Welcome to The Breakfast Club! We’re a disorganized group of rebel lefties who hang out and chat if and when we’re not too hungover we’ve been bailed out we’re not too exhausted from last night’s (CENSORED) the caffeine kicks in. Join us every weekday morning at 9am (ET) and weekend morning at 10:30am (ET) to talk about current news and our boring lives and to make fun of LaEscapee! If we are ever running late, it’s PhilJD’s fault.
This Day in History
Breakfast Tunes
Broken clouds along the blue horizon
The sun is setting and the wind is dying down
Outward bound, there is music all around
Can you hear it, it’s the, the song of the sea?Soundings taken at the edge of darkness
The widest silences the heart can ever hear
You can steer to the stars along your lee
Set your bearings to the, the song of the seaOh, and the song is as ancient as the days
And the winds upon the waves
Let it carry you away, so far awayTrim my sails to greet the breakin’ morning
Past the headlands to the rolling open sea
An’ it comes to me, I have never felt so free
As when I’m listening to the, the song of the seaOh and the song is as ancient as the days
And the winds upon the waves
Let it carry me away, so far awaySome were meant to watch the world from windows
And never look beyond the road beneath their feet
But for me, I was always meant to be
One forever chasing the song of the sea
The song of the sea
The song of the sea
Breakfast News
US evacuates Tripoli embassy as rival militias push Libya towards war
The US embassy in Tripoli staged a dramatic evacuation in the early hours of Saturday, with other embassies debating whether to follow suit as Libya hovers on the brink of full-scale war. Efforts by diplomats and prime minister Abdullah al-Thinni to engineer a last-minute ceasefire between warring militias have collapsed and the capital echoes to the sound of artillery and rockets.
Fighting is also continuing in the eastern city of Benghazi, part of a nation-wide struggle between an Islamist-led alliance and fragmented opposition.
In Tripoli, thousands are fleeing their homes under a rain of rocket, tank and mortar fire. “They phoned us to tell us to get out,” said Huda, a resident in the south-western Tripoli district of Seraj. “They told us: you have seen how the airport looks, this will be your district too.”
Barack Obama banned from entering Chechnya
Although Russia has not responded to US sanctions over the Ukraine crisis by putting a travel ban on President Barack Obama, there is one part of the country he is now barred from entering: Chechnya.
On Saturday Ramzan Kadyrov, the president of the small Russian republic that has been the scene of two devastating separatist wars in the past 20 years, said he was placing Obama on a list of people banned from visiting.
The list also includes European Union figures José Manuel Barroso, Herbert van Rompuy and Catherine Ashton.
Kadyrov, wrote on his Instagram account that the ban was in response to US and EU actions in Ukraine, Libya, Syria, Iraq and Afghanistan, which he called “state terrorism”.
Dispute over ex-CIA officials’ access to Senate ‘torture report’ highlights feud
About a dozen former CIA officials named in a classified Senate report on decade-old agency interrogation practices were notified in recent days that they would be able to review parts of the document in a secure room in suburban Washington after signing a secrecy agreement.
Then, on Friday, many were told they would not be able to see it, after all. Some of them were furious, while Democratic Senate aides were angry that they were given the chance in the first place.
It is the latest chapter in the drama and recriminations that have been playing out behind the scenes in connection with what some call the Senate torture report, a summary of which is being declassified and is expected to be released in the coming weeks.
Five people die, 1,400 rushed to hospital amid heat wave
Five people died and around 1,400 people were taken by ambulance to hospitals nationwide due to heat stroke or heat exhaustion, a tally showed Saturday, as temperatures soared across much of Japan.
The rising mercury prompted the Meteorological Agency to issue heat wave advisories for 41 of the 47 prefectures.
The preliminary figure of people being rushed to hospitals came to 1,389, of whom five died and 20 were in a serious condition, according to the tally.
Race in Toyland: A Nonwhite Doll Crosses Over
Jade Goss, age 2, looks as if she just stepped out of the wildly popular “Doc McStuffins” cartoon.
“She has the Doc McStuffins sheets. She has the Doc McStuffins doll. She has the Doc McStuffins purse. She has Doc McStuffins clothes,” said Jade’s mother, Melissa Woods, of Lynwood, Calif.
“I think what attracts her is, ‘Hey, I look like her, and she looks like me,’ ” Ms. Woods said of the character, an African-American child who acts as a doctor to her stuffed animals.
With about $500 million in sales last year, Doc McStuffins merchandise seems to be setting a record as the best-selling toy line based on an African-American character, industry experts say. [..]
“The kids who are of color see her as an African-American girl, and that’s really big for them,” said Chris Nee, the creator of Doc McStuffins. “And I think a lot of other kids don’t see her color, and that’s wonderful as well.”
Must Read Blog Posts
CIA Intercepted Whistleblower Communications Related to Senate Investigation into Torture By Kevin Gosztola, FDL The Dissenter
Cofer Black Gets to Rebut Torture Report that Shouldn’t Include Him By Marcy Wheeler. emptywheel
Want To Help A Detroiter Pay Their Water Bills? Now You Can. by Karoli, Crooks & Liars
Accomplices to the extreme by digby, Hullabaloo
The Obama Regime’s Awesome Hypocrisy by Eric Zuess, Washington’s Blog
Why Does Anyone Believe the State Department … After Being Caught In Repeated Lies? By Washinton’s Blog
Something to Think about over Coffee Prozac
The world is a dangerous place to live; not because of the people who are evil, but because of the people who don’t do anything about it.
Stupid Shit by LaEscapee
Cross posted at The Stars Hollow Gazette and Voices on the Square
