I’m switching back and forth between that and Packers vs. Falcons. OMG, Colbert just trotted Sean Spicer out for a cameo as Melissa McCarthy as Sean Spicer. Really.
Open thread!
by Betty Cracker| 171 Comments
This post is in: America, Open Threads, Television
I’m switching back and forth between that and Packers vs. Falcons. OMG, Colbert just trotted Sean Spicer out for a cameo as Melissa McCarthy as Sean Spicer. Really.
Open thread!
This post is in: Don't Agonize - Organize, Open Threads, Daydream Believers, Teabagger Stupidity
"Different, not dangerous." My story on the Juggalo March on Washington: https://t.co/i50cDlc7Xj
— Daniel Dale (@ddale8) September 17, 2017
Since some of y’all were confused by yesterday’s post:
Even Insane Clown Posse couldn’t quite believe it.
“We’re the good guys here today,” Violent J, one half of the widely loathed face-painting “horrorcore” rap duo, told the fans, known as “Juggalos,” who had gathered in front of the Lincoln Memorial. “We’re actually in the right this time!”
The Juggalos, so easy to make fun of, had a case: the feds were the real clowns. And for a surreal Washington afternoon, the colourful people of one of America’s most-mocked subcultures were being seen by powerful people as freedom fighters, weird makeup and all.
Profane freedom fighters, yes. Two of the Juggalos’ Saturday refrains of choice: “You f—ed up” and “F— that s—,” which they occasionally chanted in the direction of police helicopters, fingers extended skyward.
But this was the exception. They were so cheerful that some of them insisted on hugging journalists. And their favourite chant was a single upbeat word: “family.”
It was their response to the term the FBI insists describes them: gang…
Hundreds of Juggalos had assembled for the demonstration and march in protest of a curious six-year-old FBI decision to include the Juggalos in their official national gang list, alongside such indisputably dangerous entities as MS-13.
The gang classification, Juggalos said, had led employers to force them out of jobs, convinced judges to deny them custody of their kids, and subjected them to police harassment for their Insane Clown Posse tattoos. One Virginia woman, Jessica Bonometti, said she had been fired as a probation officer because of Facebook posts about the band…
Violent J and partner Shaggy 2 Dope cast the Juggalos as the defenders of Americans of all kinds, warning that the persecution of America’s “most hated people” would inevitably lead to the persecution of others. As usual, they railed against racism, homophobia and economic segregation…
Okay, the music (and the Faygo) aren’t to my taste, either. But neither is the Grateful Dead, and I wouldn’t want Deadheads classified as “gang members”, if only for Cole’s sake. And ICP’s heart is in the right place:
The voice of progressive resistance in America today https://t.co/a6rHdlxD0G
— Dave Weigel (@daveweigel) September 16, 2017
"It was the largest crowd to ever witness a juggalo march — period." pic.twitter.com/GnYLUC2PQv
— Josh Billinson (@jbillinson) September 16, 2017
Meanwhile, same time same city…
The pro-Trump "Mother of All Rallies" happening on the mall right now appears to have attracted between 200 and 300 people.
— Peter Jamison (@PeteJamison) September 16, 2017
Sunday Evening Open Thread: Nice Weekend for Some ProtestingPost + Comments (141)
by John Cole| 39 Comments
This post is in: Open Threads
I have a ton of cleaning that needs to be done but I am just sitting, unshowered and in dirty clothes, drinking coffee and generally being lazy as shit.
I don’t even want to cook dinner and think I will just eat watermelon and cheese.
This post is in: Crazification Factor, Open Threads, Russiagate, Our Failed Media Experiment
I can’t add much to what Anne said. There are a lot of isolated facts floating around about Trump’s Russia connections and what the Russians may have done in the election, and a lot of speculation on how those facts fit together. My own sense is that there are SO MANY Russian connections that it’s likely that the Russians had more than one route into Trump and his people.
There are still many possible narratives. We need more information to be able to verify one or more.
This post is in: Election 2016, Foreign Affairs, Russiagate, Science & Technology, Trump Crime Cartel, Fucked-up-edness, Let A Thousand Watergates Bloom
BREAKING: Facebook provided special counsel Mueller more details re: Russian ad purchases than it shared w/ Congress https://t.co/foJAEKAwgl
— Evan Rosenfeld (@Evan_Rosenfeld) September 15, 2017
The info Facebook shared w/ Mueller incl. copies of the ads, details about the accounts that bought them & the targeting criteria they used https://t.co/ehkeZ2gdWR
— Evan Rosenfeld (@Evan_Rosenfeld) September 15, 2017
.
Until Adam or Cheryl can post more expert information, I’m just gonna toss out some links that seem like they might be important. Per CNN:
… Facebook did not give copies of the ads to members of the Senate and House intelligence committees when it met with them last week on the grounds that doing so would violate their privacy policy, sources with knowledge of the briefings said. Facebook’s policy states that, in accordance with the federal Stored Communications Act, it can only turn over the stored contents of an account in response to a search warrant.
“We continue to work with the appropriate investigative authorities,” Facebook said in a statement to CNN.
Facebook informed Congress last week that it had identified 3,000 ads that ran between June 2015 and May 2017 that were linked to fake accounts. Those accounts, in turn, were linked to the pro-Kremlin troll farm known as the Internet Research Agency.
In those briefings, Facebook spoke only in generalities about the ad buys, leaving some committee members feeling frustrated with Facebook’s level of cooperation.
Sen. Mark Warner, the top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee, told CNN last week that Facebook had not turned over the ads to Congress. Warner has also called Facebook’s review “the tip of the iceberg,” and suggested that more work needs to be done in order to ascertain the full scope of Russia’s use of social media…
Are those “contents” significant? This guy — “Former federal prosecutor. Legal expert for TV and print” — thinks so:
2/ The @WSJ talks about some of the info Mueller obtained (see below). Mueller could not obtain *content* of an account without a warrant. pic.twitter.com/Hl2wMuyF3Y
— Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) September 16, 2017
4/ But @CNN has confirmed that Mueller obtained content via search warrant, including ads, acct details, targeting. https://t.co/DQ5fVB1fH3
— Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) September 16, 2017
6/ in connection with an election. It also means that he has evidence of that crime that convinced a federal magistrate judge of two things.
— Renato Mariotti (@renato_mariotti) September 16, 2017
Russiagate Open Thread: The Facebook Conundrum(s)Post + Comments (154)
This post is in: Domestic Politics, Open Threads, Sports
Just have to see this one more time:
It’s a beautiful day here. Still a little hot, but cooler than it has been. We just got a new grill yesterday — the old kettle finally fell apart after 12 years of service.
Gonna figure out what to throw on Weber III later and just otherwise chill out around the house today. You?
This post is in: Cooking, Excellent Links, Garden Chats
Since I’m out of garden pics, here’s a recipe for the use of gardeners. Mark Bittman, in NYMag:
… We think of tomatoes as summer food, and they’re the best thing to eat right now. For the next couple of weeks, you can make the best late-summer pasta sauce there is, though it’s probably the most ingredient-dependent pasta sauce, too. That is, if you do this with supermarket ingredients, you’ll be rewarded with decent sauce. If you do it with Sun Gold cherry tomatoes; fresh-picked basil; strong, ultrasticky garlic; and top-notch olive oil (mine happened to be Californian), you’ll end up with something mind-blowing.
Getting the ingredients is the hardest part — the actual prep and cooking are simple. Let’s say for two servings you want 30 or 40 cherry tomatoes, cut in half. You want a couple of big cloves of garlic (or a few smaller ones), slivered, and, say, a quarter cup of oil — maybe a little more. A small fresh chile is not a bad addition.
As you start the water for the pasta, grab a medium pan and begin cooking the garlic in the oil very slowly (add the minced chile, if you’re using it). By the time the water boils, the garlic should have begun to color. Add the halved tomatoes to the garlic and crank the heat a bit. A minute or two later, start the pasta. I’d use long pasta for this if you have it, but I’m not slavish about shape. A decent serving size is 75 grams, but 60 is good for a snack, and 100 if you’re hungry.
When the tomatoes have broken down a bit, throw in a lot of roughly torn basil leaves — an entire supermarket-size bunch isn’t too much. Add salt and pepper, of course, and toss the whole thing together. It does not need cheese; a little shredded basil on top of it all is nice….
Bittman also includes a recipe for a tomato “galette/crostini/free-form tart”, for which you’ll have to click the link.
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I’ve got a friend coming out from the midwest to sightsee, so my blog participation this week is liable to be spotty and unreliable. Good thing there are other front-pagers to take up the slack — here’s hoping for a slow news week…
What’s going on in your garden(s) this week?
Sunday Garden Chat: “How to Make the Most of Gorgeous Late-Summer Tomatoes”Post + Comments (88)