08/19/2012 archive

Mars sucks.

Scientists must explain how it’s possible that the tiny island country of Jamaica can at the same time possess all the most stoned people in the world and all the fastest people in the world.

Voter ID laws solve a problem that doesn’t exist.

This is your morning Open Thread. Pour your favorite beverage and review the past and comment on the future.

Find the past “On This Day in History” here.

August 19 is the 231st day of the year (232nd in leap years) in the Gregorian calendar. There are 134 days remaining until the end of the year.

On this day in 1909, the first race is held at the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, now the home of the world’s most famous motor racing competition, the Indianapolis 500.

The rectangular two-and-a-half-mile track linked four turns, each exactly 440 yards from start to finish, by two long and two short straight sections. In that first five-mile race on August 19, 1909, 12,000 spectators watched Austrian engineer Louis Schwitzer win with an average speed of 57.4 miles per hour. The track’s surface of crushed rock and tar proved a disaster, breaking up in a number of places and causing the deaths of two drivers, two mechanics and two spectators.

The surface was soon replaced with 3.2 million paving bricks, laid in a bed of sand and fixed with mortar. Dubbed “The Brickyard,” the speedway reopened in December 1909. In 1911, low attendance led the track’s owners to make a crucial decision: Instead of shorter races, they resolved to focus on a single, longer event each year, for a much larger prize. That May 30 marked the debut of the Indy 500–a grueling 500-mile race that was an immediate hit with audiences and drew press attention from all over the country. Driver Ray Haroun won the purse of $14,250, with an average speed of 74.59 mph and a total time of 6 hours and 42 minutes.

“Punting the Pundits” is an Open Thread. It is a selection of editorials and opinions from around the news medium and the internet blogs. The intent is to provide a forum for your reactions and opinions, not just to the opinions presented, but to what ever you find important.

Thanks to ek hornbeck, click on the link and you can access all the past “Punting the Pundits”.

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The Sunday Talking Heads:

Up with Chris Hayes: Joining Chris on Sunday morning at 8 AM are: Judith Browne-Dianis, co-director of The Advancement Project;Tanya Wells, a student and recipient of Pell Grants, Supplemental Nutritional Assistance and Medicaid; Maya Wiley, founder and president of the non-profit Center for Social Inclusion; Sam Seder (@samseder), political talk show host of the Majority Report and Ring of Fire Radio; Michael Grunwald (@mikegrunwald), author of “The New New Deal: The Hidden Story of Change in the Obama Era,” TIME‘s senior national correspondent; Ari Berman, contributor to The Nation; and Rep. Chaka Fattah (@chakafattah), Democrat representing Pennsylvania’s 2nd congressional district, senior member of the House Appropriations Committee, ranking member on the Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science and related agencies, chair of the Congressional Urban Caucus.

This Week with George Stephanopolis: This Week’s guests are Obama deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter and Romney campaign senior adviser Kevin Madden;

Jake Tapper will moderate a special panel that will discuss America’s economic and budget problems. The panel guests are Senate Budget Committee member Sen. Pat Toomey, R-Pa.; House Budget Committee ranking member Rep. Chris Van Hollen, D-Md.; former TARP Special Inspector General Neil Barofsky; former Obama economic adviser Austan Goolsbee; Americans for Tax Reform president Grover Norquist; and Wall Street Journal columnist Kimberley Strassel.

Face the Nation with Bob Schieffer: Mr Schieffer’s guests this week are Americans for Tax Reform president Grover Norquist; and president of the Center for American Progress, Neera Tanden.

CBS Political Director John Dickerson, the Washington Post‘s Nia Malika-Henderson, plus Jeff Zeleny and Carl Hulse from the New York Times make up the panel for a roundtable discussion.

The Chris Matthews Show: Joining Mr. Matthews

are Dan Rather, HDNet Global correspondent; David Ignatius, The Washington Post

columnist;  Gloria Borger, CNN Senior Political Analyst; and Kathleen Parker, The Washington Post columnist.

Meet the Press with David Gregory: This Sunday’s MTP guests are  Chairman of the Democratic Governors Association, Gov. Martin O’Malley (D-MD) and Chairman of the Republican Governors Association, Gov. Bob McDonnell (R-VA).

The roundtable guests are  NBC’s Chuck Todd; Atlanta’s Democratic Mayor Kasim Reed; Republican nominee and Tea Party backed candidate for the U.S. Senate in Texas, Republican Ted Cruz; the Washington Post‘s E.J. Dionne; and the Wall Street Journal‘s Peggy Noonan.

State of the Union with Candy Crowley: CNN National Political Correspondent Jim Acosta will be sitting in for the vacationing Ms. Crowley. His guests will be  Romney Senior Adviser Eric Fehrnstrom and Obama Deputy Campaign Manager Stephanie Cutter; Former Senator and GOP Presidential Candidate Rick Santorum; CNN Political Director Mark Preston and USA Today‘s Jackie Kucinich.

Support Grows in Germany for Vote on Giving Up Power to European Bloc

　

By MELISSA EDDY

It has become the buzzword of the summer in Berlin: referendum. The foreign and finance ministers as well as opposition leaders have all come out in favor of allowing Germans to have a direct say in whether to give up more power to European Union institutions.

Although the idea of a referendum is for the moment more notional than concrete, it is gaining currency in Germany’s political debate. Approving it would amount to the exceptional step of a national vote to change the Constitution to allow Germans to relinquish some executive authority to Brussels.

Proponents say that if such a referendum were approved, it would send a strong signal of Germany’s commitment to the euro. It would also streamline the steps needed to save the common European currency, they argue, and appease mounting complaints by Germans that even as they are being asked to pay more to bolster or bail out their troubled euro zone partners, they have no say in where their taxes are flowing or how they are being spent.

The stutter steps in the middle disqualify this one and I think the rush is just a little too intense for some people.

Kashmir

Chris Hayes, the host of  MSNBC’s Up with Chris Hayes, share week’s news with guests: Richard Belzer (@MRBelzer), comedian, actor, talk show host and author; Michael Hastings (@mmhastings), BuzzFeed correspondent, Rolling Stone contributing editor, and author of “The Operators: The Wild and Terrifying Inside Story of America’s War in Afghanistan“; Heather McGhee (@hmcghee), vice president of policy and research at the progressive think tank Demos; Josh Barro (@jbarro), writes “The Ticker” for Bloomberg View; and Michelle Goldberg (@michelleinbklyn), senior contributing writer for Newsweek/Daily Beast, author of “Kingdom Coming: The rise of Christian Nationalism.”

34 South African miners killed in clash with police

Some miners vowed to fight to the death yesterday  as police announced a shocking casualty toll from the previous day’s shooting by officers of striking miners with 34 dead and 78 wounded.

Wives of miners at the Lonmin Platinum Mine, northwest of Johannesburg took the place of dead and wounded husbands yesterday  in staging a protest. But this time, instead of asking for higher wages as the miners had done, the women demanded to know why police had opened fire Thursday with automatic rifles, pistols and shotguns on the strikers, many of whom had been armed with spears, machetes and clubs, as they rushed toward the officers.

Russia Sentences Pussy Riot Members to Two Years in Jail

A Russian court jailed three female punk performers for two years for inciting religious hatred and hooliganism, prompting international condemnation of the case that’s become a symbol of President Vladimir Putin’s intolerance for dissent.

Prosecutors had sought three-year prison terms for the Pussy Riot band members, who performed a “punk prayer” in the country’s main Christian Orthodox place of worship in February urging Putin’s removal.

Rage Against the Machine Isn’t Returning Ryan’s Love

Representative Paul D. Ryan may love Rage Against the Machine, but the feeling isn’t mutual.

“Paul Ryan’s love of Rage Against the Machine is amusing, because he is the embodiment of the machine that our music has been raging against for two decades,” Mr. Morello said.

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