Month: May 2014

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Our Daily Thread 5+9=14

Good Morning!

Today’s header photo is from Cheryl.

This one is from Kim.

cropped-kim-fish-river.jpg

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On this day in 1502 Christopher Columbus left Spain for his final trip to the Western Hemisphere. 

In 1926 Americans Richard Byrd and Floyd Bennett became the first men to fly an airplane over the North Pole. 

In 1960 the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved for sale an oral birth-control pill for the first time. 

And in 1996, in video testimony to a courtroom in Little Rock, AR, U.S. President Clinton insisted that he had nothing to do with a $300,000 loan in the criminal case against his former Whitewater partners. 

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Quote of the Day

“If you would be loved, love, and be lovable.”

Benjamin Franklin

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Today is Hank Snow’s birthday.

And it’s Tom Peterson’s. So Cheap Trick covering Elvis.

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Anyone have a QoD?

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Prayer Requests 5-9-14

Anyone have a request or praise to share?

And it’s Friday, so please remember the folks at The Nest.

Psalm 101

¹ I will sing of mercy and judgment: unto thee, O Lord, will I sing.

2 I will behave myself wisely in a perfect way. O when wilt thou come unto me? I will walk within my house with a perfect heart.

3 I will set no wicked thing before mine eyes: I hate the work of them that turn aside; it shall not cleave to me.

4 A froward heart shall depart from me: I will not know a wicked person.

5 Whoso privily slandereth his neighbour, him will I cut off: him that hath an high look and a proud heart will not I suffer.

6 Mine eyes shall be upon the faithful of the land, that they may dwell with me: he that walketh in a perfect way, he shall serve me.

7 He that worketh deceit shall not dwell within my house: he that telleth lies shall not tarry in my sight.

8 I will early destroy all the wicked of the land; that I may cut off all wicked doers from the city of the Lord.

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News/Politics 5-9-14

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. While the kidnapping of hundreds of schoolgirls has drawn the world’s attention, Boko Haram continues to commit their bloody rampages. This is now 450 victims in the last week, in addition to the girls.

And now we learn that once again, Obama and Hillary refused to call them what they are, or to pursue them, for political purposes.

From TheDailyBeast  “Under Hillary Clinton, the State Department repeatedly declined to fully go after the terror group responsible for kidnapping hundreds of girls.

The State Department under Hillary Clinton fought hard against placing the al Qaeda-linked militant group Boko Haram on its official list of foreign terrorist organizations for two years. And now, lawmakers and former U.S. officials are saying that the decision may have hampered the American government’s ability to confront the Nigerian group that shocked the world by abducting hundreds of innocent girls.

In the past week, Clinton, who made protecting women and girls a key pillar of her tenure at the State Department, has been a vocal advocate for the 200 Nigerian girls kidnapped by Boko Haram, the loosely organized group of militants terrorizing northern Nigeria. Her May 4 tweet about the girls, using the hashtag #BringBackOurGirls, was cited across the media and widely credited for raising awareness of their plight.”

Yeah, widely credit by the media who seek to provide cover for her for not doing her job in the first place.

More here on their latest brazen attack on those hunting them, and the innocent bystanders who got in the way. From CNN

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And we now know that Boko Haram is armed with weapons from Libya. They have them because of yet another failure of the Obama/Clinton foreign policy strategy, or lack there of.

From CommentaryMag  “The Bama attack showed their [Boko Haram’s] substantial firepower, including machine guns, large numbers of rocket propelled grenades (RPGs) and pick-up trucks mounted with anti-aircraft guns, a sign the weapons flood from the Libyan war that helped rebels seize parts of Mali last year has reached Nigeria, officials say.

Let this be a miserable lesson in the dangers of foreign-policy ambivalence. The Obama administration was dragged kicking and screaming into Libya and refused to take the necessary steps to secure the regime’s weapons after Gaddafi was gone. This “light footprint” approach was praised by many as a low-risk “new model” for American military action. But in reality it was just world-policing on the cheap. The results speak for themselves. We can either fight terrorism or we can watch it advance and offer our remorse after the fact.”

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Kerry has chimed in as well. Of course he continues with the Obama policy of refusing to acknowledge the elephant in the room. While poverty plays a roll, it’s not the motivation of the leaders of Boko Haram or Al-Qaeda.

From CNSNews  “Secretary of State John Kerry on Wednesday underlined the issue of poverty as a recruitment tool for extremist groups like Boko Haram, although analysts and Nigerian officials have for months been reporting that the organization is forcibly conscripting civilians, including children, into its ranks.”

“Kerry’s comments on poverty as a key factor follows others by State Department officials in recent years, focusing on socio-economic issues rather than the religious element when discussing Boko Haram.

“It is important to note that religion is not the primary driver behind extremist violence in Nigeria,” then-assistant secretary of state for African affairs Johnnie Carson told a Senate committee in March 2012. He said Boko Haram “attempts to exploit the legitimate grievances of northern populations to garner recruits and public sympathy.”

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2. Not shocking.

From USAToday  “The Obama administration continues to withhold documents that could shed light on how U.S. officials produced its false narrative that the attack on the U.S. Consulate in Benghazi arose from a non-existent protest over a video, according to a conservative watchdog group.

The documents reveal “that the Obama administration is still refusing to provide the full details of how top officials arrived at the now-discredited talking points released to the public following the deadly assault on the U.S. Mission in Benghazi, Libya,” Judicial Watch said in a statement.

“Though the State Department document repeatedly describes the material as ‘Unclassified’ or ‘Sensitive But Unclassified,’ it nonetheless justifies scores of extensive redactions and exemptions,” the statement said.”

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3. But…but…. it’s a consensus.

From ClimateDepot  “’600 page litany of doom’: Weather Channel Co-Founder John Coleman slams Federal climate report: A ‘total distortion of the data and agenda driven, destructive episode of bad science gone berserk’

“ Coleman: ‘When the temperature data could no longer be bent to support global warming, they switched to climate change and now blame every weather and climate event on CO2 despite the hard, cold fact that the “radiative forcing” theory they built their claims on has totally failed to verify.’

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Our Daily Thread 5-8-14

Good Morning!

Today’s header photo is from Janice.

On this day in 1541 Hernando de Soto reached the Mississippi River. He called it Rio de Espiritu Santo.

In 1914 the U.S. Congress passed a Joint Resolution that designated the second Sunday in May as Mother’s Day.  

In 1933 Gandhi began a hunger strike to protest British oppression in India. 

In 1956 Alfred E. Neuman appeared on the cover of “Mad Magazine” for the first time. 

And in 1973 militant American Indians who had held the South Dakota hamlet of Wounded Knee for 10 weeks surrendered. 

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Quote of the Day

“You want a friend in Washington?

Get a dog.”

Harry S. Truman

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 Today is Bob Herdman’s birthday.

And it’s Chris Frantz’s too.

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Anyone have a QoD?

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Prayer Requests 5-8-14

Who has a request or praise they’d like to share?

And it’s Thursday, so don’t forget Jo and the folks in PNG.

Psalm 100

¹Make a joyful noise unto the Lord, all ye lands.

2 Serve the Lord with gladness: come before his presence with singing.

3 Know ye that the Lord he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture.

4 Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name.

5 For the Lord is good; his mercy is everlasting; and his truth endureth to all generations.

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News/Politics 5-8-14

What’s interesting in the news today?

1. Ted Cruz and the definitive list of Obama’s 76 lawless actions. Not surprising. As today’s news shows, everything this administration does has an element of fraud involved.

From TheDailyCaller  “Republican Sen. Ted Cruz released a definitive list Wednesday of 76 “lawless” Obama administration actions and abuses of power.

Cruz’s “The Legal Limit Report No. 4,” obtained by The Daily Caller, delves into little-known and little-reported details of President Obama’s executive actions. Cruz was set to discuss his report at the Federalist Society in the Promenade Ballroom of the Mayflower Hotel in Washington at 2:15 PM Wednesday.

“Of all the troubling aspects of the Obama presidency, none is more dangerous than the President’s persistent pattern of lawlessness, his willingness to disregard the written law and instead enforce his own policies via executive fiat,” Cruz stated in the report’s introductory remarks.

“President Obama has openly defied [rule of law] by repeatedly suspending, delaying, and waiving portions of the laws that he is charged to enforce. When President Obama disagreed with federal immigration laws, he instructed the Justice Department to cease enforcing the laws. He did the same thing with federal welfare law, drug laws, and the federal Defense of Marriage Act,” Cruz wrote. “In the more than two centuries of our nation’s history, there is simply no precedent for the White House wantonly ignoring federal law and asking others to do the same.”

You can read the entire list at the link. It speaks for itself, and he more than makes his case.

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2. Will they lock her up if that’s what it takes to get answers from her?

From RollCall  “Deep in the recesses of congressional power — and in precedent stretching back to the 18th century — is the ability to pursue “inherent contempt” against individuals, including the right to imprison a person in the Capitol to compel compliance with lawmakers’ authority.

Congress hasn’t exercised inherent contempt power since 1935 and there’s no suggestion that lawmakers are actively considering the option in Lerner’s case.

But House attorneys, and lawyers for the former Internal Revenue Service official, are looking at the potential legal paths as House leaders consider first whether to take a contempt citation to the floor and, if it passes, whether the Justice Department will pursue prosecution.

The House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform voted on party lines to recommend the full House hold Lerner in contempt and refer her to the Justice Department for refusing to testify before the committee on allegations of political targeting at the IRS of conservative political groups seeking tax-exempt status. The GOP members said Lerner, who resigned from the IRS last year under fire for her role as the head of the office at the heart of the controversy, waived her Fifth Amendment privilege by delivering an opening statement declaring her innocence before the panel last year.”

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3. Of course they are. After all, nobody’s been held responsible for the IRS scandal, so why would they fear scrutiny of yet another potential scandal blatantly targeting their political enemies?

From TheWashingtonExaminer  “Government officials, reacting to the growing voice of conservative news outlets, especially on the internet, are angling to curtail the media’s exemption from federal election laws governing political organizations, a potentially chilling intervention that the chairman of the Federal Election Commission is vowing to fight.

“I think that there are impulses in the government every day to second guess and look into the editorial decisions of conservative publishers,” warned Federal Election Commission Chairman Lee E. Goodman in an interview.

“The right has begun to break the left’s media monopoly, particularly through new media outlets like the internet, and I sense that some on the left are starting to rethink the breadth of the media exemption and internet communications,” he added.

Noting the success of sites like the Drudge Report, Goodman said that protecting conservative media, especially those on the internet, “matters to me because I see the future going to the democratization of media largely through the internet. They can compete with the big boys now, and I have seen storm clouds that the second you start to regulate them, there is at least the possibility or indeed proclivity for selective enforcement, so we need to keep the media free and the internet free.”

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4. Told you the ObamaCare numbers were just more fuzzy math. And fraud. Lots of fraud.

From Rare.US  “In a House Energy and Commerce Oversight and Investigations subcommittee hearing this morning, a major health insurance trade association representative testified that the administration is reporting inflated enrollment numbers.”

According to their testimony:

“Duplicate enrollments: Because of the challenges that surfaced with the launch of the Exchanges in October 2013, some consumers were advised to create a new account and enroll again. As a result, insurers have many duplicate enrollments in their system for which they never received any payment. In cases where an insurer has a new enrollment for a consumer who previously enrolled, they are not expecting that original policy to be effectuated – even though that data is still reported.”

In other words, due to website glitches, some individuals may have enrolled multiple times. In these cases, the government may count all of these enrollments toward the total enrollment number. The insurer, knowing that the individual enrolled multiple times, will count that individual as having paid.”

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5. I guess this is to replace the operation they had running in Benghazi. They’re goin’ legit this time.

From TheLongWarJournal  “While the opposition Syrian National Coalition, headed by Ahmad Jarba, has been meeting with US officials this week in Washington in an effort to secure further support, including more funding and additional antitank and antiaircraft weapons, news from Syria indicates that some advanced US-made weapons are already being used in various Syrian provinces by rebel fighters.

Over the past few weeks, media reports have stressed that US officials have begun a “pilot program” of providing small quantities of advanced weapons, including TOW missiles, to vetted “moderate” groups, and specifically the Harakat Hazm, which fights in a newly formed coalition called the Southern Front. [See Threat Matrix, The shadowy flow of US weapons into Syria.]

As we at LWJ have pointed out, however, alliances and accommodations between the so-called ‘moderate’ rebel groups and the Islamists have made it very difficult for outside backers of the Syrian opposition to ensure that weapons and other aid provided does not end up in the hands of the Islamists, who dominate the battlefields. [See Threat Matrix, Southern Front tries to disassociate itself from Al Nusrah, which illustrates that an increasing number of reports from ‘moderate’ commanders claiming independence from Islamist groups such as Al Nusrah appear to be concocted in order to secure the provision of more weapons and funding from the West.]

Yesterday the opposition activist group Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported that the Islamic Front, a large coalition of mainly Islamist fighting groups, was using US TOW missiles in clashes in Aleppo against the forces of President Bashar al Assad and allies. According to SOHR, the Islamic Front (which it refers to as “Islamic battalions”) employed the weapons in Aleppo’s Al Sheik Najjar area and near Al Brej, and possibly near the air force intelligence building in Al Zahraa district as well.”

What could possibly go wrong? I’m sure it’s OK, they vetted ’em and they’re all like totally moderate, or something. 🙄

As if such a simple Jedi mind trick will make us forget we’re arming the bad guys.

These aren’t the droids Al-Qaeda you’re looking for. 🙄

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6. Not shocking. And remember, they’re independent and they’re like totally unbiased professionals. It’s true, I think they were vetted by the same people as the “moderates” above, so you know you can trust ’em. 🙄

From TheWashPost  “A majority of American journalists identify themselves as political independents although among those who choose a side Democrats outnumber Republicans four to one, according to a new study of the media conducted by two Indiana University professors.

Write Lars Wilnat and David Weaver, professors of journalism at Indiana, of their findings:

Compared with 2002, the percentage of full-time U.S. journalists who claim to be Democrats has dropped 8 percentage points in 2013 to about 28 percent, moving this figure closer to the overall population percentage of 30 percent, according to a December 12-15, 2013, ABC News/Washington Post national poll of 1,005 adults. This is the lowest percentage of journalists saying they are Democrats since 1971. An even larger drop was observed among journalists who said they were Republicans in 2013 (7.1 percent) than in 2002 (18 percent), but the 2013 figure is still notably lower than the percentage of U.S. adults who identified with the Republican Party (24 percent according to the poll mentioned above).”

“Over the last several decades, three things have happened: 1) The number of Democratic-identifying reporters increased steadily prior to a significant drop in the latest survey 2) The number of Republicans has steadily shrunk with that number dipping into single digits for the first time ever in the new survey c) more and more reporters are identifying as independents.  What seems to be happening — at least in the last decade – is that journalists are leaving both parties, finding themselves more comfortable as unaffiliateds.”

Independent. Sure. 🙄

Regardless of self identified party label, liberal is more accurate. Just like the college professors teaching at most of today’s journalism schools.

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Our Daily Thread 5-7-14

Good Morning!

On this day in 1429 the English siege of Orleans was broken by Joan of Arc. 

In 1800 the U.S. Congress divided the Northwest Territory into two parts. The western part became the Indiana Territory and the eastern section remained the Northwest Territory. 

In 1942, in the Battle of the Coral Sea, Japanese and American navies attacked each other with carrier planes. It was the first time in the history of naval warfare where two enemy fleets fought without seeing each other. 

In 1954 the United States and the United Kingdom rejected the Soviet Union’s bid to join NATO.

And in 1984 a $180 million out-of-court settlement was announced in the Agent Orange class-action suit brought by Vietnam veterans who claimed they had suffered injury from exposure to the defoliant while serving in the armed forces. 

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Quote of the Day

“Without craftsmanship, inspiration is a mere reed shaken in the wind.”

Johannes Brahms

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Today is composer Johannes Brahms’ birthday. Here’s an excellent rendition of “Intermezzo” from CBC Music

And it’s also Pyotr Ilich Tchaikovsky’s. So it’s “Waltz of the Flowers” from The Nutcracker, via Berliner Philharmoniker

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Anyone have a QoD?

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Prayer Requests 5-7-14

Anyone have a request or praise to share?

And today is Wednesday, so don’t forget The Gambia and our missionary friend who’s preparing for her trip back to the US.

Also, if you would be so kind, my wife has an interview today for another job within the company she works for. If you wouldn’t mind, could you pray for her too?

Thanks. 🙂

Psalm 99

¹The Lord reigneth; let the people tremble: he sitteth between the cherubims; let the earth be moved.

2 The Lord is great in Zion; and he is high above all the people.

3 Let them praise thy great and terrible name; for it is holy.

4 The king’s strength also loveth judgment; thou dost establish equity, thou executest judgment and righteousness in Jacob.

5 Exalt ye the Lord our God, and worship at his footstool; for he is holy.

6 Moses and Aaron among his priests, and Samuel among them that call upon his name; they called upon the Lord, and he answered them.

7 He spake unto them in the cloudy pillar: they kept his testimonies, and the ordinance that he gave them.

8 Thou answeredst them, O Lord our God: thou wast a God that forgavest them, though thou tookest vengeance of their inventions.

9 Exalt the Lord our God, and worship at his holy hill; for the Lord our God is holy.

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News/Politics 5-7-14

What’s interesting in the news today?

Open Thread, with a few from me to start off.

1. Sounds like another Summer of Recovery….. 🙄

From TheWashPost  “The American economy is less entrepreneurial now than at any point in the last three decades. That’s the conclusion of a new study out from the Brookings Institution, which looks at the rates of new business creation and destruction since 1978.

Not only that, but during the most recent three years of the study — 2009, 2010 and 2011 — businesses were collapsing faster than they were being formed, a first. Overall, new businesses creation (measured as the share of all businesses less than one year old) declined by about half from 1978 to 2011.”

“The authors don’t mince words about the stakes here: If the decline persists, “it implies a continuation of slow growth for the indefinite future.” This lack of economic dynamism, particularly the steep drop since 2006, may be one reason why our current recovery has felt like much less than a recovery. As Matt O’Brien noted on Wonkblog last week, annual job growth rates have stubbornly refused to budge above 2 percent for the duration of the recovery.”

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2. The Obama admin isn’t just obstructing Congressional investigations. Looks like Inspector Generals are being obstructed as well.

From HotAir  “Remember the bizarre case of John C. Beale? Last year, it was finally revealed that the former high-level Environmental Protection Agency employee managed to defraud the federal government of almost a million dollars over the course of twelve years while doing almost no work, and then excusing his many absences by claiming that he was jetting off on secret climate-change-related business in conjunction with the CIA, followed by a fake retirement party. Much to the EPA’s chagrin, federal watchdogs were not filled with confidence in either our sprawling bureaucracy generally or the EPA’s power-grabbing/obfuscating tendencies specifically, and began an investigation into the lack of internal controls that allowed the guy to fly under the radar for so long; then in February, the EPA inspector general wrote a letter to Sen. David Vitter informing him that several EPA employees were actively getting in the way of the IG’s investigations thereof. This afternoon, the Associated Press just dropped another bomb on those inauspicious EPA activities:

A unit run by President Barack Obama’s political staff inside the Environmental Protection Agency operates illegally as a “rogue law enforcement agency” that has blocked independent investigations by the EPA’s inspector general for years, a top investigator says.

The assistant EPA inspector general for investigations, Patrick Sullivan, was expected to testify Wednesday before a House oversight committee about the activities of the EPA’s little-known Office of Homeland Security. The office is overseen by EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy’s chief of staff, and the inspector general’s office is accusing it of impeding independent investigations into employee misconduct, computer security and external threats, including compelling employees involved in cases to sign non-disclosure agreements.

“Under the heavy cloak of `national security,’ the Office of Homeland Security has repeatedly rebuffed and refused to cooperate with the OIG’s ongoing requests for information or cooperation,” Sullivan wrote in prepared testimony obtained by The Associated Press. “This block unquestionably has hamstrung the Office of Inspector General’s ability to carry out its statutory mandate to investigate wrongdoing of EPA employees.” …

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3. What Floyd Mayweather tells us about manhood and abortion.

From TheFederalist  “Recently Floyd Mayweather publicly broadcast his sadness that his ex-fiancé had aborted his unborn twins. While I know little of the back-and-forth gossip going on here, my heart broke for this man. There was something about a man whom I only knew as a boxer, speaking out in defense of his children, that got to me. Was it personal business? Yes. Was airing it in public not the best option? Probably true. Is it right not to involve a man in a decision like this? No.

A boxer standing in opposition to “killing babies” is an apt metaphor. Men, while capable of brutish violence, channel that effort best into protection of others. Men at their most heroic save lives, fight wars, die for their country, or even patiently smile through tea parties with their daughters. The boy inside the man has always wanted to do right. That is, until women told them that they don’t need their help, their opinion, their love, their care, or protection.   From “don’t hold that door” to “don’t think you deserve to be a part of your child’s life,” the message is clear. Go away.

Women lament very often that men have changed, wondering, “Where have all the good men gone?” They falsely attribute it to women outpacing men in education or moving into the workplace. Notice, despite a long period of economic success by men, there never once was a movement to tell women they weren’t needed. Even when they joke, men realize they know better.“

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Our Daily Thread 5-6-14

Good Morning!

On this day in 1527 German troops began sacking Rome, bringing about the end of the Renaissance. 

In 1877 Chief Crazy Horse surrendered to U.S. troops in Nebraska. 

In 1889 the Universal Exposition opened in Paris, France, marking the dedication of the Eiffel Tower. Also at the exposition was the first automobile in Paris, the Mercedes-Benz. 

In 1941 Bob Hope gave his first USO show at California’s March Field. 

And in 1999 a parole board in New York voted to release Amy Fisher. She had been in jail for 7 years for shooting her lover’s wife, Mary Jo Buttafuoco, in the face. 

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Quote of the Day

“Popularity should be no scale for the election of politicians. If it would depend on popularity, Donald Duck and The Muppets would take seats in the Senate.”

Orson Welles

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Today is Heinrich Wilhelm Ernst’s birthday.

And it’s Bob Seger’s.

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Anyone have a QoD?