As Nutmeg said, welcome to Sunday Puzzle Warm-Up — a little light mental exercise for a Saturday evening as you prepare for the harder mental work-out pucklady is preparing for tomorrow night’s Sunday Puzzle. (Nutmeg is one of 3 cats and 1 dog whom I’ve been pet-sitting for this week.)
The warm-up puzzle theme for the past few months, and for at least a few more weeks, is Candidates Worth Supporting. Some of the candidates featured have included Daily Kos members Angela Marx, Tim Canova, Zephyr Teachout, Kim Weaver, Russ Feingold, Jim Keady, and Wade Norris. Non-DK members have included Peter DeFazio, Maggie Hassan, Diana Hird, Pramila Jayapal, Susannah Randolph, Tammy Duckworth, Eileen Bedell, Angie Craig, Beth Tuura, Bob Poe, Tom Wakely, and Ann Kirkpatrick.
The answer to last week’s puzzle was Adam Sackrin, a Daily Kos member who’s running for congress in Florida’s 27th district. You can find information about Adam — and a new puzzle identifying another candidate worth supporting — directly below.
Adam is still fairly new to Daily Kos, and has not published any diaries here yet, but he’s the kind of candidate many have said we need more of: a young person who has taken the challenge to get involved in politics and is willing to run for office on strong progressive positions.
In his own words:
Our next Democrat President needs a cooperative, competent, uncompromised Congress if we want to see real change and get important things done.
There are 80 million Americans between the ages of 18-35, and 2016 is going to be the first election with more eligible Millennial voters than Baby Boomer voters.
Republicans know this, and have intentionally made politics so corrupt and unbearable that Millennials just don’t care anymore. Government doesn’t work for them (us), so they (we) have other things to focus on. They stay out of the national debate, they lose interest in local politics, their needs are not met and they stay home on voting day; exactly what the GOP wants.
We cannot let the GOP continue to jeopardize our future. Their reelection campaigns are funded by a handful of wealthy donors, and they collectively hold our country hostage and silence the voice of the people…
Good progressive candidates are running honest campaigns in winnable races across the country, including right here in Miami, Florida. The Political Revolution has come to South Florida, and we are going to take out one of the most well-liked and “reasonable” GOP incumbents and replace her with the progressive, energized “new blood” the people of Miami so badly need fighting for them in Washington, D.C. right now.
The system we have is broken, and it allows incumbents in Congress to win reelection 95% of the time despite a 12% approval rating. To fix government we need to fix democracy first and replace ALL those members of Congress supported by a few wealthy donors and shady SuperPACs who are responsive only to the needs of that few…
Support progressive candidates down-ticket and refrain from voting Republican for any office. The Political Revolution is just getting started.
Many candidates write wishy-washy feel-good statements on the issues in order to appeal to as many voters as possible without really telling the voters where the candidate stands. Adam’s issues page is filled with strong clear statements. I’m mostly just going to quote some of the headings, to avoid taking up too much space since I know folks are eager to get to tonight’s puzzle, but I encourage people to visit Adam’s site and read some of the issues stands themselves.
- Smart, Aggressive Action On Climate Change To Save The Planet
- Restore Democracy and Ensure Free & Fair Elections
- Equal Rights For All, Non-Negotiable
The American people of today are vibrant, diverse, and tolerant. The kind of bigotry and ignorance we see from some elected officials is no longer acceptable. It’s 2016, the world is moving forward, making progress, and we have work to do. We are not re-arguing the civil rights movement; every person is guaranteed the right to life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness. Government should be insistent on fostering an inclusive society, free of discrimination, racism, oppression, and hate. We are not like the Party of Trump in this regard and we never have been. Women’s rights to make healthcare decisions, to safe family planning and to equal pay for equal work are non-negotiable. Equal rights and protections under the law for all people, regardless of age, race, nationality, gender identity, sexual orientation, non-negotiable. Some members of Congress are corrupted by money and some are corrupted by their prejudices, but all must be replaced in Congress before we will be able to do the things we need to do as a nation.
- Criminal Justice Reform and a Concerted National Effort to End Institutionalized Racism
- End Federal Marijuana Prohibition
- Strong, Healthy Working Families, Good Jobs and a Living Wage
Nobody who works a 40-hour week should be living in poverty. Corporate greed has created a super-capitalist tendency to treat workers poorly and maximize profits. We need to encourage socially moral business practices and expand workers’ rights.
A strong middle class creates more consumerism, and is the backbone of a productive, just society. It’s time to raise the minimum wage to a living wage, expand and guarantee paid sick and family leave, stand with unions for fair labor conditions and collective bargaining, create better jobs with benefits in emerging fields to strengthen the middle class workforce, enact a single-payer healthcare system, get big pharma under control, safeguard women’s reproductive rights and expand medical research towards cures for cancer, HIV/AIDS and other diseases and on stem cells.
We are the most powerful nation in the world and it is 2016, people should not be going bankrupt over medical bills or staying at an unbearable job for the lousy health benefits.
- Education Overhaul: Transform Our Public Schools, Make Public Colleges Tuition-Free, Fix Student Debt Crisis
- Stand With the 99% and Reign In Wall Street
Support Elizabeth Warren’s 21st Century Glass-Steagall reforms act. Close tax loopholes and make the ultra-wealthy pay their fair share in taxes. Tax on speculation. Reverse Income and Wealth Inequality. Expand estate tax revenue.
- Expand Social Security, Medicaid and Medicare
- Rebuild Our Crumbling Infrastructure for the 21st Century
- Oppose the Job-Killing Trans-Pacific Partnership
- War Is The Last Option
… And numerous more.
All right, let’s move on to tonight’s puzzle!
Tonight’s puzzle is a JulieCrostic. It has 3 rows, with 4 answers per row.
If you’re familiar with how JulieCrostics work you can jump right in; if you don’t know how JulieCrostics work, you can find complete instructions (with diagrams and everything!) at the bottom of this diary.
NOTE: This past week a handful of Republicans did something pretty obnoxious which I think got too little attention from the media. Several of them have no credible opponent so will likely get away with it. But one of them has a very credible opponent. The person whose name is spelled out in the verticals of tonight’s puzzle is someone who has good stands on the issues and has a good chance of taking out a Republican who very much deserves taking out.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- 1. ceremonial acts
- 2. makes a knot again
- 3. incapable of reproducing
- 4. very first
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- 5. one alleged to be more evil than Donald Trump
- 6. rays found in the tropical waters
- 7. variety of apple (related to the Winesap)
- 8. backbone
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
- 9. gaze intently
- 10. humor used to make a point
- 11. most risque
- 12. container for flour
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
For those new to Sunday Puzzle, here’s an explanation of how JulieCrostics work
In JulieCrostics you are given a set of clues, such as these:
- 1. say what’s not so
- 2. resting
- 3. concede
………..………….…………..………..………….…………..
- 4. more than game, less than match
- 5. famous star location
- 6. vampire slayer
………..………….…………..………..………….…………..
- 7. activist Eastman
- 8. skirt or pad
- 9. accepted principle
………..………….…………..………..………….…………..
- 10. consume
- 11. blue-green color
- 12. candidates who share a platform
The answers to the clues need to be entered into a grid of rows and columns. For the Saturday night warm-up puzzles I usually tell solvers how many rows and columns there are; for the more challenging Sunday night puzzles the solvers generally need to figure that out for themselves. (In this example, the puzzle contains 4 rows with 3 answers per row).
Solving the clues is easier than it looks, since every word in a row has all the letters of the previous word plus one new letter. For example, in the set of clues above the answers in the first row are
- 1. say what’s not so = LIE
- 2. resting = IDLE [LIE + D, anagrammed]
- 3. concede = YIELD [IDLE + Y, anagrammed]
Also, as you can see in the chart below, all the words in a column have the same number of letters. In this example puzzle the first answers in a row all have 3 letters, the middle answers all have 4 letters, and the final answers all have 5 letters.
As you solve the clues, write the answers and the add-on letters into a grid like so:
lie D idle Y yield
set A east K stake
Max I maxi O maxim
eat L teal S slate
When you have solved all the clues and written down all the added letters, the added letters will form columns that spell out a message of some sort. It might be a person's name, it might be the title of a book, it might be a familiar phrase, or it might be a series of related words.
In the example given, the verticals read DAIL YKOS. With proper spacing and capitalization that spells out Daily Kos!