Thought we’d have some fun with disco this week.
Disco is a genre of music that peaked in popularity in the late 1970s, though it has since enjoyed brief resurgences including the present day.[10] The term is derived from discothèque (French for “library of phonograph records”, but subsequently used as proper name for nightclubs in Paris[11]). Its initial audiences were club-goers from the African American, gay, Italian American, Latino, and psychedelic communities in New York City and Philadelphia during the late 1960s and early 1970s. Disco also was a reaction against both the domination of rock music and the stigmatization of dance music by the counterculture during this period. Women embraced disco as well, and the music eventually expanded to several other popular groups of the time.[12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19]
In what is considered a forerunner to disco-style clubs, New York City DJ David Mancuso opened The Loft, a members-only private dance club set in his own home, in February 1970.[20][21] Allmusic claims some have argued that Isaac Hayes and Barry White were playing what would be called disco music as early as 1971. According to the music guide, there is disagreement as to what the first disco song was. Claims have been made for Manu Dibango’s “Soul Makossa” (1972), Jerry Butler’s “One Night Affair” (1972), the O’Jays’ “Love Train” (1972, #1 hit), the Hues Corporation’s “Rock the Boat” (1973), and George McCrae’s “Rock Your Baby” (1974).[6][22] The first article about disco was written in September 1973 by Vince Aletti for Rolling Stone magazine.[23] In 1974 New York City’s WPIX-FM premiered the first disco radio show.[21]
Musical influences include funk, Latin and soul music. The disco sound has soaring, often reverberated vocals over a steady “four-on-the-floor” beat, an eighth note (quaver) or 16th note (semi-quaver) hi-hat pattern with an open hi-hat on the off-beat, and a prominent, syncopated electric bass line sometimes consisting of octaves. The Fender Jazz Bass is often associated with disco bass lines, because the instrument itself has a very prominent “voice” in the musical mix. In most disco tracks, strings, horns, electric pianos, and electric guitars create a lush background sound. Orchestral instruments such as the flute are often used for solo melodies, and lead guitar is less frequently used in disco than in rock. Many disco songs employ the use of electronic instruments such as synthesizers.
Well-known late 1970s disco performers included ABBA, Donna Summer, The Bee Gees, KC and the Sunshine Band, The Trammps, Van McCoy, Gloria Gaynor, The Village People, Chic, and The Jacksons—the latter which first dipped its toes into disco as The Jackson 5. Summer would become the first well-known and most popular disco artist—eventually having the title “The Queen of Disco” bestowed upon her by various critics—and would also play a part in pioneering the electronic sound that later became a prominent element of disco. While performers and singers garnered the lion’s share of public attention, producers working behind the scenes played an equal, if not more important role in disco, since they often wrote the songs and created the innovative sounds and production techniques that were part of the “disco sound.”[24]
Many non-disco artists recorded disco songs at the height of disco’s popularity, and films such as Saturday Night Fever and Thank God It’s Friday contributed to disco’s rise in mainstream popularity. Disco was the last mass popular music movement that was driven by the baby boom generation.[25] Disco music was a worldwide phenomenon, but its popularity declined in the United States in the late 1970s. On July 12, 1979, an anti-disco protest in Chicago called “Disco Demolition Night” had shown that an angry backlash against disco and its culture had emerged in the United States. In the subsequent months and years, many musical acts associated with disco struggled to get airplay on the radio. A few artists still managed to score disco hits in the early 1980s, but the term “disco” became unfashionable in the new decade and was eventually replaced by “dance music”, “dance pop”, and other identifiers. Although the production techniques have changed, many successful acts since the 1970s have retained the basic disco beat and mentality, and dance clubs have remained popular.
Rikyrah,
I still love SHAME just as much today as I did back then.
Wrapped in your arms
Is where I want to be
I want to be, want to beeeee
Republican Puppet Chuck Todd Says Democrats Will Lose On Health Care In Midterms
By: Justin Baragona
Monday, April, 21st, 2014, 10:32 am
During Monday’s broadcast of MSNBC’s Morning Joe, Chuck Todd, the network’s Chief White House Correspondent, stated that Democrats will lose on the health care issue in this year’s midterm elections. During the segment, a number of specious arguments were made, some with quite a bit of merit, others (like Todd’s) that just seemed to be talking points straight from the RNC. An interesting discussion did result from Todd’s statements, though, where host Joe Scarborough essentially said that Republicans won’t know what to do on the campaign trail if hit hard on their opposition to the ACA
The discussion began with a short interview with New York Times reporter Jonathan Martin, who wrote a story regarding the complex political issues that Democrats face in the short-term. Martin’s piece argued that the Democratic Party will have issues running on the law as a major achievement because the people who it most positively impacted are the least likely to come out to vote in midterm elections. In essence, Martin said, in the nicest possible way in his article, that minorities and young people are lazy and don’t care about serious issues.
Martin pretty much made the same argument on Morning Joe. This led to Todd being brought on to discuss the strategy of Democrats this year. He claimed that the White House will likely not discuss the health care law much over the coming months. That especially will hold true when the President travels across the country, where he will instead focus solely on an economic message. Basically, President Obama will only want to talk about the ACA when it hits certain positive milestones.
This is where Todd then advanced the message that regardless of how hard Democrats try to campaign on the positive impact of health care reform and push back against the negativity from Republicans, they will still lose on this issue. Todd did say that he feels that Democrats need to start campaigning on the ACA as a way to change public opinion and flip the narrative. However, his message was very clear–Democrats can’t possibly win on the health care law in November.
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/04/21/republican-puppet-chuck-todd-democrats-lose-health-care-midterms.html#comment-354609
Missouri GOP House panel to discuss impeaching Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon
April 21, 2014
BY JASON HANCOCK The Star’s Jefferson City correspondent
JEFFERSON CITY — The long shot effort to remove Gov. Jay Nixon from office will get underway on Wednesday, when a state House committee will hold a hearing on three articles of impeachment.
While the chances that Nixon will actually be impeached are minuscule, the House Judiciary Committee Chairman Stanley Cox had said a hearing would be conducted if the sponsors of the articles of impeachment requested one.
Republican lawmakers have raised three complaints against the Democratic governor they believe rise to the level of misconduct and neglect of duty that warrant impeachment.
http://www.kansascity.com/2014/04/21/4972495/missouri-house-panel-to-discuss.html#storylink=cpy
Leaked Emails Detail “Secret” Frat’s Antics With Drugs, Cops, and Sex
They’re staffers for influential congressmen and PACs. They work at top international banks and consulting firms. Also, they claim to hit women, lie to cops, chase ass, trade pills and hard drugs, and pour “so much champagne on bitches titties.” These are the email confessions of a banned fraternity.
Late last week, someone leaked a 70-page trove of racy emails and texts between the brothers of the Epsilon Iota chapter of Alpha Tau Omega, a fraternity chapter that was banished from American University’s campus way back in 2001 for “serious policy violations which involved hazing and alcohol abuse.” The university continues to warn students off of the rogue frat, saying involvement in EI “could pose risks to students.”
That seems to be the way EI likes it. Since its campus ban, the organization has continued to tally up members and insane behavior, untouched by university regulations; the unrecognized chapter has even pitched itself to prospective members as the “bad-ass” alternative to conventional Greek fraternities.
http://gawker.com/leaked-emails-detail-secret-frats-antics-with-drugs-1565614503
Watch Thug Bullying Elderly Couple On Bus Get Beat Down By Passengers
A video capturing an elderly couple being viciously bullied by an unidentified thug on a New York City bus is going viral on the web. In the cellphone video, an unidentified man is filmed giving the couple a vulgar tongue-lashing and hovering over them in a menacing manner. At one point, the thug gets in the face of the elderly woman and curses at her.
When the elderly man accompanying the woman stands up to his younger opponent, the thug punched him. At this point, the passengers could no longer stand idly by and watch the abuse. Many of the riders sprung to action to defend the elderly couple, pummeling and knocking the man down. The elderly man is even captured on video getting in a few licks of his own, as riders try to restrain the menacing stranger.
http://newsone.com/3006032/watch-thug-bullying-elderly-couple-on-bus-get-beat-down-by-passengers/
http://twitter.com/Ryanintheus/status/458289331464339456/photo/1
Hello 3Chics. Hope you all had a good Easter weekend. As a 70’s child, I’m here for your disco week. So much to choose from so little time. On with my woman Donna “Love to Love You Baby” long version please!
Hi Tyren. Happy belated Easter to you! I’m so feeling you on the 70’s. This decade and the 60’s & 80’s, my favorite decades for music. Of course, I’m a child of the 50’s.
Tale of Two Deltas: Poverty and Affluence Side By Side in Mississippi Town
.The Baptist Town neighborhood of Greenwood, Miss., is mostly black and poor. Across town, life differs for the mostly white, more affluent residents.
Ellen Wilson smokes a menthol cigarette while cooking French fries in the Baptist Town section of Greenwood, Miss. For the past four years, photojournalist Matt Eich has been documenting life in Baptist Town, a largely black and impoverished neighborhood. He was drawn to the area because of the deep socioeconomic divide between blacks and whites.
While blacks make up the majority of Greenwood residents, they are much more likely to be poor than white residents, who make up less than a third of the population. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, about 49 percent of blacks and 8 percent of whites in Greenwood lived below the poverty line in 2010. “While we like to pretend that segregation is behind us, the numbers reflect a different reality in the economically-challenged neighborhood of Baptist Town,” Eich said.
http://www.nbcnews.com/feature/in-plain-sight/tale-two-deltas-poverty-affluence-side-side-mississippi-town-n84451
California Latinos surpass whites in freshman UC admission offers
April 21, 2014, 9:25 a.m.
For the first time, the number of Latinos from California offered freshman admission to the University of California was larger than that for whites.
Reflecting demographic trends, 28.8% of those admitted to at least one UC campus were Latino, compared with 26.8% white. At 36.2%, Asian Americans again made up the largest ethnic group among admitted students from California. Blacks from California were just 4.2%, a number that officials said was disturbingly low.
“It remains a difficult issue for the university,” said Stephen Handel, UC’s associate vice president for undergraduate admissions. “We certainly would like to see more African Americans enrolling at the University of California.”
UCLA admitted 406 black students from California, nine more than last year, representing 4.4% of the accepted pool. Youlonda Copeland-Morgan, UCLA’s associate vice chancellor for enrollment management, said that even though applications from black students increased by about 5% this year, the campus must increase recruiting to better compete with top universities that offer students more financial aid.
State law forbids the use of racial affirmative action in public university admissions
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-uc-california-latinos-surpass-whites-20140421,0,7289404.story#ixzz2zYHm6T9s
Oop! I see BROWN PEOPLE! LOL
Western lawmakers gather in Utah to talk federal land takeover
‘It’s time’ Lawmakers from 9 states gather in Utah, discuss ways to take control of federal lands.
By Kristen Moulton The Salt Lake Tribune
Last Updated Apr 20 2014 12:21 pm
It’s time for Western states to take control of federal lands within their borders, lawmakers and county commissioners from Western states said at Utah’s Capitol on Friday.
More than 50 political leaders from nine states convened for the first time to talk about their joint goal: wresting control of oil-, timber -and mineral-rich lands away from the feds.
“It’s simply time,” said Rep. Ken Ivory, R-West Jordan, who organized the Legislative Summit on the Transfer for Public Lands along with Montana state Sen. Jennifer Fielder. “The urgency is now.”
http://www.sltrib.com/sltrib/politics/57836973-90/utah-lands-lawmakers-federal.html.csp
These MOFOS have really gone nuts.
Justice Stevens Rips Into John Roberts’ Campaign Finance Ruling
Justice Stevens’s Solution for ‘Giant Step in Wrong Direction’
APRIL 21, 2014
WASHINGTON — Justice John Paul Stevens, who turned 94 on Sunday, is a mild man with an even temperament. He has a reverence for the Supreme Court, on which he served for almost 35 years until his retirement in 2010, and he is fond of his former colleagues.
But there was a hint of anger in some of his remarks when I went to see him last week in his Supreme Court chambers. He said the court had made a disastrous wrong turn in its recent string of campaign finance rulings.
“The voter is less important than the man who provides money to the candidate,” he said. “It’s really wrong.”
He talked about what he called a telling flaw in the opening sentence of last month’s big campaign finance ruling. He filled in some new details about the behind-the-scenes maneuvering that led to the Citizens United decision. And he called for a constitutional amendment to address what he said was the grave threat to American democracy caused by the torrent of money in politics.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/04/22/us/politics/justice-stevenss-prescription-for-giant-step-in-wrong-direction.html?_r=3&assetType=nyt_now
How the Left and Right Raise Money is Instructive
by BooMan
Mon Apr 21st, 2014 at 12:35:05 PM EST
The DCCC continues to out-raise the NRCC despite the fact that the Republicans have considerably more seats and that it’s easier for the GOP to collect large donations. This isn’t a bad development, but I’d caution against reading too much into it. Much of the money funding the right is going into PACs and Super PACs rather than straight into the party’s coffers. Also, they don’t have a president to do fundraisers for them.
I think, rather than seeing this as some kind of advantage for the Democrats, we should view it as indicating other things. For example, the Democrats as a whole have more confidence and faith in their party leadership than the Republican base has in their leadership. The Dems are less fractured.
Also, and relatedly, the GOP donor class is more interested than the Dem donor class is running their own show. They’ve learned not only from the party’s past poor performance but also from entrusting their money to ineffectual insiders like Karl Rove.
I don’t think the left is out-raising the right, but they’re doing better at raising money through the traditional channels.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2014/4/21/12355/1699
Louie Gohmert Wants Congress To Arrest Eric Holder
BY Brian Tashman on Monday, 4/21/2014 1:20 pm
In an interview Friday on the Family Research Council’s Washington Watch, Rep. Louie Gohmert said that Congress should considering passing a resolution directing the sergeant at arms to arrest Attorney General Eric Holder.
FRC president Tony Perkins repeated his suggestion from earlier this month that the House sergeant at arms should have “slapped the cuffs on” Holder and “stuffed him down there in the cell in the Capitol” during the State of the Union Address in response to the House GOP’s 2012 vote to hold Holder in contempt of Congress.
In response, Gohmert suggested Republicans consider passing “a resolution directing the Sergeant at Arms to detain anyone who is in contempt of Congress.”
“There is a cell there on Capitol Hill,” he added.
http://www.rightwingwatch.org/content/louie-gohmert-wants-congress-arrest-eric-holder
This hillbilly is one crazy MOFO. But come with it, muthafucka, COME WITH IT.
Love your responses, Ametia!
EVIL ASS MOFOS
………………………………
Florida City About To Make It Illegal For Homeless People To Have Possessions In Public
By Scott Keyes April 21, 2014 at 11:34 am
A backpack. Spare clothes. A notebook. Some keepsake photos. Crackers.
Though they may not have a home in which to secure their stuff, homeless people still have possessions like everyone else.
Yet the city of Ft. Lauderdale, Florida is on the cusp of passing a new regulation that would make it illegal for anyone to store their personal things on public property. Specifically, it would empower police to confiscate any personal possessions stored on public property, provided they have given the homeless person 24-hours notice. If the homeless people wish to retrieve their items, they must pay the city “reasonable charges for storage and removal of the items,” though that fee is waived if the person is able to demonstrate he or she cannot afford to pay. The city may dispose of any possessions not retrieved within 30 days. One of the driving factors behind the measure, according to the legislation, is the city’s “interest in aesthetics.”
Last week, the City Commission gave unanimous preliminary approval to the measure, despite overwhelming opposition from local residents who testified.
One woman, Gazol Tajalli, told Commissioners that is “insanity that we are even here discussing whether an individual can put on the ground the few objects that they own.” Another citizen, Rev. Gail Tapscott of the Unitarian Universalist Church of Ft. Lauderdale, criticized some of the Commissioners for “demoniz[ing]” the homeless.
Maria Foscarinis, Executive Director of the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty, chastised Ft. Lauderdale’s approach. “Maintaining city streets is a legitimate concern, but simply punishing homeless people for leaving their possessions in public places is not an effective or humane way to address it,” she told ThinkProgress. “Instead, city and business leaders should work with advocates and homeless people to develop alternative short and long term solutions, such as public storage options for homeless people and affordable housing.”
http://thinkprogress.org/economy/2014/04/21/3428899/fort-lauderdale-criminalize-homelessness/
https://twitter.com/BlackHistoryUS/status/457639900871790592/photo/1/large
Love Dr. Jemison’s postulate!
House GOP Bill Would Stop Eric Holder From Getting Paid
Dylan Scott – April 21, 2014, 10:40 AM EDT2833
A House Republican has introduced a bill designed to stop Attorney General Eric Holder from being paid his government salary.
The Washington Post reported on the bill, introduced earlier in April by Rep. Blake Farenthold (R-TX). It would require the federal government to withhold the pay of any federal official who is found in contempt of Congress by the House or the Senate until that status is rescinded.
As it stands now, the Post noted, only one currently serving federal official is considered in contempt of Congress: Holder. The House voted in June 2012 to find Holder in contempt for refusing to comply with the House investigation into the Fast and Furious scandal.
In his statement introducing the bill, Farenthold made clear that he was targeting Holder’s paycheck.
“In 2012, the House of Representatives voted to hold Attorney General Eric Holder in contempt of Congress for refusing to turn over documents related to the botched Fast and Furious gun-running sting operation — despite this fact, he is still receiving his paycheck courtesy of American taxpayers,” he said.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/house-gop-bill-eric-holder-salary
https://twitter.com/NoShock/status/458279992342769664/photo/1
Meb Keflezighi, 38, of the United States won the men’s event at the 2014 Boston Marathon, the first American man to do so since 1983. His unofficial time is 2:08:37, according to the race’s Facebook page.
Kenya’s Rita Jeptoo, 33, won her second straight Boston Marathon and set a new course record in the women’s division with a time of 2:18:57, according to the event’s official Twitter account.
At last year’s race, bombs killed three people and injured more than 260 others. Some of the survivors are participating in today’s event.
Obama plans clemency for hundreds of drug offenders
Barbara Scrivner’s long quest for mercy tests a president’s will — and her own faith
DUBLIN, Calif—Scrawled on the inside of Barbara Scrivner’s left arm is a primitive prison tattoo that says “Time Flies.”
If only that were the case.
For Scrivner, time has crawled, it’s dawdled, and on bad days, it’s felt like it’s stood completely still. She was 27 years old when she started serving a 30-year sentence in federal prison for selling a few ounces of methamphetamine. Now, 20 years later, she feels like she’s still living in the early ’90s—she’s never seen or touched a cellphone, she still listens to her favorite band, the Scorpions, and she carefully coats her eyelids in electric blue eye shadow in the morning.
It’s out there, outside of prison, where time flies.
On a sunny afternoon at a federal prison outside San Francisco last month, Scrivner nervously clutched a manila envelope full of photos of herself and her daughter that she keeps in her cell. As she displays the pictures, Scrivner’s daughter Alannah, who was just 2 years old when her mom was put away, changes from a redheaded, freckled young kid to a sullen teen to a struggling young mom. Scrivner changes in the photos, too. At first she’s a plump-cheeked beauty with chestnut-brown hair, then she’s a bleached-blonde woman in her early 30s, before becoming increasingly gaunt as the years grind on.
………………………………
Thousands and thousands of people like Scrivner are serving punishingly long sentences in federal prison based on draconian policies that were a relic of the “tough on crime” antidrug laws of the ’80s and ’90s. Thirty years after skyrocketing urban violence and drug use sparked politicians to impose longer and longer sentences for drug crimes, America now incarcerates a higher rate of its population than any other country in the world. This dubious record has finally provoked a bipartisan backlash against such stiff penalties. The old laws are slowly being repealed.
Now, in his final years in office, Obama has trained his sights on prisoners like Scrivner, and wants to use his previously dormant pardon power as part of a larger strategy to restore fairness to the criminal-justice system. A senior administration official tells Yahoo News the president could grant clemency to “hundreds, perhaps thousands” of people locked up for nonviolent drug crimes by the time he leaves office — a stunning number that hasn’t been seen since Gerald Ford extended amnesty to Vietnam draft dodgers in the 1970s.
The scope of the new clemency initiative is so large that administration officials are preparing a series of personnel and process changes to help them manage the influx of petitions they expect Obama to approve. Among the changes is reforming the recently censured office within the Justice Department responsible for processing pardon petitions. Yahoo News has learned that the pardon attorney, Ronald Rodgers, who was criticized in a 2012 Internal watchdog report for mishandling a high-profile clemency petition, is likely to step down as part of that overhaul. Additional procedures for handling large numbers of clemency petitions could be announced as soon as this week, a senior administration official said, though it could take longer.
http://news.yahoo.com/obama-plans-clemency-for-hundreds-of-drug-offenders–162714911.html?soc_src=mediacontentstory
The Future Of How We Watch Television Is In The Hands Of The Supreme Court
[….] The television ratings company Nielsen classifies nearly 5 million households as “Zero-TV,”
meaning that they either have no television or that they use it only
for DVDs, games and other activities unlike traditional TV watching —
and this is a 150 percent increase in the number of Zero-TV households
since 2007.[….]
While cable and satellite companies must pay a fee to broadcast
copyrighted material that they ultimately transfer to consumers, a
company known as Aereo has found a workaround to this fee.
Under federal
law, broadcast programs are free as long as the consumer owns and
controls the antenna used to catch the broadcast signals.[..] On Tuesday, however the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. v. Aereo, Inc., a case that could potentially shut down Aereo’s ability to take advantage of this loophole.
The case pits Aereo against major broadcast companies
such as ABC, CBS, NBC and Telemundo. If Aereo wins, it could expand TV
on the internet, opening up the market for online-only cable and
satellite TV alternatives. But if the broadcasters win — and even if
they don’t — consumers may have to pay for content that was once free, regardless of whether they actually watch it on TV or online.[…]
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/04/21/3213971/scotus-future-of-television/
First Lady Michelle Obama to Address 2014 Graduating Seniors
This year, First Lady Michelle Obama will deliver commencement addresses at Dillard University, an assembly of high schools in the Topeka, Kansas Public School District, and the District of Columbia College Access Program (DC-CAP). All of these institutions are supporting the First Lady’s higher education initiative and doing their part to answer the President’s call to ensure that by the year 2020, America once again has the highest proportion of college graduates in the world.
The First Lady will deliver remarks at Dillard University because of its legacy as one of America’s top historically black universities; she will address high school students in Topeka, Kansas – home of the landmark U.S. Supreme Court case, Brown vs. Board of Education – which will celebrate its 60th anniversary the same day as the First Lady’s remarks; and she will deliver remarks at the Graduation Celebration of the DC College Access Program (DC-CAP) to highlight the important work that CAP is doing to ensure that first generation, low income students are graduating from high school ready to pursue a higher degree.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2014/04/17/first-lady-michelle-obama-address-2014-graduating-seniors
Conservative heavyweights have solar industry in their sights
The Koch brothers and large utilities have allied to reverse state policies that favor renewable energy. Environmentalists are pushing back, but the fight is spreading and intensifying.
By Evan Halper
April 19, 2014, 9:00 p.m.
WASHINGTON — The political attack ad that ran recently in Arizona had some familiar hallmarks of the genre, including a greedy villain who hogged sweets for himself and made children cry.
But the bad guy, in this case, wasn’t a fat-cat lobbyist or someone’s political opponent.
He was a solar-energy consumer.
Solar, once almost universally regarded as a virtuous, if perhaps over-hyped, energy alternative, has now grown big enough to have enemies.
The Koch brothers, anti-tax activist Grover Norquist and some of the nation’s largest power companies have backed efforts in recent months to roll back state policies that favor green energy. The conservative luminaries have pushed campaigns in Kansas, North Carolina and Arizona, with the battle rapidly spreading to other states.
Alarmed environmentalists and their allies in the solar industry have fought back, battling the other side to a draw so far. Both sides say the fight is growing more intense as new states, including Ohio, South Carolina and Washington, enter the fray.
http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-solar-kochs-20140420,0,7412286.story#ixzz2zXAks5Jf
Kochs, conservative allies align against solar
04/21/14 10:45 AM
By Steve Benen
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recently did its level best to alert the public to a genuine global crisis: climate change is accelerating and the need for action is critical. The IPCC’s report highlighted some sings of preliminary progress, however, including sharp reductions in the costs of renewable energy.
A New York Times editorial this morning talked about a “plausible pathway” to success through binding emission reduction targets and a vast increase in the use of renewable sources like wind and solar.
As we talked about last week, it’s against this backdrop that Oklahoma policymakers approved a bill, endorsed by major electric utilities, to make renewable energy more expensive, on purpose. Consumers who install solar panels or wind turbines are now slated to pay extra changes.
The L.A. Times reports that Americans can expect to see a lot more of this: “Solar, once almost universally regarded as a virtuous, if perhaps over-hyped, energy alternative, has now grown big enough to have enemies.”
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/kochs-conservative-allies-align-against
Justice Scalia Tells Law Students ‘Perhaps You Should Revolt’ If Taxes Become Too High
During an event at the University of Tennessee’s law school on Tuesday, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia suggested to the capacity crowd that perhaps they should revolt against the U.S government if their taxes ever get too high.[….] The remark, first reported by the Knoxville News Sentinel, has become a common rhetorical flourish for conservatives nationwide during the Obama presidency.
A state Tea Party chairman in Mississippi called for armed rebellion ahead of Obama’s reelection in 2012, and a Texas Judge told a local news station that he was prepared to join a “civil war” if Obama agreed to sign away U.S sovereignty to the United Nations. Michele Bachmann found herself in hot water in 2009, shortly after Obama took office, for calling upon a violent uprising against Obama, and faced accusations of using treasonous language.[….]
http://thinkprogress.org/justice/2014/04/19/3428747/scalia-taxes-revolt/
Heller sees Bundy, allies as ‘patriots’
04/21/14 09:27 AM—Updated 04/21/14 09:50 AM
By Steve Benen
Last Thursday, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) responded to the standoff at Cliven Bundy’s Nevada ranch in very forceful terms. “Those people who hold themselves out to be patriots are not,” Reid said. “They’re nothing more than domestic terrorists,”
A day later, Reid appeared alongside his fellow Nevada senator, Republican Dean Heller, for a joint appearance on Las Vegas’ NBC affiliate. They apparently don’t see eye to eye.
“What Sen. Reid may call domestic terrorists, I call patriots,” GOP Sen. Dean Heller said during the rare joint appearance on KSNV-TV. “We have a very different view on this.” […]
“It’s a pretty broad brush,” Heller said Reid is using in making the “domestic terrorist” charge. “When you have boy scouts there, you have veterans at the event, you have grandparents at the event.”
I think it’s probably safe to say Reid, when raising the specter of domestic terrorism, was referring to well-armed militia activists who risked creating a violent incident at Bundy’s ranch, not boy scouts.
Heller added, “I take more issues with BLM coming in with a paramilitary army of people, individuals with snipers, and I’m talking to people and groups that were there at the event, and to have your own government with sniper lenses on you, it made a lot of people very uncomfortable.”
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/heller-sees-bundy-allies-patriots
Wanker of the Day: Robert Samuelson
by BooMan
Mon Apr 21st, 2014 at 09:44:14 AM EST
Robert Samuelson actually wrote the following as the concluding paragraph of his column today:
Let’s look at this:
Premise A: less income inequality would be better.
Premise B: political action to create less income inequality would not be better.
Conclusion: Since A does not equal B, confidence fairies, ponies, and rainbows.
If you don’t want higher taxation on the rich, you should just say so. No rationale is really required. But to present this as a logical argument is beyond embarrassing. It’s a preference.
Insofar as there is any logic to it, the argument is that the government cannot take action to lower income inequality because that would “bruise” rich people and cause them to lose confidence, which would cause them to withdraw from investment opportunities, which would lessen economic growth, which would hurt everyone and solve nothing.
One problem with this argument is that Samuelson acknowledges that there was a time when income inequality wasn’t so great in this country:
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2014/4/21/94414/4368
Parents Outraged After Finding Easter Eggs Filled With Racist Notes
Updated: Apr 21, 2014 4:53 AM EDT
By WRIC Newsroom – email
HENRICO COUNTY, Va. (WRIC) -Parents in the West End are outraged after waking up to find Easter eggs filled with racist notes.
“You can hit the whole world with the Internet, stay out of my yard.”
The Smiths were having an egg hunt with their 3-year-old son Sunday afternoon. It’s an Easter tradition that was interrupted after an upsetting discovery.
“My husband noticed the last Easter egg and i knew it wasn’t one that put out. we opened it and it’s got the white supremacist stuff in it,” said Jackie Smith.
Inside the egg was the message “diversity = white genocide.” It said, “Mass immigration and forced assimilation of non-whites into our lands is genocide.”
“I think it’s absurd,” said Brandon Smith. He went around their college hill neighborhood looking for more of the eggs and alerting parents so other children wouldn’t find them.
“We don’t want other kids around here who can read being like, ‘Hey mommy what’s the million man white march or what’s the genocide project?’ Most of us don’t want to explain genocide to our 6-year-olds,” said Jackie.
http://www.wric.com/story/25293952/parents-outraged-after-finding-easter-eggs-filled-with-racist-notes
Jimmy Carter: ‘Race’ motivates white men to vote Republican
by theGrio | April 11, 2014 at 9:28 AM
ormer president Jimmy Carter is never shy about speaking his mind on modern politics.
And in a no holds barred interview with Salon, the “Man from Plains” spoke plainly about why a generation of white men have solidly embraced the Republican party in multiple elections.
“It’s race. That’s been prevalent in the South…. Ever since Nixon ran — and ever since Johnson didn’t campaign in the deep South, the Republicans have solidified their hold there,” he said.
Carter also said that GOP attacks on programs like food stamps have a coded appeal for the wealthy.
“Those kind of things just exalt the higher class, which is the whites, and they draw a subtle, but very effective racial line throughout the South,” Carter said.
http://thegrio.com/2014/04/11/jimmy-carter-race-motivates-white-men-to-vote-republican/
Rush Limbaugh Is Going Down, And It Can’t Come Soon Enough
Author: Ryan Denson April 20, 2014 6:31 pm
Rush Limbaugh has been around for over twenty years. For twenty years, the misogynistic pig has plagued our airways with outrageous speech, offensive rhetoric, and sheer stupidity to a mass of equally stupid people. However, just two years ago, grassroots groups like BoycottRush and StopRush put their feet down and said enough is enough, and began a massive national boycott movement which took storm to expose Limbaugh for his truly offensive ways, with the goal of destroying his hateful career. Conservatives can pipe up about Limbaugh’s “freedom of speech,” for it is his sponsors who can choose what to do with their money.
Facing possible probes of illegal funding based on political agenda, right-wing think tank The Heritage Foundation ended its five-year sponsorship of Limbaugh’s circus act show after paying a total of $9.5 million over the course of the partnership. If someone receives money from an organization like The Heritage Foundation, who pays you to promote their product (in this case a slanted political opinion), without directly telling the audience the source of funding, it may be considered ‘payola,’ which is illegal. It’s like a business paying for positive reviews. So they paid $9,5 million, and when they realized it might be illegal, they pulled out.
http://www.addictinginfo.org/2014/04/20/rush-limbaugh-going-cant-come-soon-enough/
Michael Strahan reaches new heights for pro athletes in retirement
by Veronica Miller | April 3, 2014 at 9:14 AM
ichael Strahan is moving up, to ABC’s Good Morning America.
The retired New York Giants star and current co-host of Live! with Kelly and Michael announced yesterday that he would soon be joining the team at GMA.
Strahan seems to be effortlessly getting into the groove of his second career (dubbed “The Fifth Quarter” by the New York Times) with great results. A man once known for his relentless pursuit of quarterbacks has successfully shown the world that he’s also a sparkling media presence, evidenced by the wacky gags on Live! and his incisive analysis on Fox NFL Sunday.
And while plenty of former NFL stars move on to careers in broadcasting, Strahan’s success is a remarkable story, one that even amazes some of his contemporaries.
Before becoming a television darling, Strahan spent fifteen years with the Giants, setting the record for number of sacks in the 2001 season and snagging a Super Bowl trophy in 2007, just before his retirement. He was inducted into the Pro Football Hall of Fame earlier this year.
As for his media career, Strahan has had a couple of misses (anyone remember his Fox sitcom Brothers?) but mostly hits, between landing a plum daytime-TV gig and appearing in commercials for Subway, Vaseline and other brands. His affable personality and big smile have made him a bankable personality, and has been credited with helping Live! achieve its highest ratings since Regis Philbin left the show in 2011.
http://thegrio.com/2014/04/03/michael-strahan-reaches-new-heights-for-pro-athletes-in-retirement/
Two Reasons To Vote Out Republicans – Scalia the Seditionist and Thomas the Corrupt
By: Adalia Woodbury
Monday, April, 21st, 2014, 8:51 am
Tea Party Republicans have their eye on the Senate for many reasons – with the power to appoint another Scalia or Thomas chief among them. Nothing would please Republicans more than to give Scalia judicial support when he makes seditious comments like suggesting armed rebellion if you think taxes are too high and argues that the right to vote free of discrimination is “some sort of black entitlement.” Of course, no Scalia is complete without a dynamic Tea Party duo like Clarence and Ginni Thomas
Two Supreme Court justices with ties to the Koch Brothers and one whose wife is on the Koch Brother payroll reflect what Tea Party “jurisprudence” looks like. It’s the sort of jurisprudence that would overturn Roe v. Wade, The New York Times v Sullivan and other rulings that coincide with the U.S. constitution as we know it.
A Kochist dominated Supreme Court would favor a corporation’s imposition of its religious beliefs on its employees and the community at large. It would reshape the constitution to reflect Kochist ideology in which corporations are people except when being a person entails responsibility or accountability. True to Kochism, the SCOTUS would support laws that reduce racial minorities to on slave wages and all of us to slave like work conditions. Women are reduced to”hosts” of future Kochist soldiers under the forced marriage laws envisioned by the Koch brothers. The LGBT community would be subject to the sort of policies resembling those of Putin’s Russia.
Antonin Scalia is the SCOTUS clown car ringleader, with Clarence Thomas as his Koch brother sidekick. While they have a generally cordial relationship with the Republican wing of the SCOTUS, when they disagree on an already restrictive interpretation of the constitution, you can count on Scalia and Thomas for an interpretation even more extreme and completely inconsistent with U.S. jurisprudence. They have overturned settled law and decades of jurisprudence to advance an agenda from which Thomas has financially benefited and both justices have numerous ties.
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/04/21/reasons-vote-2014-scalia-seditionist-thomas-corrupt.html
Mitch McConnell Says He Stood Up for Women in a Senate Sexual-Harassment Scandal. The Real Story Is Damning.
McConnell claims he led a 1995 investigation against a GOP senator accused of sexual misconduct. Actually, he took steps to keep it quiet.
—By Molly Redden
| Fri Apr. 18, 2014 3:00 AM PDT
Facing his toughest reelection battle in years against a well-known and well-financed female opponent, Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) recently boasted that he led the Senate in ousting a GOP colleague accused of sexual harassment in 1995. But news reports from that time show that late in the investigation, McConnell tried to stall the probe against his fellow Republican, Sen. Bob Packwood (R-Ore.). He derided efforts by Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) to hold public hearings on Packwood as “frolic and detour”—after the Senate ethics committee had substantiated nearly two-dozen claims of sexual harassment leveled against Packwood by female lobbyists and former staffers.
Talking about the Packwood scandal this past week, McConnell noted that he was chair of the Senate ethics committee when Packwood resigned. In a Tuesday interview with the Lexington Herald-Leader, McConnell said he had taken “the toughest possible position.” The newspaper reported that McConnell had “offered himself as an example of how elected officials should handle situations when a member of their own party is accused of sexual harassment.”
But the bulk of the ethics probe against Packwood took place when the committee was chaired by a Democrat. When Republicans regained a majority in the Senate after the 1994 elections and McConnell became chair of the committee, he transformed the Packwood investigation into a partisan mess.
http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/04/mitch-mcconnell-bob-packwood-sexual-harassment
How The Media Distorts Numbers And Provides False Information To Fool Low-Wage Workers
By: Dennis S
Sunday, April, 20th, 2014, 9:01 pm
Saturday, I emailed my reaction to two stories, in slightly stinging prose, to a popular local newspaper column. I expressed concern about some mistakes and what I considered the misleading politicizing of income numbers. My offering didn’t make it into the maximum circulation Sunday edition. If history is any guide, there’s little chance of making any edition.
To the great distaste of my local paper, I’m convinced, I wrote of one particular issue where print and electronic media outlets need to take responsibility for their troubling parroting of Republican “facts” that are, in fact, pure propaganda. There also seems to be a journalistic epidemic of misinformation based on the lack of familiarity with the subject matter, little research by reporters and, in many cases, severe under-staffing.
This contribution roughly reflects what I wrote for Upstate South Carolina consumption. It involves two separate stories published days apart in the newspaper. In their content are elements that you must recognize as both uninformed and politically sneaky. The stories involve presentations to the City Council that have little to do with economic development, but do involve wages and certain definitions that are both confusing and what appear to be intentionally misleading. Part one of this questionable journalism involves two terms that are often used interchangeably when describing earnings levels. The terms are average and median. Workers can be making a certain income, couched as either the ‘average’ income of that worker or the ‘median’ income of said worker.
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/04/20/media-distorts-numbers-false-information-fool-low-wage-workers.html
https://twitter.com/amk4obama/status/458057967233794048/photo/1
David Dinkins on death of Basil Paterson: Harlem’s ‘Gang of Four is no more’
by Donovan X. Ramsey | April 18, 2014 at 5:17 PM
New York City lost one of its most powerful progressive forces Wednesday with the passing of Basil Paterson.
As a member of the influential “Gang of Four” Paterson – along with former Mayor David Dinkins, late civil rights activist Percy Sutton, and Congressman Charles Rangel – helped to develop the economic and political capital of the city’s black community.
With Paterson and Sutton both now deceased, many are now looking back on the legacy of the Gang of Four and wondering if there is a void in New York City’s black political leadership.
Forming the “Gang of Four”
The four men were forged into a coalition by outside forces. In 1985, former New York congressman Herman Badillo was interested in becoming mayor of the city but needed the backing of prominent black leaders.
According to Dinkins, a meeting of 30 to 35 leaders was convened. Badillo went in expecting to receive the group’s blessing but was taken by surprise when one of the men, Herman “Denny” Farrell, made a last-minute appeal for his own candidacy. The group was swayed and backed Farrell. Afterwards, an incensed Badillo placed the blame at the feet of Paterson, Sutton, Rangel and Dinkins.
In a press conference, he blasted them as the “gang of four” responsible for torpedoing his candidacy.
“We really weren’t to blame,” said Dinkins in an interview with theGrio. “Actually, in the meeting that resulted in Denny getting the backing, we didn’t even speak — not so much as cleared our throats, but we were blamed. So we wore it as a badge of honor, like Nixon’s Enemies List.”
The name and their bond stuck. In years to come, all four would all rise in influence in local and national politics, working together and helping each other along the way.
http://thegrio.com/2014/04/18/david-dinkins-on-death-of-basil-paterson-harlems-gang-of-four-is-no-more/
Happy Easter! Celebrate the holiday with the Obamas (SLIDESHOW)
by theGrio | April 20, 2014 at 6:39 AM
very year the first family participates in an epic Easter egg roll and don their Sunday best to attend holidays services in the nation’s capital.
No matter what your politics are, it’s undeniable that the Obamas are one of the most photogenic first families in history.
So in the spirit of the season, theGrio has put together this slideshow of images from their first year in the White House (2009) through today.
http://thegrio.com/2014/04/20/happy-easter-celebrate-the-holiday-with-the-obamas-slideshow/#s:president-obama-and-family-go-to-sunday-church
From TOD:
https://twitter.com/laura_nelson/status/458074582071537664/photo/1
https://twitter.com/LearnSomethlng/status/458075700701188096/photo/1
April 17, 2014
Justices Scalia and Ginsburg on the First Amendment and Freedom
Justices Antonin Scalia and Ruth Bader Ginsburg talked about their views of the First Amendment and the origins and contemporary meanings
C-SPAN
http://www.c-span.org/video/?318884-1/conversation-justices-scalia-ginsburg
And the children shall teach the adults how it’s done. I think a tear drop just landed on my keyboard.
https://twitter.com/LifeHeIp/status/457602780924895232/photo/1
https://twitter.com/emptychampagne/status/457598762282536960/photo/1
Ummm….
Ummm…..
https://twitter.com/emptychampagne/status/457599119695953920/photo/1
OMG. NO.WORDS.
NBC Hired Psychological Consultant to Evaluate David Gregory
by Noah Rothman | 7:59 am, April 21st, 2014
NBC’s Meet the Press, the longest running program in television history, has fallen to a solid third place behind its network competitors, ABC’s This Week and CBS’ Face the Nation.
In August of 2013, MTP fell to a 21-year ratings low against it’s competitors and sagged among viewers in the key demographic, aged 25 – 54, to a level of viewership unseen since 1991-1992. The ratings have not recovered since. CBS host Bob Schieffer currently scores the highest ratings with coveted younger viewers.
Amid this ratings meltdown, The Washington Post reported on Monday that NBC is seriously evaluating MTP host David Gregory‘s performance. “Gregory’s job does not appear to be in any immediate jeopardy, but there are plenty of signs of concern,” The Post‘s Paul Farhi reported.
http://www.mediaite.com/tv/nbc-hired-psychological-consultant-to-evaluate-david-gregory/
Live with Kelly and Michael to Host Michelle Obama
April 18, 2014 7:53 AM by Digital Spy
Live with Kelly and Michael will cover the annual White House Easter Egg Roll next week.
The Monday, April 21 edition of the daytime series will be simulcast for the first time from Washington DC and New York City.
http://www.marieclaire.com/blog/live-with-kelly-and-michael-to-have-michelle-obama-interview-digital-spy?src=spr_TWITTER&spr_id=1449_53961352
https://twitter.com/Elverojaguar/status/458093589441314816/photo/1
Putting the GOP line on jobless aid to the test
04/18/14 04:49 PM
By Steve Benen
When congressional Republicans explain their opposition to extended unemployment benefits, they don’t say, “We dislike jobless Americans.” They actually argue the opposite: they like the unemployed and want what’s best for them, so GOP lawmakers have cut off benefits so jobless Americans will have no choice but to accept an available position, re-enter the workforce, and earn a paycheck worth more than a government check.
In effect, it’s just tough love. The jobless will thank them later.
What’s more, taking this argument one step further, congressional Republicans also believe they’ve been proven right. After the GOP cut off extended benefits a few days after Christmas, the job picture has been pretty good – over 530,000 jobs were created from January through March – and workforce participation has improved. “See?” Republicans replied, “we were right all along.”
Except, as Ben Casselman noted, they really weren’t.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/putting-the-gop-line-jobless-aid
https://twitter.com/TheUniverse1981/status/458162374714064896/photo/1
Foreign policy and the definition of ‘manhood’
04/21/14 08:00 AM
By Steve Benen
On “Meet the Press” yesterday, Sen. Bob Corker (R-Tenn.), the ranking member on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, sounded a deeply pessimistic note about Russian incursions into Ukraine. “I think we’re going to lose eastern Ukraine if we continue as we are, and I think it’s going to be a geopolitical disaster if that occurs,” Corker told David Gregory.
Naturally, the Republican senator blamed the Obama administration, complaining that U.S. foreign policy “is always a day late and a dollar short,” adding that that Russia’s actions are emblematic of the “era of permissiveness the U.S. has created around the world.”
It was the New York Times’ David Brooks, however, that took this same line of criticism to its “crude” limit.
As Ben Armbruster noted, Chuck Todd echoed the sentiment, adding, “By the way, internally, they fear this. You know, it’s not just Bob Corker saying it, okay, questioning whether the president is being alpha male. That’s essentially what he’s saying: He’s not alpha dog enough. His rhetoric isn’t tough enough.”
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/foreign-policy-and-the-definition
Conservatives’ exaggerated sense of contraception access
04/21/14 08:42 AM
By Steve Benen
A couple of years ago, when conservative opposition to contraception access was starting to become more common, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) was asked about the millions of American women who can’t afford access to birth control. The Republican replied, “My wife actually went online here in Wisconsin and typed in, ‘what if I can’t afford birth control?’ Came up, bam. If you can’t afford it, you can get birth control in this country.”
Asked what he meant, Johnson added, “You can get it. Go online, type it in. It’s easy to get.”
It seemed that in the senator’s mind, women can go online and “bam,” contraceptives are readily available for little or no cost.
Yesterday on CBS’s “Face the Nation,” the archbishop of New York, Cardinal Timothy Dolan sounded a similar note. After endorsing the Hobby Lobby case at the Supreme Court, which says employers can deny birth control coverage to employees because corporations are people with their own distinct religious belief, Dolan was asked about the dangers of a private company using religion to deny benefits to its employees.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/conservatives-exaggerated-sense
Fox News Sunday Dabbles In Obamacare Enrollment Trutherism and Repeal Fantasies
By: Justin Baragona
Sunday, April, 20th, 2014, 2:45 pm
During the Easter Sunday broadcast of Fox News Sunday, host Chris Wallace used some of the show’s time to further the Republican belief that the GOP should still run against the ACA. Basically, the position taken by Wallace and the conservative members of the panel is that Democrats cannot possibly win by touting the law and its positive impact. Therefore, despite the fact that millions of people have signed up for private insurance plans due to the law, and rising costs of health care have slowed down, Wallace and Co. feel that the GOP should still use the health care law as a way to defeat Democrats in the November midterms.
To begin this segment, Wallace played a clip of the President saying the repeal debate is over. Wallace then segued to asking conservative columnist George Will if the repeal debate was really over.
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/04/20/fox-news-sunday-dabbles-obamacare-enrollment-trutherism-repeal-fantasies.html
Sunday, April 20, 2014
Your Sunday Long Read
This depressing, saddening and altogether heartbreaking ProPublica article by Nikole Hannah-Jones on school re-segregation in America should definitely spur some action. It’s evidence that the Bush-era civil rights division of the Justice Department, which started releasing school districts from busing orders almost immediately and for 8 years, has done so much damage to the public education system in this country that as we approach the 60th anniversary of Brown v Board of Education, one has to wonder if the decision even matters anymore in places like Tuscaloosa.
http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2014/04/your-sunday-long-read.html
Sunday, April 20, 2014
Another Milepost On The Road To Oblivion
CNN’s Ashley Fantz asks:
Can the Klan rebrand?
Because as white supremacists like Frazier Glenn Miller are shooting people and shouting “Heil Hitler” the real problem in 2014 with the Aryan movement is lack of marketing.
……………………………………
There’s no chance that the Klan could rebrand and these are all dangerous, hate-filled lunatics, but somebody felt the need to write 5,000 words to give us the “both sides” of this “argument” in 2014. How nice.
http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2014/04/another-milepost-on-road-to-oblivion_20.html
New York Times’ Ross Douthat Offers Another Weak, Factless GOP Repudiation of Inequality
By: Becky Sarwate
Sunday, April, 20th, 2014, 8:25 pm
I am not an economist. Although I appreciate data of all kinds, especially the economic variety, as a useful tool for driving policy, I’m not into hard number crunching as a form of amusement. I leave that in the capable hands of experts such as Nate Silver, Nobel Prize-winning guru Paul Krugman and others who may interpret the statistics through a liberal lens, but abstain from playing games with the raw facts.
The aforementioned Krugman has referred to the 2014 “it” text of economic circles across several of his Winter and Spring New York Times columns. I’m speaking of course of Thomas Piketty’s Capital in the Twenty-First Century. In Krugman’s March 23 piece, “Wealth Over Work,” he describes Piketty’s book as doing “more than document the growing concentration of income in the hands of a small economic elite. He also makes a powerful case that we’re on the way back to ‘patrimonial capitalism,’ in which the commanding heights of the economy are dominated not just by wealth, but also by inherited wealth, in which birth matters more than effort and talent.” Just prior to this description, Krugman labels Piketty’s work the most “important economics book of the year — and maybe of the decade.”
They don’t go around handing out Nobel Prizes for nothing, so when Krugman speaks in these terms, sensible people (real ones, not the Paul Ryan pretenders) tend to listen. And predictably, the right wing cottage industry that is dedicated to undermining Krugman and others who argue that their much vaunted “job creators” aren’t generating much besides personal wealth, have to articulate and repeat some sort of disingenuous response.
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/04/20/york-times-ross-douthat-offers-weak-factless-gop-repudiation-inequality.html
Sunday, April 20, 2014
Last Call For Burying The Lede
The Associated Press story on Missouri Republicans’ latest nullification nonsense gets buried to the point of the final paragraph. It starts off well enough:
Well sure, that’s standard GOP idiocy that’s patently unconstitutional. The Supremacy Clause has been settled precedent for decades now: states can’t pass laws that specifically refuse to enforce federal ones. The Missouri GOP wants to not only make enforcement of federal gun control laws a crime, they now want to end the law enforcement careers of those who enforce these federal laws, and they reserve the right to declare which laws are unconstitutional.
The only thing keeping these bills from becoming law is Democratic Gov. Jay Nixon.
http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/
Dems Better Say It Loud; We Support Obamacare And We’re Proud
By: Black Liberal Boomer
Sunday, April, 20th, 2014, 7:14 pm
Now that President Obama’s Affordable Health Care Act has begun to surpass even his own administration’s expectations for success, perhaps, as the New York Times editorial board suggests, it’s time for the Democrats to come out of hiding and actually fight for themselves and what they believe in rather than trying to perpetually run scared at the slightest hint of distress. And considering the fact that the NYT hasn’t exactly been known for it’s unabashed support of the President in recent years, the pro-Obama stance of this editorial is worth noting. The Times, like so many other mainstream news organizations, went overboard during their coverage of the Obamacare rollout in detailing all the flaws, banging the doom and gloom drum loudly for all to hear, making sure we knew just how poorly everything was going with the website. But now that the clouds have passed and Obamacare is not only still here but growing stronger by the day, it’s encouraging to see an open acknowledgment of just how well Obamacare is actually working despite the monumental – and well-documented – right-wing campaign to strangle this baby in the crib.
But here’s the thing; because even if Democrats begin to come off the fence and stand with the President in support of his historic achievement, using it to (hopefully) propel more Democrats to victory in 2014, Democrats still must confront this recurring tendency we have of being our own worst enemy. Because say what you want about right-wing Republicans, they may have their internal struggles as all organizations do, but they still do a hell of a job rallying around whatever perverse little talking point they choose to promote for the upcoming news cycles. Whether it be the need to destroy Obamacare, or the need to provide automatic weapons to defenseless babies in their cribs to fend off evil, you can pretty much count on them all towing the line while the moderate Republicans dutifully keep their mouths shut as the inmates run rampant in the asylum. Democrats, on the other hand, too often try their hand at morphing into some sort of unidentifiable, useless Demopublican hybrid which does little to promote the issues of the Democratic party and has absolutely no success achieving inter-party cooperation. If the results of the President’s first-term attempts to reach out and cooperate with Republicans aren’t instructive enough to those still wanting to hold hands, it’s hard to imagine what it will take.
http://www.politicususa.com/2014/04/20/dems-loud-support-obamacare-proud.html
Remember those that attacked Fast Talking Dyson for calling out Cornell West?
………………..
From POU:
http://www.yourblackworld.net/2014/04/black-news/michael-eric-dyson-takes-carnell-and-watkins-to-task-over-cornel-west-dispute/
From Tex-Mex and pork rinds to fitness and veggies: A change in Obama White House
By Juliet Eilperin, Published: April 20
ach president and first lady sets a new tone for the White House, partly based on personal beliefs and private quirks, but few have so transformed the culture inside the building the way the Obamas have regarding nutrition and fitness.
Gone are Tex-Mex Thursdays at the White House Mess and the least healthy vending machine options; calorie counts and hummus with vegetables are in. Working out with the Obamas’ personal trainer is one of the few acceptable excuses for being late to a meeting; the first family reserves desserts for weekend meals despite having a full-time pastry chef.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/president-and-michelle-obamas-white-house-emphasizes-healthy-eating-and-exercise/2014/04/20/d8b160ce-c4ce-11e3-bcec-b71ee10e9bc3_story.html?wpisrc=nl_politics
Good Morning, Everyone :)
Good Morning, Rikyrah & Everyone!
Wow after a 4 day spiritual retreat, I come back to party down with Disco. I’m ready!!!!
Me too!
rikyrah…l love the disco art picture!!!