Recommended Reading
from Bruce
Josh Marshall: He's Poison (TPM)
But now we are. And that's the thing: Donald Trump poisons everything. It's like an abuser with a captive family; he poisons everything, inflames everything, destroys and degrades anything in his path for his own ends. No one gets out in one piece. He's poison. He's just poison. There's no other way to put it. He hurts the country every moment he's in office.
Garrison Keillor: The old obit man looks around (Washington Post)
I tell myself to buckle down. Pay attention. Do your job. Don't kill time.
Nosheen Iqbal: Hurray for Riz Ahmed's Netflix Dane - but is it time for a moratorium on A-list Hamlets? (Guardian)
The importance of playing the prince isn't just overstated, it's boring. Which is why we should welcome a break from the usual narrow casting.
Killian Fox: Bacon and eggs for every meal: absurd diets of the rich and famous (Guardian)
Lucian Freud had breakfast at the same restaurant every morning for 15 years, Balzac drank up to 50 cups of coffee a day and Steve Jobs spent weeks at a time eating only apples and carrots.
Party animals: why 50 is the new 21 (Guardian)
Sales of 50th birthday cards and party paraphernalia have overtaken those marking 21sts, and 50th bashes have the most guests. Time to befriend lots of people in their late 40s …
Lydia Bugg: Working In The Dying Radio Business (Cracked)
5. Request Shows Are Fake
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Presenting
Michael Egan
took the day off.
has returned to semi-retired status.
In memory.
Reader Suggestion
Michelle in AZ
Reader Comment
Current Events
For those existential angst moments. (Or maybe just a question we need to put to Predator every single day when he wakes up and stumbles down to the Oval Office.)
Linda >^..^<
We are all only temporarily able bodied.
Thanks, Linda!
Bonus Links
Jeannie the Teed-Off Temp
Reader Comment
Homecoming
I arrived at the baggage claim at the Sacramento airport to find a couple dozen Australian firefighters waiting for their bags. I spoke with them and thanked them them for their service.
The more of them I thanked, the more emotional I became.
The enormity of what has happened so close to home finally hit me. The stories from the fires are horrific, heart-wrenching and sometimes heart-warming.
Firefighters are arriving from half a world away. #45 hasn't even acknowledged that we've burned. How reprehensible he is.
Deborah
Thanks, Deborah!
from Marc Perkel
Patriot Act
Selected Readings
from that Mad Cat, JD
EVENTUALLY EVERYONE IS GOING TO DIE.
"FROM MANY, ONE".
PUT ON A SAPPY FACE.
WHERE HAVE ALL THE INSECTS GONE?
THE "COLOSSAL DICK" CLAUSE.
THE NAZI.
COMPASSIONATE CONSERVATIVES.
NO PARTY FOR HONEST MEN.
THAT'S BETTER.
Visit JD's site - Kitty Litter Music
In The Chaos Household
Last Night
Running late.
Stars Urge People
#RejectTheNRA
In response to the devastating mass shooting in Las Vegas on Oct. 1, stars including Melissa McCarthy, Emma Stone, Bill Hader, Laura Dern, Sheryl Crow and Adam Scott have teamed up for a video showing how everyday Americans can call on their congressional lawmakers to reject legislation that would roll back gun silencer safety laws and to reject a national concealed carry reciprocity bill.
Emma Stone starts off the clip. "The mass shooting in Las Vegas has left all of us grieving, scared and angry," she says. "Knowing what to do about it can be confusing. Here's one thing that can make a difference right now," Bill Hader adds. A slew of stars then urge viewers to text "REJECT" to 644-33 to connect them to Everytown Gun Safety, which will then connect people with their Congressional representatives. The group also provides a script to use when speaking to lawmakers.
The video is part of a large grassroots effort to #RejectTheNRA. Everytown for Gun Safety Action Fund and Moms Demand Action for Gun Sense in America, part of Everytown, announced Tuesday that they will send 1 million phone calls to reject the NRA and its policies. Through November 2018, Moms Demand Action volunteers and supporters of Everytown will work to get the word out to demand that legislators stop efforts to roll back gun silencer safety laws and to pass so-called concealed carry reciprocity. They will also back candidates who support gun safety.
"The NRA has spent millions electing the President and Congress it wants - but grassroots momentum is on the side of gun safety," said John Feinblatt, president of Everytown for Gun Safety, in a statement. "By sending 1 million calls, we'll prove the power - and passion - of Americans hungry for change. The NRA's leadership is deeply out of touch with the American people, and we'll make sure Congress and lawmakers in states hear their constituents loud and clear."
#RejectTheNRA
Weinstein's Behavior Is No Surprise
Anita Hill
Anita Hill, who championed women's ability to speak out against sexual harassment, didn't mince words about the allegations against Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein.
"The details are clearly shocking but the behavior itself is not surprising because I've heard from women, thousands of them over the past 26 years, about behavior of this kind that they've endured," Hill, a law school professor who in 1991 famously accused then-Supreme Court nominee Clarence "Slappy" Thomas of sexual harassment, told CNN's "New Day" on Wednesday.
Dozens of women have come forward in recent weeks with stories describing Weinstein's predatory conduct. Many have told of being tricked into taking a meeting in Weinstein's hotel rooms or being manipulated into caving to his sexual demands out of fear that he could sabotage their careers.
Hill, now a Brandeis University professor, credited the media with digging deeply into the Weinstein story instead of just asking "the old, pat questions" about sexual harassment and assault.
"But we've also gotten questions about how this type of behavior can be sustained over three decades, and those are going to be important questions moving forward," she added.
Anita Hill
Tears Into Trump
Keith Olbermann
Keith Olbermann rose to fame at ESPN before entering the cable news fray at MSNBC, where he was a forceful critic of George W. Bush. Ah, the good old days. Today, the 58-year-old, like many liberals, often feels like he's in an alternate universe - or wishes he were. "It's exactly that feeling you get in a dream where there's a nuclear war or you're back in the fourth grade," he says. He exorcises his anxiety via his GQ video series The Resistance, which is in its second season. Since the September 2016 premiere, he's taped 170 commentaries, culled for his new book, Trump Is F*cking Crazy ($27, Blue Rider Press).
Olbermann has authored previous books based on his TV commentaries on MSNBC'sCountdown, but the Trump book "actually manages to produce a narrative of the whole campaign and more importantly, the warnings that were not heeded," he says. "So it became more than the sum of its parts. I'm very pleased with it, actually. It reads like the Titanic is in the water, and you get that sense that, well, maybe they won't hit the iceberg this time. And then on the next page, no, they hit the iceberg all right."
Do you still watch cable news?
Turning on CNN and MSNBC is of no value to me. Number one, I know all the tricks. Number two, I know all the conflicts. Number three, I know all the self-interest. The structures of cable news and other networks are still: "How do we leverage this? How do we position ourselves correctly?" Rather than: "The country is on fire - what do we do?"
Keith Olbermann
Notable Contestant
'Jeopardy!'
Former Fresno resident Fran Fried became part of "Jeopardy!" history following Tuesday's episode.
Not so much because Fried is transgender, and is believed to be only the third trans person to appear on the popular game show.
But because Fried was part of arguably the wildest "Jeopardy!" ending ever.
Fried, 56, led for most of the show, including a $10,300 lead with only six clues remaining.
But after fellow contestant Carlos Nobleza Posas of Salt Lake City managed to pull into a tie with Fried at $12,300 going into Final Jeopardy!, one of the craziest finishes went down.
'Jeopardy!'
States Sue
DeVos
Democratic attorneys general in 17 states and the District of Columbia filed suit Tuesday against the U.S. Department of Education over its decision to block an Obama-era rule designed to protect students from being defrauded by for-profit colleges.
The Gainful Employment rule was supposed to take effect this year, but Education Secretary Betsy DeVos froze it until a new rule could be crafted. The rule was meant to ensure that students received an education that would help them land a job with a high enough income to pay off their student loan debt.
The lawsuit, filed with the U.S. District Court in the nation's capital, comes as DeVos faces criticism from student advocates and Democratic lawmakers for delaying action on tens of thousands of claims for loan forgiveness from former students at defunct for-profit colleges.
DeVos' move to block the gainful employment rule is part of an ongoing effort to roll back some of the policies of the Obama administration on issues ranging from student loans to the rights of transgender students and the way colleges investigate sexual assault on campus. DeVos says those rules were ineffective, confusing and were an encroachment on state and local rights.
"The Department of Education is again eliminating crucial protections for student borrowers," said Maryland Attorney General Brian Frosh, Other states represented in the lawsuit were California, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Iowa, Massachusetts, Minnesota, New York, North Carolina, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Virginia and Washington.
DeVos
10 Days Later
California Wildfires
Ten days and more than 200,000 scorched acres later, Donald Trump (R-Execrable) has tapped out a Twitter response to California's devastating wildfires.
The president-for-now regularly uses Twitter to communicate with the American people his base, issuing 140-character policy proclamations or messages of support spewage. But in the days since powerful winds ignited voracious wildfires across California's wine country, Mr Trump's hadn't specifically tweeted a word on the catastrophe.
Finally breaking the Twitter silence, Mr Trump wrote that "Our hearts are with all affected by the wildfires in California", praising the first responders who have been battling the blazes.
Topics he addressed before Wednesday morning's message of solidarity included the booming stock market - a subject Mr Trump returned to numerous times - and protests by NFL players. He has repeatedly lashed out at the news media, former Democratic opponent Hillary Clinton, congressional Democrats and Republican senator Bob Corker.
California Wildfires
Monuments Vandalized
Virginia
Two Confederate monuments in two Virginia cities have been vandalized this week.
The Richmond Times-Dispatch reports the word "racist" was found painted in red on the Jefferson Davis statue in Richmond on Tuesday. The Virginian-Pilot reports Norfolk police spokesman Daniel Hudson says a memorial to the Confederate dead was spray-painted with "#2 BETTER LUCK NEVER" early Monday morning.
Richmond's Davis statue is on Monument Avenue, which also features four other Confederate statues. The nearby J.E.B. Stuart statue was splattered with pine tar in August, and three statues were tagged with spray paint after President-for-now Donald Trump's (R-Racist) election victory last year.
The Norfolk statue was previously spray-painted with the word "SHAME" in May.
Both Richmond and Norfolk are considering whether to move or contextualize the monuments following August's violent white nationalist rally in Charlottesville.
Virginia
Torture Report
CIA
The Central Intelligence Agency thought for months that it had mistakenly shredded a massive U.S. Senate report on its use of waterboarding and other "enhanced interrogation techniques" before suddenly discovering that its copy had not been lost after all, an agency official said on Tuesday.
"It's embarrassing and I have apologized," Christopher Sharpley, the acting CIA Inspector General, told the Senate Intelligence Committee during his confirmation hearing as President-for-now Donald Trump's (R-Crooked) nominee for the position.
Championed by Democratic Senator Dianne Feinstein when she chaired the Senate panel, the "torture report," as it is known, is the result of a six-year investigation into so-called enhanced interrogation techniques used by the CIA after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, during the administration of Republican resident George W. Bush (R-Previous WPE).
Feinstein wants the 6,700-page document declassified. But Republican Senator Richard Burr, her successor as committee chairman, has resisted its release and asked for the return of copies distributed to government agencies under Democratic President Barack Obama.
Sharpley said the CIA received the report in December 2014 on a computer disk, which was then uploaded into a classified system. Shortly thereafter, he said, the agency was told to delete it because of ongoing Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) litigation.
CIA
Decline Dramatically In German Nature Reserves
Insects
Researchers in Germany have documented a steep decline in flying insects at dozens of nature reserves in the past three decades, and agricultural pesticides may be to blame, said a study Wednesday.
While it is well documented that butterflies and bees have been disappearing in Europe and North America, the study in PLOS ONE is the first to document that flying insects in general have decreased by more than three-quarters across Germany since 1989.
Researchers are concerned because insects are important pollinators and also a key part of the food chain, serving as meals for birds and other small creatures.
For the study, researchers used sticky traps to collect insects at 63 nature reserves, then measured the biomass, documenting changes over time.
Over the past 27 years, they found an average decline of 76 percent, with the effects appearing worst in summer (82 percent).
Insects
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