{"id":18834,"date":"2016-01-10T01:40:02","date_gmt":"2016-01-10T09:40:02","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=18834"},"modified":"2016-01-10T01:40:02","modified_gmt":"2016-01-10T09:40:02","slug":"squatchs-open-thread-09012016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2016\/01\/10\/squatchs-open-thread-09012016\/","title":{"rendered":"Squatch’s Open Thread 09\/01\/2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday was busy.  By the time I arrived home, I couldn't seem to stir myself to prepare an Open Thread in time for publishing.  The one short take I had morphed into today's lead article.  So I threw up my hands, watched a video, and did some major cat cuddling.  My little girl, Annie, was asleep under my desk earlier, but now my big ginger, Winnie, is there, his paw and head resting on my foot.<\/span><\/p>\n

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

Think Progress<\/span><\/a><\/strong> — <\/strong><\/span>On Monday, Republican presidential candidate Ben Carson released his tax plan<\/a>, the center of which is a flat tax of 14.9 percent.<\/p>\n

Rather than different tax brackets for different income levels and categories, the flat tax levies the same rate on all personal and business income, although Carson’s 14.9 percent rate would only apply to people who have incomes above 150 percent of the poverty level, or $36,375 for a family of four. Those who make less would have to make a small tax payment: “Even those who earn little income will pay taxes, no matter how small their contribution might be,” Carson says in his plan. Currently, 46 percent of Americans<\/a> don’t have to pay federal income taxes because their incomes are too low.<\/p>\n

Shades of Mr 999!  Republicans have been in a sweaty dither about the national deficit during Obama's presidency, and now Carson wants to significantly reduce revenues?  He probably thinks it will help him at the polls.  What a jackass!<\/span><\/p>\n

Politico<\/span><\/a><\/strong> — Charles Koch is “disappointed” with the line-up of Republican candidates in the 2016 cycle, and is surprised by the lack of influence he and his brother have wielded so far.  …<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

Koch, his brother David, and their network had pledged to spend $889 million<\/a> on policy and political battles headed into November 2016. But Charles Koch said<\/a> in October that the political network of donors revised its estimate and instead planned on spending $750 million on politics over two years.<\/p>\n

So Charles isn't feeling the love?  Poor baby.  I can hear him now as the campaign finance laws are reformed and Citizens United is overturned!  The reduction is still a drop inthe bucket!<\/span><\/p>\n

Mediaite<\/strong><\/span><\/a> — Cruz defiantly scoffed off recent criticism by Republican opponent Donald Trump regarding his citizenship by proclaiming that the question is “settled law.” Here is the thing. It is not. In fact, the meaning of natural born is just simply not defined in the U.S. Constitution.<\/p>\n

There are three basic requirements for presidency. First, the President must be 35 years old or older. Second, he or she must be a “Resident” of the Unites States for fourteen years. But the third one is vague and is the heart of the controversy. The President must be a “natural born Citizen.”  Mr. Cruz – a Harvard Law grad, an attorney and former state solicitor general – should know that.<\/p>\n

Certainly, Trump is test driving his "birther" screed on Cruz, but so far, not as vehemently as he did with Obama . . . yet!  And then there is the notion put forth in <\/span>Talking Points Memo<\/strong><\/span><\/a> that Cruz's mother may have become a Canadian.  Personally, I doubt it.  And of course, the Coultergeist, a Trump supporter, weighed in on the issue in her usual flip-flop style in <\/span>Mediaite<\/strong><\/span><\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n

My Universe<\/strong><\/span> — h\/t JL<\/strong><\/span><\/p>\n

I could not get the video embeded so <\/span>click here<\/strong><\/span><\/a> to watch.  When the picture appears, click in the middle of it and the fun begins.<\/span><\/p>\n

\"AmazingCats08\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I'm ready for the video!  Who's got the popcorn?<\/strong><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

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

Yesterday was busy.  By the time I arrived home, I couldn't seem to stir myself to prepare an Open Thread in time for publishing.  The one short take I had morphed into today's lead article.  So I threw up my hands, watched a video, and did some major cat cuddling.  My little girl, Annie, was asleep […]<\/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-18834","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\/18834","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=18834"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18834\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18834"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18834"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18834"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}