Friday Talking Points [486] -- Hurricane-Force Lies
It was another rollicking week in the world of politics, which is admittedly not saying much in the era of Trump. It was revealed this week that the death toll on Puerto Rico from Hurricane Maria was not just higher than had been officially reported, but at least seventy times higher, and in fact was more than twice as high as the death toll from Hurricane Katrina. You'd think this would be a gigantic media story, but (sadly) you would be wrong. Just like everything else about the devastation, most certainly including the media's treatment of it, this bombshell report was largely ignored this week. No wonder Puerto Ricans feel like second-class citizens, when they keep getting second-class treatment like this.
There was even a handy "story hook" the media could have used: this year's hurricane season just began. But instead, all anyone wanted to talk about on the news was Roseanne and (later in the week) Samantha Bee. More on all of these stories later, down in the awards section of the column.
Roseanne Barr, of course, sent her career revival down in flames this week, when she tweeted out conspiracy theories, racism, and anti-Semitism. That's a pretty damning trifecta, especially those last two. She later tried to blame her tweetstorm on Ambien, which prompted the maker of Ambien to tweet: "People of all races, religions and nationalities work at Sanofi every day to improve the lives of people around the world. While all pharmaceutical treatments have side effects, racism is not a known side effect of any Sanofi medication."
In fact, what with all the false equivalents being casually tossed around (by Barr's defenders), it bears pointing out that the only possible comparison that can be made is between Roseanne and anyone else guilty of making racist or anti-Semitic statements. So it's valid to compare her to Michael "Cosmo Kramer" Richards (for his racist remarks), or perhaps Al Sharpton (for his previous anti-Semitism). Either would indeed be an apples-to-apples comparison. But comparing Roseanne to some vile insult hurled in the political arena with no racist or anti-Semitic component is not. Both are to be condemned, as both cross the lines of propriety, but they simply are not directly comparable. That's because both racism and anti-Semitism are so ugly and vicious that they are in a category of condemnation all by themselves. But again, more on this in a moment.
One parallel worth drawing (that few have yet bothered to) is between Roseanne and a man President Donald Trump just pardoned. Because Dinesh D'Souza's Twitter feed is like Roseanne on steroids. D'Souza has not only pushed every rightwing nutjob conspiracy theory under the sun, he has also openly defended Hitler and argued that slaves were treated "well," because they were valuable property. Here's the only D'Souza tweet we were able to stomach quoting, just to give you a tiny flavor of what this guy's about: "OVERRATED DEMOCRATS DEPT: So Rosa Parks wouldn't sit in the back of the bus -- that's all she did, so what's the big fuss?"
Here is a good rundown of the crimes Trump just pardoned D'Souza for:
There are some campaign-finance violations that are trivial, or that might be explained away as oversights. This was not one of them. D'Souza knew very well he was breaking the law, and took steps to conceal his actions. He devised and carried out a scheme to violate election laws. Specifically, once he and his wife had given the legal limit in contributions to a friend running for Senate, he wanted to give more money but was prohibited by law from doing so. He then instructed his assistant and his mistress (yes, his mistress) to also give the legal limit, and reimbursed them for their contributions, concealing the true source of the money. That is not an oversight; it was willful fraud.
According to Trump, though, even though D'Souza pled guilty rather than fight the charges in court, the justice system "was unfair" to him, so he deserves a pardon. The man who prosecuted D'Souza, Preet Bharara, tweeted in reaction: "The President has the right to pardon but the facts are these: D'Souza intentionally broke the law, voluntarily pled guilty, apologized for his conduct & the judge found no unfairness. The career prosecutors and agents did their job. Period." Then, just as icing on the cake, Trump lied that he'd never previously spoken to D'Souza (Trump helped D'Souza promote one of his films, back in 2012). Trump's also considering pardons for two of his celebrity buddies: Martha Stewart and Rod Blagojevich (who appeared on The Apprentice before he had to go to jail for corruption). All just par for the Trump course, these days.
But back to that equivalence. D'Souza has publicly expressed worse racism than Roseanne and publicly defended Adolf Hitler, but that's OK with Donald Trump. Please keep this in mind when drawing comparisons, please.
Other hurricane-force lies blew from the Trump White House this week, as well. Trump inexplicably is trying to blame his own detention policy for immigrants on the Democrats. Nobody has the faintest idea what Trump is talking about, because all it would take to end the policy separating children from their parents would be one phone call from Trump -- to overturn his own policy. Even though Republicans control both houses of Congress, Trump is insanely trying to blame Democrats for the situation, somehow.
Trump is also doubling down on his "spygate" lie, even though some of his own staunchest supporters are now admitting that Trump is lying. Representative Trey Gowdy -- who attended the confidential briefing with the Justice Department last week -- notably went on Fox News to debunk Trump's conspiracy theory. Gowdy also shot down Trump's inaccurate use of the term "spy." But what really had to hurt Trump was seeing one of his biggest Fox News cheerleaders -- Judge Napolitano -- call the claim that the F.B.I. had placed an informant within the Trump campaign nothing short of "baseless." He went on to unequivocally state: "There is no evidence for that whatsoever," and called the use of a confidential informant who spoke with "people on the periphery of the campaign... standard operating procedure in intelligence-gathering and in criminal investigations." Fox News anchor Shep Smith also chimed in, calling the allegations "unfounded, not based in fact or reason, with no evidence to support them." Ouch.
In other Trump investigation news, the vetting team responsible for identifying documents from the raid on Trump lawyer/fixer Michael Cohen which are truly covered by attorney-client privilege just released over one million documents to the prosecuting team, while only holding back a relative handful. The vetting process will be fully completed in a few weeks, and there are millions more documents to sift through. That doesn't sound very good for Cohen's legal situation, does it?
It's no wonder Trump decided to leave town for a while. He flew to Texas to meet with the parents of the recent school shooting there. Before he left he told reporters: "We're going to Dallas. We're going to Houston. And we're going to have a little fun today. Thank you very much." After the meeting, one incredulous parent said of her meeting with the president: "It was like talking to a toddler."
OK, that's enough Trump news for this week, let's instead look forward to next week, when another big round of primaries will happen. The biggest of these is taking place in California, which will use its bizarre and unfair "top two primary" system next Tuesday. Every candidate from every party appears on the primary ballot, but only the top two -- no matter what party they are each from -- appear on the general election ballot in November. This was designed by meddlesome political theorists who thought it would allow for moderates to be elected over extreme candidates. Why the state government should stick its thumb on the scale in such an ideological fashion has never been adequately explained. But now it seems that what some of us have been worried about for a long time might just come to pass, because there are three House districts in Southern California where Democrats might just be shut out.
The theoretical has become real in these districts. Consider, if there are four or five Democrats in the race and only two Republicans, and the total votes for all the Democrats equals 60 percent, the two Republicans could still wind up as the only ones on the general election ballot. The unfairness of this outcome should be obvious for all to see, especially if these three districts wind up being the difference between the Democrats regaining control of the House or not this November.
However, it's not quite as dire as this article makes it sound:
Candidates are scrambling to set themselves apart, Democratic groups are urging unity to gain control of the House -- and many voters are wondering how to contend with the despair they would feel if Democrats were locked out in this liberal state.
"I would do a Thelma and Louise -- just drive over the cliff," said Danna Lewis, 66, a doctor who lives in the 48th Congressional District and went door to door over the weekend for her candidate, Harley Rouda.
Let's be clear, and put this in some needed perspective. Democrats, even if they lose the chance to appear on the ballot in all three of these House districts, will not be "locked out in this liberal state." Please remember, California has a total of fifty-three House districts. In most of them, Democrats will be either elected or re-elected. In fact, in the big statewide races (governor, U.S. senator) the voters may wind up with the choice between two Democrats in November -- which is exactly what the designers of the new system wanted. The problem here is not for just Democrats or Republicans -- the problem is the stupid "top-two" primary system. Let's keep that in focus, if it's ever going to be changed.
And finally, we end this week by going far afield once again. Last week we pointed out the referendum in the Republic of Ireland to repeal their Eighth Amendment, which outlawed all abortion. When the votes were counted, "Yes on Repeal" had won big -- by a 2-to-1 margin, in fact. Ireland is quickly moving in a very progressive direction, after long being a virtual Catholic theocracy, and should be applauded for doing so. Just three years ago, Ireland became the first nation in the world to approve gay marriage by popular vote, and now Irish voters have overturned one of the strictest abortion bans in the Western world.
And we had to go even further afield here at the end, because this one amused us so much. Vladimir Putin, after annexing Crimea, rushed to build a bridge between the Crimea Peninsula and Russian soil, to provide a land-link to his new territory. The bridge is an impressive one, and it is impressive how fast it got built. But when Putin went to the ribbon-cutting ceremony, he had to deal with the fact that he would not be the first to cross the bridge, because he was beat by a cat. Mostik the cat had become somewhat of a mascot for the construction team, so it was only fitting that the cat was actually the first to cross the bridge. The photos of Mostik with a tiny safety vest and a cat-sized hardhat are much more adorable than anything Putin could ever manage, that's for sure.
There was an interesting breakdown of the media coverage of two events this week, which showed that the Roseanne Barr story got significantly more coverage than a new report showing that over 4,600 people's deaths could be attributed to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico. This is a sad commentary on the priorities of television news media in general, but it's not all that surprising, really.
This should be bigger news, mostly because of Trump's bragging about his response to the crisis (he gave himself a 10 out of 10, unsurprisingly). When he visited the island, Trump said:
We've saved a lot of lives. If you look at the -- every death is a horror. But if you look at a real catastrophe like Katrina, and you look at the tremendous -- hundred and hundred and hundreds of people that died. And you look at what happened here with really a storm that was totally overpowering. Nobody's ever seen anything like this.
Trump then asked the governor what the official death toll was, and again bragged about how different it all was from Hurricane Katrina:
Sixteen people, certified -- 16 people versus in the thousands. You can be very proud of all of your people, all of our people working together. Sixteen versus literally thousands of people.
From the Harvard University report, the death toll now stands at:
- Hurricane Maria -- 4,645
- Hurricane Katrina -- 1,883
That's more than twice as many deaths, and that's using the conservative estimate from the study (the high end of their estimate was almost 8,500). Hillary Clinton tweeted her response:
More than 4,600 lives lost in Puerto Rico. 70x the official number. The US gov't has failed its own citizens. The response itself is an American tragedy. Hurricane season is about to begin in Puerto Rico. The administration must step up & protect its people.
But the most forceful condemnation came from this week's Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week, the mayor of San Juan, Carmen Yulín Cruz, who ripped into Trump's politicization of the tragedy:
It was about creating a narrative that made him and his administration look good. And many in the political class in Puerto Rico looked the other way, disregarded the truth and played into his narrative, that he gets "a 10 out of a 10" for the federal response to the storm.
No, Mr. President -- you get 4,645 souls that were lost on your watch because the federal government that you are supposed to be in charge of was incapable of doing its job.
Later, Cruz tweeted:
It took too long to understand the need for an appropriate response was NOT about politics but about saving lives.
In a different interview, Cruz demanded accountability for "negligence that allowed those lives to be lost," stating:
These people were killed by the neglect of two governments. One: the Trump administration that was very dismissive of the value of our lives. And two: those in Puerto Rico that favored political positioning rather than telling the truth.
Throughout the tragedy, Mayor Cruz was the only one who strongly stood up and demanded that the rest of America be told the reality of the situation rather than just some convenient political spin which tried to sweep a whole lot of ineptitude under the rug. Now that more of that truth is being revealed, she has once again stepped up to express her righteous outrage.
Think about what a scandal Hurricane Katrina was. Now multiply that times two. Is that how much attention the American news media paid to Hurricane Maria? Far from it. Even when it becomes impossible to ignore the true scope of the disaster, Roseanne Barr is far more entertaining to pay attention to, it seems.
So we wanted to thank Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz for her tireless efforts to remind us all that Puerto Ricans are our fellow Americans and deserve every bit as much sympathy as other hurricane victims. That's an important and timely message, as this year's hurricane season begins. Which is why we're awarding her this week's Most Impressive Democrat Of The Week. Keep telling truth to power, Mayor Cruz, since nobody else seems to be doing so.
[Congratulate San Juan Mayor Carmen Yulín Cruz on her Facebook page, to let her know you appreciate her efforts.]
We're not even sure that she's technically a Democrat, but we decided she's close enough. This week's Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week award goes to none other than Samantha Bee.
[Full disclosure: We have never actually met Samantha Bee or exchanged any words with her, but we were in her close proximity several times at the last Netroots Nation, as she and her film crew were all over the place in the hallways, sometimes filming and sometimes just standing around.]
This week, Samantha Bee called Ivanka Trump a "feckless cunt" on her cable television show. Now, the standards for cable are quite different than the standards for broadcast television, and the standards for what is said on the air are necessarily different than what someone does late at night on Twitter, but none of that really is the point here.
The real point was the spectacularly bad timing. The Roseanne blowup had been roiling for a few days, with both sides of the American political divide lining up in predictable fashion. False equivalencies were offered up, from the president on down. They were pretty weak, stacked up against blatant racism and anti-Semitism.
Then, right in the middle of this storm of outrage (both faux and real), Samantha Bee lobbed her C-bomb. At the president's daughter, for posting an image of her and her baby.
There was a lot of liberal outrage at this photo, because of the plight of thousands of children being removed from their families by the immigration service and over a thousand others who just got "lost in the system" somehow. So Ivanka's photo was called insensitive, and on the order of Marie Antoinette's mythical "Let them eat cake" cluelessness. That's all fine and good -- people can protest respectfully anything anyone in public life does, after all.
But Samantha Bee went further, and crossed a definite line of propriety. The show wasn't even live, meaning that the producers and the network must also be held accountable for airing what she said. And let's please remember that what Ivanka did to set all this firestorm of criticism off what nothing more than post a happy-mom-and-baby photo online. She didn't post it with text that said: "Look how happy we are, and screw all those immigrant children being detained," or anything even remotely close to that.
For doing so and for not using her influence over her father on the subject of immigrant children, Samantha Bee called her a "feckless cunt." That's not just a little bit beyond the pale, it's miles beyond it. For her overreaction, and for her timing -- which, in the midst of the Roseanne frenzy, could not have been worse -- Samantha Bee is the winner of this week's Most Disappointing Democrat Of The Week, hands down.
[Contact Samantha Bee via her show's webpage, to let her know what you think of her actions.]
Volume 486 (6/1/18)
OK, we've got rather a grab bag this week, so let's just get right to it. We begin with some good news, for a change.
The 37th state
There were two bits of good news from state legislatures this week.
"Illinois just became the 37th state to ratify the Equal Rights Amendment. When originally proposed, the amendment was ratified in 35 states, only three short of the constitutional requirement of three-fourths of all states. Recently, Nevada ratified the proposed amendment, and now Illinois has followed their lead. This puts it only one state from the goal, although it will also require Congress to act to become the Twenty-Eighth Amendment to the Constitution. Can Democrats -- especially women candidates for office in November -- build on this success to make the E.R.A. a reality? This remains to be seen, but if I were running for office in one of the remaining 13 states, I would certainly be campaigning on the issue."
The 33rd state
Meanwhile, in the Old Dominion, Democratic victories in last year's election are beginning to bear fruit as well.
"Also this week, Virginia just passed Medicaid expansion, which Democrats had heavily campaigned on in last year's election. The blue wave in Virginia last year was driven by Medicaid expansion more than any other single issue. The potency of the issue caused even some Republicans in the state legislature to change their minds. By expanding Medicaid, Virginia becomes the 33rd state to add coverage for millions of vulnerable Americans who could not afford health insurance or even healthcare. In several states there may be ballot initiatives this year to expand Medicaid as well, since the Republican legislatures in those states refuse to do so. This is going to be the year that healthcare becomes a winning issue for Democrats. After many elections where Republicans ran against Obamacare, this time around Democrats are boasting of their plans to expand it. Over half of all Democratic candidates' campaign ads run in this election season so far mention healthcare -- that's how important an issue it is going to be in November."
The Ministry of Truth working overtime
When you live in Orwellian times, sometimes you have to use Orwellian terms to describe them.
"The hallmark of Donald Trump and his administration is none other than incoherence. Nothing stays the same week-to-week, or even day-to-day. We're going to launch a trade war against Europe, Canada, and Mexico. We're going to launch a trade war against China. Oh, wait, no we're not. No trade wars anywhere. Whoops! Trade wars are back on again. Except that now they're on hold. Trump is negotiating to save Chinese jobs at a company labelled a threat to American national security. No, no -- the new line is that we're going to slap tariffs on European cars because of 'national security' -- yeah, that's it! Today's news: trade war is back on with Europe, Canada, and Mexico. It all makes your head spin, doesn't it? Not to mention the on-again-off-again-on-again summit meeting with North Korea. I can just picture all the hardworking folks at Trump's Ministry of Truth working overtime, around the clock, to erase what Trump and his advisors said yesterday that is no longer official policy today. Oh, wait, we've got a new official position -- down the memory hole everything else goes!"
Conspiracy theory debunked, once again
Time and time again, the evidence proves what a gigantic lie this is, seemingly to no avail.
"Republicans either pass abusive laws to suppress voter turnout among people of color and the elderly, or they honestly believe the conspiracy theory that voter fraud is rampant across the nation. They really can't have it both ways. The problem for them is that voter fraud barely exists in real life, as investigation after investigation proves, over and over again. This week, New Hampshire was the latest to conclusively debunk the conspiracy theory that Hillary Clinton only won the state because of rampant voter fraud, mostly from people brought in from other states via bus. None of this turned out to be remotely true. Yes, some buses were used -- to bring New Hampshire residents to the polls. Hillary Clinton won the state by 2,732 votes, and the investigation only turned up 66 cases of ineligible voters in the 2016 election. Kris Kobach can scream conspiracy theories until he's blue in the face, but the reality is that whenever anyone has examined the actual data and the actual facts, only a tiny, tiny fraction of ineligible votes cast is ever found. But that doesn't stop Republicans from endlessly repeating the falsehood -- because, as I began with, it's obviously the only cover story they have for their real goal of suppressing the vote."
Hoo, boy
This one really takes the cake this week.
"Republican Representative Diane Black, who is running for governor in Tennessee, just blamed, quote, pornography, unquote, for driving the spike in school shootings. She further explained this jaw-dropping assertion: 'It's available on the shelf when you walk in the grocery store. Yeah, you have to reach up to get it, but there's pornography there. All of this is available without parental guidance. I think that is a big part of the root cause [of school shootings].' The only thing this statement does is prove her massive ignorance on two subjects -- the root causes of school shootings, and pornography today. She seems stuck in the past on that last one. I bet if you surveyed 10,000 school students today, zero of them would have ever bought a pornographic magazine. A goodly number of them would likely have to have the concept explained to them: 'It's like all the free porn online, except the pictures don't move, it's on paper not on your phone, and you have to pay money for it.' Does Tennessee really want a governor that is so many decades out of touch with reality? Someone who blames school shootings on magazines that barely exist anymore, much less 'in grocery stores'?"
A nap or a dirt nap?
Every so often, John Boehner pops up to say something amusing, then goes back to taking naps himself.
"Former speaker of the House John Boehner said something revealing this week: 'There is no Republican Party. There's a Trump Party. The Republican Party is kind of taking a nap somewhere.' While I would tend to agree with him about the 'Trump Party,' I also wonder whether the GOP is actually taking a nap, or has actually slipped into a coma. I mean, at this point it's hard to even see any vital signs at all, so even a coma might be being generous. What Boehner and all the others horrified at the Trump Party takeover of the GOP should really be worried about is whether the GOP as they knew it is ever going to wake up, or revive, or come out of its comatose state. Could it be that the Republican Party is taking its final 'dirt nap' instead? Time will tell...."
A big raspberry for Rudy
Too, too funny.
"Rudy Giuliani decided it'd be a good idea to spend his birthday at the ballpark. Furthermore, he or someone he knows also decided it'd be a good idea to pay to have his name displayed (as a birthday boy) at Yankee Stadium. The result, from a New York crowd, was pretty predictable. Representative Maxine Waters tweeted about it later: 'Giuliani, I join with the crowd of 46,583 fans in Yankee Stadium from earlier this week: BOO!' But the best response, hands down, came from an unexpected source. Dictionary.com posted an amusing word of the day to rub salt in Rudy's wound: 'Bronx cheer. A loud, abrasive, spluttering noise made with the lips and tongue to express contempt.' That about sums it up, in a New York minute."
-- Chris Weigant
All-time award winners leaderboard, by rank
Follow Chris on Twitter: @ChrisWeigant
Cross-posted at: Democratic Underground
CW-
Mostly a great wrap on the week...
The comments on the death toll in PR are a bit misguided... not saying the current admin doesn't deserve some blame, however, managing a large scale crisis always has some problems.
Perhaps the blame should go to the fact that the "system" hasn't kept up with the times and widespread corruption in front of the disaster has also contributed to the under reporting of facts.
The real story is that we will never know the true toll that the hurricanes brought due to the second world medical system that was imposed upon PR.
As much a it would be fun to blame trump... the simple fact is that this is a long trajectory of mismanagement by multiple administrations.... and that should be the true outrage.
Continuing on...
Nice work on the "jungle primary"... It is a poor system at best that disenfranchises.
Can't wait to see the result of the SD race link I sent a while back... the winner will be corrupt or corrupt.
Is it just me or, am I missing the politics of old when one could huff and puff but then compromise to keep the from the house from falling down?
Without knowing the slightest thing about whatever Reseanne said that is being pronounced "anti-semitic", I would think that the fact that she is Jewish herself would make it difficult for most folks to get worked up into a lather of indignation over it.
{/LurkMode}
Just wanted to check in and see if President Trump is getting a fair shake, what with all the monumentally awesome economic news..
With the exception of GT...
Nope... Still the same old HHPTDS....
{LurkMode}
I have to agree, it was odd timing by Bee for a 'cunt-out' with Roseanne. It did, however, allow the left-leaning media types to lambaste her and thus establish some tenuous high-ground over the right-wing media, who true to form, wasted no time in doing and saying very little about Roseanne. Worst of all, Ivanka Trump gets to slink off deluded that she's somehow a victim (again) armed with six lucrative Chinese patents which died on the media vine because of all the tumult.
Puerto Rico, just when their kitchen rolls were running out, are now staring down another Hurricane season...These poor buggers must truly feel like the poor relations in US society, you can bet your arse if they were allowed to vote for President, Trump would have had the entire island looking like the back nine at Maralago by now.
I can't even fathom the inhumanity of The Trump administration in losing 1500 plus kids then shrugging it off as some kind of Obama era debacle. When exactly does it stop being Obama's fault for all the shit things going on --- A full 20 months of Trump's tenure and it seems he's all giggles about unemployment, economic growth and rising stocks, all of which Obama left in his wake. Back to the kids, I emailed DHS, I put it to them that if they were unable to explain the whereabouts of these poor kids, surely they'd be able to furnish the public with a accounting of the vetted homes to which these poor creatures were assigned. Seems 'vetted' has a slightly different meaning in some of the darker, more disreputable sub-departments of the DHS than elsewhere in the real world. I await an email destined never to be sent.
Apparently we in Canada have the distinction of collectively being a threat to US national security...I broke out the Twitter account to alert Trump to the fact that we share the longest undefended border on the planet with the US, and that perhaps we can exert pressure on Mexico to redouble their efforts to finish their wall and submit a timetable and cost analysis for ours, ASAP...Jesus from Baja assured me our wall was second on their list of things never to be done. It's refreshing to know Jesus from Baja has our best interests foremost in his mind.
LL&P
CRS-
Ever hear the term self-loathing? Self-loathing Jew? it's the content, not the source, that matters. It is said in the press she was raised a crypto Jew in a Mormon town. Might explain it, doesn't make it any better.
More bad news on the economic front, as the markets flatline and interest rates rise. Just as the economy is teetering on the edge, some clown in DC wants to start a series of trade wars.
Looks like the Obama economy is becoming the Trump economy - and even the dumb "Tax Cut" (i.e. a giant giveaway to shareholders and billionaires) hasn't impacted wages, while assistance to the poor has been slashed.
The mismanagement of the economy is typical of Republican presidents - they are handed an economy that was finally fixed after the last Republican boom and bust cycle and they immediately take the brakes off the car and point it downhill then brag about how fast it is going.
CRS: Roseanne Barr once lambasted “trolls” who objected to her support for a Holocaust denier. And she was photographed dressed up as Adolf Hitler taking “Jews” out of an oven.
I can't figure out if she is an anti-semite, but here's a piece of advice for anybody thinking about dressing up as Hitler and pulling people-shaped cookies out of an oven:
"Don't."
https://images.tmz.com/2018/05/31/0531-roseanne-hitler-bradley-meinz-3.jpg
This is not photoshopped, this was Barr posing for the cover of the magazine "Heeb".
So Kim Jong Un sent over a love letter to Trump and Trump immediately rolls over and gives Un what he wants. Bloody hilarious. And the letter was deliberately oversized to make Trump look small when he holds it in the pictures (of course Trump fell for that trick and gave Un the photo-op, the man is as dumb as a box of nails).
Good to see some justice and common sense prevail - Barr gets the boot and Bee gets the laughs she deserves. I found her show very amusing, but I'd have used the word "P#$$y" - I mean, that's the Presidential term after all, so the right wing boo-hoo artists can't complain about that.
goode t made a "goode" point in his [1]. Hurricane devastation at the PR level would have been tough to deal with under the best circumstances, but when it hits a place where the infrastructure of society has been allowed by local (Dem) leadership to deteriorate to third-world status over the course 50 yrs, it gets DAMN tough!
However, the Harvard study has gone to ridiculous lengths to make the Trump admin. look bad. I read about a guy who died after crashing his motorbike into hurricane debris on the hiway almost two weeks after the storm ended, and he's part of the 4600 "hurricane fatalities".
stig your [6]
Not sure what a "crypto" Jew is, but I know that where Mormons are a large percentage of the population, they operate a multitude of youth-oriented programs available to the public. They do scout troops, summer camps, athletic leagues, drama productions, etc. It seems Roseanne participated in many such, but I seriously doubt that she ever became a member of that church.
gt,
As much a it would be fun to blame trump...
For me, there is nothing fun about this president.
CRS-13
A crypto Jew is a Jew who does not publicly identify as such - either by choice or through ignorance. The latter is unlikely, but can occur because most Jewish sects define identity through matrilineal descent. * Going crypto can make a lot of sense if 1) you live in an antisemitic environment and 2) you know local customs well enough to blend. Crypto Jews sometimes feign or adopt overt antisemitism to blend better. Bar has described herself as growing up as crypto Jew in published interviews.
* slight oversimplification but close enough for the matter at hand
CRS-13
Don't know what a Crypto Jew is? Lost the ability to use a search engine? This sort of rhetorical laziness is one more reason why I identify you as trollish.
Stig [17]
Think much closer to "doesn't give a damn/too lazy/couldn't care less", or as you'd likely say 'could care less'!
You misundertood me when you inquired about ancestry, I said "Polish", not "Trollish"!
Neilm [7]:
More bad news on the economic front, as the markets flatline and interest rates rise. Just as the economy is teetering on the edge, some clown in DC wants to start a series of trade wars.
Looks like the Obama economy is becoming the Trump economy - and even the dumb "Tax Cut" (i.e. a giant giveaway to shareholders and billionaires) hasn't impacted wages, while assistance to the poor has been slashed.
The mismanagement of the economy is typical of Republican presidents - they are handed an economy that was finally fixed after the last Republican boom and bust cycle and they immediately take the brakes off the car and point it downhill then brag about how fast it is going.
Exactly, precisely true. Perfect description of reality. Trumpettes in particular unaware of danger he's put them into with tariffs. It'll be messier this time.
PS: was looking up 'feckless' to see if it applies in this case, got this result from Google:
https://forums.civfanatics.com/media/google-feckless.4852/full?d=1527965129
Can't say they're not keeping up!
Gotta love the way the Dem/Lib mind works. In the Lib lexicon, NOT confiscating something from the people who earned it equates to "A Giant Giveaway" to those earners.
Bottom line here is, regardless of who earns it, it's all 'community property', so if you let the earners keep it, you're actually 'stealing from the non-earners'!!!
<i?Bottom line here is, regardless of who earns it, it's all 'community property', so if you let the earners keep it, you're actually 'stealing from the non-earners'!!!
The non-earners are our kids and grandchildren. If we don't pay our way then we are running up debts for those "non-earners".
Once you've explained why we are adding trillions more onto the money you are stealing from them, you can then get on your high horse.
I read about a guy who died after crashing his motorbike into hurricane debris on the hiway almost two weeks after the storm ended, and he's part of the 4600 "hurricane fatalities". [mentioned in the Harvard Study]
That number was 4,645. If this story is any more than Rightie mythology, the administration still has 4,644 more Puerto Rican deaths to explain.
And yet another agenda item for Congress to address, if they ever find their way out of Trump's colon.
Let's list some more non-earners that are stealing good people's money in CRS worldview:
1. Everybody in the military - they don't create wealth, they just spend it.
2. All the retirees who didn't cover the cost of their government retirement and medicare costs
3. Kids in school
4. Police
5. Firefighters (both like military, wealth destroyers)
Once we've had an explanation as to why we should stop taxing the people who have most benefitted from everything our military, police, and firefighters have done, let's chat about taxes. And once we've heard how just about everybody in the country over 25 is going to cover the costs of their own medical and retirements costs we can chat about cutting education.
This "wealth creator" and "earners" vs. "non-earners" drivel needs to be addressed when it comes up. Too many morons spout on about "taxing the job creators" but can't explain why, when we already have record employment numbers, we need to help only the "job creators" at the expense of everybody else.
neilm [23]
Comeon dude, give me a gawdam break! How many times have I explained to you that productivity involves the creation/production of real wealth (as opposed to monetary wealth), defined as "goods AND SERVICES".
Not only the military, but ALL ewmployees of ALL levels of government do not create goods, but they do create services. Likewise all doctors, all teachers, all lawyers, all law enforcement, all firefighters, don't normally create goods, but they DO provide services in exchange for their monetary income.
CRS [24]: I agree that the production of services should be paid for, that was not my point, tho' nice try.
My point is that the excuses given by Republicans for why all the tax cuts need to go to shareholders and the very rich is so obviously nonsense that it takes a belief in a nonsense kind of economics philosophy.
It boggles the logical mind that ''Trickle Down Economics'' is still being considered a valid economic theory. Debunked as ''political voodoo'' the horse-and-sparrow theory: ('If you feed the horse enough oats, some will pass through to the road for the sparrows,') for over a century, it borders on lunacy. No one in their right mind honestly believes that by making the wealthy wealthier still incentivizes re-investment in anything but their own lavish lifestyles. The likes of Trump and Helmsley of the New York elite are prime examples of how the wealthy react to their own status, they piss on poor people, flaunt tax laws, rip off laborers and act as if butter wouldn't melt in their mouths, all because they believe their wealth alone is enough contribution to society. It's a very jaded world view if you think economies are supported from the top by a few, who in their heart of hearts know that without the folks at the bottom, the people who actually create the wealth, they'd be extinct as a class. Trickle down isn't so much an economic theory as it is an insurance policy for the one percenter's to maintain the myth that they are somehow a vital cog in the economic machine. The fact is this, if you maintain the middle class with a decent living wage, reduce their tax to a manageable amount, ensure they have decent healthcare, education and housing they will, in turn, pour their disposable income back into the economy, thus feeding and growing it. The wealthy don't see society in this way, they see themselves as the ultimate beneficiaries of the labour of the toiling classes, and therefore it would never occur to them to pour their disposable cash back into the system. Wealth has always flowed up, not down...anyone who thinks otherwise needs to rethink their own participation within the collective experience.
LL&P
I am a fan of Samantha Bee, watch “Full Frontal” every week, and I even defended Michelle Wolf during the kerfuffle involving her speech at the correspondent’s dinner. However I am ashamed of her for this(though I also agree with Chris about false equivalence between her and Ms. Barr). For me, what puts it over the line is the use of the “c word”. Samantha, you call yourself a feminist, and yet when you feel the need to insult another woman the word you reach for is a gendered slur? When you call Ivanka Trump a c***, what are you saying about her? That isn’t an incisive or witty piece of commentary illuminating her complicity in racism, exploitation or anything else. That’s just taking a word for female genitalia that our society deems the worst thing you can call a woman, and applying it to Ivanka for shock value. I will be sad if “Full Frontal” goes off the air because of this, plenty of comedians have survived worse(*cough cough Bill Maher*), but I hope Bee realizes from this that the use of such slurs is disrespectful and unfunny, and I do think she should apologize to Ivanka Trump.
The May jobs report is great news for everyone — except Democrats running for office
Friday's monthly employment report was great news for anyone looking for a job in America – unless you happen to be a Democrat running for Congress.
That's because voters who are employed are historically more likely to favor incumbents than those who are out of work.
With the jobless rate now down to 3.8 percent, Democrats in 435 House districts and 35 Senate races face a major challenge as they try to unseat Republican majorities in both chambers.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/01/may-jobs-numbers-are-bad-news-for-democrats.html
The BIG BLUE WAVE.... drip... drip....drip....
The US economy suddenly looks like it's unstoppable
Friday's economic data provided evidence the U.S. economy is heading into the second half of 2018 with strong momentum.
Nonfarm payrolls beat expectations while manufacturing and construction indexes both showed accelerated growth.
Economists are slowly ratcheting up expectations for growth through the end of the year, with widely followed measures putting the second quarter at between 3.6 percent and 4.8 percent.
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/01/the-us-economy-suddenly-looks-like-its-unstoppable.html
It's funny because ObamaNomics said that 2.5 growth was the best it's going to get and is the "New Normal"...
Looks like President Trump demolished that way of thinking!! :D
The "Blue Wave" has suddenly become a couple sweat drops coming off of Hillary Clinton during her WAAAA WAAAAA I Wanted To Be POTUS!!! IT WAS MY TURN!!! tour.... :D
neilm [25]
Tax cuts do not 'give money to people' as you imply ("shareholders and the very rich", as you specify). Tax cuts allow people who have EARNED money (regardless of who they happen to be or their financial circumstances) to KEEP more of what they did earn than they would otherwise be able to keep if the taxes were NOT cut, right?
Of course you deplore that fact, because the corollary of that is that there is thereby less money to redistribute to the people who did NOT earn it, right?
I fully understand that ideology. It always distills to the basic liberal premise that the more productive have an obligation to support the less productive/unproductive, and Reps/Cons have no quarrel with that so long as the less less productive/unproductive are limited to the very old, the very young, the incapacitated, etc.
Where we differ is that Dems/Libs want the "less productive/unproductive" category to include the lazy, the unmotivated, the incompetent, the alcoholics, etc.
Tax cuts do NOT "transfer money from the poor to the rich", because the money in question belonged to the rich in the first place. You can't transfer money from the poor to the rich for tha obvious reason that the poor DON't HAVE ANY MONEY TO TRANSFER, right?
C U Next Tuesday...
As some of you may or may not know, I'm transatlantic, being born in the UK and living in Canada, lo these many years...All this fuss over a word from a language that is forever undergoing change. The English language, being that which belongs to the English, isn't spoken today as it was even a century ago (as anyone with even the slightest exposure to that most cruel of all writers, Charles Dickens, can attest,) it changes and morphs with the times and common usage. Even within the UK, every region has its own dialects, inflections and 'novelty' words and phrases. For instance, we hailed from the ''Rhubarb Triangle''an area generally regarded as the area that lies between Leeds, Bradford and Wakefield in the Riding of South Yorkshire, our accents are considered neolithic by the rest of Britain for being almost Chaucerian in it's refusal to adapt and conform. For us, the word cunt falls into the widest most welcoming group of all words, the 'adverbial function.' It's a word so commonly used that it's rarely taken harshly and more frequently used to describe and define a feeling or thought. While working in professional kitchens in the late eighties, Chef would routinely christen the new cooks, S. Cunt, or Scunt for short. The new guys quickly figured out that Chef wasn't being mean or rude when he'd burn himself, stub his toe or lose a digit to a blunt parer and let loose a string of obscenities directed at some inanimate object that had the temerity to cross him, usually with 'cunting' thrown in every second word. We have a wonderfully named city on the Yorkshire-Lincolnshire border, no doubt everyone has it's geographical reality seared into their subconscious hind-brain as a place to never to wind up, dead or worse...Scunthorpe. The wretched inhabitants of this city have taken their misfortune in good stride down through the years, they are a constant source of amusement, they go about their existence creatively shrugging off their shame with new and interesting ways to make outsiders feel like the shame is theirs for even thinking there's a cunt in Scunthorpe. The benighted 'Scunthorpers' have some of the most colourful, not to mention, breathtakingly lewd soccer chants in all of England and their graffiti has all the subtlety of a brick hurled through a stained glass window. But I digress, the point I'm labouring toward is this, the word has taken far more abuse than it really should have. Given its recent 'bad press' by those unfeeling and marginal know-it-alls, to whom the etymology of this syntactic powerhouse is a mere blur on the way to moral indignation...I give you this.
https://thec-wordandwhatitmeans.weebly.com/history.html
PS, I'm offended by the word ''Fanny,'' all decent English people are, as far as we're concerned, 'fanny' is well below cunt on the expletive attributive totem pole. However you folks disarmed and gentrified that most offensive of slurs is beyond me. However, its cavalier and egregious insinuation into daily use is a topic for another day.
LL&P
CRS [30]
You do understand how corporate taxation works, right? You do understand how we pay for all those services you suddenly seem so deem important. If your business is in debt to the infrastructure and society’s frameworks, you should be paying for it. This is where libertarians are so childlike, they think everything society provides them has no cost and so they dont owe anything to society for god governance.
Ask any CEO of any large multinatonal if they would rather
1) pay more taxes and have god infrastructure, the rule of law, particularly property law, and low or
2) pay less taxes, have poor transportation, losses due to broken contracts with little recourse, and have to pay bribes to get pieces of paper to allow them to ldo business
They’ll take option 1 every day of the week. Time to grow up, you may be in your 8th decade, but simple economics and governace probably is t beyond you. Just stop channeling Ayn Rand and you’ll be amazed how much you can really understand about the world.
neilm
Yeah, I hear that. It's Obama's "You didn't build that", right?
Truth is, the more productive in realiy DID "build that", it's the less productive that did not.
However, you're surely aware that the less-productive drive on the same roads, send their kids to the same schools, etc, right? So give me your thoughts on the question, What is it differentiates the more productive from the less productive????
Never met Ayn, nor read her book(s), but I get the idea. However, I'm not the one living in the dream world of economic unreality, that be you.
P.S. I'm all in favor of "god governance", in spite of being agnosstic.
[30] C. R. Stucki
Even I would take issue with a couple of things:
1.) "I fully understand that ideology. It always distills to the basic liberal premise that the more productive have an obligation to support the less productive/unproductive," - That's not just a "liberal" premise. It's also part of the basic teachings of Jesus and Christianity.
2.) "and Reps/Cons have no quarrel with that so long as the less less productive/unproductive are limited to the very old, the very young, the incapacitated, etc." - Alcoholics, which you single out, should be included among this group, since alcoholism IS a chronic disease like diabetes, etc. and therefore should NOT be held against someone, just like any other disability.
3.) "Where we differ is that Dems/Libs want the "less productive/unproductive" category to include the lazy, the unmotivated, the incompetent, the alcoholics, etc." - What Reps/Cons keep failing to realize is that no system is 100 percent perfect. A certain small percentage of the lazy and unmotivated etc. are AlWAYS going to get benefits too. That doesn't mean the rest should be penalized for that small percentage. Why must you constantly pit the "deserving" against the "undeserving?" That suits no good productive purpose whatsoever. Unless your true goal of course is simply to justify denying assistance to everyone.
A better question might be is why do Reps/Cons always have such a big beef against the poor that they are constantly making war against them?
Also, if you don't think the poor can have what little meager wealth that they do have siphoned off from them by unscrupulous rich for the rich's own benefit at the expense of the poor, perhaps you should go back and read about the relationship between Bob Cratchit and Ebenezer Scrooge in A Christmas Carol. There's a reason why the word Scrooge became an adverb to describe someone as well as a proper name.
The "Blue Wave" has suddenly become a couple sweat drops coming off of Hillary Clinton...
I honestly think that there's some sort of game going on among righties where they get points for using Hillary's name in a post, with extra points garnered for associating the name with an obscure subject.
For example, this one was about Trump taking credit for the Obama economy. Michale gets 2 points for his pointless mention of Hillary in this context.
The 'Trump economy' will develop in a minute, when the effect of the new Tariffs begins to kick in.
For example, this one was about Trump taking credit for the Obama economy.
OK, so.. What you are saying is that, when things are bad, it's Bush's (R) fault..
When things are good, Trump (R) doesn't get the credit.. Then it's because of Obama (D)..
Congrats, Balthy.. You have finally discovered transparency.. :D
The 'Trump economy' will develop in a minute, when the effect of the new Tariffs begins to kick in.
Ya'all have been screaming that for months now.. When does this finally happen??
I am glad to see that ya'all are maintaining your PERFECT record of being absolutely wrong about everything to do with President Trump.. :D
"Generic Polling" is a term used by poll takers to describe polls that simply state the preference of a Democrat over a Republican..
The poll is usually phrased, "If the Congressional Elections were held today, would you vote for a Democrat or a Republican?"
Six months ago, Democrats lead that poll by over 20 points...
Today, Republicans lead that poll by 1....
My feelings on polls are well known.. They are all bullshit..
But hysterical NeverTrumpers SWEAR by polls all the time.. At least the polls that say what they want to hear... :D
The 'Trump economy' will develop in a minute, when the effect of the new Tariffs begins to kick in.
Yea.. That is EXACTLY what ya said when President Trump imposed tariffs in Jan....
NOTHING happened... :D
Like I said.. Ya'all STILL have a PERFECT record on being WRONG about everything President Trump.. :D
And ya'all have to ask yerselves one question..
If President Trump is as bad as you say... If he is Mark Pellegrino Incarnate... If he is the worst of the worst of the worst of the WORST human being ever to have slimed across the face of the planet...????
WHY are his poll numbers comparable to Odumbo's???
I mean, ya'all live by your polls...
If President Trump is as bad as you say... Why are his poll numbers really not much different than Odumbo's???
One of two possibilities exist..
1. I am right and polls are shit..
2. Ya'all are wrong about President Trump..
Heads I win, tails you lose.. :D
Isn't it possible that Obama wasn't all he was cracked up to be?
Not only possible, but well documented...
But on the plus side, he WAS a legend in his own mind..
Obama — Just Too Good for Us
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/06/02/opinion/sunday/obama-ben-rhodes-world-as-it-is.html
John M
Yeah alcoholism and diabetes are considered to be "diseases", but the cause of them is "It makes me feel so good (booze)/it tastes so good (sugar) that I don't have the will power to abstain", right???
On that system, robbing banks could be classified as a "disease", because "I love to spend money, and don't have the will power to resist"!
On that system, robbing banks could be classified as a "disease", because "I love to spend money, and don't have the will power to resist"!
We may not agree on a whole helluva lot, but I do like the way you think.. :D
Supreme Court rules narrowly for Colorado baker who wouldn't make same-sex wedding cake
https://www.cnbc.com/2018/06/04/supreme-court-rules-in-favor-of-colorado-baker-who-refused-to-make-wedding-cake-for-gay-couple-for-religious-reasons.html
Freedom rings!!!!!
"I don't owe Monica Lewinsky an apology.. I was a victim too!!"
-Bill Clinton
The gift... to Republicans.. that keeps on giving.. :D
Freedom rings!!!!!
Let freedom ring, let the white dove sing
Let the whole world know that today
Is a day of reckoning.
Let the weak be strong, let the right be wrong
Throw the stone away, make the guilty pay
It's Independence Day.
-Martina McBride, INDEPENDENCE DAY
Michale,
Is POTUS above the law?
JTC,
Have you ever seen the movie 'Fanny'? The remake with Leslie Caron is the one to watch!
[46] = fake quote. I know that it's not in vogue for GOP lackeys to tell the whole truth these days, but just making shit up is still wrong.
neilm
10
Good to see some justice and common sense prevail - Barr gets the boot and Bee gets the laughs she deserves. I found her show very amusing, but I'd have used the word "P#$$y" - I mean, that's the Presidential term after all, so the right wing boo-hoo artists can't complain about that.
I know, right!? It's a pretty pathetic state of affairs when the Twit-in-Chief, his mouthpieces, and those particular righties who wore t-shirts containing the same vulgar term along as well as t-shirts with multiple other choice terms to describe Trump's opponent are now taking issue with identical language being used to describe Ivanka.
From Washington Post (transcript unavailable):
Clinton said he had apologized “to everybody in the world” for the 20-year-old episode but acknowledged he had not spoken directly to Lewinsky about the affair.
“I’ve never talked to her,” Clinton said. “But I did say, publicly, on more than one occasion, that I was sorry. That’s very different. The apology was public.”
Clinton also noted that there had been negative consequences for him related to the episode, which led to his impeachment by the House but acquittal by the Senate.
“Nobody believes that I got out of that for free,” he said. “I left the White House $16 million in debt. “
__________________________________________________
When we're done discussing this 20-year old scandal, let's discuss the multiple charges of sexual abuse alleged against the current president, and then the multiple allegations of impropriety in office made against the current president which include (at a minimum) violations of the emoluments clause, violating multiple campaign financing laws, money laundering, and treason/collusion with the Russians.
PS, I'm offended by the word "Fanny," all decent English people are, as far as we're concerned, 'fanny' is well below cunt on the expletive attributive totem pole.
Because there is simply no self-respecting Brit who would ever want to be referred to as "like France." :)
Oh, and forgot: Obstruction of Justice, witness tampering, mishandling of classified material, giving aid and comfort to racists, generally boorish behavior, and policies that have undermined American interests and national security - in particular policies that have undermined our alliances throughout the world.
And the stupid, stupid tariffs.
[43] C. R. Stucki
"Yeah alcoholism and diabetes are considered to be "diseases", but the cause of them is "It makes me feel so good (booze)/it tastes so good (sugar) that I don't have the will power to abstain", right???
On that system, robbing banks could be classified as a "disease", because "I love to spend money, and don't have the will power to resist"!"
WOW, just WOW. Are you seriously that ignorant???
To chalk up a serious disease with a real physical cause to just a failure of "willpower?" That's like saying everybody who gets cancer because of the faulty genes they inherited are equally responsible because they didn't choose their own parents carefully enough. Makes about as much sense doesn't it?
No one gets diabetes just from eating sugar. You do know it's usually because of a physical inability of your pancreas to make enough insulin, right? That has nothing to do with willpower.
The same with alcoholism. It's because an alcoholic's body physically processes alcohol differently so that it becomes an addictive substance.
Again, I will ask you, why do Reps/Cons seem to go out of their way to be needlessly cruel and vindictive towards the less fortunate and think they can actually solve problems like homelessness, poverty and illness through persecuting the very people they say they are trying to help?
Liz,
Is POTUS above the law?
Depends...
When we're done discussing this 20-year old scandal, let's discuss the multiple charges of sexual abuse alleged against the current president, and then the multiple allegations of impropriety in office made against the current president which include (at a minimum) violations of the emoluments clause, violating multiple campaign financing laws, money laundering, and treason/collusion with the Russians.
TRANSLATION: I am going to ignore and let slide the rape, sexual assaults and sexual harassments of the DEMOCRAT President. NONE of that is any big deal.. I want to concentrate on the REPUBLICAN President who I said was going to be a disaster and has proven to be anything but...
Gotcha, Balthy.. {wink, wink}
Michale
47
It's interesting that the righties frequently use Martina McBride's song about domestic violence as if it's about patriotism when it's not. It's a song about a woman burning down the house of her abuser... with him in it... and her becoming free of him. Fact.
I am going to ignore and let slide the rape, sexual assaults and sexual harassments of the DEMOCRAT President. NONE of that is any big deal.
The rape charge was spurious. The rest happened more than 20 years ago. I've moved on, just as Roseanne ought to, I guess.
I want to concentrate on the REPUBLICAN President who I said was going to be a disaster and has proven to be anything but.
Oh, but he has ALREADY proven to be a disaster for American foreign policy, or does the wholesale shedding of valued alliances and a nascent trade war not bother you? Of course it all fits Putin's agenda perfectly. Maybe that's what you're thinking of. All of the 'shithole countries' he talks about seem to think so.
Or maybe you're thinking of Trump's domestic policies, like allowing his cabinet secretaries to fly around like billionaires on the taxpayers dime, gut environmental protections, loosen regulations on sketchy behavior by bankers, and reduce health care coverage for millions. Maybe you're thinking of his $1 million-dollars-per-day trips to Mar-a-lago, or million-dollars-per-day security at Trump tower. Maybe the 4,645 dead citizens in Puerto Rico are something the GOP is proud of.
Winning!
The rape charge was spurious.
Of course it was.. It was against a Democrat after all..
Oh, but he has ALREADY proven to be a disaster for American foreign policy
Yea.. That's your claim.. But the FACTS say different...
Of course it all fits Putin's agenda perfectly.
"Please tell Vlad that he is going to have to give me some space to win this election. After I win, I can be more... flexible.."
-Barack Obama
'nuff said..
Maybe the 4,645 dead citizens in Puerto Rico are something the GOP is proud of.
Considering it was bad Democrat-style governing that caused those deaths, the GOP has nothing to do with it..
Face the facts, Balthy...
You have been WRONG about everything to do with President Trump since he announced his candidacy...
WRONG.. WRONG... WRONG...
Now the Democrats are setting themselves up to get their asses handed to them AGAIN in the next election..
I admire your capacity for self-delusion.. :D It's mind-boggling..
Depends on what, Michale?
Given the fact that the Clintons have screwed up so much for so many - forgive me if I can't bear to count the ways - why do they find it so hard to go away?
Balthasar and Michale,
I'm just wondering how the two of you and write posts like that while your fellow citizens in Puerto Rico are still suffering so.
A better discussion would be what should be done to make sure the US is better prepared to take care of its citizens when the next natural or man-made disaster strikes ...
Balthasar and Michale,
Balthasar and Michale,
I'm just wondering how the two of you can write posts like that while your fellow citizens in Puerto Rico are still suffering so.
A better discussion would be what should be done to make sure the US is better prepared to take care of its citizens when the next natural or man-made disaster strikes ...
Depends on what, Michale?
Why, the law, of course..
Presidents have great latitude to "break" laws that apply to us mere mortals...
Obama proved that beyond a shadow of a doubt.. He said he has to obey the law when it comes to immigration and the Dreamers, but then he went ahead and broke that law via an EO....
Because he could...
Let me put it in another way...
There is a specific course of action outlined in the US Constitution on how to bring the POTUS to justice if he commits a crime...
Until such time as that way is followed, the POTUS is the Chief Law Enforcement Officer of the Country..
If one is going to kill the king, one must KILL the king..
What the NeverTrumpers have now is laughable...
2+ years of investigating and we STILL don't even know if a crime has been committed..
I dunno about you but I find that laughable to the point... PAST the point of absurdity...
A better discussion would be what should be done to make sure the US is better prepared to take care of its citizens when the next natural or man-made disaster strikes ...
I agree...
But there is too much hate and intolerance for that discussion to EVER have a chance...
Democrats never want to fix the problem. They only want to fix the blame...
Republicans aren't much better...
Thank the gods for President Trump...
Can you answer a question or participate in a discussion without bringing the 44th president into the mix?
But there is too much hate and intolerance for that discussion to EVER have a chance...
Well, that is the saddest commentary possible on Chris's blog.
:-(
In a complete coincidence that has nothing to do with President Trump, China announced that they will slash import tariffs on almost 1500 different categories of consumer goods.
Just as a reminder, China recently cut tariffs on imported vehicles, effective July 1, 2018.
It's very VERY important that **NO ONE** makes the connection between President Trump's hardline trade stance and China rolling over and showing it's belly...
We can't have Americans thinking that President Trump is actually doing great things for this country, now can we?? Democrats would get TOTALLY DECIMATED in the mid-terms if that happened!! :D
EM
62
Given the fact that the Clintons have screwed up so much for so many - forgive me if I can't bear to count the ways - why do they find it so hard to go away?
Go away to where, Elizabeth? Whether you like them or not, the Clintons are an ex-president and first lady of the United States who will "go away" the day they die. Same with Melania Trump. Same with Donald Trump... who will likely die in prison for multiple crimes.
Well, that is the saddest commentary possible on Chris's blog.
Made more so by the fact that it is 1000% true and correct...
President Trump could single-handedly bring a full and just peace to the Middle East and single-handedly de-nuclearize and unify the Koreas..
And everyone here (NEN) would STILL find a way to attack him and his orange skin and his small hands and other immature 3rd grade attacks..
Go ahead.. Tell me I am wrong...
Go away to where, Elizabeth?
You know what I mean, Kick.
Bill and Hillary need to come to terms with the fact that their political days - in any real public sense - are over!
They have done too much damage to be consistently in front of a camera.
But, I know you know that.
Can you answer a question or participate in a discussion without bringing the 44th president into the mix?
Absolutely..
But when Obama is relevant (for example to show the hypocrisy of the NeverTrumpers) then he is relevant..
Considering how much Obama (and ya'all incidentially) brought Bush into the discussion 2009-2016, I don't think my few references to Obama, post his shellacking, is anything to complain about...
But that is my, admittedly, biased opinion :D
EM
72
You know what I mean, Kick.
Bill and Hillary need to come to terms with the fact that their political days - in any real public sense - are over!
Once a president, always a president and first lady. This applies regardless of party affiliation, and the camera and attempts to create news will follow regardless.
They have done too much damage to be consistently in front of a camera.
But, I know you know that.
There is somebody somewhere who believes that about all of them, regardless of party affiliation. I know what you're saying, but I don't think the press allows any of them their peace until the day they are laid to rest; that's what I meant. :)
Kick [70]
You Dems/Libs are perpetually trying to criminalize everything and anything you don't like. You'd cheerfully declare me "illegal" if you thought anybody would enforce it.
Re " . .Donald Trump who will likely die in prison for multiple crimes." Sorry, being an asshole/cum/moron is just like "price gouging", there's no law against it no matter how much you think there ought to be!!
2+ years of investigating and we STILL don't even know if a crime has been committed..
There are 5 guilty pleas so far. How many admissions of guilt to a crime does it take to convince a former "police occifer" that laws have been broken. Do tell. :)
I dunno about you but I find that laughable to the point... PAST the point of absurdity...
C. R. Stucki
75
You Dems/Libs are perpetually trying to criminalize everything and anything you don't like.
I'm not a Dem/Lib and never will be no matter how many times you type it.
You'd cheerfully declare me "illegal" if you thought anybody would enforce it.
Poor, Stucki... still flailing in your attempts to apply traits and feelings to multiple persons on this blog that you know nothing about. As I have said before, please stop emoting your personal "feelings" all over the place and applying them and/or projecting them onto others.
Re " . .Donald Trump who will likely die in prison for multiple crimes." Sorry, being an asshole/cum/moron is just like "price gouging", there's no law against it no matter how much you think there ought to be!!
There are multiple laws against "price gouging," Stucki, but lucky for you and Trump, being an ignorant "asshole/cum/moron" isn't a crime. :)
Bill and Hillary need to come to terms with the fact that their political days - in any real public sense - are over!
They have done too much damage to be consistently in front of a camera.
If the Clintons had ANY loyalty to anyone but the Clintons, they would find a dank dark cabin in the middle of Knowhere and just live out their days...
Hillary has taken so much momentum from the Blue Wave and Bubba totally decimates the #MeToo movement...
The best thing for the GOP is to have Bubba and Hillary front and center til the mid-terms..
RED TSUNAMI :D
Elizabeth Miller wrote:
Can you answer a question or participate in a discussion without bringing the 44th president into the mix?
Or the Clintons. It's simple deflection, and they are united in their hatred and their hypocrisy. They insist Bill Clinton has committed rapes for which he has never been charged... let alone convicted... while insisting that Donald Trump and company are "innocent until proven guilty" when several of them have already plead guilty.
The Clintons nor the Obamas will ever be allowed to rest until they are no longer useful to Fox News and their ilk and the "useful idiots" who repeat their mindless BS while refusing to acknowledge facts.
Donald Trump's lawyers admitted in January in a letter to Robert Mueller and company that Trump had indeed dictated the press release wherein he lied about the reason for the June 2016 meeting at Trump Tower between Trump Jr., Manafort, Kushner, and multiple Russians... the meeting with Russians Trump Sr. had claimed to know nothing about.
Question: So why was Trump Sr. dictating a statement about a meeting he said he knew nothing about?
Answer: He wasn't... he knew about the meeting with Russians to obtain dirt on his opponent and lied about it.
All that goalpost moving is heavy lifting... sooner or later you lay down your burden and plead guilty... or you die in prison. It's a rather easy choice, and that's why so many of them have already chosen it. :)
We have the Clintons to thank for Trump.
We have the Clintons to thank for Trump.
Partially...
We also have Obama to thank for Trump for BACKING Clinton over Biden...
Can you answer a question or participate in a discussion without bringing the 44th president into the mix?
The best answer I can come up with is to ask if ya'all could have answered a question or participated in a discussion about Obama without bringing up Bush...
It's the exact same answer...
You see, Liz.. What you have to understand is, even if the Trump campaign got dirt on Hillary from the Russians, it's NOT illegal..
Hell, HILLARY got dirt on Trump from the Russians..
No one here seems to have ANY problem with that...
And why??
Because it's ALL about Trump.. He beat Hillary in a free, fair and legal election..
And ya'all simply can't accept that....
That is what this is ALL about...
Nothing more...
EM
80
We have the Clintons to thank for Trump.
On one level I agree with that, but on a whole 'nother level, I realize it's way more complicated, and I know you know that... just like you knew I knew.
The good news is: Trump too shall pass... and when he does, it'll be painful like a kidney stone, like Nixon, and the Republicans and their ilk and the "useful idiots" will claim he was a Democrat. :)
My understanding is the president is sort of above the law. The president can’t be charged, arrested, jailed while in office. Once out of office, they theoretically could be charged for what happened in office but that has never been tested? But it’s a double edged sword. Congress is the judge/jury for the president and the definition of “high crimes and misdemeanors” are whatever congress says it means. Law enforcement can investigate but once it reports to congress, it’s job is over. At least until the president is out of office...
My understanding is the president is sort of above the law.
I know that was hard for you, Bashi.. :D
Huh? Was that an attempt at a joke?
You see, Liz.. What you have to understand is, even if the Trump campaign got dirt on Hillary from the Russians, it's NOT illegal..
Yes, Liz, it's very illegal. Otherwise, they'd have no reason to lie about it multiple times... including under oath... just to state the obvious... you know... facts. :)
BashiBazouk
83
My understanding is the president is sort of above the law.
Wrong. No one is above the law, not even "sort of."
Congress is the judge/jury for the president and the definition of “high crimes and misdemeanors” are whatever congress says it means.
Fact. So anyone telling you the president has to commit a crime to be impeached is lying or misinformed or both.
Yea.. Cuz something ILLEGAL is the **ONLY** reason why someone would lie...
I guess that means Bubba's affair with Lewinsky was "illegal" because Bubba lied his ass off about it..
I guess Hillary's email server was "illegal" because Hillary lied her ass off about it..
I guess Odumbo's TrainWreckCare was "illegal" because Odumbo lied his ass off about it...
Some people don't have more than 2 brain cells to rub together and are consumed by partisan bigotry....
Just to state the obvious... yunno... FACTS....
:D
https://uploads.disquscdn.com/images/f4857991cd676944758d073b1c4c285c9fb99d0300378be00eb8b167e866183f.gif?w=800&h=167
:D
Michale
88
Yea.. Cuz something ILLEGAL is the **ONLY** reason why someone would lie...
I didn't use the word "**ONLY**" and you're missing the point.
I guess that means Bubba's affair with Lewinsky was "illegal" because Bubba lied his ass off about it..
This type of straw man bullshit deflection to "Bubba" is pretty much all you've got; that's why you talk about him incessantly and him being holed up in the woods in a cabin wouldn't matter.
Your whataboutism and deflection to all things Hillary and Bill Clinton and Barack and Michelle Obama does not change the written law "occifer." :)
I guess Hillary's email server was "illegal" because Hillary lied her ass off about it..
It wasn't illegal... stupid but not illegal. Those are two different things.
I guess Odumbo's TrainWreckCare was "illegal" because Odumbo lied his ass off about it...
Straw man argument number 3 still doesn't change the written law.
Some people don't have more than 2 brain cells to rub together and are consumed by partisan bigotry....
Just to state the obvious... yunno... FACTS....
:D
I agree, and it's those people who do the most deflecting, whataboutism, and projecting. You are the most partisan on this board who brings up polling the most... all whine whining about bigotry and polling. You are also the one who claims to know the law... "occifer." :)
We also have Obama to thank for Trump for BACKING Clinton over Biden...
Indubitably.
Michale[89]
We'll never see Trump do that. :)
Michale,
Given Biden's circumstances at the time, Obama could have made things much easier for him to run, without a doubt.
Given Biden's circumstances at the time, Obama could have made things much easier for him to run, without a doubt.
Yes, he (Obama) could have...
And yes, Biden had a MUCH better chance to win than Hillary had...
The problem for the Left is that, it was Hillary's turn after all...
That's what happens when Democrats put purity over competence...
And they are making all those same mistakes in the run-up to the mid-terms...
Progressive purity is the litmus test...
BREAKING NEWS
I just heard that a mere 162 items will be withheld as attorney-client privileged from the federal investigators in the case against Trump's lawyer of 2 decades, Michael Cohen. If this is true... ouch.
So if no one has committed any crimes that might be found in any of the several million other items of evidence obtained by investigators, there is simply no reason whatsoever to lie under oath and commit a crime in order to cover up crimes that have not been committed. Simple. :)
The problem for the Left is that, it was Hillary's turn after all...
No, actually, it was Biden's turn ... for more reasons than I can hope to enumerate here.
Given Biden's circumstances at the time, Obama could have made things much easier for him to run, without a doubt.
That's probably not the most unsubstantiated thing said here today, but it's close. Are you too going to start running down Obama just like you have Clinton, because the Republicans (and the Russians) will happily talk alot of smack about both on your behalf if you'd like. Or are you just down on Democrats not named Biden?
I remember when Biden was considering (and considering, and considering) whether or not to run in 2015. I don't recall Obama weighing in, either pro or con. I'm sure that had he decided to run, Obama would have supported him. He did, after all, choose Biden and not Hillary to succeed him in the first place.
There's been a lot of self-serving revisionism about the Clintons going on lately. To remind you, Bill Clinton left office with the highest approval rating of any president since Truman (65%). His highest approval rating, during the impeachment, was 73%, a number that Trump could only dream of. Moreover, despite all of the best efforts of the GOP, he managed to leave the country with a booming economy and a budget surplus.
Hillary's best approval numbers have come at times when she was actually in office: 67% as first lady, 65% after her first term as Senator, and 69% as her term as Secretary of State was winding down. Moreover, her poll ratings among Democrats have been consistently higher, and more dependable: her approval rating among Democrats was 79% just before the 2016 election, and was off just one point, to 78% a year later, despite all of the gnashing of teeth and rending of clothing by the left in the wake of her electoral college defeat.
But the Clinton's approval rating has sunk to new lows among Republicans, to just 5%, in part because for many of them - Trump included - the 2016 election never ended. They're still running against Hillary, and apparently intend to keep running against her for as long as they can. Bill too, is a convenient punching bag for them, as long as he sticks around to take the blows. That doesn't mean that they deserve it, only that, out of office, they have less time and ability to defend themselves against accusations that are mostly fiction anyway.
Wherever your low opinion of Clinton comes from, it still isn't very common among anyone who actually voted for her, which was, as everyone knows, a majority of the electorate by 5 million votes.
A lot of folks think that she'd have been a great president, yours truly included.
You have me pegged all wrong, Balthasar.
And, for the record, how is my statement unsubstantiated?
Certainly, you would agree, that a sitting president has it in his power to make things easier for his vice president to succeed him.
What, pray tell, is unsubstantiated about that!?
What, pray tell, is unsubstantiated about that!?
That Obama failed to 'make things easier' for Joe. I remember that Obama had a tough situation at the time: he didn't want to slight either of his popular associates who had both served him well and loyally. Obama did withhold his endorsement of either until Biden made his final decision - which took 12 weeks to make, by the way. That's pretty supportive, actually, given the shots that Hillary was already taking from Republicans (and others) by then. It was at about that same time, you might remember, that she was, for instance, subjected to an 11-hour marathon grilling by the Benghazi committee.
Moreover, contemporaneous accounts of Biden's decision do not list 'tepid support from Obama' among the reasons that Biden didn't run, because that was not a concern.
So there is no reason to doubt Obama's loyalty to Joe. I don't believe that Joe would either.
Thanks for failing to read/understand my post and, thereby totally missing the point.
We're done here.
Michale
65
Presidents have great latitude to "break" laws that apply to us mere mortals...
While it's true that law enforcement will turn a blind eye to crimes committed by those in power, friends/family, etc., no one has "latitude" to "break" or is above the law in this country or from whence we came... Mother England/Britain. No one.
Obama proved that beyond a shadow of a doubt.. He said he has to obey the law when it comes to immigration and the Dreamers, but then he went ahead and broke that law via an EO....
Question 1: Are you just woefully misinformed and actually believe all the BS spoon-fed to you by Trump and/or right wing propaganda media or are you purposely lying here? Trump lied repeatedly when he claimed Obama signed an EO and broke the law, and even after he was informed it wasn't true, he kept right on lying about it multiple times.
http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2018/jan/09/donald-trump/obama-hedged-didnt-say-he-lacked-legal-right-daca/
Question 2: Are you going to follow Trump's lead and continue to lie about this issue now that you've been informed it's a lie?
Because he could...
Nope. Fact check. He didn't. :)
Until such time as that way is followed, the POTUS is the Chief Law Enforcement Officer of the Country..
It's kind of a contradiction to make a claim that Obama broke the law and then turn around and "put it another way" and insist that the POTUS is the "Chief Law Enforcement Officer of the Country." What part of the Constitution did you pull that from? Perhaps you simply pulled it from "somewhere else."
The Office of the Attorney General was created by the Judiciary Act of 1789, and it has evolved over time into the head of the Department of Justice, a.k.a. the "chief law enforcement officer."
If one is going to kill the king, one must KILL the king..
The founders saw no need to kill the "king," just declare their independence from him and list in no uncertain terms why they were doing so. The foundational principle of their Declaration of Independence was that the colonists were British citizens and as such were entitled to the rights and privileges granted to them by the Magna Carta and the British Bill of Rights of 1689, which documents established that the King was not above the law. :)
Balthy,
. I remember that Obama had a tough situation at the time: he didn't want to slight either of his popular associates who had both served him well and loyally.
Oh PLEASE....
Biden served Obama well and faithfully, tis true..
But Hillary!!???
She phoned in as SecState having failure after failure after failure..
She embroiled and embarrassed Obama in mess after mess after mess...
The ONLY reason that Obama backed Hillary is because his base demanded it..
It was her turn, after all...
Crowded Primaries Could Dash Dems' California Dreams
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2018/06/04/crowded_primaries_could_dash_dems_california_dreams_137181.html
What a hoot!!! :D
California Democrats are going to GUARANTEE that the GOP keeps the House.. :D
"No, you know what!? It IS funny!! It's a hoot that you don't get this!"
-Tony Stark, AVENGERS AGE OF ULTRON
:D
"MS-13?? They're Not So Bad..."
-Democrat Party
https://youtu.be/luIcsZJpUwE
Yep.. Blue Tsunami is turning Red....
WALSH: The Vindictive Gay Couple In The Masterpiece Cakeshop Case Richly Deserved To Lose
But even if the Court basically punted on the broader questions, it is still good to pause and appreciate the fact that the innocent victim won in this case and the vindictive bullies lost. The Colorado Civil Rights Commission clearly bullied Phillips and sought to punish him for his religious views, even at one point comparing his cake refusal to the Holocaust. They have now been thoroughly humiliated, and I imagine they will face considerable backlash from their fellow liberals for squandering a golden opportunity. This is all worth celebrating.
And we should also rejoice that the other bullies — the gay couple, David Mullins and Charlie Craig — failed to achieve the victory and admiration they were chasing. While the Supreme Court focused its rebukes on the Civil Rights Commission, I think a hearty rebuke is owed to these two men, who targeted Jack Phillips and sought to ruin his life and his business for no good reason.
Remember that Jack Phillips was well known for his devout Christian beliefs before that fateful day when Mullins and Craig walked in the door. Phillips would regularly refuse to create customized cakes for events he found morally problematic. Yet, of all the bakers in the area, these two gay men just so happened to seek the services of the one baker who was so orthodox that he wouldn't even make Halloween cakes. It does not take much of a logical leap to see that this was quite intentional.
It is said that Phillips "refused to serve" Mullins and Craig. That's not true. He offered to sell them any item in the store. He would have even sold them a wedding cake. The only thing he would not do — could not do – was customize one. So, the gay men could have simply purchased a standard wedding cake. Or they could have left the store and gone to literally any other bakery in the state. Decent human beings would select either of those two options. But Mullins and Craig are not decent human begins. They opted for option three: set out on a years-long process to utterly destroy Jack Phillips, take down his business, and impoverish his family.
They failed. Praise God they failed. They richly deserve this failure and the public humiliation that accompanies it. But there are more bullies waiting in the wings to try and successfully accomplish what Mullins and Craig failed to do. We must remain vigilant. The First Amendment lives another day, but its long-term prospects remain in doubt.
https://www.dailywire.com/news/31408/walsh-gay-couple-masterpiece-cakeshop-case-matt-walsh?utm_medium=referral&utm_source=idealmedia&utm_campaign=dailywire.com&utm_term=68758&utm_content=2246441
Any day that the bullies lose and the good guys win??
It's a good day indeed...
So.....
Since the hysterical NeverTrumpers believe that it is perfectly acceptable for Obama's FBI to plant spies in the Trump campaign.......
https://amgreatness.com/2018/06/04/the-scandal-on-the-other-foot/
Ya'all won't have a problem with Trump's FBI to plant spies in the Sanders or Biden or Joe Blow campaigns in 2024...
Right???
This is exactly why it's so easy to shoot down the hysteria of the NeverTrumpers...
Their ENTIRE argument is solely based on a partisan agenda...
All you have to do is layout that exact same agenda in a logical and rational manner that completely exposes that agenda and they are left floundering and sputtering, "Well...er.. uh... That's different!!!"
You simply hoist them on their own Picard and watch them melt away.. :D
Trump is not flaming out, jobs and the economy are thrumming, and their Sanders-style socialism is not winning new fans.
In 2016, congressional Democrats were given a gift: the election of Donald Trump. Trump’s approval ratings had never crossed 51 percent; they’d consistently hovered in the low 40s. His personal popularity had always been low, and he had an obvious penchant for jumping on political land mines with both feet. All Democrats had to do was sound reasonable, and they’d probably take back the House of Representatives in sweeping fashion.
Oh well.
Democrats had a massive opportunity when Trump was elected. As an ideological nonconformist and a reactionary personality, Trump seems particularly susceptible to praise and flattery. Imagine if Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) had strolled into the Oval Office during the first week of Trump’s presidency, sidled up to Trump, and told him that they’d love to impose indelible change on America by granting everyone comprehensive health care. There’s a decent shot that with the help of then–White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, Trump would have gone full Bernie Sanders. That isn’t complete speculation — in September 2017, Trump went over the heads of congressional Republicans in favor of working with Schumer and Pelosi to avoid a government shutdown.
Even the high hopes surrounding porn star Stormy Daniels have gone flaccid.
But instead of playing nice with Trump, while stoking the flames of anti-Trump ire with their base, Democrats promised a deus ex machina: Trump would flame out, retire, be impeached, be prosecuted by Robert Mueller for Russian collusion, and all the rest. Trump wasn’t merely a bad guy — he was the worst guy, a buffoonish Hitler clad in the armor of cruel conservatism.
But there’s a problem: Trump hasn’t flamed out. Mueller so far hasn’t come up with credible evidence of Russian collusion, and even the high hopes surrounding porn star Stormy Daniels have gone flaccid. Trump himself seems alternatively irked by his office and trollishly empowered by it, but never willing to walk away. That’s dispiriting to the Democratic base, which spends each morning fuming over the latest Trumpian twitterstorm, thrilling to the extremist musings of kooks such as Maxine Waters (D., Calif.).
All of which means that Democrats have been forced to turn to the second prong of their 2018 attack: policy.
But on policy, the Democratic record looks even worse. Trump’s rhetoric continues to fuel feelings of unmoored chaos, but the markets continue to soar, the job market grows, and we’re not in the middle of any serious foreign-policy crisis. In 2016, CNN Money warned, “A Trump win would sink stocks.” Nope. Pelosi warned that Trump’s tax cuts were mere “crumbs” that would amount to nothing. Nope. Hollywood celebrities warned about the significant possibility of global thermonuclear war. Nope. Democrats promised a dystopian hellscape. Instead, they got an economy so good that the New York Times ran a piece headlined “We Ran Out of Words to Describe How Good the Jobs Numbers Are.”
https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/06/democrats-might-ruin-their-midterm-chances-jobs-economy-strong/
Time ta face reality, NeverTrumpers...
President Trump is kicking the NeverTrumpers' ass six ways from sunday....
Trump is not flaming out, jobs and the economy are thrumming, and their Sanders-style socialism is not winning new fans.
In 2016, congressional Democrats were given a gift: the election of Donald Trump. Trump’s approval ratings had never crossed 51 percent; they’d consistently hovered in the low 40s. His personal popularity had always been low, and he had an obvious penchant for jumping on political land mines with both feet. All Democrats had to do was sound reasonable, and they’d probably take back the House of Representatives in sweeping fashion.
Oh well.
Democrats had a massive opportunity when Trump was elected. As an ideological nonconformist and a reactionary personality, Trump seems particularly susceptible to praise and flattery. Imagine if Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D., N.Y.) and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D., Calif.) had strolled into the Oval Office during the first week of Trump’s presidency, sidled up to Trump, and told him that they’d love to impose indelible change on America by granting everyone comprehensive health care. There’s a decent shot that with the help of then–White House chief strategist Steve Bannon, Trump would have gone full Bernie Sanders. That isn’t complete speculation — in September 2017, Trump went over the heads of congressional Republicans in favor of working with Schumer and Pelosi to avoid a government shutdown.
Even the high hopes surrounding porn star Stormy Daniels have gone flaccid.
But instead of playing nice with Trump, while stoking the flames of anti-Trump ire with their base, Democrats promised a deus ex machina: Trump would flame out, retire, be impeached, be prosecuted by Robert Mueller for Russian collusion, and all the rest. Trump wasn’t merely a bad guy — he was the worst guy, a buffoonish Hitler clad in the armor of cruel conservatism.
But there’s a problem: Trump hasn’t flamed out. Mueller so far hasn’t come up with credible evidence of Russian collusion, and even the high hopes surrounding porn star Stormy Daniels have gone flaccid. Trump himself seems alternatively irked by his office and trollishly empowered by it, but never willing to walk away. That’s dispiriting to the Democratic base, which spends each morning fuming over the latest Trumpian twitterstorm, thrilling to the extremist musings of kooks such as Maxine Waters (D., Calif.).
All of which means that Democrats have been forced to turn to the second prong of their 2018 attack: policy.
But on policy, the Democratic record looks even worse. Trump’s rhetoric continues to fuel feelings of unmoored chaos, but the markets continue to soar, the job market grows, and we’re not in the middle of any serious foreign-policy crisis. In 2016, CNN Money warned, “A Trump win would sink stocks.” Nope. Pelosi warned that Trump’s tax cuts were mere “crumbs” that would amount to nothing. Nope. Hollywood celebrities warned about the significant possibility of global thermonuclear war. Nope. Democrats promised a dystopian hellscape. Instead, they got an economy so good that the New York Times ran a piece headlined “We Ran Out of Words to Describe How Good the Jobs Numbers Are.”
https://tinyurl.com/yd93w8vj
Time ta face reality, NeverTrumpers...
President Trump is kicking the NeverTrumpers' ass six ways from sunday....
Kick [102]
Your literacy level is evidently on a par with that of your economic literacy.
Only morons write "from whence".
A major study finding that voter ID laws hurt minorities isn’t standing up well under scrutiny
A follow-up study suggests voter ID laws may not have a big effect on elections.
It was supposed to be the study that proved voter ID laws are not just discriminatory but can also have a big impact on elections. And it was picked up widely, with outlets including ThinkProgress and the Washington Post reporting that the study found voter ID laws hurt Hispanic voters in particular and skewed elections to the right.
But a follow-up study suggests the findings in the original were bunk. According to researchers at Stanford, Yale, and the University of Pennsylvania, the original study was based on surveys of voters that are extremely unreliable — skewing the results. On top of that, several calculation errors led to even more problems. When the errors are corrected, the follow-up researchers found, there’s no evidence in the analyzed data that voter ID laws have a statistically significant impact on voter turnout.
In other words, it’s possible that voter ID laws still have an impact on elections, but the original study just doesn’t have the data to prove it.
https://www.vox.com/identities/2017/3/15/14909764/study-voter-id-racism
And another Left Winger bullshit fantasy myth debunked...
:D
OK OK, I have to concede it..
President Trump was WRONG!!!!
TECH STOCKS SMASH RECORDS
https://www.yahoo.com/news/asia-stocks-dip-rally-focus-back-fundamentals-003909123--finance.html
I am NOT getting tired of winning!! :D
Where is all the economic Armageddon that the hysterical NeverTrumpers promised us???
Michale
Presidents get credit for a good economy and blame for a bad economy, and truth be known, they don't generally have a damn thing to do with either one.
Stucki
109
Your literacy level is evidently on a par with that of your economic literacy.
Said the moron who repeatedly insists there are no "price gouging" laws. *LOL*
Only morons write "from whence".
Welcome to the moron club, Stucki... you just wrote it.
Actually, that phrase is found in multiple texts from the time period I was speaking about. It's probably too difficult a concept for you, but it's called "using the vernacular" and can be found in texts from that time period and beyond... which texts include the King James version of the Holy Bible and works by Shakespeare, Dickens, Dryden, etc. I was referring to Mother England/Britain and simply chose to speak the vernacular of the day when doing so, but surely no one here would expect your ilk to comprehend such a concept such as word usage.
If you'd prefer to discuss grammar and spelling issues versus actual political ones, I will be happy to grade your comments for literacy and misspellings and encourage all the commenters on the blog to follow your lead... NOT. :)
Kick
Welcome once more to the moron club - you just wrote it for the second time, *LOL* (That's "Light on Literacy" in your case, right?)
You mis-quote me (again), I never said even once, much less "repeatedly", that "there are no pricegouging laws". *LOL*. I actually said "There is no law against pricegouging." *LOL* If you're too dense to differentiate between singular and plural case, I cannot help. *LOL*
So if indeed the "vernacular of the day" justifies illiterate usage, you're definitely 'vernacular' *LOL*
Presidents get credit for a good economy and blame for a bad economy, and truth be known, they don't generally have a damn thing to do with either one.
Yep...
The problem is that conventional and oh so accurate piece of wisdom, wisdom fully and completely acknowledged Pre-2016 has utterly and completely gone out the window due to HHPTDS...
In the here and now, President Trump gets *ALL* of the blame and *NONE* of the credit..
It's a classic symptom of HHPTDS...
C. R. Stucki
114
Welcome once more to the moron club - you just wrote it for the second time, *LOL*
Wrong again, new member; I've written it way more times than two. What kind of moron would presume or fabricate about how many times I've written something? I guess that makes you a member of the moron and the bullshitter clubs, right? How will you divide your time? <--- rhetorical question, no one cares
You mis-quote me (again), I never said even once, much less "repeatedly", that "there are no pricegouging laws". *LOL*. I actually said "There is no law against pricegouging." *LOL* If you're too dense to differentiate between singular and plural case, I cannot help.
So you're still insisting "law" is a singular noun? *LOL* I guess that also makes you a member of the dense club too, right?
There is law against price gouging; it exists in many states and in multiple forms. This has all been covered, of course, and you sound just as stupid to everyone else as you did when we spoke about it then.
Who said it best?
Your ignorance is legendary on this blog. As I've stated many times, old man, you really should stop digging. :)
Kick (aka *LOL*, for Light on Literacy) blathers ever on, but nobody gets too worked up over it, we just consider " whence it came! (She's too dumb to know the 'from' is included within the 'whence', just as 'to' is included within 'whither'.
She thinks Shakespeare would have written, 'Whither goest thou to?'
C. R. Stucki
117
Kick (aka *LOL*, for Light on Literacy) blathers ever on, but nobody gets too worked up over it, we just consider " whence it came!
Wrong again, Stucki. There's this old man with the initials of "Can't Remember Shit" who trolls this political blog whining about grammar lames and making up lies about other commenters. He gets plenty worked up about grammar, but he only grades the comments of those who disagree with his smug bullshit.
(She's too dumb to know the 'from' is included within the 'whence', just as 'to' is included within 'whither'.
Wrong again, old man, and getting yourself all worked about grammar enough to make shit up about people you know nothing about says more about you than it does about anyone else on this blog.
She thinks Shakespeare would have written, 'Whither goest thou to?'
Wrong again, old man. Is there anything else regarding grammar that you got yourself so worked up about that you felt you needed to continue digging and inventing more of your bullshit about the commenters on this blog? You could even thrown some politics into your rants too and become relevant. :)
Kick
Re "You could even 'thrown' (typo?) some politics into your rants too and become relevant." No, actually, that's the OPPOSITE of "relevant"!
Sorry, I don't do politics, nor religion. There's no point, because there's no right nor wrong, so nothing ever gets resolved.
I happily argue economics, but the problem there is, Dems/Libs aren't smart enough to differentiate between economics and politics, so they perpetually infuse their economics with liberal (small 'l') doses of their Liberal (big L) politics, which serves to make their economics irrelevant. Just more of that same old *LOL* (Low on Literacy) thing.
C. R. Stucki
119
Sorry, I don't do politics, nor religion. There's no point, because there's no right nor wrong, so nothing ever gets resolved.
Nothing ever gets resolved either when trolls who don't "do politics" hang out on a political blog making up lies about other posters and whining about grammar and spelling while assigning feelings and actions to people they know nothing about.
I happily argue economics, but the problem there is, Dems/Libs aren't smart enough to differentiate between economics and politics, so they perpetually infuse their economics with liberal (small 'l') doses of their Liberal (big L) politics, which serves to make their economics irrelevant. Just more of that same old *LOL* (Low on Literacy) thing.
While I realize that's what you believe you do, what you actually do is hang out on the political board and repeat the same bullshit regarding economics over and over ad nauseam in a smug and erudite fashion. When you are challenged on your bullshit, you resort to calling commenters stupid, making up lies about people you don't know, and whining about typographical errors and grammar.
So we've "resolved" you don't "do politics" and that you believe yourself to be an economics genius while you're essentially nothing but a smug and erudite troll who's basically here to insult people and get your jollies inventing lies about other commenters. :)
It's academic if Trump is above the law as president, he can't be president forever. Trump has less chance of being re-elected as he does being appointed the next Ayatollah. No one here doubts that were someone like Biden to run in 2020, Trump would be thrashed in a general election. Trump's only hope to remain a free man is to be followed by someone willing to pardon or commute him for all his illegal money laundering activities prior to his presidency. We all know this is what Mueller and his team are looking into, why else throw Cohen to the NYS district court, of not to isolate him from Federal interference.
LL&P
Lie, Lobby and Purger.