Tonight's Republican Debate from Iowa Minus Donald Trump in Tweets (1 of 3)

Here are tweets from tonight's debate from folks who are right, left, center and non-partisan. As everyone outside of Tashkent, Uzbekistan, probably knows Republican front-runner Donald Trump (pict. top) ironically boycotted the Fox News debate because of a feud with moderator Megyn Kelly.
The other images are of the eastern Iowa town of Nemaha (the debate was actually held in Des Moines) and an image of Jeb Bush (actually from an event in New Hampshire):

1) Erick Erickson (conservative): This is a brilliant part of the debate. Megyn Kelly's accountability project.

2) Cenk Uygur (liberal): I have to give credit to Fox News for asking really targeted and fair questions showing these candidates' clear hypocricy.

 3) David Corn (liberal): Asked about immigration, Ben Carson points out that he declared war on ISIS.

4) Molly Ball (The Atlantic): Ivanka is due in two weeks, but Trump is hoping she has baby in Iowa: 'It'd be great. I'd definitely win.'"

5) Michael Ian Black: "Carson: 'I recognize not all Mexicans are terrorists.' Brave."

6) Michigan State Spartans Basketball: "With 15:18 remaining, MSU leads 41-29." (They wound up winning the game over Northwestern; yeah, this has nothing to do with the debate).

7) Ana Marie Cox (liberal): 'Chris Christie: I will flip flop in public so you can totally trust me." (Yeah, he didn't actually say that).

8) Michael Medved (conservative): If Ted Cruz wants to win anything, anywhere, he MUST learn not to talk like a bad, slimy televangelist. (Yeah, Medved did actually tweet this!)...

9) Chris Cillizza (Washington Post): Jeb Bush is getting better as a debater. But, he's not natural at all."

SOTU Blogathon: Let's Drop the Gloves (1 of 3)

With our hearts and minds on the ISIS terrorism victims from today's senseless ISIS attack in Istanbul, Turkey, which we hope to dwell into later this week, we focus on tweets from tonight's State of the Union Address (SOTU), the final one for President Barack Obama.

Picture here we have Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vermont), Alex Ovechkin captain of the Washington Capitals, and new Speaker of the House Cong. Paul Ryan (R-Wisc.).....

Here are tweets from right, left and center.........

1) Ana Marie Cox: Paul Ryan thinking about how tomorrow is legs day.

2) Mormon Democrats: Obama calls for bipartisan work on criminal justice reform.

3) Susan Davis (NPR): Prescription drug abuse is one of those issues that crosses party lines. Big and growing problem in both red and blue states.

4) Molly Ball (The Atlantic): Oh god, the WH livestream is full of cheesy graphics.

5) Larry Sabato: Camera focused on Bernie. Those stars in his eyes are actually polling numbers.

6) Chris Cillizza: Direct Trump shot: "Promising to restore past glory if just get some group or idea that was threatening America under control."

7) Michael Crowley (Time): Only two sentences on Iran in this speech.

8) Washington Week: Obama asks: "How can we make our politics reflect what's best in us, and no what's worst."

9) New Republic: Paul Ryan and Joe Biden: Awwkwarrdddd

10) NBC Nightly News: Former Congresswoman Gabbie Giffords is attending tonight's SOTU.

11) Post Politics: Obama: 'I want to focus on the next five years, ten years, and beyond. I want to focus on our future. '

http://www.thehill.com

http://www.rollcall.com

http://www.politico.com

Noon Rush Hour Tweets: No More Garden Yeti Statues

Greetings to our blog readers in Canada, Kuwait and Japan........

We took down some tweets from the noon hour on the east coast, which was three hours ago, but perhaps those of you joining us from San Jose, Calif., have time to read this on your lunch break. Did you get Chinese take-out? Just wondering.

Congrats to Ghana for its 1-0 win over Algeria at the Africa Cup of Nations in Guinea, the winning goal came from Asamoah Gyan in the 91st minute. Our favorite Turkish team (well, we like Galatasaray too) Bursaspor also won 3-2 at the last minute, as Brazilian international Fernando kicked in the game-winning goal over Konyaspor in the 92nd minute.

The images above are of 1) Big Ben Clock in London, which actually has a Twitter account; 2) A Garden Yehti statue; and 3) Hillary Clinton, who is the current favorite to win the Democratic Party presidential nomination in 2016.

Here are the tweets:

1) Big Ben: BONG BONG BONG BONG BONG

2) WDBJ Weather (tv station in Roanoke, Va.): Snow now falling across the Roanoke Valley and Salem area. We'll see a mix with sleet this afternoon.

3) NPR News: Goodbye, Garden Yeti....in-flight catalog SkyMall files for bankruptcy

4) Karia Pacheo: Legitimately more upset about SkyMall than any celebrity death I've about on Twitter.

5) Sean Lemon (Guitarist for Room 94):........... (hashtag MakeSexAwkwardin5Works): Can my friends watch please?

6) Chris Cillizza (aka The Fix, a Washington Post political columnist): I am taking August off! DNC says Dem convention will be held week of July 25, 2016, back-to-back with GOP convention (Yea, this is the reason why we have an image of Hillary)

7)  What the F*** Facts: None of the menu items on the McDonald's menu are certified vegan or vegetarian. Even French Fries, which use natural beef flavors.

8) The Guardian (UK newspaper): Laura Deas takes World Cup skeleton bronze in St. Moritz (Switzerland).

9) Felix Salmon: I wanted to cover a protest event, but, it's scheduled to last 3.5 hours. No one has that kind of time in Davos (Switzerland).

10) Nona WillisAronowitz (contributor to The Nation): Sorry, old white Republican dudes; tweeting like a teen won't make us vote for you. (Perhaps, she has Cong. Bob Goodlatte in mind........we always make fun of him on this blog)

11) DCist: Maryland once again tops list of most millionaires per capita.

http://www.washingtonpost.com

http://www.visitlondon.com

http://www.dcist.com

http://www.thenation.com

Top Sunday Comics from the Sunday, June 22nd Washington Post

We suggested to political reporter Chris Cillizza of "The Washington Post" who runs a weekly column of Sunday called Worst Week in Washington that the dubious honor should go Ambassador Ramon Gil-Casares of Spain his country performed very badly at the World Cup in Brazil though they went out with a win over Australia. Cillizza chose President Barack Obama instead.

But, in the comics section, there was very little politics except for "Doonesbury,"which poked fun of global warming denialists, and surprisingly only comic strip "Knight Life" from Keith Knight, who is a great and wonderful person (yeah, I am partially saying that so he will base a character on me) mentioned the World Cup.

"The Argyle Sweater" was our overall top choice as the comic strip did a take on what the Three Bears would think if Goldilocks had come into the family bathroom. "Lio" was our second favorite strip of the week as the title character gave a map of the stars to an alien visiting his home. And, "Rhymes with Orange" was our third favorite strip as a woman is horrified to learn that the whole class will be using Twister yoga mats.

We also enjoyed "Dustin," which illustrated what can happen if a senior citizen mixes up the words tweeting and twerking; yes, we thought about Miley Cyrus too!

Here is our survey, our top ten comic strips from "The Roanoke Times" can be seen on our sister blog http://politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com/


1. "The Argyle Sweater"

2. "Lio"

3. "Rhymes with Orange"

4. "Sherman's Lagoon"

5. "Pearls Before Swine"

6. "Dustin"

7. "Doonesbury"

8. "Speed Bump"

9. "Knight Life"

10. "Prickly City"

http://www.gocomics.com/lio

http://www.doonesbury.com

http://www.gocomics.com/knightlife

http://www.dcbikramyoga.com/

http://www.bikramyogahampden.com/

http://bikramyogarichmond.com/

Sunday Comics Grand Slam (1 of 4)

Greetings to those of you in Poland, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, thanks for tuning in, and we regret your respective countries not being in the World Cup.

And, greetings to our readers in Belgium, Italy and Chile, and kudos for making it to the World Cup!

We are a week behind, so bear with us. We begin with a look at our favorite comic strips from the June 8th "Washington Post," be sure to go to our sister blog "Politics, Culture and Other Wastes of Time" http://www.politicscultureandotherwastesoft.blogspot.com for a look at our favorite comic strips from the June 8 issue of "The Roanoke Times."

Also, since we have a slight center-left political bias here at "The Daily Vampire," we wanted to mention that we are amused (for the moment) that Cong. Eric Cantor (R-Va) lost his Congressional seat due to a Republican Party primary which was won by tea party extremist David Brat, who will face Democrat Jack Trammell in November.

Two weeks ago, while in Richmond, Va., we saw 18 signs for Cantor and one for Brat, whom we mistook for a Democrat!

Cantor was also given the dubious Worst Week in Washington title by political reporter Chris Cillizza of "The Washington Post."

We personally think if there was a Best Week in Washington title that it should go to the Dutch ambassador Rudolf Bekink as The Netherlands shocked Spain 5-1 in World Cup play in Brazil.

Last week, our favorite strip from the Post belonged to "Dustin," a King Features strip which had a great take on the agony of remembering all 42 passwords for our respective Internet/social media sites. We are using an image of Sean Connery playing James Bond because we presume JamesBond007 is one of the worst passwords to use.

"Foxtrot" also delighted with us as the kids took in lots of ice cream, so much so that one of them actually wore a winter coat! Thus, we give the strip second place.

The bronze medal goes to "Prickly City," a strip which some times shows a conservative tilt, but this week cartoonist Scott Stantis had a great take on how cyber deities whose name we won't mention (Google, Facebook, Twitter) are inclined to watch us these days!

Here is our top ten list:

1) Dustin

2) Foxtrot

3) Prickly City

4) Doonesbury

5) Pearls Before Swine

6) Brewster Rockit

7) Lio

8) Sherman's Lagoon

9) Judge Parker

10) WUMO

http://www.washingtonpost.com/comics

http://www.dustincomics.com

http://www.foxtrot.com

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/thefix/worst-week-in-washington/

Friday Night Tweets: Terror Suspect and Major Storms

With so much chaos going on in Boston and the fact that a major rain storm struck our mid-Atlantic part of the country from Greensboro, NC, to Philadelphia, which got particularly nasty in Washington, DC, Baltimore and Annapolis (Maryland), we were more or less stuck inside.

We should point that image one, a recreational boat in Smith Mountain Lake, Va., (near Roanoke) was used because the Boston Marathon bombing suspect Dzhokar Tsarnaev, a son of Chechnyan immigrants, was hiding inside one such boat. The second image is because it is raining in Baltimore, where major league baseball's Baltimore Orioles play. And, the third image is for the four victims of the bombing and police shoot-out. Boston University student Lingzi Lu (her name has also been spelled Lu Lingzi) was among the three killed in Monday's blast.

So, here is a look at some of the more interesting tweets we saw tonight as a real-life episode of "The Fugitive" unfolded before our very eyes. Some tweets have been reworded to avoid confusion:

1) Boston Globe News @GlobeMetro: BREAKING NEWS: Police have taken the cover off the boat; the man believed to be the Marathon bombing suspect is inside.

2) Capital Weather Gang @capitalweather: "Wow, a gust of 70 mph clocked near Charles Co., MD, as storms roared thru.

3) Will Wheaton @Wilw: New York Post reporting, CNN confirming: D.B. Cooper is in the boat (not to point out the obvious, but this is a joke)

4) Boston College @BostonCollege: "Also thanks to all students and parents who tweeted appreciation. It did not go unnoticed."

5) Politico @politico: "Injured man (Jeff Bauman) who helped ID Boston suspects is uninsured."

6) Jake Updegraff @OnAirJake: "Poor Dzhokar Tsarnaev, apparently he never watched Disney movies or any movies at all. The bad guy always loses."

7) The Boston Globe @BostonGlobe: "BREAKING NEWS: Police appear to be preparing a robot with a camera to approach the boat."

8) Nicholas Kristof @NickKristof: "And our awareness of geography is such that Czech Republic has to explain that it's not Chechnya." (Chechnya is a part of Russia)

9) Lucas McNelly @lmnelly: "This is generally the part of the story where I start wondering if I could have gotten away."

10) The Fix @TheFix ("Washington Post" political reporter Chris Cillizza): "Serious Q: More reporters or more cops on the scene in Watertown?"

It's Election Day in America

As a resident of North Carolina who is from neighboring Virginia, today's election, in spite of the constant tv ads, radio spots, mailings and robo calls, is of great interest: North Carolina carries 15 electoral college votes whereas Virginia has 13. But, Ohio with 18 electoral college votes is considered the most important battleground swing state.

In the Sunday edition of "The Washington Post," Chris Cillizza who is an excellent non-partisan political analyst with his 'Post" blog 'The Fix,' predicts that President Barack Obama will get 277 electoral college votes while his challenger Mitt Romney will have 261; Reid Wilson of the non-partisan "National Journal" forecasts that Obama will get slightly more votes 294 for Obama and 244 for Romney.

Hopefully, everyone will get a chance to vote. I am fortunate to live in a swing state and I realized that people in Fort Mill, South Carolina, which neighbors the Tarheel State, and Bluefield, West Virginia, which neighbors Virginia, have to be agonized over the fact that their state is not in play.

Similarly, people in far away places like Baku, Azerbaijan, and Nairobi, Kenya, are watching this election very closely, perhaps in some cases just as much as Americans.

Lastly, in order to be 'remotely' objective, we should point out that the top image is of a Greek donkey (it may actually be from Macedonia); I am a Turkish-American:)

http://www.nationaljournal.com

http://www.thehill.com

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix

http://www.theonion.com (a satirical publication)