Sep 192017
 

My dang printer is on the fritz again.  I think I know what’s wrong, that the cable connection jostled loose when Wendy was cleaning.  I think I can work around it until tomorrow night.  Today I’m missing my morning nap, because I cannot print my grocery list, which I usually read to Store to Door from bed.  So I’ll just publish and go down for my afternoon nap a bit earlier.  It’s a cool rainy day, and I’m thoroughly enjoying the cool air washed clean of smoke.  It’s time for Trump to take a vacation in Puerto Rico.  God help everyone else.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 2:48 (average 4:43).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Fantasy Football Report:

Here are the latest results from our fantasy football league, Lefty Blog Friends.

Scores:

2Scores

If Pam had reamed my poor kitty butt any worse, I’d think she was a Republican!! Sick smileWinking smile

Standings:

2Standings

Congrats to Pam and Patty Monster, who lead the league. Condolences to our beloved Sasquatch who STILL has nobody under her BIG feet.

Players, please have your lineup set by Thursday night.

Short Takes:

From YouTube (GQ Channel): Trump, Russia, and the Facebook Factor

If the Fuhrer does resign, as Keith suggests, pseudo-Pence will pardon him very quickly. If both resign, Lyin’ Ryan will pardon both. RESIST!!

From The Last Word: GOP gives up on bipartisanship, backs new Obamacare repeal

Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-LA) is pushing a new ACA repeal-replace bill that has gained GOP backing but violates his own “Jimmy Kimmel Test.” Fmr. Medicare and Medicaid Administrator Andy Slavitt and Washington Post opinion writer Jennifer Rubin join Lawrence O’Donnell.

If we can stop RepubliCare, with its guaranteed death benefit, one more time, the reconciliation window will be closed for another year. This time, for the worst bill of all, Republicans have set aside ninety seconds total for debate.  Call your Senators!  RESIST!!

From The New Yorker: Robert Mueller is renting a massive warehouse facility in suburban Virginia to accommodate the approximately forty cubic tons of evidence against Donald Trump that the independent counsel’s investigation is generating on a daily basis.

Employing over two thousand workers in a warehouse the size of seven football fields, the Mueller investigation has become the fastest-growing sector of the U.S. economy, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.

Working twelve-hour shifts, the members of Mueller’s evidence-storage team rarely leave the warehouse, where the punishing task of filing mountains of evidence against Trump proceeds around the clock.

Sorry, Andy. I just can’t buy that one. The space and staff size you suggest are just tiny fractions of the actual resources needed to store the evidence against Fuhrer Drumpfenfarten. RESIST!!

Cartoon:

0919Cartoon

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Sep 182017
 

Here is the ninety-sixth article in our Republicans on Parade series, featuring individuals who personify what the Republican Party has become. Today’s honoree is Republican Federal Judge Paul Maloney. He is so honored for ignoring the Constitution to rule based in Republican Supply-side pseudo-Christian hate and homophobia.

0918MaloneyIn what can charitably be described as an idiosyncratic reading of the First Amendment, a George W. Bush-appointed federal judge in western Michigan held that businesses can discriminate against LGBTQ customers so long as they explain why they did so on Facebook.

Prior to Judge Paul Maloney’s Friday opinion in Country Mill Farms v. City of East Lansing, it was well understood that the First Amendment does not protect business owners who post signs announcing “blacks need not apply” or “we don’t serve women here.” As the Supreme Court once explained in a related case, “discrimination in employment is not only commercial activity, it is illegal commercial activity,” and “we have no doubt that a newspaper constitutionally could be forbidden to publish a want ad proposing a sale of narcotics or soliciting prostitutes.”

Yet Judge Maloney’s opinion does not simply disregard this longstanding rule, it suggests that a business that is actively engaged in discrimination can immunize itself from the law simply by writing about its discrimination on Facebook… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <Think Progress>

The notion that, if Republican Supply-side pseudo-Christians, the exact opposite of real Christians, should spew the evidence of their crimes on Sphincterbook, let alone that doing so makes it legal, is so absurd that only a Republican could do such a thing.

RESIST THE REPUBLICAN REICH!!

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Sep 182017
 

I love feeling comfortable with the AC off, and barring the unforeseen, it will stay that way for the rest of the day.  Now all we have to do is get rid of a Nazi Republican Reich, and I’ll be in a good mood.

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:04 (average 5:02).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Religious Ecstasy:

0917Broncos42-Cowboys17

I was a rout, and I was quite pleased with the Orb’s holy light.

Short Takes:

From YouTube (PBS Channel): Facebook allowed advertisers to target anti-Semitic groups

 

Perhaps they should change to a Republican name: Sphincterbook. RESIST!!

From The Independent: A Soviet officer who averted thermonuclear war between the United States and the Soviet Union had died aged 77.

Soon after midnight on 26 September, 1983, duty officer Stanislav Petrov was in charge of an early warning radar system in a bunker near Moscow when computer readouts suggested several missiles had been launched from the US towards the USSR.

The protocol for the Soviet military would have been to launch a retaliatory nuclear attack, but Mr Petrov decided not to alert his superiors.

"I had all the data [to suggest there was an ongoing missile attack]. If I had sent my report up the chain of command, nobody would have said a word against it," he told the BBC’s Russian Service in 2013.

However, he suspected a computer error, believing a first-strike nuclear attack by the US would likely involve hundreds of simultaneous missile launches.

"All I had to do was to reach for the phone; to raise the direct line to our top commanders – but I couldn’t move. I felt like I was sitting on a hot frying pan," he told the BBC.The duty officer decided to call the Soviet army’s headquarters to report a system malfunction.

"Twenty-three minutes later I realised that nothing had happened. If there had been a real strike, then I would already know about it. It was such a relief."

He was a great man. But the USSR under Yuri Andropov was more free and less aggressive than Russia is under Trump’s boss. RESIST!!

From Daily Kos:

A fascinating study was recently reported in Vox and The Root. And the conclusion of that academic study(1) is, as the title sadly suggests, that a mere photograph of a black person can actually make a Trump supporter angry. From The Root:

“When researchers simply asked subjects how they felt about a not-so-complex housing-assistance issue, they were split on their support. But there was a subtle twist to the study: When the information about the issue was accompanied by a picture of a white person, Trump voters were much more likely to support it than when they were cued by an image of a black person.”

If the study ended there, it would probably reveal only what we (sadly) already knew about too many of our fellow Americans.

But there was more:

“The study revealed that when Trump voters were exposed to the “black cue,” it not only made them less supportive of the issue. It made them angry. Yes, a picture of a black man—not an actual black man, but a picture of a black man—made them mad.”

The Republican Reich has carefully cultivated this attitude, ever since they adopted the Southern Strategy under Nixon.  RESIST!!

Cartoon:

0918Cartoon

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Sep 172017
 

Here is the ninety-fifth article in our Republicans on Parade series, featuring individuals who personify what the Republican Party has become. Today’s honoree is Republican Firefighter Tyler Roysdon. He is so honored for his representation of Republican hate and racism.

0917racistA volunteer Franklin Township, Ohio, firefighter lost his job after his racist Facebook post came to light.

What made the post especially egregious was that his rant was not just derogatory to black people, but it actually related specifically to his job.

WHIO reports that 20-year-old Tyler Roysdon was suspended without pay Tuesday by Fire Chief Steve Bishop after a Facebook post attributed to him said that if he had to choose between saving a dog or a black man from a burning building that he would save the dog first because “one dog is more important than a million niggers.”… [emphasis added]

Inserted from <The Root>

Here is a video source.

Now, this Republican could not have acted more like a Republican, so he clearly deserves his parade.

Hoiwever, if he had said that one handsome, intelligent tuxedo cat was more important than a million Republicans, that would have been completely accurate. Winking smileCat face

RESIST THE REPUBLICAN REICH!!

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Sep 172017
 

My AC is off.  My window is open.  I feel comfortable!  Wooo Hooo!!  Wendy is due momentarily, so I’ll be brief, as I have a lot to get done, before I meditate on the holy Ellipsoid Orb.

Later: Wendy just left, we got everything done, and my AC is still off!

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 4:37 (average 6:37).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (MoveOn Chapter): Under Attack

 

Don’t let the Republican Reich steal their future. RESIST!!

From Business Insider: FBI Special Counsel Robert Mueller reportedly obtained a search warrant for records of the "inauthentic" accounts Facebook shut down earlier this month and the targeted ads these accounts purchased during the 2016 election. 

The warrant was first disclosed by the Wall Street Journal on Friday night and the news was later confirmed by CNN.

Legal experts say the revelation has enormous implications for the trajectory of Mueller’s investigation into Russia’s election interference, and whether Moscow had any help from President Donald Trump’s campaign team.

"This is big news — and potentially bad news for the Russian election interference ‘deniers,’" said Asha Rangappa, a former FBI counterintelligence agent.

Rangappa, now an associate dean at Yale Law School, explained that to obtain a search warrant a prosecutor needs to prove to a judge that there is reason to believe a crime has been committed. The prosecutor then has to show that the information being sought will provide evidence of that crime.

Tick… tick… tick… RESIST!!

From Daily Kos:

This will not shock you. House Republicans are advancing legislation, H.R. 620, the so-called ADA Education and Reform Act of 201, that would gut the landmark law that has allowed millions of Americans to participate in public life. The Americans with Disabilities Act was signed into law more than a quarter of a century ago, and has revolutionized life for many disabled Americans.

However, the job isn’t done and many more still face insurmountable barriers when it comes to accessing private businesses. Now Republicans are trying to push a change in favor of those businesses, putting the onus on their would-be customers to force them to comply with the law.

H.R. 620 would completely change the way in which a business is required to comply with the ADA. Instead of requiring that a business comply proactively, the bill would place the burden on the individual who is being denied access. This bill proposes that after an individual with a disability is denied access she must first notify the business owner, with exacting specificity, that her civil rights were violated, and then wait for six months to see if the business will make “substantial progress” toward access, before going to a court to order compliance.

As one confined to a wheelchair, I often have difficulty getting through doors, navigating aisles that are too narrow, using restrooms without rails, encountering crosswalks without curb ramps, etc.  If I had to wait for six months, just to see if I had access to a business, I’d be inclined to bitch, go elsewhere, and not go through all the hassle of following up. RESIST!!

Cartoon:

0917Cartoon

I made this cartoon in 9/2011.  Was I prophetic or what?

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Bill Maher from 9/15

 Posted by at 1:30 pm  Politics
Sep 162017
 

It’s that time of week again, and I’m happy to share four video clips from Bill’s show last night.  Enjoy!!

Monologue: Amnesty Don

 

"This is not bipartisan. This is bipolar." AMEN!!

Bret Stephens: Out of the Echo Chamber

 

In my own defense, I never made fun of Joni’s bread bags. I made fun of her pig nuts. I disagree with Stephens that the Trump Reich is a neurosis. It’s a psychosis.

25 Thing You Don’t Know About Melania Trump

 

FOMCROTFPIMPLMAO!!

New Rule: Liberal States’ Rights

 

Dang! On a goat roper scale of 1 to 10, Bill rates a 9.5, but I think I’ll pass on vaginal rejuvenation!!

Get a laugh?  Good!

RESIST THE REPUBLICAN REICH!!

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Sep 162017
 

It’s a super muggy day here in Portland, and we have four cool days starting tomorrow.  Tomorrow is a holy day and I shall be meditating upon the Ellipsoid Orb.  My Broncos are hosting the Cowboys in the afternoon game, but it will not be televised here. Crying face  I play Pam in our fantasy football league, which she leads, and she’s going to be damn tough to beat.  May the Ellipsoid Orb shine it’s holy light on your team, unless they are known for cow pucky! Winking smile

Jig Zone Puzzle:

Today’s took me 3:08 (average 4:38).  To do it, click here.  How did you do?

Short Takes:

From YouTube (MoveOn Channel): Sen. Jeff Merkley Backs Medicare for All

 

Amen Jeff! Oregon leads the way! RESIST!!

From The New Yorker: In his most stunning deal yet with Democratic leaders, Donald Trump agreed on Friday to be impeached by the end of 2017.

Emerging from an Oval Office meeting with Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, a beaming Trump touted the deal for his imminent removal from office.

“Chuck and Nancy and I got a deal done on impeachment,” Trump said. “It was a good deal and it was a fast deal.”

Trump said that the Democrats had convinced him that agreeing to be impeached would make him soar in popularity. “People are going to love me for doing this,” Trump said. “They’re going to love it on all the channels.”

LOL Andy! He’s dumb enough, but Lyin’ Ryan would balk, unless he could impeach Pence too. RESIST!!

From The Rachel Maddow Show: Pence, up to his neck in Russia scandal, losing press secretary

Rachel Maddow looks at the growing list of White House departures, adding Mike Pence’s press secretary to the list, and noting the striking number of lies Pence has told about aspects of the Trump Russia scandal.

 

Pence is clearly guilty of Obstruction of Justice and much more. If we can just win the House next year, we can remove the Reich from power. RESIST!!

Cartoon:

0916Cartoon

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Everyday Erinyes #92

 Posted by at 9:21 am  Politics
Sep 162017
 

Experts in autocracies have pointed out that it is, unfortunately, easy to slip into normalizing the tyrant, hence it is important to hang on to outrage.  These incidents which seem to call for the efforts of the Greek Furies (Erinyes) to come and deal with them will, I hope, help with that.  Even though there are many more which I can’t include.  As a reminder, though no one really knows how many there were supposed to be, the three names we have are Alecto, Megaera, and Tisiphone. These roughly translate as “unceasing,” “grudging,” and “vengeful destruction.”

 

This article is 10 days old, but I haven’t seen it anywhere else, and it needs to be known.  Especially for you science types.

Alabama Republican Rep. Rogers DESTROYED Key Hurricane Monitoring Satellite

Let me be clear that Congressman Rogers did not go out and shoot this satellite up with an AK-47, although, as an Alabama Republican, he probably has several.  And the destruction didn’t just happen ten days ago; it was a result of the 2016 budget.  It has hit – not the news, but the professional journals – recently because of the use of Weather satellites in tracking our recent rash of hurricanes.  We were able to do that pretty well, but next year may be another story.

The Air Force has maintained a series of weather satellites with microwave imaging since the 1960’s.  It was called the F-series.  Currently in orbit are the F-16, the F-17, and the F-18.  There was an F-19, but it malfunctioned.  The F-20 had been built but had not been launched – they had built multiples at the same tome to save money on building (although saving money on beuilding translates into spending money on storage, it was considered a good trade-off.  So, there it was – it had cost $518 million to build and millions more to store – when the F-19, as I said, malfunctioned.

Congressman Rogers was the chairnman of the House Armed Services strategic services subcommittee when, in 2015, the Air Force asked for $20 million to launch the F-20 in, say, 2018 (the three that are currently orbiting have some overlap, which is why our Harvey and Irma predictions were as good as they were.)  But the F-19 had malfunctioned.  (It had also been keeping track of the losses in sea ice, of course, and Congressman Rogers didn’t like that at all.)  So Congressman Rogers declared that “Congress has lost confidence in the Air Force’s ability to run” its legacy program.

“We could have saved the Air Force and the Congress a lot of aggravation if we put a half of a billion dollars in a parking lot and just burned it,” he said. …

Instead, he said, the money set aside for DMSP could have been spent on other national security priorities, but now the satellite is “going in the trash. I presume it’s going to be made into razor blades.”

Ha ha ha.  A real comedian.

But that’s why “FishOutofWater” titled this story “Alabama Republican Rep. Rogers DESTROYED Key Hurricane Monitoring Satellite,” and, even though Rogers didn’t physically lay a hand on it, I think the title is fair.  What do you think, Tisiphone?

 

Moving to a little bit newer government issue, things are happening within the CIA which may give us a taste of what the country would look like if enough Dominionists get into power.

According to an investigation by Foreign Policy into changes in the intelligence community under President Donald Trump, the CIA has set aside plans to diversify and has become more white and more Christian under new director Mike Pompeo.

Noting the Pompeo, a former Republican congressman from Kansas,  is a self-professed evangelical, the report states that the new director once claimed, Islamist terrorists will “continue to press against us until we make sure that we pray and stand and fight and make sure that we know that Jesus Christ is our savior is truly the only solution for our world.”

Barf.

In my not-so-humble opinion, REAL Christians don’t want to exercise temporal authority, and certainly not to impose their beliefs on others.  Real Christians know that forced conversopn is no conversion at all.  “A man convinced against his will/Is of the same opinion still.” (attributed to Benjamin Franklin and Dale Carnegie – so, probably actually an old proverb)

A spokesperson for the CIA defended the move, saying, “Director Pompeo is a man of faith. The idea that he should not practice his faith because he is Director of CIA is absurd.”

Well, not so asburd if by “practicing his faith” he is violating the Constitution – which apparently he is doing on a daily basis.

According to Michael Weinstein, founder of the Military Religious Freedom Foundation, he is being flooded with complaints about the creeping evangelical Christianity that is beginning to pervade the intelligence agency.

Weinstein notes that insiders are afraid to speak up, stating, “They don’t typically file formal complaints within the government. But certain things are making them especially uncomfortable, such as officials signing off with the phrase ‘have a blessed day.’ That’s something “straight out of The Handmaid’s Tale.”

Yes, The Handmaid’s Tale is about a lot more than sex slavery.

It’s not as though theocracy were anything new in the world.  It has been around since forever.  Surely, Alecto, it’s time to put a stop to it?

The Furies and I will be back.

Cross posted to Care2 here.

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