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THIS WAS AWESOME

You are here: Home / Archives for THIS WAS AWESOME

Today in Creative Lawmaking

by Rose Judson|  April 18, 202510:58 am| 115 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads, THIS WAS AWESOME

It’s a holiday weekend, so here is something a bit on the lighter side. The Wisconsin state Supreme Court has ruled that Governor Tony Evers does, in fact, have the power to increase school funding for the next four hundred years. From the AP:

Evers’s partial veto in 2023 increased how much revenue K-12 public schools can raise per student by $325 a year until 2425. Evers took language that originally applied the $325 increase for the 2023-24 and 2024-25 school years and instead vetoed the “20” and the hyphen to make the end date 2425, more than four centuries from now.

Evers told lawmakers at the time that his partial veto was intended to give school districts increases in funding “in perpetuity.”

The Legislature, along with the state’s largest business lobbying group Wisconsin Manufacturers & Commerce, argued that the court should strike down Evers’ partial veto and declare it unconstitutional. They argued that the Evers veto was barred under a 1990 constitutional amendment adopted by voters that removed the ability to strike individual letters to make new words — known as the “Vanna White” veto, named the co-host of the game show Wheel of Fortune who flips letters to reveal word phrases.

Finding otherwise would give governors unlimited power to alter numbers in a budget bill, they argued.

But Evers countered that the “Vanna White” veto ban applies only to striking individual letters to create new words, not vetoing digits to create new numbers. Evers said that he was simply using the longstanding partial veto process allowed under the law.

I’m sure Evers is at least partially using this situation as a way to draw attention to how ridiculous the WI governor’s veto powers are, but it’s nice to see this kind of weaponization of technicalities working on behalf of the side of good for once.

Open thread.

Today in Creative LawmakingPost + Comments (115)

Evening Open Thread: Beep, Beep

by TaMara|  October 5, 20197:56 pm| 167 Comments

This post is in: Open Threads, Republican Stupidity, Assholes, The Republican Crime Syndicate, THIS WAS AWESOME

I turn on the computer and what do I see? President Impeachment has run a bus over Rick Perry several times

"I was talked into my crime by Rick Perry" is the most implausible alibi I've ever heard/ https://t.co/Y1eddWxPSq

— Charles P. Pierce (@CharlesPPierce) October 5, 2019

I’m sorry, but Rick PERRY? Please. You need a much more credible patsy than that. https://t.co/R1PCxoUQjT

— NotOutlandishHat (@Popehat) October 5, 2019

Frog/Scorpion and all.

Open thread

 

Evening Open Thread: Beep, BeepPost + Comments (167)

Hello, 911? Hello…I’d Like To Report A Murder

by Tom Levenson|  January 5, 201912:17 pm| 186 Comments

This post is in: A Woman's Place Is In The House, All we want is life beyond the thunderdome, THIS WAS AWESOME, Very Serious People

I’m very much of the “what pisses off Republicans pleases me” crowd these days.  In that vein, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is my heroine:

Republican hypocrisy at its finest: saying that Trump admitting to sexual assault on tape is just “locker room talk,” but scandalizing themselves into faux-outrage when my sis says a curse word in a bar.

GOP lost entitlement to policing women’s behavior a long time ago.

Next.

— Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (@AOC) January 5, 2019

It hasn’t sunk in yet for the political establishment — and by that I mean not just the electeds, but the whole infrastructure of consultants and wingnut welfare types and staffs and so on — and the elite political media ecosystem, that they are a day late and a dollar short in the face of those who simply don’t accept their asserted authority.

AOC and many more did not come to the arena to play.  She is no where near dumb enough to acquiesce to the pre-existing “rules”.  Those norms are intended both to constrain policy, but, as important, to channel political warfare into forms that favor incumbent power.

This is the one true lesson Donald Trump absorbed, and now others have learned:  don’t apologize. Attack.

Which is, of course, ever more vital when you are on the right side of history.

Image: Henri Toulouse-Lautrec, At the Moulin Rouge, 1890.

Hello, 911? Hello…I’d Like To Report A MurderPost + Comments (186)

Wednesday Morning Open Thread: MOAR POPCORN!

by Anne Laurie|  August 22, 20184:45 am| 143 Comments

This post is in: Activist Judges!, C.R.E.A.M., Hail to the Hairpiece, Open Threads, Republican Venality, Trump Crime Cartel, Let A Thousand Watergates Bloom, THIS WAS AWESOME

Tomorrow’s @washingtonpost A1 — wow pic.twitter.com/OZ5wFcCho8

— Seung Min Kim (@seungminkim) August 22, 2018

An admitted felon is "saying that his co-conspirator and/or his aider and abetter was the president of the United States. That is something that I think is basically without precedent in American history" —@JeffreyToobin

— Brian Stelter (@brianstelter) August 21, 2018

If only there were precedent for a Republican Congress impeaching a President for crimes associated with covering up an affair

— Tim Miller (@Timodc) August 22, 2018

In case you're wondering: the third member of Congress to endorse Donald Trump in '16 was then-Sen. Jeff Sessions. https://t.co/l56mPOGNJo

— Dave Wasserman (@Redistrict) August 21, 2018

show full post on front page

Wednesday Morning Open Thread: MOAR POPCORN!Post + Comments (143)

Good News Open Thread – Congo Rapidly Curtails Ebola

by Cheryl Rofer|  July 30, 20184:44 pm| 30 Comments

This post is in: Excellent Links, Open Threads, THIS WAS AWESOME

Remember the Ebola scare in May?

As 42 days (two incubation periods) have passed since the last possible exposure to a confirmed Ebola virus disease case, on 24 July 2018, the Minister of Health, Dr Oly Ilunga announced the end of the outbreak in the Democratic Republic of the Congo. (from the World Health Organization)

Lessons were learned from the West Africa epidemic of 2014 to 2016 and applied in the Congo. Additionally, a vaccine was available this time around. Nobody who was vaccinated became ill with Ebola. The response was coordinated by the Democratic Republic of Congo and the World Health Organization. Much more at the link about the public health response.

That’s pretty good in a nation that is still torn by war. Congratulations and thanks to all who stopped the epidemic.

 

Good News Open Thread – Congo Rapidly Curtails EbolaPost + Comments (30)

Happy New Year: Ireland Man Edition!

by Adam L Silverman|  December 31, 20169:35 pm| 96 Comments

This post is in: An Unexamined Scandal, Because of wow., Open Threads, Popular Culture, Silverman on Security, Fuck Yeah!, Someone Somewhere Is Having More Fun Than I Am, THIS WAS AWESOME

We have an early entrant in the bizarre things that occur on New Year’s Eve contest. This one courtesy of Ireland Man (like Florida Man, but with a better accent!).

(h/t: https://twitter.com/AMoCS/status/815302062829404160)

Hope everyone’s festivities or quiet night’s in are going to plan!

Stay frosty!

Happy New Year: Ireland Man Edition!Post + Comments (96)

Because Every Now And Then It’s Good To Stop And Look At Something Amazing

by Tom Levenson|  December 5, 201611:38 am| 36 Comments

This post is in: Because of wow., Open Threads, THIS WAS AWESOME

Yo Yo Ma and Lil Buck would be draw enough, I’d say.  But manohmanohman — check out what Lil Buck does to draw his performance to a close:

My every joint and ligament screams in mute sympathy.  Human bodies shouldn’t be able to do that.  An extraordinarily gifted human has done I have no idea how much constant, brutal, consuming work to make it look…well, not effortless, but graceful.  Beautiful.

Enjoy, for just a moment, before resuming our regular coverage of the Trumpocalypse.

Oh — and open thread, also too.

PS:  I thought about the “not normal” tag, for obvious reasons, and for equally obvious ones, declined to use it.

Because Every Now And Then It’s Good To Stop And Look At Something AmazingPost + Comments (36)

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