{"id":9913,"date":"2013-02-04T06:25:20","date_gmt":"2013-02-04T14:25:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/?p=9913"},"modified":"2013-02-04T06:25:20","modified_gmt":"2013-02-04T14:25:20","slug":"open-thread242013","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/2013\/02\/04\/open-thread242013\/","title":{"rendered":"Open Thread–2\/4\/2013"},"content":{"rendered":"

Yesterday I had a bad air<\/em> day, with severe coughing and bronchial congestion.  The Super Bowl cut into my sleep time. so I overslept.  I don\u2019t want to push myself too hard, although I do have an extra article for you.  I\u2019m current with replies.  I plan to go back to posting our articles on other sites tomorrow instead of today.<\/font><\/p>\n

Church of the Ellipsoid Orb<\/strong>:<\/font><\/p>\n

Congratulations to the Baltimore Ravens for out-meditating the San Francisco 49ers 34-31.  Their achievement is particularly noteworthy, because they were considered the weakest team to make the playoffs, and were the underdogs in every game they played.  To get to the AFC championship, they had to defeat the best team in football.  Then to get to the Super Bowl, they had to defeat the second best team in football.  By consistently playing above the capabilities their record reflects, they have earned high praise.<\/font><\/p>\n

Now the great mourning has begun, because the mighty orb has gone dark.  Except for a brief glimmer in April for the Selection of Future Acolytes, we will have none of it\u2019s divine light until late Summer, if we are indeed blessed with it\u2019s return.  Now is the time for wailing and gnashing of teeth.<\/font><\/p>\n

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

Today\u2019s took me 3:32 (average 4:31).  To do it, click here<\/a>.  How did you do?<\/font><\/p>\n

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

From MoveOn<\/a>: <\/font>FLASHBACK: What The NRA Sounded Like Back When It Was Sane<\/p>\n

\"4NRAsane500\"<\/p>\n

Back then, the NRA represented gun owners, and their intent was to promote the best interests of responsible shooters. Today the NRA represents corporate criminals, and their intent is to represent the most profit for irresponsible manufacturers, regardless of how many innocents die to sate their greed. By their strong NRA support, Republicans demonstrate, once again, that they certainly are the pro-death party.<\/font><\/p>\n

From NY Times<\/a>: <\/font>President Obama said in a televised interview on Sunday that he could foresee a budget deal in Congress that did not include further increases in tax rates but instead focused on eliminating loopholes and deductions. <\/p>\n

Although I think that rates are still too low on those making over $1 million per year, I can support reform limited to eliminating loopholes, such as allowing Vulture Capitalists to have their income taxed at the lower capital gains rate and the many tax credits lavished on Big Oil.<\/font><\/p>\n

From Crooks and Liars<\/a>: <\/font>Millionaire Pundit Laura Ingraham Doesn’t Like Paying Americans a Living Wage<\/p>\n

 <\/param><\/embed><\/object><\/p>\n

Callahan is spot on. We have a demand problem. Producers have no incentive to hire, as long as consumers don’t have the money to pay for those products. Smith’s statement that union membership is low, because unions don’t work, is pure propaganda. Union membership is low, because Republicans have outsourced so many union jobs, and because Republicans have legislated away union rights.  Note that. at the end of the segment, Ingraham thanked the goose-stepper, but not the Democrat.  After all, this is the Republican Ministry of Propaganda.<\/font><\/p>\n

Cartoon<\/strong>:  We\u2019re trying something a little different today to demonstrate how ethnic bias can literally distort our world view.  The first image is a Mercator Projection of the world map, the map with which we are all most familiar.<\/font><\/p>\n

\"4Cartoon\"<\/font><\/p>\n

Note how the area north of the equator takes up 2\/3 of the map, making nations in the northern hemisphere appear larger, and therefore, more important.<\/font><\/p>\n

The second image is a Peters Projection of the world map.<\/font><\/p>\n

\"4bCartoon\"<\/font><\/p>\n

It divides the area equally between the northern and southern hemisphere, thus showing the sizes of different features more accurately with respect to each other.  It changes your perspective, doesn\u2019t it?<\/font><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Yesterday I had a bad air day, with severe coughing and bronchial congestion.  The Super Bowl cut into my sleep time. so I overslept.  I don\u2019t want to push myself too hard, although I do have an extra article for you.  I\u2019m current with replies.  I plan to go back to posting our articles on […]<\/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-9913","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\/9913","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=9913"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9913\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9913"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9913"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.politicsplus.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9913"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}