I slept better last night, but I still feel quite tires from my exertions earlier this week. I have a few slow days, before medical mayhem returns next month, and I’m going to take advantage of them.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today’s took me 5:51 (average 7:00);. To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From The New Yorker: Donald J. Trump’s personal war with Mexico escalated further on Friday after Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto cancelled his meeting with Trump and scheduled one with Meryl Streep instead.
“The American people are a great people, and no one personifies that greatness better than Meryl Streep,” Peña Nieto said in an official statement.
The summit with Streep was widely seen as a prelude to Mexico establishing full diplomatic relations with the Academy Award-winning actress.
At the White House, Trump’s advisers were reportedly considering a host of retaliatory measures, including Steve Bannon’s proposal that the President of Mexico be told to “shut up.”
Dang, Andy!! Will Fuhrer Drumpfenfarten declare war? RESIST!!
From Exposed by CMD: Public education advocates are demanding another hearing on Trump nominee for Secretary of Education, Betsy DeVos, after her dismal performance in front of the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pension Committee (HELP) January 17th and after the late release of her ethics report on January 20th.
The report, available here, details some 102 companies that might pose a conflict of interest for DeVos and sheds new light on the nominee’s investments and ethics.
While most Secretaries of Education have an extensive resume as school administrators or as educators, DeVos has neither. DeVos is married to the billionaire heir to the Amway fortune, Dick DeVos. Together they have spent millions advancing a radical school privatization agenda, including taxpayer vouchers for private and religious schools, and electing politicians across the nation willing to advance that agenda. DeVos was asked about her experience for the job by Democratic senators who were only allowed 5 minutes each.
What a horrible choice! Remember, Democrats cannot block her nomination without three Republican votes. The most they can do is delay it for one week. RESIST!!
From Daily Kos:
According to the New York Times, at least six journalists were charged with rioting after they were detained while covering some of the more “violent protests”* taking place near Trump’s inauguration parade.
The journalists were among 230 people detained in the anti-Trump demonstrations, during which protesters smashed the glass of commercial buildings and lit a limousine on fire.
The charges against the journalists — Evan Engel, Alexander Rubinstein, Jack Keller, Matthew Hopard, Shay Horse and Aaron Cantu — have been denounced by organizations dedicated to press freedom. All of those arrested have denied participating in the violence.
“These felony charges are bizarre and essentially unheard of when it comes to journalists here in America who were simply doing their job,” said Suzanne Nossel, the executive director of Pen America. “They weren’t even in the wrong place at the wrong time. They were in the right place.”
The journalists in question are being arrested for being around the violent parts of the protests—a guilt by proximity.
While all but one of the journalists is a lefty, only one (Horse) is an self-avowed anarchist, who may have been as much a participant as a journalist. Expect charges to be dropped for Rubenstein. He’s as right-wing propagandist for Trump’s owner, Putin. Perhaps Cantu is the best accredited. He writes for The Nation. Guilt by proximity is criminal. If they committed the acts themselves, charge them. If not, apologize! RESIST!!
Cartoon:
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10 Responses to “Open Thread – 1/27/2017”
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7:43 Fun with numbers. /s
TNY – Straight News!
CMD – And she probably fits beautifully with what Republicans perceive as the double purpose of education: 1) to produce sheep-like citizens, and 2) to make money for those who own the means of education. At that, I probably have those backwards.
DKos – Now, THIS is what worries me the most. This, and the "disappearing" of a couple of top Russian Intels, as described by Rachel in the lead article. We are inches away from journalists "disappearing," and that will be followed by activists "disappearing." Please click through for the videos. The only violence was committed by a handful of disguised people. Unliess, as I do, you consider that the baseless arrests do violence to the Constitution, and thus to America itself and the American people.
Cartoon – So is snow in the Sahara (yes, that is a thing that happened.)
Puzzle — 4:46 I think I got the right number!
The New Yorker — "Will Fuhrer Drumpfenfarten declare war?" — On Streep or Mexico? LOL!!
Resist!!!
Exposed by CMD — There was a recent news item north of the 49th that there has been a marked increase in the number of American students wanting to study at our universities. One of the reasons (probably the main one) was the lack of attention to quality affordable education. With DeVos at the helm, that is likely to continue. She is as incompetent as these next 4 years are going to be.
Resist!!!
Daily Kos — Gee, there seems to be a war on journalists, no doubt fuelled by the abhorent, hateful rhetoric spewing out of Drumpfenfarten. Amy Goodman of Democracy Now was arrested for doing her job at the DAPL protests. Me thinks the universality of the 1st amendment is in danger. Almost sounds like Egypt a few years ago when Mohamed Fahmy, a Canadian journalist, was arrested for participating in a protest which he was covering for Al Jazeera.
Resist!!!
Cartoon — With what is going on in the US today, France should reposess the Statue of Liberty. Sorry, but with Drumpfenfarten in charge, the whole notion of liberty and freedom is gone . . . except of course for billionaires.
Resist!!!
I went to see mum tonight and things are not good, not that they were good at all this week. For the first time tears flowed which is only natural. I guess I was like a pressure cooker and needed that release. I feel better now. I won't be going to my Auntie's memorial after all tomorrow which disappoints me because she was a wonderful woman, but she would understand.
Glad to hear that you ,managed some sleep. "Medical mayhem" — Do you ever feel like you spend as much time at medical appointments as you once did working? I sometimes do! Take care!
Hang in – yes, in my experience tears are a necessary purgative for a lot of things – we are behind you and support you with or without tears.
I do!
A shoulder for your tears. {{{HUGS!!}}}
NYer: Yea, he did cancel, and was smart to talk to Ms. Streep instead. Probably had a good time too.
LOL, Andy!
CMD: Several teachers I know (from my last campus), are choosing to retire, or take early retirement. Mention her name on campus, and one gets 'the deer in the headlights stare', and I can't blame them. She has never worked in a school, or being on a School Board, or even subbed in a class! She's a cluster…and well, you know how clusters work. Not good at all.
DK: From the article: "You want to use their footage to help identify “rioters,” that’s one thing. You want to make it illegal to show what’s happening in the streets, that’s fascism." I hope these journalists will be released. Is this going to be a norm for journalists/reporters being arrested, for showing the truth of what's going on??? Lord help us, if it is!
Cartoon: Awww…
Hope that you rest & relax. Enjoy your evening, take care, and Thanks, Tom.
New Yorker: Very funny! I just posted a piece, at C2, about the Empty Orange alredy starting to peel apart, its having become increasingly evident in Washington, D.C.
Exposed by CMD: Here's hoping! What a monstrous joke she is, presented by the Orange bozo!
NY T, via DK: No! This is not guilt by proximity, as absurd as that is. This is a shot over the bow of Free Press in the United States, by a Fascist SOB! "the founders of the school of thought out of which Fascism has grown all have certain common characteristics. They seek the good in WILL rather than in feeling or cognition; they value POWER more than happiness; they prefer force to arguemant, war to peace; aristocracy to democracy; propaganda to scientific impartiality." Bertrand Russell, in a collection of essays, called "In Praise of Idleness."
Sad, but it's clear that China is the only grown-up left in the room.
Hope they can get their pollution under control.
At least they acknowledge Climate Change & have begun working on correcting it. They actually realize their citizens – and NOT the corporations – are their most-prized assets!
New Yorker – gotta love Andy!
Daily Kos – well, wasn't it Steve Bannon who said the media were the opposition? Strewth.
Excellent idea to take it easy for a couple of days to be fit for the coming medical conundrum, TomCat.
TNY: Peña preferring a diplomatic relation with Meryl Streep above one with him would certainly have Drumpf explode in a twitter war, but the image of a dwarf-like Steve Bannon jumping up and down in a rage, telling every one to "shut up"and be completely ignored had my vote, Andy.
EbCMD: Republicans have all turned on their heels and voted for Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, a very dangerous and completely unfit nominee for this important job, so how could we possibly expect the GOP to go against the grain and vote against incompetent but billionaire Betsy DeVos on such a "harmless" position? It's only the education of America's future that's at stake here, isn't it.
DK: If charges are dropped against Rubinstein but not the others, as is to be expected, it'll be interesting what spin on alternate facts they come up with to let him go while he was in the same proximity. It would of course give the growing anti-Drumpf media another great chance to show people what America is turning onto and
RESIST!
Cartoon: I've heard of the line/song "It never rains in California", but never of "It never snows in New York".
Thanks all! Hugs!!