreed to be on-call backup. Both are registered with the same agency. I have to use it, because the state pays for six hours per month of my care through their disabled seniors program. I have to pay for the rest, but every little bit helps. Tomorrow, I have my last pre-surgery blood tests, so please expect no more than a Personal Update tomorrow.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:46 (average 5:46). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From Daily Kos: The Dixie Chicks are back, and they’re already making trouble. The much-loved liberal bad girls of country/pop kicked off their North American tour this month with a nice big flip-off to Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.
Unabashed in their political views, the three Grammy-winning musicians have taken the long way getting back on tour, after dissing George W. Bush in 2003 while on stage in London. The trio suffered a backlash not many artists can or will survive. Like millions around the world, they were angry at “W” for starting the Iraq War. In comparison to the racist and incredibly disrespectful remarks made publicly about President Obama on the likes of Fox News every day, the Dixie Chicks’ lead singer Natalie Maines merely said she, "Just so you know, we’re ashamed the president of the United States is from Texas."… [emphasis original]
The article did not include a picture of what they did to Rump Dump. Here it is.
The article did include the song they played right after dissing Crawford Caligula. Here it is.
I love that tune!! Kudos to the Dixie Chicks!!
From NY Times: After the Central Intelligence Agency transferred Abu Zubaydah to the American military prison at Guantánamo Bay, Cuba, and he was brought before a panel of officers for a hearing in March 2007, he described in broken English how he had been tortured in the agency’s black-site prisons.
He said his body had shaken when he stood for hours, naked and shackled in a cold room and unable to shift his weight to an injured leg. He spoke of his humiliation at having to relieve himself in a bucket in front of other people, “like an animal.” And he described being waterboarded until he stopped breathing and required resuscitation.
“They shackle me completely, even my head; I can’t do anything,” Mr. Zubaydah said. “Like this, and they put one cloth in my mouth and they put water, water, water.” At the “last point before I die,” he said, interrogators stood the board back up and “make like this” — he made breathing noises — “again and again they make it with me, and I tell him, ‘If you want to kill me, kill me.’ ”
Mr. Zubaydah’s testimony was contained in newly declassified transcripts of military hearings for the C.I.A.’s former prisoners. The government disclosed the accounts this week in response to a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, which provided the documents to The New York Times.
Bush, Chaney, Rice, Rumsfeld Gonzalez, Yoo and more belong behind bars for this.
From Alternet: At first blush it seems almost un-American—a universal basic income (UBI) that grants an income to every US citizen without any obligation to work or perform a socially mandated task. In a country that celebrates hard work as the path to fulfillment and riches, the idea of getting money for nothing—even if it’s just enough to keep you and your family off the debt collector’s call list and above the poverty line—is heresy. And yet, in some ways, UBI is as idealistic, optimistic, and American as the Declaration of Independence and its foundational principle that “We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.”
Even with our current economic problems, we live in a land of abundant wealth and resources. And UBI is rooted in the belief that every human being should have at least the basic means to choose the life they want for themselves and their families. At a time when the tried-and-true twentieth-century solutions are failing us, UBI has the potential to give our troubled economy a twenty-first-century shot in the arm by transforming the technological disruption that’s been causing us so much anxiety into a force for self-fulfillment and the common good.
If these sentiments sound lofty and gilded, as I’m sure they do, my hope is that the conversations here will inspire you to see UBI as a policy that can raise the floor and reinvigorate our nation’s founding principles while providing new scaffolding for the American Dream.
Click through for his detailed support for his position. I agree with him.
Cartoon:
We need it back!
I’m getting another late start, because I’m so tired I needed a Lona nap this morning. Then I needed to arrange a medical cab for all three trips to and from Casey Eye Institute next week. Then I needed to massage the parade pictures into shape. Finally I ordered a new pad for my wheelchair, as the old one is worn out.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:11 (average 4:30). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Portland Rose Festival Grand Floral Parade:
The Rose Queen and her Court. (a better Court than SCROTUS).
After every horse act came a contingent of poop-scoopers. Republicans lack the intellectual capacity to do this job, 
Short Takes:
From NY Times: …Mr. Sanders said that he and Mrs. Clinton planned to meet on Tuesday and that he would ask her “whether she will be vigorous in standing up for working families in the middle class, moving aggressively in climate change, health care for all, making public colleges and universities tuition-free.”
“And after we have that kind of discussion and after we can determine whether or not we are going to have a strong and progressive platform,” he said, “I will be able to make other decisions.”
There have been signs that he was winding down his run. While Mrs. Clinton has been hiring campaign workers, Mr. Sanders started laying off at least half of his campaign staff members last week. He has let go of a number of advance staff members who help with campaign logistics, as well as field workers who have been canvassing for votes.
According to a person who attended the meeting at Mr. Sanders’s home Sunday, and who spoke on condition of anonymity to describe a private gathering, there was no talk from Mr. Sanders about trying to win the nomination. The group was keenly interested in how the senator’s meeting with Mrs. Clinton on Tuesday will turn out, and whether he would get assurances that she would fight for his ideas, this person said…
By continuing to run, Bernie increases the likelihood that his dream will live-on because it gives him a stronger negotiating position for the platform. As their stance clings to more and more desperate delusions, those who say they follow Bernie, but ignore his overtures toward unity work to increase the likelihood that Bernie’s dream will die in a totalitarian Rump Dump Trump Reich.
From Alternet: …The Muslim Alliance for Sexual and Gender Diversity, which works to support and empower LGBTQ Muslims, declared in a statement released on Sunday, "This tragedy cannot be neatly categorized as a fight between the LGBTQ community and the Muslim community. As LGBTQ Muslims, we know that there are many of us who are living at the intersections of LGBTQ identities and Islam. At moments like this, we are doubly affected."
"We reject attempts to perpetuate hatred against our LGBTQ communities as well as our Muslim communities," the organization continued. "We ask all Americans to resist the forces of division and hatred, and to stand against homophobia as well as against Islamophobia and anti-Muslim bigotry."…
The violence stems from neither Islam, nor Christianity, but from right wing pseudo-Muslims and right-wing pseudo-Christians, who abuse their respective religions to pursue the right-wing hatred and homophobia that they share.
From Think Progress: This morning on Fox & Friends, Donald Trump not so subtly returned to the subject that launched his political career — outrageous conspiracy theories about Barack Obama.
Trump said there were two possible reasons the gun massacre took place in Orlando. The first possibility was that Obama is “not tough” and “not smart” and therefore incapable of stopping terrorist attacks.
The other scenario, according to Trump, is that Obama is fully capable of stopping terrorist attacks but “has something else in mind.” In other words, Obama is purposefully allowing terrorists to kill people in the United States to pursue a hidden agenda.
Barf Bag Alert!!
Perhaps we could use his hair as a filtration mesh for sewerage. I can’t imagine any other productive use for him, at the moment.
Cartoon:
Before SCOTUS became SCROTUS (Republican Constitutional VD)
I expected to be done by now, but I was Napster Nailed!! Lona got me this morning, and I slept for four solid hours. It’s already 96°, and the building is super-heated. The 10,000 BTU floor AC isn’t keeping it as cool as the 5000 BTU window AC used to, but it’s keeping it in the high 70³s, and with sum hitting the concrete face of the building most of the day, it would be over 120° inside without it.
Last night I was awakened by the beginnings of the Portland Rose Festival Starlight Parade, which passes under my window every year. So I dressed, decided to give Stumpy some fresh air, and went out without George. I took a bunch of my pictures with my Kindle Fire tablet. That was a mistake, because this was the best of them.
Fortunately, I also took a few with my IPhone 6.
I hope to do better with the Grand Floral Parade next weekend. It’ll be daytime.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 5:53 (average 10:02). To do it. click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From Daily Kos: An as-of-yet unnamed language arts teacher at Burns Middle School in Mobile, Alabama, is on administrative leave after giving 8th grade students a shockingly racist math test. Erica Hall’s son was so shocked that he snuck a photo of the test and sent it to his mom.
We may not know the teacher’s name, but we do know his political party.
From NY Times: Senator John McCain does not say much these days about Donald J. Trump’s attack on his five-plus years as a prisoner of war. Instead, he clenches his teeth and says he will support the Republican Party’s presumptive nominee, who once said derisively about the senator’s time in captivity, “I like people that weren’t captured.”
That McConJob is goose-stepping behind Rump Dump, even after that, shows what a terrible President he would have been.
From Crooks and Liars: \Senator Elizabeth Warren hammered Donald Trump on his now defunct, and probably fraudulent, Trump University while giving a speech the Massachusetts State Democratic Convention in Lowell on June 4.
Bingo!! Once again, our Lizzie is a national treasure!!
Cartoon: a blast from five years ago.
