What's up? No time to talk, catch you later.

link

The one-year mark of new U.S. military operations in Iraq is Saturday.

And lawmakers still haven't authorized the fight.

"The theater of battle is growing," Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., said. "We've seen other groups swearing allegiance to [the Islamic State group]. The Turks are getting involved. We've seen reports that the U.S. can take military action against Syria if they try to mess with our anti-ISIL fighters.

"This thing is creeping and growing. And Congress has not said anything about it."
...
Kaine said he is hopeful that Congress will still take up the work soon, but acknowledged it's likely to be late September or October before talks even resume. The Iran deal deserves oversight, he said, "but I think it's ironic that (Congress) wants to challenge diplomacy but is OK with war."

Republican leaders already have scheduled votes on the Iran deal next month, in what is expected to be a foreign policy showdown between the White House and its critics.
...
About 3,500 U.S. troops are stationed in Iraq, and seven have lost their lives in connection to the new military operations there.

It's still the economy, stupid

There is a deep economic anxiety driving Republican voters toward the blunt-spoken presidential campaign of Donald J. Trump. It is more than just anger at the political class or rebellion against political correctness. It reflects decades of lost jobs and falling wages for a swath of blue-collar Americans, who saw their opportunities diminish and developed a sense that someone has stolen something from them.
...
In a recent Washington Post/ABC News poll, Trump won support from nearly a third of Republican voters and Republican-leaning independents without college degrees, compared to just 8 percent of Republican college grads. (That education gap has been smaller, but still prevalent, in other surveys.)

Non-college grads have struggled since the turn of the century: Economist Robert Shapiro estimates that incomes stagnated or declined from 2002 to 2013 for American households headed by workers without a degree, a marked departure from prior decades.

A CBS poll this week showed more than 7 in 10 Republican voters are confident in Trump’s economic decisions, well above any other Republican candidate. He also leads, though by a small margin, on confidence in his decisions on illegal immigration.

I should post this to DKos and then walk away
DKos does not reflect reality.

Perceptions of discrimination for blacks in the U.S. as they go about their daily lives -- including interactions with police -- have not changed materially over the past 18 years. This is the case even as news reports, social media and other communication sources focus extensively on examples of discrimination, particularly the highly visible deaths of black citizens at the hands of white police. This can be seen as a positive sign that things are not getting worse, or as a negative sign that things are not getting better. Blacks' reports of satisfaction with the way their daily lives are going is at its all-time high point, providing additional evidence that U.S. blacks' views of their general life conditions have not recently deteriorated.

In German that would mean nothing, because most of the politicians have a "einen Vogel im Kopf" (literally translated "most politicians have a bird in their head, properly translated "they have a bat in their belfry".)

So, when will we get some awesome photos of some bats? Very nice. The lake is also something to look at.

Just kidding, tired. Have a good day.

so well-captured. i live that white egret. I saw a couple of them beside Swan Lake in Victoria and it is a rare occasion that they ever stop here.

link

Tens of thousands of Haitians and Haitian-Dominicans have fled the Dominican Republic in response to its strict new immigration policy with many settling in squalid camps in Haiti.
Haitian officials estimate the population at four camps in the south of Haiti is at least 2,000 and growing.
...
The Haitians here say they either cut their losses and left with their belongings or been intimidated into leaving.
“I lived over there for 22 years,” said Jean Louis Andres, motioning his sinewy arm across the rocky river bed at Tete-à-l’eau, near the border town of Anse-à-Pitre. Across the gulch was the Dominican Republic. “They don’t want me there. I know that.“

Because of international outrage, and the fear of a tourist boycott, the DR said that the 290,000 people who have applied for residency won't be deported for up to two years ( only 4,600 have gotten residency).
The problem is that so many of those people will never be able to get residency despite living their whole lives in the DR. So this crisis will only get worse as the months go on.
The Obama Administration has yet to confront the DR about this, but the State Department couldn't be more clear about what is going on.

According to the most recent State Department report on human rights in the country, released this summer, Haitians and their descendants are routinely denied “basic education, health, and documentation services.” Persons of “darker” complexion are also denied “access or services in banks, service in restaurants and stores, entry into nightclubs, enrollment in private schools, and birth registration in hospitals.”
The report also called institutional discrimination, like the 2013 high court ruling on citizenship, the country’s “most serious human rights problem.” In other words, the United States has no problem acknowledging the scope of the humanitarian crisis faced by Haitians and their descendants in Haiti. And yet beyond the State Department report, the Obama administration has been largely silent on the crisis, and largely unwilling to intervene. When asked about the United States’ position on the impending crisis in the Dominican Republic, a spokesperson for the State Department referred only back to this report.