It Is Good News ....

Okay … was it all we hoped for? Was it better than we expected? No, but that’s okay because, first off, we took the House, putting an end to those in Congress who will do whatever the Racist-In-Chief wants to do.

Beto lost to Ted Cruz in Texas, but in the long run it might be for the best because whatever Beto O’Rourke does next, and in the future, he will always best Cruz.

Florida once again proved they put the ‘Duh’ in Flori-duh by electing racist _____ist Ron DeSantis over Andrew Gillum, and, as of now, making it a tie between Rick Scott and Bill Nelson.

But enough about that …. Let’s talk some good stuff.

Kim Davis, the Kentucky Kounty Klerk who famously refused to sign marriage licenses for gay couples, lost her reelection bid to Democratic challenger Elwood Caudill Jr.

Karma is good.

Up in Minnesota they have elected Ilhan Omar, a Democrat, as the country’s first Somali-American elected to Congress. In Michigan, Rashida Tlaib, who also won her election. Tlaib and Omar will be the first Muslim women in Congress.

In Colorado, Jared Polis won the governor’s race and is the first openly gay person to be elected governor in America.

Funny side note: the Colorado cake baker who refused to bake a cake for a gay couple now has a gay governor.

Angie Craig, a lesbian candidate, won her race to take the U.S. House seat for Minnesota, unseating Republican Jason Lewis, a vicious anti-LGBT lawmaker.

Allis not good everywhere, because Iowa has reelected Nazi-sympathizer, racist and white supremacist Steve King to a ninth term. Really, Iowa?

In my own state, while our Democrat lost his bid to become governor—Foghorn Leghorn won reelection—for the first time in 40 years, a Democrat, Joe Cunningham, is the winner of South Carolina's 1st Congressional District, defeating _____-endorsed Republican Katie Arrington.

Democrat Anthony Brindisi is the winner of the race for New York’s 22nd Congressional District, besting _____ supporter and asshat, Claudia Tenney.

Gay former Marine Neil Rafferty won his race for the State House in Alabama. The seat was vacated by Patricia Todd, Alabama’s first openly gay legislator. 

Chris Pappas is now New Hampshire’s first openly gay member of Congress.

Kris Koback, a _____ lapdog, wanted to be governor of Kansas; Kansans said, ‘No.’

Dana Rohrabacher, one of Putin’s favorite lawmakers, appears to have lost his bid for reelection to represent California's 48th congressional district in Congress.

GOP Governor Scott Walker lost in Wisconsin.

Massachusetts voters have handed a resounding victory for transgender people, voting Yes On 3 and defeating a first-of-its-kind effort to repeal the state’s landmark transgender rights law.

J.D. Ford, another openly gay man, bested Republican Mike Delph, who is best known for his staunch opposition to gay marriage equality.

Sharice Davids made history as the first openly gay Native American elected to Congress in Kansas.

Jennifer Webb, another LGBTQ candidate, and Democrat won a narrow victory to take a seat in Florida’s state Legislature. Webb is the first openly LGBTQ woman elected to that position.

Ayanna Presley has become the first Black congresswoman in Massachusetts.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is the youngest person ever in the House of Representatives.

Lauren Underwood wins her House race, becoming the first Black Woman to win her Illinois district.

91% of all the House candidates _____ endorsed lost last night.

Democrats flipped—as of posting time last night—some 28 House seats.

Democrats have flipped 5 governor seats.

Democrats have flipped 4 state legislative chambers.

Democrats took control of the NY State Senate.

Democrats flipped 21 state legislative seats.

Democrats flipped 3 state Supreme Court seats.

Democrats broke the North Carolina GOP supermajority.

Democrats rebuilt the "Blue Wall" in Michigan, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin and that’s a big deal for 2020.

Winning the House means that Adam Schiff, not _____ lapdog Devin Nunes, will chair the House Intel Committee.

Democrats can investigate and check the Trump Administration.

Your votes mattered.

But, no matter what happens, remember this: we are done with Paul Ryan.

And don’t feel bad about the lack of a Blue Tsunami. With wins at local and state levels we are setting the stage for 2020 and beyond; with wins for women and people of color and LGBTQ Americans, we are setting the stage to take the power from old rich white men.

The game is on!

Muslims Are Not Terrorists ... Terrorists Are Terrorists

On March 22, 2017 52-year-old Briton Khalid Masood deliberately drove a car into pedestrians along the south side of Westminster Bridge and Bridge Street—near the British Parliament—injuring more than 50 people, three of them fatally.

After the car crashed into a perimeter fence, Masood abandoned it and ran into New Palace Yard where he fatally stabbed an unarmed police officer. He was subsequently shot and killed by another police officer.

The attack lasted barely a minute, but it once again raised the idea in people around the world—and in our own White House—of Muslim terrorists attacking decent honest, non-Muslim folks, even though police now say that while Masood had an interest in jihad, they have found no motive, no evidence of radicalization or any link with any known terrorist group.

Still, many said Muslims are terrorists ...

There was another man close by Parliament that day; he owns three restaurants in the area and as the attack and the aftermath spread, he was ordered to shutter his businesses and evacuate.

Instead, he decided to keep Troia, his cafe just yards from Westminster Bridge, open so police officers had a place to eat and keep warm.

“I went to one of the officers and said 'I can shut all the businesses, but I want you guys and all the emergency staff to use this place for food, drinks, and for warmth for free'.”

His name is Ibrahim Dogus; he’s Muslim.

“All these great people need our support. Some of them tried to give us money—one said, 'I'm a police officer, you have to take my money.' We said, 'We're not going to take any money from you.”

Dogus kept the restaurant open until 11:30PM “until the last officer was fed”. He estimates he fed between 300 and 500 emergency workers from the police, London Ambulance Service, and London Fire Brigade.

“We wanted to play our role in terms of supporting the emergency crew. This was happening right at our doorstep. If you walk two seconds on my doorstep I would be on the bridge. I use the bridge to take my kids to school, not on that day, but I live next to the area, I work next to the area.”

Think about Ibrahim Dogus the next time you, or anyone near you, says Muslims are terrorists.

And think about this, too ...

After the attack, a group of women, many of them Muslim women, gathered at the scene and linked arms as a show of solidarity with its victims.

Wearing blue as a symbol of hope, the women stood on the bridge where pedestrians were mown down by terrorist—not Muslim terrorist, just terrorist—Khalid Masood.

In an event, organized by Women's March On London, they formed a human chain by holding hands for five minutes as Big Ben chimed at 4PM.

Fariha Khan, joined by fellow Ahmadiyya Muslims, said she wanted to condemn the attack and stand up to the face of terrorism:

"The feeling of what happened here on Wednesday was really strong."

Sarah Waseem:

"When an attack happens in London, it is an attack on me. It is an attack on all of us. Islam totally condemns violence of any sort. This is abhorrent to us."

Ayesha Malik:

"As a visible Muslim I think it was important to show solidarity with the principles that we all hold dear, the principles of plurality, diversity and so on."

Again, remember, after this horrific attack, it was a Muslim man who stood up to help, and a group of Muslim women, who chose to stand in solidarity against terrorism, in the days after the attack.

Muslims are not terrorists.

Terrorists are terrorists.

Independent

Mirror

In The Age of _____ Your Name, Your Faith, Your Birthplace Can Get You Detained

America in the Age of _____ ...

The son of boxing legend Muhammad Ali—Muhammad Ali, Jr.—was detained for hours by immigration officials at Fort Lauderdale-Hollywood International Airport because of ... his “Arabic sounding” name.

Ali Jr. was traveling home from a speaking at a Black History Month event in Jamaica with his mother, Khalilah Camacho-Ali—Ali’s second wife—when they were pulled aside while going through customs.

You know, those Arabic sounding names always mean trouble, but, get this, Khalilah Camacho-Ali was allowed to leave the airport, to enter this country because she showed officials a photograph of herself with her ex-husband. Her passport wasn’t good enough to get through customs, but a photo with a boxer did the trick.

Sadly, for Muhammad Ali Jr. he had no such photographic evidence so officials held him and questioned him for nearly two hours, repeatedly asking him, "Where did you get your name from?" and "Are you Muslim?"

When Ali Jr. responded that he is Muslim, the officers began questioning him about his religion and where he was born.

Muhammad Ali Jr. was born in Philadelphia in 1972 and holds a U.S. passport. But, again, that darned Arabic-sounding name .... A spokesman for U.S. Customs and Border Protection [CBP] played it off like this:

"Due to the restrictions of the Privacy Act, U.S. Customs and Border Protection cannot discuss individual travelers; however, all international travelers arriving in the U.S. are subject to CBP inspection."

Even the guy with the famous name and an American passport.

What this is, in the Age of _____, is racial, and religious, profiling, where you are stopped and questioned and detained for hours because of your name and your faith.

In America .... and yet it isn’t just those with “Arabic-sounding names” or those who are Muslim. Henry Rousso, a French historian was detained at a Houston airport for 10 hours by US immigration officials and then threatened with deportation.

It all began when border agents in Houston began to question Rousso’s visa, saying he’d been selected for a “random check”, which the Egyptian-born ... oops, Egyptian ... perhaps that explains everything ... academic claims was not some "mere coincidence".

When the immigration officer discovered Rousso was to be paid for speaking at Texas A&M University, he ordered Rousso to be deported, claiming he should have a working visa rather than a tourist visa. 

“I told him I don’t need one, that the university took care of the formalities, as always, and especially, that I have been doing this for more than 30 years without any problem.”

Yes, for thirty years he’s been coming to this country without incident and yet a month in Hair Furor’s regime and he is stopped, detained, questioned, fingerprinted and searched and then threatened with deportation.

Rousso was given a phone call, and spoke with Richard Golsan, a Texas A&M professor; he told Golsan “he was waiting for customs officials to send him back to Paris as an illegal alien.”

A slew of university officials, a law professor and the director of the Immigrant Rights Clinic, swept in and succeeded in securing Rousso's release. 

Rousso says he has no idea why he was detained, but did say that his situation was “nothing compared to some of the people I saw who couldn’t be defended as I was".

“That is the situation today. It is now necessary to deal with the utmost arbitrariness and incompetence on the other side of the Atlantic. I do not know what is the worst. What I know, having loved this country forever, is that the United States is no longer quite the United States." — Henry Rousso

And I think Rousso is right. We are headed in the wrong direction when the son of an athletic legend, bearing the exact same name, is detained, because his name sounds odd and because he’s Muslim, and when a visiting professor, traveling as he’s traveling for years, is detained because ... well, no one really knows why Rousso was detained  ...

In the Age of _____.

Independent

Courier Journal

Random Musings

Last year, when _____ was campaigning for the presidency he called for a Muslim ban because, you know, Muslims are terrorists—when, in reality, it’s orange ego-maniacal ALLEGED billionaires who are terrorists.

And, at that time Speaker of the House, Paul Ryan, said:

"I do not think it is reflective of our principles, not just as a party, but as a country. And I think the smarter way to go in all respects is to have a security test, not a religious test. I do not think a Muslim ban is in our country's interest.”

Cut to this week, when Hair Furor in office, and suddenly Paul Ryan is goose-stepping to a different tune and telling us that he backed the decision to stop the U.S. refugee program and ban all entries from seven Muslim-majority nations for 90 days.

What happened Paul? Whatever it was that made you do a 180 on a Muslim ban and now stand for hate, it spawned one of my new favorite Twitter hashtags:

#TheCowardlyRyan.

Use it when you Tweet him, it’s fun.

The racist co-worker—for those who don’t remember, she said to me one time that the reason more white people are not shot by police during routine traffic stops or because they’re just walking down a street is because, and I quote, “White people don’t act like that.”—has quit the job.

And, on her last day, she made a point to come tell me she was leaving, and, because I cannot help myself, I said:

“I didn’t really care for you because I thought you were just another racist, bigoted, homophobic, anti-immigrant, white supremacist gun-loving Black Lives Matter hating, conspiracy theorist loon. ..... That’s all.”

Bye Felicia.

Another sign of the End Times?

This fall, Oprah will step away from her WeightWatchers commercials and begin a  new job as a special correspondent on 60 Minutes:

“I’ve been a big admirer of 60 Minutes since my days as a young reporter. I’m so excited and proud to join forces with this historic news program, which for me represents the bastion of journalistic storytelling.”

Uh huh. Oprah? Reporter? Journalist?

I didn’t watch her “tribute” to the late Mary Tyler Moore last week but I did hear that the show was less Mary and more how Mary made Oprah feel, so, Sixty Minutes? Shame on you for inflicting this blubbering ego on us.

Oprah? I say Noprah.

In response to the Muslim ban, which _____ and Sean Spicer aren’t saying is a ban though they’ve both called it a ban, Starbucks announced that will hire 10,000 refugees over the next five years.

Howard Schultz, Starbuck’s chairman and CEO:

“We have a long history of hiring young people looking for opportunities and a pathway to a new life around the world. This is why we are doubling down on this commitment by working with our equity market employees as well as joint venture and licensed market partners in a concerted effort to welcome and seek opportunities for those fleeing war, violence, persecution and discrimination.”

I need a Caramel Macchiato now.

I’ve been watching the show Timeless because I love stories about time travel and because co-star Matt Lanter is delicious. But last week they did a show about the Old West and Jesse James and one Daniel Lissing played Jesse.

Seriously, a little scruff on the chin and he was scorching my TV.

HotHotHot.

More about the fallout from the Muslim non-ban-ban?

The American Civil Liberties Union reported an astounding $24,164,691 in donations—from 356,306 online donors—following Hair Furor’s hate-filled executive order.

The ACLU usually raises $4 million a year from online donations.

The Resistance is working.

The ride company Lyft said it would donate $1 million to the group after it was revealed that its competitor Uber broke a solidarity strike at JFK airport and a #DeleteUber campaign was born.

Resist.

Want more?

In response to hate, Google has launched a $2 million crisis fund that can be matched with up to $2 million in donations from employees, for four organizations: the American Civil Liberties Union, Immigrant Legal Resource Center, International Rescue Committee and UNHCR. It is Google’s largest crisis campaign ever.

The campaign was disclosed in a memo sent by Google CEO Sundar Pichai and the company’s logo for that day celebrated the birth of Fred Korematsu, an American civil rights activist who objected to the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II.

The resistance grows.

I love court shows. I love Judge Judy because I love bitchy, snarky common sense.

But I saw a show the other day about a man who lost his glasses at a hair salon and was suing the salon for $5,000 because the glasses cost $300. The rest was because he had to drive without his glasses, putting his life at risk.

Seriously? Forty-seven hundred dollars because he had to drive home? Where does he live? The Moon?

And what about _____’s suggestion that he would investigate voter fraud because he’s all pissy that he lost the popular vote by three million to Hillary? And, remember, if you add in all votes against him, he lost the popular vote by over 11 million votes?

Well, it turns out that Gregg Phillips, the man _____ touted as a voter fraud expert was registered to vote in Alabama, Texas, and Mississippi during the 2016 election.

Uh huh. Now, he only voted in Alabama but doesn’t it seem odd that the man investigating fraud was registered in so many places?

I know most of these musings are all about _____, but I cannot help it.

Anyone else bothered by the fact that President _____ didn’t offer condolences to the victims of the mosque shooting in Canada?

Is it because the shooter was white and an anti-immigrant fool and a _____ supporter?

In The Age of _____, Speaking Arabic Gets You Kicked Off A Delta Flight

And, since, for now, we are in The Age of _____, let’s talk blatant hate and blatant fear and blatant stupidity ...

Adam Saleh, a YouTube vlogger whose prank videos have made him an internet star, is accusing Delta Air Lines of kicking him off flight because he spoke Arabic to his mom on the phone before takeoff. 

“I speak to my mom on the phone every flight. She only speaks Arabic.”—Adam Saleh

According to Saleh, a woman in the seat in front of him turned around and told him he should speak English. He told her he can speak whatever language he likes, and then her husband stood up and began screaming at him.

And from there the hate swarmed as about twenty other passengers said they were uncomfortable with Saleh and his “foreign” tongue. Saleh was then approached by the captain—whom Saleh said “seemed ashamed and embarrassed”—and asked Saleh to leave the plane because of passengers complaints.  

In a statement, Delta said: 

“Maintaining a safe, comfortable and orderly onboard environment is paramount for every flight and requires the cooperation of all of our customers in conjunction with adherence to directions from our crew members. This is a Delta policy and is required by U.S. regulations as well as others governing aviation worldwide.

Two customers were removed from Delta flight 1 departing London-Heathrow today after a disturbance in the cabin resulted in more than 20 customers expressing their discomfort.

We have spoken with the customers who were removed; they were rebooked on another flight. Plans are in place to immediately speak with our crew and other passengers when the flight lands this afternoon. We will provide an update once we have more information.”

Okay, how do I put this delicately: fuck you, Delta. Why not remove the twenty bigots from the plane? Why not remove the people who started the disturbance by listening in on Saleh’s private conversation? Again, fuck you, Delta.

Saleh posted a video of his removal and posted it to YouTube; in that video, some passengers can be seen telling the Delta employees that they did not want Saleh removed, while others are seen waving and saying “bye” as he walks away.

Again, the disturbance was caused by that nosy woman and her loudmouthed husband; they should have been removed from the flight at once.

Some of the passengers on the flight spoke to CBS News after the plane landed at JFK, like Rev. Karen Georgia Thompson:

“It was clear that this guy knew what he was doing, because as he was leaving the plane he would stop, he would kind of make eye-contact with people. He would say ‘Delta, Delta is kicking me off the plane.’ He wasn’t alone; he was travelling with somebody else.”

Of course he knew, you idiot; he was being walked off the plane. And, what does it matter if he was travelling with someone else. This all started because he spoke Arabic and a handful of bigots got their feelings hurt.

Jacqueline Willemsen:

“I was sitting towards the front of the plane and just heard a lot of commotion actually. When he came up to the front he was just screaming that it was an injustice and that he was being kicked off for speaking loudly in Arabic. To be really honest it seemed like more of a scene than anything that actually happened.”

Um, Jacqueline, you moronic tool, something did happen. How else do you explain him being kicked off the plane? 

Chris Ashford:

“I think the guy was giving a bit of a prayer, just before take-off, which is not unusual. Somebody heard him speaking in Arabic and I think reported him ... whether Delta performed or acted in the manner they were supposed to, I’m assuming, for protocol, yes. There definitely seemed to be a bit of a misunderstanding.” 

Does Delta have a list of acceptable languages to be used on a plane? if not, then, again, Delta, fuck you, because, despite skepticism about Saleh’s account, Delta employees have been accused of discriminating against Muslims in recent years. 

In August, an Ohio Muslim couple said they were removed from a return flight from Europe after an airline employee allegedly singled them out because, ALLEGEDLY, the woman wearing a headscarf and talking on the phone, and with the husband sweating.

Delta issued them a full refund of their airfare.

Look, was there a kerfuffle between Saleh and some passengers? It seems very likely, but was Saleh loud and shouting profanities? Maybe. But then remove all of those involved, not you Saleh and his friend. Was Saleh being the prankster on the flight? Maybe; but he didn't start the brouhaha.

Remove the woman and her husband who started the mess; remove every person who joined in. I wouldn’t feel unsafe hearing a person speaking Arabic on a flight but I’d be scared shitless of the people, who verbally assaulted the person speaking Arabic.

They are the problem, but, in the Age of _____, they are acting like the victims.

CBS News