Happy hump day everyone. Were half way to a long holiday weekend. After 3 years in corrections when I never had holidays, or even weekends, off I am so looking forward to this summer. Being a month away from finishing up with school I hope to never ever have to do shift work again. Anyhow, lots to cover so lets get to it.
Senator Ted Kennedy Diagnosed with Brain Tumor
Ted KennedyI really wanted to write about this yesterday as the news came out but didn’t have time. As you probably know Kennedy was taken to the hospital after having seizures on Monday. Obviously a malignant brain tumor was not the news the nation was hoping to hear. We are all pulling for him and his family.
Kudos to Kathleen Sebelius!
I feel kind of embarrassed that I haven’t been covering this as well as I should. I have a project in the works for a local Kansas news site so I apologize. As a Kansan I am incredibly proud of our Governor. She has consistently made the right choices even when they were not the most politically expedient. Since I have dropped the ball on her recent acts here are links to others who are picking up the slack.
Kathleen Sebelius Vetoes Voter ID Law. Read Think Progress and Crooks and Liars. Everything I said about the SCOTUS ruling on the Indiana law applies here. Reading local news and blogs it is apparent that most Kansans are unaware of the true effect of these kinds of laws. Either that or their a bunch of assholes. The jury is still out on that distinction.
All the Rest of the News thats Important
- A federal appeals court has ruled Virginia’s late term abortion ban unconstitutional!
- Openly gay Sam Adams has been elected mayor of Portland making him the first openly homosexual mayor of a major American city. It seems like every day I get to write about another accomplishment in LGBTQ equality.
- On the other hand LGBTQ hate crimes rose by 24% in 2007 over the 2006 rates. This just proves that there is still a long way to go. It also shows how needed hate crime protection is.
- A top aid for McCain has stepped down out of respect for Barack Obama. I haven’t followed politics long but can anyone remember this happing before? More at The Carpetbagger Report.
- Tim Haab has a good piece up at Environmental Economics about what we as consumers can do about $4 gas. Read the comments.
- Bush has issued a formal apology after a soldier apparently shot a Koran. Keep telling yourself that its our freedom that they hate.
- I have found out why American schoolchildren compare so poorly to children from other countries. 16% of biology teachers are young earth creationists. The same survey shows that 48% of the general population believes that “God created human beings pretty much in their at one time within the last 10,000 years or so”.
Video of the Day
Henry Waxman Threatens to Have Rep Issa (R-CA) physically removed from hearing. Awesome.
[youtube width="500" height="394"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zr3HuRZFbfk[/youtube]
Thats all for today folks. I’ll try to have something up over my lunch break. Also Summer finally had a chance to comment on a story yesterday. If you havn’t been reading long it may surprise you to know that this is a multi-author blog.
In fact we accept story submissions from anyone with a progressive viewpoint. Writing for us couldn’t be easier. Just sign up for an account then when you log in you will have the ability to write a story. We will then post it assuming that its appropriate for our viewers.
Have a wonderful day
William ~ WWJV4.com
Bill Ludwig
Summer Ludwig