Friday Open Thread | Billy Joel Week

Posted on November 18, 2016 by rikyrah

TGIF, Everyone! Hope you’re enjoying Billy Joel week.

This entry was posted in Media, Music, Open Thread, Politics and tagged , , , . Bookmark the permalink.

57 Responses to Friday Open Thread | Billy Joel Week

  7. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 18, 2016 at 8:35 pm

    A new commercial featuring Matthew McConaughey and Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings for the 2017 Lincoln MKZ. Courtesy Lincoln Motor Company

    http://www.freep.com/videos/money/cars/ford/2016/06/06/lincoln-tv-commercials/85478446/

    Reply
  13. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 18, 2016 at 5:38 pm

    This bigoted racist thug has no business as a national security adviser.

    https://twitter.com/CNNSitRoom/status/799753636511354880

    Reply
  18. Liza says:
    November 18, 2016 at 1:43 pm

    The Major Fall
    What killed Leonard Cohen is one of the rising causes of death among the elderly. Here’s how you can protect yourself.

    By Jeremy Samuel Faust

    …the actual cause of his death was not simple old age. As his manager announced on Wednesday, he died following a fall.* And as our population continues to live longer and longer, falls are becoming the great plague of the modern era. They are the leading cause of accidental death in the elderly, and the incidence has increased steadily over the past decade. And, usually, they are not an easy way to go—many cause prolonged discomfort.

    … The one-year mortality for patients who are admitted to the hospital after a fall is a staggering 33 percent. A fall bad enough to warrant hospital admission can carry as poor a prognosis as some stage IV cancers that have metastasized to the lungs and brain. Of course, the people who are hospitalized after a fall are much more likely to have a higher mortality rate anyway. (They’re going to be older, and have more comorbid medical conditions, but falls still pose a bigger risk than other conditions.) By comparison, the one-year mortality for older patients admitted to the hospital for pneumonia hovers around 21 percent.
    …
    Why are falls so dangerous? There are short- and long-term risks. In the short term, falls that involve trauma to the head can cause life-threatening intracranial bleeding. Broken bones have their own risk, including lung embolisms in which tiny fragments of broken bone make their way into our circulation and reach the lung, causing impressive and often life-threatening damage. But falls that cause broken hips and legs can cause death and disability even well after the acute phase. Blood clots to the lung are more likely in the months after surgery or prolonged periods of immobilization. People who become more sedentary are more likely to develop a host of other problems, including heart and lung disease.

    Read more…
    http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2016/11/the_five_stages_of_grief_aren_t_real_but_trump_anxiety_is.html

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      November 18, 2016 at 1:48 pm

      This happened to my cousin last May. He was a healthy guy in his 80s, no dementia at all, still living in his home and taking care of his wife. So one day he was having the roof of his house repaired, he’s outside talking to the workers, he looks up at the roof, falls and breaks his leg. Three weeks later he was dead.

      Reply
  23. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 18, 2016 at 11:42 am

    I’m so damn sick of this woman. She’s been such a huge disappointment.

    https://twitter.com/TPM/status/799663450603614208

    Reply
  25. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 18, 2016 at 11:20 am

    The Democrats need to move their ass on #JeffSessions as Attorney General. You can’t dance with the devil on this. Our lives are at stake.

    Reply
  26. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 18, 2016 at 11:17 am

    Trump and his white racist henchmen think this is their time to take us to the back of the bus. We say HELL NO! #JeffSessions

    Reply
  27. Ametia says:
    November 18, 2016 at 9:59 am

    Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas comments on a spoon and fork he found on the podium while he addresses the Federalist Society’s National Lawyers Convention dinner at National Harbor, in Oxon Hill, MD, Thursday, Nov. 17, 2016. The convention is dedicated to the legacy of Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia who died Feb 13, 2016. (AP Photo/Cliff Owen)

    Clarence Thomas welcomes new conservative era on the Supreme Court under Trump and vows to stop his fellow justices inventing ‘newly discovered rights’

    •The Supreme Court justice said the court has too often granted rights to people that are not found in the Constitution
    •He cited the example of same sex marriage being made legal last year
    •He called on the audience at a dinner in Scalia’s memory to carry on the judge’s ‘unfinished business’
    •Conservative Justice Scalia died in February this year at the age of 79

    http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3948828/Justice-Thomas-calls-conservatives-continue-Scalias-work.html

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      November 18, 2016 at 10:10 am

      Another rare occasion when I have no words.

      I’m having weird, bad dreams for the past week but they are better than our new reality.

      Reply
  30. rikyrah says:
    November 18, 2016 at 9:46 am

    SG2,

    Did you tweet the CBC about Sessions?

    Reply
  31. rikyrah says:
    November 18, 2016 at 9:44 am

    You want Sessions?

    Then pass a new Voting Rights Act first that covers the entire country.

    Reply
  32. rikyrah says:
    November 18, 2016 at 9:37 am

    Republican proposes charging anti-Trump protesters with ‘economic terrorism’
    The Hill

    Brooke Seipel

    A Republican state lawmaker is proposing a bill that would allow authorities to charge protesters with committing “economic terrorism.”

    Washington state Sen. Doug Ericksen proposed the bill Wednesday that would also allow authorities to charge protesters with felonies for a range of other crimes already on the books.

    “I respect the right to protest, but when it endangers people’s lives and property, it goes too far,” Ericksen said in a press release Wednesday. “Fear, intimidation and vandalism are not a legitimate form of political expression. Those who employ it must be called to account.

    “We are not just going after the people who commit these acts of terrorism,” he added. “We are going after the people who fund them. Wealthy donors should not feel safe in disrupting middle-class jobs.”

    The proposed bill would make protesting a class C felony should it cause any sort of “economic disruption” or “jeopardize human life and property.” Such a proposal would mean violators could face five years in prison, a $10,000 fine or both.

    Reply
  34. rikyrah says:
    November 18, 2016 at 9:17 am

    We’re Still On Medicare Phase Out Plan

    ByJOSH MARSHALL
    Published NOVEMBER 17, 2016, 9:00 AM EDT

    In case you missed this, yesterday evening we published our first checklist of where members of Congress stand on Paul Ryan’s plan to phase out Medicare and replace it with vouchers for private insurance. A few things to keep in mind for analyzing it and seeing what you can find out from your representative or senator. First, there are lots and lots of Democrats who either are stating vague opposition or are not saying where they stand at all. If they’re still vague or not stating a position at all, that’s very, very dangerous for the future of Medicare. Like every other member of Congress, they won’t state a flat and categorical decision unless pressed. And frankly, from what I can see, most of the these folks are still cuddling with comfort novels or awkwardly singing in dive bars over their third beer. It’s sad. But they’re totally not focusing on this. Trust me. Bigly.

    Next, this is all about word play and bamboozlement. So you need to listen closely. For instance, yesterday up on the hill Marco Rubio told our reporter that he opposed “privatization” of Medicare. That’s great. But people tend to come up with their own definitions of what ‘privatization’ means. Because right after that he said: “I don’t want to change it for people that are on it now, but I do think for future generations it will have to look different.”

    Those are the code words people usually use to signal support for Ryan-style Medicare phase out. So I would say Rubio more than likely does support Medicare phase-out. But it’s ambiguous and it seems like he at least wants to make people think he doesn’t support it. You will hear a lot of people playing these games. So to get the real story it’s important to press.

    Reply
  35. SouthernGirl2 says:
    November 18, 2016 at 8:59 am

    Trump picking Jeff Sessions as Attorney General should tell you everything about his racist agenda when it comes to black people.

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      November 18, 2016 at 8:56 am

      All of those folks “normalizing” Trump and saying we should wait and see what he really does because he didn’t mean what he said blah blah blah need to STOP right now. Trump is intends to make good on what he promised and there are people waiting in line to help him. And, first and foremost, Trump is a white supremacist down to the marrow in his bones.

      Reply
  39. rikyrah says:
    November 18, 2016 at 8:28 am

    A new theory for why Trump voters are so angry — that actually makes sense

    By Jeff Guo
    November 8

    ………………………………….

    There’s been great thirst this election cycle for insight into the psychology of Trump voters. J.D. Vance’s memoir “Hillbilly Elegy” offers a narrative about broken families and social decay. “There is a lack of agency here — a feeling that you have little control over your life and a willingness to blame everyone but yourself,” he writes. Sociologist Arlie Hochschild tells a tale of perceived betrayal. According to her research, white voters feel the American Dream is drifting out of reach for them, and they are angry because they believe minorities and immigrants have butted in line.

    Cramer’s recent book, “The Politics of Resentment,” offers a third perspective. Through her repeated interviews with the people of rural Wisconsin, she shows how politics have increasingly become a matter of personal identity. Just about all of her subjects felt a deep sense of bitterness toward elites and city dwellers; just about all of them felt tread on, disrespected and cheated out of what they felt they deserved.

    Cramer argues that this “rural consciousness” is key to understanding which political arguments ring true to her subjects. For instance, she says, most rural Wisconsinites supported the tea party’s quest to shrink government not out of any belief in the virtues of small government but because they did not trust the government to help “people like them.”

    “Support for less government among lower-income people is often derided as the opinions of people who have been duped,” she writes. However, she continues: “Listening in on these conversations, it is hard to conclude that the people I studied believe what they do because they have been hoodwinked. Their views are rooted in identities and values, as well as in economic perceptions; and these things are all intertwined.”

    Reply
    • Liza says:
      November 18, 2016 at 9:07 am

      Well, Paul Ryan wants to help out these folks. He will destroy the ACA, Medicaid, Medicare and Social Security so that government can be smaller.

      It’s too early in the AM for me to figure how the decimation of these programs will help them with their identities and values and economic perceptions, but eventually it won’t matter. Without healthcare they will just simply be dead much sooner than they expected.

      Reply
    • Ametia says:
      November 18, 2016 at 9:17 am

      There is absolutely NOTHING NEW here about this perspective.

      SHORT: Those BLAH folks & POC are taking what is rightfully ours.

      EVEN SHORTER: CLINGING TO WHITENSS

      Reply
      • Liza says:
        November 18, 2016 at 10:06 am

        They may be clinging to whiteness but they haven’t thought this through. “Lawmakers” like Paul Ryan despise them as much as anyone else. It’s a textbook case of cutting off the nose to spite the face.

        I feel nothing for the plight of these folks who voted for Trump effective 11-8-2016.

        Reply
  40. rikyrah says:
    November 18, 2016 at 8:24 am

    Everyone has their own healthcare story, or you know someone has. In order to fight back against the upcoming GOP attempts at taking away Obamacare, Medicare and Medicaid, we need to tell our stories.

    Please go to COULD HAPPEN TO YOU and leave your story.

    We have to get out in front of these butchers. Have our voices heard.

    Please share on twitter. We need those stories.

    Reply
  41. yahtzeebutterfly says:
    November 18, 2016 at 6:53 am

    The following news release was created by the Association of Artists for Freedom:

    FOR RELEASE – December 3, 1963

    “The same hatred, the same bigotry, the same sickness, the same gun, which on June 11, 1963 killed Medgar Evers in Mississippi, and on September 15, 1963, killed six children in Birmingham, has now on November 22, 1963, struck down the President of the United States.

    “We are deeply sorrowful, but sorrow is not enough. There has been unleashed in our land the deadly virus of hatred and violence…

    “We are a great people for feeling sorrow and for shedding tears to express our grief. But all too often our sadness is of a brief season, and all too soon we turn again back to business as usual.

    “Permissive violence is a common staple today in the mass media of our country. Coming down to us historically through war against the Indians, through slavery, lynchings, gangland warfare, to the current use of dogs and electric cattle-prods against human beings by law enforcement officers.

    “Before the next martyr is struck down and the next season of public anguish and sorrow commences, we the Association of Artists for Freedom, call upon you, the American people to join us in putting our deep grief into positive actions.

    “This is no time for business-as-usual. This is no time for Christmas-as-usual. On moral principles alone, let us refuse to participate in the orgy of shopping-as-usual this Christmas. Let us make this Christmas season in the year of our Lord and of our profound sorrow, nineteen hundred and sixty three, a time of National Shame and Mourning. And by our sacrifices, let us, who love our country, reaffirm our dedication to those forgotten principles upon which this country was founded, and by which it must live or die.

    “To those of us who must give something, let us make our Christmas gift a contribution to civil rights organizations and other institutions working to build and strengthen the moral and religious fibre of our nation.

    “What profounder monument can we build to the memory of Medgar Evers and the children of Birmingham and the President of the United States?”

    FOUNDING MEMBERS:
    James Baldwin, Ossie Davis,
    Ruby Dee, Odetta Gordan,
    Louis Lomax,
    John O. Killens, Acting Chairman
    Clarence B. Jones, Counsel

    Photo of the founding members of the Association of Artists for Freedom who called for the boycott:
    http://findingeliza.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/12/boycott_1963.jpg
    From left to right: James Baldwin, Odetta, John O. Killens, Ossie Davis and Ruby Dee

    For further reading:
    http://noirg.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/11/Jet.10.17.1963.BoycottChristmas.pdf

    Reply
  44. rikyrah says:
    November 18, 2016 at 6:22 am

    Morning, Everyone 😒😒😒

    Reply

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