credit: trayport.com
In the past month or so, I was intrigued by the story as it was reported about Kiera Wilmot, the young black woman in Florida who got in trouble for exploding a pop bottle bomb. What first attracted me to the story were the similarities to my own experience. At 16 years old, I was an honor student, with straight A's in science courses, and I was also threatened with expulsion for something I did that was school related.
The putative justification for the use of the filibuster in the U.S. Senate is to protect the rights of the legislative minority and to ensure that legislative proposals, especially critical or controversial ones, receive sufficient scrutiny before they are adopted—or rejected if the filibuster is sustained and able to withstand a cloture vote (at least 60 votes, three-fifths of the Senate membership). That is the theory.
But, the filibuster also functions in more nefarious ways, such as Strom Thurmond’s unsuccessful, but record-length filibuster against a civil rights bill.
The Favorable Winds of Pride
The latest voter registration figures in the City of San Diego explain the collapse of the Republican Party in the City. And the numbers don't look good for their prospects in 2014. For the first time, voters who decline to state a party preference now outnumber Republicans in San Diego.
According to recent research mapping sentiment on Twitter, Napa - located in the heart of California's Wine Country region - is home to the happiest tweeters in the nation.
California as a whole, however, did not even rank in the top five in a measure of happiness on Twitter.
Credit: http://images.onset.freedom.com/
California Assembly floor // credit: assembly.ca.gov
