a good statue:
a bronze shoe statue built for Iraqi journalist Muntazer al-Zaidi, who threw his shoes at Bush pic.twitter.com/oGg0fuZpR0— SubMedina (@SubMedina) August 22, 2017
H/t naked capitalism for finding this engaging bit of history.
These days, we have a surfeit of targets for such a protest. 
At the rate things are going, there aren’t going to be any Nazis in the white house before long.
The latest to go, faux PhD and Bigot Sebastian Gorka.
I’m not sure if this is because they’ve lost, or if they’ve just found the warehouse where the Ark of the Covenant is located:
Sebastian Gorka, an outspoken adviser to President Trump, has been forced out of his position at the White House, two administration officials said on Friday.
One of the officials said that the president’s chief of staff, John F. Kelly, had telegraphed his lack of interest in keeping Mr. Gorka over the last week in internal discussions.
Mr. Gorka, a deputy assistant to the president, had been on vacation for at least the last two weeks, with no clear assigned duties to hand to others, that official said.
………
Mr. Gorka, 46, has also been accused of having links to far-right groups in Europe.
Of the various racist losers who entered the White House in January, Sebastian Gorka was by far the most malignant.
It’s good to see him go.
It appears that dog lovers of San Francisco have decided to to let their dogs’ colons express their distaste for the latest white supremacist theater:
When a group of far-right activists come to San Francisco to hold a rally this Saturday, they will be met by peace activists offering them flowers to wear in their hair.
Also, dog sh%$. Lots and lots of dog sh%$.
Hundreds of San Franciscans plan to prepare Crissy Field, the picturesque beach in the shadow of the Golden Gate Bridge where rightwing protest group Patriot Prayer will gather, with a generous carpeting of excrement.
“I just had this image of alt-right people stomping around in the poop,” Tuffy Tuffington said of the epiphany he had while walking Bob and Chuck, his two Patterdale terriers, and trying to think of the best way to respond to rightwing extremists in the wake of Charlottesville. “It seemed like a little bit of civil disobedience where we didn’t have to engage with them face to face.”
Just a word of note: Don’t exclude all those folks who keep Vietnamese Potbellied Pigs. Pig sh%$ is even worse.
*He is an author who related what might be the ultimate fecal sabotage tale.
It looks like support is growing in Italy for establishing a parallel currency as an alternative to the Euro:
There have been some amazing Italian inventions over the centuries. The newspaper. The pistol. The radio. The stock exchange. The motorway. And who could overlook those staples of modern life, jeans (originally from the French word for Genoa: genes) or the pizzeria.
Few other countries have contributed quite as much to creating the world we live in.
Right now, Italy could be on the brink of another major innovation. A parallel currency to run alongside the euro. It already had the backing of the former Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi, and the parties supporting it are steadily gaining ground in the polls.
Could it work? The mainstream economic establishment will no doubt heap scorn on the idea. And yet, in reality, a parallel currency could provide an elegant exit from the euro, maintaining some of the advantages of the single currency, while freeing the country from endless recession. If it ever gets off the ground, Italy could quickly become one of the most attractive economies in the world.
It is hard to find any words to describe Italy’s experiment with merging its currency with Germany, France and the rest of the eurozone other than “dismal failure.” Since it adopted the euro, Italy’s average annual growth rate has been zero, according to calculations by the Bruegel Institute. You read that correctly. Absolutely nothing, over almost two decades.
………
Italy’s unemployment rate is a crippling 11%, the highest of Europe’s three biggest economies, and youth unemployment is a scary 35%. The national debt has climbed to a giddy 133% of gross domestic product, not because the government is especially extravagant, but because that’s what happens in a zero-growth economy.
I’ve always said that the best way to fix the Euro is to kick the Boche out of the common currency, but a parallel currency as a way to create infrastructure for leaving the Euro is not an unreasonable tactic for dealing with the deep problems of the Euro as a currency.
Secretary of Defense James Mathis is trying to gin up support for US military involvement in the Ukraine:
Defense Secretary James Mattis said Thursday that the Trump administration is “actively reviewing” whether to provide weapons to Ukrainians who are fighting Russian-backed rebels.
“On the defensive lethal weapons, we are actively reviewing it,” Mattis said during a press conference alongside Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko.
“I will go back, now, having seen the current situation, and be able to inform the secretary of State and the president in very specific terms what I recommend for the direction ahead.”
There is a permanent war party in Washington, DC, AKA, “The Blob,” and they haven’t won a war, since 1945, and they haven’t made the world a better place, or had a diplomatic success in almost as long a time.
They were the ones, in the person of Victoria Nuland, who fomented a coup and a civil war in the Ukraine in the first place.
And now these idiots are back in command of our foreign policy.
What the hell, it’s just more blood and treasure sacrificed on the altar of pointless American hegemony.
In response to threats and a blockade led by the House of Saud, Qatar has reopened full diplomatic relations with Iran:
Qatar said Thursday that it has restored diplomatic relations with Iran, marking a further break with Arab nations that have closed ranks against Qatar for its links to Islamist groups and others perceived as regional threats.
The decision ignores demands by Qatar’s neighbors — led by Saudi Arabia — to limit ties with Tehran and threatens to deepen the region’s worst diplomatic crisis in decades, which has complicated Washington’s policies in the Middle East.
Qatar hosts U.S. warplanes at a major air base and serves as a logistical hub for Pentagon operations.
“The State of Qatar expressed its aspiration to strengthen bilateral relations with the Islamic Republic of Iran in all fields,” Qatar’s foreign ministry said in a statement.
The brief statement made no mention of the tensions that have roiled the Persian Gulf region since June, when Saudi Arabia and three other Arab nations severed ties with Qatar. The Arab bloc shut down borders, airspace and shipping lanes after accusing the tiny, energy-rich nation of backing terrorism because of ties with groups such as Egypt’s Muslim Brotherhood.
Qatar also has come under pressure to close down the powerful pan-Arab broadcaster Al Jazeera, which is based in the Qatari capital, Doha.
Qatar has denied the allegations and has weathered the boycott, not least by turning to Iran and Turkey for economic and military assistance.
Qatar recalled its ambassador from Tehran in early 2016 to show solidarity with Saudi Arabia after protesters ransacked the kingdom’s embassy in Tehran and a consulate in the city of Mashhad. The attacks were triggered by Riyadh’s execution of a well-known Shiite Muslim cleric, and prompted Saudi Arabia to sever ties with Iran after accusing it of not protecting its missions.
When you look at the Saudi initiatives that have come to the fore since Mohammed bin Salman first rose to prominence in the House of Saud, the pointless and self-destructive confrontation with Qatar is only the latest clusterf%$#, it has been a very inauspicious start for the youngster.
I’ve always said that the House of Saud would fall sooner rather than later, and that the only choice was whether they fell like the House of Windsor (British Royals), or like the House of Romanov (the Russian Czars).
They seem determined to going the Romanov route.
The Pew Research Center just did a study, and it showed that black voter’s turnout fell in 2016.
A record 137.5 million Americans voted in the 2016 presidential election, according to new data from the U.S. Census Bureau. Overall voter turnout – defined as the share of adult U.S. citizens who cast ballots – was 61.4% in 2016, a share similar to 2012 but below the 63.6% who say they voted in 2008.
This wasn’t Russian hacking. This wasn’t, as Lamberth Strether sarcastically noted, “Black voters are racist, sexist bros,” this was an incompetent, arrogant, and, uninspiring candidate with a history of winking and nodding to racism. (“They are often the kinds of kids that are called superpredators — no conscience, no empathy. We can talk about why they ended up that way, but first, we have to bring them to heel.”)
This was a candidate who promulgated a Lord of the Flies management style in her campaign which created an incompetent, arrogant, and uninspiring campaign.
And the Democratic party establishment, the incompetent, arrogant, and, uninspiring Debbie Wasserman Schultz, the incompetent, arrogant, and, uninspiring DNC, and the legions of incompetent, arrogant, and, uninspiring consultants pulled out all the stops to fix the primary process for her.
Running against the most racist major Presidential candidate since Woodrow Wilson, somehow, she, and the entire Democratic Party establishment, could not get black voters to turn out.
These are not the people who should be running the Democratic Party.
These are not consultants who candidates should pay to run their campaigns.
These are not people who should hold elective office.
They need to go away.
I tried a new food combination today, chicken & waffles.
I rather liked the textural combination of the fluffy waffle and the crisp skin off the chicken as well as the juxtaposition of the sweet syrup (real maple syrup next time) and savory/salty chicken.
Eating out was a bit of a challenge, fried chicken is best eaten with the hands and waffles and syrup is certainly fork and knife territory. (The wings were a particular challenge.)
I actually googled how to best eat chicken & waffles before ordering.
I enjoyed the culinary combination, and I would recommend it.
I’m not entirely sure of its origins, but I get the sense that hung over musicians played a significant roll in the origins of the dish.
John Oliver explaining the affection of Nazis for Donald Trump:
Nazis are a lot like cats: If they like you, it’s probably because you’re feeding them. Also, cats are like Nazis, but that’s a whole different subject.
this is the most dccc response to a tragedy that i could ever imagine pic.twitter.com/7C6mdsa3TM— fake noosh (@COINCELPRO) August 16, 2017
Seriously, if we were to fire every strategist, consultant, and fund-raiser in the DCCC, and replace them with Dr. Who bobble heads, it would improve the chances of political victory for the Democratic Party.
Of course, if we were to replace them with all 13-29 doctors (they are hard to count), they would save the Democratic Party in the nick of time. 
I think that my car is getting more miles per gallon of gas than my colon.
It appears that the House of Saud has finally noticed that the majority of the citizens of Iraq are Shia, and they are determined to reestablish Sunni hegemony in the region, because, after all, it’s worked so f%$#ing well in Syria and Yemen:Iraq and Saudi Arabia are negotiating a new alliance that would give Riyadh a leading role in rebuilding Iraq’s war-torn towns and cities, while bolstering Baghdad’s credentials across the region.
Meetings between senior officials on both sides over the past six months have focused on shepherding Iraq away from its powerful neighbour and Saudi Arabia’s long-time rival, Iran, whose influence over Iraqi affairs has grown sharply since the 2003 ousting of Saddam Hussein.
Iraq and Saudi Arabia have long been considered opponents in the region, but a visit by the Iraqi Shia cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to Riyadh last week and a follow-up trip to the UAE further thawed relations which had already been much improved by high-profile visits between the two countries.
………
“This visit was an important step in ensuring that Iraq returns to the Arab fold and is supported in doing so by friendly partners,” said the former Saudi minister of state Saad al-Jabri. “This necessitates limiting Tehran’s continued attempts to dominate Iraq and spread sectarianism. Broader engagement between Riyadh and Baghdad will lead the way for enhanced regional support for Iraq, especially from the Gulf states. This is essential after the capture of Mosul from Isis and as Iraq looks towards national reconstruction.”
The House of Saud created ISIS, and now these arsonists want a piece of the action rebuilding after the conflagration.
A rapprochement between Sunni and Shia in Iraq is essential to the nation’s future as a unitary state.
Involving Riyadh in this process would be an unmitigated disaster.
A California court has ordered a Silicon Valley billionaire to restore access to a beloved beach that he closed off for his private use, a major victory for public lands advocates who have been fighting the venture capitalist for years.
An appeals court ruled on Thursday that Vinod Khosla, who runs the venture capital firm Khosla Ventures and co-founded the tech company Sun Microsystems, must unlock the gates to Martins Beach in northern California by his property.
The decision is a major blow to Khosla and other wealthy landowners who have increasingly tried to buy up the internationally celebrated beaches along the California coast and turn public lands into private property.
The beach was a popular destination for fishing, surfing and other recreational activities for nearly a century, and the previous owners provided a general store and public restroom. But Khosla eventually bought the property and in 2010 closed public access, putting up signs warning against trespassing.
Khosla, who has a net worth of $1.55bn and does not live on the property, has faced multiple lawsuits and legislative efforts to get him to open up the gate to the beach near Half Moon Bay, about 30 miles south of San Francisco. The law in California states that all beaches should be open to the public up to the “mean high tide line”.
The decision this week, affirming a lower court ruling, stems from a lawsuit filed by the Surfrider Foundation, a not-for-profit group that says the case could have broader implications for beach access across the US.
“Vinod Khosla, with his billions of dollars, bought this piece of property and said, ‘No, no, the public isn’t going to use this anymore. End of story,’” the Surfrider attorney Joe Cotchett said by phone on Thursday. “He got away with it for many years … This is probably one of the most important public right-of-access cases in the country.”
You know, maybe if we actually enforced the rules against the rich, we would have a better society.
As you may have heard, Steve Bannon has left the White House.
So, as the saying goes, he has gone from inside the tent pissing out to outside the tent pissing in.
The interesting thing here is whether or not Bannon actually likes Trump and sees him as a means to an end.
His behavior over the next few months should tell us that.
I expect attacks against his former White House rivals, it’s whether those attacks extend to the Donald.
The lawsuit agaisnt the CIA’s torture psychologists has been settled, so the rest of us won’t find out what they did:
A settlement in a lawsuit against two psychologists who were paid tens of millions of dollars to design torture techniques used by the CIA in black-site prisons was announced on Thursday. The terms of the settlement were undisclosed.
Two of the plaintiffs in the case, Suleiman Abdullah Salim and Mohamed Ben Soud, were held and brutalized in 2003 in a secret CIA facility in Afghanistan that prisoners called “The Darkness”. Salim, who is Tanzanian, and Ben Soud, who is Libyan, were eventually released and are now living in their home countries with their families.
A third plaintiff is a young Afghan computer engineer whose uncle, Gul Rahman, was tortured to death in November 2002 in the same facility.
The three filed the lawsuit in October 2015 against James Mitchell and John “Bruce” Jessen, contract psychologists who devised a menu of abusive interrogation methods and billed the CIA between $75m and $81m. The plaintiffs sought damages from the men for allegedly aiding and abetting torture, non-consensual human experimentation and war crimes.
You may recall that these were the guys whose lawyers inaccurately claimed that the maker of Zyklon-B weren’t held liable for their aiding genocide.
I’m not happy. Their misdeed should have been revealed to the world.
Honestly, they should be spending the rest of their lives in jail.
Removing Confederate Statues Isn’t Sanitizing History—It’s Fumigating History
Insert cockroach metaphor here.
The Sukhoi fighter jet, has had its name updated from T-50 (Basically the company’s internal designation meaning the 50th delta wing model) to the official Russian military designation Su-57. (Also here)
I don’t think that this means a whole bunch in the greater scheme of things, but have a promotional video for the 5th generation fighter.
It doesn’t reflect much in the way of a change in the status of the aircraft: It’s still a limited production prototype, and the intended final engine is years down the road, but it does make for some decent videos.
Last night, without any advance notice, the City of Baltimore removed the 4 Confederate monuments in the City.
If the Neo-Nazis show up to protest, I recommend that every policeman assigned to protect their sorry ass get a case of severe existential nausea that day, and don’t show up to protect them.
Starting a new job at Tate Access Floors, a manufacturer of raised access floors.
As always, this is likely the last time that I will post about Tate, or my job, because blogging about your workplace is not a good way to stay at that workplace.
In any case, I’ll be learning the ropes, and as such will have less time to blog for a while.
The above title is a comments from a story about how Uber screwed over a customer whose stuff was stolen by one of their drivers.
The short version is that the driver drove off with his stuff, and Uber steadfastly refused to help him contact the driver, and when sued (small claims) lied to the court.
To quote the film Aliens, nuke it from orbit, it’s the only way to be sure.