RandySF
RandySF's JournalOfficial wants to de-fund library, users should 'go back to Mexico'
Library funding in Lafourche Parish, Louisiana, may be diverted to a new jail thanks to a legislator who doesn't approve of the library's programs. Jail proponent and chair of the Lafourche Parish Council Lindel Toups supports a ballot measure that would take funding away from libraries.
“They’re teaching Mexicans how to speak English,” Toups told the local Tri-Parish Times, referencing Biblioteca Hispana, a Spanish-language section of one of the nine branch libraries. “Let that son of a bitch go back to Mexico. There’s just so many things they’re doing that I don’t agree with. ... Them junkies and hippies and food stamps [recipients] and all, they use the library to look at drugs and food stamps [on the Internet]. I see them do it.”
"We are here to serve all of the residents of Lafourche Parish," Library System Director Laura Sanders told the Los Angeles Times. "It doesn't matter what ethnicity they are -- we serve them all."
The parish -- Louisiana's equivalent of a county -- holds a ballot election Saturday over the issue; residents will vote on whether a portion of property tax dollars allocated to the libraries should instead be used for a new jail. EveryLibrary, a nonprofit organization supporting libraries nationwide, calls it "the worst library election in the country."
http://www.latimes.com/books/jacketcopy/la-et-jc-library-users-should-go-back-to-mexico-says-official-who-wants-to-divert-library-funds-to-jails-20131114,0,7474904.story#axzz2kgma5F99
Batkid rescues grateful San Francisco damsel, pursues Penguin
By day, he’s just a 5-year-old boy from Northern California. But when the city needs a hero, he becomes the Batkid.
And today is one of those days. The Riddler and the Penguin are terrorizing San Francisco, in a nefarious plot hatched by the Make-A-Wish Foundation.
The group has also converted two black Lamborghinis into Batmobiles to escort Batkid around the city as he battles the forces of evil. Along the way, he’ll be guided by dispatches from Police Chief Greg Suhr and cheered on by at least 12,000 grateful citizens.
“We have done other superhero wishes before at Make-A-Wish, and no city has embraced it like this one,” Patricia Wilson, the foundation’s director for the Bay Area, told the San Francisco Chronicle.
The Chronicle loaned out its presses for a special edition, the Gotham City Chronicle, with a front-page story by Clark Kent. (Reprints will be available in Saturday’s regular edition.) Batkid is also being aided in escapades by the San Francisco Giants, the municipal government, a social-media consultancy, and what seems like most of the city.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/liveblog/wp/2013/11/15/batkid-rescues-grateful-san-francisco-from-riddler-penguin/
Former Bush Officials Eagerly Compare Obamacare Rollout To Hurricane Katrina
When it comes to the bungled rollout of the Affordable Care Act, former George W. Bush officials insist they've seen this movie before. In fact, they had a front row seat.
"There are moments in a presidency where everything is different afterward and I believe this is that moment," former Bush communications adviser Nicolle Wallace said Friday on MSNBC's "Morning Joe." "For us, it was Hurricane Katrina because while public support had been dropping for the war in Iraq, after Katrina, after many members of the public and every member of the Democratic Party viewed us as incompetent and it transcended to everything else we did.
"You know, you can't look in a crystal ball but I believe this is a moment after which everything will be different for the President," Wallace added. "And if you look at the problems he's facing in the world, with Iran and other issues, he's going to miss his credibility very much."
Can President Obama reclaim that credibility, host Joe Scarborough asked Wallace.
"Among large numbers of the public, no," she said.
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/livewire/former-bush-officials-eagerly-compare-obamacare-rollout-to-katrina
Gov. Jay Nixon says he supports legalizing gay marriage
Gov. Jay Nixon said Thursday that he supports legalizing gay marriage in Missouri during a news conference announcing that homosexual couples married under the laws of other states would be allowed to file combined state tax returns.
In an executive order, Nixon directed the Department of Revenue to accept the combined returns as a reaction to the June ruling from the U.S. Supreme Court striking down the federal Defense of Marriage Act. That law barred same sex couples who were legally married from receiving any marriage-based federal benefits, such as tax exemptions and Social Security payments.
Under state law, couples who file a joint federal return are required to file a combined state tax return. The executive order clarifies that the law applies to all couples, Nixon said.
The executive order does not alter state restrictions on same-sex marriages, Nixon said. Those marriages are banned under the Missouri Constitution. “This is not about the definition of marriage, this is about the structure of our tax code and Missouri law, which is clear,” Nixon said.
http://www.columbiatribune.com/news/local/gov-jay-nixon-says-he-supports-legalizing-gay-marriage/article_6c271bde-4d72-11e3-92c7-001a4bcf6878.html
Hawaii judge upholds state's new gay marriage law
HONOLULU (AP) — A Hawaii judge on Thursday ruled the state's brand new gay marriage law is legal, despite a challenge saying voters thought they barred same-sex marriage 15 years ago in the state constitution.
Hawaii Circuit Court Judge Karl Sakamoto said the 1998 amendment didn't force the Legislature to define marriage as between a man and a woman. Sakamoto says it doesn't factor into lawmakers' ability to allow gay couples to wed.
"Same-sex marriage in Hawaii is legal," Sakamoto ruled after hearing arguments for more than an hour from the state attorney general and a Republican lawmaker who voted against the bill in the House last week.
The challenge brought by Rep. Bob McDermott was an attempt to block the state from enacting the new law, signed Wednesday by Gov. Neil Abercrombie. The measure allows the state health department to begin issuing licenses to same-sex couples Dec. 2. Ceremonies can begin the same day.
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2013/11/14/hawaii-judge-upholds-states-new-gay-marriage-law/3541963/
Great article about VA and what it means for 2014.
MIND THE POLITICAL INTELLIGENCE GAP. Democrats’ growing use of voter files, histories and other data in their campaign polling, and the persistence of Republican and publicly available polls that don’t, means we may face an outbreak of races in 2014 in which the results diverge from conventional wisdom as they did in Virginia.
In the grand scheme of things, Governor-elect Terry McAuliffe’s “surprisingly close” win doesn’t really affect Democrats. Speculation about a landslide win and headlines about a “stench of death” enveloping GOP opponent Ken Cuccinelli made Team Macker nervous about overconfident supporters not turning out, and they had to spend the post-election week explaining their methods instead of just reveling in their win. Altogether, a small price to pay for staring at a two-point race heading into Election Day with no one else knowing about it.
It matters a heck of a lot for Republicans, who once again—as in the 2012 presidential race—had less of a grasp on the true state of a critical race. We approached a few operatives for this column but they were reluctant to talk in the midst of their own post-mortem. And for purposes of this column, it matters for a political media complex that, with every passing cycle, moves further away from covering races and closer to just trying to predict outcomes.
For anyone who missed HuffPollster’s excellent deep dives into what happened in Virginia, the issue with the public polling is that many don’t account for the fact that a respondent’s enthusiasm for a particular candidate at the particular time of the poll might affect his or her willingness to take part in the poll at all. In other words, the likely voter screens used in public polls may happen too late in the process, resulting in polls that overstate the margin for the candidate who’s “up” and/or understate support for a candidate who’s “down.”
http://cookpolitical.com/story/6436
My elderly parents think Joe and Hillary are too old to run for Pres.
I'm not joking. My dad is 77 and mom is 71, in good health and love both people. But they are actually holding out for younger candidates. In the end, they'll probably vote for Hillary, But it's interesting that they feel this way.
BART may turn down contract that ended strike
SAN FRANCISCO (KGO) -- Just when the BART labor situation seemed resolved, ABC7 News has learned about a major glitch in the agreement -- a glitch so big the BART board is ready to vote it down.
The problem has to do with what BART considers a mistake in a clause that grants too much paid family leave to union workers.
BART's two largest unions approved the contract last month after workers went out on strike twice in the past four months. Now, sources tell ABC7 News that a page in the agreement somehow made it into the final draft and was signed by all the negotiators. However, BART officials claim they had rejected the provision and the union had verbally agreed to take it out.
The issue is family medical leave. The new contract states that BART will give full pay for the first six weeks. The old language said employees need to use sick leave and vacation time first. Sources tell ABC7 News that when BART management discovered the mistake, the unions said the clause could not be withdrawn.
http://abclocal.go.com/kgo/story?section=resources/traffic&id=9326491
Racist hotel guest inserts fire hose in butt, causes mayhem
Joseph Small, 20 appeared in Westminster Magistrate's Court in London this week and admitted to multiple charges after a hotel rampage that involved him shoving a fire house up his butt, Sunday World reported.
Police say that on Halloween, Small stripped naked on the fourth-floor hallway of a Premier Inn before inserting the hose of a fire extinguisher in between his buttcheeks and started playing with his own fire hose, according to the Metro.
Hotel workers told officials that Small, who was a guest at the hotel, then began yelling at a Bangladeshi hotel worker, saying "This country has been taken over by al-Qaeda. Go back to Pakistan."
Oh yeah, he also peed on the floor.
On Tuesday, he admitted to charges of criminal damage, racially aggravated harassment and outraging public decency. He will be sentenced December 3.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/13/joseph-small-fire-hose-racist_n_4268537.html?ncid=edlinkusaolp00000003
Sarah Palin Compares Federal Debt To Slavery
Speaking at a conservative fundraiser in Iowa on Saturday evening, former Alaska governor and Republican vice presidential candidate Sarah Palin compared the United States' debt to slavery, claiming that younger Americans will be shackled by the country's spending.
The Des Moines Register's Jennifer Jacobs reports that Palin, speaking at the Iowa Faith & Freedom Coalition's fall fundraiser, warned of the allure of "free stuff" offered by the government.
"This free stuff, so seductive. Why do you think marketers use free stuff to bring people in? Free stuff is such a strong marketing ploy," Palin said. "But didn't you all learn too in Econ 101 there ain't no such thing as a free lunch? Our free stuff today is being paid for by taking money from our children and borrowing from China."
Palin continued, "When that note comes due -- and this isn't racist.. but it's going to be like slavery when that note is due. We are going to be beholden to a foreign master. Because there is no plan coming out of Washington, D.C. to stop the incurrence of debt."
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/11/10/sarah-palin-debt-slavery_n_4250896.html
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