Open Thread February 3, 2023

 Posted by at 7:14 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 032023
 

Yesterday, only a day or two after I pointed out that McCarthy had seated Ilhan Omar on the Foreign Affairs Committee, she was kicked off of it. The snake didn’t have the guts to do it himself. He took a vote of the full House. Grrrrr. Also, I want to highlight an article by Robert Reich on the debt ceilling – factual and easy to understand, like everything he writes.

Also, this video was in Wednesday’s video thread, and Lona recommended reporting it here because, essentially, it should be seen by everyone in the country.  She also recommended Freya including it in her action emails, which is up to Freya of course, but I’d concur.

PoliticsGirl – Why Less Tax is Actually More Tax

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Letters from an American – February 1, 2023
Quote – On February 1, 1862, in the early days of the Civil War, the Atlantic Monthly published Julia Ward Howe’s “Battle Hymn of the Republic,” summing up the cause of freedom for which the United States troops would soon be fighting…. [T]he hopes of that moment had crumbled within a decade. Almost a century later, on February 1, 1960, David Richmond, Franklin McCain, Ezell A. Blair Jr., and Joseph McNeil set out to bring them back to life when they sat down on stools at the F.W. Woolworth Company department store lunch counter in Greensboro, North Carolina…. Exactly 63 years later, on February 1, 2023, Tyre Nichols’s family said laid their 29-year-old son to rest in Memphis, Tennessee.
Click through for more detailed history. Mr. and Mrs. Nichols have accepted President Biden’s invitation to attend his State of the Union address. But – will we ever learn?

Washington Post (no paywall) – A Black professor defies DeSantis law restricting lessons on race
Quote – The painful chapter in Florida’s history known as the Newberry Six lynchings is one the university professor has taken pains to help document over decades of research. It’s also one that he fears will be removed from Florida history lessons under a new education law championed by Gov. Ron DeSantis (R) as part of a broader push to root out ideas he deems “woke.”
Click through for story. In DeSantis’s Florida – Desantistan – it’ is not unthinkable that Professor Dun may need to be concerned that he may be lynched. That despite the fact that so many of us, even before 1861 and up to the present – have fought so hard to prevent that.

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Open Thread February 2, 2023

 Posted by at 6:51 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Feb 022023
 

Yesterday, the weather site I use was predicting highs in the 40’s and 50’s for the next ten days, and no snow. That will certainly make life more comfortable for me. While I am of course concerned about the snowpack, snow here does not translate into snow in the snowpack. Menot getting any doesn’t mean the snowpack is a lost cause (of course it also doesn’t mean it isn’t.)  Denver (measured at DIA) did get the heaviest snowfall this year (so far) than they have seen in over ten years.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The Good in Us by Mary L. Trump – A Failing of Basic Humanity
Quote – The great Sherrilyn Ifill [responded] “I suggest that what Friedersdorf sees as failure, is instead his own inability to recognize the power and resilience of white supremacy, and its hold on the institution of American law enforcement. Those of us in this work have long explained the systematic and cultural hard-wiring of racism in policing, while so many leaders in the white community have insisted that it is only “bad apples.” We explained that so deeply-imbedded is the culture of white supremacy in policing that even Black police officers can participate in brutality against Black victims, because they too are responding to the messages of white supremacy in their profession that promotes and rewards officers who know whose lives matter and whose don’t.”
Click through for full opinion. It’s long – but Mary gets it (as does Sherilynn – IIRC a niece of the late Gwen.)

Daily Beast – Racist RSVP Cannot Ruin 9-Year-Old’s Birthday
Quote – Dr. Ijeoma Nnodim Opara[, MD, FAAP, FAIM] sent [her daughter] to school with party invitations [for the girl’s 9th birthday] in bright yellow-and-white envelopes for her close friends. But the daughter still had one of the invitations when she returned home. Her explanation pained Opara as both a Black mother and a physician researcher who studies systemic racism in health care. “She said this person will not be able to come because their grandfather does not like Black people,” Opara told The Daily Beast….
[B]efore Opara spoke, her daughter responded exactly how the mother would have hoped. “She said ‘I know it’s racist, and I told [the classmate] so,’” Opara recalled.
Click through for bittersweet story. So many responded wanting to send her a card that D. Opara is opening a PO Box just for tehm. But it should not have been necessary.

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Open Thread January 24, 2023

 Posted by at 6:42 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 242023
 

Yesterday was a good day to play the New Yorker’s “Name Drop” quiz. The first two clues were obscure but suggestive – but any one of the last four would bave been a dead giveaway to me. So I would think that at least one of them would be a dead giveaway to anyone in my generation. Oddly, my cartoon today is a clue of a sort as well. I doubt whether the author knew that – if he had, he might have rescheduled it a day.  (And p.S.  – first new Randy Rainbow in 5 months in today’s video thread!)

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

The New Yorker – When an Anti-Abortion Activist Calls
Quote – I asked for her phone number and said I would call her right back. I dialled the number, and reached a recorded message from a movie theatre. Then I called my doctor, and he told me that anti-abortion groups pay nurses for lists of women who have had abortions, the same way diaper companies used to pay nurses for lists of women who had given birth.
Click through for story. This is a reprint. It’s from 45 years ago. But it could easily have happened yeaterday. And it’s as infuriating, to me at least, as if it did.

Wonkette – How Are We Flaunting Our ‘Qualified Immunity’ Today?
Quote – Scott County immediately and grossly retaliated with an investigation into the molested boy’s parents. Just three months after the boy’s father threatened a lawsuit, a Missouri Department of Social Services manager, Spring Cook (no apparent relation to Brandon), showed up at the family’s home. And so began the harassment campaign…. A lawyer defended the parents pro-bono, and in August 2019, the Child Abuse and Neglect Review Board (CANRB) found that the charges of neglect were “unsubstantiated under a preponderance of the evidence standard.” The nightmare didn’t end here, though. The parents contend that Cook contacted the FBI, which led to a federal investigation into the charges that CANRB had dismissed.
Click through for details – it’s ugly, but shouldn’t be ignored.

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Open Thread January 1, 2023

 Posted by at 6:55 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Jan 012023
 

Yesterday, the opera wasn’t an opera, but a collection of excerpts from operas previously broadcast, some more or less recently, some way, WAY back. What they had in common was that each was from the Met debut of a singer(/actor/storyteller – plus one conductor) who later became an international star. Kiri Te Kanawa was one, and another was Latonia Moore (you may remember I heard that debut – she stepped in as understudy and I was, like, “Wow!”) Not all, of course, were quite that “A Star Is Born” dramatic – some stars were pretty well established elsewhere before coming to the Met – but some were (Astrid Varnay and Te Kanama). The range was from Moore (2012), the newest, all the way back to Bidu Sayão on February 13, 1937.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

ProPublica – They Called 911 for Help. Police and Prosecutors Used a New Junk Science to Decide They Were Liars.
Quote – Junk science in the justice system is nothing new. But unvarnished correspondence about how prosecutors wield it is hard to come by. It can be next to impossible to see how law enforcement — in league with paid, self-styled “experts” — spreads new, often unproven methods. The system is at its most opaque when prosecutors know evidence is unfit for court but choose to game the rules, hoping judges and juries will believe it and vote to convict.
Click through for details. You thought facial recognition technology was bad? Hold these p[eople’s beer (And I use the term “people” loosely. I questin their humanity.)

National Public Radio – Why scientists dug up the father of genetics, Gregor Mendel, and analyzed his DNA
Quote – Sequencing his DNA revealed genetic variants linked to diabetes, heart problems, and kidney disease. The variant that most intrigued Fairbanks was in a gene that has been associated with epilepsy and neurological issues. “He suffered throughout his life from some sort of a psychological or neurological disorder that caused him to have very severe nervous breakdowns,” says Fairbanks. “That may well have been an inherited condition – and that was a fascinating discovery that these scientists made.”
Click through for story. At first it sounds morbid – but on reflection, I think he would take it in the sirit of homage in which it was done. (He might have even gotten a chuckle out of it.)

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Video Thread 12/26/2022

 Posted by at 11:46 am  Open Thread, Politics
Dec 262022
 

Glenn Kirschner – Trump White House Attorney Stefan Passantino tampers with witness Cassidy Hutchinson

Meidas Touch – DOJ busts INSURRECTIONIST PLOT to ATTACK Investigators

Farron Balanced – Republicans Tout Homeland Security Chief’s Successes While Calling For His Impeachment

Six13 – Elton Johnukah (just barely got it in)

This Perfect Little Baby Is Called A ZEBU

Beau – Let’s talk about responses to Minnesota’s proposed regulations….

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Open Thread November 4, 2022

 Posted by at 11:40 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Nov 042022
 

Yesterday, PolitiZoom reported that Trump** has filed a new lawsuit against Letitia James, the Attorney General of New Yourk. He filed it in FLorida, because reasons. He refers to hmself throughout as “President Trump” as if “President” were his first name. But none of that is the punch line. The punch line is that, in footnote 12, beginning on page 32, he complains about the cost to society of “frivolous lawsuits.” My heart goes out to comedians and cartoonists. How in the world can anyone compete with that level of whatever it is? Also, Paul Peliso was released from the hospital after surgeries to mend his injuries. Good news.

Cartoon –

Short Takes –

Washington Post (free link) – Capitol Police cameras caught break-in at Pelosi home, but no one was watching
Quote – The 911 call and the struggle inside the home that followed have led to charges of attempted homicide of the speaker’s husband, and attempted kidnapping of the speaker, who is second in line to the presidency. The incident has also put a spotlight on the immensity — and perhaps the impossibility — of law enforcement’s task to protect the 535 members of Congress at a time of unprecedented numbers of threats against them…. An external review ordered by Pelosi shortly after the January 2021 attack found that there were more than 230 vacancies in the two months after the insurrection and recommended that the Capitol Police eventually increase the size of its force by roughly 850 officers. That would take years, given that about 100 officers leave or retire each year, and the force is now accepting only about 1 in every 16 candidates.
Click through for article. I am not slamming the Capitol Police. They have 1800 cameras, and while they are not completely unsupervised all night, mu understanding is that the supervision staff consists of two pwople. At lest the cameras providid evidence.

Letters From An American – November 2, 2022
Quote – “Anecdotal data point,” conservative commentator Tom Nichols tweeted this afternoon, “Had lunch with an old friend, a fellow former [Republican] (but not in politics or media or anything) and he said that things feel different after the Pelosi attack. Not sure why. I feel the same thing; not sure that it’ll matter, but have that same sense.”… Nichols is right: something feels different.
Click through for full letter. We need some hope – I hope Heather and Tom are right – but at least the excerpts from President Biden’s speech may help

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Video Thread 10/8/22

 Posted by at 11:42 am  Open Thread, Politics
Oct 082022
 

Glenn Kirschner – Trump’s dangerous post about Mitch McConnell & his wife, and what it says about the Republican party

The Lincoln Project – Last Week In the Republican Party – October 4, 2022

MSNBC – Sore Loser Syndrome’: What Lowered Confidence In Elections Means For Midterms

Robert Reich – This One Thing Made Alex Jones Stop Lying [temporarily – jd]

Armageddon Update – Losers Gonna Lose

Beau – Let’s talk about Psychology and Alameda, California…

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Open Thread September 29, 2022

 Posted by at 6:55 am  Open Thread, Personal, Politics
Sep 292022
 

Yesterday, Colorado Public Radio preovided an update on the death of Christian Glass, which was in a short take on September 15th’s Open Thread. Who knew that (sadly) commonplace police outrage in rural Colorado would turn out to be an international incident? You see, we give birthright citizenship to anyone born on American soil. The UK and New Zealand probably do too, but they also give it to children of there citizens born anywhere in the world. Christian Glass had one parent from each of those countrues … so he had triple citizenship. So now both countries have some questions for the Clear Creek County Sheriff’s Office. Oops!

Cartoon – 29 0929Cartoon.jpg

Short Takes –

Robert Reich – Are record levels of stress inside us — or outside us?
Quote – Studies show that women have nearly double the risk of depression as men. Black people also have higher stress levels — from 2014 to 2019, the suicide rate among Black Americans increased by 30 percent. Are women and Black people suffering from a “disorder,” or are they responding to reality? Or both? White men without college degrees are particularly vulnerable to “deaths of despair” from suicide, overdoses, and alcoholic liver diseases, with contributions from the cardiovascular effects of rising obesity, according to the American Council on Science and Health.
Click through for article. As a person who has experienced clinical depression, controlled with medication, I suggest that both are real. And that stress anxiety/depression and clinical anxiety/depression do not respond to the same coping mechanisms. But also that external stress from an unhealthy society should certainly be minimized, and everyone would feel better if that could happen.

Mother Jones – Don’t Try Serving Ken Paxton With a Subpoena, Unless You Want to Get Shot
Quote – Paxton responded angrily to the Texas Tribune’s write-up of the incident on Tuesday morning, framing the encounter as a precautionary maneuver at a time when elected officials are being subjected to violent threats…. But if it was concern for the safety and well-being of his family that compelled Paxton to flee from a suspicious man with a manila envelope, it’s not really clear why his wife dealt with him. If anyone is familiar with what it’s like to be subpoenaed, it’s the scandal-plagued attorney general of Texas.
Click through for story. Beau of the Fifth Column made a video on this incident also. Paxton must hate the Texas Tribune – it has a deserved reputation for honesty and reliability.

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