{"id":8291,"date":"2012-07-07T09:04:13","date_gmt":"2012-07-07T16:04:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=8291"},"modified":"2012-07-07T09:04:13","modified_gmt":"2012-07-07T16:04:13","slug":"open-thread772012","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2012\/07\/07\/open-thread772012\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread&ndash;7\/7\/2012"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">Yesterday the heat was severe, and it set off my COPD.&#160; I could not sleep at all last night.&#160; Therefore, this is today\u2019s only article, so I can go to bed.&#160; I am not current with replies, but will catch up ASAP.&#160; Today is supposed to be even hotter, so tomorrow is uncertain.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\"><strong>Jig Zone Puzzle<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">Today\u2019s took me 4:16 (average 5:19).&#160; To do it, <a href=\"http:\/\/www.jigzone.com\/puzzles\/2012-07-07-CE2504A965A9\" target=\"_blank\">click here<\/a>.&#160; 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=\"http:\/\/front.moveon.org\/dear-climate-deniers-youre-ridiculous-warmly-bill-maher-neil-degrasse-tyson-esq\/?rc=daily.share\" target=\"_blank\">MoveOn<\/a>: <\/font>Dear Climate Deniers, You&#8217;re Ridiculous. Warmly, Bill Maher &amp; Neil Degrasse Tyson, Esq.<\/p>\n<p>&#160;<iframe loading=\"lazy\" height=\"360\" src=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/embed\/FZYMD0oSQQQ?rel=0\" frameborder=\"0\" width=\"640\" allowfullscreen=\"allowfullscreen\"><\/iframe> <\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">I knew animals were brighter than Republicans, but he made an excellent case that plants are too.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">From <a href=\"http:\/\/www.reuters.com\/article\/2012\/07\/06\/us-usa-marijuana-oregon-idUSBRE8650VX20120706\" target=\"_blank\">Reuters<\/a>: <\/font>Oregon will soon qualify as the third U.S. state to ask voters in November to legalize marijuana for recreational use in a move that could put the state on a collision course with the federal government, proponents said on Friday.<\/p>\n<p>Backers of the Oregon Cannabis Tax Act said they have collected 165,000 signatures on petitions seeking to put the measure on the ballot, nearly double the 87,000 they were required to submit by Friday&#8217;s deadline to qualify.<\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">While I have not used the drug in over 30 years, I support its legalization. It is hypocritical that it should be more restricted than alcohol, a far more harmful drug. Law enforcement and correctional resources can be better used elsewhere.<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">From <a href=\"http:\/\/m.livingstonparishnews.com\/mobile\/news\/article_6c2da5fe-c1e5-11e1-ae3b-0019bb2963f4.html\" target=\"_blank\">Livingston Parrish News<\/a>: <\/font>Rep. Valarie Hodges, R-Watson, says she had no idea that Gov. Bobby Jindal\u2019s overhaul of the state\u2019s educational system might mean taxpayer support of Muslim schools.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI actually support funding for teaching the fundamentals of America\u2019s Founding Fathers\u2019 religion, which is Christianity, in public schools or private schools,\u201d the District 64 Representative said Monday.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cI liked the idea of giving parents the option of sending their children to a public school or a Christian school,\u201d Hodges said.<\/p>\n<p>Hodges mistakenly assumed that \u201creligious\u201d meant \u201cChristian.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>HB976, now signed into law as Act 2, proposed, among other things, a voucher program allowing state educational funds to be used to send students to schools run by religious groups.<\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\">Of course, this throws public schools under the bus.&#160; Not surprisingly, Republicans think freedom of religion means freedom for THEIR religion ONLY!<\/font><\/p>\n<p><font color=\"#0000ff\"><strong>Cartoon<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n<p><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" style=\"display: inline\" title=\"7Cartoon\" alt=\"7Cartoon\" src=\"https:\/\/www.7thstep.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/07\/7Cartoon.jpg\" width=\"650\" height=\"350\" \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Yesterday the heat was severe, and it set off my COPD.&#160; I could not sleep at all last night.&#160; Therefore, this is today\u2019s only article, so I can go to bed.&#160; I am not current with replies, but will catch up ASAP.&#160; Today is supposed to be even hotter, so tomorrow is uncertain. Jig Zone <a href='https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2012\/07\/07\/open-thread772012\/' 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":[35,3,5,47],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8291","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\/8291","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=8291"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8291\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8291"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8291"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8291"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}