DNC Offers to Help Drop the Ball by Mark Roebuck (The Hard Times).
The Clock is Ticking
Leonard Peltier is old, sick and innocent. If he is not pardoned by President Obama, he will die in prison.
From the No Comment Desk:
Scenarios presented in Fighter Not Killer, an app that is used by militant groups, including the Islamic State, to test combatants’ knowledge of international humanitarian law. The app was created by Geneva Call, an NGO that promotes humanitarian norms in armed conflict. Zako is a character who represents an untrained recruit:
You are on patrol after a battle and come across two wounded fighters. First, Zako, with a bullet wound in the shoulder. Second, an enemy fighter, who is breathing but unconscious. Zako looks at you and says, “Kill him!” Can you kill the unconscious enemy fighter?
You go to a café to pick up new recruits. They begin to harass and fondle the barmaid, telling her that she should do her duty to the cause. Can the men force the barmaid to have sex?
On patrol, you discover that many farm animals have died from starvation. Zako has an idea: “Let’s dump the carcasses into the stream. It flows into the enemy camp and we’ll contaminate their water supply.” Can you use the carcasses to contaminate the enemy’s water supply?
It is the end of a long, dry summer. Zako says, “Let’s burn the forest down. The enemy will either become charcoal or run right into our arms.” Can you burn down the forest?
Zako is very excited. He has discovered that the local hospital is treating wounded enemy fighters. He wants to destroy the hospital so that it can no longer assist the enemy. Can you target the hospital?
Zako approaches your checkpoint in an ambulance with a red crescent. He winks at you and says the enemy will never know what hit them. Can Zako use an ambulance with the red-crescent emblem to attack the enemy?
You have received information on the route an enemy general will take. You plan an ambush and capture the general. Your supreme commander calls you on the radio and says the general has critical information. Because of military necessity he authorizes you to torture the general, but only as much as necessary. Can you torture the general?
You are conducting a guerrilla campaign. Your commander instructs you to detonate a remote-control bomb targeting an enemy general on a road. Just as the jeep approaches, you notice a school bus full of children approaching from the opposite direction. They will pass the bomb at the same time. Can you launch the attack?
You retreat to a village where civilians are sympathetic to your struggle. The mayor offers to assemble the schoolchildren around your base as shields. Can you accept the mayor’s offer?
Your bureaucrats at work
"City gears up to count the homeless"
"Cyclists count (officially now) in Santa Monica" -- Local headlines.
Here's an idea. Instead of counting bicyclists and the homeless, how about making the streets safe to ride and building some shelters?
Unforced Error
After eight years in office, Barack Obama's greatest failure will be to leave office without delivering justice and mercy to political prisoner Leonard Peltier.
Case of Leonard Peltier (FreeLeonard.org)
Leonard Peltier, 38 years a detainee: How did we get here? (Amnesty International)
A Tax for All Seasons
So, Christmas eve:
Santa Monica's meter maids and masters -- Grinches, all -- are out in force.
Parking spaces everywhere, so it's not about "managing a scarce resource."
It's about imposing an extremely high, regressive tax.
It's about revenue.
Cover Up
Those outraged by Muslim culture might consider how recently our own modesty police roamed the land.
Who'll be AG?
Non-profit executive Sara Hernandez, a former aide to Los Angeles city councilmember Jose Huizar, on Tuesday entered the race to replace state attorney general nominee Xavier Becerra in the House, joining assemblyman Jimmy Gomez and Arturo Carmona, a former political strategist for Sen. Bernie Sanders, in the competition. Hernandez said she had raised more than $150,000 since she began fundraising last week, according to the LA Times. LA city councilmembers Gil Cedillo and David Ryu and school board member Monica Garcia are also believed to be considering runs; former assembly speaker John A. Pérez, the first to announce, has already dropped out. “The special election would probably be held no earlier than spring 2017, though the law gives the governor wide discretion in setting the schedule," says the Times.
Not The Onion:
Rick Perry, who blew up his own campaign for president, will now oversee the National Nuclear Security Administration for the winner.
Book Proposal
Why hasn't John Wiley & Sons published "The Oval Office for Dummies"? There are 239 titles in the series, but not the one we need.
"It Can't Happen Here."
Not only can it happen here, it probably will.The same people who, out of complacency, did not resist as Barack Obama embraced and enlarged the mechanisms of oppression, will not resist, this time out of fear and despondency, as Donald Trump uses them.
No longer can Americans smugly scorn the complicity of "good Germans" in Hitler's rise. We are all good Germans now.
Seriously?
Sen. Heidi Heitkamp (D-N.D.) is reportedly under consideration for Energy or Interior secretary, as is Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.). Whether the Democrats allow their numbers in the Senate to be reduced in this way will provide another measure of how serious they are about thwarting GOP ambitions.
Mr. "President"
"Normalizing" took an interesting turn tonight when NPR, reporting on candidates to head the VA, noted that, even though up to now the administrator has always been a veteran, this time two non-veterans are also being considered, including "Sarah Palin, whose son served in Iraq," the last said in a tone suggesting her son's history somehow makes up for her own lack of military experience.
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