Never been for me

I personally hate the act of smoking, whether it was cigarettes or pot... the sensation of inhaling smoke, awful.

But the war on drugs dumbest aspect was the assault on pot.  Handle it like alcohol, its about as destructive and could raise a lot in taxes instead of being a wasted source of them.

A New York Times editorial agrees.

The think Obama should lead the way on it.

Doubtful.

But within a generation?  Almost certainly.

Late to the Party

But as ever Mr. Pierce had a pithy and brilliant denouement of Thanksgiving:

When you come right down to the bottom of the chafing dish, Thanksgiving is a holiday of great ambivalence. A day allegedly dedicated to thanking the great Whoever that enough white people survived the winter in Plymouth to kick off 300-odd years of continent-wide genocide. A day dedicated to celebrating the simple gifts that the great Whoever bestowed upon this land, yet one that we mark by going crazy over cheap, Chinese-slave-labor produced crap at 12:01 a.m. the very next morning. Also, too: the Detroit Lions. Sometimes, America is a very tough room.

Oh this should be good

Just four days away:

Senior judge Brian Leveson is set to announce by the end of November the findings of his dissection of the industry, which was prompted by a phone-hacking scandal at Rupert Murdoch's News of the World Sunday, a News Corp tabloid the media tycoon then shut down. Leveson is expected to recommend a new independent body with statutory powers over the press instead of the current system of self-regulation that the industry wants to retain.

A bad tradition like no other

For those of you who follow the sport most predominantly known as "football" this is old school bigotry:

A brutal attack in Rome on fans of the Tottenham Hotspurs soccer team, a London club with strong Jewish connections, has been blamed on anti-Semites. Ten fans were injured on Thursday, one seriously, when a gang of around 50 stormed a bar in the Italian capital, wielding baseball bats, knives and broken bottles before a Europa League match against Lazio, a Rome team. The assault was immediately linked to Lazio’s notoriously troublesome fans, the Ultras, although team officials denied its supporters were involved.

Unmentioned is that Lazio's 'Ultras' go back with a strong association with Facism. NOTE however, that the BBC says it was fans of A.S. Roma Lazio's biggest rival (though also with a history of facism). Some bad shit never changes.

Here's a cartoon you could have shared

With your Republican relatives last night.

See the rest here, it is brilliant.

Good for these folks

And good luck to them:

It’s on. A year and a half after retail workers announced the founding of a new Walmart employee group, five months after guest workers struck a Walmart seafood supplier, and seven weeks after the country’s first multi-store Walmart strikes, the Black Friday strike has begun. Walmart stores opened at 8 PM, drawing additional ire from employees required to come into work on Thanksgiving earlier than ever. But workers’ protests got off to an early start too. Around 7:30 PM EST, 30 workers from three Miami stores went on strike, joining 100-plus supporters for one of several nighttime rallies across the country. “It’s been so long that I’ve been working for people that had no respect for me,” Miami striker Elaine Rozier told The Nation. “They retaliated against me, and they always treated me like crap. And I’m so happy that this is history, that my grandkids can learn from this to stand up for themselves.” In the past, said Rozier, “I always used to sit back and not say anything…I’m proud of myself tonight.”

As she should be, now stay tuned for FoxNews to accuse them of engaging in a war on freedom and Christmas.

Happy Worst Holiday of Year

Hope everyone had as nice a Thanksgiving as you could...and that the screaming, yelling, and resentment were kept to a minimum.

Here's how to make sure

You ruin THEIR Thanksgiving for a change.


5 Things To Tell Your Republican Relatives At Thanksgiving Dinner

THIS is what he wants modified

Can't have sex without trying to make a baby; two dudes can never get it on; and women as Priests, EGAD no...but making Jesus into an old guy just like him...no problem.

"The calculation of the beginning of our calendar – based on the birth of Jesus – was made by Dionysius Exiguus, who made a mistake in his calculations by several years," the Pope writes in the book, which went on sale around the world with an initial print run of a million copies. 

"The actual date of Jesus's birth was several years before."

A "Model" for government

Almost single-handedly being the downfall of a major charitable organization that once had almost universal support sure would not look good on most resumes.

But in the world where depriving people of sex, science and medicine is considered a positive boon, it has the makings of either political candidate or FoxNews Contributor. 

And before you do the latter, you might as well try the former:

Karen Handel, the former Susan G. Komen for the Cure executive who drove the charity's attempt to defund Planned Parenthood, is considering running for U.S. Senate in Georgia, according to one of her former aides.

 And ONLY is such a world could this statement be considered marginally valid:

If she ran, she would be going up against Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-Ga.), whom Roll Call reported may be vulnerable to a primary challenge from the right, given his "willingness to reach across the aisle and his comfort with the idea of compromise."

I find it hard to believe

The Romney Campaign wasn't run by the same IT wizards that still have this up.

Like "Lincoln"

My Thanksgiving is going to end with a candle-flame transitioning to me giving a speech.

If you have seen "Lincoln" let me know if the ending didn't strike you as kind of off-puttingly hilarious.   Like Darth Vader's "NOOOOOOO" moment -- only with that it was the final denouement of a hilariously badly thought out trilogy of films, this was the "too schmaltzy" ending of a great movie -- how Spielbergian.

Should not keep anyone from seeing the movie, though, I liked it very much otherwise.  Very hard to make so much exposition interesting but it was done, in large part because of the performances -- Day Lewis pretty much has the Oscar already.

Just could have used a stronger editing in the finish.

Cannot help but notice

That on or about November 23rd FoxNews will start "War on Christmas" season (as mythical as Santa itself), while Thanksgiving is being taken away from millions of employees in the retail trade ACTUALLY DESTROYING THANKSGIVING.

But since it involves the proles having their holidays ruined they do not give a shit.

Is it the "Whitey Tape"?

Sorry still in Dean Chambers mode.

NASA's Mars rover Curiosity has apparently made a discovery "for the history books," but we'll have to wait a few weeks to learn what the new Red Planet find may be, media reports suggest. The discovery was made by Curiosity's Sample Analysis at Mars instrument, NPR reported today (Nov. 20). SAM is the rover's onboard chemistry lab, and it's capable of identifying organic compounds — the carbon-containing building blocks of life as we know it. SAM apparently spotted something interesting in a soil sample Curiosity's huge robotic arm delivered to the instrument recently. "This data is gonna be one for the history books," Curiosity chief scientist John Grotzinger, of Caltech in Pasadena, told NPR. "It's looking really good."

The Curiosity Rover would have picked up more info but its path was blocked by a large monolith...bah dum baaaaah!

Not so much a philosophy as a Cult

Having found that calling Nate Silver wrong ahead of time because he was "slight and effeminate" not the best idea in the world, the hilariously wrong Unskewed Polls Guy has after a period of inhalation of pork chops and tater-tots reflection begun a new way to proclaim he must not have been wrong (and yet another attempt to de-legitimize the black guy).

Barackofraudo.com

Naturally.

Well I guess there's a reason

Paul Krugman is a Nobel Prize winner   while I choked every year at regionals.

...today’s Republican party is an alliance between the plutocrats and the preachers, plus some opportunists along for the ride — full stop. The whole party is about low taxes at the top (and low benefits for the rest), plus conservative social values and putting religion in the schools; it has no other reason for being.

We're getting sooooooo close...

And apparently IT is going to happen when all is said and done.

BWAHAHAHAHAHA! And to toot my own horn (I'm soooooo lonely) SUCK ON THIS ONE NATE SILVER!

I suppose we'll just have to pretend this "might" happen

Rupert Murdoch, last heard from calling both Chris Christie and Jewish publishers traitors almost simultaneously must think a lot of his legal troubles from the phone-hacking scandal behind him. After all, he has started buying things again -- hoping to match the unqualified success of MySpace. But recent events have reawakened that old issue:

[bribery] charges brought against Rebekah Brooks, who ran Murdoch's newspaper holdings in Britain, Andy Coulson, former editor of the now defunct News of the World, and two other former News International employees exposes the parent News Corporation to possible action under the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. The FCPA exists to prosecute US-domiciled companies for acts of bribery and corruption that they might commit abroad.

Yeah, I'll pretend that might happen the same way I'll pretend Rupert did not become an American citizen for the sole purpose of ruining American journalism.

[cross-posted at Firedoglake]

Just another sign you chose wisely America

Mitt Romney could have picked this weekend to see y'know 'Lincoln' the movie where Republicans get to pretend they are progressive and awesome...while approaching their 150th anniversary of selling their souls (should be noted it took another 70 for the Democrats to find theirs).

Or he could have seen 'Skyfall' -- where they can pretend "M" is played by the head of the Morman Church and they marry every woman they sleep and or wrestle with, even Bambi and Thumper.

I'm ruling out 'Flight' because it involves the "alcohol" and another distinguished black guy.

But Mitt Romney...Sixty-fucking-Five year old Mitt Romney and his sister-wife Ann chose to see 'Twilight'...on its opening weekend.

Now I know somehow there's supposedly a Mormon-theme in the movie somewhere (are Mormon's sparkly?  I dunno, they never knock on my door when the Sun is out)

Team Mittens.

And what of the two-ply wetsuit?

Oh dear, super right-wing lawyer who's face is all up in your tolerance and gay marriage has a peculiar notion of what Jesus would do:

Biron is associated with the Alliance Defending Freedom, a group of lawyers who, according to their website, are committed to keeping “the door open for the spread of the Gospel” by advocating for “religious liberty, the sanctity of life, and marriage and family.” In Concord, she worked with the ADF in defending a Pentecostal Church on Mountain Road in its tax fight against the city.

Annnnnnndddddd.....

A Manchester lawyer took a teenage girl to Canada, had her engage in sexual activity and convinced her to let it be filmed, according to federal indictments.

FBI agents swiftly arrested Lisa Biron yesterday morning as she awaited a hearing on child pornography charges at Manchester’s district court. About 9 a.m. FBI agents entered the courtroom, told Biron to leave her belongings and took her into an adjoining conference room where she remained for several minutes before coming out in handcuffs.

...scene!

(via AmericaBlog)