January 5, 1916 With the Great War (World War I) entering its third year, British Prime Minister Herbert Asquith introduced the first conscription law in British history to the House of Commons, the Military Service Act. World War I Conscientious Objectors, Dyce Camp, UK About 16,000 conscientious objectors refused to fight. Most believed that even during wartime it was wrong to kill another human being. About 7,000 agreed to perform non-combat service; more than 1,500 refused all compulsory service. They were usually drafted into military units and, upon refusing to obey orders, were court-martialed. Consequences of conscription
January 5, 1968 A mass movement advocating political and economic reforms, including increased freedom of speech, travel and an end to state censorship, began in Czechoslovakia when Alexander Dubcek came to power as the head of the Czechoslovakian Communist Party. “We shall have to remove everything that strangles artistic and scientific creativeness,” he said. The time later became known as “Prague Spring.” Alexander Dubcek, ”Socialism with a human face” Soviet tanks enter Prague, August 1968 Read more
Cold is the winter day, misty and dark: The sunless sky with faded gleams is rent: And patches of thin snow outlying, mark The landscape with a drear disfigurement.
The trees their mournful branches lift aloft: The oak with knotty twigs is full of trust, With bud-thronged bough the cherry in the croft; The chestnut holds her gluey knops upthrust.
No birds sing, but the starling chaps his bill And chatters mockingly; the newborn lambs Within their strawbuilt fold beneath the hill Answer with plaintive cry their bleating dams.
Their voices melt in welcome dreams of spring, Green grass and leafy trees and sunny skies: My fancy decks the woods, the thrushes sing, Meadows are gay, bees hum and scents arise.
And God the Maker doth my heart grow bold To praise wintry works not understood, Who all the worlds and ages doth behold, Evil and good as one, and all as good.
This poem is in the public domain. Published in Poem-a-Day on January 4, 2025, by the Academy of American Poets.
Even if you weren’t around when the band got their start in the late 1950s, you’ve definitely experienced the music of The Isley Brothers. With a sound that combines R&B, rock, funk and soul, their music has been been heavily sampled and covered by the likes of Ice Cube, The Beatles and Whitney Houston.
But while you surely know their music, you may not know that the Cincinnati, Ohio-born siblings who were known for producing sexy love ballads actually started singing gospel music as teens. Despite label changes, family tragedies and a lawsuit between two of the original members, founding member Ronald and younger brother Ernie Isley still entertain fans with the songs that first made them famous in the 1960s.
To this day, The Isley Brothers are the only act in history to hit the Billboard Hot 100 in six consecutive decades: The 1950s, 1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s and 2000s. Here is their story. (snip-go see the photos, listen to the music. While going through the early slides, why not turn on this?or this? )
I have a question of the people who like these meme posts. What day should I do them on. I can post them on Friday, Saturday, or Sunday. It makes no difference to me. I do enjoy if others can use any of the memes or cartoons I post, and I know that Jill and I share a few back and forth. So let me know what day gives you the most for enjoyment and ability to use them, and I will go with the majority. I love the meme / cartoon posts also. Hugs
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The Nancy Mace baby picture. In all these years nothing whatever has changed. What a tragedy that she never grew up!
“Democracy dies in darkness” is a phrase popularized by Washington Post investigative reporter Bob Woodward who used it in an article about government secrecy. After billionaire and Amazon founder Jeff Bezos purchased The Washington Post and Donald Trump assumed the presidency (sic), it became the newspaper’s first slogan in its 140-year history. Today, democracy is dying.
When Bezos purchased the paper, many felt he was saving the Post and journalism. He stood out of the way and allowed his journalists to defend democracy because there is no democracy without journalism.
After Trump lost the 2020 election by being soundly and squarely defeated by Joe Biden, the Post started to get a little flaky. It laid off and bought out prominent journalists. It started running whimsical New Yorker-like cartoons by Edith Pritchett on its opinion page. It hired right-wing Nixon/Reagan lover Michael Ramirez to draw political cartoons for its opinion page. It refused to make an endorsement in the 2024 election. but it still had Ann.
Herblock Award, Pulitzer Prize, and Rueben Award-winning political cartoonist Ann Telnaes had been freelancing for the Post for years. She was freelancing for the Post when the excellent Tom Toles retired in 2020. The Post promised to hire a full-time cartoonist to replace Toles who had replaced the legendary Herblock. Many felt the Post would hire Ann full-time as she was the most qualified and deserving. But the Post backtracked (lied) and didn’t hire a staffer. Instead, they brought in a freelancer who worked from Canada.
No offense to Michael de Adder, but this is the legendary Washington Post. The person filling Herblock’s spot should be expected to live in Washington, DC, or at the very least, the United States. I believe political cartoons are better if the person drawing them is actually affected by the issues he or she is drawing about. Ann was living in Washington at the time.
For the past few decades, Ann has been one of the best political cartoonists in the world. The Washington Post never fully respected that, and they disrespected her again this week.
During the 2024 presidential campaign, The Post has been flaky. Bezos issued statements before election day about having high expectations from a second Trump administration. Never mind that Donald Trump has attacked the Post, calling it the “Amazon” Washington Post. Never mind that Trump continues to call journalists the “enemy of the American people.” Never mind that Trump calls legitimate news “fake news” while pushing lies over and over again. Never mind that Trump sues journalism outlets for reporting facts about him. Never mind that Trump threatens and wants to do away with the basic tenets of democracy.
After the election, Bezos and other tech billionaires started dumping money into Trump’s “inauguration” fund with many, such as Bezos, making treks to MAGA-Lardo to kiss Trump’s ass.
As the owner of Amazon, which has government contracts, and with the threat of Elon Musk in a position to make cuts to government spending, it’s in Bezos’ financial interest, or so he believes, to play up to Donald Trump. Jeff Bezos had dinner with Trump, probably sitting in the same spot as all the white nationalists who had dinner with Trump at MAGA-Lardo. Trump was launching a lawsuit against the Des Moines Register for a poll while Bezos was sitting at MAGA-Lardo chomping on his Cobb salad.
This week, Ann drew a cartoon that depicted the billionaires groveling to Trump, and among them was Jeff Bezos. Guess what her editor did with that cartoon? He killed it. Guess what Ann did. She quit.
That’s right. Ann Telnaes got up and quit working for the most prominent publication for political cartoonists. In her substack piece, Why I’m Quitting The Washington Post, Ann, who has been with the Post since 2008, writes, “In all that time I’ve never had a cartoon killed because of who or what I chose to aim my pen at. Until now.”
Ann called the spiking of the cartoon a “gamechanger,” that was “dangerous for a free press.”
She’s correct. When newspaper owners are afraid of presidents to the point they start killing critical political cartoons, a free press is in danger. Bezos and Los Angeles Times owner Patrick Soon-Shiong both killed editorials endorsing Vice President Kamala Harris for president over Trump. Why? Because it was bad for business.
Ann’s editor, David Shipley, called her a liar for her “interpretation of events and said in a statement, “Not every editorial judgment is a reflection of a malign force,” Mr. Shipley said in the statement, “My decision was guided by the fact that we had just published a column on the same topic as the cartoon and had already scheduled another column — this one a satire — for publication. The only bias was against repetition.”
As a political cartoonist who’s worked with editors, I smell bullshit. In my experience, editors LOVE it when cartoons coincide with editorials. Now, these are columns but still, they typically like it when they run together or close together. Shipley says one of those columns had already been published and the second is scheduled for publication. Since one of those hasn’t been published yet, then he should have given deference to Ann’s cartoon, that is if he’s not lying. Ann is a Pulitzer Prize winner. Why would he kill her piece for something else?
Shipley said he respects Ann but he clearly doesn’t.
Trump spent his entire campaign promising to weaponize the Justice Department to go after his enemies. Look at his nominees to lead the DOJ. First, it was Matt Gaetz and now it’s Pam Bondi. His pick to lead the FBI is Kash Patel. These are goons.
Ann took a principled stand that will cost her financially. I can’t think of an outlet that would hire her and pay more than the Post. It may have hurt her professionally as I can’t think of an outlet that would hire her and be more prominent than the Post. But she’s established that she’s a badass.
The last time something like this happened was when the Pittsburgh Gazette fired Rob Rogers for refusing to stop criticizing Donald Trump. His replacement was goosestepping Steve Kelley (who was later quietly let go). Someone should tell the Post that Steve’s available, who’s probably already FedEx’ed his resume.
I drew a cartoon in 2015 when Ted Cruz attacked Ann which provoked thousands of death threats and threats of other despicable things I won’t mention here.
I drew a cartoon in 2019 that featured the firing of Rogers. When Rogers was fired, Michael Cavna, who wrote about cartoon issues did a piece about that. He’s not there anymore to write about Ann’s departure.
I drew a cartoon in 2023 about McClatchy laying off three Pulitzer Prize-winning political cartoonists on the same day.
This person was not fired for his religious beliefs. He was fired for pushing his beliefs on others and doing something at work on work property that their employer told them not to do. How many of us get to disregard the orders of our bosses and when fired claim it was because of ours religious beliefs?
But this is entirely about getting the case to the SCOTUS to move the US a little closer to making Christianity the official religion of the country, and cementing into law that Christians do not have to follow the non-discrimination laws due to being Christians, so above such laws. It is about making Christians above any law or rule because of … god, because you can make the bible say anything you desire. It is about making it legal for Christians to push their religious beliefs on coworkers while insulting and refusing to work with those they claim their god dislikes. And forcing the employer to make special concessions to them again based on what they claim their holy book says and it is only their holy book that counts. Hugs.
Eli Lilly & Co. has been hit with a suit claiming it fired a New Jersey drug sales representative for holding a biblically based view on sexual morality. In a case that pits an employee’s right to religious expression against the company’s support of its LGBTQ+ workers, plaintiff Jonathan Samaniego claims he was terminated based on his religious views, in violation of Title VII and New Jersey’s Law Against Discrimination.
In Samaniego v. Eli Lilly & Co., the plaintiff began posting scripture passages during a discussion of Pride Month on the company’s in-house employee communication system, Yammer.
On June 14, 2024, Samaniego’s manager, Jacqueline Porter, posted a lengthy message about Pride Month on Yammer, according to the lawsuit. According to Samaniego’s suit, the plaintiff prayed about how to respond to Porter’s Pride Month posting, then made his own post to Yammer from the book of Leviticus, which said, “You shall not sleep with a male as a with a woman. It is an abomination.”
According to the report, Samaniego was called into HR and told to refrain from such future postings on the company’s system.
However, days later he reportedly posted anti-gay bible verses again, including this from Corinthians: “Do you know that wrongdoers will not inherit the kingdom of God? Do not be deceived: Neither the sexually immoral nor idolaters nor adulterers nor men who have sex with men nor thieves nor the greedy nor drunkards nor slanderers nor swindlers will inherit the kingdom of God.”
After refusing to sign a directive agreeing to stop the postings, he was then terminated, per the report.
Samaniego is being represented by the Pacific Legal Foundation, which appeared here in 2022 when they sued to block LGBTQ-related questions from the US Census.
The group first appeared on JMG in 2010 when they sued then-California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger in an attempt to force him to defend Proposition 8 in federal court.
In 2012, they attempted to force a California state referendum that would have banned mentioning LGBTQ figures in history lessons.
Also in 2012, they attempted to sanction DOJ attorneys for opposing the Defense of Marriage Act.
The group has repeatedly sued to overturn state bans on ex-gay torture, claiming that 80% of ex-gay “conversions” are successful.
In 2019 they sued California to end sexual education and HIV prevention instructions in public schools.
The Pacific Justice Institute, their parent organization, was named a hate group by the SPLC in 2014.
Since the advent of the pandemic, the group has also filed multiple lawsuits against COVID protocols and vaccine mandates.
“…fired …for holding a biblically based view on sexual morality…”
No, you have the right to hold any view you choose. You were fired for spreading it around on company media, which you mistakenly thought was a pulpit. Your religious beliefs are YOUR beliefs, just yours.
The company has a right to its policies, seriously, it’s right there in virtually every employee handbook of the majority of companies. You used company property to push your cult bullshit, thus committing acts of discrimination, they warned you and you chose to violate the policy again.
Also, this is in no way a Title VII violation of your rights as you had been told, via the company, that you were violating their employee guidelines and non-discrimination policy that they set. The irony of you suing for doing what you claim they did to you is hilarious. This should be laughed out of court, but in present day USA, anything religious takes priority, even over other human rights.
I’m from Louisiana, mostly. But I always tell people I’m from the part of the state that’s not fun, which means I’m not from New Orleans because that’s the impression most people get when I say I’m from Louisiana. Yes, I am a Saints fan. Who dat?
It breaks my heart to see New Orleans suffer. While I haven’t been there in over two decades, it’s a city I love. While every city is different and has its own character, New Orleans is special. I read somewhere a long time ago that the four most distinctive cities in this nation are Boston, Austin, San Francisco, and New Orleans. I don’t know if I believe that because I’d throw New York City and Chicago into that mix.
But like New York City, New Orleans knows how to rebound after a disaster. While 9/11 was hard, it didn’t destroy NYC. Katrina nearly destroyed New Orleans and the city was down for the count, but it’s back. And I assure you that an ISIS-inspired terrorist from Texas isn’t going to take the city out either.
And now I want an oyster po’boy.
What New Orleans nor the nation needs right now is Donald Trump.
Trump has blamed this attack on President Biden, open “border’s,” and immigrants. He also trashed law enforcement. But the thing is, this attack wasn’t perpetuated by an immigrant but by a U.S.-born citizen who’s in the military.
Donald Trump probably followed a false news report by Fox News, which they quickly corrected, but Trump doubled down on his lies.
But Trump isn’t just any American citizen. He’s the president-elect. He is receiving an intelligence briefing daily which means he knows he’s lying.
The election is over, so what the hell is Trump campaigning for? He’s scaring America so it’ll go along with his hate agenda, especially when he starts rounding up immigrants along with his enemies.
Creative note: I thought I had my idea for this in my head yesterday. But I went north to Northern Virginia last night and when I started work this morning in a different location, I decided I didn’t like my original idea. But then this hit me.
Scottie's Playtime 