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My head hurts

Talk about culture wars cognitive dissonance. No matter your political leanings, there’s something in this story to make your head explode. A man born a woman was fired for not being man from his $10/hour job at a drug treatment center watching people pee into cups for drug tests. He’s suing his former employer on the grounds of “gender-identity discrimination,”…

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Hating the Lovers

Speaking of issues I thought we had long since decided (like slavery, segregation, suffrage, medicinal bleeding, etc.), a poll found a plurality of Mississippi Republicans believe interracial marriage should be illegal. Forty-six percent oppose, 40 percent support, and 14% are “undecided” (as if they’ve weighed the pros and cons of this timely issue, but still need a few more days…

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Ken Jefferson for Jacksonville Sheriff

Ken Jefferson of Jacksonville, Florida, that is. Now I’ve never met Ken Jefferson and I’ve never been to Jacksonville, but I did get this email from a professor at Florida State College at Jacksonville: I thought you might like this story from my class, an Intro to Communication Class. The context is students are presenting brief plans for change and…

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NPR Video

I love NPR. And if I didn’t live in a big city, I’d be more passionate about cutting federal support for what is truly an essential public service in small-town and rural American (public radio is essential here in New York City, too–but it would survive just OK without federal funding). This is from Glen Beck’s website: an analysis of…

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Class War? Bring it on!

Or why we don’t need to and shouldn’t cut spending. Let’s compare at “programs at risk” and “tax breaks for the wealthy”: I can’t vouch for the numbers, but they seem reasonable.

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Our Socialized Health Care

From Tom Scocca at Slate. The column is actually about the debt and David Brooks. Scocca questions whether the debt is really “the” central moral challenge of our time: “Maybe I was distracted and missed the day we let all the young black men back out of prison. (How are they doing? They must feel great now.)” But I particularly…

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Our Worst Justice

From an LA Timescolumn by Jonathan Turley: “Clarence Thomas insisted that his wife was being attacked because she believes in the same things he does and because they were ‘focused on defending liberty.’” Wow. I like liberty. Why all the brouhaha? Thomas reported “none” in answering specific questions about “spousal non-investment income” on annual forms. … In truth she had…

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The Problem With King

Peter King sees nothing wrong with the hearings he’s holding on Muslim radicalization in America. I can’t imagine anything productive or less radical coming from these hearings. But my main objection–even fear–is that these hearings will allow the next terrorist attempt to be successful, thus “proving” their point, and creating a horrible vicious cycle. How are these hearings dangerous? Because,…

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Brokeback Marijuana

It amazes me that all those rugged western cowboy can get all Big State when it comes to drugs (actually, nothing really amazes me in the war on the drugs). The headline reads: In Montana, an Economic Boom Faces Repeal Effort. Really? Because you’d think they wouldn’t be in a position to shut down money-making agriculture. A resurgent Republican majority…

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This is America

Hopefully just a very small part of it. Shame on us. I try not and make the Nazi comparison lightly, but people, this is American fascism. You know you’re a fascist when: You wrap yourself in an American flag to call another group of Americans terrorists, killers, and pure evil. You wish another group of Americans an early death for…

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