Tag Archives: Florida

This Week in WTF, March 14, 2014

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David Matusiak [CC BY-SA 2.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/2.0/deed.en)], via Flickr

Does this hat make me look unprofessional?

– Style is important: In my years as a practicing attorney, I had to prep many people for courtroom and deposition testimony. One thing they don’t teach you in law school is about how to prepare people whose sense of fashion might……differ from the standard conservative mode of the American courthouse setting. That’s why the one thing that really stood out for me in this article about a New York City union manager accused of sexual harassment was this:

[He] declined to comment as he left the courthouse wearing a silver suit and a fedora.

They say you never get a second chance to make a first impression. They tend to leave out that the first impression is supposed to be a good one. (Although for all I know, he rocks the look.)

– I’m sorry science class wasted your time: For my part, I thought the first episode of Neil deGrasse Tyson’s new Cosmos series was pretty excellent, but some people have some extremely wacky ideas about where they think it went wrong (h/t Jason). See also:

Via Fundies Say The Darndest Things on Facebook

Via Fundies Say The Darndest Things on Facebook

– You said you wanted greens, right? I don’t pretend to know all that much about gourmet food, but I’m pretty sure your typical gourmet salad is not supposed to include a lizard head (h/t Bob). Then again, I really don’t know anything about life in New York City.

– Trapped in a closet: Cats are evil. This cat in Oregon proves the point. When it’s not cornering entire families in closets, I bet it’s killing lizards and putting their heads in salads.

– It was bound to happen eventually: (I’m being non-snarky about this one.) A man is charged with shooting a sheriff’s deputy in Florida. He is claiming “Stand Your Ground” as part of his defense. It will be interesting to see if this influences support for the law.

Photo credit: David Matusiak [CC BY-SA 2.0], via Flickr; Fundies Say The Darndest Things, via Facebook.

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Cowards with Guns

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By Mom's Break [Public domain], via Wikimedia CommonsIf a bag of popcorn makes you fear for your life to the point that you need to discharge a firearm at the threat, you are a coward who deserves all the ridicule humanity can throw at you.

Photo credit: By Mom’s Break [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons.

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Comparing Apples to Oranges in Oklahoma

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The Wall Street Journal’s editorial staff is asking why Al Sharpton, et al, are not devoting the same amount of attention to the murder of Christopher Lane in Oklahoma, allegedly by three bored teenagers, as they did to the George Zimmerman case. The editorial begins as follows:

Three teenagers were charged Tuesday in the killing of a white college student in Duncan, Oklahoma…

(Emphasis added to make my point as painfully obvious as possible.) That’s not even the entire first sentence, but it has already explained how this case is different from Zimmerman’s case. To be clear, Lane’s death is a tragedy and a horrible crime that deserves thorough investigation and punishment of the guilty parties. (I shouldn’t have to add that caveat, but I suspect someone somewhere will try to say I don’t care as much about this case.)

Here’s how it’s different: the suspects in Lane’s death are already in custody and facing criminal charges, including murder. Trayvon Martin died on February 26, 2012, but Zimmerman wasn’t arrested until April 11, 45 days later.

No one is disputing that what the three teenagers allegedly did is a crime.

So far, no one has tried to claim that the three teenagers in Oklahoma acted in self-defense, and no one will ever be able to make that claim plausibly. The Zimmerman case involved the killing of a black teenager (who was not committing any crime) by an overzealous neighborhood watch volunteer who, for reasons we’ll likely never know for sure, thought he looked “suspicious.” The narrative of people finding young black men “suspicious,” just for being young black men, plays itself out every day in this country. Certain people are seizing on the fact that the Lane case involves a young white man killed by three young black men as a sleazy way of trying to create a false equivalence with the Zimmerman case, or to fabricate some kind of “both sides do it” narrative.

It’s pretty sickening, really.

Think of it this way: many people expressed a high level of skepticism about the allegation that Zimmerman was motivated by Martin’s race. See if those same people apply the same high level of skepticism to the Lane case.

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Dear Michigan and Florida Republicans: Vagina. Uterus. Vagina. Uterus. Vagina. Uterus. Vagina. Uterus. Vagina. Uterus. Repeat…..

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Who remembers something that happened in the world of American politics fifteen months ago? Don’t worry, you’re not alone. Most voters can’t remember what politicians said or did back when they started reading this sentence. This forgetfulness accounts for about one hundred and twelve percent of Republicans’ electoral successes since at least 1996. It’s almost enough to–SQUIRREL!!!

'Eastern Grey Squirrel (Sciurus carolinensis) in Florida' by BirdPhotos.com (BirdPhotos.com) [CC-BY-3.0 (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/3.0)], via Wikimedia Commons

Where was I?

Oh yeah…

VAGINA

Republicans in Michigan don’t like the word VAGINA. They dislike it so much that they barred the woman who uttered it, a Democratic state representative, from speaking on the House floor for as long as they feel like it. Presumably until she’s learned her lesson.

House Republicans prohibited state Rep. Lisa Brown from speaking on the floor Thursday after she ended a speech Wednesday against a bill restricting abortions by referencing her female anatomy.

Brown, a West Bloomfield Democrat and mother of three, said a package of abortion regulation bills would violate her Jewish religious beliefs and that abortions be be allowed in cases where it is required to save the life of the mother.

“Finally, Mr. Speaker, I’m flattered that you’re all so interested in my vagina, but ‘no’ means ‘no,'” Brown said Wednesday.

Brown’s comment prompted a rebuke Thursday by House Republicans, who wouldn’t allow her to voice her opinion on a school employee retirement bill.

“What she said was offensive,” said Rep. Mike Callton, R-Nashville. “It was so offensive, I don’t even want to say it in front of women. I would not say that in mixed company.”

Ahem, VAGINA.

The pearl-clutching got better:

House Republicans also wouldn’t let state Rep. Barb Byrum speak on the House floor today.

Byrum, D-Onondaga, caused a disturbance on the House floor Wednesday when she wasn’t allowed to introduce an amendment to the abortion regulations bill banning men from getting a vasectomy unless the sterilization procedure was necessary to save a man’s life.

“If we truly want to make sure children are born, we would regulate vasectomies,” Byrum told reporters Thursday.

Now, to be fair, a Republican spokesperson later said the impetus for banning Rep. Brown was that she made a rape reference (“no means no”) that Republicans though breached the decorum of the House. They really should have checked with Rep. Callton before dragging that one out.

The internet, being the predictably unpredictably beast that it is, responded to Michigan Republicans’ unease over accurate medical terminology and whatnot with a barrage of VAGINA-related comments and post, to the point that the Michigan Republican Party’s Facebook page administrator had to ask for calm.

Does any of this sound familiar?

It should. Continue reading →

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