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.
AP’s Today in History for May 1st
President George W. Bush announces major combat has ended in Iraq; U2 spy plane shot down over Soviet Union; Empire State Building dedicated.
Breakfast Tune Pete Seeger “Which Side Are You On?”
Something to Think about, Breakfast News & Blogs Below
Baghdad state of emergency declared after protesters storm parliament
Dominic Smith and agencies, The Guardian
A state of emergency has reportedly been declared in Baghdad after supporters of the Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr stormed the Green Zone and entered the parliament building.
Hundreds of people gathered in protest at the failure of Iraqi MPs to convene for a vote to approve new ministers. The unrest comes after weeks of political turmoil in Baghdad over efforts by the prime minister, Haider al-Abadi, to replace party-affiliated ministers with technocrats. MPs failed to reach a quorum to approve the measures on Saturday.
People gathered outside the heavily fortified green zone, comprising government buildings and foreign embassies, after crossing a bridge over the Tigris river chanting: “The cowards ran away.” …
‘We’ve had massacres all week’: Aleppo on fire again as Assad consigns ceasefire to history
Daniel Boffey
The president of Aleppo city council, Brita Haji Hasan, had a picture on his phone. It showed the corpse of Hasan Amory, 29, a father of two and council engineer who that morning had been killed by a Syrian air force missile as he headed into work in the opposition stronghold.
“We have had massacres on a daily basis for six or seven days,” Haji Hasan told the Observer, during an interview in the Turkish city of Gaziantep, 30 miles from the Syrian border.
“They are destroying schools and civilian targets using barrel bombs, airstrikes and machine guns. Another colleague of mine was killed yesterday while I spoke to him on Skype.” …
Turkish police fire tear gas in central Istanbul on May Day protesters
Humeyra Pamuk, Reuters
Turkish police fired tear gas as clashes broke out on Sunday with dozens of protesters, several hundred of whom were trying to get to Istanbul’s main Taksim square where celebrations have been banned on May Day.
Several people were being put inside a police bus, CNN Turk footage showed.
Authorities have agreed with some unions to mark the day in a designated area in Bakirkoy district nearby the airport.
Detroit residents scramble as water shut-off looms — while businesses that owe thousands slide by
Bethania Palma Markus
Water problems in the state of Michigan are not limited to the contaminated supply in Flint.
Hundreds of residents lined up outside the Detroit Water and Sewerage Department’s East Side Customer Service Center on Saturday hoping to avoid having their water shut off on Sunday, the Detroit News reports.
…
Citing public records, the News reports that businesses and government-owned properties owe almost twice as much as residential customers — $41 million versus $26 million for homes — but by comparison, only 680 had their water shut off. …
- They should all be tried: George W. Bush, Dick Cheney and America’s overlooked war crimes
Rebecca Gordon, tomdispatch
- Clinton Camp says She’s Been Forced to the Left Enough Already
Andrea Germanos
Something to Think about over Coffee Prozac
Windows 10 Update Interrupts Weather Report Just As It Was Getting Good
Steven Hoffer
Do you ever feel like computer software updates are designed to appear only when you’re working on something important?
KCCI 8 News Meteorologist Metinka Slater was just trying to do her job on Wednesday morning when an update window decided to pop up like a zit on a high schooler’s face the day before prom.
“Microsoft recommends that I update to Windows 10,” Slater said, playing it cool and pressing on with the weather in Iowa. “What should I do?”
What you do is postpone your software updates like the rest of us. …