The unimportant news thread

[zamyrabyrd]

82 does seem about right for Nixon.

I happen to disagree. Nixon inherited Johnson's mess.

"Nixon's most enduring achievements were made in the arena of foreign policy.When he made his ground-breaking visit to China in 1972 he brought that country out of dangerous isolation. He was the first US president to go to Moscow, where he negotiated the Strategic Arms Limitation Treaty, breaking the ice of Cold War nuclear hostility. Other Nixonian achievements, with full honour to the role played in them by Henry Kissinger, included saving Israel from near annihilation in the 1973 war and eventually signing the peace treaty with North Vietnam. By the time Nixon left office he had brought peace to millions, even if he had not found it for himself.

On the home front, Nixon was a creative innovator. He desegregated southern schools, which neither JFK nor LBJ had achieved. He ended the compulsory call-up of the draft. He launched the Environmental Protection Agency. He created more new national parks than any other president and started the federally funded war on cancer. Tom Wicker of New York Times thought so highly of these policies that he wrote in praise of Nixon as 'the domestic liberal'."

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/us-politics/9780832/Richard-Nixons-dark-side-has-obscured-his-greatness.html

[Todd]

This certainly does look like a case of getting what you pay for.

[zamyrabyrd]

This certainly does look like a case of getting what you pay for.

On NHK (Japan) News it was said North Korea has 5000 tons of VX nerve agent!!!
This is crazy and possibly worse than their nuclear capability. 

[Todd]

Adieu, Mr Arrow.  Sad to see you go.

[Todd]

The new Dirty Dozen.

[Turner]

Just in case that for some reason you´re not entirely updated with the current list of the world´s leading 500 billionaires:

https://www.bloomberg.com/billionaires/?cmpid=socialflow-twitter-business&utm_content=business&utm_campaign=socialflow-organic&utm_source=twitter&utm_medium=social

[Turner]

Lately, there was the "let´s make it much less illegal to beat one´s wife a bit"-law initiative in Russia, which came into effect.

Now, there´s "let´s make hooliganism into an organized sport - teams of 20 fighters versus each other"-initiative:

"Russia would be a pioneer in a new sport," said Lebedev, who also suggested fights between different fan groups could draw crowds of thousands. "English fans arrive, for example, and start picking fights. And they get the answer — challenge accepted. A meeting in a stadium at a set time (...)

It isn't the first time Lebedev has courted controversy with his views on hooligans. He hailed the violence in Marseille last year, telling Russian fans: "Well done lads, keep it up!"
Besides his parliamentary duties as deputy speaker, Lebedev is also on the board of the Russian Football Union."

http://bigstory.ap.org/13a9f428626044928e73c55f030eaf4f

[Todd]

Pfft, Trump.  This is the real political news story of the week in the US.  (Well, unless a new war in a non-Greater Middle East country breaks out by end of day Saturday.)

[NikF]

The 'missing' Ford Mustang used in Bullitt discovered in a Mexican junkyard.

Although I'd prefer to find and restore the Plymouth DeLuxe driven by Bogart in 'The Big Sleep' - especially if it came with a latter day Martha Vickers in the passenger seat.

[Turner]

To celebrate the anniversary of the national poet, Kiev´s subway grants free rides at some stations, for those who recite Shevchenko´s poems on entry.

https://twitter.com/myroslavapetsa/status/839952674342711296
http://world.24-my.info/in-kiev-the-passengers-for-free-was-riding-the-subway-for-the-knowledge-of-the-poems-of-shevchenko/

[Spineur]

Bernard Pivot (writer, former TV litterary figure) kitchen view of the french presidential race which I did put into pictures

[Karl Henning]

But this time, O'Reilly bullied a fellow Fox News contributor who kept calm and professional. And the dispute was not just over history and politics — it also raised questions about O'Reilly's ethics and decorum.

[Todd]

Another thousand US troops to Syria.  Good times for everyone.  (Looks like one lucky city already hosts both US and Russian troops.  What's the worst that could happen?)

[Karl Henning]

Hands across the wadi!

[Karl Henning]

Moore was an early critic of both Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. The core of his critique was simple: that American Christians shouldn't excuse or rationalize sin for the sake of political victory in any single election. Moreover, the same moral standards one applies to political opponents should also apply to one's political friends. If sexual misconduct, for example, rendered Bill Clinton unfit for office in the 1990s, how should Christians think about a thrice-married serial adulterer in 2016 — especially one who bragged about grabbing women by the genitals?

[Spineur]

Exit pools indicate a large victory of Rutte center right party (31 seats) over De Wilders extreme right (19 seats) in Dutch general elections.  His decision on saturday to expel turkish ministers flying in to campain at pro-Erdogan rally won him the election as last week pool were not nearly as favorable.

Should he call Erdogan to thank him ?

[Todd]

It is safe to say that the craze for "smart" devices has gone too far.  (Then again, maybe not.)

[Spineur]

Dismay

The mayor of the city of Beziers, Robert Menard, is from the far right party National Front led by M. LePen.

Every year there is a vocal competition of young lyric talents in Beziers.  They got instructed by the mayor, that they could not sing works by Meyerbeer or Halevy because of their jewish ancestory.

[kishnevi]

http://www.scarymommy.com/starbucks-barista-says-not-to-order-unicorn-frappuccino/

[kishnevi]

and extremism of a sort was involved in the Dortmund Borussia bus bombing
http://www.marketwatch.com/story/borussia-dortmund-bus-bomb-was-no-terrorist-just-a-greedy-investor-investigators-say-2017-04-21