{"id":12878,"date":"2014-05-29T00:31:30","date_gmt":"2014-05-29T07:31:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=12878"},"modified":"2014-05-29T00:31:30","modified_gmt":"2014-05-29T07:31:30","slug":"open-thread5292014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2014\/05\/29\/open-thread5292014\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread–5\/29\/2014"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m writing for tomorrow.  First, I wish to express my sorrow over the death of Maya Angelou today, and wish condolences to all who loved her.  Tomorrow I have to go for physical therapy for arthritis in my spine and hips and for a blown out shoulder.  Because of that, please expect little or nothing on Friday, especially since I\u2019ll be taking my walker onto regular public transit for the first time and walking over a mile.  Day 38.<\/font><\/p>\n

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

Today\u2019s took me 2:38 (average 4:28).  To do it, click here<\/a>.  How did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n

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

From Daily Kos<\/a>: <\/font>Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) drew audible gasps Thursday when he told gathering of Christian conservatives that Democrats intended to amend the Constitution to limit free speech. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen you think it can\u2019t get any worse, it does,\u201d Cruz warned at the Watchmen on the Wall gathering of pastors sponsored by the Family Research Council.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis year, I\u2019m sorry to tell you, the United States Senate is going to be voting on a constitutional amendment to repeal the First Amendment,\u201d Cruz said, to the audible shock of the crowd.<\/p>\n

We still need to drive with the Cruz control engaged!<\/font><\/p>\n

From NY Times<\/a>: <\/font>A teenage girl was inspired after dropping her cellphone to create concussion-reducing cushions for football helmets. A team of Girl Scout Brownies designed a bridge that could withstand flooding. And an adolescent boy in a suit and tie told President Obama about his pending patents.<\/p>\n

They were just a few of the more than a hundred students demonstrating their inventions and research on Tuesday for what Mr. Obama said was one of his favorite events: the White House Science Fair<\/a>, now in its fourth year.<\/p>\n

Republicans will likely consider this cause for yet another Congressional investigation and scandal. They hate it when \u2018libruls do skience<\/em>\u2019.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Think Progress<\/a>: <\/font>If Florida\u2019s voters evenly split between Democrats and Republicans, the state\u2019s Republicans could still expect to hold 58 percent of the state\u2019s congressional seats<\/a>. Indeed, according to California Institute of Technology statistics professor Jonathan Katz, a leading expert on redistricting who testified in a trial challenging these maps as an illegal gerrymander, Florida\u2019s maps are the most biased districts he has ever examined.<\/p>\n

Although Florida has some of the most biased congressional districts in the country \u2014 in 2012, President Obama narrowly won the state but Republicans captured 17 of the state\u2019s 27 congressional districts<\/a> \u2014 the League of Women Voters and other plaintiffs challenging Florida\u2019s maps face an uphill battle in their lawsuit. Under a state constitutional amendment enacted in 2010, \u201c[n]o apportionment plan or district shall be drawn with the intent to favor or disfavor a political party or an incumbent<\/a>.\u201d Thus, the plaintiffs in this lawsuit do not just have to prove that the maps are biased, they have to prove that they were drawn with the intent of favoring Republicans. As neither the plaintiffs nor their lawyers have ESP, that\u2019s a difficult bar to clear.<\/p>\n

In several of the states that Republicans have Gerrymandered to assist them in election theft, they have openly bragged about their intent to favor Republican candidates. What other reason could there possibly be for stacking the deck?<\/font><\/p>\n

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

\"0529Cartoon\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m writing for tomorrow.  First, I wish to express my sorrow over the death of Maya Angelou today, and wish condolences to all who loved her.  Tomorrow I have to go for physical therapy for arthritis in my spine and hips and for a blown out shoulder.  Because of that, please expect little or nothing […]<\/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-12878","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\/12878","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=12878"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12878\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=12878"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=12878"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=12878"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}