{"id":35024,"date":"2018-12-18T13:14:19","date_gmt":"2018-12-18T21:14:19","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=35024"},"modified":"2018-12-18T19:00:27","modified_gmt":"2018-12-19T03:00:27","slug":"open-thread-12-18-2018","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/18\/open-thread-12-18-2018\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread &#8211; 12\/18\/2018"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">I had a dozen chores this morning, so I&#8217;m way late and very tired.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><strong>Jig Zone Puzzle<\/strong>:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Today&#8217;s took me 4:20 (average 5:48).\u00a0 To do it, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.jigzone.com\/puzzles\/2018-12-18-CE2504A965A9\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">click here<\/a>.\u00a0 How did you do?<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><strong>Fantasy Football Report<\/strong>:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Here&#8217;s the news from our own <a href=\"http:\/\/fantasy.nfl.com\/league\/342380\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">fantasy football league<\/a>.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Playoffs:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-width: 0px;\" title=\"P1\" src=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/P1.jpg\" alt=\"P1\" width=\"750\" height=\"1300\" border=\"0\" \/><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Congrats to Pam and Vivian for winning their first round games.\u00a0 WWWendy and I had first round byes.\u00a0 Patty Monster and Squatch do not have second round games, but they will the following week.<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><strong>Short Takes<\/strong>:<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">From <a href=\"https:\/\/www.newyorker.com\/humor\/borowitz-report\/cabinet-warns-trump-that-shutting-down-government-would-make-it-harder-to-steal-from\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The New Yorker<\/a>: <\/span>In a tense meeting on Monday, leading Cabinet members warned Donald J. Trump that shutting down the federal government would make it exponentially harder for them to steal from.<\/p>\n<p>Led by his Treasury Secretary, Steven Mnuchin, the Cabinet members begged Trump to prevent a government showdown that would bring their brazen spree of pillaging the nation\u2019s coffers to a screeching halt.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cMr. President, with the federal government up and running, I was able to take seven trips on military aircraft at a cost of eight hundred thousand dollars,\u201d Mnuchin said. \u201cI implore you, sir: don\u2019t make me fly coach.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Trump\u2019s three oldest children, Ivanka, Eric, and Don, Jr., who have piled up impressive taxpayer-funded travel bills of their own, chimed in with an emotional plea to their father. \u201cDaddy, please don\u2019t make us stop plundering government money,\u201d Ivanka said. \u201cNot right before Christmas.\u201d<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Dang, Andy! That&#8217;s a valid point! But Trump is too stupid to get it. <strong>RESIST<\/strong>!!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">From <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=dPYIdfYfEKM\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">YouTube<\/a> (<a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/user\/TheNewYorkTimes\/videos\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">NY Times Channel<\/a>): <\/span>The Secret History of Muslims in the U.S<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.youtube-nocookie.com\/embed\/dPYIdfYfEKM\" width=\"640\" height=\"360\" frameborder=\"0\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Cool! I do have a Muslim friend. In fact, he&#8217;s a gay Muslim friend. He couldn&#8217;t be nicer or kinder. Reject GOP hatred. <strong>RESIST<\/strong>!!<\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">From <a href=\"https:\/\/www.nbcnews.com\/feature\/nbc-out\/first-transgender-woman-competes-miss-universe-competition-n948791\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">NBC<\/a>: <\/span>While she didn\u2019t win the crown, Angela Ponce broke barriers on Monday in the 67th Miss Universe pageant. The 27-year-old Spanish beauty became the first transgender woman to ever participate in the international competition.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/1218Spain.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"background-image: none; padding-top: 0px; padding-left: 0px; display: inline; padding-right: 0px; border-width: 0px;\" title=\"1218Spain\" src=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/12\/1218Spain_thumb.jpg\" alt=\"1218Spain\" width=\"700\" height=\"467\" border=\"0\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"color: #0000ff;\">Kudos to Angela. She has courage and looks good. <strong>RESIST<\/strong>!!<\/span><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong>Cartoon<\/strong>:<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/12\/1218Cartoon.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>I had a dozen chores this morning, so I&#8217;m way late and very tired. Jig Zone Puzzle: Today&#8217;s took me 4:20 (average 5:48).\u00a0 To do it, click here.\u00a0 How did you do? Fantasy Football Report: Here&#8217;s the news from our own fantasy football league. Playoffs: Congrats to Pam and Vivian for winning their first round <a href='https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2018\/12\/18\/open-thread-12-18-2018\/' class='excerpt-more'>[&#8230;]<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35,3,5,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-35024","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-open-thread","category-personal","category-politics","category-religion","category-35-id","category-3-id","category-5-id","category-47-id","post-seq-1","post-parity-odd","meta-position-corners","fix"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35024","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=35024"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/35024\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=35024"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=35024"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=35024"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}