{"id":29085,"date":"2017-08-25T13:58:45","date_gmt":"2017-08-25T20:58:45","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=29085"},"modified":"2017-08-25T14:01:50","modified_gmt":"2017-08-25T21:01:50","slug":"squatchs-open-thread","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2017\/08\/25\/squatchs-open-thread\/","title":{"rendered":"Squatch’s Open Thread 25 August 2017"},"content":{"rendered":"

Another day, another dollar . . . or in the case of Canada, another 80 cents!\u00a0 We were to have rain yesterday and last night but it passed over my area.\u00a0 The US gulf coast won’t be so lucky as hurricane Harvey looks like it will bring storm surges and flooding to parts of Texas and other gulf states.\u00a0 Please be safe all of you in those areas!\u00a0 And tomorrow, my little girl will turn 9 years old so we will be having a celebration of fresh roasted chicken breast which is a real favourite with the furbabes!<\/span><\/p>\n

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

CBC<\/strong><\/a> —\u00a0It’s taken more than\u00a0150 years to erect a\u00a0monument honouring\u00a0the 40,000 Canadians who fought in the American Civil War, and Rob McLachlan\u00a0is hoping next month’s unveiling near Cornwall, Ont., won’t be delayed by the controversies swirling around memorials to the Confederacy south of the border.<\/p>\n

The founder of the Grays and Blues of Montreal, a Civil War re-enactment group, doesn’t think the Sept. 16 unveiling will be controversial. After all, some 90 per cent of Canadians who fought in the Civil War served with Abraham Lincoln’s Union forces.<\/p>\n

“It’s not propagating Robert E. Lee or the Confederacy or what have you,”\u00a0McLachlan told CBC News.<\/p>\n

“It’s propagating the fact Canadians were involved, and the majority were in the North. It just recognizes that historical fact.”<\/p>\n

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Of those estimated 40,000 Canadians who fought south of the border, around 4,000 Canadians\u00a0fought for the Southern Confederacy.<\/p>\n

Prior to the recent deadly clash between far right protesters and anti-racist activists in Charlottesville, Va., over a \u00a0 Canada has a statue dedicated to Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee, the only media paying attention to their monument on the grounds of the Lost Villages Museum in Long Sault, Ont., was the Cornwall newspaper.<\/p>\n

I had no idea that Canadians had fought in the American Civil War, mostly for the Union side.\u00a0 The terminus of the underground railway, spiriting slaves and others from the South, also was in eastern Canada.\u00a0 During the American Revolution, the United Empire Loyalists fled the US and headed up to Canada.\u00a0 Canada has a very long association with the US, including the War of 1812 when the British (Canada) beat the Americans.<\/span><\/p>\n

Huffington Post<\/a> <\/strong><\/span>—\u00a0A science envoy for the Department of State sent a resignation letter<\/a> to President Donald Trump<\/a> on Wednesday with a not-so-subtle secret message: \u201cIMPEACH.\u201d<\/p>\n

Daniel Kammen, a professor of energy at the University of California, Berkeley, told Trump in a letter dated Wednesday that his decision to quit his State Department post is \u201cin response to your attacks on core values of the United States.\u201d As one example, he cited Trump\u2019s reaction<\/a>\u00a0to the deadly white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia<\/a>, calling the response\u00a0\u201cconsistent with a broader pattern of behavior that enables sexism and racism.\u201d<\/p>\n

But it\u2019s Kammen\u2019s acrostic \u2014 the first letter of each paragraph spelling out a word \u2014 that sends a blunter message to Trump: IMPEACH.<\/p>\n

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A number of higher profile people have or are in the process of leaving various positions in the US federal government in protest over Trump policies.\u00a0 This letter is from Prof Daniel Kammen and the first letter of each paragraph spells out “IMPEACH”.\u00a0 There is a similar acrostic in a resignation letter from the Arts and Humanities Advisory Council<\/strong><\/a> which spells out “Resist”.\u00a0 You can see that letter at the link.\u00a0 And in true Drumpf style, after the entire committee resigned, Drumpf dissolved the committee which had already ceased to exist.\u00a0 Drumpf always seems to want the last word.\u00a0 The last word I want Drumpf to utter is “I quit!”<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n

Robert Reich<\/strong><\/a> —\u00a0<\/span>If you voted for Donald Trump, I get it. Maybe you feel you\u2019ve been so badly shafted by the system that you didn\u2019t want to go back to politics as usual, and Trump seemed like he\u2019d topple that corrupt system.<\/p>\n

You voted to change our country\u2019s power base \u2013 to get rid of crony capitalism and give our government back to the people who are working, paying taxes, and spending more just to survive. Lots of Americans agree with you.<\/p>\n

But now, the president is turning his back on that idea and the many changes he promised.<\/p>\n

He did not drain the swamp. After telling voters how he would take control away from special interests, he has surrounded himself with the very Wall Street players he decried. Now, those who gamed politicians for tax loopholes and laws that reward the rich don\u2019t even have to sneak around with backroom deals.<\/p>\n