Midday open thread: Int'l flag of Earth; man admits plot against NY Muslims; O'Reilly denies abuse

• Today's comic by Jen Sorensen is The Great Hall of Iraq Whoppers:
  
• The ugliest race of the year (to date) will conclude tonight in Kentucky, where voters are headed to the polls to pick the Republican nominee for governor. The winner will face state Attorney General Jack Conway in November as Democrats try to hold the governor's mansion. A major primary pitting labor against the "education reform" movement is also on tap in the Philadelphia mayor's race, while Democrats are trying to retain control of the mayoralty in Florida's largest city, Jacksonville. Click here for our in-depth preview of all these races and more, and come back to Daily Kos Elections for our liveblog starting at 6 PM ET, when polls begin closing in Kentucky.
• Waco shootout makes no difference to Texans who want to expand "open carry" gun laws:

  One bill, HB910, passed the Texas house and was debated on Monday in a state senate committee. It would allow people to carry handguns and pistols in the open and would bar police from asking whether the person carrying the gun is licensed.

  Texans can already carry so-called “long guns”, such as rifles, in public. Another bill, SB11, would allow “concealed carry” of weapons on college campuses.
  

• NY congressional candidate admits plotting murderous attack on Muslims. Robert Doggart thought Islamberg in Delaware County, New York, should be "utterly destroyed" to capture attention public attention. He faces up to five years in prison and a $25,000 fine.

  In a plea agreement filed in federal court April 29, the Signal Mountain resident and former District 4 congressional candidate admitted he spent months gathering weapons and plotting an all-out assault on the small Muslim enclave in Delaware County, New York.

  "We shall be Warriors who will inflict horrible numbers of casualties upon the enemies of our Nation and World Peace," he wrote in one Facebook post.

  Doggart's plan seems to have been based on the fear that Islamberg residents were themselves planning a terrorist attack, though local law enforcement say no such plan exists. The town is the headquarters of Muslims of America.

• These Daily Kos community posts were the most shared on Facebook May 18:
  

  We're Number 1! Arizona reaches another milestone of hate, by Mother Mags

  Shell Oil Caught Planning for Deadly 4 to 6 Degree Rise in Global Temperature, by ericlewis0

  THE DUMBENING: How the Right Deliberately Confuses the Loss of Power with the Loss of Liberty, by GrafZeppelin127

• 
  For use when we land people on Mars, Swedish student designs the International Flag of Planet Earth:

  "We are sailing in a different kind of water now, so it should be relevant for our ships—which are spacecraft nowadays—to have a flag where we come from, and we come from Earth," [Oskar Pernefeldt] said. “I think it’s a bit weird, ethically, to have different countries’ flags when we’re cooperating as much as we’re doing. The space race is over.”

  He sees the flag being used when humans go to Mars, to represent the Earth and remind people that we share the planet.

• Cartoonists face death threats and prison for satirizing authorities. There are many examples. Here is one, the cartoonist Zunar in Malaysia:

  The satirist faces a possible 43 years in prison on nine charges of sedition, an anti-state offense that carries mandatory jail time under Malaysian law. Hearings in his case are due to begin on May 20. He is also under investigation for two separate sedition accusations, including for the books seized in January and another volume, Cartoon-O-Phobia, published in 2010, Zunar told CPJ. “In a corrupt regime, the truth is seditious,” said Zunar, who has had five books banned since 2010. “I will keep drawing until the last drop of my ink.”

• Apparently, he wasn't standing his ground:

  The Winter Springs man accused of shooting at George Zimmerman in Lake Mary earlier this week must turn in his weapons and avoid contact with him, a judge ruled this morning.

  Matthew Apperson, 35 of Winter Springs, was charged Friday with aggravated assault with a deadly weapon, aggravated battery with a deadly weapon and firing a deadly missile into an occupied conveyance.

• Bill O'Reilly denies accusations he physically abused his wife:

  The Fox News Channel star issued a statement to The Hollywood Reporter through his personal attorney that reads: "All allegations against me in these circumstances are 100 percent false."

• Activists warn that body cams on cops no panacea:

  ...a coalition of over 30 privacy and civil rights organizations released a statement of shared principles outlining their vision for the future use of police body cameras. The coalition statement argues that body camera footage documenting police interactions with the public “can have a valuable role to play in the present and future of policing,” but insists that safeguards be put in place to ensure that body cameras do not become a “tool for injustice.” Signatories include ACLU, the NAACP, Color of Change and the Electronic Frontier Foundation.

• Team Blackness discussed the fact that the Waco shootout, in which nine died, has been called by CCN a "brouhaha" while the NYT called it a "confrontation." Also discussed was the demilitarization of the police, a woman who got jail time for raping a man, and a really inappropriate way that one Boston couple chose to wait for the train. Subscribe on iTunes | Subscribe On Stitcher | Direct Download | RSS
• On today's Kagro in the Morning show, Bristol Palin calls off her wedding! 15yo MT boy shot & killed by a friend. Revisiting Luis Lang, self-reliant ACA protester who blames everyone else. "Liberal bias" explained. Krugman on excusing Iraq as a "mistake." And hey, what about torture?