HorsesAss.Org

Longtime readers know I’ve never been a fan of the Transportation Security Administration. So I wasn’t the least surprised to read this:

The Department of Homeland Security on Monday reassigned the acting director of the Transportation Security Administration and ordered the agency to revise its security procedures after screeners at airport checkpoints failed to detect weapons and other prohibited items 95 percent of the time in a covert test.

… In the investigation, undercover agents were able to get prohibited items through security checkpoints in 67 of 70 instances, according to ABC News, which first reported the findings.

I’m not a terrorist, but if I were, I’m pretty sure I’d have no problem sneaking prohibited items through airport security. In fact, no sneaking required. Twice, I’ve inadvertently passed bottles of water through security—once in the outer mesh pocket of my backpack, and once in my back pocket. On multiple occasions I’ve forgotten to take my toiletries out of my carry-on luggage before scanning. And once, I flew round trip between Seattle and Philadelphia only to realize after the fact that I’d left a 10-inch serrated knife in the bottom of my backpack.

Oops.

The truth is, there is nothing that TSA has done at the security checkpoint since 9/11 that would have prevented another 9/11, because that was achieved entirely by requiring reinforced cockpit doors. That was the weak point in the system—a secure cockpit door combined with the memory of 9/11 is all that is needed to prevent a similar tragedy. (On the other hand, a locked cockpit door apparently played a crucial role in enabling the suicidal crash of Germanwings Flight 9525, so there’s that.)

What would I do to improve the system? Drop the ban on liquids and gels,  and go back to simple metal detectors. One good bomb-sniffing dog would be a helluva lot more effective than a dozen TSA agents ogling at porno-scanners.

Commercial air travel is by far the safest form of transportation. TSA’s security theater mostly just succeeds in making it less comfortable and convenient.

Please joins us this evening for another cocktail-enhanced and conversation-packed edition of the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally.

We meet tonight and every Tuesday at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. Our starting time is 8:00 pm, but some folks stop by earlier for dinner.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings this week. The Long Beach, Tri-Cities and West Seattle chapters also meet tonight. The Lakewood chapter meets on Wednesday. And on Thursday, the Tacoma chapter meets.

There are 190 chapters of Living Liberally, including eighteen in Washington state, four in Oregon and two in Idaho. Chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting somewhere near you.

If you want to know why the Washington State legislature can’t seem to pass a budget, it’s because Republicans have forgotten how to do math.

Oh, I’m not talking about budget math; Republicans have never been very good at that. I’m talking about electoral math. The Democrats control the state house. The Democrats control the governor’s mansion (and have for over 30 years). The Democrats control both US senate seats, six of ten US house seats, and seven of eight statewide executive offices. The Democratic nominee has won Washington State in seven straight presidential elections.

Washington is a Democratic state.

Yet weirdly, Republicans believe their three-seat majority in the state senate somehow gives them an electoral mandate to unilaterally impose their will on the rest of the state:

Sen. Don Benton, R-Vancouver, said Democrats are wasting taxpayers’ dollars by keeping lawmakers in Olympia longer.

“There’s just one thing standing in the way of a deal — the House Democrats’ unreasonable insistence on raising taxes solely for the sake of raising taxes,” Benton said in an email.

Right. It’s the Democrats who are standing in the way of a deal. Gimme a fucking break.

Look, the Republicans control the state senate, so they deserve something. Can’t pass a budget without them. No doubt about that. But compromise is a two-way street, and the problem is that today’s Republican Party is ideologically incapable of compromise on many key issues. For example, taxes. A majority of Republicans will never vote to approve something called a “tax.” For any reason. Ever. So they demand that the Democrats fold entirely on that.

Then there is transit. The Republicans largely have the transportation funding proposal they want—lots of tasty pork for their home districts. But they’re ideologically opposed to funding light rail, even when it’s not their money. And so they refuse to give Sound Transit the $15 billion in local taxing authority it needs to go to voters with a package that builds enough rail in each of the subareas to give it a chance of passing. Instead, they think they have an electoral mandate to insist on an ST3-crippling $11 billion in authority—not enough to get to either Tacoma or Everett, and not enough to get to both West Seattle and Ballard. Because Republicans can’t do the electoral math.

But the bigger danger would be if the Democrats can’t do the electoral math either.

The Democrats control two-thirds of state government. And if they want to hold on to the two-thirds they have (and have a hope of retaking the senate) then they can’t disillusion the Democratic base by rewarding the three-seat senate Republican majority for their uncompromising obstruction. Politically, capitulation is neither a responsible nor viable option.

The Republicans control only one-third of government. Give them a third of what they want. If Republicans want anymore than that, force them to make a case for it at the polls.

– No, traffic accidents aren’t accidents. They’re unacceptable and preventable.

– Most smoking bans make sense, but outside in parks seems like too much.

– I guess I shouldn’t be surprised at how pro-Iraq war the GOP is even today, but damn.

– I love the World Cup, but I don’t know how I’ll possibly be able to justify to myself watching it in Qatar.

Exodus 35:2
For six days, work is to be done, but the seventh day shall be your holy day, a day of sabbath rest to the LORD. Whoever does any work on it is to be put to death.

Discuss.

From last night, maybe the most unintentionally hilarious tweet I’ve ever seen:

@lee_rosenberg magnified by the reality that Islam is a system of imperialism propelled by terrorism since inception. @eliottkroll

— ن CRUZADΞR ن (@AlphaRomeo223) May 30, 2015

Mass murders and the media that love them.

Dickipedia: Mitch McConnell is a dick.

Tar Sands CEO says climate change is real.

Thom: Meet the new normal for student debt.

The silliest things people tweet at Obama.

Farron Cousins and Pap: FAUX News makes you stupid and the G.O.P. is worried about it.

The problem with frats.

Sam Seder: A Red state overturns the death penalty.

David Pakman: So much for “the party of jobs,” as Republicans pass zero jobs bills in their first 138 days in session.

White Super Power: Why Hollywood needs more white Super Heroes:

Mental Floss: 24 strange scientific studies.

The 2016 Clown Parade:

• Sam Seder: Koch Brothers are shopping for a candidate
• Young Turks: Rand Paul blames ISIS on Republicans
• Ann Telnaes: Rand blows Republican’s minds on Iraq.
• Farron Cousins: Jeb Bush bashes…intelligence?!?
• Young Turks: Ted Cruz was a gamer
• Sam Seder: Marco Rubio thing that gay rights are a “real and present danger” to Christianity!
• David Pakman: Marco Rubio goes all bigot over same sex marriage
• Young Turks: Santorum is…um, running.
• Jon takes on “Tremendous asshole” Donald Trump and other fringe candidates
• Farron Cousins: Ben Carson is too weak to be President
• Richard Fowler: Ben Carson is running….
• Sam Seder: Remember that time 2016 GOP Presidential candidate George Pataki got OWNED on live TV?
• Young Turks: GOP candidates having a fiveway in battle to be tops
• Richard Fowler: Huckabee is running!
• Sam Seder: Lindsey Graham ran a pool room, so he knows that Iran is lying
• Richard Fowler: Carly Fiorina is running….
• Young Turks: Carly Fiorina wants to ask Hillary Clinton about the Iraq War

Congressional hits and misses: Rob Bishop (R-UT-01) edition.

White House: West Wing Week.

Trevor Noah’s New and Sexy Daily Show premier.

Farron Cousins: Media racism in the age of Obama.

Sam Seder: Louie Gohmert’s feelings are hurt over Jade Helm.

Thom: G.O.P. birth control bill is an insult to women.

Mr. Speaker:

• Hastert indictment explained.
• Young Turks: Dennis Hastert indicted for covering up sexual assault of a minor
• Maddow: Surprise indictment wrenches former Speaker Hastert from obscurity

Obama’s reaction to a meltdown by Congress a toddler in the White House.

Lawrence O’Donnell: John Stewart’s plan to help vets:

Farron Cousins: Louie Gohmert longs for perpetual war

David Pakman: GOP dragged kicking and screaming into acknowledging climate change.

Jon on allergies and media hyperbole.

Chris Hayes: Obama’s secret weapon on Iran’s nuclear program speaks

Liberal Viewer: The FAUX News alarmist irony alert.

Mark Fiore: Mitch McConnell and Snuggly The Security Bear beg to spy.

Mental Floss: Why do you see better when you squint?

Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.

– Am I being a dick with open thread titles? Someone asked for dates so you could distinguish one from the other, and sometimes I do these things that amuse me, but — I sort of assume — nobody else. At least there haven’t been puns in a little while!

– If you are thinking “Hmmm, I wonder if Mike Huckabee has anything to do with this,” you are wearing your thinking pants correctly! It turns out that, as Arkansas governor, Huckabee thought it would be great to use Gothard’s teachings and programs for … just about everything!

– Everyone raising money makes me uncomfortable, even as I understand it’s necessary in politics, but there’s something about the anti-Sawant people.

– The fuck, Denny Hastert?

– I’m always a bit skeptical when organizations change their names. The Committee to End Homelessness had a name that laid out a really ambitious agenda. No, they haven’t come anywhere near meeting that, but it’s better to fail than to not try.

Recently in Cairo:

An Egyptian court on Saturday [May 16] sentenced to death the deposed president, Mohamed Morsi of the Muslim Brotherhood, along with more than 100 others, for fleeing prison during the 2011 revolt against President Hosni Mubarak.

Mr. Morsi’s conviction is the latest sign of the undoing of the uprising that overthrew Mr. Mubarak. Mr. Morsi, who was Egypt’s first freely elected leader, now faces the death penalty for escaping extralegal detention — a form of detention that many Egyptians hoped would be eliminated by the revolution.

The past few years in Egypt have been painful to watch. The 2011 revolution that seemed to give many moderate Egyptians hope for a more democratic future was snuffed out after a 2013 coup against their first ever elected leader. Morsi was clearly unpopular and his religious extremism arguably rendered him unfit for the office. But it should be clear now that Egypt would be much better off had they democratically replaced him rather than the extreme response from al-Sisi and the Egyptian military.

At the time of the coup, I chatted a lot with a former co-worker from Microsoft who’d gone back to Alexandria (and who Dana and I visited in Cairo in 2007). He was torn between his fear of greater Islamic control of the country and his desire to trust the democratic process. It’s hard for most Americans to put themselves in his shoes. He supported the coup, but hoped it would still lead to more democratic reforms. It hasn’t (and he’s since moved out of the country again).

Ebrahim Deen, a researcher based in South Africa, wrote about Morsi’s death sentence (which he believes won’t actually be carried out) at Informed Comment:

The trial verdicts –Mursi was sentenced to life in prison on the espionage charge as well– were procedurally flawed, defendant’s had irregular access to legal representation, and evidence gathering and cross examination procedures were severely compromised. The glaring fact that the initial arrests were carried out by the former Mubarak regime in early 2011 under emergency law and without detention orders was not considered and so to [sic] was the communication between Mursi and an Aljazeera journalist the day of the ‘breakout’ wherein he provided the name, and street address of the prison, asserting that they were not escaping and would remain at the location awaiting government officials responses. The prosecutorial process had been extremely and even laughably shoddy. Of the around seventy Palestinians sentenced, two (Hossam Sanie and Raed El-Attar) had already died –Sanie as far ago as 2008 and Attar, during Israel’s operation ‘pillar of defence’ in 2014, which caused the deaths of over 2000, mostly civilian, Gazans. Another, Hassan Salama, has purportedly been in detention in Israel since 1996 and could not have possibly committed the alleged crimes from inside an Israeli cell. Further in the espionage case, which saw Muslim Brotherhood leaders including Mohamed El-Beltagy and Mohamed Khairet El-Shater receive death sentences, Emad Shahin, a political science professor now based at Georgetown University, who has no real links with the Brotherhood was handed the same censure, and so to was Sondos Assem, a media liaison official employed by Mursi.

This is an insult to everyone’s intelligence. Morsi is being sentenced for breaking out of a prison that shouldn’t have had the authority to hold him in the first place. Al-Sisi has taken Egypt back to the pre-2011 authoritarian regime where illegal detentions are commonplace, torture is routine, and members of religious parties like the Muslim Brotherhood are presumed to be terrorists, regardless of what those individuals have actually done. Deen continues:

These sentences are the latest in a string of actions adopted by the Sisi regime to crackdown on opposition and descent. Following the 2013 ouster, thousands have been killed, and over 16000 political prisoners currently languish in Egyptian detention facilities. A protest law, which has banned sit-ins and severely curtailed other protest rights, was adopted in November 2013, while in April, the Cairo Administrative Court criminalised worker strikes. Liberals and secular activists have not escaped this purge, in December 2014 Ahmed Maher, Mohamed Adel, and Ahmed Douma, three influential members of the April 6 youth movement were sentenced to three years for organizing protests in contravention of the protest law, while in February Douma was amongst over two hundred who received life sentences for inciting violence and destroying a science facility housing precious artefacts. Shahin’s farcical conviction falls into this milieu. Being opposed to the military ouster, publically vocalising this through writings and interviews, and being somewhat more ‘reputable’ internationally were the main reasons informing his death sentence. In 2014 alone, over 1400 individuals were sentenced to death in mass trials, which usually took only a few days to complete, and lacked even basic prosecutorial and judicial impartiality. It is noteworthy that the judiciary was a key cog in the political structure which allowed and maintained Mubarak’s regime and that following Mursi’s ouster, Sisi has sought a similar role for the institution –Adli Mansour (head of the Supreme Constitutional Court) was even installed caretaker president following the coup.

At least it’s not a theocracy, I guess.

News items from the last two weeks…

[Read more…]

I hope I’m not back-in-my-daying this too much with this post but I’m writing it anyway:

The bus from Drinking Liberally to my apartment has been rerouted so now the best stop is like 10 blocks away from my apartment. It hasn’t been a bad walk the last few times I’ve taken it, but a few nights ago I was already dragging a bit. I had walked to Drinking Liberally when it was still pretty hot out, and I was out too late. 10 blocks was sort of that middle distance where it’s too short to call a cab or an get an Uber but I thought to m’self “if I see a cab, I’ll hail one.”

I didn’t see a cab until I was a block away from my apartment. I feel like even 5 years ago there were enough cabs out downtown — even at 11:30 on a weekday — that I would have caught one. Maybe this is me misremembering things, maybe it’s the route I took home, maybe it was just coincidence and I would have caught a cab most times.

Certainly, this personal story of one night isn’t data in any sense. But it does feel like now that Uber and Lyft are out there there are fewer cabs to be hailed. Maybe from a consumer’s point of view that’s a fine tradeoff for the advantages of ride sharing, but it is an issue. I’m not sure what the solution is.

Bill Finkbeiner, the former Republican state senate majority leader, has an op-ed in the Seattle Times urging lawmakers to give Sound Transit the full $15 billion taxing authority it needs to extend light rail to Everett, Tacoma, Redmond, West Seattle and Ballard.

Today, when we wonder how we are going to get from here to there in the future, the light-rail system, with all of its critics and detractors, looks like our best hope.

Somewhat fortuitously, our new growth seems to be centering in our urban cores. This is a sharp contrast to the last growth cycles, which saw new homes expand to ever distant exurbs. This new density increases the number of people who can realistically be moved in their daily lives by light-rail infrastructure and makes an even stronger case for the transportation solutions being offered by Sound Transit.

The Sound Transit board has asked the Legislature for the authority to present a $15 billion mass-transit funding package to voters in 2016, and the Legislature needs to give them that full authority, now.

Interestingly, the Seattle Times merely describes Finkbeiner as “a former state legislator,” rather than the Republican majority leader that he was (you know, back before the Republican Party went totally tea-bagger crazy). Not sure why they would want to hide this biographical detail from readers, as for all the cogent arguments that he makes, it’s Finkbeiner’s Republican pedigree that is the hook here.

A Republican enthusiastically endorses expanding light rail. That’s the story here.

That it is a story, well, that’s a whole nother story.

– Saying this early: Bryant v. Inslee is not Jobs vs. Environment

– The underrepresentation of women and people of color in media extends all the way to the cartoons tucked into the New Yorker, according to an analysis of every cartoon published in the magazine last year.

– If this is how the Patriot Act goes, well, OK, I guess.

– But it’s worth noting that amidst all the hue and cry turning cake bakers into martyrs in the name of religious freedom, here is an actual ordained minister who was jailed and fined for seeking to practice her faith and support same-sex marriage.

– Byron Calhoun and the Phantom Fetal Skull

– The Bad Intelligence

If Seattle businesses are closing up shop in response to our $15 minimum wage, you wouldn’t know it from our falling unemployment rate:

King County’s unemployment rate reach[ed] a low not seen since April 2008, data released Tuesday by the state Employment Security Department show.

King County’s unemployment rate in April was 3.3 percent, compared to 4 percent in March and 4.1 percent in April 2014.

Okay, monthly unemployment data is not seasonally adjusted, so the rate will surely rise in May and June as college and high school graduates join the workforce (like it does every year). And of course, it will take years—maybe even a couple decades—to fully suss out the employment effect (if any) of Seattle’s phased-in $15 minimum wage.

But again, if employers are cutting back on hiring in anticipation of rising labor costs—like $15 critics insist a rationally self-interested employer would—you wouldn’t know it from our falling unemployment rate.

But, you know, one crappy chain pizza place closed, so screw the data.

[Cross-posted to Civic Skunkworks]

Okay…so it’s back to work on Tuesday, which is a pretty good excuse to swing by the Seattle Chapter of Drinking liberally for an evening of conversations over a cocktail.

We meet tonight and every Tuesday at the Roanoke Park Place Tavern, 2409 10th Ave E, Seattle. Our starting time is 8:00 pm, but some folks stop by earlier for dinner.

Can’t make it to Seattle tonight? Check out one of the other DL meetings happening this week. Tonight the Tri-Cities chapter also meets. On Wednesday, the Bellingham and Burien chapters meet. The Spokane, Woodinville and Kent chapters meet on Thursday. And next Monday, the Yakima and South Bellevue chapters meet.

There are 190 chapters of Living Liberally, including eighteen in Washington state, four in Oregon and two in Idaho. Chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting somewhere near you.

Leviticus 11:20-22
All flying insects that walk on all fours are to be regarded as unclean by you. There are, however, some flying insects that walk on all fours that you may eat: those that have jointed legs for hopping on the ground. Of these you may eat any kind of locust, katydid, cricket or grasshopper.

Discuss.