New York Times: “Pope Francis was in critical condition on Saturday night after having a long 'asthmatic respiratory crisis' earlier in the day that required 'high flows of oxygen' as well as a blood transfusion, the Vatican said, adding to concerns about the health of the 88-year-old pontiff.”
To keep the Conversation going, please help me by linking news articles, opinion pieces and other political content in today's Comments section.
Link Code: <a href="URL">text</a>
OR here's a link generator. The one I had posted died, then Akhilleus found one, but it too bit the dust. He found yet another, which I've linked here, and as of September 23, 2024, it's working.
OR you can always just block, copy and paste to your comment the URL (Web address) of the page you want to link.
Note for Readers. It is not possible for commenters to "throw" their highlighted links to another window. But you can do that yourself. Right-click on the link and a drop-down box will give you choices as to where you want to open the link: in a new tab, new window or new private window.
Thank you to everyone who has been contributing links to articles & other content in the Comments section of each day's "Conversation." If you're missing the comments, you're missing some vital links.
Marie: Sorry, my countdown clock was unreliable; then it became completely unreliable. I can't keep up with it. Maybe I'll try another one later.
Public Service Announcement
Zoë Schlanger in the Atlantic: "Throw out your black plastic spatula. In a world of plastic consumer goods, avoiding the material entirely requires the fervor of a religious conversion. But getting rid of black plastic kitchen utensils is a low-stakes move, and worth it. Cooking with any plastic is a dubious enterprise, because heat encourages potentially harmful plastic compounds to migrate out of the polymers and potentially into the food. But, as Andrew Turner, a biochemist at the University of Plymouth recently told me, black plastic is particularly crucial to avoid." This is a gift link from laura h.
Mashable: "Following the 2024 presidential election results and [Elon] Musk's support for ... Donald Trump, users have been deactivating en masse. And this time, it appears most everyone has settled on one particular X alternative: Bluesky.... Bluesky has gained more than 100,000 new sign ups per day since the U.S. election on Nov. 5. It now has over 15 million users. It's enjoyed a prolonged stay on the very top of Apple's App Store charts as well. Ready to join? Here's how to get started on Bluesky[.]"
Washington Post: "Americans can again order free rapid coronavirus tests by mail, the Biden administration announced Thursday. People can request four free at-home tests per household through covidtests.gov. They will begin shipping Monday. The move comes ahead of an expected winter wave of coronavirus cases. The September revival of the free testing program is in line with the Biden administration’s strategy to respond to the coronavirus as part of a broader public health campaign to protect Americans from respiratory viruses, including influenza and respiratory syncytial virus (RSV), that surge every fall and winter. But free tests were not mailed during the summer wave, which wastewater surveillance data shows is now receding."
Democrats' Weekly Address
Marie (Feb 23): As far as I can tell, there isn't any. I hope I'm wrong, but it looks like Democrats are so screwed up, they can't even put together a couple of minutes of video to tell us how screwed we are.
New York Times: “Joy Reid’s evening news show on MSNBC is being canceled, part of a far-reaching programming overhaul orchestrated by Rebecca Kutler, the network’s new president, two people familiar with the changes said. The final episode of Ms. Reid’s 7 p.m. show, 'The ReidOut,' is planned for sometime this week, according to the people, who were not authorized to speak publicly. The show, which features in-depth interviews with politicians and other newsmakers, has been a fixture of MSNBC’s lineup for the past five years. MSNBC is planning to replace Ms. Reid’s program with a show led by a trio of anchors: Symone Sanders Townsend, a political commentator and former Democratic strategist; Michael Steele, a former chairman of the Republican National Committee; and Alicia Menendez, the TV journalist, the people said. They currently co-host 'The Weekend,' which airs Saturday and Sunday mornings.” MB: In case you've never seen “The Weekend,” let me assure you it's pretty awful.
As we watch in horror the rapid destruction of our democratic form of government, it is comforting to remember there is life outside politics. I took a break a while ago to enjoy a brief lesson in the history of the moonwalk: ~~~
But it may go back even further:
And this chronological account is helpful:
New York Times: “Chuck Todd, the former 'Meet the Press' moderator and a longtime fixture of NBC’s political coverage, told colleagues on Friday that he was leaving the network. A nearly two-decade veteran of NBC, Mr. Todd said that Friday would be his last day at NBC.... Mr. Todd, 52, is the latest TV news star to step aside at a moment when salaries are being scrutinized — and slashed — by major media companies. Hoda Kotbexited NBC’s 'Today' show this month, and Neil Cavuto of Fox News and CNN’s Chris Wallace departed their cable news homes late last year.”
CNBC: “ CNN plans to lay off hundreds of employees Thursday [Jan. 23] as it refocuses the business around a global digital audience.... The layoffs come as CNN is rearranging its linear TV lineup and building out digital subscription products. The cuts will help CNN lower production costs and consolidate teams, said the people, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss nonpublic changes. Certain shows that are produced in New York or Washington may move to Atlanta, where production can be done more cheaply, said the people. For the most part, the job cuts won’t affect CNN’s most recognizable names, who are under contract, said the people. CNN has about 3,500 employees worldwide.... NBC News is also planning cuts later this week, according to people familiar with the matter who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss nonpublic changes. While the exact number couldn’t be determined, the job losses will be well under 50....”
New York Times: “The president of MSNBC, Rashida Jones, is stepping down from that position, the company said on Tuesday, a major change at the news network just days before ... Donald J. Trump takes office. Rebecca Kutler, senior vice president for content strategy at MSNBC, will succeed Ms. Jones as interim president, effective immediately. Ms. Jones will stay on in an advisory role through March.... MSNBC is among a bundle of cable channels that its parent company, Comcast, is planning to spin out later this year into a new company.” ~~~
~~~ MSNBC: “On Monday, Jan. 20, MSNBC will present wall-to-wall coverage of the inauguration of ... Donald Trump and Vice President-elect JD Vance and will kick off special programming for the first 100 days of the new Trump administration.... On the heels of her field reporting during the last 100 days of the 2024 presidential campaign, Alex Wagner will travel the country to follow the biggest stories as they develop in real-time during Trump’s first 100 days in office, reporting on the impact of his early promises and policies on the electorate for'Trumpland: The First 100 Days.'... During the first 100 days, Rachel Maddow will bring her signature voice and distinct perspective to the anchor desk every weeknight at 9 p.m. ET, offering viewers in-depth analysis of the key issues facing the country at the outset of Trump’s second term. After April 30, 'The Rachel Maddow Show' will return to its regular schedule of Mondays at 9 p.m. ET and Wagner will return to anchoring 'Alex Wagner Tonight' Tuesday through Friday.”
Success is not final, failure is not fatal: it is the courage to continue that counts.
Success is not final, failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts. — Anonymous
A nation of sheep will beget a government of wolves. — Edward R. Murrow
Publisher & Editor: Marie Burns
I have a Bluesky account now. The URL ishttps://bsky.app/profile/marie-burns.bsky.social . When Reality Chex goes down, check my Bluesky page for whatever info I am able to report on the status of Reality Chex. If you can't access the URL, I found that I could Google Bluesky and ask for Marie Burns. Google will include links to accounts for people whose names are, at least in part, Maria Burns, so you'll have to tell Google you looking only for Marie.
Friday
Sep102010
Japanese Model Beats U.S. Rube Goldberg Mock-up
Paul Krugman: "Japan’s performance has been disappointing but not disastrous. And given the policy agenda of America’s right, that’s a performance we may wish we’d managed to match."
What the Japanese didn't have was John Boehner, Mitch McConnell & Jim DeMint. They've never had to look forward to Sen. Rand Paul or possibly even Sen. Sharron Angle.
Surely the main reason our own government did too little in early 2008 was the fault of Republicans. We all remember those closed-door sessions in which, presumably, President Obama tried to explain prudent fiscal policy to Sens. Collins & Snowe. We all remember the Party of No, with the exception of the somewhat confused Ladies of Maine (& then-Republican Sen. Specter), standing firm against sensible economic policy.
Ezra Klein wrote a good post the other day on how much better the stimulus package (& the healthcare bill) would have been if not for the filibuster. He used the apt term "legislating to the lowest common denominator," & there he referred to the Democratic leadership's having to kowtow to ConservaDems' every whim.
As for the handful of House Republicans who voted for the stimulus package, their party's membership rewarded them with threats of primary defeats in 2010.*
I'm surely happy to see that somebody in the Obama Administration figured out Democrats shouldn't be running against Bush, but against Boehner, McConnell, Ryan, Cantor, & the rest of the current crop of economic knuckleheads. Let's hope the Democrats can act like an organized political party for the next two months (okay, fat chance!) & show disengaged American voters the horrors and hardship they will bring down upon themselves if they reward the Party of No -- who brought on, then exascerbated the economic crisis -- with their votes.
* CW: Oops! Exactly zero Republican House members voted for the stimulus bill. It was the eight Republican House votes for a climate bill that engendered the backlash & threats:
Gail Collins writes about a minister in Gainesville, Florida, whom she refuses to name so as not to give him more publicity, who is following "the theory that the best way to honor Americans who died at the hands of religious extremists is to do something that is both religious and extreme." Collins notes that "the candidates running in this year’s elections seem to be superquiet."
The Constant Weader finds some politicians & Gainesville residents with guts:
If you read the Gainesville Sun, you'll find out that many people in Gainesville are rising to the occasion & condemning the crazy Koran burners. Wednesday, 300 people opposing the Koran-burning showed up for an interfaith prayer service at the local Episcopal church. Christian, Muslim, Jewish & Greek Orthodox clerics spoke in solidarity against Terry Jones' planned "protest." Video from the Sun:
Clergy gather at Gainesville's City Hall to speak out against the Koran burning. Gainesville Sun video:
The paper's letters to the editor are pretty much exclusively from Gainesville citizens who are appalled by the Koran-burning plans.
And some Florida politicians are speaking out. The mayor of Gainesville has expressed his opposition from the beginning. Mayor Craig Lowe has also been a victim of Terry Jones' theology of hate: Jones protested Lowe's election because Lowe is gay. The catchy protest slogan: "no homo mayo."
Gov. Charlie Crist, running for Senate as an independent, calls the Koran-burning "offensive" and says he "strongly agrees" with Gen. Petraeus that the Koran-burners are putting American soldiers at risk. Not a peep from Crist's opponents, as far as I can tell.
Some national politicians have spoken out. Ron Paul, who of course is up for re-election to Congress, has blasted Jones. And, oh dear, Sarah Palin calls Jones' plans "insensitive ... much like building a mosque at Ground Zero." That's a direct quote from Palin's Facebook media outlet. (Oh, and sorry, no link.)
Unfortunately, it is unlikely that the Taliban are reading the Gainesville paper & Palin's Facebook page. As long as the media push the story of one Florida nut case & his band of 50 dopey disciples, Jones remains a good sales tool for radical Muslims -- exactly the folks Jones claims he is protesting. Like most crazy people, Jones is evidently incapable of appreciating irony.
Reuters, related: "India led calls on Thursday for the United States to intervene to halt a small church's plan to burn copies of the Koran in commemoration of the September 11 attacks and urged a media blackout to calm tensions." ...
... Gainesville SunUpdate: "The city of Gainesville's top administrator said Wednesday that he will send Terry Jones, the senior pastor at the Dove World Outreach Center, a bill for the estimated tens of thousands of dollars it will cost to police the area if the church goes through with its plan to burn the Quran on Saturday." ...
** Huh? AP Update: "Pastor Terry Jones said Thursday that he decided to cancel his [koran-burning] protest because the leader of a planned Islamic Center near ground zero has agreed to move its controversial location. The agreement couldn't be immediately confirmed." ...
... Change of Heart (not to suggest he has one). AP: "An anti-Islamic preacher backed off and then threatened to reconsider burning the Quran on the anniversary of the 9/11 attacks, angrily accusing a Muslim leader of lying to him Thursday with a promise to move an Islamic center and mosque away from New York's ground zero. The imam planning the center denied there was ever such a deal."
... Gainesville Sun: "A Dove World Outreach Center sign on Southwest 13th Street announcing its 'International Burn a Koran Day' was painted over Wednesday evening by Alachua County sheriff's deputies. The sign was put up on a billboard on property adjacent to the Hoda Center Academy, a mosque and Islamic center, under an agreement between the property owner and church officials."
On Background.Wall Street Journal: Gen. David Petraeus, "the top U.S. commander in Afghanistan, said the planned burning of Qurans on Sept. 11 by a small Florida church could put the lives of American troops in danger and damage the war effort.... [He] said the Taliban would exploit the demonstration for propaganda purposes...."
AP: "Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton on Tuesday called a Florida church's threat to burn copies of the Muslim holy book to mark the ninth anniversary of the Sept. 11 attacks a 'disrespectful, disgraceful act.' Others in the Obama administration weighed in against the proposed burning, including Attorney General Eric Holder, who called it idiotic and dangerous. A State Department spokesman branded the planned protest 'un-American' while other officials warned that it could threaten U.S. troops, diplomats and travelers overseas."
New York Times: "Prominent Christian, Jewish and Muslim leaders held an extraordinary 'emergency summit' meeting in the capital on Tuesday to denounce what they called 'the derision, misinformation and outright bigotry' aimed at American Muslims during the controversy over the proposed Islamic community center near ground zero.... Some of the same religious leaders later met with Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. to urge him to prosecute religious hate crimes aggressively."
Addendum
"The housekeeper noticed a foul smell coming from the chimney." My friend Lulu Moretti has remarked on media coverage of the Case of the Right Rev. Cap'n Kangaroo. Her observations, in part: "... our media love a good story (though I don't think they spent enough time on the doctor who tried to enter her ex-lover's house via the chimney)." Ah, the Constant Weader pleads guilty as charged. Tardy though it may be, here's a link to a Time article on a summertime Santa story gone awfully wrong.
Glenn Greenwaldcomments on President Obama's "State Secrets" Victory. (You knew he would.) ...
.... The New York Times report: "A federal appeals court on Wednesday ruled that former prisoners of the C.I.A. could not sue over their alleged torture in overseas prisons because such a lawsuit might expose secret government information. The sharply divided ruling was a major victory for the Obama administration’s efforts to advance a sweeping view of executive secrecy powers." ...
... The Times' Editorial Board on the decision: "All too often in the past ... secrecy privileges have been used to avoid embarrassing the government, not to protect real secrets. In this case, the embarrassment and the shame to America’s reputation are already too well known." ...
I'm less concerned about the radicals in American than I am concerned about the radicals in the Muslim world.... If we do move, it will strengthen the radicals' ability to recruit and their increasing aggression & violence against our country. -- Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf
Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf speaks to CNN's Soledad O'Brien on "Larry King Live":
... Greg Sargent: "... there's a direct link between public anti-Islam sentiment and public opposition to the construction of Cordoba House.... The evidence can be found in the internals of the new Washington Post poll.... The numbers directly contradict the claim by opponents that public opposition to the project is not linked to broader anti-Islam sentiment, and is only rooted in a desire to be sensitive to 9/11 families or to respect Ground Zero as hallowed ground."
Hey, Hot Dog Guy!
Afghanistan -- Worse than We Thought. Mark Thompson of Time: "a high-powered band of foreign-policy thinkers" concludes that the NATO Afghanistan strategy is not working & is creating more enemies than friends. The report, geared for readers like us rather than for the inside-the-Beltway crowd, offers insights & suggestions on more effective ways to deal with the problems Afghanistan presents. Here's the report index; you can take it from there.
"Legislating to the Lowest Common Denominator." Ezra Klein of the Washington Post on why the filibuster matters. Were it not for the filibuster, the stimulus would have been larger, we would have had a public option to purchase healthcare insurance, & we might even have a climate bill. For starters. Many things don't get done at all because there's not enough appetite for a fight.
Robert Pear of the New York Times: "A new government study says President Obama’s health care law will have negligible effects on total national health spending in the next 10 years, neither slowing nor fueling the explosive growth of medical costs."
John Cassidy of The New Yorker on the President's speech in Cleveland: "Despite being billed as an economic address, his speech was ultimately as much about political strategy as economics." ...
... Here's President Obama speaking to George Stephanopoulos about the economy:
Jeff Zeleny of the New York Times: "... those who know [Rahm] Emanuel well ... believe he is seriously weighing leaving the White House in the wake of Mayor Richard M. Daley’s abrupt announcement on Tuesday that he intends to step down next year." ...
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