{"id":31265,"date":"2018-01-31T12:39:54","date_gmt":"2018-01-31T20:39:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=31265"},"modified":"2018-01-31T12:39:54","modified_gmt":"2018-01-31T20:39:54","slug":"open-thread-1-31-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2018\/01\/31\/open-thread-1-31-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread – 1\/31\/2018"},"content":{"rendered":"

It’s a busy day here in the CatBox.  Store to Door delivered my groceries and I put them away.  WWWendy is coming this evening to destink the TomCat.  I’m tired, so I’ll be brief.<\/font><\/p>\n

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

Today’s took me 4:00 (average 5:54).  To do it, click here<\/a>.  How did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n

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

From NPR<\/a>: <\/font>The head of Russia’s foreign spy service reportedly traveled to the U.S. earlier this month and met with top Trump administration intelligence officials, despite being on a U.S. sanctions blacklist.<\/p>\n

Is anyone surprised that Trump and the Republican Party are ignoring the sanctions against their electoral benefactors? RESIST<\/strong>!!<\/font><\/p>\n

From The New Yorker<\/a>: <\/font>The White House press secretary, Sarah Huckabee Sanders, is proofreading the text of tonight\u2019s State of the Union address one last time to remove any remaining facts, Sanders confirmed on Tuesday.<\/p>\n

While a team of wordsmiths led by the senior adviser Stephen Miller has attempted to craft an entirely fact-free address, \u201cIt\u2019s good to have a fresh set of eyes to root out any stray accuracies that might have crept in,\u201d Sanders said.<\/p>\n

The press secretary said that, for example, while purging the speech of truths, she noticed a reference to the African-American unemployment rate standing at 6.8 per cent, a statistic that she deemed \u201cunacceptably correct.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI read that and my Sanders sense started tingling,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Taking her blue pencil to the text, Sanders changed the number to a \u201cbetter-sounding\u201d 2.3 per cent. \u201cThat may seem like a tiny detail, but it\u2019s stuff like that that separates the professional liars from the mere amateurs,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

Dang Andy! She sure did a good job! RESIST<\/strong>!!<\/font><\/p>\n

From TPM<\/a>: <\/font>The adult film star, who reportedly was paid $130,000 to keep quiet about a 2006 extramarital affair with Donald Trump, was interviewed on Jimmy Kimmel after Trump\u2019s State of the Union address Tuesday evening and appeared to cast doubt on her previous denials of the affair.<\/p>\n

Here’s the video<\/a>.  It’s hilarious!<\/font><\/p>\n