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Bobsled track worker nearly run over by sled traveling at 75+ MPH at Lake Placid

A few days ago, two sleds crashed during the second run of the International Bobsleigh and Skeleton Federation (IBSF) World Cup four-man bobsled event near Lake Placid, New York. The first sled that crashed was the Swiss sled driven by Michael Vogt, and that was a typical bobsled crash: the sled tipped over onto its side during the run and slid to a halt after crossing the finish line. However, the second crash during the second four-man run in Lake Placid was more notable for multiple reasons . The sled that posted the fastest time in the first run of the two-run four-man event in Lake Placid was the Monegasque sled driven by Rudy Rinaldi. During the second run for the Rinaldi sled, the sled tipped over in the middle part of the racetrack, slid on its side for a few hundred feet or so, and was tipped back onto its runners by the steep banking of one of the turns. While the sled being tipped upright after a crash is, in and of itself, an unusual occurrence (usually, when a bobsled
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Trump's purely political national emergency declaration imperils the American form of government

President Donald Trump has declared a national emergency in order to build a border wall along the U.S.-Mexico border, despite the lack of a legitimate basis for such a national emergency. This is, by far, easily the most controversial national emergency declaration in U.S. history. Usually, a national emergency is declared by the president for a legitimate reason, such as, to use historical examples, the Great Depression and the 9/11 attacks. Trump's national emergency declaration to build a border wall is the first instance in U.S. history of a national emergency being declared for the purpose of achieving a purely political objective instead of due to the presence of a legitimate national emergency. Prior to today, the previous instance of a national emergency declaration being controversial was when then-President Richard Nixon declared a national emergency due to a postal workers' strike in 1970, in which members of the U.S. Armed Forces and the National Guard were used

Jason Witten breaks Pro Bowl trophy

After a runaway victory by the AFC team in pouring rain at the NFL Pro Bowl in Orlando, Florida earlier today (the AFC defeated the NFC by a score of 26 to 7), Jason Witten, the color commentator for the English-language telecast of the Pro Bowl that aired on ABC and ESPN and was produced by ESPN, broke the #1 rule of trophy presentations, which is to not break the trophy, by breaking the trophy: Jason Witten broke the damn Pro Bowl trophy: https://t.co/Rxvi41usqy pic.twitter.com/RKL3SXqi17 — Deadspin (@Deadspin) January 27, 2019 That's an embarrassing way to cap off one of the least interesting Pro Bowl games in a long time.

Disgusting attacks against Kamala Harris over her personal life are absolutely unacceptable

I will preface this entire blog post by saying that I am currently undecided in regards to who I will support in the race for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination, although I fully intend to vote in the Illinois Democratic primary for a Democratic presidential candidate and his or her slate of Democratic National Convention delegates in my home congressional district. Now, there is a nasty smear campaign that is being waged against Kamala Harris, one of several Democrats seeking the Democratic presidential nomination, over her past relationship to Willie Brown, a former San Fransisco Mayor and California State Assembly Speaker. While the smear campaign appears to be largely waged by the far-right media, including outlets like Fox News and Breitbart, at least one person on the left has tried to smear Kamala over her past relationship to Brown as well. One of them is Lauren Steiner, who hosts a social media video series called The Robust Opposition , and Steiner went as far as t

"President Pelosi" trending on Twitter after report that Trump ordered Cohen to lie to Congress

With nearly 270,000 tweets in a short amount of time as I start to write this blog post at 7:10 A.M. U.S. Central Standard Time on January 18, 2019, "President Pelosi", referencing U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) being second in the official line of succession to the presidency, is officially a trending topic on Twitter right now. President Pelosi began trending on Twitter in response to a bombshell BuzzFeed report that the actual U.S. President, Donald Trump, directed former Trump attorney and convicted felon Michael Cohen to lie to Congress regarding negotiations between the Vladimir Putin regime in Russia and The Trump Organization regarding a proposed Trump Tower in Moscow: President Donald Trump directed his longtime attorney Michael Cohen to lie to Congress about negotiations to build a Trump Tower in Moscow, according to two federal law enforcement officials involved in an investigation of the matter. Trump also supported a plan, set up by Cohen, to visit

Beto only needed 48 seconds to make a very powerful case against Trump's border wall boondoggle

Soon-to-be-former U.S. Representative Beto O'Rourke (D-TX), who is a possible candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020, released this 48-second video, which made a very powerful case in opposition to President Donald Trump's demand for a border wall boondoggle among the U.S./Mexico border: pic.twitter.com/XONeh8HUf1 — Beto O'Rourke (@BetoORourke) December 28, 2018 That might be the most well-produced web video that I've ever seen from a political figure of any kind, bar none. Beto did not physically appear in the video, and neither his voice nor anyone else's voice, was heard in the video. However, the video didn't need anyone to be seen or heard to drive home the message about the many reasons why the proposed border wall boondoggle would be an absolutely ridiculous idea, and the various images of the natural beauty of Rio Grande Valley also helped make the case against the border wall boondoggle. I will note that I am currently undec

The divide within the Democratic Party is a lot more complicated than a divide between two factions

With a potentially very large field of candidates expected to seek the Democratic Party's presidential nomination in 2020, I made this observation about the divide within the Democratic Party being more complicated than a simple divide between a center-left establishment and a left-wing progressive insurgency: The 2016 primary campaign between Hillary and Bernie has probably led a lot of people to incorrectly believe that there are only two factions within the Democratic Party. In reality, it's a lot more complicated than that. — Aaron Camp (@ProgMid) December 25, 2018 Obviously, the 2016 Democratic presidential primaries/caucuses quickly became virtually a two-candidate race between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders well before the first-in-the-nation Iowa caucuses were held that year, and became an actual two-candidate race between the center-left Hillary and the progressive Bernie after Martin O'Malley ended his longshot presidential bid after the Iowa caucuses.