Last week’s contest was still unsolved as of Wednesday night. It was in Boone County, WV, at the location where this photo of a milky-white Pond Fork River was taken.
This week’s contest is a random location somewhere on earth, good luck! And Go Seahawks!!
1 Corinthians 9:24
Know ye not that they which run in a race run all, but one receiveth the prize? So run, that ye may obtain.
Discuss.
Darryl forgot to add this one to the Extravaganza below, here’s courtroom footage of the Amanda Knox trial in Italy.
Jon: Georgia’s Ice age zombie apocalypse.
Bill Maher’s remarkable new congressional campaign.
State of the Union:
Maddow: Minimum wage, Part I.
Maddow: Minimum wage, Part II.
Liberal Viewer: FAUX News says God’s hand caught skydiver.
Roy Zimmerman: This Machine:
Galaxy full of planets…luckily we’re on the one God cares about.
Mark Fiore: Goodbye net neutrality, hello guilded age internet.
Porky Politics and the Christie Crisis:
Thom: Time for big oil to pay for its pollution.
Sharpton: Rand Paul blows it on women.
Pap: The dumbing down of America for political gain.
David Pakman: Nutcase Rep. Louie Gohmert’s (R-TX) brilliant economic idea…raise taxes on the very poor.
Ann Telnaes: The never ending march.
Lewis Black: Nothing about the Sochi winter Olympics makes sense.
Unhinged Congressman—A Grimm Story:
Mental Floss: 50 more facts about 50 states.
DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz on: The Anniversary of the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act:
David Pakman: More creationism in publicly-funded science classrooms.
White House: West Wing Week.
Thom: A declaration of the end of the Reagan era.
Stephen: Medici-NFL.
ONN: The Onion Week in Review.
Last week’s Friday Night Multimedia Extravaganza can be found here.
Like Goldy, I had assumed the WA DREAM Act was DOA. And so like Goldy, I was genuinely surprised when it got a hearing and passed in the State Senate. Congrats, first and foremost, to the dreamers.* I hope they get the best out of their education. I hope they stay here in Washington and do great things, but whatever they do and wherever any individuals end up, this is a great opportunity. One they have earned and that they deserve.
Also, congrats to the activists and legislators who pushed through the cynicism — including mine, initially. This shows that even in a gridlocked, dysfunctional legislature that democratic pressure can do great things.
I hope this also puts the lie to the next thing Rodney Tom says we can’t do even though he claims to want to do it and the votes are there. That argument killed so much good stuff throughout the last session, and special sessions.
Don’t get me wrong, Trey Radel is a complete asshole. You know, fuck that guy. Seriously. And double don’t get me wrong, you probably shouldn’t use cocaine. But I don’t think that he should have resigned.
Sure, if he legitimately needed to get his shit together, fine, whatever. But he did something so bad that it earned him no jail time. It was a crime, and he faced the consequences; They just weren’t all that extreme in the eyes of the law. If that’s something the voters want to punish him for, well, we live in a democracy. If his party doesn’t want to get behind him for future elections, that’s their right. But elections ought to matter.
I mean, sure cocaine mostly just exists to make rich people act like assholes. But he was a Tea Party Republican, so you know, par for the course. And yes, I know that makes him a hypocrite. By all means, we should throw out every member of the House who someone can show is a hypocrite; Except then there’s a slight problem that there probably wouldn’t be a quorum. Again, that’s what we have elections to figure out. They’re frequent enough, especially in the House, that waiting until the next election seems reasonable.
I am writing to ask you to give your full support to the Voting Rights Amendment Act of 2014. This bill would set a new formula for preclearance after the old formula was thrown out by the Supreme Court. It would help make sure that future elections are fair throughout the country.
Preclearance is a vital to make sure that states that consistently violate people’s rights aren’t able to get away with it. This formula will give states the chance to get off of the list, as well as making sure that violators of a more recent vintage are watched by the Justice Department.
Your support, and the support of as many members of the House as possible, will help make sure that all citizens have the chance to vote. This vital and fundamental right needs as much support in Congress as possible, and I hope that includes you.
Thank You
Carl Ballard
You can find your rep here. I’d encourage you to write them on this or anything else.
– Big Burke-Gilman Trail detours coming soon on UW campus
– Something, something executive orders are horrible. AKA, another GOP talking point doesn’t hold up to reality.
– Too bad Republicans like McMorris Rodgers want to deny most Americans the same right.
– And more McMorris Rogers SOTU response commentary, from a constituent.
– The State Of The Union may have finally killed the stupid Iran sanctions bill.
This is a bit old, but somehow, I’d missed it.
State Senate Democrats sent out a news release today about a bill introduced by their Republican counterparts that would eliminate the elected office of insurance commissioner, which has been filled by Mike Kreidler since 2001. He began his fourth term in office in 2012.
Since federal health care reform passed, Kreidler has been all about health insurance, all the time. He’s the one who determines which insurance plans get included in the state exchange, and last year rankled some critics when he decided that some plans initially did not have robust enough offerings to be included — effectively limiting the options that were available in the exchange. The four plans that were denied entry appealed his decision, and he later settled with them so they all got included after all.
The Senate Republicans’ Bill 6458, which hasn’t even been heard in committee yet, “creates the state insurance board which will be responsible for the oversight of the insurance code.” It “transfers the powers, duties, and functions of the office of the insurance commissioner pertaining to regulation of insurance to the state insurance board.”
I’m not generally a fan of the way we elect so many executive positions. So I could probably hear arguments that putting that power in the Governor’s office is more logical.
Still, it seems to me that at least part of the reason that this could get 13 GOP co-sponsors is because of the way that the office has kicked ass for consumers. Both on the ACA and long before it (Seattle Times link). But if they oppose him making policy they’ve had 4 chances to take that case to the people. This seems like a pretty silly runaround.
OK, it’s a legit story, I guess. And now I’m writing about it so it’s meta googlebait? Spokane may have an initiative for a ban on nude coffee. Or topless seems to be the problem.
The brewing debate about how much clothes must be worn by baristas could be decided by voters.
Spokane resident Beth Solscheid this month filed an initiative proposing to create a law making it a misdemeanor crime to expose at least half of a female breast, or any part of female areolas or nipples or any part of male or female genitals or anus at any place the general public has a right to be or see.
Those coffee places with topless women seem gross (I’m not going to judge anyone for taking a job, but it’s not for me as a customer). Still this seems rather prudish to force it. And making the criminal act on the individuals instead of the businesses seems problematic.
Also, I realize that a law like this almost by definition has to have a lot of specifics. But this seems to be a protect-me-from-me type of law. If you want to go to a coffee shop where everyone wears shirts in Spokane, I’m pretty sure you can.
Assuming I can connect to the internet from the Union Bar, I’ll be liveblogging the SOTU. Please leave your own observations in the comment threads.
5:53: [Darryl] Okay…so I am on the intertubes. The teevee is on here at the Union Bar, and there is a good group of Drinking Liberally folks here, so here we go…just as soon as that turn up the sound.
5:57: [Darryl] Look for Boehner shedding a tear as introduces Mr. President.
6:00: [Darryl] Future first ex-lady arrives!
6:04: [Darryl] The cabinet arrives…no word on where Obama’s many Tsars are.
6:10: [Darryl] The Gavel. Obviously, Obama was frantically rewriting his speech for 10 minutes. A sure sign that his whole administration is in a steep decline….
6:12: [Darryl] Obama has a solid light blue tie on. It must mean something important….
6:14: [Darryl] Obama slips Boehner and Biden envelopes of unmarked bills just before taking the podium….
6:16: [Darryl] Obama front loads the address with all of the anecdotes.
6:18: [Darryl] “…I believe this can be a breakthrough year for America.” Are you with us or against us in this quest?
6:20: [Darryl] Obama says “In a balanced way.” and the cameras cut to Sen. Patty Murray. Nice.
6:21: [Darryl] Obama talks inequality and the income gap, and then promises concrete proposals. Then he threatens Republicans that he will implement these things using executive authority if they don’t help.
6:24: [Carl] All this America is the greatest country on Earth makes me think Obama feels there are better countries on other planets.
6:29: [Darryl] “Congress should undo the damage done last year to basic research.” Yes. Seriously! I’ll never understand why these asshole Republicans want to turn America into a 3rd world-class country in innovation. Oh…wait, I do. They are petty, greedy, selfish, small minded fucks!
6:33: [Darryl] “Climate change is a fact!” Of course…if you don’t believe in science or facts….
6:37: [Carl] Yay unemployment insurance. Now how many people applauding it will vote against it?
6:40: [Carl] Is son of a factory worker a parallel to son of a barkeep? Good job, some of the best speechwriters in the world.
6:43: [Darryl] Obama channels Christine Gregoire on early education.
6:47: [Darryl] “I believe when women succeed, America succeeds!!!” It’s that Democratic War on Women thing again.
6:49: [Darryl] Obama calls out Costco as a company that has learned that paying living wages turns into better business. “Say Yes…give America a raise!”
6:51: [Darryl} Okay…while I was eating my fish & chips, Obama totally schooled Republicans on health care. It was brilliant.
7:12: [Darryl] Until he got into all this foreign policy stuff, I was convinced this was Obama’s best SOTU address so far. It still may be.
7:16: [Darryl] This SOTU isn’t HIPPA compliant (Cori’s story).
7:20: [Darryl] Great closing. Definitely Obama’s best SOTU to date.
7:22: [Darryl] Here is my rebuttal prebuttal: Kathy McMorris Rodgers is a generic wingnut. So there.
The Seattle Chapter of Drinking Liberally is still “on tour,” searching for a new permanent home. We’ve received a number of excellent suggestions, and will be following them up and voting on new locations to check out in the coming weeks.
This evening is, of course, the Presidential State of the Union Address. And that will be followed by a “response” from the highest ranking Republican woman in the House, Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R WA-5).
We’ll watch those while checking out the state of the Union Bar, 5609 Rainier Ave S Seattle. Our normal starting time is 8:00pm, but this week we’ll start at 5:30pm for the 6:00pm start of the SOTU address.
The Union Bar assures us they will have the SOTU on the TV. But I am not sure what the acoustics are like. Bring a radio and ear buds if you must hear every word.
Can’t make it to Seattle to watch the SOTU? The Northwest Progressive Institute will host a SOTU watching party at the Bellevue Regional Library, Room 1, 1111 110th Avenue NE, Bellevue.
Besides the Seattle Chapter of Drinking Liberally, the Tri-Cities chapter meets tonight and every Tuesday night. And next Monday, the Yakima, South Bellevue and Olympia chapters meet.
With 213 chapters of Living Liberally, including eighteen in Washington state, four in Oregon, and three more in Idaho, chances are excellent there’s a chapter meeting somewhere near you.
Peter “Pete” Seeger (May 3, 1919 – January 27, 2014)
As recounted by Stewart Hendrickson of the Pacific Northwest Folklore Society, Pete (traveling with Woody Guthrie in 1941) first encountered the word hootenany as a term for rousing singalongs right here in Seattle.
Pete stood up to HUAC on August 18, 1955. He stood up for all of us, to this day and far into the future.
– This is the polite way of saying the CRC is fucked, right?
– I have nothing to add about Dinesh D’Souza, but his defenders make me sad.
– After a while, I stopped linking to Macklemore local-boy-makes-good stories. I mean he was crushing it, so whatever at a certain point. But I will say, I’m glad he’s pissing off the right people.
– Oh, Northwest rate payers are subsidizing Kentucky. Seems fair.
– Will the last Republican woman turn out the lights?
– Who could have predicted that Rodney Tom would keep dicking people around?
– I dig the Seattle buildings turning blue and green, but holy cowThe Empire State Building blue and green.
As the scandals around Chris Christie continue to pile up, it made me revisit the story of how Christie handled – well, mishandled – the implementation of New Jersey’s medical marijuana program. I didn’t pay too much attention to it at the time, but it was certainly a reason that drug law reformers were some of Christie’s loudest detractors in the 2013 campaign for governor.
The aspirations of New Jersey’s first medical marijuana businesses range from modest to potentially massive, but marijuana advocates say the state’s startup dispensaries have stronger ties to traditional medicine than most — and an unusual number of politically connected people involved in them.
Christie inherited the law from his predecessor, Jon Corzine, but has done just about everything possible to keep it from being implemented in a way that might actually help people – well, not counting well-connected people hoping to make money.
Fast forward to this month:
A state appeals court today ruled the state Health Department must produce a report within 45 days that explains how New Jersey’s medical marijuana program has been implemented, the status of dispensaries that have not yet opened, and whether there are enough growers to meet patient demand.
The decision, however, is only a partial win for the patients and physician who sued the Christie administration in 2012 for intentionally delaying the program. The plaintiffs wanted the court to nullify the health department’s choice of three nonprofits that have yet to have their plans for dispensaries approved nearly three years later.
Yesterday, Jay R. Lassiter in PolitickerNJ also called out Christie for this horrible track record:
Now that the entire universe knows about Chris Christie’s insatiable appetite for recriminations, it’s a good time to reexamine the scandal-plagued Governor’s role in destroying NJ’s medical marijuana law. Why? Because the five-year-old program — signed into law shortly before Christie took office — has been a case study in big-government incompetence.
Yes, worth taking a much longer look.
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