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October 2014

Posted by 0387erp on October 05, 2014 15 Comments
Have you noticed that everything nowadays gets videotaped? With everyone suddenly having a smart-phone that photographs and videotapes, every newsworthy or even trivial event gets recorded and presented on YouTube, Twitter, Facebook, or onto someone’s blog. This phenomenon has coincided with the movement of “citizen journalists,” who aim to bring the straight news to blogs and websites all over, giving the unvarnished news to anyone who cares to check the website in question, oftentimes pointed there by the Drudge Report or another news aggregator. No licenses or formal credentials are needed – just a thirst for getting the straight truth out there for viewers or readers to watch and make up their own minds. What about videotaping the police? So much of what they do is newsworthy, and their salaries are paid by our tax-dollars. You would think that videotaping the police in a public area, not interfering with them, would be perfectly fine. Try telling that to Emily Good, the Rochester, New York resident who in 2011 saw the local police arresting someone right in front of her house. From her front yard, Ms. Good pulled out her iPod and started filming. One of the officers involved saw the filming and claimed that he felt unsafe with her filming from that location, so Ms. Good backed up and kept filming. The officer ordered Ms. Good to stop filming and go inside her house, which she refused. Then the officer arrested Ms. Good, claiming that she was obstructing the arrest. The criminal case against Ms. Good was dismissed as soon as a local prosecutor read some of the details, but she spent many hours in jail, and several police officers later showed up at a meeting of supporters and issued parking tickets for cars parked more than 12 inches from the curb.

Posted by Amy Miller on October 05, 2014 12 Comments
A new poll from Harris Interactive suggests that 70% of Americans are uncomfortable with using a system of lifetime appointments to fill vacancies on our nation's highest Court. This shouldn't come as a shock, and neither should that fact that millennials are far less likely to object to the idea of lifetime appointments (only 63% object) as compared to baby boomers (73%), "matures" (76%), and---perhaps most interestingly---Gen Xers (71%.) A generational gap isn't surprising because, for all intents and purposes, the Court is generally painted as some sort of next-level legislative body, expected to respond to the ever-fluid world views of pundits, protesters, and various voting demographics. (Don't believe me? Review the news coverage from the Court's rejection of DOMA.) As a card-carrying member of the bizarro generation tucked neatly between "GenX" and "Millennial," I can testify to the fact that as we grow, so grows our exposure to various ideas about how government should respond to a diversifying society, and vice versa. The problem with this viewpoint isn't that it's likely to change the system overnight---this would require a Constitutional amendment---but that it comes from a bloc of people who harbor a fundamental misunderstanding of the point and purpose of a Supreme Court.
The Harris Poll asked Americans to deliberate on the nation's highest court, and found that despite two-thirds of Americans (68%) feeling it's a crucial governing body for the success of the United States, nearly half of Americans (47%, up from 42% in 2010) say they are not knowledgeable about the Supreme Court confirmation process. Just over half of Americans (53%, down from 58% in 2010) indicate being that they're knowledgeable about the process, with one in ten (11%) saying specifically that they are very knowledgeable about it and just over four in ten (42%) saying they're somewhat knowledgeable.
Less than half of those who have an opinion about how the court should be run know how we currently choose justices. Excellent. Then there's this gem:

Posted by Andrew Branca on October 05, 2014 47 Comments
Look up irony in the dictionary, and by all rights you should find a footnote pointing to this news story from CBS re: Ferguson MO: "Ferguson residents frustrated over lack of opportunity." The story notes that the previous night was sufficiently quiet--"just eight arrests"--and that the National Guard is pulling out (meaning, productive people are being released to go back to their day jobs.) The irony arose when the reporter spoke to local Ferguson residents.  The common theme among those interviewed was outrage that local businesses--you know, the ones that had been relentlessly looted and vandalized by local residents--had not hurried to rebuild and offer jobs to local residents. Huh.  Who knew that robbing and burning local businesses might prove a disincentive to them investing and hiring in the community! Anybody remember this guy? Beer

Posted by Mike LaChance on October 05, 2014 12 Comments
Americans' fears about the spread of Ebola are growing, and the constant debunking of the Obama Administrations' claims regarding the severity of the situation haven't done much to gain the confidence of the public. Dan Nather of Politico doesn't seem to have a firm grasp on the reality of the current situation:
GOP 2016ers on Ebola: Panic For once, President Barack Obama and Texas Gov. Rick Perry are on the same page. At separate briefings on the Ebola crisis, Obama administration officials and Perry have delivered the same message: Don’t panic — the health authorities know what they’re doing. But for other Republicans — and conservative media outlets — it’s time for panic. The likely 2016 Republican presidential candidates — except for Perry — are practically lining up to warn that the Obama administration isn’t doing enough to keep Ebola out of the United States, now that Dallas is dealing with the nation’s first confirmed case.

Posted by Leslie Eastman on October 04, 2014 42 Comments
One of the most troubling tendencies of the Obama Administration and their minions in the media is to relabel a problem, giving the appearance that solutions are on their way. Exhibit 1: An act of terror becomes a "man-caused disaster". Exhibit 2: The prohibition on the term "illegal alien". Now, the illness associated with a terrible pathogen is now being reclassified from "Ebola Virus Hemorrhagic Fever" to "Ebola Virus Disease". LI #08 Ebola VD This seems to be an attempt to lull people into a false sense of security, lumping it with other "Virus Diseases" like the flu and the common cold. I have taught bloodborne pathoghen safety from the early 1990's, when healthcare, security, and first-aid providers were worried about contracting AIDS. Ebola is rated as a class 4 pathogen because of its fatality rates in humans and the fact that there is no cure or treatment. It is, and remains, a "hemorrhagic fever". It did not stop being a Class 4 pathogen once it hit the Dallas hospital. The mechanism of attack, which includes destruction of the endothelial cells that weaken the blood vessels and cause excessive bleeding, has not changed. Once the blood vessels are weakened, a suite of devastating symptoms occurs, as noted in a Business Insider article published in July of this year.

Posted by Andrew Branca on October 04, 2014 25 Comments
So, people send me stuff. Which I love. And sometimes what they send makes me want to both laugh, and cry. Today I was sent a link to a video on the Bloomberg news site, about a company named Hardwire that has for years provided high-tech armoring materials to combat vehicles in the Middle East wars. Of course, those wars are drying up (ha-ha, right), so companies serving that "market" now find themselves seeking alternative customers. In the case of Hardwire they've decided to take their high-end armor material, Dyneema, and use it to make small bullet-proof whiteboards for use in schools as shields--no, I'm not kidding, as shields--against active shooters who may attack as in Sandy Hook. Bloomberg's video embeds early an utterly trite quote from Obama, and then starts with the company's pitch:

Posted by Mike LaChance on October 04, 2014 9 Comments
Harry Reid's attacks on the Koch Brothers have been plentiful and well documented. While his obsession and poor taste have been noted on many conservative blogs, there hasn't been much push back from the media. That's what makes this segment from MSNBC's Morning Joe so special. Not only does host Joe Scarborough call Reid's attacks pathetic, he points out the large amount of money the Senate Majority PAC has spent on political ads this year. From the Washington Free Beacon:
MSNBC Blasts Sen. Reid As Hypocritical: ‘Sad And Pathetic’ To Call Koch Bros Un-American Even MSNBC is turning against Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D., Nev.). Reid has repeatedly criticized the Koch brothers and other big-money Republicans on the Senate floor. In March, Reid called the Koch brothers un-American, immoral, and dishonest for their hefty donations, even though Reid’s Senate Majority PAC has been the biggest spender of the midterm elections. It is “sad and pathetic when somebody calls a person un-American, especially when they are bigger offenders of the action he defines as ‘un-American,’” Morning Joe host Joe Scarborough said on Friday.

Posted by Mike LaChance on October 04, 2014 20 Comments
As Americans become increasingly concerned about the spread of Ebola in the United States, there is a growing call to cut off flights to and from Liberia. Senator Ted Cruz has even contacted the FAA. Niels Lesniewski of Roll Call reported:
Ted Cruz Asks FAA About Ebola Flight Ban Sen. Ted Cruz is asking the Federal Aviation Administration what it’s doing to prevent the spread of Ebola after the first U.S. diagnosis, which came in his home state. “Given the severity of this virus and the fact that its spread to Texas has been associated with travel, it is imperative that the FAA take every available precaution in preventing additional cases from arriving in the United States. As you may be aware, several African nations have already restricted or banned air travel to countries with confirmed cases of the Ebola virus,” the Texas Republican wrote in a letter to FAA chief Michael P. Huerta. “British Airways, Emirates Airlines and Kenya Airways have also suspended flights due to the rising death toll and deteriorating public health situation in Ebola-stricken countries.”
One recent voice on CNN, an author named David Quammen believes doing such a thing would be wrong because of slavery. I kid you not. Brendan Bordelon of National Review has the story:
CNN Guest: ‘How Dare We’ Cut Off Liberia Flights When ‘American Slavery’ Created That Country An author on Anderson Cooper’s CNN program Thursday said the United States is uniquely obligated to maintain air links with the Ebola-ridden nation of Liberia, claiming it would be immoral to quarantine a nation created through “American slavery.”

Posted by New Neo on October 04, 2014 13 Comments
US Ebola patient zero, Thomas Eric Duncan, recent arrival from Liberia, had to go to Texas Health Presbyterian Hospital twice to get admitted. On his first go-round, the hospital sent him home with antibiotics even though a nurse had obtained information that he'd been in Liberia, and despite the fact that his symptoms were consistent with the early signs of Ebola. If Duncan had been admitted on that initial visit his diagnosis would still have been a big story and a distressing one, but nothing as awful as the situation we're currently in. That being said, it's been difficult to obtain much information about how the mistake happened. Here's the relevant section of the initial press conference with hospital official, Dr. Mark Lester:
(INAUDIBLE QUESTION) LESTER: A checklist was in place for Ebola in this hospital for several weeks. And Dr. Ed Goodman (ph), to my right, had led the implementation of that. That checklist was utilized by the nurse who did ask that question. That nurse was part of a care team. And it was a complex care team taking care of him in the emergency department. Regretfully, that information was not fully communicated throughout the full team. And as a result, the full import of that information wasn't factored into the clinical decision-making. The overall clinical presentation was not yet typical for Ebola; so as the team assessed him, they felt clinically it was a low-grade common viral disease. That was the presentation. (INAUDIBLE QUESTION) LESTER: He volunteered that he had traveled from Africa in response to the nurse operating the checklist and asking that question. (INAUDIBLE QUESTION) LESTER: I can't answer that question because that's one piece of information that would be factored into the entire clinical picture. The clinicians did not factor it in. So it was not part of their decision-making. (INAUDIBLE QUESTION) LESTER: I -- that's a question that's really not in my domain.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on October 04, 2014 17 Comments
A video published earlier this month now making the rounds on the internet is drawing all kinds of mockery, and deservedly so. On YouTube, the video is summarized as follows:
It seems like it's okay to say mean things about someone just because they're Republican. That isn't right. Before you write another mean post about Republicans, remember Republicans are people, too.
Former Romney ad guy, Vinny Minchillo, is the brains behind the terrible ad. Minchillo told Fox News, "he’s trying to “catch a wave” of interest by launching “Republicans Are People, Too” shortly before the midterm elections – though he’s not advocating for any particular candidates. I appreciate the idea: debunking the lame, white guy Republican stereotype. In fact, it's something I wrote about in a 2012 election post-mortem:

Posted by William A. Jacobson on October 03, 2014 8 Comments
Democrat Martha Robertson, whose struggling campaign to unseat incumbent Tom Reed has struggled (and then some), didn't need any more problems than she already had. But the Sierra Club, which has endorsed Robertson, just created more problems by suing to prevent conversion of a coal fired power plant in western New York to gas. That would result in the power plant shutting down, killing jobs. Tom Reed wasted no time in asserting that this reflected Robertson's "extreme liberal agenda": Reed Robertson NRG Sierra Club lawsuit
Tom Reed today vowed to stand firm against Martha Robertson's extreme liberal agenda and the devastating actions of Robertson’s liberal supporters and campaign donors who have filed suit against the Dunkirk NRG conversion in Chautauqua County. The Sierra Club has joined with Ratepayers and Community Interveners to file suit with the State Supreme Court to derail the $140 million dollar project to convert the NRG power plant to natural gas. The suit threatens the bipartisan solution supported by Governor Cuomo and Senator Schumer – likewise, Robertson’s supporters also threaten local jobs with a potential devastating effect on Chautauqua County.

Posted by Kemberlee Kaye on October 03, 2014 10 Comments
As if the situation in Ferguson, Missouri wasn't bad enough, Code Pink has decided to join the riots and protests. Code Pink infamously dressed as vaginas and paraded around the RNC in 2012. They also protested the maker of my favorite body wash, Ahava, (made in Israel), because it contains "occupied mud." More ominously, Medea Benjamin, the leader of Code Pink, just attended a gathering of anti-Israel groups, including notorious anti-Semites, in Tehran, as reported by Buzzfeed:
A number of American and European antiwar activists and conspiracy theorists have gathered in Tehran for a conference aimed at addressing supposed Zionist control of the United States, according to Iranian press reports and the Anti-Defamation League. Code Pink chief Medea Benjamin, journalist and former Cambodian genocide denier Gareth Porter, conspiracy journalist and 9/11 truther Wayne Madsen, and PressTV contributor Kevin Barrett are all reportedly at the conference. Other reported attendees include Dieudonné M’bala M’bala, the anti-Semitic French comedian whose performances have been banned in several French jurisdictions, several Holocaust deniers, and former congressman Mark Siljander, who pleaded guilty in 2010 to being an unregistered foreign agent for an Islamic charity that the government said was connected to terrorism.
Capitalizing on the two month anniversary of the death of Michael Brown, Code Pink is among the groups organizing a Weekend of Resistance, and is equating Ferguson to Gaza:
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