Wednesday Open Thread
I guess one good thing I can say about this week is that it’s moving quickly. It’s already time for an open thread! Tell us your deepest feelings, we’ll keep it just between us.
Nick Ayers, the executive director of the Republican Governors Association, tweeted a series of jokes this morning about White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel trying to get certain Democratic governors to retire.
Rahm: “Gov Paterson you should accept the ambassadorship to New Zealand. Its beautiful there. Have you not seen it?…oh, right, sorry.”
New York Gov. David Paterson is legally blind.
Update: Ayers is now apologizing.
Now, he tweets:
Paterson tweet too far. A poor attempt at poking fun of White House. Deleting now. Apologies.
Ya think? At least it was a less lame apology than I’m sorry if some people were offended…
Ummm….as far as security tests go I guess it worked? The Slovaks proved that they are imbeciles.
Slovak officials on Wednesday blamed ”a silly and unprofessional mistake” for a failed airport security test that led to a man unwittingly carrying hidden explosives in his bag aboard a flight to Dublin.
…
Security experts said the episode illustrated the inadequacy of security screening of checked-in luggage — the very point the Slovak authorities had sought to test when they placed real bomb components in nine passengers’ bags Saturday.
”The aim of the training was to keep sniffer dogs in shape and on alert in a real environment,” the ministry said.
Eight items were detected. But one bag had two bomb components in it. The sniffer dog found one but the police officer in charge failed to remove the second, which was not detected by the dog, because he was busy, the ministry said.
That allowed 90 grams (3 ounces) of RDX plastic explosive to travel undetected through security at Poprad-Tatry Airport in central Slovakia onto a Danube Wings aircraft. The Slovak carrier launched services to Dublin last month.
What about those poor passengers who had bombs detected in their bags? What about the poor passenger in Dublin who was unwittingly carrying around plastic explosives?
Tags: Open Thread
today is also A.price’s birthday. 25. (and syd barret for you floyd fans)
Happy Birthday, a. price!
Ah, youth… Happy Birthday, a. price!
Happy Birthday A.
Shut up, Ted.
http://www.wdel.com/story.php?id=74548076345
should be interesting to see the Dems piss away their super majority
Happy birthday, A. 🙂
note to all politicos…
leave humor to the professionals.
The revolution will not be televised.
and neither will the healthcare debate (negotiation, bribery, strong arming and blackmail)
but it’s not Obama’s fault.
Pelosi? Reid?
Bush! Bush!! that’s who’s to blame
Happy birthday, a. price! Shine on you crazy liberal.
thanks for the wishes all. I am very disappointed with the democrats. there is no reason to do this behind closed doors. It makes them looks suspicious, and like republicans. It also gives fodder to the enemies of America (conservunists) to use against democrats and president Obama in 2010. I’d like ot see Obama at least publicly ask Pelosi and Reid to bring the debate out in to open so he is at least keeping one of the promises i decided to vote for him on. C’mon O, be who i voted for.
Oh, Good Lord, I can’t imagine anything more depressing than watching politicians trying to get something done while maintaining their carefully crafted political persona. It would be like having a live broadcast of Mickey Mouse having diarrhea.
just get it done.
“Be the President I voted for” – I like this even better than conservunist.
Sort of like C-Span now — lots of posturing and bloviating and not much gets done.
Lightning strikes, pigs fly, hell freezes over, I agree with Frank Knotts.
I agree with Brooke (I think), minus the rodental scatalogical reference. As Cassandra says, if they had their little C-Span theater (or “theatre”, for you fancy types) nothing would get done. The real negotiating would still take place behind closed doors. There is a good reason why people have closed-door meetings — everyone can speak freely without worrying about their image. Right now, image seems to be foremost on many congresspeople’s minds. I don’t care about their image. I just want to see the best possible bill get passed.
I dare say the public spotlight has not done much to raise the level of discourse in the HCR debate so far. I can’t see that changing now. As far as the ’10 elections, I don’t think this would have much effect. Passing a decent bill would. How many voters do you think remember many details from the stimulus debate of less than a year ago? When this bill gets passed, how it got passed will quickly fade into forgotenness.
Oh yeah — and what’s with the poll on the homepage? Are we talking looks or temperature of their afterlife destination?
Two news items:
The Holocaust Museum shooter has died in prison of natural causes.
The underpants bomber has been indicted.
I had nothing to do with that poll, but I intend to find out who did! 👿
The underpants bomber has been indicted.
Really, I was sure our Judicial system would have set him free by now.
and the pantybombers visa has been revoked!
Reminder — Progressive Democrats for Delaware meets tonight, and the first Wednesday of every month, at DelDems Headquarters at 7:00 PM. One of the things on tonight’s agenda is to start selecting questions for our endorsement questionnaire. What issues are you intested in learning about from candidates? I’ll assume ElSom wants to know their position on progressive taxation. What else? Come tonight and share your thoughts. Or post them here. I’ll check back.
Onward!
3 federal prisoners escape Illinois custody
ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH ^ | 1/6/2010 | ST. LOUIS POST-DISPATCH
The U.S. Marshals Service is hunting for three men who escaped from a detention center in Ullin, Illinois.
The Marshals provided no details on how the men were able to escape today from the Tri-County Detention Center. Click to learn more…
The men — all considered armed and dangerous — were being held on federal charges.
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ofcourse terrorists could never escape federal custody in Illinois…
It is useful to note that the Tri-County Detention Center is owned by a county and is the only privately run detention facility in Illinois.
And reading the description of the facility by the administrative assistant, literacy isn’t a strong point in the county.
http://www.pulaskicountyil.net/departments.php
SuperMax it ain’t.
Oh, and the terrorists would likely be held in lead cells, so they would be unable to use their superpowers once incarcerated.
Lizard’s news dispatches are cut and pasted from Freeperville.
I think they should be deleted or disemvowelled unless accompanied by some original commentary.
Teach for America is releasing its data on what makes a good teacher:
This may be worth its own post from our Education watchers.
Here’s a goody. Fact checkers on break again, I guess.
http://www.texasmonthly.com/2010-02-01/letterfrombryan.php
Conservatives Finish 2009 as No. 1 Ideological Group
Gallup ^ | January 7, 2009 | Lydia Saad
Uptick owing largely to more independents calling themselves conservative by Lydia Saad PRINCETON, NJ — The increased conservatism that Gallup first identified among Americans last June persisted throughout the year, so that the final year-end political ideology figures confirm Gallup’s initial reporting: conservatives (40%) outnumbered both moderates (36%) and liberals (21%) across the nation in 2009. More broadly, the percentage of Americans calling themselves either conservative or liberal has increased over the last decade, while the percentage of moderates has declined.
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It’s just rethug talkingpoints from Rasmussen… oh wait it’s Gallup? well.. um.. people are stupid and didn’t understand the question.. yeah that’s it.
Whatever floats your boat lizard.