I’m writing for tomorrow. Yesterday’s victim meeting at the prison was excellent. It featured mothers of crime victims and mothers of criminals discussing how crime impacted their lives, They and my guys made a strong positive impression on each other. As always I was proud of them, and I learned that another has a release date in February. Let the short-timer abuse begin! After two prison meetings, I’m worn out, and this is tomorrow’s only article. I have another meeting tomorrow morning, so my partial absence may continue another day, depending on how long that takes.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:32 (average 4:38). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From The New Yorker: In an impressive white-knuckle performance on live television today, members of Congress spent several hours in a hearing room pretending to understand the Internet.
Beginning this morning, members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee devoted four hours to grilling Web-site contractors about site architecture, Web traffic, software, and other I.T. concepts about which their ignorance is nearly complete.
“As members of this committee, we are supposed to have a deep understanding of the technology involved in the health-care Web site,” said Chairman Fred Upton (R-Michigan). “So it was absolutely imperative for us to fake that we do.”
For the duration of the hearings, the Web contractors offered detailed testimony about “end-to-end testing,” “enterprise identity management,” and other technical concepts to a group of elected officials who can barely use e-mail…
Those twits even pay Aides to tweet for them!!
From Upworthy: CNBC invited AFL-CIO Policy Director Damon Silvers to talk about Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid cuts. Then the hosts decided to defend the idea of hacking away at those programs…
Those moderators might as well be wearing GOP pig pins. Note the moderators’ 'most people' claim, qualified, when debunked, to mean most people, who "understand the figures". In his mind, the only people, who understand the figures, are the 0.1%. Bull!! Kudos to David Silver. Scrap the cap!
From NY Times NY Times: A secretive nonprofit group with ties to the billionaire conservative businessmen Charles and David Koch admitted to improperly failing to disclose more than $15 million in contributions it funneled into state referendum battles in California, state officials there announced Thursday.
The group, the Arizona-based Center to Protect Patient Rights, is one of the largest political nonprofits in the country, serving as a conduit for tens of millions of dollars in political spending, much of it raised by the Kochs and their political operation and spent by other nonprofits active in the 2010 and 2012 elections.
The fine is $15 million. That's hitting Koch suckers where it hurts!!
Cartoon:
23 Responses to “Open Thread–10/26/2013”
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4:59
How about raising the cap Billionaires use to escape paying into the Social Security Trust Fund?? ❗
I'd agree to $5 or $10 million.
OOPS! I thought you meant a $15 million cap on Social Security.
$30 million would have been twice as good. 🙂
I'm so glad your prison meeting went so well – they do say that if offenders meet (for example) the householders whose houses they have burgled that in most cases both benefit from the meeting, though I would imagine it needs a lot of careful input by the organiser. Congrats on another of your chaps getting a release date for February! (It is interesting how many of our great actors have had brushes with the law, and who have said that if they hadn't found acting they would have ended up inside…). [There but for the grace of God…]
Loved the New Yorker article – painfully true I would imagine! Damon Silver acquitted himself well – those were 'moderators'?? Really? Oh my!
I see yet another non-profit, The Center for Patient Rights, has been unmasked as anything but honest – and the Far Right are at it again…. Things are now so bad that if I see something with an optimistic/pretty (fluffy even) name then I instantly suspect it as probably doing the opposite of what it says – and investigate it further till I find out. People usually try and mask their misdeeds behind pretty words.
Very well said Pat. Another plus was how much the criminals' mothers and victims' mothers found they had in common. They bonded.
3:09 I was in a hurry to cross this bridge.
3:34 A bridge to far!
3:46 The bridge collasped before I could get all the way across.
Mashed!
The New Yorker ~ Clowns on Parade on C-SPAN.
Upworthy ~ I agree with Richard. Scrap the Cap!
NY Times ~ Apt punishment for that bunch of thieves.
Cartoon ~ Yup! They would be happy if it went back to $.40 an hour. Just think of their profit margins then.
Amen!
Richard was agreeing with me.
Amen again!
They sure would!
Congress critters acting like they understand high technology……….can I stop laughing now, I am about to piss my panties! Pla-eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeze…… Love the fraudian slip….fake like we do….YUP YA THINK?!!!!
I would love to see the Kochroaches pay DOUBLE the fine…..just for GP. Millions are nothing to them who have billions.
SCRAP THE CAP!!!!! Yes, yes,yes!!!!
Rethuggars would love to see it go to zero, many do not want even a federal minimum wage. They salivate in their darkest fantasies about 'slave' labor. The Fascist Bastards.
LOL!!
See my reply to Rixhard.
Yes!
True!
Puzzle — 3:34 A bridge too far!
The New Yorker — Their "understanding" of the internet rivals their "understanding" of women's bodies, and that has not stopped the Republicanus/Teabaggers from legislating against women. “So it was absolutely imperative for us to fake that we do.”
A real FUBAR!
Upworthy — Scrap the cap! Canada too has a cap on contributions to the Canada Pension Plan. Harper and his harlots have made some changes, but not the changes like the cap that will benefit the majority.
NY Times — Life can be sweet when the conservative wallet is hit with a $15 million fine! I'd like to see more of that movie!
Cartoon — That's a big increase — almost 100%. I know the Republicanus/Teabaggers would like to cancel the minimum wage and let it be market driven. What crap! Currently, the lowest minimum wage in Canada (provincial jurisdiction) is Alberta's $9.95 and the highest $11.00 in Nunavut. BC is $10.25. The problem is the same all over — the minimum wage does not keep up. In Nunavut where food etc are outrageously expensive because of living so far north, $11/hour is barely going to heat your house.
Remembering Market-Garden, I see.
Scrap both caps!!
Ditto!
In the sixties, a guy could feed a family on minimum wage. No more.
A Market-Garden?
Operation Market-Garden was the name of the operation that failed, because it tried to go "a bridge too far".
3:39, unusually good day for me.
Uuuh – "Scrap the cap" is actually better than "Raise the cap" – and the same would go for the "Debt Limit."
So, is one of the definitions of "moderator" now "bully"?
Let's just hope the Kochs' PAC doesn't manage to deduct the fine from their taxes. The jerks. And Pat A is right – I'm embarrassed how long I was skeptical of PFAW because it sounded to me like a far right front group.
3rd, 7 seconds behing me.
Amen twice!
It is on Faux Noise.
PFAW is legit!!
Moved me to fifth place!
TC, so glad your meeting went so well, you are a bridge those guys need.
The New Yorker: This was so funny. Most of Congress had not even read the Affordable Care Act, can't email, and the ones who can (Weiner) get in trouble.
UPWORTHY: I think I am in love with Damon Silvers. Those twits on CNBC are just pawns for the wealthy and the GOP. I have never heard any of them say anything that did not parrot GOP measures. I agree with most on here, the cap on Social Security needs to be lifted. If all paid the same percentage of SS taxe on their income, that would solve any problem with financing.
Center to Protect Patient Rights is yet another outfit profiting from the supreme court decision that has caused so much dishonesty in campaign contributions. I wish the fine on them had been higher.
The cartoon is so true. When mimimum wage was raised to $3.35 per hour, I had a businessman in our community, who was a millionaire and lived in a mansion, come into our office to tell us he would lay off half his staff rather than be extorted by the Federal Government in this manner. AND I had to be nice to him. Almost exploded.
man
Thanks Edie!
LOL!
Well said!
Amen!
Good control!