Welcome! "What's Happenin'?" is a casual community diary (a daily series, 8:30 AM Eastern on weekdays, 10 AM on weekends and holidays) where we hang out and talk about the goings on here and everywhere.
We chat about our lives, our health, our families, our social circles, our pets, etc. We welcome links to your writings here on dkos or elsewhere, posts of pictures, music, etc.
Just about anything goes, but attacks and pie fights are not welcome here. This is a community diary and a friendly, peaceful, supportive place for people to interact.
This diary series is produced by the Team DFH group but anyone who wants to join in peaceful interaction is very welcome.
|
Good Morning!
|
Drop in any time of day or night to say hello. |
|
A Few Quotes for This Morning
When a sermon at length comes to an end, people rise and praise God, and they feel the same way after many other speeches. ~John Andrew Holmes
Nothing is as easy to make as a promise this winter to do something next summer; this is how commencement speakers are caught. ~Sydney J. Harris
Oratory is the power to talk people out of their sober and natural opinions. ~Joseph Chatfield
I sometimes marvel at the extraordinary docility with which Americans submit to speeches. ~Adlai E. Stevenson
Liberty don't work as good in practice as it does in speeches. ~Will Rogers
|
|
|
|
News
And here comes the legal twisting for justification. I understand that they will use Bush's AUMF from the week after 9-11 for legal cover...
U.S. to offer legal backing for "targeted killing": source
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - The Obama administration on Monday plans to outline how U.S. laws empower the government to kill Americans overseas who engage in terrorism against their home country, a source familiar with the matter said, months after a drone strike killed a U.S.-born cleric who plotted attacks from Yemen.
Civil liberties groups have been pressuring the administration to offer justification for what has been described as a top-secret "targeted kill" program in which Americans who have joined al Qaeda or other militants are deemed legitimate targets to be killed overseas.
U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder plans to address the issue and the underpinning legal principles for using lethal force during remarks at Northwestern University School of Law on Monday afternoon in Chicago, the source said Sunday on condition of anonymity.
The war drums keep banging...
Obama, Netanyahu face struggle over Iran "red lines"
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are deeply at odds over how fast the clock is ticking toward possible military action against Iran's nuclear program, and their talks on Monday are unlikely to change that.
Even though Obama has offered assurances of stiffened U.S. resolve against Iran before the White House meeting, the two allies are still far apart on explicit nuclear "red lines" that Tehran must not be allowed to cross, and they have yet to agree on a time frame for when military action may be necessary.
Obama wants Israel to hold off on attacking Iran's nuclear sites, insisting there is still time for sanctions and diplomacy to work. But he also vowed in a speech on Sunday to the largest U.S. pro-Israel lobby that he would be ready to act militarily - with all "elements of American power" - to prevent the Islamic republic from building an atomic bomb.
Well, imagine that...
Voting fraud allegations mar Putin's presidential win
MOSCOW (Reuters) - A few days before Russia's presidential election, Sergei Smirnov received a phone call from a man who called himself Mikhail and told him the terms of the deal: you will vote for Vladimir Putin four times and receive 2,000 roubles ($70) in return.
The sum was promised to dozens of other young men and women who met on Sunday outside a popular fast food joint on the southwest fringe of Moscow, waiting to be taken to various polling stations in the province that rings the capital.
Smirnov, a journalist, said he found the group a few weeks prior to the election through a friend. Mikhail, whom he met at Moscow's Yugo-Zapadnaya (Southwest) metro station on Sunday morning, gave him final instructions.
More Drill Baby Drill... Sigh...
Deepwater Oil Drilling Picks Up Again as BP Disaster Fades
HOUSTON — Nearly two years after an explosion on an oil platform killed 11 workers and sent millions of gallons of oil gushing into the Gulf of Mexico, deepwater drilling has regained momentum in the gulf and is spreading around the world.
The announcement of an agreement late Friday by BP and lawyers representing individuals and businesses hurt by the disaster represented something of a turning of the page, though BP and its drilling partners continue to face legal challenges.
After a yearlong drilling moratorium, BP and other oil companies are intensifying their exploration and production in the gulf, which will soon surpass the levels attained before the accident. Drilling in the area is about to be expanded in Mexican and Cuban waters, beyond most American controls, even though any accident would almost inevitably affect the United States shoreline. Oil companies are also moving into new areas off the coast of East Africa and the eastern Mediterranean.
Well this ought to make him friends in the South and Midwest...
Ron Paul: No Federal Financial Aid for Tornado Victims
Rep. Ron Paul, R-Texas, stood by his libertarian beliefs on Sunday, saying that victims of the violent storms and tornadoes that have battered a band of states in the South and Midwest in recent days should not be given emergency financial aid from the federal government.
"There is no such thing as federal money," Paul said, on CNN’s State of the Union. "Federal money is just what they steal from the states and steal from you and me."
Santorum can go to hell...
Santorum to Protesters: Get a Job
OKLAHOMA CITY, Okla. – A rally for Republican presidential candidate Rick Santorum was disrupted for 20 minutes on Sunday by Occupy Wall Street protesters chanting, “Get your hate out of our state,” and “Pro-life, pro-war, what are you fighting for?”
Santorum supporters clashed with the protesters and tried to shout them down with “We pick Rick!” One demonstrator was shoved, but there were no other physical altercations. Santorum was calm, and preached tolerance, but also suggested the protesters should get jobs.
“People are allowed to protest and we respect their opinion. We just happen to believe that folks who are at public rallies should let both sides to be heard,” he said, and later commented, “Something that maybe these folks over here could … maybe working a little bit instead of coming to these events and screaming at people.”
Not sure I like this review, but it sounds like a heckuva play. I put the link to the full play down there for anyone who wants to check it out...
George Clooney, Brad Pitt star in gay marriage play, "8"
LOS ANGELES, March 4 (TheWrap.com) - On one side, in the all-star play "8," which was live-streamed from Los Angeles Saturday night, you had George Clooney and Martin Sheen in the heroic roles of the pro-gay-marriage attorneys ... not to mention Brad Pitt as a judge so sympathetic to the cause, he might as well have been starring in a buddy picture with the aforementioned leading men.
On the other side, portraying a noted anti-gay-marriage advocate, you had Jane Lynch at her scenery-chewing best; think Sue Sylvester with a very specific reason for hating musicals. Then there was John C. Reilly as the bumbling lone "expert" to take the stand on the pro-Prop 8 side, looking and sounding as if he'd stepped right out of "Step Brothers" onto the witness stand.