{"id":16085,"date":"2015-09-19T13:09:10","date_gmt":"2015-09-19T20:09:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=16085"},"modified":"2015-09-19T13:09:10","modified_gmt":"2015-09-19T20:09:10","slug":"squatchs-open-thread-19092015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2015\/09\/19\/squatchs-open-thread-19092015\/","title":{"rendered":"Squatch’s Open Thread 19\/09\/2015"},"content":{"rendered":"

Here I am early on Friday evening and I am preparing another Open Thread for Saturday.  This is my 10th Open Thread and 12th article this year at Politics Plus.  I wish the circumstances were different.  I started following TC in August 2011 with the idea that I could learn a lot about Canadian politics by watching American political theatre.  And TC knew that.  He encouraged me to write more articles, but I kept putting it off.  A friend and former manager of mine keeps saying "You need to write a book." to which I scoffed "About what?"  Here are two people I respect pushing me forward out of my lethargy, out of my comfort zone.  But I think I learned the most from TC about life . . . about viewing people in different ways; about making a difference.  For that, I will be forever greatful.  Now, whether that book ever gets written is another matter, but at least I'm thinking.<\/span><\/p>\n

Puzzle<\/strong> — Today’s took me 3:11 (average 5:02).  To do it, <\/span>click here<\/span><\/a>.  How did you do?<\/span><\/p>\n

Short Takes<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Mother Jones<\/strong><\/span> — When Pope Francis addresses a joint session of Congress next Thursday, there's a pretty good chance he'll talk about climate change, one of his favorite subjects<\/a> of late. Paul Gosar, a Republican Congressman from Arizona, is not happy about that. <\/p>\n

Plenty of climate change deniers<\/a>, Catholic and not, have expressed their displeasure<\/a>with the Holy Father over his stance on climate. But Gosar, himself a Catholic, just became the first member of Congress to announce he will boycott the speech because of it. …<\/p>\n

Mother Jones<\/a><\/p>\n

Interesting!  Republicans will invite the Israeli warlord Benjamin Netanyahu to address the Congress, he hoping to foment a war between the US and Iran, his sworn enemy.  But when it comes to Pope Francis, a man trying to live with respect to Creation and promote that idea, Republicans, or at least one will boycott the visit.  Stupid is as stupid does.<\/span><\/p>\n

Robert Reich<\/strong><\/span> — I’ve had so many calls about an article<\/a> appearing earlier this week in the Wall Street Journal – charging that Bernie Sanders’s proposals would carry a “price tag” of $18 trillion over a 10-year period – that it’s necessary to respond.<\/p>\n

The Journal’s number is entirely bogus, designed to frighten the public. <\/p>\n

Read his 4 reasons why the Wall Street Journal's attack on Bernie Sanders is bogus at <\/span>Robert Reich<\/span><\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n

That bastion of the right wing, The Wall Street Journal (Rupert Murdoch de-linked), engaged in deception.  In 16\/09\/2015's Open Thread, I posted a piece from <\/span>The Nation<\/span><\/a><\/strong> regarding the WSJ's attempted take down of Bernie.  Robert Reich outlines 4 reasons why the WSJ was wrong.<\/span><\/p>\n

Think Progress<\/strong><\/span> — Elementary school students are in their school gymnasium for a pep rally. An extremely enthusiastic young host shows them a video based on the year’s theme: a community spirit called “Rock’n Town Live.” He leads the students in loud cheers of “go Tigers,” “can’t believe it,” and “thirty to thirty-five laps.” And in addition to whipping the kids into a frenzy, he and the school’s principal take turns asking the kids to go home and get two adults to pledge a contribution. Roughly half of that money will go to benefit the school. Roughly half of it will go to Booster Enterprises Inc., a Georgia-based for-profit company putting on the event. …<\/p>\n

Think Progress<\/a><\/p>\n

This is outrageous . . . 48% of funds raised go to the fund raising companies.  If the US wants to have a highly educated workforce, then it needs to fund education properly, AND it needs to ensure that funds raised for special projects are accounted for.<\/span><\/p>\n

My Universe<\/strong><\/span> —<\/p>\n

\"funny-cat-meme\"<\/a><\/p>\n

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

Here I am early on Friday evening and I am preparing another Open Thread for Saturday.  This is my 10th Open Thread and 12th article this year at Politics Plus.  I wish the circumstances were different.  I started following TC in August 2011 with the idea that I could learn a lot about Canadian politics […]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,5],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-16085","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-open-thread","category-politics","category-35-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\/16085","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\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=16085"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/16085\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16085"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16085"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16085"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}