world aids day

there’s only so much more encouraging news the gop can take

Marketwatch: Private-sector employment rose 93,000 in November, the largest gain in three years, according to an employment report released Wednesday. Employment in the service-producing sector gained 79,000, while the employment in the goods-producing sector rose 14,000

WSJ: U.S. stocks soared into the new month Wednesday, rising more than 2% as investors found solace from the latest domestic economic numbers … helping the markets was data showing the U.S. added 93,000 private-sector jobs in November – the 10th consecutive month of gains and the largest one-month gain in three years.

Separate data showed productivity rising more than previously thought in the third quarter, as companies boosted output … U.S. spending on construction projects also unexpectedly rose by 0.7% in October, for a second straight gain … Goldman Sachs added to the optimism, saying in a report that the U.S. growth outlook “has brightened significantly in recent weeks”…

 

looking up

First lady Michelle Obama welcomes military families to the White House, December 1

let’s start

President Barack Obama speaks alongside former US Secretary of State General Colin Powell and Vice President Joe Biden during a meeting in the Oval Office, December 1, where they discussed a wide range of issues including education and the passage of the New START Treaty

(When camera crew neared VP Biden just now in Oval Office, Obama said “don’t hit him – we already got one fat lip in the Administration.”)

spiderman

December 1

top toon

 

toys for tots

First Lady Michelle Obama speaks during a ceremony to welcome the military families who organize the Quantico and Anacostia branches of the Marine Corps Reserve Toys for Tots drive in the East Room at the White House, December 1

Toys for Tots

First Lady Michelle Obama shows a cookie she made as she and some military families visit ‘creative stations’ in the State Dining Room to learn how to make holiday ornaments, cards and treats

indoctrination!

by Creators Syndicate

only 85% of liberal democrats support the president? he’s ruined!

The New Republic: It’s time to smack down, once and for all, the idea that President Obama will face a serious primary challenger in 2012…..

This trope has been popping up ever since the 2008 general election, when horserace-hungry pundits speculated that Hillary Clinton would try to knock off the Democratic nominee four years down the road.

And it’s only gotten worse with the rise of the “angry left,” which thinks Obama has been too eager to compromise with Wall Street and the Republicans, and considers itself the representative of the Democratic base.

…For a substantive primary challenge to occur, a coherent bloc of Democratic voters—whether liberal or moderate—would have to sour on Obama and coalesce behind another candidate in such a way that threatens the president’s hold over his base. There’s just no sign of that happening.

….Obama’s straight approval ratings among rank-and-file Democrats are very high. According to Gallup’s latest weekly tracking poll, 81 percent of self-identified Democrats give Obama a positive job approval rating. Among liberal Democrats, who are supposedly the most likely to rebel, the number rises to 85 percent.

More

55 years ago today…..

On December 1, 1955 in Montgomery, Alabama, Rosa Parks, age 42, refused to obey bus driver James Blake’s order that she give up her seat to make room for a white passenger – Parks’ action sparked the Montgomery Bus Boycott.

Parks’ act of defiance became an important symbol of the modern Civil Rights Movement and she became an international icon of resistance to racial segregation. She organized and collaborated with civil rights leaders, including boycott leader Martin Luther King, Jr., helping to launch him to national prominence in the civil rights movement.

“My resisting being mistreated on the bus did not begin with that particular arrest…I did a lot of walking in Montgomery.” Parks had her first run-in on the public bus on a rainy day in 1943, when the bus driver, James F. Blake, demanded that she get off the bus and re-enter through the back door. As she began to exit by the front door, she dropped her purse. Parks sat down for a moment in a seat for white passengers to pick up her purse. The bus driver was enraged and barely let her step off the bus before speeding off.

After a day at work at Montgomery Fair department store, Parks boarded the Cleveland Avenue bus at around 6 p.m., Thursday, December 1, 1955, in downtown Montgomery. She paid her fare and sat in an empty seat in the first row of back seats reserved for blacks in the “colored” section, which was near the middle of the bus and directly behind the ten seats reserved for white passengers. Initially, she had not noticed that the bus driver was the same man, James F. Blake, who had left her in the rain in 1943. As the bus traveled along its regular route, all of the white-only seats in the bus filled up. The bus reached the third stop in front of the Empire Theater, and several white passengers boarded.

Blake noted that the front of the bus was filled with white passengers and there were two or three men standing, and thus moved the “colored” section sign behind Parks and demanded that four black people give up their seats in the middle section so that the white passengers could sit. Years later, in recalling the events of the day, Parks said, “When that white driver stepped back toward us, when he waved his hand and ordered us up and out of our seats ….

…… I felt a determination cover my body like a quilt on a winter night.”

By Parks’ account, Blake said, “Y’all better make it light on yourselves and let me have those seats.” Three of them complied. Parks said, “The driver wanted us to stand up, the four of us. We didn’t move at the beginning, but he says, ‘Let me have these seats.’ And the other three people moved, but I didn’t.” The black man sitting next to her gave up his seat. Parks moved, but toward the window seat; she did not get up to move to the newly repositioned colored section. Blake then said, “Why don’t you stand up?” Parks responded, “I don’t think I should have to stand up.” Blake called the police to arrest Parks. When recalling the incident for Eyes on the Prize, a 1987 public television series on the Civil Rights Movement, Parks said, “When he saw me still sitting, he asked if I was going to stand up, and I said, ‘No, I’m not.’ And he said, ‘Well, if you don’t stand up, I’m going to have to call the police and have you arrested.’ I said, ‘You may do that.'”