I'm having a very difficult day. Last night was so muggy and noisy that I ably slept for about ninety minutes. Safeway.com will be delivering groceries in the next hour and forty minutes. When they do, I have to unpack and put them away, without the help I normally get from Store to Door. I already feel exhausted. Please expect no more than a personal update from me tomorrow. I have a meeting.
Jig Zone Puzzle:
Today's took me 4:52 (average 4:54). To do it, click here. How did you do?
Short Takes:
From The New Yorker: Donald J. Trump’s claim that Barack Obama wiretapped him received a strong denial on Monday from the former President, who said to reporters, “Like I’d want to hear more from that fool?”
Obama said that, when he first saw Trump’s allegations on Twitter, “My first thought was, Only a narcissist on the scale of Donald Trump would think people want to hear more from him than they currently do. If anything, I think we’d all like to hear way, way less.”
He said that his wife, Michelle, agreed that the idea of his wanting to hear more from Donald Trump “was one of the funniest things she’s ever heard.”
LOL Andy! Is that an exact quote? It could be! RESIST!!
From NY Times: President Trump’s executive order barring immigrants from seven Muslim-majority countries experienced nearly universal defeat in the federal courts. On Monday, he issued a revised version of that order, but it still suffers from a fundamental, and fatal, flaw: It constitutes unlawful religious discrimination.
On the surface, this revised order looks different from the first version. It explicitly exempts Iraq from the travel ban, thus reducing the number of affected countries to six, as well as lawful permanent residents (that is, green card holders) and people who have visas. It no longer categorically bars Syrian refugees or includes a religious test to determine which refugees may enter the country. And in a marked departure from the earlier order, it goes into effect in 10 days, so that the chaos that unfolded in airports around the world when the January order became effective presumably won’t happen again.
These changes are, no doubt, intended to address the due process concerns that led the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit to affirm a lower-court ruling that put a hold on part of the original order. But while these changes are important, they do not fix the core problem with the executive order: The administration is waging an all-out assault on Islam and Muslims.
That’s because anti-Muslim bias and bigotry that characterized the original travel ban remain in this revised version. The order is still limited to only Muslim-majority countries: namely, Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. Residents of those countries — and only those countries — will be severely restricted in their ability to travel into the United States for 90 days. Left off are the predominately Christian countries that the State Department lists as “Terrorist Safe Havens” like Colombia, the Philippines and Venezuela.
The Fuhrer's underlying motives for this are still hatred and bigotry. RESIST!!
From YouTube (GQ Channel): The Russian Developments That Matter Most | The Resistance with Keith Olbermann
Flushing Trump is not enough. Every Republican must be removed from office. RESIST!!
Cartoon:
13 Responses to “Open Thread – 3/7/2017”
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4:23 A puzzle one isn't supposed to care about?
In Everyday Erinyes #61 https://www.7thstep.org/blog/2017/02/04/everyday-erinyes-61/, I wrote about Gina Haspel. Today, I received a petition to get rid of her. https://secure.reprieve.org/page/s/petition-gina-haspel Reprieve is an international group of lawyers and investigators. ReprieveUS is the US branch. http://www.reprieve.org/about/
TNY – Here's how you can tell this is satire: while it's probably exactly what they are thinking, both have too much class to be that blunt.
NYT – Steve Bannon's Ayn Rand is Jean Raspaill, and his "Fountainhead" is "The Camp of the Saints." Saw that somewhere yesterday and looked him up. Pretty awful. Sometimes I'm sure the Marmalade Mephistopheles isn't sure whose hand is up his – well, you know. But this is pure Bannon IMO.
YT/GQ – Sessions takes "weasel words" to a new level, doesn't he? Bottom line, though – yes, we have an iron clad case. But how are we going to get it into court? They control all the prosecutors, and it needs to be a criminal case. But even if it could be framed as a civil case, who has the standing to sue? (And how long would they live if six, or I have also heard eight, Russians have mysteriously kicked the bucket?) Who will rid us of these turbulent priests (and, no, I am not advocating violence)?
Cartoon – You mean, Government should not repair. Private companies should repair and charge tolls to recoup the cost. The quality and safety of the repairs? I won't even go there.
Petition signed!
NYer: I'm not on Twitter, but I would want nothing to do with DT. "Yea, way less!".
NYT: Such a mean, hateful man. This is so wrong. The courts must continue to resist (like all of us)! Not his way of bigotry.
KO: Smack them, KO. I really enjoy listening to his vids. Yea, get them ALL out! Lyin', cheatin', ids!
Not getting a full night's sleep is exhausting the next day. Hope that you can catnap, and get some rest this evening. Take good care, and Thanks, Tom.
Puzzle — 3:54 There are some tacky issues, but I get the point! I just came in, and forgetting I had already done the puzzle earlier, did it again in 3:22 min.
Will return later. I have a memorial service at mum's care centre (all the deaths in the past 2 months) and a meeting there late this afternoon. It is snowing yet again so I hope the driving isn't too bad. Later — Snow mixed with rain in some areas, and all snow in others. . . the driving was very ugly with poor visibility but I arrived home safely. Tonight will be cold so the morning commute will be very slippery. A shame that you did not have help with those groceries. Please take care and do not over do things.
JD, signed petition.
The New Yorker — Could not agree more JD! . . . way to much class for such a comment. Maybe one of those "what I like to say but will not" type of comments.
Resist and Persist!!!
NY Times — "The Fuhrer's underlying motives for this are still hatred and bigotry." — AMEN!!! Drumpfenfarten is one sick, racist bastard that is completely unqualified for the position of POTUS!
Resist and Persist!!!
YouTube — As usual, Keith did a great job! IMO, Drumpfenfarten's attempts to distract attention away from the 'Russian Connection' (sounds like a good spy thriller book/movie!) have largely failed. It is time that Drumpfenfarten face the real music, along with his Republican cohorts of course, and resign. He'll never do that unfortunately. As I was driving today, I thought of "The US – a fake democracy with a fake President" predicated on Drumpfenfarten's policies with particular attention to immigration (the Muslim ban and the deportations of largely Latinos) and the Russian connections. Keith did an excellent job outlining the latter.
Resist and Persist!!!
Cartoon — The party of no says no to the safety of its people and yes to the increased wealth of its corporations.
Resist and Persist!!!
I know you are both competent and careful, but as hubby says to me, "I'm not worried about you, it's those other – ahem." Do drive carefully (as I know you will, or, by now, have.)
Hope you sleep better tonight, dear TomCat, and are well rested for your meeting. Good luck.
TNY: Good thing Drumpf doesn't read and certainly not your column in the New Yorker, Andy. This one was razor sharp and really must have cut him to the bone, had he read it. Pitty he didn't.
NYT: If this Muslim ban 2.0 looked any different on the surface it must have been because the Drumpf administration used another font and different paper, because to me it sounded very much the same. Old wine in a new bottle: still a Muslim ban, still no evidence that the 6 remaining banned countries are in any way connected with terrorist influx. This shouldn't hold in court for the same reasons the first version didn't. The administration is really feeling the pressure, they have nothing better but had to put it out there to divert from "the Russian connection".
Keith Olbermann: WOW!!! It is no longer Drumpf's fault, it is yours and you will take the fall for your inaction, Republicans. AMEN!
Cartoon: …because they wouldn't have a clue how to go about it.
Did you see where Michelle Obama stopped in an at-risk, alternative High School in SE Washington – and stayed and talked to the students for TWO HOURS! This was clearly NOT a photo-op!
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/michelle-obama-surprises-dc-students-talks-struggles-and-life-goals-for-two-hours/2017/03/03/12160e5a-003b-11e7-8ebe-6e0dbe4f2bca_story.html?utm_term=.5096cca803af
I did see that! A real class act! Thank you for sharing it here!
Wonderful article! As JD says, a real class act!
Melania would never do this and would never inspire anyone to reach higher.
Cats need their sleep!
NYorker: Much less!
NYT: A bigot is a bigot, is a bigot!
YT/GQ: It's YOUR fault, and, by the way, yes, he is a lunatic!
Kudos to Hawaii for being the first to file against the "new" travel ban.
The only reason I'm on Twitter is to annoy trump as much as possible. It's quite easy since his tweets are so darn stupid. But also, Obama people, including me, tweet and retweet how gracious, intelligent, attractive, clever, wise, amazing and so forth, the Obamas are. Oh, and then, of course, there's fact checking trump's nonsense…
Melania is sort of a non-being, isn't she? As if her personality has been erased….
I'm starting to feel very sad for Melania. Sure, she married for money, but there are signs she is now wiser and regrets it – only stays for Barron. And I think the Obamas see that. The photos when Trump and Melania first came to the White House and he jumped out of the car and stormed in so fast she was still picking up her gift from the car – and then, when she did reach the door, both Obamas supported her by literally "having her back."
Thanks all! Sick hugs!