{"id":25603,"date":"2016-12-24T13:34:08","date_gmt":"2016-12-24T21:34:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=25603"},"modified":"2016-12-24T13:34:37","modified_gmt":"2016-12-24T21:34:37","slug":"open-thread-12242016","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2016\/12\/24\/open-thread-12242016\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread &#8211; 12\/24\/2016"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">Just to give you an idea how busy I&#39;ve been, today is a holy day in the Church of the Ellipsoid Orb, and I didn&#39;t even know it until five minutes ago.&nbsp; Most of the league meditates today, but my Broncos meditate with the Chiefs in one of the two Christmas games tomorrow, so I&#39;ll get to watch it.&nbsp; So for today, may the Orb shine its blessed light on your team.&nbsp; I&#39;m running late, even thought I arose early, because I cooked the ham for tomorrow&#39;s feast with Wendy.&nbsp; And, of course, I&#39;m pooped.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\"><strong>Jig Zone Puzzle<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">Today&#39;s took me 2:51 (average 4:55).&nbsp; To do it, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.jigzone.com\/puzzles\/2016-12-24-CE2504A965A9\" target=\"_blank\">click here<\/a>.&nbsp; How did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\"><strong>Short Takes<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">From <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=6Ucf7f56IEk\" target=\"_blank\">YouTube<\/a> (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/TheYoungTurks\/videos\" target=\"_blank\">TYT Channel<\/a>): <\/font>Trump Backer: Michelle Obama Should Live In Africa With Apes<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<iframe loading=\"lazy\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\" frameborder=\"0\" height=\"360\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/6Ucf7f56IEk?rel=0\" width=\"640\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">Paladino, who the Reich nominated for Governor in NY, typifies the Fuhrer&#39;s Republican Party.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">From <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2016\/12\/23\/arts\/rockettes-wont-be-forced-to-play-trump-inauguration-company-says.html\" target=\"_blank\">NY Times<\/a>: <\/font>Within hours of <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nytimes.com\/2016\/12\/22\/us\/rockettes-will-perform-at-donald-trumps-inauguration.html\" target=\"_blank\">confirming plans to appear at the inauguration of Donald J. Trump<\/a>, the Radio City Rockettes were plunged into a maelstrom of social media outrage on Friday <a href=\"http:\/\/www.rollingstone.com\/politics\/news\/radio-city-rockette-im-embarrassed-to-perform-for-donald-trump-w457635\">amid <\/a><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnbc.com\/2016\/12\/23\/dance-or-else-rockettes-ordered-to-perform-at-trumps-inauguration.html\">reports<\/a> that the performers were contractually obligated to dance at the ceremony or lose their jobs.<\/p>\n<p>But as the day wore on, both the Madison Square Garden Company, which manages the Rockettes, and the dancers&rsquo; union, the American Guild of Variety Artists, said that any of the dancers could opt out of the Jan. 20 performance in Washington.<\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"1224rockettes\" border=\"0\" height=\"401\" src=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/1224rockettes.jpg\" style=\"border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px\" title=\"1224rockettes\" width=\"600\" \/><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">They should all boycott. In this position, Rockettes are far too vulnerable to be grabbed by the Peach Pervert.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">From <a href=\"https:\/\/thinkprogress.org\/donald-trump-is-demanding-the-names-of-federal-employees-working-to-curb-violent-extremism-13a37b0ae469#.pxoktt3hx\" target=\"_blank\">Think Progress<\/a>: <\/font>Officials from Donald Trump&rsquo;s transition team submitted requests to at least two cabinet departments demanding they hand over the names of any government employees who are working on programs that seek to combat the rise of violent extremism, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/us-usa-trump-islam-exclusive-idUSKBN14D00N?utm_campaign=trueAnthem:+Trending+Content&amp;utm_content=585e485104d3014179315b22&amp;utm_medium=trueAnthem&amp;utm_source=twitter\" target=\"_blank\">according to a report from Reuters<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>The news wire obtained a copy of an email sent from members of Trump&rsquo;s transition team to the State Department, asking for the identities of anyone working on anti-extremism programs. &ldquo;Please indicate names of people serving in those roles and status (political or career),&rdquo; the email says.<\/p>\n<p>While the State Department deals largely with threats posed by foreign extremists and international terrorist organizations like ISIS, a similar request was made of the Department of Homeland Security. In addition to their work on international terrorism, <strong>DHS focuses on domestic threats as well, <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/thinkprogress.org\/why-cant-anyone-agree-on-the-definition-of-domestic-terrorism-fed245151c42#.l21vuhv53\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>including the rise of right-wing extremism<\/strong><\/a><strong>. A <\/strong><a href=\"http:\/\/www.cnn.com\/2015\/02\/19\/politics\/terror-threat-homeland-security\/\" target=\"_blank\"><strong>2012 report from DHS<\/strong><\/a><strong> outlined the growing threat of so-called &ldquo;sovereign citizen extremists,&rdquo; pockets of far-right activists who reject, sometimes violently, the authority of government<\/strong>&#8230; [<em>emphasis added<\/em>]<\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">I have no doubt that the Tangerine Traitor will ask his adopted Russian daddy to prepare accommodations for them in Siberia.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\"><strong>Cartoon<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/1224Cartoon.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"1224Cartoon\" border=\"0\" height=\"400\" src=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/1224Cartoon_thumb.jpg\" style=\"border-left-width: 0px; border-right-width: 0px; background-image: none; border-bottom-width: 0px; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-top-width: 0px\" title=\"1224Cartoon\" width=\"650\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Just to give you an idea how busy I&#39;ve been, today is a holy day in the Church of the Ellipsoid Orb, and I didn&#39;t even know it until five minutes ago.&nbsp; Most of the league meditates today, but my Broncos meditate with the Chiefs in one of the two Christmas games tomorrow, so I&#39;ll <a href='https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2016\/12\/24\/open-thread-12242016\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/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-25603","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\/25603","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=25603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/25603\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=25603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=25603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=25603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}