Category: Community

Well, post holiday weekend I have 2 things for your perusal.

First the bad news:

Next battle in the war on science

The war over science is heating up on Capitol Hill.

GOP House members have had little success reining in research agencies so far, but, emboldened by their growing majorities, they’re hoping for better luck next year. They plan to push proposals to cut funding for global warming and social science research, put strict new rules on the National Science Foundation’s grant-making process and overhaul how science informs policy making at the EPA.

At the same time, however, researchers and their advocates in the Democratic caucus are taking increasingly aggressive stances of their own: Rather than answer GOP objections one by one, or brush them off, they’re making a larger issue of what they see as heavy-handed interference based on ideology rather than methodology.

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Today is Thanksgiving Day! I hope you all are going to have a wonderful holiday and eat lots of good food and have good conversation! Since it is a holiday, I have one feel good article and then a traditional Thanksgiving song.

This is a writeup of a great story. It’s from GOS, but has links for the more in depth story. There is no one great link to give you, but several that work in tandem, hence the GOS diary:

29-year-old leaves NFL and $37 million contract to become farmer in order to feed the hungry

St. Louis Rams center Jason Brown has left the NFL to pursue farming:

“My agent told me, ‘You’re making the biggest mistake of your life,'” Brown told CBS. “And I looked right back at him and I said, ‘No I’m not. No I’m not.'”

It’s a great story. This guy is a hero!

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I have some lighter fare for you all this morning:

Don’t rake your leaves, scientists say

Here’s an excuse to use the next time someone asks you to rake the leaves: Science.

The National Wildlife Federation is encouraging people to leave the leaves.

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With apologies to Gilbert & Sullivan~

Optional Musical Accompaniment To This Post

Bot:

I am the very model of a pro-Obama partisan

Pragmatic in appeasement I really am a Vichy Dem!

I know all of the talking points I’m not afraid of spouting them

from deficit to HCR no arguments abouting them

I’m very well acquainted, too, with matters electorial

Use of information anecdotal and historical

Call me out on this and I will swiftly hand you snottiness

And overwhelm you with my very botti botti bottiness!

All:

And overwhelm you with his very botti botti bottiness

And overwhelm you with his very botti botti bottiness

And overwhelm you with his very botti botti botti bottiness!

Bot:

I’m awfully good at spin, I do insist on positivity

The plan, the facts be damned – I order you to go GOTV

In short, it matters not the issues or just where he stands on them

I am the very model of a pro-Obama partisan!

All:

In short, it matters not the issues or just where he stands on them

He is the very model of a pro-Obama partisan!

Bot:

The proper way to speak of him is always deferential

Those who come to praise him get the treatment preferential

My diaries range in scope from peppy rally to pictorial

Your comments welcome, but policed by those with rules dictorial

I’ll say that I’m a liberal while I act authoritarian

I claim the voice of reason while I speak like a contrarian

I shout down all debate with snide remarks about maturity

Take note of your ideals and thank you kindly for your purity!

All:

Take note of your ideals and thank you kindly for your purity

Take note of your ideals and thank you kindly for your purity

Take note of your ideals and thank you kindly for your purity!

Bot:

I can derail a thread with questions-mostly disingenuous

I do the verbal do-si-do with logic leaps most strenuous

In short, it matters not the issues or just where he stands on them

I am the very model of a pro-Obama partisan!

All:

In short, it matters not the issues or just where he stands on them

He is the very model of a pro-Obama partisan!

Bot:

In fact there is no act that I cannot quickly rat-ion-al-ize

No point I can’t dismiss or instantly infantilize

Here I say we must unite! to clear firebaggers from this place

Get in line, clap harder, now! or you never were “the base”

When I have learnt what progress has been made in dem blog politics

When I know more of tactics than a bunch of rapid response dicks

In short, when I’ve a smattering of elemental strategy

You’ll find no better pro-Obama bot that’s bottier than me!

All:

You’ll find no better pro-Obama bot that’s bottier than he

You’ll find no better pro-Obama bot that’s bottier than he

You’ll find no better pro-Obama bot that’s botty bottier than he!

Bot:

For my loyalty to man above both party and society

Blind faith up to the point where one must question my sobriety

And still it matters not the issues or just where he stands on them

I am the very model of a pro-Obama partisan!

All:

And still it matters not the issues or just where he stands on them

He is the very model of a pro-Obama partisan!

I have 3 articles for you this Wednesday morning!

First, on media complicity in framing our drone victims:

ON MEDIA OUTLETS THAT CONTINUE TO DESCRIBE UNKNOWN DRONE VICTIMS AS “MILITANTS”

Since its 2012 report, the Times itself has tended to avoid the “militant” language in its headlines, but often lends credence to dubious official claims, as when it said this about a horrific U.S. drone strike last December on a Yemeni wedding party that killed 12 people and wounded at least 15 others, including the bride: “Most of the dead appeared to be people suspected of being militants linked to Al Qaeda, according to tribal leaders in the area, but there were also reports that several civilians had been killed.” Other U.S. media accounts of that strike were just as bad, if not worse. The controversies over the definition of “militant” are almost never mentioned in any of these reports.

A new article in The New Yorker by Steve Coll underscores how deceptive this journalistic practice is. Among other things, he notes that the U.S. government itself-let alone the media outlets calling them “militants”-often has no idea who has been killed by drone strikes in Pakistan. That’s because, in 2008, George W. Bush and his CIA chief, Gen. Michael Hayden, implemented “signature strikes,” under which “new rules allowed drone operators to fire at armed military-aged males engaged in or associated with suspicious activity even if their identities were unknown.” The Intercept previously reported that targeting decisions can even be made on the basis of nothing more than metadata analysis and tracking of SIM cards in mobile phones.

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I have two articles for ya; one not so good and the other pretty cool:

First, probably not the area in which we want a lot of incompetence:

Pentagon Review Says America’s Nukes Are FUBAR

Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel is ordering a massive overhaul of America’s nuclear weapons program after finding that “we’ve taken our eye off the ball,” he said at a press conference on Friday morning. The Pentagon released a review of the nuclear forces that found outdated equipment, weak leadership, and abysmal morale among the men and women responsible for maintaining and launching some of the most destructive weapons on the planet. It found, for example, that the Air Force had only one wrench to attach and remove nuclear warheads on 450 ICBMs at three different bases. Maintenance officers would FedEx it among the bases.

The wrench fiasco, since remedied, “is reflective and indicative of a system that has been allowed to slowly back downhill,” Hagel said. “We must change the culture of the nuclear force, especially in the Air Force.”

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A food coma inducing meal that will keep you satisfied all day.

Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover  we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:30am (ET) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.

Today in History

Highlights of this day in history: Dr. Sam Sheppard acquitted of murder in new trial; U.S. and U.S.S.R. form diplomatic ties; Second anthrax letter found sent to Capitol Hill; Actor William Holden dies; ‘Sound of Music’ hits Broadway. (Nov. 16)

Breakfast Tune: Hendrix played on a banjo

Breakfast News & Blogs Below