{"id":11978,"date":"2014-01-06T02:55:43","date_gmt":"2014-01-06T10:55:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=11978"},"modified":"2014-01-07T02:37:17","modified_gmt":"2014-01-07T10:37:17","slug":"open-thread162014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2014\/01\/06\/open-thread162014\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread–1\/6\/2014"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m writing for tomorrow, and to tell you the truth, I’m just pooped.  Other than today’s Short Takes, when I did my morning research, nothing knocked me out of the fog the way something usually does, so I’m taking a partial day off to rest.  I won’t be distributing links.  There is nothing wrong.  I just need a little extra down time.  May the divine light from the holy Ellipsoid Orb bless your team<\/font><\/p>\n

Jig Zone Puzzle<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n

Today’s took me 4:23 (average 5:47).  To do it, click here<\/a>.  How did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n

Short Takes<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n

From TPM<\/a>: <\/font>From Mike Kelly's late evening column<\/a> in the Bergen Record …<\/p>\n

\n

The George Washington Bridge lane closures that led to paralyzing gridlock in Fort Lee this past September were ordered by someone outside the Port Authority and possibly for “an improper motive,” said the state lawmaker leading the investigation into whether the closings were politically motivated.<\/p>\n

“There are documents that we’ve received that would indicate that there was somebody else who initiated this,” said Assemblyman John Wisniewski. “There are words that are used that would imply an improper motive.”<\/p>\n

Wisniewski, who has scheduled more hearings next week in Trenton on the controversy in his role as chairman of the Assembly Transportation Committee, declined to say who those other officials might be or what their motives were.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Read the rest of Kelly's column at the link above…<\/p>\n

A dollar against a donut says it's the same Republican pig, who is using Sandy relief funds only where his campaign will benefit, but is holding out on New Jersey's needy storm victims, and  who squandered $millions of New Jersey citizens money to hold a special election for the Senate, so his margin in the general election would appear bigger.<\/font><\/p>\n

From NY Times<\/a>: <\/font>The byline of Dick Metcalf, one of the country’s pre-eminent gun journalists, has gone missing. It has been removed from Guns & Ammo magazine, where his widely-read column once ran on the back page. He no longer stars on a popular television show about firearms. Gun companies have stopped flying him around the world and sending him the latest weapons to review.<\/p>\n

In late October, Mr. Metcalf wrote a column that the magazine titled “Let’s Talk Limits,”<\/a> which debated gun laws. “The fact is,” wrote Mr. Metcalf, who has taught history at Cornell and Yale, “all constitutional rights are regulated, always have been, and need to be.”<\/p>\n

The backlash was swift, and fierce. Readers threatened to cancel their subscriptions. Death threats poured in by email. His television program was pulled from the air.<\/p>\n

Just days after the column appeared, Mr. Metcalf said, his editor called to tell him that two major gun manufacturers had said “in no uncertain terms” that they could no longer do business with InterMedia Outdoors, the company that publishes Guns & Ammo and co-produces his TV show, if he continued to work there. He was let go immediately…<\/p>\n

Kudos to Dick Metcalf, a journalist with the integrity to tell the truth. I would suggest he sue InterMedia Outdoors for wrongful termination.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Crooks and Liars<\/a>: <\/font>As anyone who works in politics knows, it takes very little for your name to appear on email lists and the fundraising asks can be overwhelming. There are supposed to be list managers who help cull out names that don't belong. Still, it's an imperfect process.<\/p>\n

So it really shouldn't be a surprise that Ralph Nader's name showed up on the email list for the Bush Presidential Library and the ubiquitous asks for donation to help promote the legacy of the Bush presidency. What I suspect they didn't expect is Nader's open letter in response<\/a>:…<\/p>\n

While Nader's letter was interesting, there is a terrible irony here. Had Nader NOT [correction made] whored himself by taking piles of Republican cash and “volunteer” help from paid Republican operatives for his campaign in Florida, to lure people on the left foolish enough to throw away their votes, there would be no Bush Presidential Library, and America would be far better off.<\/font><\/p>\n

Cartoon<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n

\"0106Cartoon\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I’m writing for tomorrow, and to tell you the truth, I’m just pooped.  Other than today’s Short Takes, when I did my morning research, nothing knocked me out of the fog the way something usually does, so I’m taking a partial day off to rest.  I won’t be distributing links.  There is nothing wrong.  I […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,3,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-11978","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-open-thread","category-personal","category-politics","category-35-id","category-3-id","category-5-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11978","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=11978"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11978\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=11978"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=11978"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=11978"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}