Censorship by Ohio Republicans. There is suppose to be free speech in the USA.

September 25, 2016
By Michael Moore

...Well, this past week, (click here) my big plans got dealt a death blow by the Republicans of Licking County, Ohio. We got a call from the theater management telling us, "We're sorry but the community board that oversees the theater has voted to not allow Michael Moore to perform his show here. We are declining the rental." When asked why, it was explained to us that, "Michael Moore's appearance here could reflect negatively upon the Midland Theatre. He is too controversial and the risk is too great. The board is afraid that renting the theater to him
may cause the theater to lose long-standing patrons. Our board here is fairly conservative and it was felt that Mr. Moore would try to sway people's minds to vote his way."...

I thought Ohio was a state that loved freedom and cared about free expression of political ideologies. I am surprised and ashamed there would be such oppression in the state of Ohio.

Typical Republicans. Insulting the open minded and educated. Oppression is not what the USA is about and I am offended by the exercise of oppression in the time of elections.

Really, Ohio? Really? Retreating into the 1950's? Censorship AGAIN!

...In 1951, (click here) a low-budget film noir remake of Fritz Lang's "M" crossed the border into Ohio. State censors were concerned that the tale of a child snatcher would incite crime. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed the censors. Two years later, Howard Hughes released two sexy confections, "The French Line" and "Son of Sinbad." Both featured legs and cleavage in full-color, widescreen splendor. Both were banned for indecency. This time it was Ohio's Supreme Court that reversed....

I am never buying another Longaberger basket again and the ones I have are being given to the poor!!!!

Guess what else isn't funded well?

Zika. I believe there is $1.1 billion in the funding bill before Congress. The US has decided to focus on a vaccine and HHS has repurposed funding to attempt to achieve that.

September 27, 2016
By Reuters' Staff

...As of September, (click here) the HHS has awarded at least $433 million in repurposed funds to support Zika response and preparedness activities. 

This is extremely difficult research. It isn't a matter of growing an attenuated virus in an egg. This virus has characteristics that may not be stopped by an attenuated vaccine injection. 

An attenuated vaccine is a vaccine created by reducing the virulence of a pathogen, but still keeping it viable (or "live"). Attenuation takes an infectious agent and alters it so that it becomes harmless or less virulent. These vaccines contrast to those produced by "killing" the virus (inactivated vaccine).

This is very intense and dilligent work going on in those laboratories. The Democrats currently serving the USA are not playing politics with anyone's life. Before HHS distributed their funding, President Obama released funds very early on from his accounts.

REMEMBER THAT. When American lives are saved remember the people and their party affiliation that saved those lives! 

The Republicans have both houses and blame the Democrats of brinkmanship. Amazing.

September 27, 2016
By Carl Hulse

...The thought that Democrats (click here) might be playing hard to get for political purposes has occurred to Mr. McConnell and his fellow Republicans.

“It’s almost as if a few Democratic leaders decided long ago that bringing our country to the brink would make for good election-year politics,” he said.

“Democrats are marching us down a path that leads to a shutdown in order to gain some sort of political advantage,” said Senator John Cornyn of Texas, the No. 2 Senate Republican.

The problem for them and the House speaker, Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, is a familiar one. Republicans probably lack the votes to pass a stopgap funding bill without Democratic help since a significant number of Republicans in the Senate, and particularly in the House, refuse to vote for any spending bill whatsoever to avoid conservative backlash or provide fodder for a future primary challenge....

Have you ever wondered when Republicans finally grow up and stop blaming everyone else because they can't accomplish a thing honestly.

Let me think about that a minute.

The minute is up.

Mitch McConnell decided to bring a ten week funding bill to the US Senate floor without checking to be sure there were enough votes. Really? Not really. What Mitch McConnell did was to begin political grandstanding by bringing a bill to the Senate floor that the American people want.

The favoritism of Mitch McConnell in allowing the funding for Louisiana to stand while denying the funding to Flint, Michigan is PROOF he does nothing in his leadership but play politics with the lives of Americans.

NOTHING. 

There is nothing else Mitch McConnell does with his power as majority leader in the Senate but parlay every aspect of governance into political grandstanding.

It is no different than the nomination of an eminently qualified candidate for the Supreme Court that has a record of voting in favor of conservative values as well as more liberals values. The reason Judge Garland does that is because he decides about what is constitutional and what is not. Not every ideology of conservatives are protected by the US Constitution and the same goes for liberal values as well. 

But, does Mitch McConnell care about the country? No.

Does Mitch McConnell care about the people? No.

Does Mitch McConnell care about his own grandiose political standing? Yes.   
  
Can the same be said about Paul Ryan? Yes and no. He puts politics first, but, he also stumbles a lot in his leadership of the US House. I don't think there is one word, only one word for that phenomena. Nope, can't come up with one.

Many Americans are regreting the day Judge Scalia passed away.

The Supreme Court Justice hanging in the balance is the excuse many Republicans use to vote for Donald Trump, but, it is more than that. It is simply the way Republicans game the country. 

They don't govern. The Republicans pad the pockets of their Wall Street interests. That is all they have done leading up to the economic collapse of 2008 and it is all they have done since.

It is amazing that Americans simply don't see the forest for the trees. Does anyone believe Donald Trump would be in office long? Pence is hanging his hat on the Vice Presidency hoping it leads to more. If the Republicans have the Senate and House majority, President Trump will be removed as quickly as possible.

Congressional Republicans will not work with a President they disagree with. They had real experience with President Obama. 

September 27, 2016
By Heather Digby Parton

If someone had told me 10 years ago (click here) that the first general election presidential debate of 2016 would feature a CNN chyron that said “Awaiting the Historic Clinton-Trump Debate,” I would have thought you were crazy. If you had told me the polls would be tied going into that debate I would have thought the world had gone crazy. But that’s where we are and last night’s debate showed how far we’ve gone down the rabbit hole.
My preview of the debate yesterday focused on the fact that Trump’s “serious” debates at the end of the primaries, when there were fewer rivals, gave us some clues about how he might perform in the main event. He was aggressively incoherent and sometimes completely unintelligible, proving repeatedly that he had absolutely no idea what he was talking about.
This has been obvious from the beginning of his campaign if you watched his rallies and interviews. It’s just that his personality is so remarkably bizarre that I think the lack of substance is easy to overlook. (I confess I have been somewhat surprised that so many people find his rambling “braggadociousness” appealing enough that they fail to notice that he is ignorant about everything important to the job of president.)...

Is no one paying attention to the Atlantic Ocean?

September 27, 2016
1430.18z 
Unisys GOES East water vapor satellite (click here for 12 hour loop)

There is all kinds of talk about the eastern Pacific, but, there are major circulation centers in the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean.

 

Each debate is important. It opens a door or it may close a door to balloting.

Early balloting (click here) has already begun in states such as Iowa and Illinois where as soon as the ballots are ready, voting begins.

The majority of votes are cast on Election Day, but, early balloting matters.

Real Clear Politics has the race to close to call. Nate Silver (click here) basically sees it the same way. He states as of today Hillary Clinton has a 45 percent chance of winning the presidency and Donald Trump a 46 percent chance of winning the presidency.

Nate Silver has added new polls to his election model.

The only polling that matters is the one that is completed on Election Day.

I think there is a larger error than stated by the polls. The polls are primarily conducted online and that isolates many voters out of the polling model. If the error is larger than stated that means the electorate will be more heavily Democratic and favor Hillary Clinton.

As with any major election there is no magic formula. "Get out the vote" is the answer.

During the Presidential Debate the question was asked what is more dangerous the climate crisis or nuclear weapons.

The Climate Crisis is more dangerous.

Nuclear weapons have been around a long time. Since WWII to be exact. They are always controversial, but, there is the Non-Proliferation Treaty which the world's countries needs to take more seriously. We have witnessed the rise of extremists. These extremists would like to use nuclear weapons, that we can be confident. But, it is up to the global community the ability for them to succeed.

Realizing the global community has a policy already written and primarily ratified by the majority of countries, it needs to be realized, the Non-Proliferation Treaty denies extremists from carrying out nuclear holocaust.

The tensions that exist between Pakistan and India should be at a peace table no different than Israel and Palestine. Pakistan has to disarm from nuclear weapons as its tribal regions have seen the most dangerous of international terrorists and Osama bin Laden resided within Pakistan near a military academy. 

It is time to honor the Non-Proliferation Treaty and make nuclear stockpiles into antiquated mistakes of power.

The Climate Crisis on the other hand is racing to a very tragic end for most life on Earth. We are seeing the Sixth Extinction take it's toll on life that thrived only a short time ago. There is no doubt, the Climate Crisis is dire and is now. We cannot look away from this burgeoning danger that already has claimed the lives of hundreds of thousands of lives and perhaps even more.

While starvation because bees are no longer available to pollinate our crops and lack of water due to droughts is already upon us, there is no reason to consider these minor problems of which technology will fix; that simply won't happen. It is technology that brought us high carbon dioxide levels. The biotic content of Earth's troposphere is more frail than most realize. The climate shift over the past two decades is more than obvious.

The climate crisis needs to be addresses now. In that I believe Secretary Clinton needs to clarify her idea of providing solar panels throughout the USA. That high aspiration did not completely succeed with the production of American solar panels.

Buy American (click here) and support companies providing manufacturing jobs in the USA. These high quality panels are ARRA* (2009 American Recovery and Reinvestment Act) compliant meaning that they were substantially manufactured in the US, the components were sourced and assembled in the USA, or they qualify under some other ARRA qualification or exemption. ARRA compliant means that they should qualify for ARRA grants, rebates and other purchasing which requires a buy American certification.  

SolarWorld manufactures most of its panels in Hillsboro, OR. Suniva produces its ARRA compliant panels in Atlanta.

Transitioning to green energy is vital to the efforts to stop and reverse the climate crisis. We need to be sure "American Made" matters.

Nuclear weapons need to respect the Non-Proliferation Treaty and the Climate Crisis needs attention today. Now. The investment of countries does not belong producing weapons of mass destruction so much of green energy products that will save us all.