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Sunday, November 22, 2009

News The Morning News: Senate Votes to Consider Health Care, Conflict Over Church Cookies, and Street Signs are Brown

Posted by Garrett McCulloch on Sun, Nov 22, 2009 at 9:14 AM

Sixty: Senate Democrats put together enough votes to open debate on health care reform. That doesn't guarantee whatever bill the Senate comes up with will pass though.

Jesus Is Mean: An orthodox Catholic bishop has banned U.S. Rep. Patrick Kennedy from receiving communion—which is important to those guys—in Rhode Island. Because Kennedy's pro-choice. And the bishop's kind of a dick.

The Crazy Murder Trial is Back: Prosecutors in Italy are seeking a life sentence for Amanda Knox. They even backed up their case with some kind of crazy cartoon reenactment!

Mine Explosion in China: 92 people now dead, and 16 missing inside.

MLS Cup: They've sold 40,000 tickets so far for today's championship game between the L.A. Galaxy and ridiculously named Real Salt Lake.

Smoking: Here's who the CDC says is doing it. A lot of them seem to come from West Virginia.

Anyone Else Noticed This? The city's been installing brown street signs. Here's what it all means.

Iran: They want fuel for their nuclear facilities, and say any attack on them "will be crushed."

Raising Awareness About Pedestrian Safety: Via a crowd of people prancing around downtown. It's how SDOT is getting the word out about car-pedestrian collisions.

Oops: Washington State collects $21,000 in child support from a man who didn't owe it. And offered him a $1.24 refund.

In case you need some dumbing down this morning:

And if that wasn't enough glorious stupidity, part 2 is here.

Comments (21) RSS

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Patrick Kennedy can make his own communion with the following recipe:

Get some bread and some red wine, make the sign of the cross and say: "Abra kadabra alakazam this bread and wine is the son of man." and presto you have wonder bread.

Posted by Heather on November 22, 2009 at 9:23 AM

Call me simple, but I like that. Even not knowing quite what you mean, and aside from being briefly nicknamed Wonder Bread, I'm sure the 3 month long "backup man" scanning for bar chicks/thrills, who gave me that name, and who didn't share my written propensity for run-on sentences, he didn't mean harm by the joke, "Did you know Dean Martin was born in Seattle?" ... "Well yeah, but he was 'reared' in Hollywood."

Posted by dnt trust me on November 22, 2009 at 9:37 AM

That dance in the mall thing was so lame, but I like the kid in purple. So sue me.

Posted by gloomy gus on November 22, 2009 at 9:41 AM

It's not Jesus that is mean, it's Patrick Kennedy who wants to have his cake and eat it too. If he's pro-choice, he should stop being a Catholic.

Posted by raindrop on November 22, 2009 at 9:41 AM

Ritual cannibalism is for sick minds anyway.

Posted by Vince on November 22, 2009 at 9:54 AM

If someone is anti-smoking (which I lean toward), I suggest this new health bill continue the rise of programs (fitness, alternatives, breathing contests in schools if such a thing could be invented, support groups, etc) which have been occurring for a few years now. Everybody, right now go for a walk around the block.
Or visit West Virginia like missionaries/condom suppliers in Africa and show by example. Something like this
http://tribes.tribe.net/seattlequeerbike…
can get some sort of security for a few days in reddish-neck land.

Posted by dnt trust me on November 22, 2009 at 9:55 AM

If the Catholic Church wants to have a say in how a U.S. Senator votes, I suggest they start paying taxes.

Posted by Fifty-Two-Eighty

on November 22, 2009 at 10:00 AM

Only had to bribe one of those democrat bitches $300 million for her vote.

Posted by Westlake, son! on November 22, 2009 at 10:22 AM

@5: Once you've tasted human flesh nothing else satisfies. But I suspect a Jesus steak would be stringy and taste a little gamy.

Posted by Trillium Fortnight on November 22, 2009 at 10:38 AM

Raindrop is clearly not Catholic or he wouldn't have said such a dumb thing.

Posted by MFD on November 22, 2009 at 10:45 AM

So...Seattle is allegedly this soccer hotbed and they can only sell 40,000 tickets for the MLS championship game (and we know a lot of those are LA and Salt Lake fans)?

Makes me think a lot of Sounders fans are just bandwagon-jumpers who go to games because it's cool, not because they give a shit about the game.

Posted by bigyaz on November 22, 2009 at 11:06 AM

"I'm hiding in the cloooooseeeeeeet"

Posted by jtwankerschmidt on November 22, 2009 at 11:08 AM

Mr. Catholic Bishop, how many abortions has Rep. Kennedy personally had? Huh? Then he's probably good to go...How many abortions has Rep. Kennedy caused the need for? That's private information between him, her, god, and his confessor, which does amount to a pretty big crowd so maybe you're right after all.

Posted by Libby on November 22, 2009 at 11:21 AM

Only because I'm a native Minnesotan...

In other sports related news, the Vikings are currently making short work of the Seahawks.

Posted by Urgutha Forka on November 22, 2009 at 12:03 PM

"Real Salt Lake" isn't totally ridiculous. Mormons consider themselves "royal", but in a way that they don't want to admit to the rest of the country, which they have unspoken contempt for, and thus like the idea of couching the pride in a translation most people won't notice the true meaning of.

Posted by Montdidier on November 22, 2009 at 12:44 PM

I welcome this bishop's edict to deny communion to Republicans that support the death penalty.

What... no Catholic bishops are barring Republican politicians from receiving Communion for going against church teachings? I can't even begin to heap the proper amount of scorn on this asshole.

Posted by demo kid

on November 22, 2009 at 1:04 PM

@10: No, but what are you? Catholic-Lite?

Posted by raindrop on November 22, 2009 at 1:21 PM

I wonder if the priests who raped children were banned from preforming communion after the church transfered them to cover up their crime.

Posted by Heather on November 22, 2009 at 2:28 PM

@ 17, unless you've grown up Catholic then you have no idea how Catholics can have great, fundamental differences with the official line from Rome while remaining in the Church. Protestants change church affiliation on the slightest whim; Catholics stick with theirs through thick and thin.

Naturally there are countless exceptions. I myself am agnostic and only go to church for weddings and funerals. I've quit, in other words. But my dad, a former seminarian, keeps on going despite being exactly the sort of Catholic that some Bishops threaten with excommunication and denial of communion.

Of course, it's all politics. All the American bishops, including RI's, are doing is currying favor with Rome in the hopes of furthering their careers within the church. There are priests who will defy the bishop's edict because, despite its top-down centralized structure, the Church has plenty of priests who flaunt the rules and rulings from on high on these matters.

Posted by Matt from Denver on November 22, 2009 at 2:32 PM

Yes, and I'll also bet just about anything you'd care to bet that they'll change their tune once that rather large donation from the Kennedy family that they've grown accustomed to having goes away.

Posted by Fifty-Two-Eighty

on November 22, 2009 at 2:47 PM