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The Washington Post offers tips on how to keep your EV battery running in frigid temperatures. The link at the end of this graf is supposed to be a "gift link" (from me, Marie Burns, the giftor!), meaning that non-subscribers can read the article. Hope it works: https://wapo.st/3u8Z705

New York Times: Explorer “Ernest Shackleton was sailing for Antarctica on the ship called the Quest, when he died in 1922. Researchers exulted over the discovery of its wreckage, 62 years after it sank in the Labrador Sea [off the coast of Canada. The Quest] ... was carrying him back to Antarctica when he had a heart attack and died in 1922. The Quest sailed on for another 40 years until it sank on a seal-hunting voyage off Canada’s Atlantic coast in 1962.... The expedition to find the Quest was led by the Royal Canadian Geographical Society..., and cost 500,000 Canadian dollars, or about $365,000.... The Quest was the last missing artifact from the 'heroic age of Arctic exploration,' said Martin Brooks, a Shackleton expert....”

Liberals Are No Fun at All: ABC News: "Eight climate protesters were arrested on Wednesday [June 12] after being tackled on the field during the Congressional Baseball Game, U.S. Capitol Police said in a statement. The self-described 'youth-led group,' Climate Defiance, took credit for the protest and shared videos on X of protesters rushing the field, calling the 'Chevron-sponsored' game 'unconscionable.' During the second inning, over half a dozen protesters hopped the fence to the field, wearing shirts stating, 'END FOSSIL FUELS.'" MB: Not sure why it took five ABC News reporters (including one contributor) to write this report. Maybe they all volunteered to be on the silly ball game beat.

"Countless studies have shown that people who spend less time in nature die younger and suffer higher rates of mental and physical ailments." So this Washington Post page allows you to check your own area to see how good your access to nature is.

Spam on a Plane. Some people just have, well, different fetishes. He's got the meats (or whatever Spam is). WashPo link.

Band of Lovers. Washington Post: In "the Battle of Tegyra in 375 B.C., a thousand Spartan soldiers, trained for combat from the age of 7, were returning from an expedition when they stumbled on a much smaller force from the rival city of Thebes. Rather than retreat, the Theban infantry charged, pulling into a close formation and piercing the Spartan lines like a spear. The Spartans turned and, for the first time ever in pitched battle, fled. The most fearsome military force of its day had been defeated by the Sacred Band of Thebes, a shock troop of 150 gay couples.... [The Theban commander] Gorgidas recruited 150 couples skilled in martial combat for his elite corps. This Sacred Band, 300 strong, became Greece’s first professional standing army, housed and fed by the city.... In the end, it took none other than Alexander the Great to bring [The Sacred Band] to heel."

New York Times: "It was only the second spell-off in the history of the Scripps National Spelling Bee, and Bruhat Soma rattled off a head-spinning 29 correctly spelled words in 90 seconds, including heautophany, nachschläge and puszta. Bruhat’s spell-off sprint on Thursday night won him the competition’s trophy, the Scripps Cup, and a grand prize of $50,000. He far surpassed his competitor, Faizan Zaki, a sixth grader from Dallas who correctly spelled 20 words, and also the bee’s previous spell-off record of 22 correct words in 2022, according to Bee officials."

Washington Post: Coastal geologist Darrin Lowery has discovered human artifacts on the tiny (and rapidly eroding) Parsons Island in the Chesapeake Bay that he has dated back 22,000 years, when most of North America would still have been covered with ice and long before most scientists believe humans came to the Americas via the Siberian Peninsula.

Marie: BTW, if you think our government sucks, I invite you to watch the PBS special "The Real story of Mr Bates vs the Post Office," about how the British post office falsely accused hundreds, or perhaps thousands, of subpostmasters of theft and fraud, succeeded in obtaining convictions and jail time, and essentially stole tens of thousands of pounds from some of them. Oh, and lied about it all. A dramatization of the story appeared as a four-part "Masterpiece Theater," which you still may be able to pick it up on your local PBS station. Otherwise, you can catch it here (for now). Just hope this does give our own Postmaster General Extraordinaire Louis DeJoy any ideas.

The Mysterious Roman Dodecahedron. Washington Post: A “group of amateur archaeologists sift[ing] through ... an ancient Roman pit in eastern England [found] ... a Roman dodecahedron, likely to have been placed there 1,700 years earlier.... Each of its pentagon-shaped faces is punctuated by a hole, varying in size, and each of its 20 corners is accented by a semi-spherical knob.” Archaeologists don't know what the Romans used these small dodecahedrons for but the best guess is that they have some religious significance.

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Sunday
Jun072015

The Commentariat -- June 8, 2015

Defunct graphic removed.

Mid-Day Update:

Adam Liptak of the New York Times: "In an important separation-of-powers decision, the Supreme Court on Monday ruled that Congress may not require the State Department to indicate in passports that Jerusalem is part of Israel. The vote was 6 to 3, with Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Antonin Scalia and Samuel A. Alito Jr. dissenting. Justice Anthony M. Kennedy, writing for five justices, said the question of the status of Jerusalem is 'a delicate subject.' But he said the Constitution conferred exclusive authority on the president to recognize foreign governments."

Julie Davis & Michael Shear of the New York Times: "President Obama said on Monday that he has asked the Pentagon for a plan to accelerate the American military's efforts to train and equip Iraqi forces fighting the Islamic State, acknowledging that the militant group's recent gains indicated a need for a shift in strategy.... Earlier Monday, Mr. Obama met with Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi of Iraq, where he reaffirmed the world powers' commitment to supporting Iraq in the fight against the Islamic State, which has made major gains in recent weeks."

Bruce Smith of the (South Carolina) State: "A white former North Charleston police officer was indicted on a murder charge Monday in the fatal shooting of an unarmed black man who was running away from the officer after a traffic stop. The shooting April 4 was captured on video by a bystander and showed officer Michael Slager firing eight times as 50-year-old Walter Scott ran away. The shooting rekindled an ongoing national debate about the treatment of black suspects at the hands of white officers."

*****

Marianne Levine of Politico: "The Obama administration is on the verge of possibly doubling the salary levels that would require employers to pay overtime in the most ambitious government intervention on wages in a decade. And it doesn't need Congress's permission. As early as this week, the Labor Department could propose a rule that would raise the current overtime threshold -- $23,660 -- to as much as $52,000, extending time and a half overtime pay to millions of American workers. The rule has already come under fire from business and Republican opponents who say it will kill jobs and force employers to cut hours for salaried employees."

David Cohen of Politico: "Treasury Secretary Jack Lew was repeatedly booed and heckled Sunday as he spoke in New York City at a Jewish-themed conference sponsored by The Jerusalem Post. Haaretz, an Israeli news organization, characterized the reaction to Lew's remarks 'as one of the surliest reactions ever accorded to such a high-ranking administration official by a Jewish audience in the United States.'" CW: Lew is an Orthodox Jew. ...

... Here's the full text of Lew's remarks, via the Jerusalem Post: not exactly anti-Israel.

Mark Mazzetti, et al., of the New York Times: "Around the world, [the Navy's SEAL Team 6 has] run spying stations disguised as commercial boats, posed as civilian employees of front companies and operated undercover at embassies as male-female pairs, tracking those the United States wants to kill or capture. Those operations are part of the hidden history of the Navy's SEAL Team 6, one of the nation's most mythologized, most secretive and least scrutinized military organizations. Once a small group reserved for specialized but rare missions, the unit best known for killing Osama bin Laden has been transformed by more than a decade of combat into a global manhunting machine. That role reflects America's new way of war, in which conflict is distinguished ... by the relentless killing of suspected militants. Almost everything about SEAL Team 6, a classified Special Operations unit, is shrouded in secrecy...."

Jerry Markon of the Washington Post: "A series of legal setbacks have halted the government's intensive preparations to move forward with President Obama's executive actions shielding millions of illegal immigrants from deportation, even as community organizations continue a rapid push to get ready for the programs, according to U.S. officials and immigrant advocacy groups."

New York Times Editors: "In a suit filed in Federal District Court on April 28, Florida charged that the Obama administration had threatened to cut off federal funding for a separate program that reimburses hospitals for charity care unless the state expanded its Medicaid program. [Gov Rick] Scott said this was an effort to 'force our state further into Obamacare.' This was a preposterous allegation. The two programs are not linked in any way, and the administration had already made clear that it had problems with the charity care program, which was due to expire soon.... Mr. Scott's disingenuous argument illustrates the lengths that some Republican leaders will go to avoid being blamed for not protecting their poor and uninsured citizens by expanding Medicaid, the federal-state program. The Republican governors of Texas [Greg Abbott] and Kansas [Sam Brownback], also apparently needing protective cover, have filed amicus briefs supporting the lawsuit."

strong>Paul Krugman: Be wary of "experts" & experts who tell you what you want to hear.

Janet Hook of the Wall Street Journal: "A new analysis of Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll data finds a marked increase in the share of registered voters identifying themselves as liberals, and an even bigger drop in the share saying they are conservatives.... The analysis by GOP pollster Bill McInturff, who looked at survey data from 2010 to 2015, found that the biggest ideological shifts came among women, young people, Latinos and well-educated voters, as well as people in the West and in cities."

Jeet Heer of the New Republic on why the majority of libertarians are white dudes.

David Pegg of the Guardian: "More people started buying drugs online in 2014 than ever before, despite the closure of the Silk Road website the previous year, according to new research.... The results of the Global Drug Survey 2015, an online survey that attracted more than 100,000 responses from individuals around the world about their drug use, suggests that the site's closure has failed to stem an increase in the number of people buying drugs online.... Other research has indicated that the darknet drug economy is expanding." CW: I would give little credence to an online survey.

Presidential Race

Ha! Jonathan Topaz of Politico: "Bernie Sanders scored 41 percent in a straw poll vote at the Wisconsin Democratic Party convention this weekend -- finishing a close second to Hillary Clinton, who won 49 percent. The Vermont senator received 208 of 511 delegate votes at the state convention in Milwaukee on Saturday, while Clinton won votes from 252 of the delegates, leaving her just short of a majority." ...

... John Queally of Common Dreams: "As Sen. Bernie Sanders continues to attract overflow crowds, it was 'standing-room-only' at a large community center in Keene, New Hampshire on Saturday where the presidential candidate continued to describe how a grassroots-driven 'political revolution' is needed in the country in order to make real progress on debilitating levels inequality and student debt, the increasing threat of climate change, and the firm grip on the nation's democracy held by the billionaire class and corporate interests."

Lydia DePillis of the Washington Post: "In one of the most explicitly union-friendly speeches of her young presidential campaign, Hillary Clinton called in to a convention of low-wage workers Sunday morning to deliver a message of support and solidarity. 'All of you should not have to march in the streets to get a living wage, but thank you for marching in the streets to get that living wage,' she said. 'We need you out there leading the fight against those who would rip away Americans' right to organize, to collective bargaining, to fair pay.'" ...

E. J. Dionne: Hillary "Clinton's proposals [on universal voting] ought to win wide assent.... But the core issue ... involves the same principle that motivated the sponsors of the Voting Rights Act in 1965: Are we a genuinely democratic republic in which the federal government guarantees broad participation, or will state politicians be allowed to shape the electorate to keep a particular class -- i.e., themselves -- in power? The question for the future of American politics is whether Republicans will be forced to moderate and modify their current tilt to the right in response to demographic changes in the electorate, or whether they will manage to keep enough of the new America away from the polls that they don't have to listen to it at all." ...

... Jonathan Martin & Maggie Haberman of the New York Times: "Hillary Rodham Clinton appears to be dispensing with the nationwide electoral strategy that won her husband two terms in the White House and brought white working-class voters and great stretches of what is now red-state America back to Democrats. Instead, she is poised to retrace Barack Obama's far narrower path to the presidency: a campaign focused more on mobilizing supporters in the Great Lakes states and in parts of the West and South than on persuading undecided voters."

Bridgegate, the Sequel. Kate Zernicke of the New York Times: "... a sworn statement by David Wildstein, a former Port Authority official and the admitted mastermind of the [George Washington Bridge] access-lane closings..., describes [New Jersey Gov. Chris] Christie breaking the law as he exercised a heavy hand over state politics from the front office. Mr. Wildstein's statement, in a civil case separate from the federal prosecution in the bridge case, offers the first insider confirmation of a long-rumored tale of New Jersey political corruption, and places Mr. Christie at the center of it. It also portrays the governor, a former United States attorney, casually revealing information about a grand jury proceeding he had overseen, which violates federal law.... Even apart from the potential violation of grand jury laws, the statement reinforces the image of Mr. Christie as an intensely hands-on manager who used the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey, which runs the George Washington Bridge, to deal with political problems. And Mr. Wildstein ... says he has emails and further 'documents to be produced for inspection.'" Wildstein's statement -- actually, objections & answers to interrogatories -- is here. ...

... CW Life Lesson: Do not publicly humiliate a guy who's got the goods on you.

Front Man for the Plan. Patrick Healy & Monica Davey of the New York Times: "More than any of his potential rivals for the White House, [Wisconsin Gov. Scott] Walker, 47, is a product of a loose network of conservative donors, think tanks and talk radio hosts who have spent years preparing the road for a politician who could successfully present their arguments for small government to a broader constituency. Mr. Walker has embraced those goals in Wisconsin, and the promise of his fledgling presidential campaign is to do the same in Washington." ...

... Scott Herbert Walker Bush. Jordyn Phelps of ABC News: "Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker says he wouldn't rule out a full-blown re-invasion of Iraq if he were to become the next commander-in-chief.... Earlier this year, he referred to Ronald Reagan's firing of air traffic controllers in a 1971 strike the 'most significant foreign policy decision of my lifetime' and also suggested that his experience battling union protesters in Wisconsin has helped prepare him to take on ISIS fighters in vying to become the next commander-in-chief." ...

... Andrea Beasley of MSNBC: "Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker said he would favor a constitutional amendment [banning same-sex marriage] if the U.S. Supreme Court rules in favor of same-sex marriage. The Supreme Court’s historic decision on the nationwide legalization of same-sex unions is expected this month. 'I personally believe that marriage is between one man and one woman,' the likely 2016 presidential candidate said on ABC's 'This Week.'"

Richard Luscombe of the Guardian: "... now that he is running for president, and enjoying a popularity surge that placed him top of the crowded field of Republican White House hopefuls in last week's CNN/ORC poll, questions over [Marco] Rubio's fiscal propriety [when he was speaker of the Florida House] appear to be coming back to haunt his campaign. Opponents will seize on his misuse of a party-issued credit card, and separate accusations that he treated hundreds of thousands of dollars in political donations to two conservative action committees he established before he became speaker as a personal slush fund."

Eli Stokols of Politico: Jeb Bush is "going to Germany, Poland and Estonia -- [which] indicates that the focus of the trip will be Russia, a complex problem but one that underlines his central foreign policy argument: that the Obama approach has enabled a more bellicose Vladimir Putin, alienated U.S. allies and made the world less safe.... For Jeb..., the trip is a chance to showcase his gravitas -- and amplify his critique of the Barack Obama/Hillary Clinton foreign policy. That a two-term governor who's taken 89 trips to 22 countries on six continents since leaving office in 2007 is spending his last week before announcing his presidential bid traveling in Europe shows just how much the current primary debate is focused on foreign policy." ...

... Nick Gass of Politico: "Don't expect Barbara Bush to hit the talk-show circuit to publicly support her son in his likely White House bid. 'I've promised that during this next campaign season, I will not talk,' the former first lady told granddaughter Jenna Bush Hager in an interview airing Monday on NBC's 'Today.'"

Margaret Hartmann of New York: "Lindsey Graham has weighed in on Caitlyn Jenner's transition and unlike some Republican presidential candidates, he avoided saying something foolish about transgender people, and even made an effort to use the correct pronouns.... Graham welcomed Jenner to the Republican party.... 'I'm a pro-life, traditional marriage kind of guy' and framed American unity in the most frightening way possible. '... In the eyes of radical Islam, they hate you as much as they hate Caitlyn Jenner,' he said. 'They hate us all because we won't agree to their view of religion. So America, we are all in this together.' Basically, if LGBT Americans aren't that worried about their own rights, but passionately agree that there's 'too much debt, too many terrorists,' Lindsey Graham's their candidate."

John Amato of Crooks & Liars: Fox "News"'s Chris Wallace calls out Rick Santorum for his support of the flat tax. After Wallace explains what a crock it is, Santorum responds, "And I just reject that. I mean, that's just a flat earth way of looking at economic growth." CW: There isn't a GOP candidate out there who lets the facts get in the way when they're carrying water for the rich -- which is always. ...

... ALSO, TOO. On Monday, Santorum had criticized [Pope] Francis for pushing action on global warming, saying the pontiff should leave 'science to the scientists.'

Two points, if he's not a scientist, and, in fact, he does have a degree in chemistry, neither are you ... And the second point is somewhere between 80 percent and 90 percent of scientists who have studied this say that humans, men -- human activity, contributes to climate change. So, I guess the question would be, if he shouldn't talk about it, should you? -- Chris Wallace to Santorum

     ... From a post by Daniel Politi of Slate. Worth reading. CW: It would seem that in Santorum's view, only a "scientist" who abandoned scientific inquiry & declared a theory an immutable fact would have a "legitimate" claim to knowledge. I think this is how the god-mind works: it "knows" certain things -- like what God herself has in mind -- and everything else is "speculative."

Beyond the Beltway

Noelle Phillips of the Denver Post: "A 17-year-old driver behind the wheel of a stolen Honda did not hit two Denver Police Department officers who shot and killed her, according to a letter released by the city on Friday.Still, Denver District Attorney Mitch Morrissey said he will not prosecute Officers Gabriel Jordan and Daniel Greene for the shooting death of Jessica Hernandez on the morning of Jan. 26. The officers were justified because they reasonably believed the teen was accelerating toward Jordan and that he was in imminent danger of being killed or suffering a serious injury, the district attorney wrote in his decision letter."

No Black Kids Allowed. Kim Bellware of the Huffington Post: "A Texas police officer has been suspended pending the outcome of an investigation after video surfaced showing one cop pulling a gun on a crowd of teens at a pool party while others handcuffed teenage partygoers." Funny, pretty much the only teens the cops went after were of a darkish hue. ...

... David Mack of BuzzFeed: "Grace Stone, a white 14-year-old, told BuzzFeed News that when she and her friends objected to the racist comments about public housing an adult [white] woman then became violent.... 'Everyone who was getting put on the ground was black, Mexican, Arabic,' said [Brandon Brooks, the white teen who shot the video & uploaded in on YouTube]. "[The cop] didn't even look at me. It was kind of like I was invisible."

Jennifer Gonnerman of the New Yorker: "Kalief Browder, 1993–2015." ...

When you go over the three years that he spent [in jail] and all the horrific details he endured, it's unbelievable that this could happen to a teen-ager in New York City. He didn't get tortured in some prison camp in another country. It was right here! -- Paul Prestia, Browder's attorney

News Ledes

Los Angeles Times: "Chief executives at the largest U.S. corporations lowered their outlook for economic growth and planned less spending and hiring amid reduced expectations for sales during the next six months, according to a new survey."

CBS News: "The Washington Post's Tehran bureau chief returned for a second hearing Monday in his closed espionage trial at an Iranian court. Jason Rezaian first appeared on May 26, but his lawyer Leila Ahsan didn't get a chance during that session to being mounting her defense against the charges, which Rezaian's family and employer have dismissed as baseless."

Comments Off

Reader Comments (18)

A confrontation (of sorts) between a U.S. Navy ship captain and Spaniards on the high seas. This is hilarious.

href="https://www.facebook.com/brunonumerouno/videos/10152540151601966/">https://www.facebook.com/brunonumerouno/videos/10152540151601966/

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterPD Pepe

Just tried the link to see if it works, and it doesn't. A friend sent this to me via Facebook so maybe that's the problem. I'll see if I can find it another way.

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterPD Pepe

PD your link above was too long, you have to watch those sneaky duplications!!

www.facebook.com/brunonumerouno/videos/10152540151601966/

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterMAG

PD P.S. That video is hilarious!

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterMAG

Rand-om thoughts on a Monday morning.

Whilst passing an eye across an article about Rand Paul's women trouble (women, in droves apparently, are not enamored of Libertarian or even Libertarian-ish "philosophy"), I nearly ran aground upon hitting this breakwater, presented as matter-of-factly as a thunderstorm on a summer afternoon. The writer informs us that The Little One "... is highly competitive among male primary voters, his 13 percent support putting him neck-and-neck with top candidates like Scott Walker (13 percent), Marco Rubio (12 percent) and Jeb Bush (11 percent)"

"Top candidates". Wow. I suppose I show my age here, but when someone writes the phrase "top candidates" in a political piece about Republicans, I'm apt to think perhaps they're talking about serious candidates, maybe a Bob Dole, a Henry Cabot Lodge, or an Ed Brooke, not balmy burlesques of top candidates. To read that phrase and realize it's describing one guy who claims taking on a public employees' union qualifies him as a terrorist's nemesis, another who thinks Adam and Eve rode to the 7-11 on a stegosaurus, and a third guy who says that knowing a certain decision led to infamy, death, destruction and fiscal calamity, he'd happily do it again, as top candidates, is more than a little disconcerting.
______________________

Rick Savonarola, when confronted with facts (see link above) by Chris Wallace--on Fox, fercrissakes--basically says "No, sorry. You're wrong. I'm right". Very mature, there Ricky. Sounds like he's been taking a cue (as so many wingnuts do these days) from Confederate darling, Ayn Rand, hypocrite and moocher extraordinaire and dweller in the Land of Delusion. Rand, in preparation for appearing on Dick Cavett's show to reprise more of her rampageous rationales for sociopathic behaviors, sent the host a list of fifteen demands for appearing on his show, one of which was “There will be no disagreeing with Ms. Rand’s philosophy.” Hmmm...that's what Ricky needs, a demand that his delusions will not be challenged.

________________________

Thinking of the Russian Fraud, I'm again reminded of Lyin' Paul Ryan's declaration that Ayn Rand's "philosophy", such as it is, was the reason he got into public service in the first place. Two things about this. One, Ayn Rand detested even the mention of public service. For her there was only one person deserving of service. Herself. Which means that, two, going into public service because of Ayn Rand is a bit like deciding to become an academic after studying the collected works of Professor Irwin Corey. Without the funny parts.

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterAkhilleus

Caught a bit of the rerun of the Ken Burns documentary on the Roosevelts on PBS this weekend.

At one point, historian William Leuchtenburg reminds viewers of all the many ways FDR improved the lot of millions of Americans against fierce opposition from Republicans: social security, unemployment insurance, the right to collective bargaining, the National Labor Relations Act, the forty hour work week, banking regulations and the FDIC that ensured that citizens with money in the bank would not be victimized by unscrupulous bankers, gambling with other peoples' money.

As he ticked off this list, I was thinking "Shit, Republicans are still against all this stuff today. It's eighty years on and they're still trying to kill these protections against the whims of their masters in the oligarchy."

This is what Hillary needs to be telling people. Every single Republican candidate (even the "top" ones), bar none, want to turn the clock back to the gilded age where people had little recourse to rapacious sociopaths, no rights on the job, and no security if they lost their job, retired, or got sick.

She needs to say this every day, everywhere she goes.

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterAkhilleus

The Navy vs lighthouse video is utterly bogus. That joke was old when I was in the Navy 40 years ago, and doubtless long before that.

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterD.C.Clark

Akhilleus: Or, as my sainted Aunt Maggie (b. 1910) told me years and years ago (and I repeated here a few years back) - "If it weren't for the Democrats we'd all be eating dirt!"

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterPatrick

Words from Snidely Whiplash: "Avoid indulging in snarky, contemptuous dismissals of Americans on the other side." begs Arthur C. Brooks in today's NYTimes. "Three Canadian psychologists found that habitual Internet commenting is strongly correlated with hateful personality pathologies "...The total amount of time spent posting comments online correlated positively with sadism, psychopathy and Machiavellianism."

Does this mean I need to cut back?

D.C. Clark —old, but still funny!

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterMAG

Words from Snidely Whiplash: "Avoid indulging in snarky, contemptuous dismissals of Americans on the other side." begs Arthur C. Brooks in today's NYTimes. "Three Canadian psychologists found that habitual Internet commenting is strongly correlated with hateful personality pathologies "...The total amount of time spent posting comments online correlated positively with sadism, psychopathy and Machiavellianism."

Does this mean I need to cut back?

DC Clark —Old, but still funny!

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterMAG

I found the results of the election in Turkey encouraging as it seemed to be a setback for the Islamist and anti-democratic, anti-West agenda of President Erdogan. As the Times points out:
"Mr. Erdogan’s party was defeated largely because secular Turks, environmentalists, women and urban intellectuals — the crowd that dominated the antigovernment protests in 2013 — rallied to the side of the Peoples’ Democratic Party, or H.D.P., a largely Kurdish bloc."
There go those greenies, feminazis and urban socialists again, having the audacity to vote and encourage others to do the same!

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterVictoria D.

@DC: Indeed, that video IS bogus. Just looked it up. Seems this has been circling around for years. However––it is so funny, and given the blunders of military prowess, it may just have a hint of authenticity. Thanks for informing us, though––terrible for us to think we Americans could make such a miscalculation.

@AK: RE: Roosevelt's improvement of citizen's lot: I was thinking the same thing you were after viewing that documentary––it's the 21st century and the Republicans haven't moved much from then to now. I also remember the deep sadness I felt after watching this––how people loved this president, had his picture on their walls, trusted him, felt he was their friend. I doubt we'll ever see this kind of reverence for a president ever again.
When FDR died, Mrs. Green from across our street couldn't stop crying and when I asked why, did she know him personally? No, my father told me, "she is crying because she loved him––many people did." I have never forgotten that––made a big impression on my young girl's psyche.

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterPD Pepe

Patrick,

I'm pretty sure Republicans have put "Dirt" at the top of the menu for everyone they hate. That'd have to be a mountain of dirt.

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterAkhilleus

Bob Dole said the same thing: that the soldiers loved FDR.

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterBarbarossa

It appears Bernie Sanders never got the memo that he was supposed to be a stalking horse for Hillary. The guy is running like he means it. He's not doing a Bobby Jindal ("Somebody PLEASE pay attention to me soon or I'll say something even stupider!") or a Rick Santorum ("The Pope never cleared that science shit with me!") or a Scott Walker ("Yes Mr. Koch, right away, Mr. Koch."), and he most definitely is not doing a Comb Over Trump ("Secret plan, secret plan, secret plan...can't tell you...").

Sanders is a serious guy for a serious time. The opposition, and I include sizable acreage from Planet Media/Entertainment in that world, think all they have to do is scream "SOCIALIST!" and he'll disappear.

While Bernie Sanders is talking about the real world problems of actual people, Republicans are trying to outdo each other performing stupid ideology tricks, and seeing how many times they can say "Jesus" in a sixty second sound bite, that is, when they're not consumed about how everyone is out to get the Duggars. And the media is right behind them.

Sanders' concern for the problems of real Americans, caused almost exclusively by the big money interests that have forced imbeciles like Scott Walker upon us, will be largely ignored by the media who will instead focus on the pablum puked up by pusillanimous purveyors of Stars and Bars/Up the Rich mentality.

One person, at least, is paying attention to that figure in the rear view mirror, and that's Hillary Clinton. Sanders is not a flash in the pan, he's not the flavor of the month. Anyone who thinks what he's talking about will gain no purchase with voters has forgotten about that mack truck that's coming up right behind him.

Elizabeth Warren.

Go Bernie!

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterAkhilleus

PD,

I sink this one is funnier:

https://youtu.be/gmOTpIVxji8

June 8, 2015 | Unregistered CommenterD.C.Clark
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