Thursday Open Thread [2.20.14]

Filed in Open Thread by on February 20, 2014

An explanation of the Polar Vortex we have experienced during what we will now forever call “The Long Winter of 2014.” And then here is another video of one of the mistakes FDR made during his Presidency: the Japanese Internment, which began by Executive Order 72 years ago yesterday. Actor and activist George Takei was a victim of the internment and he offers his thoughts to Lawrence O’Donnell.

George Takei is definitely one of those people that I will stop whatever I am doing and listen to whatever he is saying.

So, now that Governor Chris Christie has been destroyed as a credible Presidential candidate in 2016, some in the GOP have turned their lonely eyes to Governor Scott Walker of Wisconsin (R). Walker is a golden boy in the GOP hive mind for talking on the public sector unions and winning, and then surviving a recall, but I have never pictured him as a viable presidential candidate for one very important reason: he has what I call a permanent Eli Manning Face. You know that face, right?

You look at him and you hear the word “Duh.” See?

Walker

Protests Continue As Wisconsin Budget Impasse Drags On

Well, Mr. Walker, like Mr. Christie, has an email problem.

Over 25,000 pages of emails, released by a state court, that were collected during an investigation into whether Walker aides conducted political activity on the government’s dime. One of the emails, first spotted by BuzzFeed’s Evan McMorris-Santoro, contains a message titled, appropriately, “THE NIGHTMARE.”

THE NIGHTMARE, reproduced in full below, was forwarded in 2010 by Thomas Nardelli, who was Walker’s chief-of-staff when he served as Milwaukee County Executive, to an undisclosed number of recipients, including Walker’s deputy chief-of-staff, Kelly Rindfleisch. […]

Here’s the email:

THE NIGHTMARE

In the nightmare I found myself nude in bed, and I was looking at a mirror on the ceiling, and I discovered that I am a Negro, and I’m circumcised! Quickly I sat up, found my pants and looked in the pockets to find my driver’s license photo and it was that same color, black.

I felt myself being very depressed, downcast, sitting in a chair. But it’s a wheelchair! That means, of course, besides being black and Jewish, I’m also disabled! I said to myself, aloud “This is impossible! It’s impossible that I should be black and Jewish and disabled!” “It’s the pure and holy truth,” whispers someone from behind me. I turn around, and it’s my boyfriend.

Just what I needed!!! I am a homosexual, and on top of that, with a Mexican boyfriend.

Oh, my God …. Black, Jewish, disabled, gay with a Mexican boyfriend, drug addict, and HIV-positive!!!

Desperate, I begin to shout, cry, pull my hair, and Oh, nooooo…I’m bald!!!

The telephone rings. it’s my brother. He is saying, ‘Since mom and dad died, the only thing you do is hang out, take drugs, and laze around all day doing nothing. Get a job, you worthless piece of crap… Any job!’

Mom? Dad? Nooooo … Now I’m also an unemployed orphan! I try to explain to my brother how hard it is to find a job when you are black, Jewish, disabled, gay with a Mexican boyfriend, are a drug addict, HIV positive, bald, and an orphan, but he doesn’t get it.

Frustrated, I hang up. It’s then I realize I only have one hand!!! With tears in my eyes, I go to the window to look out. I see I live in a shanty-town full of cardboard and tin houses! There is trash everywhere.

Suddenly I feel a sharp pain near my pacemaker…. Pacemaker??

Besides being black, Jewish, disabled, a fairy with a Mexican boyfriend, a drug addict, HIV positive, bald, orphaned, unemployed, an invalid with one hand, and having a bad heart, I live in a crappy neighborhood.

At that very moment my boyfriend approaches and says to me, ‘Sweetie pie, my love, my little black heartthrob, have you decided what you are going to wear to Washington to see Obama?’

Say it isn’t so!!! I can handle being a black, disabled, one-armed, drug-addicted, Jewish homosexual on a pacemaker who is HIV positive, bald, orphaned, unemployed, lives in a slum, and has a Mexican boyfriend, but please, Oh dear God, please don’t tell me I’m a Democrat!

To quote one of the commenters on the Gawker article:

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  1. SussexWatcher says:

    Has anyone noticed how the AG’s website is suddenly featuring multiple photos of Beau out & about? I guess a snapshot means more than actually answering concrete questions about what’s wrong with his brain.

  2. rustydils says:

    I may have missed the general election, but, contrary to what all you guys thought, I did get the 2012 republican nominee correct from the beginning. My point being, don’t waste your energy bad mouthing Scott Walker, he has zero chance of being the Republican nominee.

    Almost 50 years ago, The speech
    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qXBswFfh6AY

    If you want to try and understand why conservatives think like they do, (And I doubt you want to really understand us), watch “The Speech” in its entirety, you will get a pretty good understanding of how we actually feel.

  3. Aoine says:

    That awkward moment when you are watching All In with Chris Hayes, and the Rebublican Nebraska Governor Haneman, that handed over Nebraska lands to the XL pipeline, is being drubbed by the shows host…..

    And then, roll tape…….who IS that smiling man with the NE Gov that allowed a Canadian private company power over US lands ………oh CRAP

    it’s our Governor…….Jack Markell, smiling and chummy…….

    A.W.K.W.A.R.D M.O.M.E.N.T

    Doesn’t mean our gov agrees with it……just…..embarrassing for a deep blue state.

    ALL IN, with Chris Hayes. At about 40-47 minutes in of the 2/20/14 show

    SIGH,……..

  4. Jim Center says:

    Anyone else watching House of Cards on Netflix? Riveting! Watched the first season(13 episodes) over the last four days.
    Just saw the opening episode of Season 2. OMG
    I’d like to believe it is just fiction, but I have to wonder…