Delaware Liberal

Kudos to Jack Markell. This is exactly the kind of crumb Markell is a master of tossing out to starving liberals. Nice work Gov! Now get back to the real work of governing and privatize public education, reduce the minimum wage, or figure out how to exempt millionaires from paying taxes.

Delaware Gov. Jack Markell (D) has declared Feb. 12 as "Charles Darwin Day" in the state. Praising Darwin's theory of evolution as "the foundation of modern biology, an essential tool in understanding the development of life on earth," Markell's proclamation says Feb. 12 -- Darwin's birthday -- "is a time to reflect and celebrate the importance of his scientific achievements."

Whenever I see a news story that references a state-run news agency in a foreign country, like Russia, for example, or North Korea, the adjective "state-run" is always a pejorative, indicating to the reader that the news or quote you are about to read is not to be trusted, because it is coming directly from the suspect government in question, a government that is so distrustful of an independent media and the freedom of press and speech that it has set up its own propaganda arm. Keep that in mind when you read that Indiana Gov. Mike Pence, of course a Republican, is setting up his own state-run news agency. The agency will be called “Just IN” will provide pre-written stories for small Indiana news outlets on breaking news as well as “personality driven profiles.” Stories will be written by the Pence administration’s communications team. Yes, this is a valuable use of taxpayer money. I wonder which child's education was cut to pay for the Republican propaganda?

This is cool, and I am going to waste hours playing with this. Becky Ferreira reports that a blizzard was not the only thing we missed out on yesterday.

[A]n enormous space rock missed Earth by a narrow margin of 745,000 miles, or about three times the distance from the Earth to the Moon. With a diameter of 550 meters and a velocity of about 35,000 miles per hour, the asteroid, known as 2004 BL86, will be so bright in the evening sky that it will be visible through binoculars. Scientists don’t expect another object of this size to pass so closely to Earth until August 7, 2027.

But what if this asteroid had hit the Earth? Well, now you can play with Purdue University's Impact Earth tool I linked to above.

We saw this very thing in the Steubenville rape case - the victim consoled their attacker, said that they didn't believe their attacker had done anything wrong. Little did they know.

It was after Vandenburg and three other football players were charged with her rape that she would see graphic videos of the alleged attack, she testified. Prosecutors played videos of the alleged attack for jurors that they said were shot from Vandenburg's cellphone. A Nashville detective testified that police were able to recover the videos from a laptop. [...] Earlier this week, McKenzie testified that Vandenberg was "amped" and coaching players to violate the woman. McKenzie said he did not touch her but took pictures. He also testified that Banks and Batey violated the woman.

There's also testimony that Vandenberg handed out condoms and covered a security camera. Those acts seem pretty deliberate for a guy saying he was too drunk to instigate rape.

Wall Street Journal: “Potential presidential candidates — top-tier contenders and long-shots alike — have already spent years quietly laying groundwork, building email lists, recruiting staff, and generally doing the scut work of building an organization on which to call if they flip the switch and launch a 2016 campaign. Mr. Biden, who said this week that he is still weighing a presidential run, is one of the few potential candidates with no political organization, nonprofit, foundation, or campaign staff-in-waiting.” That is because Biden is not running for President, and, according to the Politico article linked inside, is only saying he is considering it in order to be some kind of Plan B in case Clinton dies, implodes, or something else truly horrible happens.