1/ Frank Rich with a very good column this week.......his thoughts and wisdom on three big stories.....
Most weeks, New York Magazine writer-at-large Frank Rich speaks with contributor Alex Carp about the biggest stories in politics and culture. This week, the magazine asked him about the Confederate-flag controversy, the GOP donations from white supremacist who proselytized Dylann Roof, and President Obama's interview with Marc Maron.
Until South Carolina governor Nikki Haley called for her state’s Confederate flag to come down, almost all the Republican presidential candidates vacillated on the question. Now the movement to retire the flag has spread across the South, not to mention to retailing giants like Walmart and Amazon. Will there be a political cost for the candidates who failed to lead after the Charleston massacre?
Say this about the Old Confederacy: At least its leaders had the courage of their own bad convictions.
2/ The President attended the funeral of the Rev. Clementa Pinckney in Charleston, gave the eulogy and led the congregation in "Amazing Grace". Not the best sung version of this song, but one of the most moving - he recites the names of the nine people killed during the hymn.
Watch this two minute clip, keep a kleenex handy.....then read some of the comments on the HuffPo story below.....
It's also interesting to note there has been no mention of this on Fox, no snarky comments, nothing....it's like even the network of poison knows it's limits......
Watch the video first!
I'm a 63 year old white guy and I'll tell ya... I love my President. MY President.
I don't care what any backwoods Confederate flag waving Republican right wing racist homophobic obstructionist backwards hate filled fool has ever had to say about him. I love this man and I am PROUD of him. And GRATEFUL to him.
I don't care what any backwoods Confederate flag waving Republican right wing racist homophobic obstructionist backwards hate filled fool has ever had to say about him. I love this man and I am PROUD of him. And GRATEFUL to him.
How will Fox attack & spin this against our graceful & truly compassionate Christian President? I don't know any Kenyan born Muslims who would lead a Christian church full of mourners singing "Amazing Grace". Are you listening Hannity, Palin, Huckabee, Coulter, Trump et. al.?
This is Christianity. Not jack-leg, money-grubbing "mega church" bigots of the right wing. This is Christianity, from a Christian man who we are fortunate to call President...
I am not Christian ... technically Jewish but really not a believer, admittingly just like the nice parts but I'm not a religious man by any means. But I can say as an educated man ... you couldn't be more correct. If you truly are a religious Christian ... this is what it's supposed to be about. It's not a weapon against how others live their lives ... all religions are based on a bond, a humanity towards others ... all of them. Why then is religion basically the food of just about every war ever? If you believe ... THIS is what it's supposed to be about. Not suppression. Not telling others how to conduct their own lives wherein they find peace and happiness ... not "praying with your family to see if you should run for President" ... it's supposed to be about peace ... how to co-exist with the 7 billion other with whom you share this Earth. Isn't it?
3/ Jon Stewart with a five minute segment on the Republicans' stand on climate change and the Pope.....
Jon's getting better in his last weeks.....we're really, really going to miss him.....
Jon Stewart tonight tackled how the Pope got the ball rolling on climate changed and mocked the GOP candidates who are dismissing his expertise on the matter.
Rick Santorum, Jeb Bush, and other Republicans have said the Pope isn’t an expert on the matter and religion should stay away from such matters.
But Stewart realized that since Republicans think religion is important when it comes to gay marriage, he suggested they just view it as “taking a stand for preserving traditional sea levels.”
4/ This is interesting - the polling companies are admitting their polls are mostly bullshit because they cannot get a representative sampling of attitudes any more - a majority of people now don't have a landline......and the ones who do are mainly old and white.....
So when you see polls saying the Donald is #2 in the polls, it's a headline grabber or click magnet only - it isn't real.....
It's YOUR fault....yes, you! Reinstall your landline you millennial wannabe.....
OVER the past two years, election polling has had some spectacular disasters. Several organizations tracking the 2014 midterm elections did not catch the Republican wave that led to strong majorities in both houses; polls in Israel badly underestimated Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s strength, and pollsters in Britain predicted a close election only to see the Conservatives win easily. What’s going on here? How much can we trust the polls as we head toward the 2016 elections?
Election polling is in near crisis, and we pollsters know. Two trends are driving the increasing unreliability of election and other polling in the United States: the growth of cellphones and the decline in people willing to answer surveys. Coupled, they have made high-quality research much more expensive to do, so there is less of it. This has opened the door for less scientifically based, less well-tested techniques. To top it off, a perennial election polling problem, how to identify “likely voters,” has become even thornier.
5/ Bill Maher with a serious "New Rules" that's also seriously funny.....the clip stems from the meat labelling law passed by the Republicans in the House which says you aren't going to be allowed to know where your meat comes from....
You can tell he's means these jokes.....five good minutes.....
Based on Republican views on not labeling where meat comes from and getting rid of the estate tax, Bill Maher suggested a new slogan for the GOP: “Eat Shit and Die.”
Yes, tonight Maher ended his show by going after Republicans for voting against labeling where meat comes from, leaving the alternative “fuck you is where it came from.”
Maher explained that Republicans would rather people just not know things, be it about meat or global warming or other things, they just want to “balance the facts with the anti-facts.”
6/ Overshadowed by the Gay Marriage ruling celebrations, the Supreme Court ruled this week the ACA [Obamacare] law stays as is.....Paul Krugman explains why this is a big deal.....
Was I on the edge of my seat, waiting for the Supreme Court decision on Obamacare subsidies? No — I was pacing the room, too nervous to sit, worried that the court would use one sloppily worded sentence to deprive millions of health insurance, condemn tens of thousands to financial ruin, and send thousands to premature death.
It didn’t. And that means that the big distractions — the teething problems of the website, the objectively ludicrous but nonetheless menacing attempts at legal sabotage — are behind us, and we can focus on the reality of health reform. The Affordable Care Act is now in its second year of full operation; how’s it doing?
The answer is, better than even many supporters realize.
Start with the act’s most basic purpose, to cover the previously uninsured. Opponents of the law insisted that it would actually reduce coverage; in reality, around 15 million Americans have gained insurance.
7/ The TPP, pushed by the President, Republicans and some slimy DINO's [Democrats in name only] including Florida's own Bill Nelson, is grinding it's way through the corrupt, bought and paid for Congress to become law fairly soon. However, the protests haven't been completely in vain as Sarah Anderson notes....
Critics of the TPP forged relationship with foreign allies, firmed up union positions, and forced some concessions on the secrecy of the text.
I tried to stay emotionally distanced from this one. It didn’t work. When the White House and Republican leaders got the votes they needed in the Senate to advance “fast track” Trade Promotion Authority on Tuesday, June 23, it was crushing.
All observers agree that fast track will soon become law, making it easier for President Barack Obama to pass the controversial trade pacts in the works with Pacific Rim nations and the European Union. That will be a serious setback to the movements for the environment, labor rights, and affordable pharmaceuticals, among others.
But after observing painful trade votes for more than 20 years, this one left me feeling that opponents should be holding their heads higher than ever before as they regroup for the next phase of the fight. Here are a few reasons why:
But after observing painful trade votes for more than 20 years, this one left me feeling that opponents should be holding their heads higher than ever before as they regroup for the next phase of the fight. Here are a few reasons why:
1. A diverse progressive coalition showed that people power can put up a real fight against big money.
8/ Save some money! Foods you don't need to buy organic! Yeay......
18 fruits and vegetables you don’t need to buy organic
If you're looking to avoid pesticides, and organic isn't available, here are some non-organic foods you can trust
(Credit: jreika via Shuttersto
This article originally appeared on AlterNet.
[Editor's note: The following list, which includes the produce on Environment Working Group's "Clean 15" list plus 3 additional, only considers pesticide residue on the produce itself.]
In 2013, the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) tested 3,015 produce samples and found that almost two-thirds contained pesticide residues. The Environmental Working Group (EWG), a non-profit, non-partisan advocacy group for human health and the environment, calculated that USDA tests found a total 165 different pesticides on thousands of fruit and vegetables in the 2013 sampling.
While these findings might increase your desire to always choose organic over conventionally grown produce, in fact, there are many traditionally grown fruits and vegetables that are fine to include in a pesticide-free diet. Of course, there are foods that you should always buy organic, like apples, peaches and nectarines — nearly 100 percent of these fruits have tested positive for at least one pesticide residue.
9/ A Bill Maher panel discussion about Donald Trump, as Maher refers to as the "Tea Party Frankenstein Monster"......note there are two conservative ladies on this panel....
Five minutes of an interesting discussion on politics, and I am surprised how seriously Maher rates Trump's chances....
Bill Maher got out two weeks worth of barbs directed at Donald Trump tonight, calling him “the Frankenstein monster that was created with the tea party” who isn’t going away any time soon.
Kristen Soltis Anderson and Mary Katherine Ham doubted Trump has any staying power within the GOP, but Maher argued he actually might, because of how strongly he appeals to the angry GOP base.
“He never apologizes,” Maher said, “he’s never wrong, no matter what crazy thing he says. He’s the white Kanye.”Maher called Trump the “id” of the GOP. Michael Eric Dyson said adding the letters “-iot” after it would be a more accurate descriptor.
10/ The World Health Organization has said both Roundup and Ortho-B Weed-B-Gone [contains Agent Orange] can possibly give you cancer......the word "possibly" means they have the evidence, but before pissing off the world's most evil corporations [Monsanto, Dow Chemical] they need definitive proof, irrefutable evidence. Just suffice it to say the fact the WHO has mentioned it means it's true. So defend yourself!
Ho hum I hear you say.....pointy headed scientists in the gub'ment telling me how to kill MY weeds? Screw them, whadda they know....
Pesticide warning sign on a bright green lawn. (Bigstock)
A weedkiller sprayed widely on farms and used in a number of popular lawn-care products has been designated as "possibly" carcinogenic to humans by a World Health Organization research arm.
The analysis, published in Tuesday's the Lancet Oncology, showed that there is strong evidence that the herbicide, 2,4-D, causes an imbalance in the body called oxidative stress, and moderate evidence that it leads to immunosuppression, but the panel concluded that there was insufficient information to make a stronger link to cancers.
The WHO's International Agency for Research on Cancer also classified the insecticide lindane, which was once used for insect control in agriculture and as a treatment for lice but is now restricted as a moderately hazardous substance, as carcinogenic for non-Hodgkin lymphoma — its strongest classification — and the insecticide DDT, introduced in World War II and later banned in many parts of the world, as "probably" carcinogenic. In March, the group also gave the "probably" carcinogenic label to glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto's flagship herbicide Roundup, which had been the No. 1 weedkiller in the United States.
11/ I love this video - Above and Beyond with Zoe Johnson with "We're All We Need".....a beautiful song, impeccably sung with her haunting voice, a cautionary tale of abuse, love, stupidity and loyalty.....and it ends at the Grand Canyon which we just visited!
Yes there's elements of "Thelma and Louise", but it's still a great three minutes.....
My vote is for Zoe Johnston, who continues to produce nothing but quality vocals time and time again. It’s inspiring the way her dissonant harmonies resonated so long after the song faded out.
To say We Are All We Need exceeded expectations would be an understatement. To say that the album was well worth the wait would also not do it justice. There’s really no simple phrase that can sum up the affect of the album. Once more, Above & Beyond and their team provide music lovers with a complete package: an aural, visual, and spiritual journey to set the bar high
12/ This is amusing......five chain restaurants you shouldn't eat at.....and not necessarily for nutritional reasons.....
5 incredibly delicious chain restaurants you should never, ever eat at and 1 you should but can't
A moment of silence, please. Photo by Eric March/Upworthy.
And who could blame us? Fast food is, to use a scientific phrase, tasty as all get out.
But some chains, well. It's painful to admit, but they're bad for us.
Not because they're slowly clogging our arteries — we already knew that. Bad for us in the metaphorical heart, not the literal heart. Cosmically bad for us. Bad for us in that they pretend to be our friends, but in reality, they're talking behind our backs about how we have a weird-shaped face or whatever.
They're doing bad, shady things to the world is the point.
They are delicious. So so so so so so delicious.
But you can't eat there. You just can't.
13/ Climate change......again, bloody scientists trying to upset us all.......the fact this is an official EPA report that is inherently conservative doesn't matter to our politicians, whose campaign contributions depend on them denying or ignoring anything that might impact the energy companies profits.
But as the report says, "change is a'comin" even if we act now.....and by the way did you see, hear or read anything at all about this report in our corrupt, corporate media? No, SCOTUS took care of that with the Obamacare and Gay Marriage decisions and so did a redneck with a gun in Charleston, but here's the REAL reason - it's in the subhead of the excerpt saying even if we act now, the benefits don't show up till 2050.
So the oligarchs, the elites and our "leaders" [who believe me have all read and digested this report] have taken the view they will all be dead when the benefits kick in in 35 years, so why should I act now which will inconvenience my lifestyle/ cut into profits/ make us change our way of doing business/ etc etc etc. just to benefit my kids/ my grandkids/ todays youth/ humanity/ etc etc etc.....it's the definition of evil....
The EPA outlines our choices on global warming: moderate disaster or major disaster
A trailer truck drives through flooded Sunrise Highway at Route 111 following heavy rains and flash flooding August 13, 2014, in Islip, New York.Andrew Theodorakis/Getty Images
This week, the EPA released a major report that tried to tally up the specific benefits to the United States if the whole world took action on climate change. Fewer deaths from heat waves, billions in saved infrastructure costs, and so on.
So far, so good. But a closer look at the EPA's report also reveals two other nuanced points about climate that are getting lost in the media coverage. They're worth emphasizing, because they give a clearer sense of what we're actually dealing with and what our choices are:
1) No matter what the world does on emissions, some amount of global warming is inevitable in the decades ahead. That will lead to all sorts of disruptions and dislocations, and we really ought to start planning and adapting now.
2) If the world does cut emissions drastically, those climate impacts will be less costly, and the risk of catastrophe goes down. But we also wouldn't see any major difference for decades. That's because there's a lag between when we put CO2 in the atmosphere and when its various impacts are felt. So when we talk about reducing emissions, we're mainly talking about benefits for the United States in 2050 and beyond.
The biggest benefits of tackling climate change show up after 2050
14/ Seven movies Peter Travers in Rolling Stone says you've missed so far this year that are worth seeing......I have seen "Mad Max" and it's an amazing guy movie.......also "Me and Earl and the Dying Girl" sounds really good.....
(Disney/Pixar; Warner Bros.)
Where did the time go? The first six months of the movie year have rushed by resulting in the biggest movie opening of all-time (Jurassic World), two smash sequels (Avengers: Age of Ultron, Furious 7), successful crapola (Fifty Shades of Grey, San Andreas) and fat flops from first-rate filmmakers — the Wachowskis' Jupiter Ascending, Brad Bird's Tomorrowland, Neill Blomkamp's Chappie, Cameron Crowe's Aloha, and Michael Mann's Blackhat. Which begs the question: Has 2015 produced any movies so far that could be fairly categorized as award-caliber or memorably good? I couldn't get to 10 — but here's a solid seven.
15/ It's a brave network that starts new shows in the summer, but here are three [apparently] worth watching.....Mr Robot [USA], Unreal [Lifetime] and Catastrophe [Amazon Prime].....
Rami Malek plays a paranoid hacker in the new thriller Mr. Robot. Sadly, he is not Mr. Robot. (Scroll down to find out who Mr. Robot is.) USA
As a professional TV watcher, the question I hear most often is, "What's good on TV right now?" Here are three promising new shows that will infuse your TV-watching schedule with summer fun.
Mr. Robot is a brooding, paranoid cyberpunk thriller. Seriously.
The greatest compliment I can pay to Mr. Robot, which premieres Wednesday, June 24, on USA, is that it feels like how I sometimes imagine my life. The characters wander a gray cityscape, surrounded by a massive electronic web they cannot see but can somehow perceive, rattling away in the distance. They're caught in it, and sometimes they know they're caught in it, but there's little they can do. This is the way we live now. This is the way we've chosen to live now.
16/ "Advantageous" is a sci-fi movie that's different, and one that everyone under 30 should see because some of the things they are describing are creeping into their lives already......send this on to your kids and grandkids, if you dare.....
It's on Netflix streaming......
"Advantageous" (Credit: Sundance Institute)
Jennifer Phang’s indie science fiction film “Advantageous,” a darling of 2015’s Sundance, came to Netflix Instant Streaming earlier this week. If you’re a millennial, you have Netflix. If you’re an un- or underemployed millennial, you have time. Every un- or underemployed millennial needs to see this movie.
We live in a renaissance of science fiction film and TV and “geek” culture in general — the accelerating pace of technological change thanks to Moore’s Law makes it hard to deny we’re living in “the future,” we’re all part-machine-part-human for practical purposes now, no one can guess what element of science fiction is next to become science fact, blah blah blah.
You’ve heard that song and dance before. They use it to sell everything from splashy popcorn blockbusters with robot villains to artsy thinky indie dramas with robot antiheroes.
But “Advantageous” is the first science fiction film I’ve seen that really grasps something I think is core to the experience of us young people who are on the bleeding edge of the troubling trend of Machines Taking Our Jobs Away.
Todays wonderful Jewish jokes
A Jewish woman goes to see her Rabbi and asks, "Yankele and Yosele are both in love with me, who will be the lucky one?"The wise old Rabbi answers, "Yankele will marry you. Yosele will be the lucky one."__________________________________________________ If a married Jewish man is walking alone in a park and expresses an opinion without anybody hearing him, is he still wrong?------------------------------------------------------------ My father said, "Marry a girl who has the same belief as the family."I said, "Dad, why would I marry a girl who thinks I'm a schmuck?"------------------------------------------------------------ ----- Jewish Marriage advice: "Don't marry a beautiful person. They may leave you. Of course, an ugly person may leave you too. But who cares?"-------------------------------------------------------- The Italian says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have wine."The Frenchman says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have cognac."The Russian says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have vodka."The German says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have beer."The Mexican says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have tequila."The Jew says, "I'm tired and thirsty. I must have diabetes."--------------------------------------------------------- Jewish proverb: "A Jewish wife will forgive and forget, but she'll never forget what she forgave."------------------------------------------------------------ ------ A Jewish congregation in suburban Toronto honors its Rabbi for 25 years of service by sending him to Hawaii for a week, all expenses paid.When he walks into his hotel room, he finds a beautiful nude woman lying on the bed.She greets the Rabbi with, "Hi, Rabbi, I'm a little something extra that the President of the shul arranged for you."The Rabbi is incensed. He picks up the phone, calls the President of the shul and shouts, "Greenblatt, what were you thinking? Where is your respect? I am the moral leader of our religious community! I am very angry with you and you have not heard the end of this!"Hearing this, the naked woman gets up and starts to get dressed.The Rabbi turns to her and asks, "Where are you going? I'm not angry with you."
Todays Texas joke
BROTHEL SUES LOCAL CHURCH OVER LIGHTNING STRIKE !!
Mt. Vernon, Texas.
Diamond D's brothel began construction on an extension of their building to increase their ever-growing business.
Mt. Vernon, Texas.
In response, the local Church started a campaign to block the business from expanding - with morning, afternoon, and evening prayer sessions at their church.
Work on Diamond D's progressed right up until the week before the grand reopening when lightning struck the whorehouse and burned it to the ground!
After the brothel was burned by the lightning strike, the church folks were rather smug in their outlook, bragging about "the never-ending power of prayer."
But late last week 'Big Jugs' Jill Diamond, the owner/madam, sued the church, the preacher and the entire congregation on the grounds that the church... "was ultimately responsible for the demise of her building and her business -- either through direct or indirect divine actions or means."
In its reply to the court, the church vehemently and voraciously denied any, and all responsibility or any connection to the building's demise.
The crusty old judge, JP Reynolds, read through the plaintiff's complaint and the defendant's reply, and at the opening hearing he commented:
"I don't know how the hell I'm going to decide this case, but it appears from the paperwork, that we now have a whorehouse owner who staunchly believes in the power of prayer - and an entire church congregation that thinks it's all bullshit"
Todays terrorist joke
Two terrorists are in a locker room taking their annual shower after their bomb making class, when one notices the other one bending over holding his stomach in agony. He has a huge cork stuck in his butt.
“If you do not mind me saying,” said the second terrorist, "That cork looks very uncomfortable. Why do you not take it out?”
“I regret I cannot”, lamented the first terrorist. “It is permanently stuck in my butt."
“I do not understand," said the other.
The first terrorist says, “I was walking along the beach and I tripped over an oil lamp. There was a puff of smoke, and then a huge old man in an American flag with a white beard and top hat came boiling out.
He said, "I am Uncle Sam, the Genie. I can grant you one wish."
I said, "No shit?"
This is a true story, verified by Brian Williams of NBC news. He was there when it happened.
Todays bonus joke
Wife says to husband "You only ever want sex when you're drunk"
Husband says "That’s not true . . . sometimes I want a kebab"
Husband says "That’s not true . . . sometimes I want a kebab"
Bill Maher ended his show tonight with another rant against politically correct culture, telling people to just lighten up and take a joke already. He reiterated 
Jon Stewart really unloaded on Fox News tonight for illustrating such hypocrisy on the “rush to politicize” issue. On Charleston, they obviously think President Obama and liberals have been wrong to rush to politicize, but Stewart asked where Fox’s restraint was when they invoked the deaths of two NYPD officers to slam the leadership of Mayor Bill de Blasio and an anti-police climate.