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Olympic Alternatives V

You thought I was not serious?

I’m dead serious.  The only way to effect change is through sacrifice (changing your habits) and protest (telling people what you think, publicly).

Plenty of other stuff out on the Hypnotoad.  Just look-

The Hypnotoad.

"Television is a vast wasteland"
hypnotoad

Mid-afternoon update.

Early evening update.

Late evening update.

Late night update.

Afternoon Edition

Afternoon Edition is an Open Thread

Now with 41 Top Stories.

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 UN appeals for nearly $1.5 billion for Haiti

By EDITH M. LEDERER, Associated Press Writer

Thu Feb 18, 9:03 pm ET

UNITED NATIONS – The United Nations launched a new appeal Thursday for nearly $1.5 billion to help the 3 million Haitians affected by last month’s devastating earthquake, its largest appeal ever for a natural disaster.

The appeal, covering needs in 2010, is more than double the U.N.’s initial request on Jan. 15 for $562 million to help quake victims for six months.

U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon and his special envoy for Haiti, former U.S. President Bill Clinton, launched the $1.44 billion appeal at a meeting with diplomats from many of the 191 other U.N. member states.

Olympic Alternatives IV

You thought I was not serious?

I’m dead serious.  The only way to effect change is through sacrifice (changing your habits) and protest (telling people what you think, publicly).

Plenty of other stuff out on the Hypnotoad.  Just look-

The Hypnotoad.

"Television is a vast wasteland"
hypnotoad

8 pm – 10 pm update.

All Prime Time update.

Midnight to 3 am update.

Why are you update.

Afternoon Edition

Afternoon Edition is an Open Thread

Now with 42 Top Stories.

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 Eight US missionaries arrive in Miami after Haiti release

AFP

Thu Feb 18, 3:49 am ET

MIAMI, Florida (AFP) – Eight of 10 American missionaries who faced child kidnapping charges in Haiti arrived here early Thursday after being freed by a Haitian judge and leaving the quake-devastated nation.

The Miami Herald newspaper reported that the group arrived at Miami International Airport shortly after midnight.

A Haitian judge freed the missionaries without bail on Wednesday — though the charges were not dropped — and they were whisked to the airport in a van bearing diplomatic plates to board a US military transport plane for Miami.

Olympic Alternatives III

You thought I was not serious?

I’m dead serious.  The only way to effect change is through sacrifice (changing your habits) and protest (telling people what you think, publicly).

Plenty of other stuff out on the Hypnotoad.  Just look-

The Hypnotoad.

"Television is a vast wasteland"
hypnotoad

Now with Prime Time Update!

Late Night Final.

The Stars Hollow Gazette

So it appears that CPAC is trying to ramp up enthusiasm with video games (warning, Faux Noise link).

Let me tell you how that works out.

Back in the day I was running my brewing buddy for capo di tutti (which by the way he never got and I did) he used to host these legendary Halloween Parties.  I remember the first one.

In addition to the usual party things you do, between us we have an unusual collection of classic video games including dedicated Pongs, Ataris, Colecos, Segas, Commodore 64s, Apples, and others of more ancient vintage that we set up as stations among which people could circulate.

AND we had a new video projector on which we planned to show Music Videos that people could dance to, but with which we debuted the most mesmerising 10 minutes in movies- the opening sequence of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

12 hours of couch drooling passivity later we vowed to never again include the Hypnotoad in our plans for world domination through pastel colored boxes.

The Hypnotoad.

"Television is a vast wasteland"
hypnotoad

Afternoon Edition

Afternoon Edition is an Open Thread

From Yahoo News Top Stories

1 Sarkozy makes aid pledge on historic Haiti trip

by Nadege Puljak, AFP

1 hr 3 mins ago

PORT-AU-PRINCE (AFP) – Nicolas Sarkozy became Wednesday the first French president to visit Haiti, vowing to honor historic obligations to France’s former slave colony and promising almost half a billion dollars in quake aid.

“I have come to tell the Haitian people and their leaders that France, which was the first on the ground after the catastrophe, will remain firmly at the their side to help them pick themselves up again and open a new happy page in their history,” Sarkozy said in Port-au-Prince.

Sarkozy announced an aid package of some 326 million euros (446 million dollars) over the next two years, a sum that includes the cancellation of Haiti’s 56-million-euro debt.

Olympic Alternatives II

You thought I was not serious?

I’m dead serious.  The only way to effect change is through sacrifice (changing your habits) and protest (telling people what you think, publicly).

Plenty of other stuff out on the Hypnotoad.  Just look-

The Hypnotoad.

"Television is a vast wasteland"
hypnotoad

Wednesday Morning Science Supplement

Wednesday Morning Science Supplement is an Open Thread

From Yahoo News Science

1 Firms scale back from US climate push

by Shaun Tandon, AFP

Tue Feb 16, 9:32 pm ET

WASHINGTON (AFP) – Three major US companies said they were leaving a coalition pushing for action on climate change, dealing a potential fresh blow to landmark legislation to cut carbon emissions.

The news came on the same day that President Barack Obama announced an eight-billion-dollar drive for nuclear power — part of his controversial bid to bring a diverse coalition behind his efforts for a greener economy.

The three companies — oil groups ConocoPhillips and BP America and equipment maker Caterpillar Inc. — said they backed efforts for a green economy but felt that proposed laws were unfair to them.

The Progressive Agenda

How did that work out?

Liberals Didn’t Get Much In 2009.

A. Serwer, The American Prospect

February 16, 2009 03:20 PM

Matthew Yglesias makes a list of things progressives wanted and didn’t get last year, pointing out that the agenda has been set by finicky centrists, not raging liberals:

  • A $1.2 trillion stimulus.
  • The forcible breakup of large banks.
  • Universal health care with a public option linked to Medicare rates.
  • An economy-wide cap on carbon emissions, with the permits auctioned.
  • Repeal of Don’t Ask Don’t Tell.
  • A path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants.
  • An exit strategy from Afghanistan.
  • An end to special exemption of military spending from fiscal discipline.
  • An independent Consumer Financial Protection Agency.
  • The Employee Free Choice Act.

Maybe the following things don’t necessarily count as part of the “mainstream liberal policy agenda,” but to Matt’s list you could add the closure of Guantanamo Bay prison, some sort of legal accountability for the architects of the Bush administration’s torture program, an end to warrant-less surveillance, no more use of the state secrets doctrine to block judicial scrutiny of executive wrongdoing — and if we’re really getting nitpicky, how about simply putting up a fight for liberal political appointees to federal agencies?

Duh.

Westminster Kennel Club Dog Show Open Thread

Westminster Dog Show 2010: Why it’s better than Winter Olympics

Bite Me Bayh!

What digby says-

Bayh is complaining about the nastiness of the liberal blogs as his reason for taking his ball and going home, and I think that’s probably a real issue for him. These Democratic Senate egomaniacs are a huge problem and they are being called on it. They see their role in America’s patrician institution as protecting the rightful owners of America from the Democratic rabble that elected them. And so does the elite political and media establishment at large, which in turn protects them. When they are actually held up to scrutiny for playing such a role, they get very angry. How dare anyone, much less the dirty liberal rabble, question their judgment and their integrity. Their response is to leave the field and turn their seats over to a similarly compromised Democrat or a Republican to teach the Democrats a lesson — a lesson which the Dems have so internalized that they reflexively run in fear of offending conservative Democrats without even questioning it.

This isn’t a bipartisan problem, by the way. The owners allow Snowe and Collins off the leash from time to time to provide cover for something that needs to be done to calm the markets. But other than that this band of aristocratic centrists of both parties have but one role to play and that is to thwart the liberal economic agenda and advance conservative initiatives whenever they are needed. The problem is that this game is being publicly discussed and there is now a (small) price to pay — the village media isn’t the only game in town anymore and there are voices that embarrass the poor sensitive darlings when they “follow their conscience” and obstruct progress for ordinary people. This is very upsetting to them.

So, yes, there is a problem with this bipartisan fetish inside the beltway. The parties and the country are ideologically polarized and this means that politics aren’t a genteel pursuit best decided over scotch and cigars among like-minded nobility. But people must also be aware that these “centrists” are false flag conservatives and any discussion of the partisan make-up of the Senate needs to account for their position as de facto Republicans. It’s much better to wage this ideological war with a proper troop count, knowing which side everyone is really on.

To anyone who claims that we have no effect, I say Wrong!

These Beltway Bubblehead Buttkissing Bastards are such preening narcissists, their egos so fragile, that mere words leave them quivering puddles of petulant quitter goo.

It takes sticks and stones to break my bones baby.

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