{"id":13276,"date":"2014-07-21T00:44:53","date_gmt":"2014-07-21T07:44:53","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=13276"},"modified":"2014-07-21T00:44:53","modified_gmt":"2014-07-21T07:44:53","slug":"open-thread7212014","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2014\/07\/21\/open-thread7212014\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread–7\/21\/2014"},"content":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m writing for tomorrow, day 91.  I feel quite tired, because, between aches and cravings, I have been unable to sleep since people in the building woke me up at 3:00 AM to ask me if the dead cat they found in front of the building is mine.  Poor cat.  Hopefully I can catch a few Zzzz this afternoon. (I did).<\/font><\/p>\n

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

Today\u2019s took me 4:54 (average 5:19).  To do it, click here<\/a>.  How did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n

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

From The New Yorker<\/a>: <\/font>House Speaker John Boehner (R-Ohio) dropped his plans to sue President Obama on Friday, explaining to reporters, \u201cI realized it would mean doing something.\u201d <\/p>\n

In a brief appearance before the press, Speaker Boehner talked about his gradual realization that \u201cfiling a lawsuit requires effort and, yes, work.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cI came to the conclusion that while suing the President would be the best thing for the American people, it would also require that I do something,\u201d he said, struggling to retain his composure. \u201cAnd that would be a betrayal of everything I stand for.\u201d <\/p>\n

As right on as Andy is about Agent Orange, he forgot that the purpose of the3 lawsuit is to do nothing, while merely appearing to do something.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Daily Kos<\/a>: <\/font>As I introduce my new Center Against Religious Extremism report Hobby Lobby Case Linked To Secretive National Prayer Breakfast Group, "The Family"<\/a>),<\/p>\n

"In 2010 on MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow Show, author Jeff Sharlet publicly <\/em>accused<\/em><\/a> "The Family", which hosts the National Prayer Breakfast, of being directly responsible for the notorious Uganda Anti Homosexuality Bill, signed into law in early 2014. As this Center Against Religious Extremism (CARE) special report demonstrates, The Family is also tightly linked, through its affiliate The Gathering [fascist pseudo-Christians delinked], to the controversial Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Supreme Court case which gave broad new religious freedom rights to private corporations."  <\/em><\/p>\n

Last September, three generations of the Green family – owners of the Hobby Lobby craft store chain and central plaintiffs in the Burwell v. Hobby Lobby Supreme Court Case – attended The Gathering 2013 along with a Christian nonprofit that played a supporting "air traffic control" role in the Hobby Lobby case and also litigated Conestoga Woods v. Sebelius. Also present at The Gathering 2013 was the National Christian Foundation, which has funded the law nonprofits that litigated both the Conestoga and Hobby Lobby cases.<\/p>\n

Because gay rights was the initial analytic vantage point from which I began studying "The Gathering [fascist pseudo-Christians delinked<\/em>]", this new CARE report of mine is packed with with material on The Gathering as a central hub of evangelical anti-LGBTQ activism. But this concerns far more than gay rights.<\/p>\n

This is the same group operates C Street, helps Republican politicians cover up their own scandals. Sen. Ensign’s bribery of his mistress’ husband is one notorious example. They also have advised GOP Pootie on how to better discriminate against Russian LGBT people. They are Dominionists, so they reject the First Amendment. Their attempt to make being gay a capital offense in Uganda was a test bed for doing the same here. Click through for an extensive expos\u00e9.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Think Progress<\/a>: <\/font>Rep. Tom Marino\u2019s (R-PA) press secretary was arrested on Friday for bringing a gun into the U.S. Capitol building. Ryan Shucard, press secretary for the congressman, allegedly brought a 9mm handgun and magazine into one of the House office buildings, reports Roll Call<\/a>, but was promptly stopped by Capitol Police and detained. He is being charged with carrying a pistol without a license, a felony. <\/p>\n

This is a new level of Republican ammosexuality.<\/font><\/p>\n

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

\"0721Cartoon\"<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I\u2019m writing for tomorrow, day 91.  I feel quite tired, because, between aches and cravings, I have been unable to sleep since people in the building woke me up at 3:00 AM to ask me if the dead cat they found in front of the building is mine.  Poor cat.  Hopefully I can catch a […]<\/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-13276","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\/13276","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=13276"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/13276\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=13276"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=13276"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=13276"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}