Wednesday Open Thread

19 thoughts on “Wednesday Open Thread”

1. Jimmy Kimmel’s 10 Best White House Correspondents’ Dinner Jokes

   “Mr. President, remember when the country rallied behind you in hopes of a better tomorrow? That was hilarious. That was your best one yet.”

   “It’s a thrill for me to be here with the president. A man who has I think done his best to guide us through some very difficult times and paid a heavy price for it. You know, there’s a term for guys like President Obama. Probably, not two terms.”

   “It’s one thing to oppose gay marriage. It’s another to do it in a sweater best.”

   “Hey, is that slug Rush Limbaugh here? People are still upset with Rush for comments he made about Sandra Fluke, but you know what? There is a reason Mr. Limbaugh said what he said, and that reason is Percocet.”

   “By the way, just to clear things up for the right wingers. Here’s the difference between Bill Maher and Rush Limbaugh. The people who watch Bill Maher know he’s an asshole.”

   “I actually have my own theory about Lincoln’s death. I think John Wilkes Booth was innocent. I don’t even think it was an assassination. I believe that Abraham Lincoln had a vision of what the Republican Party would become in 150 years, and he shot himself. Is the Fox table laughing, or did Rupert Murdoch hack into all my jokes already?”

   “Ron Paul looks like the guy who gets unhooded at the end of every Scooby Doo episode.”

   “It’s fun to have conversations with people who are so passionate about politics. I talked to a guy who is a huge supporter of Obamacare and a guy who says it’s disaster that should be killed immediately. It was interesting, because I’d never met Mitt Romney before.”

   “Al Gore launched Current TV in 2005, and it took off like a North Korean rocket.”

   “Mr. President, I hope you don’t think I am out of line here, but marijuana is something that real people care about, and the fact that you believe Speaker Boehner when he tells you that he still has control of his party leads me to believe that you must be smoking some crazy great weed yourself.”

   (Assuming a large quote is ok because this is originally from Kimmel’s monologue.)

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   1. The Republicans wanted it at the Hilton.

      So they compromised…

      …and had it at the Hilton.

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2. that the new Obama slogan “Forward” is being touted by the Right as communist and marxist!?

   It’s also the state motto of Wisconsin, so unless these idiots are willing to agree that Republican Gov. Scott Walker and the state’s 6 million residents are somehow communist, their position and this attack on Obama looks quite ridiculous.

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   1. You really do have to stop being so critical of the (dis)loyal opposition.  You really don’t expect they would/should know such a little factoid thingy like Wisconsin’s motto, do you? 🙂

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   2. As the Republican slogan appears to be “Backward.”

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      1. but the current Republican slogan is “Directions are an evil government plot, I’m staying right here until God picks me up.”

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      2. I think they may be upset because Obama plagarized the “Forward” motto from their new theme…”Forward..to the Past!”

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   3. “When I give food to the poor, they call me a saint. When I ask why they are poor, they call me a communist.” Dom Helder Pessoa Camara, Archbishop of Olinda and Recife, also known as the ‘Bishop of Corum’

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3. drugged driving bill passed the Senate this morning 18-17.

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   1. How well do you think the bill handles the problem?

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      1. There is no agreement in the medical community on the amount of delta-9 THC that constitutes “impairment,” but this bill sets an arbitrary presumptive standard.

         The bill was amended to strip meth and opiates, so it’s pot only.

         The bill also lets the cops force you to take a blood test or surrender your license.

         Plus, driving while impaired is already a crime.  The bill is unnecessary.

         Maybe Senator Carroll will show up and post.  She was a very eloquent opponent of the bill during the debates of the last two days.

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         1. to go about it in a single bill. That’s not just luck, it takes work.

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         2. Much more study is needed on the effects of marijuana on driver performance. One study found that pot-smoking drivers reduce their speed and behave abnormally in distracted driving scenarios, but perform acceptably in collision-avoidance simulation.

            Another study says marijuana doubles collision risk–but even its authors admit that marijuana’s impacts on performance dissipate within 3-4 hours, sooner than alcohol.

            There’s little or no scientific agreement that a blood test is capable of determining current driver impairment due to marijuana use. This looks like just another excuse to get around voters’ choices to decriminalize adult possession of marijuana in Denver and legalize medicinal marijuana statewide. Impaired driving is and should be illegal, but it seems likely that drivers who are not functionally impaired will see their civil liberties violated.

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            1. but I agree with the ambiguity being bad. I would love to see action on better training.

               I was once picked up by a Trooper outside of Burlington* who was an “expert” at determining both impairment and what you were impaired by. Alcohol, weed, meth, NyQuil, lack of sleep, whatever. He did this magical test with a flashlight on the side of the road… while you waited in your car.

               Since suspended licences lead to mandatory court appearances (and supposedly jail time, ha!), I had the opportunity to check up on his record. This guy could look in your eyes and guess how many drinks you’d had within half a glass. It was actually kind of cool. He wasn’t born with that special skill; it really can be taught. And should be. Right along with not keeping your finger on the trigger of your gun and not beating people for no apparent reason.

               *as a teenager, while attending a Missouri university, I had a terrible habit of not paying Kansas or Missouri speeding tickets, leading to a suspended license. More than once. Smartz!

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4. Spotted an “employment rate of 8.2% in November 2011” in this week’s edition.

   I’m pretty sure there’d have been riots in the streets if that were the case last November…

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5. 

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6. Just swimmingly – Student forgotten in cell for 5 days

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7. I personally agree and now I have a Symantec report to prove it (but for different reasons).

   Religious Sites are Worst for Malware, Report Finds

   The average number of threats found on religious sites was 115 (mostly fake antivirus software). By contrast, pornographic sites had less than a quarter, at around 25 threats per site.

   Seems belief sites traffic in fake anti-virus software ads and believers are just too unsuspecting and vulnerable to know any better.  So seems porn perusers got better fake filters?    

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