Some surely unsolicited advice

Dear Bernie, 

What you need to do now is to not drop out. Stay in until the end by all means. BUT, agree -- in exchange for more power in determining the platform and whatever else you can get -- to go back to expounding on the issues instead of attacking Hillary personally. 

I'm sure you don't want to hear this, but you started losing women voters when you started saying Hillary was "not qualified." Hillary won female voters in NY by a whopping 61% to 39% -- a 22% margin and far higher than in previous primaries. 

You want your issues to win? Then make it about that instead of about her.

Sincerely,

Me

Congratulations, Hillary Clinton!

CNN projects Clinton winner in NY. Cheers! pic.twitter.com/FIoC8gFvh4

— Melissa McEwan (@Shakestweetz) April 20, 2016

If he can't make it there...

#ImWithHer #HillYes

Bye Bye Bernie!

Sarah Palin vs Bill Nye. WHO'S The Scientist?

Since some of my friends on the left are screaming at each other vis-à-vis Clinton V Sanders (and by  Grabthar's hammer, I am so happy I'm not involved in that one!), I'm veering sideways to another argument.

This one:

Of all the causes Sarah Palin has embraced in her varied career as hockey mom, Alaska governor, Republican vice-presidential nominee, Fox television commentator and Donald Trump supporter, none perhaps may be as bold or – as she still likes to say, “rogue” – as trying to take down a much-beloved children’s television personality: Bill Nye the Science Guy.

But that was where hardcore climate change denial landed Palin on Thursday: a wood-panelled committee room in Congress where she disputed the credentials of a hugely popular science educator who has designed devices for Nasa (sic) and been awarded several honorary degrees.

“Bill Nye is as much a scientist as I am,” Palin told the gathering. “He’s a kids’ show actor. He’s not a scientist.”

That's right.  The governor-who-quit-half-way is as much a scientist as Bill Nye?

Can we get a fact-check on this?

Sure:

So how do Nye and Palin’s scientific credentials compare?

Palin has none. She has a bachelor’s in communications-journalism from the University of Idaho. She has spent her career in politics. In addition to serving as governor of Alaska from 2006 to 2009, she was chairperson for the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission between 2003 and 2004 and Republican vice presidential candidate in the 2008 election, among other posts.

Nye has a B.S. in mechanical engineering from Cornell. He also has six honorary doctorate degrees, including Ph.D.s in science from Goucher College and Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute.

He held various positions as an engineer between 1977 to 2009, such as contributing to the designs of 747 planes for Boeing and the designs of equipment used to clean up oil spills.

From 1999 to 2009, Nye worked with a team at the NASA and California Institute of Technology’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory to design and create the MarsDial, a sundial and camera calibrator attached to the Mars Exploration Rover.

And so on and so forth.

That she's still taken seriously by some of our friends on the right is screamingly laughable and maddening all at the same time.

He's right and she's wrong.

Pat Toomey Met With Merrick Garland - OR - Pat Simply LOOKS Like He's Doing His Job When In Fact He's Simply Misleading The Voters.

So, Senator Pat Toomey has issued a ruling (heehee - SNARK!) explaining his current and ongoing Senatorial Obstruction.  In doing so, he's misleading you - the voting public - in a number of different ways.

He opens by saying that he supported the nomination of Justice Sotomayor but opposed the nomination of Justice Kagan - thus, I suppose, "proving" that he's fair (one for, one against, see?  FAIR AND BALANCED!).

Except that when you look even at the pieces he published (one in at philly.com, the other at the P-G), you'll see how he's changing his own rules to find a way to obstruct.

When he supported the nomination of Justice Sotomayor he wrote:

When John Roberts and Samuel Alito were nominated to the Supreme Court, Republicans argued that they should be confirmed based on their impeccable qualifications and mainstream jurisprudence. Now, Democrats are in power, and the same standard should apply.

After listening to much of Sonia Sotomayor's testimony to the Senate Judiciary Committee and carefully examining her 17-year record as a federal appellate judge, I have come to two conclusions. First, her record is somewhat left of center, and I would likely disagree with many of her rulings if she were a Supreme Court Justice. Second, she is an extremely capable and qualified jurist.

If I were a U.S. senator, I would vote for her confirmation, because objective qualifications should matter more than ideology in the judicial confirmation process. [Emphasis added.]

So even though they'd disagree on her rulings he'd vote for her because she was qualified.

And even with is non-support of the Kagan nomination, he undercuts his current and ongoing obstructionism.  Take a look:

Last year, I supported President Obama's nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the U.S. Supreme Court. In an op-ed, I noted that while I knew I would likely disagree with many of Justice Sotomayor's decisions, she was nonetheless worthy of support because objective qualifications should matter more than ideology in the judicial confirmation process.

I stand by that position and maintain that a president's selection should not be thoughtlessly vetoed or filibustered by the Senate based on the nominee's presumed ideology. Rather, the Senate should only deny a nominee if he or she holds positions outside the judicial mainstream or is otherwise hostile to basic constitutional principles. [Emphasis added.]

Wait.  Pat Toomey wrote that?

Yep.

But let's remain on his opposition to Kagan for a second.  As I wrote at the time, he got a number of very important facts just plain wrong.   For example he mislead the public when he wrote that:

• She wouldn't rule out the use of federal power to force citizens to eat their veggies all in the name of the Constitution's "Commerce Clause" (in fact she said that noneconomic activity - like eating - was beyond congressional authority given to it by the Commerce Clause).
• She argued for the congressional authority to ban political pamphlets (when in fact, she was arguing that a corporation must use a PAC not any general funds to fund any political speech).
• She circumvented federal law by denying military recruiters equal access to students at Harvard (when in fact she was following the federal law in regards to any recruiter who discriminated).

So now that we've established that Pat Toomey is not above misleading the public in order to justify blocking a Supreme Court nominee, let's take a look at what he did say about Merrick Garland's record.

First he said this:

Under our Constitution's system of checks and balances, federal courts play an essential role in limiting executive abuses of power.

Then after a few paragraphs regarding the EPA, he wrote:

I also raised with Judge Garland his approach to terrorist detainee cases. He authored an opinion that resulted in the release of 17 Guantanamo Bay prisoners who were part of a group of violent Islamist extremists the State Department had designated as terrorists.

They were captured after fleeing an Afghanistan training camp funded by al Qaeda and the Taliban. Judge Garland overruled a military tribunal's unanimous finding that these detainees were enemy combatants.

He second-guessed the military finding, contrary to federal statute. And his conclusion left the military with the choice of either jeopardizing the safety of intelligence informants or releasing enemy combatants.

As a result of Garland's decision, the detainees were ordered released into the United States. Fortunately, another panel of judges on the D.C. Circuit halted this, and the detainees were instead released into other countries.

In our discussion, Judge Garland again did not allay my concerns.

In an era in which terrorists are actively using every weapon at their disposal to kill innocent Americans, we cannot afford to appoint a Supreme Court justice who fails to understand these dangers.

It took a while but I found the conveniently-unnamed-by-Toomey opinion written by Merrick Garland.  It was almost as if he didn't want anyone to see the facts of the case.  But I could be wrong.

Here's the opening paragraph of that opinion:

A Combatant Status Review Tribunal has decided that petitioner Huzaifa Parhat, a detainee at the United States Naval Base at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, is an “enemy combatant.” This is the first case in which this court has considered the merits of a petition to review such a decision under the Detainee Treatment Act of 2005. The Act grants this court jurisdiction to “determine the validity of any final decision of a Combatant Status Review Tribunal that an alien is properly detained as an enemy combatant.” We conclude that the Tribunal’s decision in Parhat’s case was not valid. [Emphasis added.]

Wait.  Didn't Pat say that "contrary to federal statute"??  And isn't that completely wrong?

Let's move on to the second paragraph of the opinion:

Parhat is an ethnic Uighur, who fled his home in the People’s Republic of China in opposition to the policies of the Chinese government. It is undisputed that he is not a member of al Qaida or the Taliban, and that he has never participated in any hostile action against the United States or its allies. The Tribunal’s determination that Parhat is an enemy combatant is based on its finding that he is “affiliated” with a Uighur independence group, and the further finding that the group was “associated” with al Qaida and the Taliban. The Tribunal’s findings regarding the Uighur group rest, in key respects, on statements in classified State and Defense Department documents that provide no information regarding the sources of the reporting upon which the statements are based, and otherwise lack sufficient indicia of the statements’ reliability. Parhat contends, with support of his own, that the Chinese government is the source of several of the key statements. [Emphasis added.]

Wait.  Didn't Pat say that Garland failed to understand the dangers of terrorists who will use "every weapon at their disposal to kill innocent Americans"?  But didn't Garland write that Parhat is not Taliban or al Qaida and never participated in any terrorist act against the US or it's allies?

Isn't that a Y-U-U-GE lie of omission by Pat Toomey?

And now the third paragraph of Garland's opinion.  The third paragraph:

Parhat’s principal argument on this appeal is that the record before his Combatant Status Review Tribunal is insufficient to support the conclusion that he is an enemy combatant, even under the Defense Department’s own definition of that term. We agree. To survive review under the Detainee Treatment Act, a Tribunal’s determination of a detainee’s status must be based on evidence that both the Tribunal and the court can assess for reliability. Because the evidence the government submitted to Parhat’s Tribunal did not permit the Tribunal to make the necessary assessment, and because the record on review does not permit this court to do so, we cannot find that the government’s designation of Parhat as an enemy combatant is supported by a “preponderance of the evidence” and “was consistent with the standards and procedures” established by the Secretary of Defense, as required by the Act.

Not a terrorist.  Not a member of al Qaida or the taliban and yet dumped into Gitmo solely on the authority of the unitary executive.

What was it that Pat Toomey said about the courts being a balance to any abuses to the power of the executive branch?

How many times has Pat Toomey mislead us?  I've stopped counting.

Ugh - THIS "Argument" Again (A Republic, Not A Democracy)

I've heard this silly nonsense for years.

This week, it sullied up the pages of the Tribune-Review editorial page:

The simple fact of the matter is that the United States is not a democracy. It is a constitutional republic. And it is representative governance that protects us from the anarchy of pure democracy for which so many apparently pine. [Italics in Original.]

Eugene Volokh, of the blog The Volokh Conspiracy vehemently denies:

But there is no basis for saying that the United States is somehow “not a democracy, but a republic.” “Democracy” and “republic” aren’t just words that a speaker can arbitrarily define to mean something (e.g., defining democracy as “a form of government in which all laws are made directly by the people”). They are terms that have been given meaning by English speakers more broadly. And both today and in the Framing era, “democracy” has been generally understood to include representative democracy as well as direct democracy.

And here's his reasoning:

I often hear people argue that the United States is a republic, not a democracy. But that’s a false dichotomy. A common definition of “republic” is, to quote the American Heritage Dictionary, “A political order in which the supreme power lies in a body of citizens who are entitled to vote for officers and representatives responsible to them” — we are that. A common definition of “democracy” is, “Government by the people, exercised either directly or through elected representatives” — we are that, too.

The United States is not a direct democracy, in the sense of a country in which laws (and other government decisions) are made predominantly by majority vote. Some lawmaking is done this way, on the state and local levels, but it’s only a tiny fraction of all lawmaking. But we are a representative democracy, which is a form of democracy. [Emphasis added.]

BTW, lest you think that he's some tax-hiking, government-expanding, latte-drinking, sushi-eating, Volvo-driving, liberal, the libertarian/conservative Volokh has shown up on those same sullied Trib pages as this silly argument.

For example here:

UCLA constitutional scholar Eugene Volokh tells Fox News that a rule barring Nassau County, N.Y., prosecutors from bearing arms at home without special permission is a violation of their Second Amendment rights and an Empire State statute that protects gun collectors and target shooters from job-related restrictions. And talk about turning into sitting ducks those who help to bring some of the scummiest scum of the Earth to justice.

And here, where Colin McNickle, favorably  quotes him in another discussion of Second Amendment rights:

Thursday's California ruling is seminal and one that, if upheld and by extension, solidifies the Framers' notion that the Second Amendment, as constitutional scholar Eugene Volokh reminds, “is not restrictive, it is inclusive.”

Volokh's even had an e-book reviewed by an actual member of the braintrust! And it's critical of the ACA! Take a look:

“Sebelius v. Hobby Lobby: Corporate Rights and Religious Liberties” by Eugene Volokh (Cato Institute) — Oral arguments in the case referenced in this book's title will be heard by the U.S. Supreme Court on Tuesday. Filed by the family that owns the Hobby Lobby retail chain, it has been consolidated with another case that involves another business, Conestoga Wood Specialties. The publisher calls this e-book-only release “a comprehensive primer” on the constitutional issues at stake, which arise from religiously motivated opposition to the Affordable Care Act's requirement that firms employing 50 or more people provide contraceptive coverage in their group health plans. The author, a leading First Amendment scholar, combines material previously published via the Volokh Conspiracy blog, which he founded, with new content and analysis. Cato Institute constitutional scholar Ilya Shapiro contributed the book's foreword, which covers the case's “historical, legal, and current policy framework.” [Emphasis added.]

Guys, when someone on your side of the political aisle says that there's no basis for this silly argument, don't you think it's time to finally set it aside (I Corinthians 13:11)?

"Ted" Cruz And How Wrong He Is About The Climate

A few days ago we reported on what the Canadian-born junior senator from Texas, Rafael Edward "Ted" Cruz, had to say on a woman's right to choose and on marriage equality.

So today, we're gonna look at how wrong he is on the climate.

He's been fact-checked by CBS:

CRUZ: "The satellites that actually measure the temperature, that we've launched into the air to measure the temperature, they have recorded no significant warming whatsoever for the last 18 years."

THE FACTS: Scientists, including those who work with the very satellite measuring system that Cruz refers to, say he's misusing the satellite data. They do show warming, albeit relatively little over the period Cruz cites, says Carl Mears, senior scientist for Remote Sensing Systems, which produces the data that Cruz refers to.

But by starting his comparison period in 1997, Cruz has selected a time when temperatures spiked because of an El Nino weather pattern. Starting at an artificially high point minimizes the rate of increase since then, Mears said, adding, "If you start riding your bike at the top of a big hill, you always go downhill, at least for a while."

More important is what's measured at the Earth's surface, where people live, Mears said. Those ground-based systems show a greater degree of warming.

The long-term trend that Mears' satellites show is about 0.7-degree warming since 1979, when satellites started measuring temperature. Ground-based monitors show a warming of about 1 degree during the same period. And 1979 was not among the top five hottest or coldest years in the 36 years of records.

And factcheck.org:

As for Cruz’s claim that “climate change is the perfect pseudoscientific theory because it can never, ever, ever be disproven,” Mann told us that “absolutely” climate change could be disproved. “That’s true in any area of science,” he said. “It’s true in physics. It’s true in biology. It’s true in climate change.” As he explained above, the theory of climate change rests upon the accuracy of the theory of global warming, which, in turn, depends on the theory of the greenhouse effect.

One way to disprove climate change might be to disprove the greenhouse effect, Mann told us. This would entail finding strong evidence that suggests gases like carbon dioxide don’t trap the sun’s heat. But the likelihood of this occurring is slim to none, as the theory has been verified time and again since it was first proposed by the physicist Joseph Fourier in 1824.

In fact, Mann says, “things as basic as the design of heat-seeking missiles rely upon an understanding of the greenhouse effect.”

Another way to disprove climate change would be to challenge the theory of global warming, adds Mann. Since global warming can be thought of as an enhanced greenhouse effect (see NASA’s definition of the term here), this method of falsification would be related to — though different from — disproving the greenhouse effect.

In other words, instead of finding strong evidence that suggests carbon dioxide, for example, doesn’t trap the sun’s heat point blank, scientists would have to show that higher average global temperatures aren’t the result of increased levels of greenhouse gases. But scientists have found no evidence to support this claim.

And a fact-check from the Chicago tribune even showed up at the libertarian-lovin' Reason.com:

The topic was global warming. Every major scientific body has confirmed its existence, but as "the son of two mathematicians and computer programmers and scientists," he feels particularly qualified to debunk it.

"The scientific evidence doesn't support global warming," he informed NPR. "For the last 18 years, the satellite data—we have satellites that monitor the atmosphere. The satellites that actually measure the temperature showed no significant warming whatsoever."

There are two flaws in his argument. The first is that satellite data are not the only scorecard. Records of surface temperatures, for example, show that "warming during the first 15 years of the 21st century is at least as great as the last half of the 20th century," according to a study by scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

The second is that the satellite data don't refute global warming. NASA says that based on surface temperatures, 2014 was the warmest year on record. Based on satellite data, it was the third-warmest.

The same data indicate that of the 14 hottest years ever, 13 occurred in this century. When Cruz says there has been "no significant warming" since 1997, he's engaging in brazen deception.

And this is the guy the merely moderately crazie Republicans want instead of the billionaire bigot, Donald Trump.

John Kasich? MODERATE??

This ad showed up on my TV this weekend:


It's an ad for Ohio Governor John Kasich.  It presents him as a viable stable candidate in a field of two other crazies.

I am not denying that the other two are batshit crazy but John Kasich?

Take a look at this from Salon.

After linking to this story where this happened:

Staff of a Columbus, Ohio Planned Parenthood clinic were greeted Monday morning with a freshly painted message in red scrawled on the outside of their clinic: “SATAN DEN OF BABYKILLERS GOD SEE ALLLL Mark 9:14.”

Heather Digby Parton goes on:

It’s just the latest in a string of vandalism acts against Planned Parenthood since the bogus “Center for Medical Progress” released its fraudulent videos. But Ohio is actually one of the ground zero states for anti-abortion activism and the genial 1950s dad, John Kasich, is their most powerful and ruthless leader. For all of his alleged caring and sharing for the poor and weeping in public, he’s the women of Ohio’s most merciless adversary when it comes to their reproductive freedom.

It’s no surprise that anti-choice zealots are vandalizing one of the few Planned Parenthood clinics left in the state. Just two weeks ago Kasich came off the presidential trail to sign a bill to pull all federal funding from the clinics, cutting all state aid tied to insurance companies that cover abortion. It’s a cruel measure that will also deny funding for the other life-saving and health enhancing services that Planned Parenthood provides to tens of thousands of women.

And the whole thing is based upon those hideous hoax “baby parts” videos, the makers of which are under indictment in Texas for breaking laws in the making of them. Despite the fact that every single investigation in states across the country has not found any proof of wrongdoing, states like Texas are ignoring the evidence and continuing to use them as an excuse to shut down clinics.

And:

In 2013, Kasich approved a budget that included some of the harshest anti-abortion legislation in the country, including a provision requiring abortion clinics to have “transfer agreements” with private hospitals. The innovation in his law was that they also banned clinics from partnering with any public institutions such as those affiliated with state Universities. And wouldn’t you know it, most of the private hospitals in Ohio are owned by the Catholic church, which obviously will refuse to accommodate clinics that perform abortion. Oh well.

Then, just to prove that he has a sense of humor, Kasich and his henchmen in the legislature made a provision for clinics to seek a “waiver” and then populated the department that would approve such waivers with anti-abortion zealots.

 John Kasich, Republican Moderate.

At least he ain't a billionaire bigot or some crazie from Canada!

The Tribune-Review Editorial Board Misleads (Again) On Voter ID (Wisconsin Edition)

Here's what the braintrust wrote:

The Brennan Center for Justice, your garden-variety “progressive” outfit, is incensed that — GASP! — enforcing Wisconsin's new photo identification law led to — OH, MY US! — longer voting lines. Holy moley, those without the proper ID were audaciously asked to register in one line, apply for proper identification in another, then — HOLD ON TO YOUR HATS! — wait in another line to cast their ballots. Said the center's Wendy Weiser: “Wisconsin's strict photo ID law does nothing but create a hassle and confusion at the polls.” Earth to Ms. Weiser — we'll bet it also made would-be fraudsters think twice. Had bona fide voters taken the responsibility to register and obtain those IDs in advance, they could have voted in a more timely fashion. [Bolding in Original.]

Let's start with the description of The Brennan Center.  Did you know that it's based at the NYU School of Law?  No?  Perhaps the braintrust should have told you that.  In any event, here's what they say about themselves:

The Brennan Center for Justice at NYU School of Law is a nonpartisan law and policy institute that seeks to improve our systems of democracy and justice. We work to hold our political institutions and laws accountable to the twin American ideals of democracy and equal justice for all. The Center’s work ranges from voting rights to campaign finance reform, from ending mass incarceration to preserving Constitutional protection in the fight against terrorism. Part think tank, part advocacy group, part cutting-edge communications hub, we start with rigorous research. We craft innovative policies. And we fight for them — in Congress and the states, the courts, and in the court of public opinion.

Hardly "garden-variety" of any sort.

But let's move on to the major mislead by the braintrust.  It's found in these two sentences:

[T]hose without the proper ID were audaciously asked to register in one line, apply for proper identification in another, then — HOLD ON TO YOUR HATS! — wait in another line to cast their ballots.

And:

Had bona fide voters taken the responsibility to register and obtain those IDs in advance, they could have voted in a more timely fashion.

So what did the braintrust leave out of it's criticism of those irresponsible Wisconsin voters?

Simple:

On April 5, when voters cast ballots in Wisconsin’s Republican and Democratic primaries, the state’s controversial voter ID bill will face its biggest test since Governor Scott Walker signed it into law in 2011. For the first time in a major election, citizens will be required to show approved forms of identification in order to vote. The law mandates that the state run a public-service campaign “in conjunction with the first regularly scheduled primary and election” to educate voters on what forms of ID are acceptable.

But Wisconsin has failed to appropriate funds for the public education campaign. The result is that thousands of citizens may be turned away from the polls simply because they did not understand what form of identification they needed to vote.

Here's what that section of the law actually says:

SECTION 144. 0 Nonstatutory provisions.
(1) PUBLIC INFORMATIONAL CAMPAIGN. In conjunction with the first regularly scheduled primary and election at which the voter identification requirements of this act initially apply , the government accountability board shall conduct a public informational campaign for the purpose of informing prospective voters of the voter identification requirements of this act.

And lest you think that the law had nothing whatsoever to do with politics, as part of the plan some DMV offices (where voters could get the necessary IDs) were closed while others' hours were extended.

Guess which ones?  The AP reported:

Gov. Scott Walker's administration is working on finalizing a plan to close as many as 10 offices where people can obtain driver's licenses in order to expand hours elsewhere and come into compliance with new requirements that voters show photo IDs at the polls.

One Democratic lawmaker said Friday it appeared the decisions were based on politics, with the department targeting offices for closure in Democratic areas and expanding hours for those in Republican districts.

A high-ranking DOT official rejected that claim, saying the changes were based on economics, not politics. [Emphasis added]

Sure, of course.  Why wouldn't the people of Wisconsin believe that??

Needless to say, this obviously economic, obviously non-political plan wasn't implemented.

But still the state was supposed to fund an educational campaign to inform the public which IDs to use.

But they didn't.

Voter confusion, long lines and the Trib braintrust blames the voters in those lines and not the Republican legislature who created the problem in the first place.

We'll say it again, in an effort to fix a problem (Voter Fraud, VOTER FRAUD, VOTER FRAUD!!) that simply doesn't exist the Republican legislature -- GASP! -- implement a plan  -- HOLD ON TO YOUR HATS! - designed to do little more than make it harder for people to vote for the Democrats.

Our friends on the Trib editorial board just luuuuv democracy, don't they?

Senator Pat Toomey Shows Up For His Job, Tells Them He's Not Gonna Do It Anyway

From today's P-G:

U.S. Supreme Court nominee Merrick Garland will get his meeting with Sen. Pat Toomey but time seems to be the only thing the Pennsylvania Republican is willing to give to the president’s nominee.

Mr. Toomey already has said he will not vote to confirm any candidate nominated by Barack Obama during the president’s waning time in office.

“Sen. Toomey has made his position on the nomination clear, namely that the American people should have a voice in the selection of the next Supreme Court nominee,” when they elect a new president in November, Toomey spokeswoman E.R. Anderson said this afternoon.

I still think, then, that since the people of Pennsylvania should also have a voice in every decision the Senator should be making in the next few months (since he's in the last few months of his term, too!) he should do nothing until the next Senate is sworn in in January.

And if the state "goes blue" in the next presidential election, even if Toomey is reelected, he should do nothing since the population of the state will have voted against his party and his political ideology by electing another non-republican president. They will have spoken.

Note to the Trolls: those last two paragraphs are intended to be absurd, they're intended to show how absurd the GOP's position is regarding Merrick Garland.  It's absurd because simply not a rational position for the GOP to take.  And yet there they are. 

And sitting right in the middle of them is Pat Toomey, embattled Senator running for re-election in the State of Pennsylvania.

He's still not doing his job.  By sticking to the notion that the "American people should have a voice in the selection of the next Supreme Court nominee" he's ignoring the obvious fact that they already had their voice heard - twice, when they elected Barack Obama.

Senator Toomey, you should be supporting, instead, the notion that Merrick Garland deserves a hearing and an up or down vote.

The Tribune-Review Tries (and Lies) AGAIN WIth The "Voter Fraud" Myth

Our friends on the Tribune-Review editorial board are at it again - this time with a little help from a favorite Scaife Funded think tank.

But let's back up a little.  All the way up to Wisconsin:

Rep. Glenn Grothman (R), a far-right freshman from Wisconsin, generated national headlines this week when he admitted on television what many have long assumed. Looking ahead to this year’s presidential election, the Republican congressman expressed confidence about the GOP doing well in the Badger State, thanks in part to one specific policy.

“[N]ow we have photo ID,” Grothman said, “and I think photo ID is going to make a little bit of a difference.”

At least in public, Republicans are supposed to say voter-ID schemes have nothing to do with rigging elections by suppressing voting rights, though some on the right occasionally slip and accidentally tell the truth, as Grothman helped prove.

Now, another shoe has fallen. A former Republican staffer in the Wisconsin legislature wrote a Facebook message this week, confirming that he saw GOP state lawmakers who, while considering voter-ID measures, “were giddy about the ramifications and literally singled out the prospects of suppressing minority and college voters.”

So it's hardly a surprise that we see this on the pages of the Trib:

As rosters of voters swell during this presidential election year, expect considerably more voter fraud in states such as Pennsylvania, where spurious arguments over “disenfranchisement” have derailed reform and opened the door to mischief.

Nationwide, The Heritage Foundation voter-fraud database lists more than 400 proven cases of vote-buying, ineligible voting, absentee-ballot shenanigans and bogus registration. Then there are the abuses committed by election officials.

Wow. 400 cases.  In a nation of 300 million.

But anyway.  Let's take a look at that database - specifically the 6 cases they found in Pennsylvania (they start at page 174 in the report).  2 are listed as "Impersonation Fraud at the Polls", 2 are listed as "Fraudulent Use of Absentee Ballots" and the final 2 as "False Registrations" (those two are ACORN prosecutions).

You'll note that the braintrust is, yet again, using this story to pitch:

Commonsense measures to ensure the integrity of elections — such as voter-identification laws in Pennsylvania and elsewhere — have been sidelined by ambiguous claims of minority disenfranchisement.

And that Voter ID laws would only have impacted only 2 of the 6 (the Impersonation Fraud).

Do my friends on the braintrust need to be reminded of this?

As the Justice Department investigates Pennsylvania's voter ID law on the federal level, a coalition of civil rights groups is gearing up for a state trial starting Wednesday examining whether the law is allowable under Pennsylvania's constitution.

In that case, Pennsylvania might have handed those groups and their clients (including 93-year-old Viviette Applewhite) a bit of an advantage: They've formally acknowledged that there's been no reported in-person voter fraud in Pennsylvania and there isn't likely to be in November.

The state signed a stipulation agreement with lawyers for the plaintiffs which acknowledges there "have been no investigations or prosecutions of in-person voter fraud in Pennsylvania; and the parties do not have direct personal knowledge of any such investigations or prosecutions in other states."[Emphasis added.]

I guess not.

No voter fraud - certainly not "rampant" (or even approaching rampant) voter fraud.

The braintrust is lying to you, yet again, about the need for Voter-ID laws.  Laws whose only real purpose is to make it just a little bit harder for poorer or older (ie Democratic Party supporters) voters to vote.

Reprehensible.  Absolutely reprehensible.

Rafael Edward "Ted" Cruz On Abortion, Marriage Equality

Now that the Canadian-born Rafael Edward "Ted" Cruz won the Wisconsin primary, we might want to take a closer look at how the leading non-Trump in the race on the GOP side deals with some of our nation's issues.

For example, this one:

Republican presidential candidate Ted Cruz told Fox News host Megyn Kelly on Monday that he did not support abortion rights even in the case of rape or incest because it was not “the child’s fault.”

And this one:

In an interview with influential social conservative commentator Robert George on the Catholic television network EWTN last month, Sen. Ted Cruz, R-Texas, said that the president should defy the Supreme Court’s “fundamentally illegitimate” decision striking down bans on same-sex marriage, which he compared to “Nazi decrees.”

George, the co-founder of the National Organization for Marriage and a mentor of Cruz’s, likened the court’s “tragic mistake” in Obergefell to infamous Supreme Court decisions including Dred Scott, asking Cruz, “Was Lincoln right to defy the court on [Dred Scott] and would you, as president, do that with the Obergefell decision?”

“Lincoln was absolutely right, I agree with President Lincoln,” Cruz responded. “And courts do not make law. That is not what a court does. A court interprets the law, a court applies the law, but courts don’t make law.”

Saying that it is “profoundly wrong” to refer to the gay marriage decision as the law of the land, Cruz said, “I think the decision was fundamentally illegitimate, it was lawless, it was not based on the Constitution.”

Except that the Supreme Court said it was.  And they should know.  They're the Supreme Court.

This is the guy that's gonna save the GOP from the oncoming Trump trainwreck. 

The Tribune-Review Editorial Board Continues To Mislead The Public

And it's again about Climate Science.

Take a look:

On the latest front to silence the skeptics of “settled” climate change, attorneys general from at least 17 states (sans Pennsylvania) have announced a “unified campaign” to shut up those companies that challenge the accepted “narrative.”

Right there, they're misleading.

This is what's going on:

The New York attorney general has begun an investigation of Exxon Mobil to determine whether the company lied to the public about the risks of climate change or to investors about how such risks might hurt the oil business.

According to people with knowledge of the investigation, Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman issued a subpoena Wednesday evening to Exxon Mobil, demanding extensive financial records, emails and other documents.

The investigation focuses on whether statements the company made to investors about climate risks as recently as this year were consistent with the company’s own long-running scientific research.

The people said the inquiry would include a period of at least a decade during which Exxon Mobil funded outside groups that sought to undermine climate science, even as its in-house scientists were outlining the potential consequences — and uncertainties — to company executives. [Emphasis added.]

The whole thing is really just a continuation of what happened back in November.

It was reported that:

At a meeting in Exxon Corporation's headquarters, a senior company scientist named James F. Black addressed an audience of powerful oilmen. Speaking without a text as he flipped through detailed slides, Black delivered a sobering message: carbon dioxide from the world's use of fossil fuels would warm the planet and could eventually endanger humanity.

"In the first place, there is general scientific agreement that the most likely manner in which mankind is influencing the global climate is through carbon dioxide release from the burning of fossil fuels," Black told Exxon's Management Committee, according to a written version he recorded later.

It was July 1977 when Exxon's leaders received this blunt assessment, well before most of the world had heard of the looming climate crisis.

That's the fraud they're looking to investigate, my friends.  That's a long time for Exxon to know the truth and still be funding the science denial.

And for those of you keeping score, July, 1977 is about 2 and a half years before Ronald Reagan announced his candidacy for the Presidency - that's a long time ago!

Then there's this from the Trib braintrust:

As the AGs see it, the First Amendment “does not give you the right to commit fraud,” Mr. Schneiderman declared. But what if the government-funded, predisposed “science” of anthropogenic climate change is, in fact, the fraud?

If the science is a fraud, then why is the Pentagon going along with it?

Global climate change will aggravate problems such as poverty, social tensions, environmental degradation, ineffectual leadership and weak political institutions that threaten stability in a number of countries, according to a report the Defense Department sent to Congress yesterday.

And:

The report finds that climate change is a security risk, Pentagon officials said, because it degrades living conditions, human security and the ability of governments to meet the basic needs of their populations. Communities and states that already are fragile and have limited resources are significantly more vulnerable to disruption and far less likely to respond effectively and be resilient to new challenges, they added.

My question to the braintrust: Given the above, you must think that the Pentagon is part of the fraud, right?  So, shouldn't someone be investigating that?

It's BASEBALL SEASON!

Yesterday, the Pittsburgh Pirates beat the St Louis Cardinals in the home opener, 4-1.

It's a little known historical fact that before the Cardinals moved to St. Louis from Chicago in 1960, there was another team, a legendary team, that played in the Mound City.

The St Louis Wolves.

And boyoboyoboy, they had some players with some strange names on their team.

Take a look:


But as any good journalist/blogger knows, one has to confirm with a second, reliable source in order for one's assertions (in this case that the St Louis Wolves actually existed and actually had players with weird names) are taken seriously.

Here's the confirmation:


See?  Same story but a completely different frame of reference - so it has to be true!

Right?

Happy Baseball!

The Tribune-Review's Colin McNickle - Climate Science Denier - Deceives His Readers. Again.

Take a look:

Coal might be dirty. But government is dirtier.

Witness the social re-engineering political machinations in which, through taxpayer funding, the government created a very large body of very shoddy “climate change” (formerly “global warming”) research — then, contrary to the scientific method, threatened to prosecute those who dared question its slipshod “science” — that set the dominoes in motion now killing America's coal industry.

Geez Colin, do we really have to do this again?

I guess we do.

Let's start in the middle and work our way out.  Colin touches on something that the science deniers usually think is a "gotcha" moment when he did this:

...“climate change” (formerly “global warming”) research...

You've seen it elsewhere, I am sure.  It's the "they changed the name!" myth.

Skeptical Science has a whole page devoted to the myth.  Interestingly enough, they actually use evidence to back up their assertions (something Colin and the other deniers conveniently avoid).

For instance, did you know that:

Both of the terms in question are used frequently in the scientific literature, because they refer to two different physical phenomena. As the name suggests, 'global warming' refers to the long-term trend of a rising average global temperature, which you can see here:

'Climate change', again as the name suggests, refers to the changes in the global climate which result from the increasing average global temperature. For example, changes in precipitation patterns, increased prevalence of droughts, heat waves, and other extreme weather, etc.

They go on to show that the two different terms have been in use for decades (in fact there's evidence to show that the "new" term ("climate change") was in greater use earlier and has always been the norm in the scientific literature.

Not that Colin McNickle would know what the "scientific literature" is.  But let's move on to McNickle's second deception - that the guv'ment is threatened to prosecute those who dared question its slipshod “science."

Simply saying the science is "slipshod" doesn't make it so.

But Colin, if you have a problem with the science, I'll tell you what I tell anyone who's a science denier, namely take it up with:

• NASA
• NOAA
• Met Office
• Japanese Meteorological Society

They threw together this graph:

If you don't want to wrestle with those eggheads, why not these?

• American Meteorological Society: There is unequivocal evidence that Earth’s lower atmosphere, ocean, and land surface are warming; sea level is rising; and snow cover, mountain glaciers, and Arctic sea ice are shrinking. The dominant cause of the warming since the 1950s is human activities. This scientific finding is based on a large and persuasive body of research. 
• American Chemical Society: [C]omprehensive scientific assessments of our current and potential future climates clearly indicate that climate change is real, largely attributable to emissions from human activities, and potentially a very serious problem. 
• National Academy of Sciences: Rigorous analysis of all data and lines of evidence shows that most of the observed global warming over the past 50 years or so cannot be explained by natural causes and instead requires a significant role for the influence of human activities.

Colin, mon ami, how much more do you need?

And about that prosecution?

It started with this letter to President Obama and AG Loretta Lynch.  In it there's this:

We appreciate that you are making aggressive and imaginative use of the limited tools available to you in the face of a recalcitrant Congress. One additional tool – recently proposed by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse – is a RICO (Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act) investigation of corporations and other organizations that have knowingly deceived the American people about the risks of climate change, as a means to forestall America’s response to climate change. The actions of these organizations have been extensively documented in peerreviewed academic research (Brulle, 2013) and in recent books including: Doubt is their Product (Michaels, 2008), Climate Cover-Up (Hoggan & Littlemore, 2009), Merchants of Doubt (Oreskes & Conway, 2010), The Climate War (Pooley, 2010), and in The Climate Deception Dossiers (Union of Concerned Scientists, 2015). We strongly endorse Senator Whitehouse’s call for a RICO investigation.

The methods of these organizations are quite similar to those used earlier by the tobacco industry. A RICO investigation (1999 to 2006) played an important role in stopping the tobacco industry from continuing to deceive the American people about the dangers of smoking. If corporations in the fossil fuel industry and their supporters are guilty of the misdeeds that have been documented in books and journal articles, it is imperative that these misdeeds be stopped as soon as possible so that America and the world can get on with the critically important business of finding effective ways to restabilize the Earth’s climate, before even more lasting damage is done. [Emphasis added.]

That was the letter that was discussed in AG Lynch's testimony before the Senate Judiciary Committee.

From The Blaze:

During Lynch’s testimony at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.) said that he believes there are similarities between the tobacco industry denying scientific studies showing the dangers of using tobacco and companies within the fossil fuel industry denying studies allegedly showing the threat of carbon emissions.

He went on to point out that under President Bill Clinton, the Justice Department brought and won a civil case against the tobacco industry, while the Obama administration has “done nothing” so far with regard to the fossil fuel industry.

Whitehouse concluded his comments by posing a question to the country’s top law enforcement officer.

“My question to you is, other than civil forfeitures and matters attendant to a criminal case, are there other circumstances in which a civil matter under the authority of the Department of Justice has been referred to the FBI?” he asked.

“This matter has been discussed. We have received information about it and have referred it to the FBI to consider whether or not it meets the criteria for which we could take action on,” Lynch answered. “I’m not aware of a civil referral at this time.”

And so Colin.  The threat you talked about would be where, exactly?

And how much more evidence do you need to see before you drop the "slipshod" and "shoddy" from your discussion of the science?

Unless you can explain how NASA, NOAA, et al are all wrong.  Go ahead.  Drop some science (actual real science) on us to explain why you're right and they're wrong.

We're waiting.

April Fools Day!

Continuing with this blog's long tradition of April Fool's Day(!) pranks, we'd like to offer this years APRIL FOOL'S DAY jokes:

1. Donald Trump would make America grrreat again - April Fools!
2. Climate Science isn't settled - April Fools!
3. The Middle East is a safer place now that Saddam Hussein is out of power - April Fools!
4. The short form birth certificate is a fake - April Fools!
5. The long form birth certificate is a fake - April Fools!
6. Waterboarding isn't torture - April Fools!
7. There's rampant voter fraud in Pennsylvania - April Fools!
8. Planned Parenthood sells baby parts - April Fools!
9. America was founded on Christian principles - April Fools!
10. George W. Bush failed to fulfill his duty in the Air National Guard during the Vietnam war -no wait, that one's true. 

April Fools!!

Birthday (The Last) - March 31

It's March 31 - the last day of March.

The last day of Women's History Month.

You didn't think that all those birthdays were random, did you?  Go back and look - they were all, in one way or another, of some very accomplished women.  But the list itself is only one of an infinite set.  Going through March another time (perhaps next year) I am sure I'd generate another, far different list.  A blogger in the next town over would just as assuredly generate yet another one and so on.

My point is that it's certainly not THE list of important women, just A list.

We each have the responsibility to generate our own - which is why I only went with a spare amount of biographical detail which is why I was hoping to trigger in my readers (in the event they needed it) a "curiosity response."

Who's Moms Mabley?  Why is she important? Learning her story will show you a few pages, perhaps, of American history (and American comedy) not usually read aloud.  From Moms you get to the TOBA circuit, to Pigmeat Markham, to Laugh-in, Richard Pryor and then to everyone else.

Who's Janet Flanner?  Go look her up.  Read some of the stuff she wrote in Paris in the 20s.  From there, you get to Hemingway and Fitzgerald and then to everyone else.

Each historical investigation is like that, individual threads that lead to everywhere else.

But we'll leave with a slightly different thread.

Today's the Birthday of JS Bach - certainly the greatest contrapuntist in history.  He was born March 31, 1685.

Here's some Bach for yinz, sung by the incomparable Kathleen Battle (and there's some guy named Wynton on piccolo there, too):


Happy Women's History Month!

But Michael Hayden IS A War Criminal

And yet,

From the Post-Gazette:

Gen. Michael V. Hayden, former director of the National Security Agency and the CIA, said he was not surprised when four young protesters interrupted his remarks Tuesday afternoon at Duquesne University. He has had to make some difficult and controversial decisions in the war on terror.

This is what happened:

The four protesters stood up about 45 minutes into the 90-minute forum displaying small signs and chanting, ”Michael Hayden is a war criminal!”

“Assassination is a war crime! Torture is a war crime!” one of the men shouted before being led from the room by university police. “You are a war criminal and you should be in jail. Arrest Michael Hayden! He murdered people!”

“Welcome home,” Gen. Hayden said, drawing laughter from the audience.

Assistant Chief Michael Sippey of the Duquesne University police said two of the protesters, who were taken off campus in handcuffs before being released, were students at the University of Pittsburgh. He said his department will contact the Allegheny County District Attorney’s office before deciding whether to charge them with causing a disturbance.

Interesting that there's a question about whether the protestors will be charged.  Granted this is private property (Duquesne University) and they might have rules about "free speech" on their property.  But take a step back - there may be an issue with four protestors but Duquesne had no problem inviting a war criminal to their lovely and peaceful campus.

So what did Hayden do?

Do you remember a set of video tapes that showed torture that were destroyed?  Take a look at how Michael Hayden covered up their destruction.  This is from Senator Diane Feinstein's speech before the Senate:

It was the first time the interrogation program was explained to the full Committee as details had previously been limited to the chairman and vice chairman.

Then, on December 7, 2007, the New York Times reported that CIA personnel in 2005 had destroyed videotapes of the interrogation of two CIA detainees: the CIA's first detainee, Abu Zubaydah, as well as 'Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri.

The committee had not been informed of the destruction of the tapes. Days later, on December 11, 2007, the committee held a hearing on the destruction of the videotapes.

Director Hayden, the primary witness, testified that the CIA had concluded that the destruction of videotapes was acceptable, in part, because Congress had not yet requested to see them. (Source: SSCI transcript, Dec. 11, 2007 hearing)

Director Hayden stated that, if the committee had asked for the videotapes, they would have been provided. But, of course, the committee had not known that the videotapes existed. And we now know from CIA emails and records that the videotapes were destroyed shortly after senior CIA attorneys raised concerns that Congress might find out about the tapes.

And then there was the outright lying:

The second set of findings and conclusions is that the CIA provided extensive inaccurate information about the program and its effectiveness to the White House, the Department of Justice, Congress, the CIA inspector general, the media, and the American public.

This conclusion is somewhat personal for me. I recall clearly when Director Hayden briefed the Intelligence Committee for the first time on the so-called EITs at that September 2006 committee meeting.

He referred specifically to a 'tummy slap,' among other techniques, and presented the entire set of techniques as minimally harmful and applied in a highly clinical and professional manner. They were not.

The committee's report demonstrates that these techniques were physically very harmful and that the constraints that existed, on paper, in Washington did not match the way techniques were used at CIA sites around the world.

Of particular note was the treatment of Abu Zubaydah over a span of 17 days in August 2002.

This involved non-stop interrogation and abuse, 24/7 from August 4 to August 21, and included multiple forms of deprivation and physical assault. The description of this period, first written up by our staff in early 2009, while Senator Rockefeller was chairman, is what prompted this full review.

But the inaccurate and incomplete descriptions go far beyond that. The CIA provided inaccurate memoranda and explanations to the Department of Justice while its [Office of] Legal Counsel was considering the legality of the coercive techniques.

In those communications to the Department of Justice, the CIA claimed the following: the coercive techniques would not be used with excessive repetition; detainees would always have an opportunity to provide information prior to the use of the techniques; the techniques were to be used in progression, starting with the least aggressive and proceeding only if needed; medical personnel would make sure that interrogations wouldn't cause serious harm, and they could intervene at any time to stop interrogations; interrogators were carefully vetted and highly trained; and each technique was to be used in a specific way, without deviation, and only with specific approval for the interrogator and detainee involved. "None of these assurances, which the Department of Justice relied on to form its legal opinions, were consistently or even routinely carried out.

Michael Hayden's CIA tortured and then they lied about the torture to the Justice Department and to the Congress.  All those things are against the law.  And yet he was invited to speak at Duquesne University.

Looks like the police led the wrong people away in handcuffs.

Birthday - March 30

Something a little more contemporary today - Norah Jones was born today in 1979.

Have a listen:


Oh yea, and Van Gogh was born today as well - but way earlier than Norah Jones, in 1853.

He painted this:

Happy Birthday!

More Worries For Pat Toomey (Who's Still Not Doing His Job)

From Tom Fontaine at the Tribune-Review (remember this is the news division, not the embarrassingly wingnut editorial board):

The most recent Franklin & Marshall poll shows that 30 percent of Pennsylvania's registered voters have a favorable opinion of Toomey, 35 percent have an unfavorable one and 34 percent are undecided or don't know. The share of people with unfavorable opinions of Toomey is up from 23 percent a year ago and 13 percent five years ago, shortly after he joined the Senate, the poll shows.

And:

Political experts point to a number of factors for Toomey's rising unfavorability.

“It's mostly the result of criticism he's received on a number of issues over a fairly long period of time. These things build up over time,” [pollster G. Terry Madonna, director of Franklin & Marshall College's Center for Politics and Public Affairs] said.

Toomey's stance on the Supreme Court issue has generated criticism and placed him out of step with 62 percent of Pennsylvania's registered voters, the poll said. About 35 percent agree with Toomey that the Senate should wait to hold hearings on President Obama's nominee, Chief Judge Merrick Garland of the U.S. Court of Appeals for Washington, D.C.

You can take a look at the poll data yourself here.

By the way, in that same poll 408 registered Democrats were asked:

If the 2016 Democratic primary election for U.S. SENATOR were being held today and the candidates included (rotated) John Fetterman, Katie McGinty, Joe Sestak, and Joe Vodvarka would you vote for John Fetterman, Katie McGi nty, Joe Sestak, Joe Vodvarka, some other candidate, or aren't you sure how you would vote?

And here's what they found:

• Sestak - 31%
• McGinty - 14%
• Fetterman - 7%
• Vodvarka - 0%

I am guessing that pleases some of the folks who read this blog and displeases some others.

This bad news for Toomey has made the rounds of some of the state's other news sources:

Rick Dandes of the Daily Item:

U.S. Senator Pat Toomey’s support has plummeted statewide on the heels of his saying the next president should nominate the Supreme Court Justice, not Barack Obama.

More than 30 percent of Pennsylvania registered voters have a “somewhat” or “strongly” unfavorable opinion of Toomey, a Republican, according to the latest Franklin & Marshall College poll. The same poll shows 29 percent of voters have a favorable opinion of the senator, while 12 percent of those questioned are undecided.

"Plummet" might be too strong of a word (same with the verb "wilts" which was used in the headline of the piece) but the point to be made is the same: Toomey's obstruction of the constitutional process to appoint a new Supreme Court justice is beginning to erode his support among Pennsylvania voters.

Bad news for Pat Toomey.

Pat, do your job.

Birthday - March 29

Wanna know who celebrates a birthday today?

Astrud Gilberto (in 1940).

Who's Astrud Gilberto?

This is Astrud Gilberto, singing.  That's Stan Getz on tenor:


And Patty Donahue was born today, as well (in 1956, though she passed away in 1996).

Who's Patty Donahue?

She's singing this song (and while there IS a tenor in this piece, I can assure it's NOT Stan Getz)


Happy Birthday!

DoD Directive On Climate Change

I wonder how (or indeed if) my friends on the Tribune-Review editorial board will explain this one.

From the Federation of American Scientists:

The Department of Defense is organizing itself to address the effects of climate change on the U.S. military, some of which are already being felt.

“The DoD must be able to adapt current and future operations to address the impacts of climate change in order to maintain an effective and efficient U.S. military,” according to a Pentagon directive that was issued last week. See Climate Change Adaptation and Resilience, DoD Directive 4715.21, January 14, 2016.

Go take a look at that link.

In this section on "Purpose" we read:

In accordance with the direction in Executive Order 13653, this issuance establishes policy and assigns responsibilities to provide the DoD with the resources necessary to assess and manage risks associated with the impacts of climate change.

You can find that executive order here.

Back to the DoD Directive.  After that intro, there's a lot (a lot!) of stuff about who's in charge of what, who sets up what and so on.  For instance there'll be an "Assistant Secretary of Defense for Logistics and Materiel Readiness" who will:

[Identify and consider] the risks climate change poses to logistics infrastructure, materiel acquisition and supply (including critical suppliers and critical components), key transportation modes and routes, and storage and stockpile activities.

But if it's a hoax, then isn't this all a waste of time and money?  But if that's true (it's a waste of time/money), then isn't the Pentagon in on The Greatest Hoax?

Apparently they've been hoaxing for some time.

July 2015, DoD report to Congress:

The Department of Defense sees climate change as a present security threat , not strictly a long -term risk. We are already observing the impacts of climate change in shocks and stressors to vulnerable nations and communities, including in the United States, and in the Arctic, Middle East, Africa, Asia, and South America.

2104 - Quadrennial Defense Review:

Climate change poses another significant challenge for the United States and the world at large. As greenhouse gas emissions increase, sea levels are rising, average global temperatures are increasing, and severe weather patterns are accelerating. These changes, coupled with other global dynamics, including growing, urbanizing , more affluent populations, and substantial economic growth in India, China, Brazil, and other nations, will devastate homes, land, and infrastructure. Climate change may exacerbate water scarcity and lead to sharp increases in food costs. The pressures caused by climate change will influence resource competition while placing additional burdens on economies, societies, an d governance institutions around the world. These effects are threat multipliers that will aggravate stressors abroad such as poverty, environmental degradation, political instability, and social tensions – conditions that can enable terrorist activity and other forms of violence.

And that's from The Pentagon.

So either the conspiracy is so big it's sucked in the largest military on the planet.

Or it's true.

Any thoughts from the Tribune-Review editorial board?  I know you guys read this page.

Birthday - March 28

Born today in 1922, Abstract Expressionist painter Grace Hartigan.

This, I am told, is one of her most famous works, it's called Grand Street Brides:

From The Art Story:

Mannequins from a bridal shop window in her Lower East Side neighborhood, where arranged brides were often brought from Europe, are on display much like the women posing in Francisco de Goya's Charles IV of Spain and his Family (1800). At this time in Europe, aristocratic women were seen as commodities to exchange among powerful families in order to forge financial or political unions between them. Though the geography and time period were different, the brides depicted by Hartigan are also shown as if for sale. Hartigan also appreciated how shop windows frame the scene and "provide a shallow space, and define the back plane." Complexity is achieved through the layering of shapes and rendered objects.

Keep looking at the painting.  Abstract and still commentary on a number of different levels.

And here's her portrait of Marilyn Monroe:

Not a traditional portrait, more an arrangement of elements of her face (a smile, an eye and so on).  It's abstract.  You have to keep looking to see what's there.

Oh, yea.  Raphael and someone named Lady Gaga were also born today.

It's Easter

For my christian friends.

While Messiah (especially the Hallelujah chorus) is usually performed at Christmas time, it's actually an EASTER piece.

So.  Here it is:


Signed,
Mr Agnostic

More Worries For Senator Pat Toomey

From PoliticsPA:

As a result of Trump’s front-runner status, the prognosticators are moving the Senate races in Pennsylvania and Ohio from “Lean Republican” to “Toss-Up”.

In this case, Jennifer Duffy of the Cook Report (sub. req. - I'm getting what little I know about it from the PoliticsPA piece)

And, if I am reading it correctly, Donald Trump's at least partially to blame.  Take a look:

The other major problem is no one knows what ultimate effect a Trump nomination will have on the rest of the ticket since this would be an unprecedented situation.
“Is it possible for Toomey and Portman to outperform the Republican presidential nominee and go on to win?,” Duffy writes. “Yes, but it is very difficult. The closer the presidential race is in these states, the more likely that can happen. Conversely, the wider the margin of victory at the top of the ticket, the less likely a Portman or a Toomey can survive.”

 Given some recent poll data:

Following President Barack Obama's nomination of Merrick Garland to fill the open seat on the Supreme Court, a new CNN/ORC poll finds two-thirds of Americans want the Senate to hold confirmation hearings on his candidacy, and a majority of Americans say the Senate should ultimately vote to confirm him. [Emphasis added.]

And:

Turning to process, most Republicans disagree with the position taken by Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who says the Senate will not hold hearings on Garland's confirmation. Among Republicans, 55% say the Senate should hold hearings on Obama's choice, as do 67% of Democrats and 68% of independents. The 64% overall who say there should be hearings is about the same as the 66% who said so in February before Obama named his choice to fill the vacancy. [Emphasis added.]

So not only is Pat Toomey out of step with a majority of Americans on the question of Merrick Garland's Supreme Court nomination, he's out of step with a majority of Republicans on the question Merrick Garland's Supreme Court nomination as well.

If those national numbers are indicative of the opinions of voters in PA, Toomey could be in trouble (I mean more trouble than being moved from the "lean R" to the "toss up" column in the Cook Report).

Maybe after he looses, Pat Toomey can get his old job back at the Club For Growth.

Birthday - March 26

Who would've guessed today would be a day like this?

A week and a half ago the notorious RBG had a birthday and today it's Sandra Day O'Connor:

And she said this:

The First Amendment expresses our Nation’s fundamental commitment to religious liberty by means of two provisions–one protecting the free exercise of religion, the other barring establishment of religion. They were written by the descendents of people who had come to this land precisely so that they could practice their religion freely. Together with the other First Amendment guarantees–of free speech, a free press, and the rights to assemble and petition–the Religion Clauses were designed to safeguard the freedom of conscience and belief that those immigrants had sought. They embody an idea that was once considered radical: Free people are entitled to free and diverse thoughts, which government ought neither to constrain nor to direct.

In her concurring opinion declaring unconstitutional a public display of the Ten Commandments.

And as a blistering reassessment of the validity of astrology, today is also the birthday of writer Erica Jong:

And from her novel Fear of Flying (look it up, my young padawans, you'll understand the '70s better):

The zipless fuck is absolutely pure. It is free of ulterior motives. There is no power game . The man is not "taking" and the woman is not "giving." No one is attempting to cuckold a husband or humiliate a wife. No one is trying to prove anything or get anything out of anyone. The zipless fuck is the purest thing there is. And it is rarer than the unicorn.

Free Speech. Yay!

No, Senator Toomey. That's NOT Doing Your Job

In a statement dated March 24, vulnerable and embattled Pennsylvania Senator Pat Toomey released this statement regarding his on-going opposition to the Constitutional process of nominating a new Supreme Court Justice:

President Obama's team has asked if I would meet with Judge Merrick Garland, and I have agreed to do so out of courtesy and respect for both the president and the judge. The vacancy left by Justice Scalia's passing will not be filled until after the American people weigh in and select a new president, and I believe that is the best approach for deciding whether to alter the balance of the Supreme Court. I plan on making that clear to Judge Garland when I meet with him.

Um, Senator?  That's not exactly doing your job.  That's showing up to work to let them know you're taking the day off.

Contrast this with someone who actually did (in this case) his job while in the Senate, Vice President Joe Biden:

Every time — as the ranking member or chairman of the Judiciary Committee, I was responsible for eight justices and nine total nominees to the Supreme Court. More than — I hate to say this — anyone alive. Oh, I can’t be that old. Some I supported; a few I voted against. And in all that time, every nominee was greeted by committee members. Every nominee got a committee hearing. Every nominee got out of the committee even if they didn’t have sufficient votes to pass within the committee. Because I believe the Senate says the Senate must advise and consent. And every nominee, including Justice Kennedy in an election year, got an up and down vote.

Not much of the time. Not most of the time. Every single, solitary time.

There’s only one rule I ever followed on the Judiciary Committee — that was the Constitution’s clear rule of Advice and Consent.

Article II of the Constitution clearly states, whenever there is a vacancy in one of the courts created by the Constitution itself — the Supreme Court of the United States — the President “shall” — not “may” — the President “shall” appoint someone to fill the vacancy, with the “Advice and Consent” of the United States Senate.

And Advice and Consent includes consulting and voting. Nobody is suggesting individual senators have to vote “yes” on any particular presidential nominee. Voting “no” is always an option, and it is their option. But saying nothing, seeing nothing, reading nothing, hearing nothing, and deciding in advance simply to turn your back — before the President even names a nominee — is not an option the Constitution leaves open.

And before anyone can say "Biden rule! BIDEN RULE!!" here's the Vice-President himself on that so-called rule:

Now, back in 1992, in the aftermath of a bruising and polarizing confirmation process involving Clarence Thomas — who had been nominated by President Bush, with no consultation, just four days after the great Thurgood Marshall had retired — I took to the Senate floor to speak about the Supreme Court nominating process. Senate Majority Leader — and my friend — Mitch McConnell, and other Republicans today have been quoting selectively from the remarks that I made in an attempt to justify refusing to give Chief Judge Garland a fair hearing and a vote on the floor of the Senate. They completely ignore the fact that, at the time, I was speaking of the dangers of nominating an extreme candidate without proper Senate consultation. They completely neglected to quote my unequivocal bottom line. So let me set the record straight, as they say.

I made it absolutely clear that I would go forward with the confirmation process, as chairman — even a few months before a presidential election — if the nominee were chosen with the Advice, and not merely the Consent, of the Senate — just as the Constitution requires.

Senator Toomey: chatting with the guy to tell him you're not supporting the constitutional process of a hearing and a vote is not doing your job.

Doing your job (until someone else takes that oath for your seat in Congress) is doing your job.

But I'll reiterate what I and others have said:  Given how vulnerable you are in this coming election, by your own logic, shouldn't you be sitting everything out and waiting for the people of Pennsylvania to decide on what our junior senator should do?

 Shouldn't you wait until after the election before doing anything?

Or, Senator Toomey, you can do your job.

Birthday - March 25

Ok, so NOW we're back to some birthdays!

Born today in 1934, Gloria Steinem.

Founder of MS Magazine magazine, Women's Media Center and so on.  (But you knew that.)

Did you know she was born 8 years to the day before Aretha Franklin?


Yea. Aretha Franklin.

Birthday - March 24

Not actually a BIRTHDAY, more of an ANNIVERSARY as today is the day in 1721 that JS Bach dated his dedication to the magnificent Brandenburg Concertos.

There are 6 of them. The most important (to me at least) is the second.  That's the one with THE TRUMPET.  (Note: My friend Joe will be playing the Second Brandenburg with the Edgewood Symphony on May 7.)

Anyway, in the first movement of the Fifth Brandenburg you can experience the masterstrokes of The Baroque: the harpischord cadenza.  Have a listen:


That's Jeannette Sorrell of Apollo's fire.  Amazing.

Inside the Mind of Wendy Bell (UPDATE)

Pittsburgh's WTAE News anchor Wendy Bell majorly stepped in it when she decided to profile the yet unknown killers of the March 9 mass shooting in Wilkinsburg by stringing together a bunch of stereotypical racist insults on her Facebook page. She then contrasted them with a virtually tap-dancing Mr. Bojangles, Jr. version of a young man who happened to be busing tables at a restaurant where Miz Wendy was eating with her family. 

The post was so disgusting, that she received a great deal of push-back. Then came the inevitable blocking of people and removal of comments, and, eventually, some editing of the original post*. It's led to a "Demand WTAE Hold Wendy Bell Accountable" Facebook campaign and a Post-Gazette article. But the best analysis comes from Damon Young at verysmartbrothas.com. Here's a taste, but please, read the whole article:

There are so many layers and layers and layers to Bell’s abject obliviousness to how racist this is; all made clear by the fact that she thought it was fine to print it. She’s practically a White privilege lasagna caught in the throat of a White privilege turducken. 

[snip] 

Seriously, read this scribbled-on-some-toilet-paper-at-a-Hallmark-factory-bathroom bullshit again. And think about the state of mind that allows someone to juxtapose that awful tragedy with a night at the Cheesecake Factory. As if there’s any connection between the two besides the race of the server and the race of the victims. And, I don’t know, the fact that they’re both made out of space dust.

* To read her original version of the post, click on the arrow in the upper right corner and hit "View edit history."

UPDATE: In an AP story at ABC News (WTAE is an ABC affiliate), Wendy Bell gave a pro forma apology. The entire Facebook post has been removed.