Anna Akana

I like definition 1- “Ghosting can mean the viewing of a stream/streamer for the purpose of gaining information that could be used to gain an advantage against them” but I think she means definition 2- “the shutdown/ceasing of communication with someone without notice”.

While I try to be consistent in my writing (a good way to find out if I am active online) the truth is I disappear for extended periods of time with no warning and NO EXCUSES!

None of your damn business is what. The Internet is public duh, and if I don’t tell you I’m of hunting with my dog Rex (humans mostly, it’s for sport- I’m not a cannibal), or even have a dog (currently dog free and I sure wouldn’t name them Rex).

I do it in real life too. One time I didn’t talk with the Gilmores for more than a month (no message, just having too much fun and forgot). That stopped when the nice Police Officer knocked on my door, asked to see my ID and said- “Call your Mother, she’s worried. Now sign here, it says I found you and we talked and you were visibly alive with no obvious injuries.”

Personally I think it’s kind of a bad thing to nominate a proven public perjuror to a lifetime appointment as a Federal Judge and worse still a Justice of The Supreme Court.

Another point is, particularly if he gets approved, his policies are deplorable. Abortion and Contraceptive privacy rights sure, but he also hates affirmative action, Native Americans, Business regulation of any sort, and loves him some Embezzling, Extortion, and Bribery, Defrauding Charities, Tax Evasion, Money Laundering, Abuse of Power, Treasonous Conspiracy with a hostile foreign government, and Obstruction of Justice NONE of which should distract a President from the serious job of Presidenting though investigating a money losing real estate deal (just the one), non-hacked email, Benghazi, BENGHAZI, BENGHAZI!, and blowjobs are perfectly a-ok (though hush money payments to former mistresses using illegal Shell Companies is Off Limits).

Let’s not forget that Brett Kavanaugh is also a ill mannered boor and a horrible excuse for a human being you wouldn’t want breathing the same air.

Eew. Ick. Nobody said you had to go Van Gogh.

“For they are all honorable men.”

Trump suggests that Nike’s stock is ‘getting absolutely killed with anger and boycotts’
By Mark DeCambre, Market Watch
Sept 6, 2018

Just like the NFL, whose ratings have gone WAY DOWN, Nike is getting absolutely killed with anger and boycotts. I wonder if they had any idea that it would be this way? As far as the NFL is concerned, I just find it hard to watch, and always will, until they stand for the FLAG!
9:39 AM – Sep 5, 2018

On Tuesday, shares of Nike NKE, -0.12% shed 3.2%, leading declining components on a down day for the Dow industrials, suffering the sports-apparel company’s worst daily drop since April 2, according to FactSet data. Shares of the retailing giant — a retail tenant of the president’s real-estate business (“They pay a lot of rent,” Trump reportedly told the Daily Caller, though New York magazine noted that the Niketown location on 57th Street in Manhattan apparently in question is slated to close) — rebounded in Wednesday action, posting a gain of 0.4%.

Nike investors aren’t happy about the Colin Kaepernick ad
by Paul R. La Monica, CNN Money
September 5, 2018

Kaepernick remains unsigned and hasn’t played since 2016, but he started a movement that has polarized Americans. President Donald Trump has been critical of players for the protests.

One analyst expressed concerns about Nike’s ties with Kaepernick.

“Nike’s campaign will generate both attention and discussion which is, arguably, one of its central aims,” wrote Neil Saunders, managing director of GlobalData Retail, in a report Tuesday. “However, it is also a risky strategy in that it addresses, and appears to take sides on, a highly politicized issue.”

The ad could ultimately alienate customers and turn them to rivals’ products — which is not the purpose of a marketing campaign, Saunders said.

Nike sales surge 31% in days after Colin Kaepernick ad unveiled
by Martin Pengelly, The Guardian
Sat 8 Sep 2018

According to Edison Trends, a digital commerce research company: “Nike sales grew 31% from Sunday through Tuesday over Labor Day this year, besting 2017’s comparative 17% increase.”

The sportswear giant released the first version of its ad on Monday, the Labor Day holiday. It featured the quarterback and the slogan: “Believe in something. Even if it means sacrificing everything. Just do it.”

Kaepernick, 30, has been without a team since opting out of his San Francisco 49ers contract in March 2017. In 2016 he was an originator of protests by NFL players, targeting racial injustice and police brutality, which often involve kneeling during the pre-game playing of the national anthem.

Donald Trump has made the protests a key part of his appeal to his base, arguing that the players are disrespecting the anthem, the US flag and the military.

On Tuesday, the president told the rightwing website Daily Caller: “I think it’s a terrible message that [Nike] are sending and the purpose of them doing it, maybe there’s a reason for them doing it. But I think as far as sending a message, I think it’s a terrible message and a message that shouldn’t be sent. There’s no reason for it.”

He also said Nike paid him “a lot of rent” in New York and admitted that the protests and the Nike ad were “in another way … what this country is all about, that you have certain freedoms to do things that other people think you shouldn’t do”.

“But I personally am on a different side of it,” Trump said.

In the following days, the president pursued the issue via Twitter. On Wednesday, he wrote: “Just like the NFL, whose ratings have gone WAY DOWN, Nike is getting absolutely killed with anger and boycotts. I wonder if they had any idea that it would be this way? As far as the NFL is concerned, I just find it hard to watch, and always will, until they stand for the FLAG!”

Trump did not supply evidence for his claim of “anger and boycotts” but opposition to the company’s move was expressed widely and in some instances creatively on social media.

On Friday, the morning after the full version of the Nike ad played during the Philadelphia Eagles v Atlanta Falcons NFL season opener, the president asked: “What was Nike thinking?”

Edison Trends’ analysis suggested the company will be thinking its gambit has worked, allowing it to surf familiar controversy and create a “Trump bump” all of its own.

“Nike’s 2018 late summer sales show much the same trend as last year’s,” the company wrote, “with order volume decreasing slightly going into late August. The similarity decreases coming out of Labor Day weekend, however, with sales seeing a bigger bump on Monday and Tuesday than in the past.”

Edison Trends said its analysis was based on “anonymised and aggregated e-receipts from more than 3 million consumers”.

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 10:00am (ET) (or whenever we get around to it) 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.

Galveston hurricane kills thousands; President Gerald Ford pardons Richard Nixon; Nazis begin Leningrad siege during World War II; Comedian Sid Caesar born; Original ‘Star Trek’ premieres on TV.

In between goals is a thing called life, that has to be lived and enjoyed.

Sid Caesar

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Former Trump adviser George Papadopoulos sentenced to 14 days in plea deal with Mueller probe
By Spencer S. Hsu and Rosalind S. Helderman, Washington Post
September 7 at 5:26 PM

A once low-profile foreign policy campaign adviser whose offhand remark in a London bar in May 2016 helped trigger an FBI counterintelligence investigation into President Trump’s campaign was sentenced to 14 days incarceration Friday by a federal judge in Washington.

George Papadopoulos, 31, pleaded guilty in October to lying to the FBI about key details of his conversations with a London-based professor who had told him the Russians held dirt, in the form of thousands of emails, on Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

Papadopoulos tried futilely for months to arrange a meeting between top campaign aides and Russian officials.

In asking the court for leniency, Papadopoulos said he made “a terrible mistake, for which I have paid a terrible price, and am deeply ashamed,” and that he was motivated to lie to the FBI try to “create distance between the issue, myself, and the president.”

In hindsight, he said in court, he recognizes that was wrong and “might have harmed the investigation.”

Papadopoulos’s attorney, Thomas M. Breen, went further, saying “the President of the United States hindered this investigation more than George Papadopoulos ever could,” by calling the investigation fake news and a witch hunt.
…
Papadopoulos, a young oil and gas consultant, was the first Trump official to plead guilty and cooperate in the investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 U.S. election.

He now is the first campaign adviser sentenced. Three others have pleaded guilty or were convicted of felonies and are awaiting sentencing.
…
Federal sentencing guidelines under Papadopoulos’s plea deal called for a penalty between probation and six months in prison.

Moss said he had planned to give Papadopoulos a 30-day term but was persuaded by his courtroom expression of remorse to reduce the sentence.

But he said incarceration was necessary because Papadopoulos had lied on a matter of grave national interest and the public needed to understand that lying to the FBI is a serious matter.

Moss described Papadopoulos’s behavior as a “calculated act of self interest over national interest,” and noted it took him six months to correct his statements and he did “in the face of proof he lied.”
…
Prosecutors did not recommend a sentence for Papadopoulos, but said up to six months’ jail time was appropriate saying he had lied repeatedly to federal investigators and had not provided substantial cooperation to them.

They said Papadopoulos’s initial lies hindered investigators’ ability to effectively question, challenge or detain Joseph Mifsud, the London professor who had contacted him. Mifsud left the United States and not returned, after the FBI found him in the U.S. on Feb. 11, 2017, about two weeks after Papadopoulos’s first interview.

They said Papadopoulos’s initial lies hindered investigators’ ability to effectively question, challenge or detain Joseph Mifsud, the London professor who had contacted him. Mifsud left the United States and not returned, after the FBI found him in the U.S. on Feb. 11, 2017, about two weeks after Papadopoulos’s first interview.

Prosecutor Andrew Goldstein said Friday in court that Papadopoulos “deliberately and repeatedly lied to FBI agents pursuing a highly significant federal investigation,” making a calculated decision “to advance his personal interests” to try to land a high-level administration post.

He ultimately cooperated but, Goldstein added, “ee didn’t come close to the standard of substantial assistance.”

Papadopoulos’s attorneys had asked for probation for their client and said in court filings that Papadopoulos misled investigators to try to save his professional ambitions and out of a “perhaps misguided loyalty to his master” but not for more sinister reasons.
…
As part of his sentence, Papadopoulos also will have one year of court supervision, 200 hours of community service and was fined $9,500.

So last night, believe it or not, I got a phone call from Susan Collins at 2 am.

Now I’m inclined to believe it was a mistake, not just due to the lateness of the hour but also because only a few Gilmores are constituents and none of them have voted for Sue in…

Well, like ever.

In addition to a series of non-functional robo-call choices (they were in fact all non-functional, I tried them) was this- “If you would like to share your feelings about Crime Issues with Senator Collins, please press 1.”

Having been thwarted I am forced respond here.-

Senator Collins, I am deeply concerned about Crime, particularly the crime of perjury. I’m sure you’re aware that Brett Kavanaugh perjured himself at least 4 times during his testimony.

Newly Released Emails Show Brett Kavanaugh May Have Perjured Himself at Least Four Times
by Jay Michaelson, Daily Beast
09.07.18

Confirmation of Judge Pryor

The clearest contradiction between Judge Kavanaugh’s sworn testimony and the formerly confidential email record concerns the nomination of Judge William Pryor, a conservative firebrand. In 2006, Kavanaugh was asked, by the late Sen. Ted Kennedy, whether Pryor’s extreme statements disturbed him. Kavanaugh replied that he was not involved in the selection or vetting of Judge Pryor.

When Sen. Patrick Leahy (D-VT) asked him Thursday, “did you interview William Pryor?” Kavanaugh hedged a bit, saying “I don’t believe so. It’s possible but I don’t believe so.”

Leahy responded by entering a formerly-confidential email into the record that states clearly that Kavanaugh actually did interview Pryor. “How did the Pryor interview go?” he was asked in December, 2002. “Call me,” he replied.

Even if Kavanaugh’s 2018 hedge protects him against perjury, his flat denial in 2006—only three years after the Pryor nomination itself—is clearly a false statement given under oath.

Memogate

As we reported Wednesday, Leahy challenged Judge Kavanaugh over his role in “Memogate,” a 2003 scandal in which a low-level Republican aide named Manuel Miranda stole Democratic memos from a shared server. At his 2006 hearing, Kavanaugh denied receiving any stolen documents. Now, Kavanaugh says that while he may have received stolen documents, he didn’t know they were stolen.

Thursday, some—but apparently not all—of the Memogate emails were released, and they cast serious doubt on those claims.
…
(W)we now know that Kavanaugh received Democratic documents marked as confidential. A just-released email from Miranda, dated July 28, 2002, says that “Senator Leahy’s staff has distributed a confidential letter to Dem[ocratic] Counsel.” Miranda does not say how he somehow came into the possession of this confidential letter—though he does impudently “ask that no action be taken by any of your offices… except as I request.”
…
Warrantless Wiretaps

A third clearly false statement made by Kavanaugh under oath regards his involvement in President Bush’s “Terrorist Surveillance Program,” known by most people as the warrantless wiretapping program.

On Wednesday, Judge Kavanaugh said he first learned about it from a December 2005 article in The New York Times.

On Thursday, an email was released showing that Kavanaugh emailed John Yoo, the Department of Justice lawyer responsible for the Bush-era “torture memo,” about the program on Sept. 17, 2001. “Any results yet on the 4A implications of random/constant surveillance of phone and e-mail conversations of non-citizens who are in the United States when the purpose of the surveillance is to prevent terrorist/criminal violence?” Kavanaugh asked.
…
Roe
…
In fact, this is the least smoking of the emails’ smoking guns, but given that the entire confirmation process has been owned by this one issue, the disproportionate attention is understandable.

At issue is an op-ed which Kavanaugh was drafting which originally said that “it is widely accepted by legal scholars across the board that Roe v. Wade and its progeny are the settled law of the land”— language quite similar to that used by Kavanaugh himself in his confirmation hearings.

In a 2003 email, however, Kavanaugh said “I am not sure that all legal scholars refer to Roe as the settled law of the land at the Supreme Court level since Court can always overrule its precedent, and three current Justices on the Court would do so.”

Asked about the apparent contradiction Thursday, Kavanaugh noted that it is factually true that “all legal scholars” do not agree that Roe is the settled law of the land. Of course, “all legal scholars” don’t agree on anything at all, which is why phrases like that are known as “weasel words,” since they allow the writer to weasel out of meaning anything.
…
(R)emarks Kavanaugh made regarding racial profiling in the wake of 9/11.

On Jan. 17, 2002, he wrote in an email that he and others “DO need to grapple—and grapple now—with the interim question of what to do before a truly effective and comprehensive race-neutral system is developed and implemented.” In other words, although Kavanaugh says he “generally favor[s] effective security measures that are race-neutral,” non-race-neutral measures—i.e., racial profiling—will still have to be used in the meantime.

Once again, this is explosive material: a nominee for the Supreme Court has endorsed racial profiling, at least on an “interim” basis. Likewise with comments questioning whether Hawaiians count as Native Americans and accusing backers of affirmative action as acting in bad faith.

Senator Collins, I find it difficult to believe that you think a publicly admitted perjuror, a criminal, should be rewarded with a lifetime appointment to the highest court in the land rather than an orange jumpsuit in a Federal Correction Center.

ps. You might want to pass this along to Senator Scott.

Space Force!

(with Neil deGrasse Tyson and Joe Rogan)

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 10:00am (ET) (or whenever we get around to it) 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.

Nazi Blitz on Britain begins in World War II; Mobutu Sese Seko dies; Panama Canal Treaties signed; Rapper Tupac Shakur shot; ESPN debuts; Pro Football Hall of Fame dedicated; Rock star Buddy Holly born.

The aim of life is to live, and to live means to be aware, joyously, drunkenly, serenely, divinely aware.

Henry Miller

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