Have no fear, the April ish is here!

Have no fear! The April edition of The Last Word is here!

Much of this issue focuses on my trip to Washington, D.C., for a human rights conference in which we presented a legislative agenda to fight institutional abuse of youth.

But there's other interesting items in this ish too. As usual, people Chewed Gum And Thought It Was Funny. One of my readers reports that someone even chewed gum off the carpet! A video about strabismus used the magic word, a child intentionally ripped the arms off their own glasses, people blew bubbles with stuff that isn't gum, and I downvoted cosmetic dentistry and Dr. Phil videos on YouTube.

Read it and peep here...

https://www.scribd.com/document/343632039/The-Last-Word-4-2014

If that doesn't work, read it on my personal site...

http://bunkerblast.info/lastword/lw1704.pdf

Interview about my D.C. trip

As you know, I went on a trip to Washington, D.C., a couple weeks ago, and we met with congressional staffers about our legislative agenda to halt institutional abuse of young people. In this new video, I was interviewed about the event...



A couple years ago, I was also interviewed about my own experiences with abuse in a program.

University fires reporter because right-wing lawmakers told it to

If you're a journalist in Tennessee, be sure you never report things in a manner that right-wing public officials don't approve of. They'll get you.

After North Carolina passed its hated "bathroom bill", Tennessee is considering similar legislation. Jacqui Helbert - a reporter for WUTC-FM, owned by the University of Tennessee at Chattanooga - reported on the bill and met with a group of high school students as they met with legislators about it.

After the story aired, right-wing State Sen. Mike Bell and State Rep. Kevin Brooks complained about the story. They claimed Helbert didn't identify herself as a reporter - even though she clearly was a reporter, because she was lugging around recording equipment. Later, when university officials met with other Republican lawmakers, State Sen. Todd Gardenhire complained about the story and demanded Helbert's firing.

After Todd Garbagefire's complaint, the university promptly fired Helbert and removed her report from the station's website.

What's the point of even having news media if all they do is cave to public officials?

(Source: http://www.timesfreepress.com/news/local/story/2017/mar/24/utc-fires-reporter-over-bathroom-bill-reporting-after-local-lawmaker-complaints/419440)

A toast to success! Blublublublublub!

Last night, I got home from the human rights conference in Washington, D.C.! The big success story is that we met with congressional staffers from multiple states and both major parties about our legislative agenda to halt abuse of youth in confinement programs.

On a lighter note, this trip featured loads of celebrity look-alikes too. Yesterday, during my layover at JFK Airport in New York, I saw a man who strongly resembled Luis of Sesame Street.

Also at this airport, some old man bubbled. It was an elderbubbling!

People kept bubbling on Saturday

My trip to Washington, D.C., is strictly business - not vacation - but on Saturday, I kept seeing people who were in such a festive mood that they bubbled.

On the National Mall, down by the Washington Monument, a person bubbled. Later, a person bubbled at a Safeway on Connecticut Avenue in Northwest D.C. Not long after, a person bubbled at a bookstore down the street.

Congressional staffer resembles Blair from 'The Facts Of Life'

On Friday, when we visited various U.S. House members' offices to talk to them about our legislative agenda, one of the younger staffers resembled Lisa Whelchel, the right-wing has-been who played Blair on The Facts Of Life and later wrote a book advocating child abuse.

Where I've been the past few days

Long story short: For the past few days, I've been in Washington, D.C., for a human rights conference I was invited to. I was invited because of my activism in fighting against abuse of young people in residential "treatment" facilities.

This trip has been very productive. We've met with numerous congressional staffers to present our legislative agenda.

I know I have a sense of humor, but this is very serious business, folks.

Kidney stone probably won't ruin event

Keek! Ruin!

If you've followed my Twitter feed, you know that I had to fly out of town for a very serious event. I can't reveal the details until next week. But I can't help but laugh at some of the things that have happened today.

My only confirmed kidney stone was in 1999, but I strongly suspected one yesterday (the day before leaving) because I had a weak pee stream. Then I peed out a small speck of something, and the symptoms went away. The exact same thing happened the day before the big St. Louis roadmeet of 2014.

Today was marred by a series of fuck-ups by Delta Airlines. I plan to publish more details in the next ish. On the bright side, I did detect a silent-but-deadly bunker blast on the first flight, and another at the layover airport. I also saw my share of celebrity look-alikes. A Larry David look-alike was seen at the TSA checkpoint at the Cincinnati airport. A James Watt look-alike was on my first flight. An uproarious Judge Mills Lane look-alike was seen at my layover airport.

Also, I saw 3 people at 2 different airports who bubbled. This includes a woman who was about 30 who took selfies of herself bubbling with orange bubble gum and laughed maniacally about it. She Chewed Gum And Thought It Was Funny.

Best all - and get this - somebody stuck a wad of bubble gum that they had blown into a bubble on a urinal flushing mechanism at the layover airport.

A person bunkerooed at Target

LAP!!!

Today, we goed to Target in Newport. What should have been a quick trip to buy about 5 small items turned into an hour-long ordeal. I thought we'd never get out of there.

Anyway, I was in the school supplies aisle looking for tape, when I detected the unmistakable audio of a loud-and-proud bunker blast.

When 'Sesame Street' characters go bald ('Sesame Street' Wednesday)

Yes!

I finally found it!

This is a Snuffleupagus moment - even though it doesn't involve Mr. Snuffleupagus at all! For years - I'm talking decades upon decades - I've insisted there was a Sesame Street segment around 1978 in which they imagine what some of the characters would look like if they were bald. It showed Maria and Oscar the Grouch bald!

Everyone said I was just making it up. But now - for about the zillionth time - YouTube has saved the day...



I don't think this was a regular segment. I think it was just part of the storyline for a single episode, and that's why I saw it only once. It starts out with the characters lamenting how Gordon keeps shaving his head instead of letting his hair grow. Then they show Gordon with various hairstyles, before the other characters are seen bald.

Are people going to keep insisting I made it up?

Kentucky GOP would gut public school choice

The party of "local control" and "school choice" is about neither!

Louisville has one of the strongest school desegregation plans in the nation. As part of this program, parents of elementary school students can actually choose from several public schools. Wow! Choice!

But a Republican bill in the Kentucky legislature would gut this program by forcing children to attend a specific school. Not only does it erase real choice, but it would also pulverize local control.

The bill has already passed the fascist-dominated Kentucky House. Every Democrat opposed it, but almost every Republican supported it.

That's "choice" and "local control", GOP-style.

(Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/gop-bill-could-dismantle-one-of-nations-most-robust-school-desegregation-efforts)

Church paying members to create right-wing sockpuppets?

A phony Internet identity that's used to deceive is called a sockpuppet. We've all seen them, but we might not always detect them. They praise or criticize other Internetters - perhaps other people or organizations - while they pose under a false identity. I've never seen a sockpuppet last long before they disappear or are caught - but they succeed at stage-managing public opinion.

Here's a secret: A significant number of right-wing comments on news websites are from sockpuppets. It's been like this for years. But I've overheard things that are even more disturbing, and I'm pretty sure a local church is paying congregants to create right-wing sockpuppets to flood website comment pages with extremist vitriol and shout down dissenters.

I'm not 100% sure - and that's why I'm not naming the church - but I'm maybe 95% sure. I didn't hear anyone specifically state this, but I've put two and two together. I'm not stupid.

I can understand why someone might be eager to earn a little extra dough this way, but odds are, they'll get caught eventually. If the church keeps this up, it too will be caught - and it could get in some real trouble with the IRS. If the Trump regime refuses to enforce the IRS regulation on this, I will expose the church.

Why am I posting about this here? I just thought you might like to know what some of our checkbook clergy have been up to. And make no mistake, they are checkbook clergy. I don't care what anyone else says.

Kentucky House passes forced drug-testing bill

Despite Democrats in the Kentucky House raising constitutional, fiscal, and practical objections against a Republican bill that would require high school students to take a drug test to graduate, the House just voted 72 to 21 to pass the bill.

How long will it be before there's a lawsuit?

Shit got real on Facebook today

So AnnRK blogs...

http://annbugz1.blogspot.com/2017/03/facebook-sucks.html

Read that.

This is for real, my friends. Facebook has been censoring people for their political views, and it's gotten much worse lately.

Kentucky bill would require drug test for high school diploma

Wesley Morgan again.

If America still had a Bill of Rights that it felt like enforcing, this proposed legislation would be dead in the toilet. But we know we can't count on that.

A Republican bill in Kentucky would require high school students to submit to "regular, random drug tests" in order to graduate. Unconstitutional. End of story.

That's not the only bad thing in this bill. It would also require students to perform unpaid labor - though Kentucky wouldn't be the first state to do this. This has been an evergreen of America's corporatist educational establishment for a long time. The bill would also require a student's employer to verify "a work-based learning experience" - which means the student's diploma is based on how well they cater to their corporate masters.

But the drug-testing requirement stands alone in fascism.