{"id":23791,"date":"2016-09-07T14:44:14","date_gmt":"2016-09-07T21:44:14","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=23791"},"modified":"2016-09-07T14:44:14","modified_gmt":"2016-09-07T21:44:14","slug":"open-thread-972016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2016\/09\/07\/open-thread-972016\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread – 9\/7\/2016"},"content":{"rendered":"

I’m getting a late start today.  I took a nap this morning because I have groceries coming this afternoon and have to put them away.  Then Wendy is coming to de-stink the TomCat later.  The world must prepare for a great blessing tomorrow, as it is a high holy day, marking the return of the Blessed Ellipsoid Orb.  The Church od the Ellipsoid Orb convenes at 5:30 PDT.<\/font><\/p>\n

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

Today’s took me 3:55 (average 6:56).  To do it, click here<\/a>.  How did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n

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

From Daily Kos<\/a>: <\/font>It\u2019s easy to get away with lying about immigrants when your audience has never met one.<\/a><\/p>\n

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[A]ccording to a new working paper<\/a> by Jonathon Rothwell, senior economist at Gallup, the voters cheering, clapping, and nodding in agreement<\/a> at Trump\u2019s speeches aren\u2019t likely to be interacting with racial or ethnic minorities or immigrants<\/strong> on a regular basis: The best predictor of whether a person supports a Trump presidency is how white their neighborhood is. <\/strong><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Trump\u2019s entire campaign is based upon his supporters\u2019 fear of ethnic minorities, mostly Latino and Hispanic, specifically the fear that these people of a certain color are taking away jobs from \u201creal Americans,\u201d  spreading horrendous crimes, or other similar contrived right-wing horseshit.<\/a> This is the core of his appeal, a theme to which he returns again and again, in speech after speech, rally after rally. It is the glue that binds his supporters together. [emphasis original<\/em>]<\/p>\n

The Trump supporters to whom this does not apply are the well-educated super-rich people, who choose to knowingly play on the ignorance of others out of greed or lust for power.<\/font><\/p>\n

From NY Times<\/a>: <\/font>Scientists and regulators agree that earthquakes like the 5.6-magnitude tremor that struck Oklahoma on Saturday<\/a>, and thousands of smaller ones in recent years, have been spurred by the disposal of millions of tons of wastewater that is pumped to the surface, and then injected back into the ground, during oil and gas production. The shock last week tied a record set in 2011 in Prague, Okla., for the strongest such tremor in the state\u2019s history.<\/p>\n

State regulators have ordered well operators to stop wastewater injections in a 725-square-mile ellipse around the quake\u2019s center. But they conceded that trying to prevent more quakes was an inexact science. And in Oklahoma, where oil and gas are dominant economic and political forces, any effort to regulate the industry produces an entirely different set of shocks.<\/a> <\/p>\n

Perhaps the best solution is to limit fracking to deep red states, cut off federal aid, and make frackers pay to relocate Democrats.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Democracy Now<\/a>: <\/font>On Saturday in North Dakota, security guards working for the Dakota Access pipeline company attacked Native Americans with dogs and pepper spray as they resisted the $3.8 billion pipeline\u2019s construction. If completed, the Dakota Access pipeline would carry about 500,000 barrels of crude per day from North Dakota\u2019s Bakken oil field to Illinois, where it would meet up with an existing pipeline that would carry the oil all the way down to Texas. The pipeline has faced months of resistance from the Standing Rock Sioux Tribe and members of nearly 100 more tribes from across the U.S. and Canada. On Friday, lawyers for the tribe filed documents showing how the very land where Dakota Access would bulldoze on Saturday was, in fact, a tribal burial site. Democracy Now! was on the ground on Saturday, and we bring you this exclusive report.<\/p>\n