Thursday Open Thread | George Michael Week

Posted on July 16, 2015 by rikyrah

George Michael Week continues.

‘I Knew You Were Waiting (For Me)’-feat-Aretha Franklin

0518_georgemichael

Amazing

George Michael

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55 Responses to Thursday Open Thread | George Michael Week

  1. Ametia says:
    July 16, 2015 at 6:21 pm

    Colorado jury finds James Holmes guilty in massacre at Aurora movie theater
    Three years after a gunman opened fire inside a Colorado movie theater, killing a dozen people in one of the deadliest mass shootings in the country’s history, a jury convicted James Holmes of first-degree murder.

    Read more » http://link.washingtonpost.com/548289943b35d072688b4aaa2u6jp.7gby/VV_TakmOQg6g-uBLAb042

    Reply
    • yahtzeebutterfly says:
      July 16, 2015 at 6:34 pm

      Thanks for this update, Ametia.

      Reply
    • Liza says:
      July 16, 2015 at 7:08 pm

      I didn’t think the jury would go for the insanity defense. These people who open fire like that should expect the death penalty or life without parole if they live to have a trial. I think that Holme’s parents were just hoping for a more comfortable incarceration than a regular prison and they were certainly hoping to avoid the death penalty.

      Reply
    • rikyrah says:
      July 16, 2015 at 7:11 pm

      Let him rot

      Reply
  3. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 3:15 pm

    Now, it seems as if the TN shooter was Arab, maybe Muslim.

    Let’s get the glasses on and see how differently he’s treated from Roof in the MSM.

    I’m just sayin’.

    Reply
  4. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 2:59 pm

    Jeb is Headed for Little Bighorn

    by BooMan
    Thu Jul 16th, 2015 at 01:05:04 PM EST

    In the Art of War, Sun Tzu provided the following wisdom:

    So, it is said that if you know your enemies and know yourself, you can win a hundred battles without a single loss.
    If you only know yourself, but not your opponent, you may win or may lose.
    If you know neither yourself nor your enemy, you will always endanger yourself.

    When it comes to Jeb Bush’s understanding of Donald Trump, let’s just say that he really doesn’t have a clue.

    Now, those close to his campaign say, Bush, who has taken on the mantle of frontrunner, is bracing for the possibility of a presidential debate pile-on — with Trump leading the charge.

    Gaming out how Trump — a bombastic figure who refuses to abide by usual the rules of political decorum — will present himself has become a growing subject of speculation in Bush’s world.

    During one recent phone call with a political ally, Bush pointedly asked about the surging real estate mogul. What, the friend recalled the former governor wondering out loud, was behind Trump’s antics, and what was he trying to accomplish?

    I don’t think Jeb is alone in being perplexed about Donald Trump’s motives for running for president, but if he doesn’t know what’s driving Trump he’s going to have a hell of a time dodging his hand grenades.

    “Trump presents a challenge for Bush because he’s a hand grenade,” said Nelson Warfield, a longtime Republican strategist who has prepared a number of candidates for debates. “His people understand that and will be prepared for anything that comes their way.”

    As the Aug. 6 debate grows closer, some Republicans are relishing the prospect of Trump tearing the bark off the former governor — or, at the very least, trying to trip him up. “Trump has one target and one target only,” said an adviser to a rival GOP candidate. “He’s going to bring a lawn mower for Bush.”

    http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2015/7/16/1354/47628

    Reply
  5. Ametia says:
    July 16, 2015 at 2:54 pm

    The jury in the trial of Colorado theater shooter James Holmes has reached a verdict, to be read at 6 p.m. ET on Thursday.

    Holmes, who pleaded not guilty by reason of insanity, faces 165 charges in the July 2012 shooting that left 12 people dead and 70 injured.

    Reply
  6. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 2:51 pm

    Benghazi committee goes off the rails
    07/16/15 08:41 AM
    By Steve Benen
    The existence of the House Select Committee on Benghazi has always been hard to explain, even for those who support it enthusiastically. It’s only now that the panel’s purpose is coming into sharper focus.

    The trouble, of course, is that the committee is wholly unnecessary. Over the course of two years, the deadly 2012 terrorist attack in Libya was investigated by the independent State Department Accountability Review Board, the Senate Intelligence Committee, the Senate Armed Services Committee, the House Intelligence Committee, the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, the House Armed Services Committee, the House Committee on Oversight & Government Reform, and the House Committee on Foreign Affairs. None of these probes uncovered evidence to substantiate right-wing conspiracy theories.

    And yet, House Republican leaders decided what Congress really needs is another committee to re-do what the other committees have already done.

    The explanation is ugly, but increasingly obvious. The Associated Press reported this week that the GOP-led panel “has devolved from an investigation into the deaths of four Americans in Libya into a political fight over Hillary Rodham Clinton’s emails and private computer server – a battle that is likely to stretch into the 2016 presidential election year.”

    Committee Chairman Trey Gowdy (R-S.C.) and his GOP brethren are no longer being subtle about this. Just yesterday, several Democratic members of the committee wrote to Gowdy to remind him of his own Benghazi-related schedule, which Republicans are now ignoring. From the letter:
    “At the beginning of this year, Select Committee Republicans provided Democrats with detailed information about their plans to hold 11 hearings between January and October on a wide range of topics relating to the Benghazi attacks. Since then, however, Republicans have completely abandoned this plan – holding no hearings at all since January and instead focusing on former Secretary Hillary Clinton. Amazingly, the last eight press releases on the Select Committee’s webpage deal entirely with Secretary Clinton.”

    It’s almost as if the House’s Benghazi committee no longer has any interest in Benghazi.

    http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/benghazi-committee-goes-the-rails

    Reply
  11. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 2:21 pm

    Monie @MonieTalks_1

    PBO was “led” to humanity?? Some of the same activists given props also claim voting is respectabilty and not responsibility. Uh..no ma’am

    Monie @MonieTalks_1

    Activism indeed has its place. But if we celebrate Marilyn Mosby, we must acknowledge the VOTES that placed her there and lack of elsewhere

    Monie @MonieTalks_1

    Black votes matter. PBO was organizing Chicago voters to the polls before any tragedy had to strike to make folks aware. Stop the bullshit

    Monie @MonieTalks_1

    PBO was “led” to humanity? When he said Trayvon could have been his son, the GOP blew up. But allies acted the SAME with My brother’s keeper

    Monie @MonieTalks_1

    If activists can simply lead PBO, then why have they not led CBC members who have been in office for decades with little to show for.

    Monie @MonieTalks_1

    Unfair sentencing & drug laws have been in place for well over 20 years. But you ask the usual critics..PBO took too long.Where was the CBC?

    Monie @MonieTalks_1

    Every time I see a “we made PBO do it,” rant, it makes me think that as a 38 year old woman, I can tell an 80 year old how to live.

    Monie @MonieTalks_1

    Every time I see a “we made PBO do it,” rant, it makes me think that as a 38 year old woman, I can tell an 80 year old how to live.

    Reply
  13. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 2:13 pm

    #DontJudgeChallenge Goes Terribly Wrong Leaving Florida Teen’s Face Permanently Black!

    http://tmztoday.com/dontjudgechallenge-goes-terribly-wrong-leaving-florida-teens-face-permanently-black/

    Reply
  14. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 2:12 pm

    Amarlie
    ‏@marabout40Jeb Bush: U.S. economy needs immigrants because they’re ‘more fertile’ http://wpo.st/YIsQ0 So this is why he’s pro-immigration reform?

    Reply
  15. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 2:07 pm

    Mario Hussein Obama @MAPSTER5500

    TLC Finally Cancels 19 Kids and Counting http://pulse.me/s/4kATxQ

    Reply
  16. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 1:15 pm

    British Foreign Secretary speaks the truth about Bibi:

    “The question you have to ask yourself is what kind of a deal would have been welcomed in Tel Aviv. The answer of course is that Israel doesn’t want any deal with Iran.”

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/worldviews/wp/2015/07/15/israels-netanyahu-wants-permanent-tension-with-iran-says-britains-top-diplomat/

    Reply
  17. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 1:12 pm

    I am not gonna lie; I went up to my room and cried,” Steven Tyrone Johnson, a nonviolent crack cocaine offender serving life without parole, said about hearing the news. “I feel that after twenty years in these prisons, the good Lord brought us Barack Obama to set things right.”

    http://www.vice.com/read/how-federal-inmates-are-reacting-to-president-obamas-plan-to-visit-a-prison-on-thursday-715?utm_source=vicetwitterus

    Reply
    • rikyrah says:
      July 16, 2015 at 1:20 pm

      “I ain’t never see so many happy prisoners in the 20 years that I’ve been in here,” Johnson says. “Thank you President Obama. Thank you for all that you are doing for your country, our people, and this criminal justice system. Before you came, along many of us was ready to call it quits.”

      Reply
  23. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 11:43 am

    found at POU:

    Kennymack1971

    The Blacker Than Thou police had better realize that things have changed. Writing books about racism that make White liberals swoon ain’t gonna cut it. Not anymore. Going on the White man’s cable TV shows ain’t gonna cut it either. Yeah while you’re running around bragging about how you “led” PBO to humanity just understand that we’re keeping the receipts on your asses too. Deeds Muthaphuckas, not just words.

    Reply
  26. Liza says:
    July 16, 2015 at 11:21 am

    Israel wants more money from the US.

    Israel Requests 50% Increase in U.S. Military Aid, Up to $4.5B http://t.co/Gfa9N1hpsh— Democracy Now! (@democracynow) July 16, 2015

    Reply
  27. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 11:20 am

    Children of Immigrants Denied Citizenship

    For nearly 150 years, the United States, under the 14th Amendment, has recognized people born here as citizens, regardless of whether their parents were citizens.

    But Texas has other plans. In the last year, the state has refused to issue birth certificates to children who were born in Texas to undocumented parents. In May, four women filed a civil rights lawsuit against the Texas Department of State Health Services alleging constitutional discrimination and interference in the federal government’s authority over immigration.

    Jennifer Harbury, a lawyer with Texas RioGrande Legal Aid, who is representing the women, said the deluge of birth certificate refusals began last winter. “I’ve never seen such a large number of women with this problem,” she says. “In the past someone might be turned away, but it was always resolved. This is something altogether new.”

    According to the lawsuit, the women who requested birth certificates for their children in Cameron and Hidalgo counties were turned away because of insufficient proof of their identities. State law allows the use of a foreign ID if the mother lacks a Texas driver’s license or a U.S. passport.

    But local officials, which issue birth certificates registered by the Texas Department of State Health Services Vital Statistics Unit, told the women they would no longer accept either the matricula consular, which is a photo ID issued by the Mexican Consulate to Mexican nationals living in the U.S., or a foreign passport without a current U.S. visa. Undocumented Central American women are also being turned away because they only have a passport without a U.S. visa. “They are locking out a huge chunk of the undocumented immigrant community,” says Harbury…

    http://www.texasobserver.org/children-of-immigrants-denied-citizenship/#.VabEeQeg6yc.twitter

    Reply
  28. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 11:19 am

    Meet ‘Drama’ Obama
    He has seldom worn his fierce urgency so publicly as he does now.
    By GLENN THRUSH 7/15/15 5:50 PM EDT

    Mr. Cool has left the building.

    Barack Obama rode into the White House 6½ years ago on a wave of hope-and-change chill, but that guy was nowhere to be seen in the East Room on Wednesday, replaced by a graying, grinding, overachieving and visibly anxious second-term president desperate to secure what could well be his final legacy accomplishment, a landmark Iran nuclear deal.

    Obama has worn his feelings in public more often than is usually acknowledged — his hastily convened news conference in the wake of the Newtown school shooting in December 2012 was as raw and emotive an appearance as a president can make. And he often pecks at reporters who pose what he thinks are stupid questions, and he thinks a lot of them do.

    http://www.politico.com/story/2015/07/meet-drama-obama-120171.html#ixzz3g0pny6fp

    Reply
  30. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 11:17 am

    http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/washington-mayor-racist_55a71677e4b04740a3defd84

    The mayor of a small city in Washington reportedly admitted that he called President Barack Obama “monkey man” and first lady Michelle Obama “gorilla face,” but says he will not resign over the racist comments.

    “Gorilla face Michelle, can’t disagree with that,” Patrick Rushing, mayor of Airway Heights, reportedly wrote in a Facebook post. “The woman is not attractive except to monkey man Barack. Check out them ears. LOL.”

    The comments led the city council to call for his resignation on Monday.

    “When a figurehead makes comments such as these that sets us back and it’s hard to come back from,” police chief and acting city manager Lee Bennett told KXLY, the local ABC station.

    However, Rushing insists he will not step down from his role as mayor of the city, which is just outside of Spokane and has a population of nearly 6,500, according to Census data.

    “I made a mistake. I owned up to my mistake,” Rushing told the Spokesman-Review. “If I do resign that’s admitting I’m a racist and I’m not.”

    He also told local NBC station KHQ that the comments were just “playful back and forth banter that my friends and I do.”

    Reply
  32. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 10:45 am

    GOP critic of Iran deal goes completely over the top
    07/16/15 08:00 AM—UPDATED 07/16/15 08:06 AM
    By Steve Benen
    If there’s a secret competition among Republicans to see who could say the most ridiculous things about the international nuclear agreement with Iran, organizers can call off the contest. Reading this BuzzFeed report, it’s clear that Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) has won an ignominious prize.
    Senator Mark Kirk, a Republican from Illinois, says the nuclear agreement with Iran “condemns the next generation to cleaning up a nuclear war in the Persian Gulf.”

    Kirk, who has consistently spoken out against the deal with Iran, told WRKO’s Financial Exchange radio program on Tuesday that he believes “tens of thousands of people in the Middle East are gonna lose their lives because of this decision by Barack Hussein Obama.”
    The increasingly erratic Republican senator, who’s facing a tough re-election campaign next year, went on to say, “This is the greatest appeasement since Chamberlain gave Czechoslovakia to Hitler.” Kirk added that he believes the corruption charges against Sen. Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) are part of an elaborate conspiracy to punish critics of the administration’s foreign policy.

    The Illinois lawmaker, just to abandon any sense of subtlety or propriety, concluded that President Obama “wants … to get nukes to Iran.”

    Remember, these quotes weren’t from some radio shock-jock or a strange right-wing blogger. Mark Kirk is an actual, elected member of the U.S. Senate.

    http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/gop-critic-iran-deal-goes-completely-over-the-top

    Reply
  34. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 10:39 am

    some truth this morning at BJ:

    Another Holocene Human says:

    July 16, 2015 at 11:10 am
    .
    @BGinCHI: There’s a reason black and brown people have to be twice as good to make it half as far. There are white people everywhere who nurse resentments against non-whites being successful at anything. And they will twist all kinds of fantasies to avoid cognitive dissonance. Witness the white liberals and lefties who were gutted when Obama started presidenting while black, without seeking the advice of wise white lefties like themselves. No accomplishment of his admin was authentic or real, any failure was due to Obama’s moral failure or naivite or cowardice and not due to opposition party pushback or the majority-white Dem legislators bravely running away

    Reply
  39. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 8:14 am

    The failure Cheney doesn’t want to talk about
    By Steve Benen
    President Obama and his team, working with our allies and negotiating partners, reached a historic diplomatic agreement with Iran yesterday, effectively ensuring that a dangerous Middle East foe will not acquire nuclear weapons.

    And wouldn’t you know it, Dick Cheney is outraged. MSNBC’s Eric Levitz reported this morning:
    By reaching a historic deal that forces Iran to significantly scale back its nuclear program, President Obama has brought the world closer to nuclear war than it has been since World War II, according to former Vice President Dick Cheney.

    Cheney told Fox News’ Sean Hannity on Tuesday that the deal will not only enable Iran to acquire a nuclear weapon, but motivate its enemies in the Middle East to develop their own nukes, setting off a potentially catastrophic arms race.
    “What Obama has done is, in effect, sanctioned the acquisition by Iran of nuclear capability,” the failed former vice president said, apparently content to turn reality on its ear.

    Cheney added that he believes the agreement to stop Iran’s nuclear weapons program will “put us closer to use – actual use of nuclear weapons than we’ve been at any time since Hiroshima and Nagasaki in World War II.”

    Got that? There was a Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, but the international agreement that stops Iran’s nuclear weapons is, from the unique perspective of Dick Cheney, even more dangerous.

    Rather than going point by point, fact-checking every error of fact and judgment the former V.P. made, it’s probably more informative to shine a light on the detail Cheney chose not to mention.

    Revisiting our discussion from April, let’s not forget that Iran didn’t have a meaningful nuclear weapons program until Tehran developed one – during the Bush/Cheney administration. It was on Cheney’s watch that Iran’s total number of centrifuged grew from 164 to 8,000.

    http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/the-failure-cheney-doesnt-want-talk-about

    Reply
  40. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 8:01 am

    Money’s Best Colleges 2015

    Which of the country’s roughly 1,500 four-year colleges deliver the most value—that is, a top-notch education that sets students up for a successful career—at a price families can afford? To find out, MONEY started by screening out schools with financial troubles or graduation rates below the median. We then ranked the more than 700 remaining colleges on 21 factors in three equally weighted categories: educational quality, affordability, and alumni earnings. The schools that rose to the top all have graduation rates of at least 80% and alumni that, on average, report earning more than $55,000 within five years of graduation.

    http://www.msn.com/en-us/money/careersandeducation/moneys-best-colleges-2015/ar-AAcOZco?ocid=HPCDHP

    Reply
  41. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 7:54 am

    Chuck D ✔ @MrChuckD

    Theres a REASON they stopped promoting ROOTS past 1990.We now have GOVT induced 80s CRACK babies as Adults WHO have ZERO sense of HISTORY

    Reply
  42. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 7:51 am

    PragmaticObotsUnite @PragObots

    That @latimes hired someone whose expertise is in Japanese Studies to report on #BlackTwitter tells you their true agenda. #StayWoke

    Reply
  44. rikyrah says:
    July 16, 2015 at 7:49 am

    Good Morning, Everyone :)

    Reply
  45. Ametia says:
    July 16, 2015 at 7:28 am

    Good Morning, Everyone!

    Reply

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