1. Ken Langone: Pope Francis, stop pissing off rich people… or else.
Pope Francis has been shaking a lot of conservative Christians up by de-emphasizing the church’s view of gays and atheists as sinners. But the people he is upsetting the most are super-rich so-called Christians, who apparently had no idea that this Jesus fellow was so sympathetic to the poor and downtrodden. And the Pope’s indictment of greed and the implication that trickledown economics doesn’t work, and isn’t something Jesus would condone, is just a step too far.
Them’s fighting words to billionaire Home Depot founder Ken Langone, who issued a warning to the poverty-conscious pontiff this week. In a nutshell, Langone said, shut up with your criticisms of rich capitalists or we’re not going to give any more money to charity. One of Langone’s favorite charities is the Republican Party, so no great loss there. But Langone also said “his friends” might be less inclined to give money for the restoration of St. Patrick’s Cathedral in New York if that mean old pope does not stop hurting their feelings by saying they lack compassion for the poor.
Right, the old “my friends” story. And where is people’s compassion for the rich? Meanies.
2. David Brooks: Don’t legalize it, even though I got to smoke it, and yeah, it was pretty fun, but….
Apparently, David Brooks is a haunted man. See, way before he became a conservative columnist for theNew York Times, he made an embarrassing speech in a class. The reason: that ole devil weed. He smoked it at lunch and was too stoned to function in English class.
The memory of that embarrassing episode still keeps Brooks up at night sometimes. He would very much like to help prevent other teenagers from having bad memories like that. He would also like to prevent teenagers (and others) from having the silly fun and bonding experiences he admits he had while smoking pot as a youth. Curiously, he is less concerned about preventing kids, especially and statistically, black kids, from having nightmarish, life-ruining experiences with the criminal justice system after being caught with even small amounts of pot. His main point is that although he smoked it, and kind of liked it at one point, other people shouldn’t be able to because they won’t be able to modulate their use like he was able to. And they won’t pursue higher moral pleasures, like being David Brooks.
3. Maine GOP senate candidate: The system is terribly unfair to domestic abusers, like me.
Integrity. That’s something we can all agree Washington is sorely in need of. We might however have different ideas about what constitutes integrity. For Erick Bennett, who is running in the primary against Senator Susan Collins, serving time in jail for assaulting his now ex-wife proves he has integrity.
“The fact that I have been jailed repeatedly for not agreeing to admit to something I didn’t do should speak to the fact of how much guts and integrity I have,” he explained to the Bangor Daily News. “If I go to D.C., I’m going to have that same integrity in doing what I say, and saying what I do, when it comes to protecting people’s rights, as well as their pocketbooks.”
Bennett is a fighter, all right. He battled his conviction all the way until the here.
10. N.C. Rep. councilman resigns in Klingon.
There have been a lot of strange doings in North Carolina’s legislatures lately, most of them bad. But when David Waddell, a conservative councilman of a town in suburban Charlotte, tendered his resignation to the town’s mayor in Klingon, absurdity reached a new kind of height (or depth).
For those unfamiliar with Klingons, they were the alien race from Star Trek who eventually made peace with the Federation (that’s the good guys). Fortunately, for non-trekkies CNET has verified that the resignation note contained “beautiful, pointy-looking written Klingon language of Kronos.”
The mayor was not amused. “It’s an embarrassment for Indian Trail, and it’s an embarrassment for North Carolina,” Mayor Michael Alvarez said.
Sadly, for residents of North Carolina, including blacks, women, teachers and children, this is far from the worst or most embarrassing thing that has happened in North Carolina politics of late.
Source: Alternet