Reverend Kilroy Delivers A Sunday Sermon

Reverend Kilroy Delivers A Sunday Sermon

Last week my phone started ringing and emails/texts poured in. Almost everyone began with: "Have you heard?" Why no, no I hadn't heard. Today Kilroy puts up a post addressing what's going on. Go read the post.
Those who sit at the right and left hand of the Red Clay God (Merv) better take a hard look in the mirror. Though school superintendents make many request for school board approval it is the school board who makes the final approval with no veto power on the super’s part. In the big picture the super’s failures are the board’s failures. [...] I am dishearten to hear (rumor of course) some board members want to throw Merv overboard midstream (before the end of his contract). Those who think Merv may be the problem are just as much the problem.
Weekend Open Thread [3.1.15]

Weekend Open Thread [3.1.15]

So it would seem that, in order to get Democratic votes to extend funding of the Department of Homeland Security for another week, Speaker John Boehner had to promise that a vote would be held on a clean bill to fund the department for the rest of the year during this coming week. He is denying it now, but the proof is in the pudding, and if a clean vote happens next week, Politico reports many of Boehner's allies “are concerned [...] that his critics inside the Republican Conference may try to oust him as speaker if — as expected — he puts a long-term DHS funding bill on the House floor next week. While Boehner shrugs off such speculation, close friends believe such a move is a real possibility.” Said one GOP lawmaker close to Boehner: “There is a lot of speculation about this. People are watching for this very, very closely.”

The Weekly Addresses

In President Obama's weekly address, the President reiterated his commitment to ensuring that all hard-working Americans get the secure and dignified retirement they deserve. In Governor Markell's weekly message, he addresses ongoing efforts to support the supplier diversity community in Delaware at Star-Med in Hockessin. This week the bipartisan House Small Business Caucus in the General Assembly took a field trip to Painted Stave Distilling in Smyrna to meet with representatives from Delaware's vibrant craft beverage industry. I am sure they did some taste testing. Rep. Bryon Short, who co-chairs the small biz caucus with Rep. Danny Short, invited brewers, winemakers and distillers from all over the state to share their success stories, as well as suggest things state government could be doing to help their businesses grow and thrive. Since the law permitting farm wineries passed in 1991, and since the law permitting craft distilleries passed in 2012, Delaware's great craft wine, beer and spirits community has grown to 18 businesses, with more coming next year.
Friday Open Thread [2.27.15]

Friday Open Thread [2.27.15]

Kudos to Former Texas Governor Rick Perry. Yes, I just said that. Why?
“These are Americans. You are talking about, in the case of ISIS, people who are beheading individuals and committing heinous crimes, who are the face of evil. To try to make the relationship between them and the unions is inappropriate.” — Rick Perry, in an interview with NBC News, criticizing Scott Walker’s comparison of union protests with the Islamic State.
Scott Walker is an evil man and his political career must be destroyed at all costs. He is a slightly smarter Sarah Palin with male genitalia. Luckily, the polling boom has gone to his head, and he let some of the evil stupid contained within his brain to leak out. Eventually, he will be toxic to the general public. I mean, if even Rick Perry says you have gone too far, you are obviously off the road and in the forest.
The Dress.

The Dress.

It is all anyone is talking about today. And if they are not talking about that they are talking about escaping llamas, and if they are not talking about that, they are spoiling the first couple of episodes of House of Cards, which dropped its full season on Netflix at 3 am this morning (yes, I woke up at 4:22 am and have already watched one episode in bed on my phone and no I don't have a problem). Anyway, the dress. What colors are this dress?
Thursday Open Thread [2.26.15]

Thursday Open Thread [2.26.15]

The Senate is moving forward on a clean bill funding DHS until September, and though it's not clear when that vote will happen, we know that House Republican leadership plans, at the very least, to let things go down to the wire. For some House Republicans, after all, a DHS shutdown is not such a big deal. First Read: “With the Senate easily advancing a ‘clean’ bill to fund the Department of Homeland Security, the ball is now in House Speaker Boehner’s court. And the timing couldn’t be more problematic for him: The conservatives assembling at CPAC probably aren’t going to appreciate House Republicans caving in their fight against the Obama administration. It’s déjà vu for Boehner: He’s caught between trying to help his caucus out of tricky situations, and looking over his shoulder for conservatives who want his head on a platter if he caves to Democrats. What we haven’t been able to understand: Why haven’t Boehner and Republicans been able to make their success (so far) in the courts against Obama’s executive action an asset here?”
Science Takes On A Zombie Outbreak

Science Takes On A Zombie Outbreak

Given my and DelawareDem's love of The Walking Dead, I had to post this. This is for you, DD!
A team of Cornell University researchers has determined the best place to hide during a zombie apocalypse. A graduate statistical mechanics class was inspired by a reading of “World War Z,” a fictional oral history of a zombie war, and decided to explore what might happen in an actual zombie outbreak, reported Phys.org. [...] He said most films or books assume that a zombie outbreak would affect all areas at the same time, leaving a small pocket of survivors after a few months. “But in our attempt to model zombies somewhat realistically, it doesn’t seem like this is how it would actually go down,” Alemi said. Cities would fall quickly, the researchers found, but it would take weeks or even months for zombies to penetrate less densely populated areas.