{"id":17411,"date":"2015-11-27T09:32:28","date_gmt":"2015-11-27T17:32:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=17411"},"modified":"2015-11-27T09:58:16","modified_gmt":"2015-11-27T17:58:16","slug":"squatchs-open-thread-27112015","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2015\/11\/27\/squatchs-open-thread-27112015\/","title":{"rendered":"Squatch’s Open Thread 27\/11\/2015"},"content":{"rendered":"

Today is busy for me.  I'll be off teaching before too long and won't be back til late afternoon.  At least it will be sunny for those out doing Christmas shopping.<\/span><\/p>\n

Puzzle — <\/strong>Today’s took me 3:20 (average 5:30). To do it, <\/span>click here<\/strong><\/span><\/a>. How did you do? <\/span><\/p>\n

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

CBC<\/strong><\/span><\/a> — A Muslim group in Peterborough, Ont., will kneel and pray today at a local synagogue, where they will be welcomed after their own mosque was damaged in an arson attack earlier this month that police are investigating as a hate crime.<\/p>\n

"As Canadians we have to stick together," said Larry Gillman, president of the  Beth Israel Synagogue, in an interview on  CBC's Metro Morning <\/em>today. "It's not about religion, it's not about race. Canadians do this."<\/p>\n

Click through for the rest.  In a post Paris tragedy, the Masjid al-Salaam mosque in Peterborough, Ont was burned.  But the Beth Israel synagogue extended a hand in friendship and now, both Muslims and Jews are using the same space for worship.  Kenzu Abdella of the Masjid al-Salaam mosque said<\/span> "At the end of the day, it's a house of God."  Amen!<\/span><\/p>\n

Alternet<\/strong><\/span><\/a> — And he said quite clearly<\/a> that he believes,<\/p>\n

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“we’re going to have to do things that we never did before. And some people are going to be upset about it, but I think that now everybody is feeling that security is going to rule… And so we’re going to have to do certain things that were frankly unthinkable a year ago…”<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Does that add up to fascism? Yeah, pretty much. In his book, “Rush, Newspeak and Fascism<\/a>” David Neiwert explained<\/a> that the dictionary definition of the word often leaves out the most important characteristics of the philosophy, which are “its claims to represent the “true character” of the respective national identities among which it arises; and its mythic core of national rebirth — not to mention its corporatist component, its anti-liberalism, its glorification of violence and its contempt for weakness.” If that’s not Donald Trump I don’t know what is.<\/p>\n

Facism is like a contagious disease . . . it keeps on infecting.  It's not new, but the current crop of Republicans and Tea Partiers sure seem into ensuring its survival.  Dump Trump.<\/span><\/p>\n

The Nation<\/strong><\/span><\/a> — China Labor Watch’s (CLW) report on China’s toy industry<\/a> is a seasonal reminder of how American families’ appetite for cheap toys is fed by not-so-fun factory jobs, in which workers struggle to sustain their own families on pennies an hour. The advocacy group reports:<\/p>\n

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In workshops that are hazardous to their health, millions of workers toil under cruel management, 11 hours a day, six days per week. Over the course of a year, a toy worker may only be able to see her parents and children one time.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

In low-wage factories that bring Star Wars<\/em> andFrozen<\/em> toys to big-box shelves, field researchers reported observing up to 80-hour workweeks, widespread wage theft, and apparent violations of both corporate ethical sourcing codes and Chinese labor law—including age-discriminatory hiring, nonpayment of mandatory social insurance, and inadequate safety training. For example, at two suppliers, Winson and Jetta, employers reportedly “diverted” overtime hours to discount weekend work. As a result, CLW claims, “employing up to 11,000 workers, the two companies may be cheating workers out of $1 to 2 million a year.”<\/p>\n

Click through fore more.  How willing are consumers willing to finance the oppression of workers in other countries?  If these were American workers, would consumers still finance the oppression?  Given what happens with Walmart employees and with the media, the conditions would be more noticeable.  But overseas, out of sight, out of mind.<\/span><\/p>\n

My Universe <\/strong>— TGIF!!!  Getting ready for the weekend!<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

\"ATT530848\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Today is busy for me.  I'll be off teaching before too long and won't be back til late afternoon.  At least it will be sunny for those out doing Christmas shopping. Puzzle — Today’s took me 3:20 (average 5:30). To do it, click here. How did you do?  Short Takes CBC — A Muslim group in Peterborough, Ont., […]<\/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-17411","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\/17411","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=17411"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17411\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17411"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17411"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17411"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}