From the GREAT STATE OF MAINE…
Good Morning
My mama always told me it was polite to be respectful when you’re in someone else’s house. This guy gets it:
His successor will have one generic greeting: “It puts the lotion in the basket or it gets the nukes.”
Cheers and Jeers starts below the fold... [Swoosh!!] RIGHTNOW! [Gong!!]
Note: Sorry that twitter embeds are showing up twice. Must be some kind of derp in the system. Punishment of the innocent shall commence forthwith.
Cheers and Jeers for Wednesday, November 16, 2016
Note: Daily Kos quilting goddesses Sara R and winglion are creating one of their legendary community quilts for Kossack and regular C&J splasher rb608, who is battling cancer. If you feel so inclined, please visit their diary and leave a message for rb that will be sewn into the quilt (and if you’re able, make a wee contribution to help cover the materials and labor). Rb sure needs our thoughts now, and quilts have an uncanny therapeutic ability to lift the spirits. Thanks!
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By the Numbers:
Days 'til Rogue One: A Star Wars Story opens: 30
Days 'til Pomegranate Days at the Oasis Camel Dairy in Ramona, California: 8
Percent of Americans who said America was on the right track before and after, respectively, Donald Trump was elected president, according to a Politico-Morning Consult poll: 30% / 28%
Amount the city of Orlando will pay for the Pulse nightclub, with the intention of turning the site of the mass shooting into a memorial: $2.25 million
Drop in Chinese exports in October, according to AP: 7.3%
Amount Americans are expected to spend on holiday shopping this year, the second-highest amount in 13 years thanks to the Obama economy: $935
Number of people who are "directly employed in jobs related to alternative energy in the U.S." or the energy-efficiency industry according to FiveThirtyEight: 2.5 million
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Mid-week Rapture Index:
189 (including 6 leadership points and 1 End Times supermoon that's off by four months). Soul Protection Factor 24 lotion is recommended if you’ll be walking amongst the heathen today.
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Puppy Pic of the Day: Preview of what Maine might see next week…
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CHEERS to Gwen Ifill. She was one of the good, solid journalists who wasn't afraid to speak up when she saw the punditry around her acting badly. Here she is in 2007 taking on two of them sitting right in front of her---Tim Russert and David Brooks---in the aftermath of Don Imus calling the Rutgers women's basketball team "Nappy headed hos":
Says Huffington Post: "The whole incident is a crucial reminder of the vital role the press plays in calling out bigotry." Sadly, it took Ifill's death at 61, after a long and enviable career, to bring this lesson back to the forefront as the vetting of the Trump administration team by the media proceeds with far too much---pardon the word---whitewashing. Condolences to Ifill's family, friends and colleagues. And for the millionth time this year (or so it seems): fuck cancer.
CHEERS to the great purge. The Trump administration might be assembling a real rogue's gallery of white-supremacist morons and misfits, but it still feels a little sweet to know that they're rewarding Chris Christie's unfailing loyalty by booting him and anyone associated with his now-non-existent transition team duties. Oh, look, here's the latest casualty:
Former Rep. Mike Rogers (R-Mich.) has left Donald Trump’s presidential transition team, saying in a statement that he is handing off the work to advisers from the Trump campaign.
Rogers was one of the last vestiges of a transition team organized by New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie, who was demoted after the election in favor of Vice President-elect Mike Pence.
"I look forward to continuing to provide advice and counsel as needed to the incoming Trump administration as they work to make America great again."
Kudos to Mike for finding a diplomatic way to take the edges off his original goodbye letter, which simply said: "You people are nuts."
CHEERS to home where the buffalo roam. Happy Birthday, Oklahoma! The "Hey, that state looks like a skillet!" state officially nabbed the 46th star on the flag 109 years ago today. Incidentally, the state rock is "rose barite," which you'll find in the greatest abundance between Senator Jim Inhofe's ears.
CHEERS to blowing this popsicle stand. Everything is proceeding smoothly for tomorrow's launch from Kazakhstan of an MS-03 rocket carrying American astronaut Peggy Whitson, along with a Russian and French dude to the International Space Station. They'll get to enjoy the view until May. Here's a little supermoon action from the launch pad:
Tomorrow’s launch time: 3:20pm EST. Assuming no one needs to hop out to use the terlet at the last minute. (I certainly would.)
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CHEERS to flatlining. Carbon emissions have leveled off, according to the lab coats at the Global Carbon Project:
A team of 67 researchers from dozens of institutions worked on the study that tracked the worldwide rate of carbon emissions. They measured carbon emitted by burning fossil fuels, deforestation, and other sources, and tracked how much is absorbed by the oceans and the land. The team found that the total carbon emissions for 2016 are relatively the same as last year and the year before.
Yeah, we'll fix that, said Republicans as they unveiled their new slogan: Make America Bake Again.
CHEERS to pasty-faced blasts from the past. So, uh, what were you doing on November 16, 1998? Oh, c'mon, think…THINK! You were walking by a newsstand and got a tingle up your leg when you saw the cover of Time magazine proclaiming "The Fall of Newt." It's a timely reminder that, although he keeps popping up, he's just a nasty, power-mad grifter:
Even as Gingrich set to sharpening the blades of the guillotine, his adversary [Bill Clinton] stayed on message, made peace in the Middle East, waved John Glenn back into orbit and watched the Dow follow close behind, as Gingrich produced an impeachment spectacle that left voters gagging, and a budget that drew the same response from his own party. By the time the routine midterm election had dissolved into a humiliating defeat Tuesday at the polls, it was suddenly Gingrich whose judgment was challenged, his party mutinous, his tenure as Speaker numbered in days. … If Clinton has always had a gift for turning weakness into opportunity, Gingrich has a gift for turning opportunity into rubble.
May that gift serve him well in the Trump administration.
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Ten years ago in C&J: November 16, 2006
JEERS to the new GOP. Let's see: we now have an RNC chair who thought it would be a swell idea to politicize the plight of Terri Schiavo for political gain. We now have a Senate whip who considers the era of black lynchings the "good old days." As for anointed Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell? Well, his head has no shortage of loose screws...
"I think Secretary Rumsfeld's done an excellent job. He'll be remembered as one of the great secretaries of defense."
---CBS News' Face the Nation, September 3, 2006
Can they pick `em or can they pick `em?
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And just one more…
CHEERS to the playthings of our lives. Lost in all the hubbub over the elections and other assorted headline stealers is the biggest story of the month. I'm speaking, of course, about the 2016 inductees into the National Toy Hall of Fame.
Dungeons & Dragons In the 1970s, serious war game players Gary Gygax and Dave Arneson added the concept of role-playing to the strategy games that they enjoyed and helped launch the modern role-playing genre. “Dungeons & Dragons paved the way for older children and adults to experience imaginative play,” says Curator Nic Ricketts. “And it opened the door for other kinds of table games that borrow many of its unique mechanics. But most importantly, Dungeons & Dragons’ mechanics lent themselves to computer applications, and it had a direct impact on hugely successful electronic games like World of Warcraft.”
The Swing Ancient cave drawings in Europe, carved figures from Crete, and ceramic vases from early Greece document instances of humans on swings. The playground movement of the early 1900s put swings in public spaces for children of nearby apartment buildings and tenements. In the mid-20th century, many Americans put freestanding, family-sized swing sets on their own sunny suburban lots. Says Curator Patricia Hogan: “Swinging requires physical exertion, muscle coordination, and a rudimentary instinct for, if not understanding of, kinetic energy, inertia, and gravity. It’s the perfect vehicle for outdoor play.”
Fisher-Price Little People Fisher-Price first offered its Little People in a 1959 Safety School Bus pull toy. These stylized figures populated a variety of play sets that encouraged youngsters to explore the world beyond their homes and to imagine themselves at school or the airport, at the service station or the amusement park, and at the zoo or a faraway farm. Fisher-Price made the first Little People of wood and lithographed paper; solid, single-colored wooden bodies followed. More than two billion Little People have been sold since 1959.
So this year’s choices involve planning, science and people getting along. Somewhere in Trump Tower, the president-elect just made a note to repeal all three and replace them with Irwin Mainway’s Bag O’ Glass.
Have a happy humpday. Floor's open...What are you cheering and jeering about today?
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Today’s Shameless Testimonial:
Not even J.K. Rowling can say abracadabra and make a worthwhile Cheers and Jeers appear.
---Louise Keller
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