Midday open thread: Oil-price plunge takes jobs down with it; booze and bullets in Florida
- Today's comic by Mark Fiore is The toxic mining law:
- What's coming up on Sunday Kos ...
- Right-wing attacks on birthright citizenship, by Denise Oliver Velez
- Drug testing is a waste of time and money, by Mark E Andersen
- What this woman wants. This week, by Susan Grigsby
- Some policy suggestions for #BlackLivesMatter, by Frank Vyan Walton
- Now that Bernie Sanders is taken seriously, supporters must get real, by Egberto Willies
- These aren't scare tactics. A Republican President will take away your Obamacare protections, by Ian Reifowitz
- Two Utah lawmakers think the EPA released mining waste water into the Animas River in Colorado on purpose.:
Utah’s Sen. Margaret Dayton (R) and Rep. Mike Noel (R) have no evidence for their claim — it’s more of a feeling, really — but the two have asked the state Attorney General Sean Reyes to investigate anyway.
“When you went to visit, were you able to discern whether or not there’s any truth to the fact that this was an accident on purpose so they could qualify for Superfund money or if this really was an accident accident?” Dayton asked Attorney General Reyes at a meeting Tuesday.
- Elon Musk’s hyperloop concept may get a test as early as 2018:
If all goes according to plan, Hyperloop Transportation Technologies says it expects a working hyperloop prototype about five miles in length to be up and running in a stretch of land alongside Interstate 5 in between Los Angeles and San Francisco sometime before the end of 2016, with passengers able to ride by 2018. About 400 people are working on the project daily, the company said.
- U.S. oil prices at lowest since 2009; thousands of jobs lost:
Consumers [and environmental advocates] may cheer the lower prices at the pump, but jobs are being lost in the energy industry across the world. In June, the Energy Information Administration said the US petroleum industry lost about 6.5% of its jobs from October to April, or about 35,000 of its 538,000 workers, citing US Bureau of Labor Statistics data.
- Florida Gun Range To Serve Booze:
Commissioners in Daytona Beach, Florida, approved a measure Wednesday that will allow the opening of a 12-lane gun range connected to a booze-filled restaurant. Commissioners were "leery" at first, because alcohol and guns don't mix, but they came around to the idea, according to the Daytona Beach News-Journal. [...]
Everyone who eats or drinks at the restaurant will have to submit to an ID scan, and if they've had alcohol, they won't be allowed to shoot at the range that day, WFTV reports. [...]
Patrons who go to the gun range will also have to sign an affidavit promising they're not drunk.
- Myths and realities of the post-Civil War Reconstruction era are explored in this Salon interview with Eric Foner, the nation's pre-eminent scholar on the subject.
- These Daily Kos community posts were the most shared on Facebook August 20:
Carter's Guinea worm program took 3.5 million cases in 1986 to just 11 so far this year, by distraught
Crazy Republican wants to turn immigrants into slaves: Forget the 13th Amendment, by Sassine
Trump Attacks Pope Francis Over Anti-Capitalism: Say He Will Scare Pope with ISIS, by TomP
- Do American Indian Students Perform Better When They Have American Indian Teachers?
- Nation's oldest veteran dies at 110:
Emma Didlake, a longtime Detroiter and America’s oldest living veteran, passed away at age 110 on Sunday morning—just weeks after meeting President Barack Obama in Washington.
- On today's Kagro in the Morning show, after a slightly distracted Friday start, Greg Dworkin checks in with the latest 2016 headlines, plus Jimmy Carter & attempted Iran deal derailment news. History of US birthright citizenship. Cops spy on BLM. Algorithms spy on you.
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