I’m writing for tomorrow, and I spent the entire morning collecting the data for the Monthly Report. I still have errands to run.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 3:03 (average 4:56). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From Upworthy: It begins at 1:28 when a bunch of young go-getters band together to battle a nationwide stigma. We learn about a neat strategy to get people to vote — called a “dorm storm” — at 4:58. At 9:05, she considers what’s at stake if they lose the battle. And, yup, the moment you were waiting for happens at 10:02. Keep your tissues handy.
…and they call millennials lazy. Pffft.
We need more kids like those!!
From The New Yorker: The casino billionaire and Republican kingmaker Sheldon Adelson met several 2016 G.O.P. candidates available for purchase over the weekend, but decided to buy none of them, Adelson confirmed today.
After hearing speeches by Kentucky Senator Rand Paul, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, and several others who were for sale, Mr. Adelson concluded that none of them are worth owning.
“I don’t want to spend millions on another loser,” said Adelson, who purchased both Newt Gingrich and Mitt Romney in 2012.
The casino magnate was scathing in his assessment of the candidates he declined to buy, calling them “a third-rate grab bag of has-beens and dimwits.”
Funny as Andy is with his satire, you can be sure Adelson will buy at least one of them.
From Washington Post: A report by the Senate Intelligence Committee concludes that the CIA misled the government and the public about aspects of its brutal interrogation program for years — concealing details about the severity of its methods, overstating the significance of plots and prisoners, and taking credit for critical pieces of intelligence that detainees had in fact surrendered before they were subjected to harsh techniques.
The report, built around detailed chronologies of dozens of CIA detainees, documents a long-standing pattern of unsubstantiated claims as agency officials sought permission to use — and later tried to defend — excruciating interrogation methods that yielded little, if any, significant intelligence, according to U.S. officials who have reviewed the document.
“The CIA described [its program] repeatedly both to the Department of Justice and eventually to Congress as getting unique, otherwise unobtainable intelligence that helped disrupt terrorist plots and save thousands of lives,” said one U.S. official briefed on the report. “Was that actually true? The answer is no.”
Current and former U.S. officials who described the report spoke on the condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue and because the document remains classified. The 6,300-page report includes what officials described as damning new disclosures about a sprawling network of secret detention facilities, or “black sites,” that was dismantled by President Obama in 2009.
I trust you probably knew this. Now we know that we know. Soon what we know will be officially public. Thank God Obama kept his word and tore it down. Click through.
Cartoon:
18 Responses to “Open Thread–4/2/2014”
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That cartoon is perfectly GOP!
New Yorker – if only Adelson said that, but I'm afraid you are right TC he will buy one…
I didn't see the Washington Post article but I saw others in (I think) The Guardian and the Huff Post all quoting this
"“The CIA described [its program] repeatedly both to the Department of Justice and eventually to Congress as getting unique, otherwise unobtainable intelligence that helped disrupt terrorist plots and save thousands of lives,” said one U.S. official briefed on the report. “Was that actually true? The answer is no.” "
The whole thing is flipping terrifying – that a government agency can lie to the representatives of the people and get away with it for YEARS – and committing so much terrible and vile injustice – quite literally makes me sick. And it has spread across the globe – all our countries governments and agencies have been infected by it now. Unspeakable!
As far more intelligent people have remarked over the centuries – torture gets you answers, but are they true answers? No, of course not, their victims will say anything to end the pain.
All they have done is to make our countries many more times unsafe than they were and to make us millions more enemies.
You're right. With torture, the Bush Reich gave Al Qaeda the best recruiting tool they had!
“I don’t want to spend millions on another loser,” said Adelson…
Then I suggest he support a Democratic candidate for president.
If he did, it would be LaRouche!!
4:49 To solve the tortoise, I must be the tortoise.
Upworthy – Yes. We do need more kids like this. More people of every age like this also wouldn't hurt.
New Yorker – At least one, yes. The Andy-world Sheldon Adelson is right on the money, but the real one isn't going to see that let alone say it.
WaPo – I have several thoughts on this. One is that, if this is what the WaPo prints, how much worse is it really? I also am reminded of That Hideous Strength, a novel by C.S. Lewis set in a dystopian future England. The head of the "Police," a Miss Hardcastle, is advised by another of the baddies in control that she just might enjoy interrogation too much. She grumbles, "You won't find anyone to do my job unless they get some kind of kick out of it." Finally, can't this report be useful to get John Kiriakou OUT of Federal prison and back with his family where he belongs? He never said a bloody word about anything BUT torture. I only wish we could give him back the chunk of his life he has lost.
3:09 I am definitely a tortoise. I couldn't keep up to that "harey" puddy tat!
4:00 I must be a little "hare-y" puddy tat too. I guess I napped too long.
3:21 I may be slow like a turtle, but at least I don't look like a turtle…unlike a Senator I shall not name!
Once again, CAT is where it's AT!! 😀
I have to tell you that I was laughing reading these 2 "Borowitzesque" pieces that came by e-mail from Endangered Earth (www.biologicalearth.org) courtesy of Carrie B from Care2. Of course the pictures won't be here.
"Paparazzi Catch Shirtless Biden Rummaging, Howling in First Lady's Organic Garden
Vice President Joe Biden, an early adopter of the Center's new"Earth-friendly diet," was caught on film Tuesday running loose in First Lady Michelle Obama's famed organic garden, his torso bare save for a snowy coat of man-fur. The former Scrantonite and inductee of the Delaware Volunteer Firemen Association's Hall of Fame was rummaging among the garden's early sweet corn and kale. As electronic flashbulbs clicked, he threw back his head and let loose a lupine howl.
"Listen, bacon built this body, but broccoli is what's gonna keep it goin', baby," said Biden, when pressed by a reporter to explain his conduct. "I'm a cage-free compadre now. People are a little afraid of my fierceness, my virility. But hey, that comes with being a green machine."
Biden then invited reporters to feel his biceps and view his sharp canine teeth before loping off to scratch in the earth behind a clump of arugula."
New Species of Koch Brother Discovered — Possesses Beating Human Heart
Scientists working on the frontiers of descriptive biology have reportedly discovered an entirely new subspecies of Homo sapiens sapiens: a Koch Brother possessed of a living, beating human heart, a functional brain, and even what appears, on early examination, to be a moral compass.
"We've never seen a Koch Brother like this before," said Harvard mammalogist Jim Peterson. "It's simply something that none of us expected to encounter. Who knows what a subspecies like this could give to the world? We have to be careful to conserve these creatures. A Koch Brother with a functioning heart and mind isn't just worth keeping for its intrinsic value; it could turn out to be the source of a scientific breakthrough. It might provide a key medicine in the future, such as a cure for gout, or have something to teach us about how Republicans first learned to walk erect."
The Koch Brother with brain and heart has been named by its discoverer, as is the taxonomic tradition (Kochbrotherus anomalus). Like so many newly discovered flora and fauna of the past, it is being kept at the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History, where it can be compared via DNA analysis to other related specimens in the collection. It floats in formaldehyde wearing its native gray pinstriped suit.
Enjoy!!
Thank Carrie B. for the articles. Especially loved the Koch with a heart.
Anmdy went too fat on the second. Open a Koch's chest and you fdind a check book and excrement, with the e3xcrement trying to get out, because it can't stand the stink.
Actually, it isn't Andy. It's Kierán Suckling, Executive Director of Endangered Earth http://org.salsalabs.com/dia/track.jsp?v=2&c=RYB9Gv2M/qqRESZEmqRmrCQt3kBqI3bY
Upworthy ~ There are more hard-working young people like these all over this country. Soon, they will be in the majority and people will wonder why equal marriage rights was even an issue. Bless them all!
New Yorker ~ Andy is too close to the truth. Addelson didn't buy any of them yet but he still has time to consider his purchase and see what kind of guarantee comes with it.
Washington Post ~ "The 6,300-page report includes what officials described as damning new disclosures about a sprawling network of secret detention facilities, or “black sites,” that was dismantled by President Obama in 2009." Are these the same "secret prisons" the Right Wing-nuts were claiming Pres. Obama was building?
Cartoon ~ It's their kind of "Beauty" contest.
Puzzle — 3:09 I am definitely a tortoise. I couldn't keep up to that "harey" puddy tat!
Upworthy — Sure could feel the energy! Reminds me a bit of the late 60's. We were going to change the world! These guys ARE changing the world and for the better!
The New Yorker — "… calling them “a third-rate grab bag of has-beens and dimwits.”" Well I have to agree with Borowitz's Adelson on that! To get his power buzz and his political tax deduction, Adelson will have to pick one. But let's face it, a sack of hammers has more intelligence and ethics than a Republicanus/Teabagger politician.
Washington Post — "Black sites", torture, CIA, FBI, . . . eventually the piper has to be paid! When this report is fully available to the public, how many people will realise that Baby Bush and Cheney were the chief architects along with some other Washington dandies like Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld? I wonder if the Republicanus/Teabaggers distance themselves from their former bosses. Liars and dead wood.
Cartoon — Republicanus/Teabagger family values I see!
http://act.credoaction.com/sign/mccutcheon_robes?akid=10334.4312055.Ux3n0W&rd=1&t=1
Thanks everyone. SCROTUS made our job that much harder.
5:17 – Puzzle 😆
Yeah Minnesota, The time has come to promote Equal Rights. Minnesota the 1st State to win… 😆