{"id":22861,"date":"2016-07-05T12:47:32","date_gmt":"2016-07-05T19:47:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=22861"},"modified":"2016-07-05T12:47:32","modified_gmt":"2016-07-05T19:47:32","slug":"open-thread-752016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2016\/07\/05\/open-thread-752016\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread – 7\/5\/2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

Julie is coming this morning, and so is Wendy, my new Shower\/Home Health Aide, for the changing of the guard.  I trust that I’ll like Wendy just fine, as she has Julie’s highest recommendation.  Tomorrow I have a two hour appointment with my Ocular Oncologist, so please expect no more than a Personal Update.<\/font><\/p>\n

Later: They are gone.  I miss Julie already.  However, Wendy is very nice and quite competent.<\/font><\/p>\n

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

Today’s took me 4:50 (average 6:28).  To do it, click here<\/a>.  How did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n

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

From NY Times<\/a>: <\/font>The Supreme Court term had barely gotten underway in early November when Justice Sonia Sotomayor issued her first dissent<\/a>. A police officer\u2019s \u201crogue conduct,\u201d she wrote, had left a man dead thanks to a \u201c\u2018shoot first, think later\u2019 approach to policing.\u201d<\/p>\n

Justice Sotomayor went on to write eight dissents before the term ended last week. Read together, they are a remarkable body of work from an increasingly skeptical student of the criminal justice system, one who has concluded that it is clouded by arrogance and machismo and warped by bad faith and racism.<\/p>\n

Only Justice Clarence Thomas wrote more dissents last term, but his agenda was different. Laconic on the bench, prolific on the page and varied in his interests, Justice Thomas is committed to understanding the Constitution as did the men who drafted and adopted it centuries ago.<\/p>\n

Justice Sotomayor\u2019s concerns are more contemporary and more focused. Her dissents this term came mostly in criminal cases, informed as much by events in Ferguson, Mo., in 2014 as by those in Philadelphia in 1787.<\/p>\n

We need to replace Roberts, Scalia (now descended), Scalito, Thomas and Kennedy with more like and left of her.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Daily Kos<\/a>: <\/font>Private prisons are a multi-billion dollar industry where states and the federal government contract with corporations who then employ prisoners to work inside at slave wages.<\/p>\n

Many of these contracts even require the prisons to remain at least 90% full, regardless of whether crime rises or falls so that corporations running them can maintain a profit.<\/p>\n

It’s obscene, it’s disgraceful and it should be illegal. Sign the petition urging Congress to prohibit for-profit prisons.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Prisons are a government service, not corporate America’s sweatshop. It is time to find a sensible solution to our criminal justice system, which starts by banning for-profit prisons.<\/p>\n

Please click through to sign the petition. I did.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Raw Story<\/a>: <\/font>Presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump met with U.S. Senator Joni Ernst of Iowa on Monday, feeding speculation she could be on the short list for consideration as his vice presidential running mate, Fox News reported.<\/p>\n

Ernst told the network that she and the New York real estate mogul had a \u201cgood conversation.\u201d<\/p>\n

What a ticket that would be!! Donald Rump Dump Rectum, and Joni Pig Nuts!!<\/font><\/p>\n

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

\"0705Cartoon\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Julie is coming this morning, and so is Wendy, my new Shower\/Home Health Aide, for the changing of the guard.  I trust that I’ll like Wendy just fine, as she has Julie’s highest recommendation.  Tomorrow I have a two hour appointment with my Ocular Oncologist, so please expect no more than a Personal Update. Later: […]<\/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-22861","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\/22861","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=22861"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/22861\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=22861"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=22861"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=22861"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}