Amel Larrieux (née Eliza Stowell;[1] born March 8, 1973) is an American singer-songwriter and keyboardist. Larrieux rose to fame in the mid-1990s as a founding member of the duo Groove Theory along with Bryce Wilson. After leaving the group in 1999, she released her debut solo album Infinite Possibilities the following year on Epic Records. In late 2003, Larrieux and her husband, producer laru Larrieux founded the independent label, Blisslife Records, on which she has released five albums so far. Larrieux cites Ella Fitzgerald, Prince, Sade, Rickie Lee Jones, Stevie Wonder, Shawn Colvin, Chaka Khan, John Lennon, Patrice Rushen, Jimi Hendrix, and Joni Mitchell as her musical influences.
Larrieux was born and raised an only child in the Manhattan neighborhood of Greenwich Village, New York City. Her Black American mother, Brenda Dixon Gottschild, is a dance critic, author, and college instructor. Her father is of French, English, and Scottish descent. Larrieux was raised in a very artistic environment and was surrounded by talented and inspirational artists.
So please can anyone enlighten me? How is it that Ann Romney can speak for Mitt on matters of import, but Mitt disparages Michelle Obama for having her husband’s ear and confidence?
Also too, Mitt and Ann have been wealthy for a long time, and Ann’s MS diagnosis was quite a long time now. How is it that it’s just occurring to Ann to do something on ms. Most people with their wealth get active sooner. Coincidence that Ann’s center will open in 2016? They’re so obvious.
Oh My.
Look at this wonderful, bright young Black boy on Larry O right now.
He’s the CEO of ‘ Mr. Cory’s Cookies’.
He’s 10.
HUH?
HUH?
WHAT DA PHUQ?
………………………..
BySahil Kapur
PublishedOctober 14, 2014, 9:45 PM EDT 952 views
Republican Tom Cotton said during an Arkansas U.S. Senate debate on Tuesday that “Obamacare nationalized the student loan industry.”
The first-term congressman added, “That’s right, Obamacare grabbed money to pay for its own programs and took that choice away from you.”
The reality is less simple. Obamacare was paired with a bill that made significant changes to the federal student loan program, largely cutting banks out as middle-men between the government and recipients of the loans. The Congressional Budget Office estimated that the changes would save $58 billion over 10 years, about $8.7 billion of which would be used to fund Obamacare programs.
Of the remaining savings, $36 billion would go to higher Pell grants for lower-income college students, $3 billion for historically black and minority-serving colleges and $10.3 billion to reduce the deficit, as noted by the Washington Post’s fact-checker.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/cotton-pryor-debate-student-loans
Tom Cotton: ‘Obamacare Nationalized The Student Loan Industry’
Tom Cotton is despicable and pure evil. As upset as I’ve been with Pryor, we can’t let Cotton near that seat.
White People Support Voter ID Laws More After Seeing Black People Voting
ByDaniel StraussPublishedOctober 14, 2014, 12:07 PM EDT 4550 views
Support among white Americans for voter ID laws increases when that question is asked alongside of a photo of African Americans voting, according to a new study.
The new University of Delaware study found that 67 percent of white Americans supported voter ID laws after the question was posed to them with text only or accompanied by a photo of white people voting. But that number increased to 73 percent when the same question is asked with an accompanying photo of African-Americans voting.
“Our findings suggest that public opinion about voter ID laws can be racialized by simply showing images of African American people,” David C. Wilson, who helped supervise the study, said. “The resulting increase in support for the laws happens independently of —even after controlling for— political ideology and negative attitudes about African Americans.”
The spike, from 67 percent to 73 percent, may not be huge but it’s still statistically significant, The Washington Post noted. While there was an increase among white Americans who were asked about their support for voter ID laws, an accompanying picture of black people voting did not cause African Americans or Hispanic voters to show stronger support for voter ID law
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/study-voter-id-whites-african-americans-photo-support
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5fn087Jk4I
LMBAO
Jurors find deputies used excessive force in death
http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/crime/jurors-find-deputies-used-excessive-force-in-death/ar-AA6NLt0
DENVER — A federal court jury on Tuesday found five Denver sheriff’s deputies used excessive force against a homeless street preacher who died in 2010.
The jury awarded the family of Marvin Booker $4.6 million in damages.
Booker died after deputies shocked him with a Taser while he was handcuffed, put him in a sleeper hold and lay on top of him. Darrold Killmer, the Booker family’s attorney, said that was a zealous overreaction to the frail 56-year-old.
The Booker family was in tears after the verdict was announced.
“We finally got justice for my brother,” the Rev. Calvin Booker said. “My father and brother can rest in peace now.”
A lawyer representing the city of Denver, Thomas Rice, told jurors that the deputies’ actions were in line with the sheriff department’s policies for handling a combative inmate.
The three-week trial came amid calls for a federal investigation of the department over other high-profile abuse cases that prompted the sheriff’s department to make sweeping reforms. Former sheriff Gary Wilson resigned in July as the city agreed to pay $3.3 million to settle another federal jail-abuse lawsuit by a former inmate over a beating. It was the largest payout in city history to settle a civil rights case.
“Something has to change,” Killmer said in urging the Booker jury to award a large payout. “We need a voice from the community to say, something has to change. This isn’t the way we’re going to do business anymore.”
Booker’s family filed the federal suit against the city and county of Denver as well as deputies Faun Gomez, James Grimes, Kyle Sharp and Kenneth Robinette and Sgt. Carrie Rodriguez. Inmates told investigators that the struggle began when he was ordered to sit down in the jail’s booking area but instead moved to collect his shoes, which he had taken off for comfort.
Booker, who was arrested on an outstanding warrant for drug possession, was cursing and refusing to follow orders, according to the deputies’ account. He was restrained by deputies who got on top of him, placed him in a sleeper hold, handcuffed him and shocked him with a stun gun.
Attorneys representing the family of Booker said deputies stunned him for too long and should have backed down when Booker said he was struggling to breathe. In his closing arguments, Killmer said the “dogpile” of deputies was a zealous overreaction.
“Mr. Booker was essentially doing a pushup with all those deputies on his back,” he said, adding that the department then tried to “whitewash” the incident with a shoddy investigation. Among other mistakes, Killer said the deputy who stunned Booker submitted the wrong Taser for analysis and questioned whether the right one was ever found.
Denver’s medical examiner said Booker died of cardiorespiratory arrest during restraint, and ruled his death a homicide. The report listed other factors in his death, including emphysema, an enlarged heart and recent cocaine use.
Rice said Booker’s heart problems caused his death, and a healthier inmate would have survived the encounter.
The deputies “hadn’t the slightest notion that Mr. Booker had a heart condition,” Rice told jurors. “The bad heart was the trigger.”
Prosecutors declined to charge the deputies. Sheriff’s department officials never disciplined them, saying it was reasonable for the deputies to believe he could harm someone and that force was necessary to restrain him.
They’ve always gotten a thrill out of killing black folk, but it’s becoming for most of them, more a daily mundane routine like grabbing coffee. I hope we don’t allow these licensed murderers desensitize the country to the horror they perpetrate hiding behind a uniform and badge.
Christie’s flat-out slander against teachers’ union: Editorial
New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie told a few whoppers at the NAACP New Jersey Convention in Parsippany, N.J.
By Star-Ledger Editorial Board
on October 14, 2014 at 2:32 PM
Gov. Chris Christie on Saturday told an audience a whopping lie about the teachers union. And since he is still spreading the lie through his own social media network, we would like to clear the record.
In a speech to the state chapter of the NAACP, the governor said that the union bought billboard advertisements claiming that he loves millionaires and “hates children.”
He went on: “No matter of what any of you may think of me politically in this room, I do not believe there is a person of goodwill in this room who believes that I hate children – not one. But it’s an interesting moment in a public servant’s life when you’re driving down the New Jersey Turnpike, and your children see a billboard that says that their father hates children.”
The statement is simply not true, not even close. The New Jersey Education Association is the only union that bought billboard space on the Turnpike, and the message was this: “Tell Governor Christie: Protect our schools, not millionaires.”
The Star-Ledger pointed this out to the governor’s communication office on Monday, and got no comment in response. But Tuesday, they sent out a YouTube clip of the governor repeating the slander.
Damn the truth: Full speed ahead.
This is no misstep. It is cynical politics. And the irony is the governor dropped this bomb while discussing the need for more civility in our public discourse.
http://www.nj.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/10/christies_slander_on_teachers_union.html#incart_most-comments
https://twitter.com/NBCPhiladelphia/status/521978474731700224/photo/1
The Zero-Tolerance Trap
Atiya Haynes, a senior at Annapolis High School in Dearborn Heights, Michigan, received a 180-day suspension after a pocketknife was found in her purse at a football game.
How a policy meant to protect a school can ruin students’ lives.
By Allie Gross Oct 13, 2014
When Atiya Haynes’ grandfather gave her a pocketknife in July, she was hesitant to accept the gift. The 17-year-old didn’t want to think she needed a weapon for protection. But her grandfather said that was not a luxury the southwest Detroit native could afford. One of Haynes’ two summer jobs was as a lifeguard in the nearby suburb of Dearborn Heights, and to get to the pool she had to bike alone through some of the city’s rougher neighborhoods. Haynes humored her grandfather and slipped the pocketknife into her bag, along with a bevy of other teenage summer essentials: lotion, sandals, hair products, a swimsuit. She luckily never found herself in a threatening situation and, Haynes says, quickly forgot about the gift.
None of that mattered to vice principal Cheryl Howard, who found and confiscated the knife on Sept. 26, during a spontaneous bag search at the Annapolis High School senior’s homecoming football game. Though Haynes cooperated fully with the search, handing over her purse to Howard, according to Michigan state law she was in possession of a dangerous weapon, and the administrators asked her to leave the premises. When she showed up at school on Monday, Haynes was told she would be suspended for a mandatory 180 school days—in other words, the remainder of her senior year.
“I think they honestly thought in their mind, ‘this is the punishment’, ‘OK, goodbye’ and they thought we would just leave this alone. I don’t think they were expecting us to fight this,” Haynes’ mom, Guisa Bell, told me late last week, after a community dinner held in support of her daughter, who has become something of a local cause in Detroit. Bell, who immigrated to America from Ecuador when she was 6 years old, has given up a lot to ensure Haynes’ successful future. So, the notion that this Advanced Placement student with a 3.0 grade point average and dreams of attending Howard University would just clean out her locker and slink home was not only baffling to Bell, but unacceptable.
http://www.slate.com/articles/life/education/2014/10/atiya_haynes_case_zero_tolerance_school_choice_and_one_detroit_student_s.html
Lauren Mayk @WFLALauren
Follow
Democrat @CharlieCrist leads Republican @FLGovScott 45-41 in new News Channel 8 poll. @WyllieForGov at 7. #wflapolitics
7:48 AM – 14 Oct 2014
https://twitter.com/bjs5555/status/479780634366201856/photo/1
https://twitter.com/EONLINE11/status/519822486192394241/photo/1
https://twitter.com/TPM/status/522074270131027968/photo/1
John Fund has never seen a Black Voter that he didn’t think was committing Voter Fraud
…………….
Tuesday, October 14, 2014
More People Voting Is “Voting Fraud” To Republicans
Posted by Zandar
Never forget that the Republican party is fully committed to make sure as few people are allowed to vote as possible, because low turnout from mostly older, wealthier voters keeps Republicans in office. Whenever anything comes along that makes things easier for the Great Unwashed Masses to vote, it’s of course inviting “voter fraud”, as National Review’s John Fund whinges about.
There’s only one problem with Fund’s tirade: he’s factually incorrect on many of the details as The Moderate Voice’s Kathy Gill points out.
………………………………..
Gill goes on to point out a number of fallacies in Fund’s dumpster fire full of outright lies. The information on Colorado’s vote by mail is readily available, but Fund actively chooses to tell bald-faced lies about it, to delegitimize Mark Udall’s re-election. This is how Republicans work: there’s no possible way a Democrat could ever win an election fairly, so the problem is always “massive voter fraud” that never seems to materialize. But of course, “everyone knows” Democrats must have to cheat, bribe, and steal in order to win because “real Americans” vote GOP. So voter ID laws that are really all about disenfranchising those people are common practice in keeping red states red.
Fund doesn’t even try to hide his lies here. And this passes for intellectual honesty among conservatives.
If you have to keep people from voting in order to win, your policies may not be so hot, yes?
http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2014/10/more-people-voting-is-voting-fraud-to.html
Jill Miller Zimon @JillMillerZimon
Follow
Cleveland paper of record, @ThePlainDealer endorses @ninaturner for OH Secretary of State over incumbent Jon Husted! http://www.cleveland.com/opinion/index.ssf/2014/10/nina_turner_for_ohio_secretary.html#incart_river …
12:37 PM – 14 Oct 2014
Republican Senate hopeful equated welfare and ‘reparations’
10/14/14 09:28 AM
By Steve Benen
North Carolina’s state legislature considered a resolution in 2007 expressing formal regret for the state’s previous support for slavery. Republican Thom Tillis, now the state House Speaker and a U.S. Senate candidate, supported the resolution.
But as Daniel Strauss reported, Tillis issued a statement at the time elaborating on his perspective, connecting the resolution to his concerns about “reparations.”
“This measure does not obligate legislative members to provide reparations. A subset of the democrat [sic] majority has never ceased to propose legislation that is de facto reparations and they will continue to do so as long as they are in the majority,” Tillis said. “Federal and State [sic] governments have redistributed trillions of dollars of wealth over the years by funding programs that are at least in part driven by their belief that we should provide additional reparations.”
“I believe there are several conservative democrats [sic] who are prepared join Republican [sic] in OPPOSITION to measures that propose new entitlements and reparations,” Tillis added. “However, a vote against the resolution would most likely eliminate any chance that we would get support from more conservative members of the democrat party [sic] members to oppose such measures.”
To be sure, this is plainly dumb. Indeed, it’s arguably another “macaca” moment for the far-right candidate. Tillis’ argument seemed to be that Republicans need not fear the slavery resolution creating the basis for reparations because, as Tillis argued, African Americans already receive “de facto reparations” in the form of public assistance.
In other words, while trying to defend his vote in support of a Democratic resolution, Tillis ended up making a racially charged argument about the social safety net. The Republican effectively said welfare and reparations are the same thing, which is clearly an ugly and ignorant charge for anyone, especially a U.S. Senate candidate, to make.
But there’s a larger context that arguably makes Tillis’ remarks slightly worse.
Brian Beutler yesterday flagged the Republican’s 2011 remarks on pitting Americans against one another in order to dismantle anti-poverty programs.
“What we have to do is find a way to divide and conquer the people who are on assistance. We have to show respect for that woman who has cerebral palsy and had no choice in her condition, that needs help and that we should help. And we need to get those folks to look down at these people who choose to get into a condition that makes them dependent on the government and say, ‘at some point you’re on your own! We may end up taking care of those babies, but we’re not taking care of you.’ And we’ve got to start having that serious discussion. It won’t happen next year. Wrong time. Because it’s going to be politically charged. One of the reasons why I may never run for another elected office is cause some of these things may just get me railroaded out of town. But in 2013 I honestly believe that we have to do it.”
As Brian added, “The only thing missing from this exegesis is an explicit reference to racial minorities, reparations, and so on. But the subtext is pretty clear. And when you read it in light of his comments about the slavery resolution, it becomes painfully obvious who in Tillis’ mind deserves government assistance and who needs to be conquered.”
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/republican-senate-hopeful-equated-welfare-and-reparations
These two words, “police reform,” need to permeate the American culture by the 2016 presidential election and become as familiar to voters as “healthcare reform” was in 2008. It will be really hard to make that happen, but it starts at the local level. It just needs to start in a lot of places.
The effect of bad and corrupt policing needs to become cumulative and stay that way, so we aren’t just moving from one incident to the next. I’m see where some folks in the movement understand that really well. It is the ACCUMULATED evidence of police brutality and police murdering with impunity that will create the demand for reform.
When Sybrina Fulton and her people went to the United Nations and presented this as a human rights issue, it was absolutely brilliant. These are not isolated events, one here and one there, this is a systemic problem in America and it has been for a long, long time. Put it on a world stage for them to see what is happening here. It IS a HUMAN RIGHTS issue and it always has been in this country.
The connection that I see between the cops and people like Zimmerman and Dunn is that when the cops are held accountable for killing young black men, the Zimmermans and Dunns will take notice. If law enforcement is held accountable for their own crimes and are forced to provide equal protection under the law, then white supremacist killers are just quietly arrested, charged, convicted and put in a cage. Media moves on to something else they can sensationalize. And racist cops and other would be killers of young black men think about consequences before they kill for no reason other than to satisfy their blood lust.
Monday, October 13, 2014
Last Call For The Absolutism Of Dudebro Defector
Posted by Zandar
If you want to know why I have a problem with Glenn Greenwald, you have to go no further than his recent TED talk last week. There is no room in Greenwald’s universe for any criticism of Edward Snowden. He is not interested in debate, only his fanatical, binary absolutism. All those who support Snowden are the good guys. Everyone else is evil. Period.
“I consider [questions about Snowden’s motivations] absurd and idiotic,” Greenwald after a TED talk. “That accusation comes from people in the U.S. government, from people in the media who are loyalists to these governments, and … they are saying a lot more about themselves then they are about the target of their accusations because those people … never act for any reason other then corrupt reasons.
“So they assume that everyone else is plagued by the same disease of soullessness that they are,” Greenwald added.
You get that? Here’s a recap of what Greenwald believes of critics of Edward Snowden:
They are absurd and idiotic, and by extension there is no such thing as valid criticism of Edward Snowden’s motivations. Greenwald simply dismisses all criticism, period. There is no room for debate.
They must be either a US government employee or a media government loyalist. You cannot be an ordinary American outside the government or media and still have criticism of Snowden. You cannot have objective criticism of Snowden because it cannot exist, ergo you have to be a biased individual who blindly supports the US government.
They never act for any reason other than corrupt ones. Everything you therefore do is suspect because you are corrupt, and everything you do is only because you are corrupt. You have no valid argument because you are corrupt, so I can dismiss you out of hand.
They are soulless and assume everyone else is as well. Once again, you are a corrupt, evil person who cannot possibly have a shred of credibility because there is no possible valid criticism of Edward Snowden.
http://zandarvts.blogspot.com/2014/10/last-call-for-absolutism-of-dudebro.html
Coming Out of Obama Derangement Coma: Welcome Back, Paul Krugman
Spandan Chakrabarti | October 12, 2014
Paul Krugman, Nobel winning economist and New York Times columnist, and I have crossed paths before. My impression of Dr. Krugman has always been what I wrote in August of 2011: a political rookie, compared to President Obama (who isn’t?). Krugman took some offense to that, calling my article ritual bearded professor bashing, but I have also always regarded him as a top notch economist. It’s when he tried to give his economics a brand of politics that in my judgment his critics often failed.
Because Krugman is first and foremost a policy wonk and economist – despite the populist rants that have made him a darling of the Professional Left – he was bound to come around to this President’s record being amazingly good under stunningly tough circumstances – from the disaster of the Bush economic collapse to the disaster of Bush’s party’s political obstructionism.
And last week, Krugman finally did just that. In an article he penned in the Rolling Stone, Krugman terms Obama “one of the most consequential and, yes, successful presidents in American history.” Professor Krugman shines through most of his piece, highlighting the President’s achievements that will far outlast his presidency, though he seems to feel obligated to start with his signature political naivete. Let’s deal with that first.
http://www.thepeoplesview.net/main/2014/10/8/coming-out-of-ods-coma-welcome-back-paul-krugman
Establishment Media’s Whipping Boy: How the Left Conspires with the Right to Trash the Black Guy
Spandan Chakrabarti | October 13, 2014
For those of us who have been following the Professional Left Poutrage Artists in our media since the inception of the Obama presidency, it has always been clear that the self-proclaimed “Left” and “progressive” flanks of the media is in fact no better than Fox News. When it comes to propagandizing the news and cherrypicking only what suits their irrational ideological hatred of President Obama, the likes of Salon are not willing to take a back seat to their Right wing counterparts like Breitbart and Fox. It is no coincidence, then, that Salon’s own headline about Thomas Frank’s interview with Sen. Elizabeth Warren matches that of the Washington Times nearly verbatim.
And so, the headlines – Left, Right and CNN – were all atwitter about how Elizabeth Warren, the current darling of the Professional Left, had endeared herself to them even more by accusing Barack Obama’s financial management team of siding with Wall Street.
What the headlines in 30-point fonts did not note was that critic, captured entirely within the headlines and made within the context of not having bank executives prosecuted in the wake of the Bush financial crisis, was the only direct criticism of this president and his team that Thomas Frank could muster out of Sen. Warren in his 4,610 word interview, and even that followed a much stronger endorsement of the president by Warren about his tenacity to put in place the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
More than once, Sen. Warren drilled into Thomas Frank’s head that President Obama wasn’t just supportive of the CFPB, he is the singular reason it exists.
“If Barack Obama had not been president of the United States we would not have a Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. Period. I’m completely convinced of that. And I go through the details in the book, and I could tell them to you. But he was the one who refused to throw the agency under the bus and made sure that his team kept the agency alive and on the table. Now there was a lot of other stuff that also had to happen for it to happen. But if he hadn’t been there, we wouldn’t have gotten the agency.”
— Elizabeth Warren
http://www.thepeoplesview.net/main/2014/10/13/leftist-poutrage-artists-again-team-up-with-far-right-to-trash-obama
southern belle hooks @itscjs
Follow
Everybody in St. Louis getting arrested except Darren Wilson.
9:55 PM – 13 Oct 2014
Cuts to emergency preparedness take center stage
10/14/14 08:47 AM
By Steve Benen
In recent weeks, the right’s efforts to politicize the Ebola virus have focused on blaming President Obama for … something. It’s not entirely clear what Republicans disapprove of, though the party clearly hopes voters are terrified and that the politics of fear produce GOP gains in the midterms.
But as it turns out, there’s another side to this coin, and suddenly, it’s the left that’s focusing on a way to connect Ebola to the political debate in a more direct way. Sam Stein had this report yesterday:
As the federal government frantically works to combat the Ebola outbreak in West Africa, and as it responds to a second diagnosis of the disease at home, one of the country’s top health officials says a vaccine likely would have already been discovered were it not for budget cuts.
Dr. Francis Collins, the head of the National Institutes of Health, said that a decade of stagnant spending has “slowed down” research on all items, including vaccinations for infectious diseases. As a result, he said, the international community has been left playing catch-up on a potentially avoidable humanitarian catastrophe.
“NIH has been working on Ebola vaccines since 2001. It’s not like we suddenly woke up and thought, ‘Oh my gosh, we should have something ready here,’” Collins told The Huffington Post on Friday. “Frankly, if we had not gone through our 10-year slide in research support, we probably would have had a vaccine in time for this that would’ve gone through clinical trials and would have been ready.”
That “10-year slide” is not an exaggeration. We learned this week that the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s emergency preparedness budget really has been cut roughly in half since 2006. Stein added that the budget for the National Institutes of Health hasn’t fared much better, with the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases facing particular budget heat over the last decade.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/cuts-emergency-preparedness-take-center-stage
Koch donors uncloaked
By KENNETH P. VOGEL and MIKE ALLEN | 10/14/14 5:04 AM EDT
The deep-pocketed political network created by the billionaire conservatives Charles and David Koch this summer quietly launched a super PAC that can buy explicitly political ads supporting Republican candidates rather than the issue-oriented ads they‘d been airing for years.
The catch: For the first time, the network’s donors would be publicly identified if they gave to the super PAC.
Four months later and the results are in: The super PAC, Freedom Partners Action Fund, is a smash hit with donors. It has surpassed its fundraising goal and now says it is on pace to spend roughly $25 million on ads intended to help Republicans capture the Senate.
POLITICO was allowed to review an advanced copy of the mandatory report the super PAC will file Wednesday with the Federal Election Commission that will formally reveal the names of some of the Kochs’ ultra-rich conservative donors. The report, combined with additional information voluntarily provided by Freedom Partners Action Fund, are illuminating, testing some of the conventional wisdom surrounding the Koch political operation.
New York hedge fund billionaire Bob Mercer wrote the largest check — $2.5 million — followed by Charles and David Koch, who each stroked $2 million checks from trusts in their names. The group received $1 million apiece from Arkansas poultry producer Ronnie Cameron, Wisconsin roofing billionaire Diane Hendricks and Nebraska trucking magnate Clarence Werner.
Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2014/10/koch-donors-111846.html#ixzz3G7nS05vz
He just seems to be deliberately pissing his chances away. He simply isn’t listening to anyone who is looking out for him.
……………..
Florida State looking into Jameis Winston possible paid autograph sessions
BY STEVE GREENBERG
Staff Reporter
October 13, 2014 5:58PM
ESPN reported Monday that Florida State is looking into how hundreds of items autographed by Heisman Trophy-winning quarterback Jameis Winston were authenticated by James Spence Authentication — the same company that certified hundreds of autographs by Georgia star running back Todd Gurley, who last week was suspended indefinitely.
Any time such large numbers of autographs by a college athlete are authenticated, suspicions will arise about memorabilia dealers and illicit, for-pay signing sessions.
According to ESPN, Winston assured FSU coach Jimbo Fisher last weekend that he’d never received payment for signing autographs. Fisher said he doesn’t believe Winston was paid to sign.
Earlier Monday, at his weekly news conference, Fisher became emotional while he defended Winston on a different front: the upcoming student-conduct-code hearing Winston will appear at stemming from an alleged sexual assault on a fellow FSU student.
http://www.suntimes.com/30431444-761/florida-state-looking-into-jameis-winston-possible-paid-autograph-sessions.html
Study: Charter schools have worsened school segregation
Lauren FitzPatrick
Charter schools have worsened school segregation in Chicago and overall have not made the city’s school system stronger — but might have weakened it, according to a new report by urban planners.
Looking at school data for 2012-13, the Institute on Metropolitan Opportunity at the University of Minnesota Law School said that when it considered student demographics and admission criteria, it found that charters lagged behind traditional public schools in such major factors as reading and math scores, reading and math growth and graduation rates.
And while 20 percent of traditional public schools showed a diverse racial mix, only seven percent of Chicago’s charters did, according to the report.
Since students self-select into the charter system, their performance should outpace children in traditional schools — but it doesn’t, said Myron Orfield, who heads the institute that looked at Chicago because it’s home to charter champion U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.
“The question is whether charters are the best path available to find ways to better serve low-income students and students of color, given that this approach has failed to improve overall student performance by most measures, and led to less racial and ethnic diversity in the city’s schools,” Orfield said.
http://breakingnews.suntimes.com/chicago/study-charter-schools-have-worsened-school-segregation/#chicago/study-charter-schools-have-worsened-school-segregation/
Karen Lewis has brain tumor, not running for mayor
Mon, 10/13/2014 – 5:01pm
Michael Sneed LAUREN FITZPATRICK AND FRAN SPIELMAN
Chicago Teachers Union President Karen Lewis, who just pulled out of mayoral contention, is suffering from a cancerous brain tumor that was diagnosed shortly after she experienced a severe headache last week.
As a result, Lewis underwent a five-hour surgery at Northwestern Memorial Hospital, where she is scheduled to undergo a regimen of chemotherapy and radiation, according to a source close to Lewis.
The tumor had nothing to do with her weight loss surgery in Mexico.
Lewis has wanted Mayor Rahm Emanuel gone practically since he took office, but she will not be the one to unseat him in February, the head of her mayoral exploratory committee said Monday.
The feisty 61-year-old CTU leader will not run for mayor, Jay Travis, the head of her mayoral exploratory committee said in a statement Monday.
“Karen Lewis has decided to not pursue a mayoral bid,” Travis said. “Yet she charges us to continue fighting for strong neighborhood schools, safe communities and good jobs for everyone.
“The tens of thousands of signatures collected for Karen confirm what the polls have already said: Chicagoans from Beverly to Uptown want to feel safe in their neighborhoods; they want an elected representative school board; and they want political leadership at every level that is responsive and responsible.”
http://politics.suntimes.com/article/chicago/karen-lewis-has-brain-tumor-not-running-mayor/mon-10132014-501pm
McConnell flubs health care basics in key debate
By Steve Benen 10/14/14 08:00AM
The political world’s rules are coming into sharper focus. When a candidate flubs a process question — issues related to electoral considerations that have little to do with actual substance — the media is supposed to take that very seriously, possibly even characterizing it as disqualifying. When a candidate flubs a policy question — dealing with issues that will make a material difference in people’s lives — the media is supposed to back off, occasionally even applauding his or her savviness.
With the rules in mind, the big story out of last night’s Senate debate in Kentucky is probably supposed to be Secretary of State Alison Lundergran Grimes’ (D) reluctance to say which presidential candidate she voted for in 2012 — an issue the media has deemed extremely important, but which actually affects no one.
There was, however, arguably a far more important development last night: Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell’s (R) total incoherence on health care policy. Benjy Sarlin reported overnight:
Turning to health care, McConnell struggled to explain how he squared his promise to repeal Obamacare with his claim that Kentucky could also keep its popular state health care exchange, which runs on subsidies provided by the law, and the state’s Medicaid expansion, which was financed by federal dollars under the health care law as well. […]
Pressed as to whether he personally supported maintaining the exchange if Obamacare were repealed, he responded that “it’s fine to have a website, yeah.”
No, actually, it’s not. As we’ve discussed before, for most Kentuckians who visit the state-based exchange marketplace, there’s a federal subsidy that makes insurance more affordable. For that matter, the coverage plans included in these exchanges are regulated heavily to guarantee consumer protections.
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/mcconnell-flubs-health-care-basics-key-debate
I read in comments at Booman that Chuckles the Toad said Grimes’ refusal to answer the question regarding her vote in 2012 should disqualify her. Your Mainslime Media at work.
Did you see the ad Mitch McConnell is running with Chuck Todd claiming Grimes refusal to answer about her vote should disqualify her? I wonder did Chucky boy have lunch with Mitch after the ad ran? Remember when he lunched with Jon Husted?
Good Morning , Everyone :)
Good Morning, Everyone! :-)