Not all that much going on:

1. Senate passes spending bill, clearing way to end shutdown — For three week. Whoopee. Lindsey Graham sent out a release encased in the usual exclamation points: “! Graham Votes To End Government Shutdown !” But as he acknowledged, this is no win for the country. Personally, I think I’d be tempted to hide that I had anything to do with what’s happened up there.
2. Who drops everything to watch such boring news live? — Admittedly, I’m not a fan of getting news via video. But I often wonder, when I see live feeds like the one pictured above, I have to wonder who stops everything to watch the Senate or the House vote on ending the stupid shutdown. It’s certainly not historic. We’ll be doing this again in three weeks. I’d as soon watch paint dry…
3. Amazon Go: convenience and concern at new checkout-free corner shop — Technology is going to have to get better and smarter for me to trust a gimmick such as this. I mean, I love Alexa; she’s a lot of fun. But she’s not playing with a full deck. Last night I asked her to “play some Memphis soul,” and she had no idea what to do (even though Google and Wikipedia know exactly what I mean). To make it easy, I told her to play anything from Stax Records. She was totally flummoxed. Meanwhile, Netflix still doesn’t know what kind of movies I like.
4. The State has a new editor — based in Raleigh — Newspapers are not what they used to be, and you can hardly point to more dramatic evidence of that than the fact that our own daily newspaper will be overseen by an editor in Raleigh. Someone who thinks “Carolina” is located in Chapel Hill. You know, like the paper was a Starbucks or something. At least that’s the way they make it sound. Yet there is still someone here with the title of executive editor. We’ll see what this all means as time passes. It will be extremely helpful when The State puts something on the front page explaining it all. That will be a start.

SONY DSC

Dang, I neglected to do an Open Thread for Elvis’ birthday yesterday. Well, here’s hoping somebody gave you a jelly doughnut anyway.

Here’s what we have today:

1. Trump Says He Is Open to Sweeping Deal on Immigration — We’re talking about not just the Dreamers, but a path to citizenship. Hey, if he can pull off a Nixon-goes-to-China and push through real comprehensive reform like that sought by his two predecessors, I will applaud. But the heads of those in his base are likely spinning right now. For his part, Lindsey is pretty excited about this, calling it the “Most fascinating meeting I’ve been involved with in twenty plus years in politics.”
2. As North Korea Tensions Rise, U.S. Army Trains Soldiers To Fight In Tunnels — I heard this on NPR this morning. Fascinating. It’s like we’re getting ready to do battle with the Mole People. The north has thousands of these tunnels, some of which extend under the DMZ and deep into the south.
3. Ex-DHEC chief to run troubled Carolina Water Service — We’re talking Catherine Heigel, not Templeton. Will this help clean up CWS’ rep? I guess it depends on what she does from this point.
4. Roman Polanski will not face criminal charges for allegations of 1975 molesting — Too bad. He’s been a fugitive from charges of having sex with a 13-year-old since 1978. This alleged victim was 10. The statute of limitations had expired on this one.
5. Fusion GPS founder claimed FBI had Trump source during campaign — This is from transcript Diane Feinstein released, in apparent defiance of GOP members of the panel.
6. Steve Bannon Out At Breitbart News — Like I care or something.

Cowboy (or Wade Hampton) rides into sunset. Nothing to do with the news, just a picture I recently shot on one of my downtown walks.

Just to close out the week:

1. Mueller Learns of Trump Effort to Keep Grip on Russia Inquiry — This is pretty wild stuff. I thought Jennifer Rubin did a good job of putting these revelations into perspective. I still remain pessimistic about the Mueller’s investigation’s ability to heal what’s wrong with the country. But he needs to do his job, and go where the evidence takes him.
2. Graham, others take weird turn in GOP’s Russia investigation — Are they going after Manafort or Trump Jr. or Russian agents? Nope, they’re talking possible charges against Christopher Steele, the ex-MI6 guy who compiled the infamous dossier on Trump and the Russians. I suppose next they’ll go after that dude who wrote the new book, Fire and Fury. Or better yet: Hillary Clinton! I’ll bet the Rooskies are quaking in their felt boots with such bloodhounds as these on their trail.
3. These numbers could shake up the SC governor’s race — A poll shows Phil Noble edging out James Smith. This tells us that so far Dems are paying zero attention, or they’ve kind of gone nuts. Noble’s beef about Smith is that he’s too “Republican.” (You know, someone with potential appeal in the fall. I suppose Noble would hate to see the party break its streak.) The news that Kevin Bryant is ahead of Catherine Templeton is almost as weird. I find myself wondering how accurate this poll is…
4. Blizzard Has Passed, But Frigid Temperatures Remain Along East Coast — In case you still want to talk about the weather.

Y’all have any other topics?

Note the weirdness of the seven identical microphones. In a free society, an important person might be seen with multiple microphones, but they would be different, placed there by an array of news organizations. This is Kim trying to look important without the freedom part…

Happy New Year! Here’s what we’ve got at this hour:

1. South Korea welcomes Kim Jong Un’s offer of talks — This could be a big deal — and could drive a wedge between South Korea and the U.S. First you-know-who pulls us out of TPP, now this. Stand on the Pacific Rim, and watch American influence disappearing over the horizon. A smooth move by Kim. So far in 2018, that’s one point for Little Rocket Man, zero for the Dotard…
2. Nikki Haley, Lindsey Graham call out Iran. Here’s what they said — I won’t make you click to find out that they were supportive of protesters, critical of the regime. The Iranian regime, that is. Graham was sucking up to the Trump regime (“As to President Trump and all those who love freedom…”).
3. Leaving a car idling so that it’s warm when you get in is illegal in SC. Here’s why — Um, is it because that makes you a total jerk who hates the Earth? No, that’s not it. But if you need another reason, that one’s lying around available. I would also accept, “Because it makes you look like a total wuss who can’t handle a little weather…”
4. In 347 days, Trump has made 1,950 false and misleading claims — In case you were wondering whether someone is keeping score, the answer is yes — the Post‘s Fact Checker is. Of course, this won’t impress Trump supporters, because they believe “They all do it.” Well, they don’t all do this. The White House has never been held by someone with such complete disregard for reality. Ever.
5. New SC laws go into effect on New Year’s Day 2018 — I share this purely as an illustration of how slow news is: This story is four days old, and is still leading thestate.com. Seriously…

Been busy. Eating a lot. Training the Echo Dot I got for Christmas (or perhaps Alexa is training me). And I got Call of Duty WWII for my PC, and I’ve been having a lot of trouble with this one German in the fifth bunker on Normandy Beach.

But here’s an Open Thread:

1. Obama tells Prince Harry: leaders must stop corroding civil discourse — Meanwhile, the former president is still the most admired man in America. But Hillary is the most admired woman, so take that with a large amount of salt. This is basically a name-recognition test. And guess what? Nikki Haley’s in the top 10.
2. I.R.S. Warns That Prepaying Property Taxes Is a Risk — What I want to know is this: Who has the cash to run out and pay their property tax for the whole next year just sitting around? If I had that, the last thing I’d be worrying about is saving a few bucks on my income taxes. Don’t people have other things to think about? Interesting things?
3. Ryan’s ‘pro-white’ primary foe denounced by Breitbart after his anti-Semitic tweets — So apparently you can go too far for Steve Bannon. Good to know…
4. The real greatest threat to democracy this year — It’s indifference. E. J. Dionne offers a prayer for our democracy. It can use one.

You know what? That’s it. I’m just not finding any news tonight. Y’all have any?

WWII — the video game, not the real thing — has been occupying a good bit of my time today…

Yes, a weekend Open Thread. To make up for giving you nothing new the last two days:

1. ‘Chicken Man’s art trailer stolen — You know, some crooks out there don’t respect anything. That goes for the lowlifes who took Ernest Lee’s trailer, for sure…
2. On their heads be it — Congressional Republicans seem poised to pass, as their signature (let’s face it, their only) accomplishment of 2017, a completely unnecessary tax plan that is only favored by a third of the electorate. Democrats must be hugging themselves at this point, with visions of 2018 dancing in their heads.
3. How Doug Jones Destroyed Roy Moore’s Whole Shtick with One Well-Chosen Verb — Kind of an interesting piece on the use of words in politics. The most damaging word Jones used in his takedown was “prancing.” Interesting choice of weapon for a Democrat these days.
4. Glowing Auras and ‘Black Money’: The Pentagon’s Mysterious U.F.O. Program — The stuff of science fiction movies revealed, at last. Where does the funding come from? “You don’t actually think they spend $20,000 on a hammer, $30,000 on a toilet seat, do you?”
5. Palmetto State Armory’s Xmas billboards making a stir again — You know, like the “Silent Night” one showing a semiautomatic pistol with a noise suppressor?

Very quickly:

1. Russian Team Barred From 2018 Winter Olympics — Yeah, OK. Get back to us when they get barred from the real Olympics. But I will say this is a better way of punishing Russia than the last time we did it, when we stayed home instead. Y’all know I like me some Jimmy Carter, but that was a huge disappointment to a friend of mine who was coaching our boxing team.
2. Trump risks backlash as he prepares to recognise Jerusalem as Israel’s capital — Seeing as how it is the capital, it’s hard for me to get worked up about this one. Of course, I don’t have to because millions in the region will get worked up for me….
3. Justices seem divided in case of baker who refused to create a wedding cake for a gay couple — I’m including this for Bud, who may have a point — this guy seems to have a stronger case than most defendants in this are. But in the end, I’m not a lawyer and I don’t eat cake, so what do I know?
4. Evidence of fight, threats mark defense’s version of Scott shooting case — Can anyone ‘splain to me how the defense thinks any of that adds up to, “It’s OK to shoot a guy running away from you in the back?”

That’s it for now. Gotta run…