Monday Open Thread

Posted on August 1, 2016 by rikyrah

Ghazala Khan: Trump criticized my silence. He knows nothing about true sacrifice
By Ghazala Khan July 31
CHARLOTTESVILLE

Donald Trump has asked why I did not speak at the Democratic convention. He said he would like to hear from me. Here is my answer to Donald Trump: Because without saying a thing, all the world, all America, felt my pain. I am a Gold Star mother. Whoever saw me felt me in their heart.

Donald Trump said I had nothing to say. I do. My son Humayun Khan, an Army captain, died 12 years ago in Iraq. He loved America, where we moved when he was 2 years old. He had volunteered to help his country, signing up for the ROTC at the University of Virginia. This was before the attack of Sept. 11, 2001. He didn’t have to do this, but he wanted to.

When Humayun was sent to Iraq, my husband and I worried about his safety. I had already been through one war, in Pakistan in 1965, when I was just a high school student. So I was very scared. You can sacrifice yourself, but you cannot take it that your kids will do this.

asked if there was some way he could not go, because he had already done his service. He said it was his duty. I cannot forget when he was going to the plane, and he looked back at me. He was happy, and giving me strength: “Don’t worry, Mom. Everything will be all right.”

The last time I spoke to my son was on Mother’s Day 2004. We had asked him to call us collect whenever he could. I begged him to be safe. I asked him to stay back, and not to go running around trying to become a hero, because I knew he would do something like that.

He said, “Mom, these are my soldiers, these are my people. I have to take care of them.” He was killed by a car bomber outside the gates of his base. He died trying to save his soldiers and innocent civilians.

That is my son. Humayun was always dependable. If I was vacuuming the house and he was home, he would take the vacuum from my hand and clean the house. He volunteered to teach disabled children in the hospital how to swim. He said, “I love when they have a little bit of progress and their faces, they light up. At least they are that much happy.” He wanted to be a lawyer, like his father, to help people.

Humayun is my middle son, and the others are doing so well, but every day I feel the pain of his loss. It has been 12 years, but you know hearts of pain can never heal as long as we live. Just talking about it is hard for me all the time. Every day, whenever I pray, I have to pray for him, and I cry. The place that emptied will always be empty.

I cannot walk into a room with pictures of Humayun. For all these years, I haven’t been able to clean the closet where his things are — I had to ask my daughter-in-law to do it. Walking onto the convention stage, with a huge picture of my son behind me, I could hardly control myself. What mother could? Donald Trump has children whom he loves. Does he really need to wonder why I did not speak?

Donald Trump said that maybe I wasn’t allowed to say anything. That is not true. My husband asked me if I wanted to speak, but I told him I could not. My religion teaches me that all human beings are equal in God’s eyes. Husband and wife are part of each other; you should love and respect each other so you can take care of the family.

When Donald Trump is talking about Islam, he is ignorant. If he studied the real Islam and Koran, all the ideas he gets from terrorists would change, because terrorism is a different religion.

Donald Trump said he has made a lot of sacrifices. He doesn’t know what the word sacrifice means.

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85 Responses to Monday Open Thread

  23. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 8:39 pm

    zizi2 ‏@zizii2 4h4 hours ago

    Wow! @karenTumulty says #GhazalanKhan @wapo op-Ed is the “most read ever” in their history. 😳😳😳

    Reply
  30. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 7:56 pm

    Jimmy Sheridan ‏@JimmySheridanPG 7m7 minutes ago

    Warren Buffet calls out Trump on tax returns “I’ll meet him anywhere, anytime. I’ll bring mine, you bring yours”. Of course Trump won’t.
    ===
    Dan Merica ‏@danmericaCNN 7m7 minutes ago

    With HRC, Buffett challenges Trump to release his taxes. “You’re only afraid [to release] if you have something to be afraid about,” he says

    Reply
    • rikyrah says:
      August 1, 2016 at 7:55 pm

      Liberal Librarian ‏@Lib_Librarian 32m32 minutes ago

      OMG, Warren Buffett casting shade on @realdonaldtrump. “I’m under audit too and I’ll show my taxes. Let’s do this.”

      Reply
  32. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 7:54 pm

    Ga. Teenagers Hired on the Spot After Asking for Jobs to Avoid Gangs

    When four LaGrange, Ga., teens approached the head of the city’s housing authority, Zsa Zsa Heard, they were immediately hired after explaining that they were trying to stay out of trouble with gangs.
    Posted: August 1, 2016

    A group of Georgia teens landed themselves summer jobs with the LaGrange (Ga.) Housing Authority after explaining to its head, Zsa Zsa Heard, that they were trying to stay out of trouble, KHOU11 reports.

    According to Heard in a Facebook post Wednesday, she was approached by the four teens while working in her office.

    When Heard asked the boys why they wanted jobs, she said she was shocked to hear that they were trying to avoid gangs.

    “I want Facebook to empower these young men they walked into my office today and asked for a job. I said why do you want a job? They said so we [won’t] get in trouble and we do not want to be in a gang! I said have people approached you about being in a gang they said yes’mam!” Heard wrote in her Facebook post with a picture of the teens.

    Reply
  33. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 7:51 pm

    Jason Noble ‏@jasonnobleDMR 37m37 minutes ago Omaha, NE

    WarrenBuffett says a “monkey throwing a dart at the stock page” would have better returns than an investor in Donald Trump’s company.

    Reply
  34. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 7:47 pm

    YES!!!
    Ari Berman ‏@AriBerman 27m27 minutes ago

    Court blocks ND voter ID law today, 6th state with ruling against GOP restriction in 2 weeks http://nyti.ms/2aYgcNd

    Reply
  36. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 7:40 pm

    FYI:

    Public Service Announcement.

    Everyone CHECK YOUR VOTING STATUS!!!!

    This is 2016. You should be able to check your voting status ONLINE through your local voting jurisdiction.

    And, if you have Senior Citizens in your family:
    1. Check their status
    2. Ask them if they want to do Absentee Voting
    3. Contact your Absentee Voting Unit and ask them when they will be open for business. Hint: the earlier that you get your application in – you will be in the first batch of ballots mailed out when your jurisdiction is able to do so legally.

    If you have family members in the Military – ASK THEM IF THEY HAVE MAILED IN THEIR FPCA SO THAT THEY CAN VOTE.
    You can fill out an FPCA ANYTIME.
    Military/Overseas ballots – the first ballots will be mailed out the last week of September 2016.

    This is summer – bring it up at BBQ’s
    Bring it up at church/temple/mosque.
    Bring it up at the gym.

    Reply
  41. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 7:23 pm

    Minnesota Vikings honor Prince with line call
    Aug. 1, 2016 at 5:07 PM

    MINNEAPOLIS, Aug. 1 (UPI) — Teddy Bridgewater is raising “New York Bozo” and “Omaha” with “Purple Rain.”

    The Vikings quarterback debuted the line call at the team’s first padded practice Sunday, according to CBS and ESPN. The new call is a nod to Prince, who died in April. “Purple Rain” was the name of Prince’s 1984 album and also the name of a movie he starred in.

    Retired NFL legend Peyton Manning made a career of using “Omaha” at the line. Aaron Rodgers still uses “New York Bozo” for the Green Bay Packers offensive calls.

    Reply
  45. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 7:14 pm

    So sad to hear this:

    EXCLUSIVE: Shannen Doherty Reveals Her Breast Cancer Has Spread: ‘The Unknown Is the Scariest Part’
    by Antoinette Bueno 3:01 PM PDT, August 01, 2016

    Shannen Doherty has some devastating news about her battle with breast cancer.

    The 45-year-old actress reveals her cancer has spread in an exclusive sit-down with ET.

    “I had breast cancer that spread to the lymph nodes, and from one of my surgeries we discovered that some of the cancer cells might have actually gone out of the lymph nodes,” Doherty tells ET’s Jennifer Peros. “So for that reason, we are doing chemo, and then after chemo, I’ll do radiation.”

    Doherty also reveals she had a single mastectomy in May and is open about the most difficult part of fighting cancer.

    “The unknown is always the scariest part,” she shares. “Is the chemo going to work? Is the radiation going to work? You know, am I going to have to go through this again, or am I going to get secondary cancer? Everything else is manageable. Pain is manageable, you know living without a breast is manageable, it’s the worry of your future and how your future is going to affect the people that you love.”

    Reply
  46. Double D (@DubbleDhee) says:
    August 1, 2016 at 6:43 pm

    WHAT IS TRUMP’S REAL ISSUE WITH MUSLIMS?

    Trump questioned a Gold Star mom’s silence
    Did he mistake it for compliance?
    Mama bears scars
    Not on his radar
    Outwardly stoic, but on the inside, cryin’

    Trump really has no shame
    Always looking for someone to blame
    News story would be over
    For this brave soldier
    But Donald wants one more TV frame

    For Donald, this is not really a thing
    Gold Star may as well be a gold ring
    Khan’s words gave us life
    Cut like a big ginzu knife
    But Trump will feel none of the sting

    Why exactly does Trump hate Islam?
    Maybe some of the faces too brown
    Khan gave his all
    But you want a wall
    To keep his kind out of your town

    Trump thinks immigrants are coddled
    But makes exceptions for supermodels
    Melania’s fine
    So she cuts the line
    The rest get sent home. Please don’t doddle

    Reply
  47. Liza says:
    August 1, 2016 at 4:05 pm

    WTF??

    .@MarilynMosbyEsq is facing serious disbarment charges in part for losing a murder trial. pic.twitter.com/euAK0LLErH— Lizz Brown (@lizzzbrown) August 1, 2016

    //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Reply
  48. Liza says:
    August 1, 2016 at 1:07 pm

    OMG Bernie just drew a crowd bigger than Clinton/Kaine's recent crowd of 200, literally by just eating lunch in a public place.— #AmericaWeeps (@all3els) August 1, 2016

    //platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Reply
    • eliihass says:
      August 1, 2016 at 10:10 pm

      And he didn’t need to wheel out out every agenda-driven oligarch …or shamelessly exploit the valor and unnecessary and premature death in an unnecessary war, of a young man…via his parents..

      Reply
    • Ametia says:
      August 1, 2016 at 1:22 pm

      DKDS=Day LATE, Dollar SHORT Who gives a shit, lady.

      Reply
      • Liza says:
        August 1, 2016 at 3:28 pm

        Indeed. Her time is better spent buying a deep conditioner for her bleach damaged hair and using it. If she’s looking for redemption, who cares? Maybe she should pray.

        Working for Jeb Bush isn’t really something to be proud of.

        Reply
      • eliihass says:
        August 1, 2016 at 10:25 pm

        If Jeb had gotten the nomination, Jeb and them would be shamelessly, brazenly and unapologetically courting the very same demographics Trump has now..

        There’d be none of these theatrics and fake displays of ‘disgust’ …or sudden dramatic displays of fake ‘high-mindedness’..

        Only tho dishonest and disingenuous – or folks who have convenient amnesia are falling for these fake declarations by the very same folks who for the past 8 years actively supported, cultivated and egged on even more vile racists, and their even worse racist and offensive words and actions – and who very publicly and unashamedly defended and even sponsored and bused in the violently racist and offensive don’t tread on me crowd -complete with their teabag adorned hats, offensive effigies and assault guns strapped menacingly to their sides as they congregated daily and weekly in Washington D.c and cities all around this country…

        Reply
      • Liza says:
        August 2, 2016 at 10:15 am

        Yep.

        Worst election of my lifetime, I keep saying.

        Reply
  52. SouthernGirl2 says:
    August 1, 2016 at 11:32 am

    Mr Khan is kicking Trump’s ass and it’s a beautiful thing.

    https://twitter.com/CBSEveningNews/status/760149847798317056

    Reply
  53. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 10:55 am

    Poll: Millennials Go for Clinton; Trump Can’t Buy an Older Minority Vote
    FAWN JOHNSON | JULY 21, 2016
    CLEVELAND — Hillary Clinton is a grandma who is subjected to ridicule for her clothing and even her figure, judging by the street vendors hawking wares here at the Republican National Convention.

    But that’s not fazing younger voters, according to national poll results from Morning Consult.

    The Democratic presidential nominee has a sizable lead over Donald Trump among voters younger than 45, according to 23,347 interviews of registered voters conducted through June and the first two weeks of July. Clinton leads Trump by 17 percentage points, 47 percent to 30 percent, among voters aged 18 to 29. She leads by 10 points, 46 percent to 36 percent, among voters aged 30 to 44.

    …………..

    Among white voters 45 and older, Trump leads Clinton handily. White respondents over 65 pick Trump over Clinton 50 percent to 34 percent, with similar margins for white voters age 45 to 64, 48 percent to 34 percent. Gen-X white voters (age 35 to 44) still opt for Trump, but the margins are tighter at 44 percent to 39 percent. Among white voters under 35, Clinton leads Trump by 2 percentage points, 40 percent to 38 percent.

    Reply
  54. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 10:51 am

    Critics See Efforts by Counties and Towns to Purge Minority Voters From Rolls
    By MICHAEL WINES
    JULY 31, 2016

    SPARTA, Ga. — When the deputy sheriff’s patrol cruiser pulled up beside him as he walked down Broad Street at sunset last August, Martee Flournoy, a 32-year-old black man, was both confused and rattled. He had reason: In this corner of rural Georgia, African-Americans are arrested at a rate far higher than that of whites.

    But the deputy had not come to arrest Mr. Flournoy. Rather, he had come to challenge Mr. Flournoy’s right to vote.

    The majority-white Hancock County Board of Elections and Registration was systematically questioning the registrations of more than 180 black Sparta citizens — a fifth of the city’s registered voters — by dispatching deputies with summonses commanding them to appear in person to prove their residence or lose their voting rights. “When I read that letter, I was kind of nervous,” Mr. Flournoy said in an interview. “I didn’t know what to do.”

    The board’s aim, a lawsuit later claimed, was to give an edge to white candidates in Sparta’s municipal elections — and that November, a white mayoral candidate won a narrow victory.

    “A lot of those people that was challenged probably didn’t vote, even though they weren’t proven to be wrong,” said Marion Warren, a Sparta elections official who documented the purges and raised an alarm with voting-rights advocates. “People just do not understand why a sheriff is coming to their house to bring them a subpoena, especially if they haven’t committed any crime.”

    The county attorney, Barry A. Fleming, a Republican state representative, said in an interview that the elections board was only trying to restore order to an electoral process tainted earlier by corruption and incompetence. The lawsuit is overblown, he suggested, because only a fraction of the targeted voters were ultimately scratched from the rolls.

    “The allegations that people were denied the right to vote are the opposite of the truth,” he said. “This is probably more about politics and power than race.”

    But the purge of Sparta voters is precisely the sort of electoral maneuver that once would have needed Justice Department approval before it could be put in effect. In Georgia and all or part of 14 other states, the 1965 Voting Rights Act required jurisdictions with histories of voter discrimination to receive so-called preclearance before changing the way voter registration and elections were conducted.

    Reply
    • eliihass says:
      August 1, 2016 at 11:07 pm

      Isn’t it strange how these news sites always manage to find and deliberately use the most unflattering photograph of black women…And only to advance a certain negative narrative..

      Anyhow, whatever Nina decides, I’m there for her…

      Nina Turner’s story is the classic example of how the DNC and the Clintons mistreat and attempt to destroy black women when they can’t control or exploit you…

      They treated our historic FLOTUS only marginally better than they now treat Nina Turner…that is until FLOTUS gave her well-received speech at the DNC last week, and they fully realized her ‘value’ and relevance in helping rally and convince folks to vote for Hillary…then and only then did FLOTUS start getting any semblance of reluctant respect from those folks..

      It’s all brazenly and viciously mercenary – and if you cannot be specifically exploited to full effect…if they don’t believe you serve a specific purpose that very specifically benefits the agenda – in this case specifically propelling an undeserving Hillary into the White House…if you can’t be their useful idiot for this specific purpose…they’ll dismiss you and shut you out…And if they even sense that you have a mind of your own and won’t be bullied…and if you even dare raise a dissenting voice, they’ll completely destroy and do away with you…and even gloat about it..

      These folks are no better – and act and do no better than all the horrid stuff they are quick to indict and tsk tsk at Trump over…

      The brazen disingenuity and embarrassing displays of denial in the face of very brazen double standards are quite frightening and mind-blowing..

      Anyone who’s swayed by the endless Trump is evil stories, while completely overlooking and turning a blind eye to the equally damning behavior of the Clintons and their flunkies, is no better than – and should not in any way be judging or tsk, tsking at those Trump supporters…because, same difference really…

      No matter how hard folks try to wrap manure in glitter and 24 karat gold leaf…it’s still as stinky as any exposed manure ..

      Reply
  57. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 9:16 am

    Uh huh
    Uh huh

    Understanding the Trump-Khan War
    By JOSH MARSHALL
    Published JULY 31, 2016, 8:55 PM EDT
    There are smart terrible people and dumb terrible people. While they’re both dangerous in positions of power, the dangers they represent are significantly different. We’ve been watching the now multi-day war between Donald Trump and the Khan family. Trump has managed the amazing feat of finding himself savaging the mother of a dead American soldier who literally had never said a word against him. What is most important about understanding what is happening here, however, is not the callousness or shamelessness of Trump’s behavior. It is that it all could have been so easily avoided – not the damage to the Khan family but the damage to Trump himself. This may seem like a perverse way of looking at what has unfolded. But it’s actually the most instructive for understanding Trump’s actions, how his mind works and the sort of danger he represents.

    Any political operative or communications professional, indeed anyone with some moral imagination and common sense would know how to handle this situation. Assuming you wanted to maintain the policies blocking Muslim immigration, you would simply say: “I grieve for the Khans’ loss and I very much respect their opinion and their courage. But I believe the policy I have outlined is necessary for our national security for the following reasons …”

    Simple. Wouldn’t solve the original offenses that lead to their speech against Trump. But it would cut off more damaging engagement and at least suggest (whether or not it were true) that Trump is a man of empathy who believes that harsh policies are necessary.

    You will never win a fight savaging the parents of a dead soldier. So it’s a fight you simply don’t engage in. A smart terrible person would get this and say something along the lines of the quote I noted above. Trump doesn’t seem terribly bright. But this isn’t about intelligence as we test it with logic puzzles. Realizing that this would be the only way to respond requires a level of self-awareness a narcissist lacks and a degree of impulse control Trump simply does not have. Empathy or any moral consciousness would get you there too. But remember, we’re focusing here on the difference between a smart terrible person and a dumb terrible person both of which lack those qualities.

    Reply
  58. rikyrah says:
    August 1, 2016 at 8:14 am

    Good Morning 😊, Everyone 😆

    Reply
  59. Ametia says:
    August 1, 2016 at 7:30 am

    Good Morning, Everyone

    Reply

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