Today’s comic by Mark Fiore is Corn candidates:
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What’s coming up on Sunday Kos …
- The importance of fighting with someone on something, by David Akadjian
- Appetite for destruction: Biology, psychology, socialization, and the Republican mind, by Chauncey DeVega
- Incrementalism has outlived its usefulness, by Egberto Willies
- Marco Rubio is no moderate, by Jon Perr
- The courage of Autherine Lucy, by Denise Oliver Velez
- Democrats once resisted 'liberal' label, now fight to claim 'progressive' mantle. That's progress, by Ian Reifowitz
- The Daily Kos Elections guide to every key international election in 2016, by Daily Kos Elections International
- Young black men in Chicago: Out of work, out of school, and out of luck, by Sher Watts Spooner
- Essential reading: Jane Mayer's 'Dark Money,’ by Susan Grigsby
- The machines that improve our lives can also ruin them, by DarkSyde
- Socialism, Fascism, and other philosophies conservatives don't understand, by Mark E Andersen
• Black troops were key to the Union victory in the Civil War: "Once let the black man get upon his person the brass letter, U.S., let him get an eagle on his button, and a musket on his shoulder and bullets in his pocket, there is no power on earth that can deny that he has earned the right to citizenship." That’s the great abolitionist Frederick Douglass explaining why free blacks and “contraband,” runaway slaves, should serve in the Union Army. Douglass was, almost from the moment the Civil War got underway, the leading voice arguing for including black soldiers in the ranks. He wanted the conflict to be reconfigured by the Lincoln administration as a war against slavery. He wanted black soldiers to play a large role in carrying the war to the enemy that was clearly defending slavery. Straightforward reasoning stood behind that stance: Nobody, he thought, would be able to question after the war whether blacks had “earned” their freedom. Once the Union government decided in July 1862 to put blacks in uniform, and especially after the issuance of the Emancipation Proclamation, recruitment was brisk. And Douglass, whose two sons joined the U.S. Army, was its leading spokesman. Eventually, 179,000 blacks—born free and former slaves—served as Union soldiers in 163 segregated units led by white officers. That was 10 percent of the total army. Another 19,000 blacks served in the U.S. Navy. They did so amid deep prejudice, including lesser pay and initially being ordered solely into support roles, with few combat assignments because they were widely seen as uncourageous and lacking the capacity to fight effectively. But eventually they got into combat and quickly put to rest the view that blacks made lousy soldiers. Many served with distinction in important battles even though they knew that if they were captured by Confederates they would far more terrible conditions than white POWs. About 40,000 black soldiers and sailors died in the conflict, 30,000 from combat-related injuries. Despite the racism, 16 black soldiers had been awarded the Medal of Honor by war’s end. Unfortunately, the politics of white supremacy did not disappear at the end of the war, and the powers-that-were in the North proved within a few years that having fought for their freedom didn’t mean blacks got to exercise it. Reconstruction was abandoned, Jim Crow imposed, and a widespread re-enslavement using the criminal-justice system was instituted. Blacks’ crucial role in the war was not merely downplayed for nearly a century, it was made almost completely invisible to the generations that followed until the 1970s.
• Three things to know about the hottest year ever recorded. No. 3: 2015 was only one of the 16 hottest years on record. Fifteen of those years have occurred since 2000.
• Sweden disagrees with U.N. panel that says Assange has been arbitrarily detained: A U.N. panel—the Working Group on Arbitrary Detention—released an 18-page opinion Friday saying Wikileaks founder Julian Assange should be allowed to leave freely from self-imposed hiding at the Ecuadorean Embassy in London. But Anders Ronquist, who heads the legal department of Sweden's foreign ministry, says Assange entered the Ecuadorean Embassy in London in 2012 on his own and "is not being deprived of his liberty there due to any decision or action taken by the Swedish authorities." Assange has said he has been in the embassy for three-and-a-half years because he fears extradition to Sweden (on sexual offense charges) would lead to extradition to the United States to face charges over WikiLeaks' publication of secret U.S. documents.
• Security camera catches cat burglar actually stealing a cat: Vermont State Police have arrested a 54-year-old man and charged him with burglary and unlawful trespass. The police said a security camera in the burgled home recorded the man taking a family cat named “Boots” after claiming he was looking for his own cat in the house. The cops believe the man may have abducted two other pets in the area. A judge has ordered a competency hearing.
• Fight against ISIS stepped up and combat troops aren’t out of the question. Of course, there’s good reason to consider at least some of the soldiers of the Special Operations Forces and other troops already in Iraq as combat soldiers. At best, the line between combat and non-combat is a blurry one. At worst, it’s bullshit. The official tally is 3,650 US troops and private contractors. The Daily Beast says the actual number is around 6,000.
• Here’s the Public Policy Polling’s final Super Bowl poll:
PPP's annual poll on the Super Bowl finds Americans evenly divided on the big game this year- 40% say they're rooting for the Panthers and 40% say they're rooting for the Broncos. There's less division when it comes to who people actually think will win on Sunday- 56% say they believe the Panthers will be the winners to 32% who think the Broncos will come out on top.
There are big race and generational divides in terms of who people are rooting for on Sunday. The Broncos are strongly favored by white people (46/34) and seniors (55/28). Meanwhile the Panthers are the team of choice for nonwhite voters (53/26) and voters under 45 (46/31).
Despite the divide on who people are rooting for Sunday both franchises are pretty well liked overall. 64% of voters see the Broncos favorably to 18% with an unfavorable view. And 54% have a positive opinion of the Panthers to 21% who see them negatively.
• On today’s Kagro in the Morning show, Greg Dworkin reviews the most recent Dem debate, and of course, all the latest polling. Tesla’s newest innovation rolls out in the UK. McDonald’s manages to take the shine off kale. Meet Ted Cruz’s new Gop wunderkind, same as the old Gop wunderkind.
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