Weekend Open Thread – Junior Varsity Writing Edition
[guest post by JVW]
You understand that this is going to be nowhere near as interesting or comprehensive as what the vacationing Dana produces each weekend right? With that noted, here we go:
ITEM UNO: Student Stands Up to Hectoring Professor
The internet was abuzz last night with the circulation of a video showing a Cypress Community College student named Braden Ellis defending the police and pushing back on the ahistorical idea that policing in general is an outgrowth of the Fugitive Slave Laws:
WATCH: A student at Cypress College in California was berated by his professor for arguing that police are heroes and belong on children's shows. pic.twitter.com/FSu4J2YxwK
— Chrissy Clark (@chrissyclark_) April 29, 2021
Note the absolute unwillingness of the professor to allow the student to make his point without interruption, her obnoxious attempt to distort his argument, and finally her abrupt ending of the session rather than engaging in honest debate with Mr. Ellis. It’s a sad state of affairs when the student argues with more logic and composure than the professor can muster. Another second-rate mind and third-rate temperament sadly misplaced in education. No doubt she will soon claim that she is receiving death threats in order to reposition herself as the victim in this argument.
ITEM DEUX: Did the CDC’s Decision to Halt the J&J Vaccine Spur Vax-Skepticism?
Just when it seemed that our nation’s efforts to vaccinate everyone in time for the summer was humming along, reports come now that the the numbers of people seeking their first shot is slowing considerably. Whether this is the case of all of the willing participants having had the opportunity already receive their first dose, leaving only the vax-skeptics left, or whether the reluctance of some to get the shot is the result of the CDC’s overwrought decision to halt distribution of the Johnson & Johnson single-dose vaccine based upon reports of adverse reactions that turned out to largely be temporary and non-threatening and a death rate of less than one in one million, it seems there is a good chance that media sensationalism combined with our society’s penchant for hysteria is in some way contributing to the slow down.
ITEM TRE: The New York Post Beclowns Itself with Fake News
Last week the New York Post breathlessly reported that immigrant children being processed and sheltered at the Long Beach Convention Center were being given a copy (with the assumption that it was taxpayer-purchased) of the insipid children’s book that Vice President Kamala Harris “wrote” two years ago when she was merely an obnoxious and insufferable Senator. It turns out that this was pretty much incorrect: only one child was known to have been given a copy of the book and that copy had been donated by a private citizen. The reporter for the original story subsequently resigned and alleged that she had been pushed by her editors into sensationalizing the rather mundane events. The Post then updated their original story with an editor’s note acknowledging the corrections, which seems to pretty much be standard for media malpractice these days. If we are going to rightly criticize those outlets who write gross anti-conservative screeds which are later debunked, we need to take a metaphorical thwack at our fellow travelers to distort the truth to make progressives look bad.
ITEM VIER: Three Prominent Politicians Declare America Is Not a Racist Country; Guess Which One Is Criticized
As a follow-up to Patterico’s earlier post about GOP Senator Tim Scott’s declaration that “America is not a racist country” in his rebuttal to President Biden’s State of the Union Address, it’s worth noting that two other political leaders have agreed with him:
Kamala Harris, responding on ABC this AM to Tim Scott’s comments about America not being a racist country, says: “I don’t think America is a racist country but we also do have to speak truth about the history of racism in our country and its existence today.”
— Manu Raju (@mkraju) April 29, 2021
You know who else sort of agrees with Sen. Scott and V.P. Harris? The President:
In an interview with NBC’s “Today” show, a clip of which aired Thursday evening on NBC Nightly News, Biden was asked to respond to Scott’s remarks and say whether he felt was America was racist.
“No, I don’t think the American people are racist, but I think after 400 years, African-Americans have been left in a position where they are so far behind the eight-ball in terms of education, health, in terms of opportunity,” Biden said.
So President Biden very shrewdly (and this is probably the last time I will ever use that two adverbs in relation to that man) turned the question from “Is America a racist country?” to “Are the American people inherently racist?” in order to be able to grant absolution to the sort of people whose support for (or at least quiet acquiescence to) a massive and incomprehensible agenda his Administration and party will need. But the absolution provided by our top two executives is not really all that important in the long run: the rabid social justice crybully left managed to get in their full 24-hours of spittle-flecked rage at the black man who dared to contradict the established narrative, and that’s what truly matters.
ITEM ÖT: Former Obama Advisor Warns Dems That the Real Job Doesn’t Begin Until After the Legislation Passes
Former Obama Administration economic advisor Steven Rattner warned Democrats that passing legislation doesn’t particularly guarantee that people’s lives will be better, which is an amazing thing to have to tell anyone, but here we find ourselves. National Review Online has the details:
“Sure, I worry about inflation,” Rattner said in an interview on MSNBC’s Morning Joe. “Sure, I worry about the deficit and the debt. But I also worry about the execution job here. This is a massive execution job. The last plan, the jobs plan alone, had 76 separate initiatives in it. All have to be created and executed. . . . The potential for mistakes, failure of execution here is high.
“And if it fails . . . I think it will set back the cause of progressivism for several more decades,” he added. “Getting it executed, I think, in some ways, is going to be the president’s biggest challenge. He’s got to deliver, not just passage, but actual real results for Americans, and programs that people perceive are working or else we go back to government being the enemy again.”
Mr. Rattner obviously remembers the general failure of the Obama stimulus plan, in which advocates resorted to creating the phony-baloney metric of “jobs saved” in order to manufacture some good news, and stooped to delivering banal unsourced anecdotes to lamely protest they had accomplished something other than protecting public sector jobs, before being forced to ultimately admit that “shovel-ready” projects don’t really exist.
So here goes the Biden Administration setting themselves up to make the same mistakes. Democrats never seem to learn from their experience with large government boondoggles from Obamacare to California’s High-Speed Rail Authority (have I written about that in the past?) that merely passing the legislation doesn’t solve the problem at all, it’s only the first step in a long a complicated process requiring hard work which is often in short supply as bureaucracies become more powerful and complex. But just as with the American Recovery Act or the Affordable Care Act, expect to see the Democrats get some measure of what they are demanding legislatively, immediately pop the champagne corks, and set out on a public relations campaign (aided and abetted by their media fans, naturally) insisting that the problems are now being solved. Seriously, who among us trusts Joe Biden or Kamala Harris to have the concentration and enthusiasm for seeing their proposed projects to an efficient and responsible completion?
ITEM ZES: Basecamp Asks Its Workers to Separate Their Personal Lives from Work; Feelings Are Hurt
The web software and project management company Basecamp earlier this week decided that people’s personal lives and work lives were far too intertwined, and in a rather remarkable blog post the company’s leadership announced some remarkable changes. Basecamp now prohibits political discussions over company work communication channels; has rolled back “paternalistic” employee benefits such as memberships to health clubs and organic farmers’ markets, instead opting to give their employees their share of what the company had previously paid to offer those amenities; and is abandoning the trendy work policy of “360 reviews” in which one’s peers and even subordinates participate in an employee’s work evaluation, returning to the traditional method of reviews being solely conducted by the employee’s managers.
The unmistakable message is that Basecamp is undoing the two-plus decade-long corporate trend of mixing of one’s work life with their personal life, and returning to the old-fashioned model where there is a clear delineation between the corporate worker and the private person. The steps Basecamp is taking are similar to the ones that crypto currency firm Coinbase announced for their own workforce this past fall. While the social justice left is unsurprisingly flipping out over these steps — one-third of the Basecamp workforce is allegedly going to take a buyout and leave — this move appears to have struck a chord with business observers who appear to be at least initially supportive of Basecamp’s new directive.
I’m sorry that I am not ending this round-up with a humorous or even moving news item like Dana usually does, but I’m not finding much in my Twitter feed or on the regular news sites that goes beyond the typical outrage game. Have good weekend everybody.
– JVW
WHAT HAVE YOU DONE WITH DANA??
Dave (1bb933) — 4/30/2021 @ 5:26 pmClassic example of the rage-manufacturing that goes on constantly on both sides.
A few unknown nutcases, eager for attention, say something outrageous. The self-righteous partisans on the other side then try to use it to demonize a much broader swath of their political opponents.
Note, I draw a bright line between some random doofus on Twitter (or on the Instapundit/HotAir comment sections) being an @sshat, and people in positions of authority (e.g. President-Reject Trump or Maxine Waters).
Jonah had a great article on this a few days ago:
Outrage Overload
Read the whole thing, he has a lot of sensible things to say about policing, and Tucker Carlson’s dishonest attacks on Tim Scott.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/30/2021 @ 5:59 pmRattner might want to explain why Musk’s SpaceX was given Obama ‘stimulus’ funds to refurbish the infrastructure– that is, modernize the facilites at Launch Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station back in the day.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 4/30/2021 @ 6:05 pmUgh, that teacher in the video. So obnoxious. Not good pedagogy. That’s not teaching, it’s grandstanding.
nate_w (1f1d55) — 4/30/2021 @ 6:20 pmÖT. Had forgotten you were of the Magyar persuasion, JVW. So is Dana sailing on the Patterico corporate yacht?
nk (1d9030) — 4/30/2021 @ 6:42 pmHope Dana ponied up for the appropriate bonnet and gallops down to Louisville for her own ‘run for the roses’ tomorrow. Beats mowing the lawn.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 4/30/2021 @ 7:39 pmRe: NYP Story
It’s about as accurate as this Fox News story:
Kudlow: Biden’s Green New Deal means no meat for the 4th of July, have grilled Brussels sprouts instead
Rip Murdock (3e0537) — 4/30/2021 @ 7:57 pmYou know, these guys are way behind the eight-ball (to coin a phrase). I predicted, on this very site, months ago, that Kamala would ban the consumption of beef, but that Roberts, Alito, Thomas, Kavanaugh, and Barrett (and possibly Gorsuch) would roll back the ban to only on Fridays.
nk (1d9030) — 4/30/2021 @ 8:08 pmRattner might want to explain why Musk’s SpaceX was given Obama ‘stimulus’ funds to refurbish the infrastructure– that is, modernize the facilites at Launch Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station back in the day.
Because SpaceX has leased the complex since 2007 and a SpaceX launch in 2016 nearly destroyed it?
Rip Murdock (3e0537) — 4/30/2021 @ 8:13 pmRe 5:
Grreeaat…Been watching the NFL Draft being done in Cleveland this year…lots of Magyar descended folk in the stands and behind the scenes.
urbanleftbehind (36b5df) — 4/30/2021 @ 8:39 pmat least we finally have a president who takes the virus seriously
https://www.npr.org/sections/coronavirus-live-updates/2021/04/30/992511531/u-s-will-impose-new-ban-on-travel-from-india-as-coronavirus-rages
several weeks after the mutant strain was known, ban to go into effect immediately… meaning tuesday
JF (e1156d) — 4/30/2021 @ 8:53 pmBasecamp also lost a third of its employees this week, they only had 56. The CEO said if you don’t like the new plan, we’ll pay you 3-6 months salary and benefits to leave…and a third are taking it. And that’s just this week.
Basecamp’s namesake app is pretty bad, but they also created Ruby on Rails which was a pretty great platform a decade ago. They’re new app Hey, which is another take on replacing email…with email…is also pretty terrible.
As a company, they’re a nice hobby.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (1367c0) — 4/30/2021 @ 9:24 pm9. Far be him to seek capitalization from the private sector in 2007. 😉
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 4/30/2021 @ 9:28 pmWhat a tragic commentary on the state of our country that we ever chose this shrunken husk of a man to lead us.
lurker (59504c) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:46 amWhat do you mean “we”, white man?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 3:21 amI noticed she still hasn’t named names.
BillPasadena (5b0401) — 5/1/2021 @ 7:14 am@16 you know the names behind “find the fraud”, russian bounties, hunter’s fake laptop, and the capitol cop murder?
JF (e1156d) — 5/1/2021 @ 7:59 amTen years ago this weekend:
‘I’d Never Been Involved in Anything as Secret as This’
On the morning of May 1, 2011, most Americans had never heard of Abbottabad. By that night, the dusty midsize city near the mountains of northwest Pakistan was the center of the biggest story in the world. A team of U.S. Navy SEALs had just descended by helicopter on a high-walled mansion there in the dark of night, located the globe’s most hunted man and killed him.
The effort to track and execute Osama bin Laden, which took place 10 years ago this weekend, was the most closely held operational secret in modern American history—a highly sensitive, politically fraught and physically risky mission that involved breaching the sovereign territory of a purported U.S. ally to target an icon of international violence and terror.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:22 am………
The full story of how, and why, America’s top security officials decided to pull the trigger that night in May has never been told. This oral history—the story inside the West Wing and U.S. intelligence agencies as Neptune’s Spear coalesced over the fall of 2010 and spring of 2011—is based on extensive original interviews with nearly 30 key intelligence and national security leaders, White House staff, and presidential aides—including some who have never spoken publicly before……..
………
While I don’t believe that America is a racist country now, it certainly was a racist country when I was born. The change has been immense from my standpoint; possibly not as immense from the standpoint of black Americans.
And we are certainly not done. We will not be done until 1) black and poor are not synonymous, and 2) black folks can expect reasonable treatment at the hands of authority.
You cannot hold a people as slaves for 200+ years, then oppress them mercilessly for another hundred or so, then take the boot off their necks and think everything is equal when they’ve been robbed of opportunity (“the pursuit of happiness”) for all that time. How to correct that is difficult, as the people who deserved to be punished for it are long gone and the people who would be surrendering opportunity are those who wanted the boot to lift.
I expect there will be reparations some day, and in a truly American manner the cost will be born by generations as yet unborn.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:40 amRattner might want to explain why Musk’s SpaceX was given Obama ‘stimulus’ funds to refurbish the infrastructure– that is, modernize the facilites at Launch Complex 40 at the Cape Canaveral Air Force Station back in the day.
Musk did a lot better than Solyndra? The launch facilities needed modernization (read: they were rusted wrecks) and it WAS government property? If everything Obama’s people gave money to had dome as well as SpaceX he’d still be president.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:46 amWhen Trump talked about “draining the swamp”, I laughed because he had surrounded himself with swamp creatures like Manafort and Stone. (And because Trump lives much of every year in a swamp.)
So I started wondering which swamp creature Trump was — and decided that bullfrog fit him best. Bullfrogs are loud and repetitive, dangerous to tiny animals, but lunch for a fox like Putin, and a snack for a lion like “Emperor” Xi.
But I would be interested in hearing your opinions on this question.
(Yes, I know; we usually drain swamps not to get rid of alligators, but to eliminate the mosquitoes that carry malaria and other nasty diseases — but that isn’t how the “swamp” metaphor is generally used in the United States.)
Jim Miller (edcec1) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:42 amFlorida lawmakers exempt Disney from law to punish online platforms that suspend conservatives
Florida lawmakers Thursday night passed a plan to crack down on large social-media companies that block users from their platforms, giving a victory to Gov. Ron DeSantis on one of his top legislative priorities.
…….
The bill, in part, would bar social-media companies from removing political candidates from the companies’ platforms. Companies that violate the prohibition could face fines of $250,000 a day for statewide candidates and $25,000 a day for other candidates.
Also, a key part of the bill would require social-media companies to publish standards about issues such as blocking users and apply the standards consistently.
……..
……..[T]he (Florida) Senate added an amendment that would exempt theme park operators from a definition of social-media platforms.
That exemption said the definition “does not include any information service, system, internet search engine, or access software provider operated by a company that owns and operates” a theme park or other large entertainment complex.
House sponsor Blaise Ingoglia, R-Spring Hill, said the exemption was added because of concerns that the Disney Plus streaming service could be affected by the bill. He said the exemption was aimed at making sure Disney Plus “isn’t caught up in this.”
But Rep. Anna Eskamani, D-Orlando, questioned adding the exemption for one company, saying it “feeds into the fact that this bill really is political in nature.”
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:48 am………
If this is one of your Governor’s “top legislative priorities” then those priorities are pretty warped, especially when this bill is really just grandstanding and unconstitutional.
If this is one of your Governor’s “top legislative priorities” then those priorities are pretty warped, especially when this bill is really just grandstanding and unconstitutional.
How is it unconstitutional? States have the power to regulate state elections. If they can limit how much I can give to a candidate, then they can require that all candidates have equal access to media (something that the FCC required for years and years).
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:55 amI cannot speak to when you were born, but I cannot disagree more strenuously as to your solutions. We have had reparations for my entire life in the form of affirmative action and other government programs. It has done nothing but entrench divisions and promote government as the solution to problems they have created. The way to stop discriminating based on race is to stop discriminating based on race. Stop treating people differently. Get the government out of the way. Government is the problem. Period.
As for your guilt of our forefather’s, that’s a bunch of SJW nonsense. It shows even the right has bought into the innate racism spewed from the left and the media for decades. I reject your premise outright.
NJRob (eb56c3) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:58 amI should also point out that Justice Thomas, at least, has expressed deep concern for first amendment rights when speech (and press, (virtual) assembly and petitioning for redress) can be censored by concentrated private power.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:58 amI cannot speak to when you were born
1954. If you don’t think this was a racist country then, there is no use talking to you.
As for your guilt of our forefather’s, that’s a bunch of SJW nonsense. It shows even the right has bought into the innate racism spewed from the left and the media for decades. I reject your premise outright.
It’s not guilt. One feels guilt about one’s own actions. Embarrassment would be a better term, regarding actions by those associated with me. Kind of like being embarrassed that the GOP chose Trump and stands behind him yet.
Do you believe that, after 300+ years of various legal structures have held a people in poverty or worse, while everyone else profited, it is sufficient that the crimes against humanity cease for the wrong to be undone? Or do you think, as some once claimed, that slavery and/or segregation were a positive good?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:05 amHad forgotten you were of the Magyar persuasion, JVW.
I’m actually English, Irish, German, and perhaps a bit Danish and/or Scandinavian (thanks Ancestry.com), but in my fondest dreams I’m also Mexican, Hungarian, Italian, Croatian, and Polish.
JVW (ee64e4) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:08 amIs to wish happy May Day to you and fellow kolkhozniks, comrades!
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:09 amIf this is one of your Governor’s “top legislative priorities” then those priorities are pretty warped, especially when this bill is really just grandstanding and unconstitutional.
As a Californian, this attitude from the political class is all too familiar.
JVW (ee64e4) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:10 am@. 20. You really don’t know what you’re talking about. Read. In the early 2000s era, Musk did not– and could not- get the private sector investment to finance constructing launch facilities for any of his fledgling Falcons [there’s no ROI for ‘private enterprise’ commercial spaceflight operations. Private sector investors would do better buying into oil wells.] LC40 was operational, located on Canaveral AF Station aside KSC on Merritt Island, and in use by the USAF for Titan launches into the middle of the decade until the Titans were retired [it was used and featured in the film, ‘Marooned’ as well.] Nor could Musk obtain government licensing at the time to launch rockets from U.S. soil. He was looking at everything from an island in the South Pacific to ship launchings outside the coastal limits. Without government financing and government contracting to service, SpaceX was dead. Hence, the U.S. government seeded it– with quite a lot of $$.
Musk’s whole “private enterprise” BS couldn’t get off the ground w/o the deep pockets of capital investment from government. He is heavily dependent on government investment— risking taxpayer $, not his own— and on government[s] purchase launch services. Hell, NASA insisted on a redesign of Dragon w/a crew escape system to avoid the inevitable ‘bad day.’ And he will have one- as has NASA; and when it occurs– he will let NASA take the blame.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:17 amShorter Deezy-eska:
Another glorious victory for Reaganomics!
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:23 amKevin,
I believe people of all races have a higher standard of living and success here than anywhere else in the world. I believe we have the most diverse population and highest success rate of integrating them. I believe pushing the division you have in your past 2 posts would destroy that and permanently balkanize society. Do you want that?
I wasn’t alive in 1954. I grew up in the ghetto in NYC. I know what hatred and government power does and how it can control societies. I grew up under Koch, Dinkins and Giuliani. I know the difference between those leaders and how they changed NYC. I know NYC is backsliding due to the same divisive actions you seem to be promoting in those last 2 posts.
NJRob (eb56c3) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:32 amWell said, Kevin, and also in your previous post.
The problem is clear, but the solution is anything but.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:44 amIt’s a good thing for DeSantis’s tonsils that Trump has such small … ahem “hands” (IYKWIMAITYD).
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:44 amHalf of Republicans incorrectly think there’s evidence Biden didn’t win legitimately
………
……… How many people actually believe that President Biden’s election wasn’t legitimate? New polling from CNN, conducted by SSRS, answers that question.
About 3 in 10 Americans think Biden didn’t legitimately win, despite the utter lack of evidence to bolster that claim. More alarmingly, 1 in 5 believe there’s actually solid evidence that Biden didn’t win, which there is not. And more alarming still, that position — that there’s this solid evidence the election was stolen — is held by half of Republicans.
……..
From the CNN/SSRS poll:
…………
For both parties, it’s hard to be bipartisan or a unified when your bases hold diametrically opposite views of the election’s legitimacy.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:49 amFalwell invites students to ‘real Liberty graduation’ at his home
Two weeks after Liberty University sued him and banned employees from talking to him, former Liberty president Jerry Falwell Jr. unexpectedly showed up at a student event Thursday night, hopped on stage and invited the students to a graduation party at his home that he billed as “the real Liberty graduation.”
“I just want to invite all the seniors to my farm on May 8. We’re going to have the real Liberty graduation,” Falwell told the students, standing on a small stage erected outside an off-campus student house, according to a video reviewed by POLITICO. “If you’re not a senior but you date one, you can come, too.”
……..
…….. Falwell showed up partway through the event with Becki at his side, the student said. He soon hopped up on stage, lamenting that his student daughter — who he said was in the audience — had told him, “Please don’t come.”
“We’d love to have you out there. Becki says there’s no way we can plan it that fast, but we can and we will,” Falwell said, encouraging students to spread the word on social media.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:56 am……..
Toga, toga, toga!
I also find it hard to believe that Joe Biden was elected President until I remind myself that he was running against Trump. If half of Republicans believe that that, in itself, is not enough, I really don’t find their opinion all that unreasonable.
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:57 amHow’s that for “balkanization”?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:57 amBecki has a very special “graduation present” for each and every senior, and Jerry can’t wait to watch them receive it!
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:06 amMore Than Eight in Ten Say Children Are Falling Behind Academically During the Pandemic
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Overwhelming majorities of Californians (86% adults; 83% public school parents) say children are falling behind academically during the pandemic……..
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Majorities of Californians (57% adults, 64% public school parents) approve of how Governor Newsom is handling the state’s public K–12 system. The governor’s K–12 approval rating was higher last April, early in the pandemic (73% adults, 78% public school parents), but it was similar in April 2019 (53% adults, 68% public school parents). Views of the governor’s handling of K–12 education break along party lines, with 79 percent of Democrats, 52 percent of independents, and 22 percent of Republicans approving. Approval of Governor Newsom’s handling of school reopenings (56% adults, 58% public school parents) is similar to his overall K–12 approval. Across partisan groups, 76 percent of Democrats, 54 percent of independents, and 24 percent of Republicans approve.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:06 am……..
Asked about the way their local school district has been handling school closures, 65 percent of adults and 72 percent of public school parents approve. However, far more public school parents (92%) approved in April 2020, at the beginning of the pandemic. Today, majorities across regions (74% Los Angeles, 68% Inland Empire, 66% San Francisco Bay Area, 60% Central Valley, 54% Orange/San Diego) approve of how their school district has been handling school closures, as do majorities across racial/ethnic and other demographic groups.
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Reading the Tea Leaves on the Governor’s Recall
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:14 am……….
………. [T]he level of discontent with the governor’s handling of schools and the economy today are in the range of overall disapproval of the governor (42% disapprove, 53% approve) and support for the recall (40% remove him, 56% keep him) in the March PPIC Survey. This is because partisans are deeply divided and highly consistent in their approval ratings and recall support. In addition, voter registration favors one party (46% Democrat, 24% Republican, 24% no party preference). Perceptions of the COVID crisis may also influence Californians’ views about state leaders—voters said it was the top issue for the governor and legislature to work on this year in the January PPIC survey. And today, Californians are feeling more confident that COVID is getting under control—expressing less worry than last year—according to the April PPIC survey.
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Kevin, I’m a little concerned that you are stripping away all agency from poor minorities…and thereby excusing all hosts of bad choices that exacerbate the cycle of poverty….from out-of-wedlock babies to missed education opportunities to gang banging and getting on the wrong side of the law with drugs, selling or using. Government tends to only introduce perverse incentives….one example is assistance programs that discouraging saving to qualify. Putting more and more money into inner city schools has not raised performance or expectations. The Left can’t seem to wrestle itself away from teacher’s unions. Government zoning laws make housing less affordable….which eats away at poor people’s income and further inhibits saving. Government licensing rules unnecessarily limit entry to occupations and entrepreneurship…like beautician, florists, and tree trimmers. Government criminal justice coupled with bad choices has left us with more and more fatherless teens without sufficient supervision or role models. Government trying to operate some sort of ham-handed reparations program would most likely once again just simply miss the boat. Yes, poor neighborhoods need more opportunities…..few disagree….but we can’t wish away the economics of the situation…or pretend that throwing more money into a burning house does what you think it will do…..
AJ_Liberty (ec7f74) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:16 amRIP Isamu Akasaki (92). Co-winner of the Nobel for Physics for developing blue light-emitting diodes, a breakthrough in the development of LEDs.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:19 amEgged on by MAGA fluffer Maria Bartiromo, Trump rails against “ungracious” Biden:
It’s hard to decide which is more ridiculous – the man who refused to concede a landslide election loss, congratulate his opponent, or attend the inauguration whining about “ungracious” treatment, or his insane claims about the vaccine.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:21 amhttps://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/hillary-clinton-trump-is-an-illegitimate-president/2019/09/26/29195d5a-e099-11e9-b199-f638bf2c340f_story.html
After 4 years of this nonstop garbage, is it any wonder that Republicans will return the favor. Keep on dividing people and see what happens.
NJRob (eb56c3) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:25 amNot making every contributor to the mosquito reproductive cycle a Vanderbilt, Astor, or Roosevelt at birth does not make a country racist.
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:25 amAnd it’s only for 6.7% of all mosquito species anyway.
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:29 amCaitlyn Jenner’s recall campaign goes silent in first week
………
The reality TV star and transgender activist hasn’t made a single TV appearance. She hasn’t held a press conference or social media event. No rollout of key Republican endorsements. She doesn’t have an issues page on her website, but offers ways to “donate” and buy “Caitlyn for California” merchandise.
“If she doesn’t come out and say something within the next several days, I think everyone moves on and says this is just some type of crank candidacy,” said veteran GOP consultant Rob Stutzman, who was a principal adviser to former Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger during his successful 2003 recall bid.
………
……… Jenner was nearly forgotten Tuesday when “National Lampoon” actor Randy Quaid said he was “seriously considering” his own run for governor. Quaid, a supporter of former President Donald Trump, was trending by the end of the day on Twitter.
……….
On social media, one of Jenner’s attempts to join California’s fray revealed how difficult it is for a political neophyte to tackle state issues. Over the weekend, she slammed what she called “Gavin’s DAs” as the source of crime problems, a charge that drew immediate pushback from Democrats and political insiders because district attorneys are elected locally, not appointed by the governor. (Newsom also did not endorse San Francisco DA Chesa Boudin, the reformist in question; Newsom instead backed opponent Suzy Loftus in 2019.)
………
If Jenner is going to follow Schwarzenegger’s path, she needs to take advantage of every opportunity to connect with average voters — and address issues that could resonate, (Jennifer Kerns, a former California Republican Party spokesperson and now a national radio talk show host with All-American Radio) said.
“You could talk to every small business owner and create coalitions of restaurant owners that were harmed by Gavin’s policies,” she said. On Fox News and other media, “she should be out there doing a lot of shows twice a week, talking about the issues, talking about the pain and suffering that Gavin Newsom has placed upon people.”
Besides fame, Jenner does start with personal wealth and has a vast social media audience — 3.5 million followers on Twitter and nearly 11 million on Instagram. She could leverage those accounts the same way Trump and other politicians have in recent years, though it’s unclear how many of those followers are California voters or potential donors.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:32 am………
“Since she’s announced, the other three Republicans (former San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, businessman John Cox and former House Rep. Doug Ose) have all apparently fallen off the face of the earth,” Stutzman said. “Obviously Gavin — predictably — is getting some uptick … and he’s had a pretty good two months in which he switched it up and gotten on the road,” more effectively using the governor’s office as a showcase to underscore those positive outcomes.
……….
re post # 19 – I concur with #24.
Also, how about black privilege? Where attorney Benjamin Crump can conjure up a false witness (“We pushed her”) to violate the civil rights of George Zimmerman by getting him wrongly arrested, wrongly charged and wrongly prosecuted – and Crump still has his bar license? See THE TRAYVON HOAX: Unmasking the Witness Fraud That Divided America
https://www.thetrayvonhoax.com/
Why didn’t AG Bill Barr bring a criminal civil rights case against Crump and the Florida prosecutors? Zimmerman (the ‘white hispanic’ the wrong race? Or black privilege?
And the LIE – spread by BLM concerning the shooting of Michael Brown (Ferguson, MO) -‘Hands Up! Don’t Shoot!’ – that never happened. More black privilege.
The 1619 project. More black privilege. Critical Race Theory. More black privilege. The Lebron James tweet showing a photo of and targeting the Columbus, OH police officer Nicholas Reardon who fatally shot knife wielding 16-year-old Ma’Khia Bryant who was preparing to stab another you black girl pinned up against a vehicle – “YOU’RE NEXT”. More black privilege. The black Capitol Police officer (who’s name we still do not know), was there little to no investigation of, who wrongly shot Ashli Babbitt at the Capitol on 1/6/21 – who will not be charged – when there is all the clamor from the far left/the Dem party/BLM/Antifa to defund the police/get rid of the police. Black privilege? VP Kamala Harris setting up a bail fund for BLM/Antifa rioters. More black privilege. Systemic racism? – which was not mentioned in the eight (8) years of the Obama/Biden administration; and what did Biden do about it during his 47 yrs in DC? or Harris, as the San Francisco DA, Cal Atty Gen’l and as a U.S. Senator? Not only did they not do anything, they then said not a peep about it – or worse, recall the crime bills they each sponsored? More LIES or more black privilege? Or Dem privilege?
What ever happened to Dr. Martin Luther King’s I HAVE A DREAM SPEECH (content of character over color of skin)? Answer: One Barack Obama – who was sold to us a the UNITER, no red states, no blue states. He set race relations back 50 years. Recall, “… If I had a son, he would look like Trayvon Martin.” Again, go watch the movie THE TRAYVON HOAX.
And nary a word about the out of wedlock births/absent parents in the black community, the embrace and promotion of a gangster thug culture in the black community (that spawns endless and escalatling black on black crime, shootings & killings – think Chiraq) and where 2 + 2 is selling out to white supremacy. More black privilege?
Liberty & Truth require constant vigilance. GLZ.
Gary L. Zerman (a1521c) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:33 amNJRob (eb56c3) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:25 am-
Yeah, Trump’s continual denunciation of the election (even before the campaign started) has nothing to do with it.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:35 amCaitlyn Jenner’s recall campaign goes silent in first week
Caitlyn Jenner would be very smart to lie low and run a Bidenesque campaign. Maybe it’s just because I have such contempt from him, but I am of the belief that the more Gavin Newsom is left out to dominate the media (like Trump in 2020), the more people are going to be reminded of what a weasel he truly is. If I were advising Caitlyn Jenner, I would keep the media appearances to a bare minimum.
JVW (ee64e4) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:01 pmNow do Birthers.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:09 pmShe never returned a VHS copy of ‘Sabrina the Teenage Witch,’ DA’s office said. 20 years later, she faced a felony.
For years, Caron McBride never understood why she was spontaneously fired from jobs or why she had trouble landing a new one. But when she tried to change her last name on her Texas driver’s license earlier this month, she finally found out why.
“When they ran my criminal background check, all they’re seeing is those two words: felony embezzlement,” McBride, 52, told KOKH, which first reported her story.
Her crime? Not returning a VHS copy of “Sabrina the Teenage Witch,” the ’90s sitcom starring Melissa Joan Hart, after renting it from a Norman, Okla., video store in 1999, according to court documents shared by KOKH.
……….
According to court documents, McBride rented “Sabrina the Teenage Witch” on Feb. 14, 1999, from a Movie Place, a now-shuttered video store in Norman, Okla. Prosecutors said she “willfully, unlawfully and feloniously embezzle[d]” the tape, which was worth $58.59, when she did not return the video after 10 days, per the rental agreement.
Confounded, McBride told KOKH she had no recollection of renting the video. But she said she thinks she may know who actually rented the tape.
“I had lived with a young man — this was over 20 years ago. He had two kids, daughters that were 8, 10 or 11 years old, and I’m thinking he went and got it and didn’t take it back or something,” she said.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:11 pm…….
Inspector Javert would be proud.
If I were advising Caitlyn Jenner, I would keep the media appearances to a bare minimum.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:15 pmCJ should keep media appearances to minimum for a different reason. There is no way CJ can win the Inland Empire, Central Valley, or extreme Northern California except by being a stealth candidate.
Keep your day job?
He’s running against (probably) a dozen or more Republicans, as well as Newsom…
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:17 pmHe’s running against (probably) a dozen or more Republicans, as well as Newsom…
The more people running, the more name recognition is going to be all-important. Maybe I would be pleasantly surprised, but I don’t imagine Caitlyn Jenner dazzling the public with really thoughtful policy proposals or a completely thought-through ideology. But as I wrote, perhaps I will be pleasantly surprised.
JVW (ee64e4) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:24 pmI did Dave. Hillary was the first birther. Didn’t you support her?
NJRob (92d62e) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:24 pmTrue story: some years ago, I was listening to some academics talking about vegetarianism, and one of them said “Some people say that eating meat makes them feel dirty.” I said “Some people say that about Brussels sprouts.” And a professor spit out his drink in laughter. And I thought “Oh wow, I can be funny!” I think I’ve been funny twice since then, so I’ll never forget those three incidents.
It’s a little like my basketball story: I once impressed some guys with my mad skill in shooting baskets (in a skirt), though I’m 5 feet tall, max. They thought I must have honed my skill with considerable practice. In fact, I hadn’t done it since high school — when I was awful at hand-eye coordination — except for one time on a shorter kids’ hoop when no one was watching and I was surprised at how much better I had gotten by not practicing at all. Then I didn’t practice at all for a few more years, and when I tried it with a real hoop I found it surprisingly easy to get the ball in the right place — as long as no one was trying to prevent me.
Then I made the mistake of telling some relatives, so when we were on an outing at a park and there was a basketball hoop, my nephew wanted to see my mad basketball skill. Alas, my skill wasn’t so mad then. So I think maybe my relatives don’t believe me. But they should. If I wanted to invent a story exaggerating my skill at something, it wouldn’t be about basketball because it would be too absurd for anyone to believe.
If I forget everything else I ever knew, I will never forget my basketball story.
Radegunda (ebfa91) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:25 pmfollow up to post #49 – more black privilege. See:
GLAD THEY CLEARED THAT UP – The Rochester, Minnesota, school board has declared “Black Lives Matter” to be “government speech.”
https://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2021/05/glad-they-cleared-that-up.php
#19 – Where you stated, “While I don’t believe that America is a racist country now …” – you are wrong. It is racist now – it has reverted to black racism. Proof: When you have the Marxist intimidating, bullying & rioting racist BLM movement praised and given MILLION$ – yet when someone says, ‘All lives matter’ they get assailed, castigated & cancelled. Further example:
Sign at George Floyd Square has list of Orders for white visitors. https://nypost.com/2021/04/22/sign-at-george-floyd-square-has-list-of-orders-for-white-visitors/
We have largely eradicated white racism in America. Proof: there are so few real instances of white racism, they have to make them up, or falsely attribute real incidents to white people when they were in fact committed by others. Examples (illustrative, not exhaustive): Jussie Smollett. Duke Lacrosse. Bubba Wallace – garage door noose. Tawana Brawley.
See also:
If America is so racist Why are there so many race hoaxes? https://townhall.com/columnists/dennisprager/2020/07/07/if-america-is-so-racist-why-are-there-so-many-race-hoaxes-n2571987
Why do we keep falling for hate crime hoaxes?
https://nypost.com/2019/10/03/why-we-keep-falling-for-hate-crime-hoaxes/
Why are whites being blamed for attacks on Asian carried out by minorities? https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/rick-moran/2021/02/25/why-are-whites-being-blamed-for-attacks-on-asians-carried-out-by-minorities-n1428326
There is such a DOUBLE STANDARD there no longer real are standards. Think Chicago (aka Chiraq). Run by Democrats for decades and the the last few by black democrats. Yet black on black crime, shootings & killings not only never end, they are escalating. And no one seems to care or even mmention it with seriousness. Moreover, this is where Barack Obama community organized with Reverends(?) Wright, Jackson & Phelgar and Minster Farrakhan – yet they are never held to account for not doing much to stop that endless carnage. And the same is true for most major American cities. Baltimore. Philadelphia. Newark. Detroit. St. Louis. Atlanta. Milwaukee. …
Liberty & Truth require constant vigilance. GLZ.
Gary L. Zerman (a1521c) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:39 pm@. 20. You really don’t know what you’re talking about.
So you believe that SpaceX was a bad investment for the US? Compared to, say, Chrysler or Solyndra?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:45 pmAs far as the election, while thsre were some strange things on election night (e.b. Pennsylvania kept finding more absentee ballots to count) they were of the type that Hanlon’s Razor assigns to incompetence or stupidity.
Then again, maybe in 20 years the truth comes out as AOC write her best-selling “Sure We Stole It, We Had To” memoirs in hopes of rekindling her fleeting fame.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:54 pmHanlon’s Razor assigns to incompetence
Kind of like my typing.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:55 pmReading the Tea Leaves on the Governor’s Recall
The LA Times is running daily articles on how QAnon is behind the recall. They’ve stopped accepting comments on some of their articles though.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:57 pmAnd yet you’re hoping this clueless, brain-addled Trump lackey wins the highest office in our state?
OK.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 12:59 pmThe “rigged election” narrative began with Trump’s narcissistic, preemptive refusal to accept that defeat could possibly be a legitimate outcome. When people noted before the election that his attitude was worrying, Trumpers all said it was ridiculous and paranoid to think he wouldn’t accept the results of the election, win or lose. As usual, when Trump showed us who he really is, Trumpers insisted that he’s really not that at all.
After the election, the Trumpers all decided that staying on the same page as Trump was the highest imperative. If he said he actually won by a landslide, he must be right, and his defenders had to search for evidence that he was right — and smear every GOP official who said the election was legitimate as a Deep State traitor.
Because Trump and the Trumpist media kept insisting that there were very serious problems with election integrity, the Trump rank and file all believe it.
Then the Trumpist “intellectuals” say: “tens of millions of Americans doubt the integrity of the election,” as if those doubts amounted to evidence of fraud, and as if those doubts should outweigh the views of the many more who accept the results of the election, and as if those doubts had not been systematically sown by Trump-world itself, starting with the biggest sore loser ever seen in American politics.
Radegunda (ebfa91) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:10 pmFTFY.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:12 pmKevin, I’m a little concerned that you are stripping away all agency from poor minorities
Hardly. For example, I view things like the War on Poverty to have been a counterproductive failure BECAUSE they removed that agency. But enslaved people have no agency, so let’s skip forward to 1865.
Of course, the newly freed slaves had no education, great hostility and a paternalistic Reconstruction that didn’t last and left them at the mercy of the people Reconstruction antagonized. All of whom were irredeemably racist. Now, there was some agency, but not a heck of a lot; too many avenues were closed to them, and anything they acquired could be stripped from them, nearly on a whim, including their lives.
Go read US V Cruikshank where the Supreme Court struck down the protections of federal law, limited the Bill of Rights to the federal government and gutted the 14th Amendment. In doing so they legalized lynching and prevented the federal government from prosecuting a mass lynching of blacks.
When the highest court says that you do not have a natural right to life, liberty or the pursuit of happiness, I don’t see a lot of agency there.
So, let’s fast forward again to, oh, 1965, where the federal government reasserted its powers under the 14th Amendment and broke the stranglehold of the Southern Democrats. Sometime in the next decade blacks began to feel they would be accepted in many previously-forbidden areas and in society in general. Now there is some agency. Of course, everyone else has had that agency for quite some time already and made good use of it.
It kind of sucks to start over as an “immigrant” to a country your people have lived in for centuries.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:15 pmAnother lie.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:18 pm@57 The Republican party: Take someone else’s bad idea, make it worse, then shout it louder.
Nic (896fdf) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:19 pmI view Caitlyn Jenner’s campaign as a ratf**k. Suck all the attention from the people who are serious about running. A nice shiny object for the press to focus on when they aren’t talking about QAnon.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:22 pmR.I.P. Olympia Dukakis
Icy (6abb50) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:23 pmTake someone else’s bad idea, make it worse, then shout it louder.
Bipartisanship: Combining Evil with Stupid.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:25 pmR.I.P. Olympia Dukakis
Hopefully she wasn’t raped and murdered.
(too soon?)
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:25 pmSo you think it’s a Putin-style false-flag operation set into motion by Newsom?
Diabolical!
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:30 pmThat was Kitty Dukakis…
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:34 pmI also love how California’s scouring the ballots trying to disqualify as many as possible, signature issues, etc and had gotten about 10% disqualified, but we’ll less than 1% of November’s ballots had any issue. Funny how that works.
Same with the leftist party in Arizona trying to move heaven and earth to prevent a recount in Maricopia County by any means necessary. If the vote was clean, then they should welcome a recount. It legitimizes their position.
Things like that make people question elections.
NJRob (92d62e) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:46 pmDave, Hillary was the first birther. We all know it. Citing leftist propaganda doesn’t change that.
NJRob (92d62e) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:48 pmPetitions, Rob, not ballots, LOL.
Petition signatures are collected (or fabricated) entirely by private citizens, with no oversight or authentication.
It’s routine for a significant fraction to be rejected, in every election, in every state.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:51 pmThe Newsome recall election is a farce. The process isn’t a single ballot item. Newsome isn’t running against anyone. He’s running against being recalled, which he’ll win by 20 points. That means the other ballot initiative for all the silly people running for Gov, is completely moot.
When Arny became governor, the majority of Californians detested Davis, not the case now.
Colonel Klink (Ret) (1367c0) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:55 pmCool, Rob.
So that means it should be easy to find quote by Hillary questioning Obama’s citizenship.
Please find such a verified quotation, and I’ll donate $1000 to the non-profit organization of your choice.
If you can’t produce even one quote backing up your claim, then you donate $1000 to the non-profit organization of my choice.
Agreed?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 1:56 pmHer administration and her team, no problem. I’ll even use your link.
https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/hillary-clinton-started-birther-movement/
Here you go.
NJRob (92d62e) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:02 pmTrying to weasel out of it by saying it didn’t come out of her mouth so it doesn’t count is particularly weasely. I’d expect as much from a Clinton defender though.
NJRob (92d62e) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:03 pmSo let’s see:
Please send your $1000 donation to The George W. Bush Institute, and thanks for being a good sport!
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:10 pmA private school in Miami, citing false claims, bars vaccinated teachers from contact with students
……. Centner Academy……. informed employees “with a very heavy heart” that if they chose to get a shot, they would have to stay away from students.
In an example of how misinformation threatens the nation’s effort to vaccinate enough Americans to get the coronavirus under control, Ms. Centner, who has frequently shared anti-vaccine posts on Facebook, claimed in the letter that “reports have surfaced recently of non-vaccinated people being negatively impacted by interacting with people who have been vaccinated.”
“Even among our own population, we have at least three women with menstrual cycles impacted after having spent time with a vaccinated person,” (co-founder Leila Centner) wrote, repeating a false claim that vaccinated people can somehow pass the vaccine to others and thereby affect their reproductive systems. (They can do neither.)
In the letter, Ms. Centner gave employees three options:
>Inform the school if they had already been vaccinated, so they could be kept physically distanced from students;
>Let the school know if they get the vaccine before the end of the school year, “as we cannot allow recently vaccinated people to be near our students until more information is known”;
>Wait until the school year is over to get vaccinated.
Teachers who get the vaccine over the summer will not be allowed to return, the letter said, until clinical trials on the vaccine are completed, and then only “if a position is still available at that time” — effectively making teachers’ employment contingent on avoiding the vaccine.
Ms. Centner required the faculty and staff to fill out a “confidential” form revealing whether they had received a vaccine — and if so, which one and how many doses — or planned to get vaccinated. The form requires employees to “acknowledge the School will take legal measures needed to protect the students if it is determined that I have not answered these questions accurately.”
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:13 pm…….
The Centner Academy opened in 2019 for students in prekindergarten through eighth grade, promoting itself as a “happiness school” focused on children’s mindfulness and emotional intelligence…….
………
“Her administration and her team, no problem. I’ll even use your link.”
Where does it say “her administration and her team” in that link, Rob?
Davethulhu (6ba00b) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:15 pmNewsmax Issues Retraction And Apology To Dominion Employee Over Election Stories
The far-right media outlet Newsmax, which amplified former President Donald Trump’s false allegations of election rigging and widespread voter fraud, said on Friday there is no evidence that Dominion Voting Systems and one of its top employees, Eric Coomer, manipulated election results in 2020.
“Newsmax subsequently found no evidence that such allegations were true. Many of the states whose results were contested by the Trump campaign after the November 2020 election have conducted extensive recounts and audits, and each of these states certified the results as legal and final,” the company said in a statement published online that will also be broadcast.
Coomer filed a defamation lawsuit against Newsmax in Colorado state court on Dec. 22. He withdrew that suit earlier Friday, ahead of Newmax’s apology. Coomer’s attorneys said he has reached a financial settlement, but terms of the arrangement were not disclosed.
……..
In its retraction, Newsmax apologized for any harm its reporting of the allegations caused Coomer and his family.
“Newsmax has found no evidence that Dr. Coomer interfered with Dominion voting machines or voting software in any way, nor that Dr. Coomer ever claimed to have done so,” the statement said. “Nor has Newsmax found any evidence that Dr. Coomer ever participated in any conversation with members of ‘Antifa,’ nor that he was directly involved with any partisan political organization.”
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:29 pm…….
JVW-
Please release my comment 86 from moderation.
Thank you.
[Done. – JVW]
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:31 pmI debated calling you out on the extremely unlikely assertion that neither Biden nor Harris were criticized for their statements, but I figured that demonstrating otherwise would require wading into the Twitter cesspool, which I have no stomach for.
Today, a WaPo opinion columnist saved me the trouble:
Kamala Harris has to walk a tightrope on race. This time, she slipped.
I haven’t yet been able to find any criticism of Biden’s response to Scott; his white privilege probably accounts for the different treatment…
(to humor-impaired comrades, last bit was joke!)
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:40 pmAnother glorious victory for Reaganomics!
Tell that to the crew of 51L.
“Uh-oh…” – Michael Smith, Pilot, STS-51L [STS-25] final transmission, 1/28/1986
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:42 pmNASA has lost a total of 23 astronauts, on missions and in training.
How many has SpaceX lost?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 2:59 pmhttps://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2008/08/penn-strategy-memo-march-19-2008/37952/
The link to the Penn Strategy Memo that was in the post.
Love how you tried to reword your claim Dave. And love how Snopes tried to say a random freeper questioning Obama’s birthright citizenship is equivalent to the Hillary campaign doing so.
Keep plucking.
NJRob (92d62e) — 5/1/2021 @ 3:05 pmYou can make your donation to F.I.R.E.
https://www.thefire.org
NJRob (92d62e) — 5/1/2021 @ 3:10 pm@60. Revisit the epilogue quilled by Arthur C. Clarke to ‘First On The Moon’ published in 1970. Clarke was quite prescient w/his projections for the potential of LEO ops by private firms–for manufacturing and such– thus allowing government to finance BEO ops. Unfortunately, government, not the private sector, ended up financing LEO ops instead, diverting tightened, flat-lined budget $ to it from more risky BEO ventures because the private sector balked. There’s simply low to no ROI for contemporary, venture capital private sector investors in LEO spaceflight operations in this era, especially in a quarterly driven marketplace. That’s why governments do it. And that’s why Musk snookered the U.S. taxpayers into financing a large percentage of his spaceflight operations, piggybacking on facilities already existing, paid for by U.S. taxpayers, rather than risk his own fortune. Taxpayers essentially subsidize him to lease facilities taxpayers already own and operate. There’s a lot of the Larson E. Whipsnade in Elon Musk.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 3:15 pm@89. How many manned spaceflights has NASA launched since May, 1961?
NASA has successfully launched over 200 crewed flights.
Two have ended in failure, causing the death of the entire crew: STS-51-L (the Challenger disaster) in 1986, and STS-107 (the Columbia disaster) in 2003. (Apollo 1 in 1967 lost three crew members but never launched.)
How many manned flights has SpaceX launched in 18 months under NASA supervision?
Three.
SpaceX will have a bad day some day.
It is inevitable.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 3:25 pm“Same with the leftist party in Arizona trying to move heaven and earth to prevent a recount in Maricopia County by any means necessary. If the vote was clean, then they should welcome a recount. It legitimizes their position.”
They’re using UV lights to look for watermarks because of a QAnon belief that Trump secretly watermarked some of the ballots.
Davethulhu (6ba00b) — 5/1/2021 @ 3:33 pmThe Senate liaison Ken Bennett tried to keep Obama off the 2012 AZ ballot because of his birther beliefs.
At least one of the ballot counters (Anthony Kern) was also Jan 6 riot participant.
The recount is illegitimate.
BTW, SpaceX blew up the first Dragon; salt water got into a RCS. They will have ‘bad day’ some day:
SpaceX confirmed that its Crew Dragon spaceship for NASA was ‘destroyed’ by a recent test.
Here’s what we learned about the explosive failure.
SpaceX, the rocket company founded by Elon Musk, has built a new spaceship for NASA astronauts called Crew Dragon. The seven-person capsule made its first uncrewed spaceflight in March, 2020. It was supposed to fly astronauts that summer. But the same Crew Dragon spaceship exploded on April 20 during a ground test. SpaceX was relatively quiet after the incident. – source, businessinsider.com
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 3:36 pmThe Kentucky Derby.
Systemic racism? 😉
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 4:04 pmI debated calling you out on the extremely unlikely assertion that neither Biden nor Harris were criticized for their statements, but I figured that demonstrating otherwise would require wading into the Twitter cesspool, which I have no stomach for.
Today, a WaPo opinion columnist saved me the trouble:
Well gee, Dave, I’ll have to modify my assertion to acknowledge that a WaPo writer specializing in the race hustle published a muted criticism (her op-ed is pretty much about bashing Scott while exculpating Harris because she “has to perform a delicate dance as vice president”). But in case you didn’t notice, her piece was published eleven hours after I had posted the Weekend Open Thread. Shame on me for not getting my crystal ball fixed in time to anticipate it.
JVW (ee64e4) — 5/1/2021 @ 4:28 pmU.S. prosecutors release video of rioters spraying Officer Brian Sicknick in Jan. 6 Capitol attack
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/1/2021 @ 4:33 pmHave they released the name and associated photo of the black officer who shot and killed white woman and veteran Ashli Babbitt?
Don’t hold your breath. How do we know the he/she was black you say? How do we know he/she wasn’t: release the name and pix.
What’s to protect– other than ‘the narrative.’
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 4:46 pmAny American voter would have had legal justification to shoot Ashli Babbitt. She was violating their civil rights under the U.S. Constitution, to have their votes counted by their elected officers, and she used force and threats of force. Moreover, all her cohorts who were aiding and abetting her are still subject to the death penalty, and not necessarily under the felony murder rule:
And Darwin smiled, too.
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 5:31 pmFunny basketball story, Radegunda. So, you’re four foot twelve, eh? 🙂
norcal (01e272) — 5/1/2021 @ 5:50 pmI enjoyed the Kentucky Derby, and was moved at the sight of so many people in attendance, the majority of whom were not wearing masks. VC (Victory Over Coronavirus) Day will soon arrive.
norcal (01e272) — 5/1/2021 @ 5:52 pmUgh, you forced me to read Twitter. The second reply (and a number after, all dated April 29) to the Manu Raju tweet you embedded criticizes Harris.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 5:52 pmThe plot twist came when Harris seconded Scott — “No, I don’t think America is a racist country,” she said on “Good Morning America” the next day.
No winner cried “It’s not fair!”, ever.
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 5:59 pm“We” means “the electorate.” As much as it sickens me, we, the American voter, elected a vile, pathologically corrupt orange ignoramus. I tried to prevent it, but like every decision we make as a country, I accept my share of collective responsibility.
lurker (59504c) — 5/1/2021 @ 6:03 pmThe ongoing mess that is the AZ “election audit,” lacking any sense of transparency, conducted by an inexperienced, biased out-of-state firm, contaminating chain-of-custody and the ballots themselves, is not only a bad idea. It also likely violates federal law.
52 USC 20701 requires that election officials, and ONLY election officials, preserve all fed’l election records, including ballots, for at least 22 months after an election. This is to preserve evidence in case of a violation of voting laws.
@USDOJ’s Public Integrity unit has a manual on the Prosecution of Election Offenses. That manual is very clear about the responsibility to maintain the provenance of ballots and other fed’l election materials, and the penalties for failure to do so.
Election officials are required to “take appropriate steps to ensure that those records will be preserved intact until such time as they may become needed to resolve legitimate questions that frequently arise involving the election process.”
52 USC 20701 also requires ballots and other records to be under the direct control and supervision of election officials at all times, which is not what is happening in AZ.
52 USC 20701 imposes criminal penalties and fines for failure to maintain and protect ballots and other election records, under the direct supervision of election officials, for at least 22 months.
What we know about the “audit” so far raises serious legal questions. Ballots have been removed from the control/supervision of election off’ls. Chain of custody has likely been destroyed.
Ballots have likely been contaminated by use of pens by “auditors,” and perhaps by subjecting the ballots to unauthorized and unexplained processes, like UV light. This violates the entire purpose of 52 USC 20701 – the preservation of evidence.
https://twitter.com/beckerdavidj/status/1387090515120824327
Davethulhu (6ba00b) — 5/1/2021 @ 6:04 pmi dunno mr thulhu it seems pretty legit to me
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 6:07 pmDoesn’t say a word about Obama’s birth or citizenship or eligibility.
It also says:
“We are never going to say anything about his background – we have to show the value of ours”
Not very birther-y, Rob.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 6:19 pmGreat news, Deezy-eska!
Harris to chair the National Space Council
Exciting, isn’t it?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 7:14 pmThat was Kitty Dukakis…
Yes. My bad.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:36 pmDave, Hillary was the first birther. We all know it. Citing leftist propaganda doesn’t change that.
Actually, the first birther was whoever blurbed that book of his that claimed he was born in Kenya.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:37 pmhttps://www.snopes.com/fact-check/hillary-clinton-started-birther-movement/
So, she didn’t start it, but did promulgate it. Weak. Besides, it makes her a plagiarist, too.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:41 pm@88:
Damn, but that’s responsible journalism at its best, eh? I’m sure that, had one role or another been reversed, the editor who allowed that would have been fired.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:44 pmHow many manned flights has SpaceX launched in 18 months under NASA supervision?
Three.
SpaceX will have a bad day some day.
Particularly under NASA supervision. Outside of JPL, there isn’t much left of the old NASA. You should tour the Johnson Space Center sometime. Depressing.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:48 pmThat’s not what it says Kevin.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 8:53 pmWhat difference at this point does it make?
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:20 pmActually, this has been a pretty decent thread, thank you, JVW, but if you guys are in need of more, why don’t we do an “I’ll tell the punchline, you tell the joke”.
I’ll start: “Smart choice. Her clothes probably wouldn’t have fit you.”
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:24 pmI Googled the answer.
What do I win?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:31 pmAnd here I was trying to craft an original joke!
Just before posting it, I had to click refresh to see if there was anything new. Then, of course, I had to see what Dave was talking about.
I’m sorry, but I just can’t beat the Googled answer.
norcal (01e272) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:40 pmIt’s not a competition. Did you like the joke? You, norcal?
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:47 pmWhen Patterico did this one time, his punchline was: “You don’t understand. Chunks is my dog.” Go for it!
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:51 pmOh, I loved the joke. It would have been perfect for The Big Bang Theory.
norcal (01e272) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:57 pmMy brain is only good for one creative effort per day. Here is the joke I thought up for your first punchline:
norcal (01e272) — 5/1/2021 @ 9:58 pmThese are existing jokes, norcal. (I don’t know if it’s a Rule that they have to be, but I think it’s the fair thing.) It’s okay to Google the punchline. That’s what Google is there for.
nk (1d9030) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:13 pmA man was drinking, obviously way too heavily, in a bar one night. The next day he returned to the bar sat down and ordered a coffee. The bartender snickered and asked, “Are you sure you don’t want another shot of whiskey?”
Holding his stomach the man replied, “No, please, I drank so much last night that I went home and blew chunks all night long.” The bartender said, “See what happens when you drink too much–you end up throwing up all night.” The man replied:
norcal (01e272) — 5/1/2021 @ 10:29 pm@115. Particularly under NASA supervision.
Rubbish. When the private sector even tries, let alone accomplished what NASA has, get back to me–around 2250. The ‘old’ NASA doesn’t even apply; even the firing room a KSC has been gutted and modernized. You really outta keep up.
NASA has been the best ROI America has made in itself in a century. And if you say nay, start by counting the number of things in your daily life and around your own home that can be sourced to the R&D investment. You’ll lose count in an hour.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:29 pm@101. Bull.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:29 pm@110. Certainly more exciting than Dan Quayle was, Davey. She’ll push for bigger budgets.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:32 pmI’ve been enjoying the back and forth re the Birtherism claim. What’s pretty clear is that neither Rob nor Kevin can point to Clinton or the Clinton campaign pushing the specific claim that Obama was born in Kenya, let alone originating the theory. The closest is some very low ranking campaign person who forwarded an email picking up on a rumor started by right wingers, and was fired for doing so.
It just illustrate my background assumptions that nearly every purely factual claim put forth by the American right wing to make some political argument, at this point anyway, is either completely false or mostly misleading.
Victor (4959fb) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:49 pmSo you approve of President Biden’s decision, then?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/1/2021 @ 11:50 pmGoing in circles, no place, fast: congrats NASA and SpaceX on a nicely televised predawn splashdown.
Been there, done that; December, 1968.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:03 am@131. He has dumped everything else on her plate– a glass of Tang can wash it down; as long as the VP heads the civil Space Council it’s a good thing have get to the CiCs ear–and she’ll be in charge soon enough. Nelson as NASA administrator, less thrilled. But he’s a homeboy and will coddle Florida’s space coast. As a congresscritter the bastard bumped a qualified mission specialist from very trouble plagued STS-24, in 1/86 a Columbia flight before Challenger, on congressional ‘fact-finding’ junket. The idiot only had to look to his own flight; the symptoms and issues which exploded on 51-L were literally right under his ass. Both he and Garn could have just picked up the phone and called Glenn instead, too.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:30 amMitt romney booded at republican meeting in utah! No twinkles for mitt tonight! Even the mo’s are now populists!
asset (ccd2ad) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:01 am@134. For a Mormon who doesn’t drink the booze musta been a high in lows. Still, he should be at home getting the French raspberries from his Bain Capital days when his destroyed middle class lives. Greed is a character flaw– you can bet $10,000 on that; he would.
Millionaire Mitt Romney refuses to applaud Biden’s plans for taxing rich and raising minimum wage
Senator from Utah reportedly worth $250m after career at private equity firm Bain Capital
The Senator from Utah, who is reportedly worth $250m from his career at private equity firm Bain Capital, refused to get to his feet or to clap when the president addressed the subjects during his speech to the joint session of Congress. Mr. Romney was caught on camera staying firmly seated when lawmakers around him applauded the plan. And the senator looked equally unimpressed when Mr. Biden renewed his call for a $15 an hour federal minimum wage. – source:
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/mitt-romney-biden-speech-address-b1839342.html
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:34 amChrist is Risen! Greek Easter Hymn, by Vangelis and Irene Pappas.
nk (1d9030) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:56 am@135: “Millionaire Mitt Romney refuses to applaud Biden’s plans for taxing rich and raising minimum wage”
Well, if you philosophically disagree with the policy, why would you pretend to show support? There’s no great mystery that national minimum wage increases are empirically controversial. Do they really help? Confronted with higher operating costs, businesses have two practical responses: hire fewer people or raise prices. The price inflation then errodes any salary benefit. Some sectors will also choose to simply out-source low-wage positions which completely defeats the wage increase. Finally, raising the floor means that first-time entrants to the workforce must now compete against more experienced workers……with businesses preferring someone with experience….making it harder to get experience.
States can do what they want with the minimum wage…..and what goes on in NYC would seem to dictate a different level from Topeka or Ames. Why should anyone stand and applaud a one-size-fits-all solution which might not locally make any sense? Using government to try and pick winners and losers historically just doesn’t produce….and it doesn’t take a millionaire to understand that….
AJ_Liberty (a4ff25) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:10 amBottom line, asset -he avoided censure when the votes were counted. And he hadn’t gone squishy on immigration, either.
urbanleftbehind (b33404) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:14 amLet’s fight the filter again. It was on the biographical blurb of Obama’s first book, Dreams Of My Father.
nk (1d9030) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:36 amnk,
And where did that mistake in the blurb come from? some editor in the publisher’s office who didn’t have anything to do with any campaign, (And who wasn’t Hillary Clinton) and which doesn’t seem to have had any clear connection to the elaborate tales spun by right wing operatives in 2008.
Or do you believe that this blurb reveals an otherwise unknown truth?
Right wing Obama haters in 2008 had a story they wanted to tell and looked everywhere they could for evidence it was true. Let’s not forget pressuring an old woman in Kenya to remember her step grandchild being born there.
Victor (4959fb) — 5/2/2021 @ 7:14 amHow Republicans Lost Interest in Fighting Big Spending
………
In 2009, President Barack Obama created a spontaneous, hugely influential conservative grassroots movement on the basis of an $800 billion stimulus bill and a health care plan estimated to cost less than a trillion. In 2021, Biden is proposing to spend about $6 trillion in his first three big bills, and he can barely create more interest than the debate on wearing masks outdoors.
………
The party has changed and would much rather talk about the border than the budget, and cancellations than Congressional Budget Office scores. Of course, no Republicans will vote for Biden’s proposals and all will strenuously object, but that his plans won’t engender the fierce reaction they would have 10 years ago is yet another way in which the Overton window has shifted on deficit spending.
What happened to the GOP? The short answer is Donald Trump.
……..
Once in office, Trump taught Republicans how to relax and love expansionary fiscal policy. By 2019, he was running a nearly $1 trillion deficit at a time of peace and prosperity, and of course, the pandemic blew the lid off in 2020.
………
……… Republicans realized that past dire warnings of imminent economic harm from deficit spending—rising interest rates, spiking inflation, an overall debt crisis—haven’t panned out.
……….
Meanwhile, Republican politics has become focused on culture war issues, another change symbolized by Trump. There was some tutting among fiscal hawks at the time Biden’s $1.9 trillion Covid relief bill passed that conservatives seemed more upset about Dr. Seuss Enterprises ceasing the publication of several of the legendary children author’s books than about an off-the-charts spending measure that, it turns out, was just the appetizer.
But the culture-war issues hit close to the bone in a way that fiscal issues don’t. Conservatives worry about their free-speech rights getting trampled, about schools distorting the minds of their children, and about the country’s history getting redefined—and it’s hard to get them to care more about a balance sheet that may have deleterious consequences at some future date than these other, more definitional questions.
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/2/2021 @ 8:59 am………
Stocks Are Off to Best Start to a Presidential Term Since Great Depression
……….
The S&P 500 has risen 11% since Mr. Biden’s Jan. 20 inauguration. The index recorded its strongest performance since the start of Mr. Roosevelt’s first term in 1933, when it surged 80% after a spectacular crash in the Great Depression, according to a Dow Jones Market Data analysis. By comparison, the S&P 500 rose 5.3% in the first 100 days of President Donald Trump’s term in early 2017 and on average has gained 3.2% over that period in presidential terms since Herbert Hoover’s in 1929.
Investors say it is no surprise that bountiful government spending, increasing Covid-19 vaccinations, growing faith in the economic reopening and continued support from the Federal Reserve have powered the latest leg up in the stock market.
………
……… The S&P 500 on Thursday set its 25th record close of the year, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite recently set its first new high since February. Rising government-bond yields, which reflect the optimism about economic growth, had dented the appeal of technology shares relative to other parts of the market, but lately those stocks have been rallying, too.
“Sometimes people start worrying because the market has come a long way,” said Jerry Braakman, chief investment officer at First American Trust. “But with all this government spending, fiscal and monetary stimulus, an improving economy with pent-up demand, those kind of worries ebb pretty quickly.”
Rip Murdock (d20518) — 5/2/2021 @ 9:09 am……….
Kudos to WITF. I won’t be forgetting those fascists either.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/2/2021 @ 9:39 amThere was a reason I bolded “picking up on a rumor started by right wingers“, Victor.
To show that Barry Soetoro’s re-packagers and re-branders started the rumor, in the New Young Black Horatio Alger stage of the Barack Obama product development. In the model designed for the Illinois and U.S. Senates.
Right-wingers (and New York liberal orange sewer rats pretending to be right-wingers) just refused to upgrade to the newer version suitable for the White House, that’s all.
nk (1d9030) — 5/2/2021 @ 9:48 amWhy do you refuse to call him by his actual name? There must be a reason.
So your theory is that a lone reference in a promotional booklet that nobody seems to have referred to for a long period, and was not mentioned when the rumor got its real start on right wing message boards in 2004 and early 2008, really the basis of this rumor.
And that there was a deliberate attempt by his “rebranders” (? What was his prior brand?) to promote this long held version. Again for which nobody seems to point to any discussion during his state or federal Senate runs. All the way until poor naive right wingers are forced to repeat this rumor they credulously take from Obama’s diabolical editor.
I sometimes promise myself to be more temperate. But this is nonsense.
Victor (4959fb) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:04 am@127:
Old NASA, no launch deaths, Apollo 11, Apollo 13. Made moon landings boring.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:24 amNew NASA: Sending astronauts to Russia to launch.
Barry Soetoro, the immigrant, was his name and “prior brand” in Indonesia and Hawaii, very likely in Columbia, and possibly in the Harvard Law School admission process.
nk (1d9030) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:25 amCertainly more exciting than Dan Quayle was, Davey. She’ll push for bigger budgets.
People who served on that with Dan Quayle thought differently, and some (e.g. Jerry Pournelle*, did not suffer fools gladly).
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:27 amVictor, Snopes admits that her campaign did use this “information” to attack Obama. I’ve never said the she did it personally, nor that she started it. In fact, the earliest thing I’ve ever found is a book flyleaf that says the author (Obama) was born in Kenya.
For myself, I do not believe he was born in Kenya, not do I believe it would disqualify him if he was (his mother was an American citizens and the discussion ends there).
I am a bit troubled by his early education in Indonesia but don’t know enough about it to have a firm opinion.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:32 amStocks Are Off to Best Start to a Presidential Term Since Great Depression
See how that works if the capital gains rate is doubled. NASDAQ 4000, here we come.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:35 amNeither the DOW nor the S&P 500 reached their pre-crash levels until 1954, with Ike as president.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:38 amAs for who his re-branders and re-packagers were:
— Michelle Obama whom he met in his summer associate job in Chicago where she was already a lawyer;
— Reverend Jeremiah Wright who made him a black man from Chicago’ South Side;
— Bill Ayers, ex-Weatherman, who actually wrote Dreams Of My Father;
— Emil Jones, Illinois political powerhouse, who said “I’m going to make me a United States Senator” meaning Obama; and
— Valerie Jarrett, Rahm Emanuel, and David Axelrod, who should need no introduction.
And now you also know how Trump’s supporters feel when you disturb their image of their Great Pumpkin.
nk (1d9030) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:44 amAlso the way his opponents spontaneously combusted like Spinal Tap drummers.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:53 amThose were the hands of Emil Jones in his Illinois Senate run, and David Axelrod in his U.S. Senate run.
nk (1d9030) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:59 amTwo things I don’t believe:
1). I don’t believe that Obama was born in Kenya
1). I don’t believe that a narcissist like Obama does not read everything, in print, that mentions his name. Even less unlikely that he didn’t read a promotional pamphlet that highlighted him.
NK is absolutely right about Obama’s constant rebranding.
At one point he was a half white kid hanging out with other white kids at an exclusive high school:
https://time.com/4355622/obama-prom-photos/
That photo probably wasn’t as rough and tumble as the booksellers required for a diversity pamphlet.
The guy is a chameleon who allowed the Kenyan allure to fester in his social/political circles as long as it was a plus for his manufactured success. There is no way he didn’t know that the in-crowd, at that time, thought he was born exotically as opposed to being another white kid born into privilege.
BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/2/2021 @ 11:29 amNice music link, nk.
Radegunda (d5730b) — 5/2/2021 @ 11:30 amCovid common sense from Ms. Weiss.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/2/2021 @ 11:39 am@146. NASA doesn’t make policy directives, Kevin; it carries them out.
Why Americans bought seats aboard Soyuz? [the basic vehicle is a highly reliable spacecraft BTW- originally capable of lunar flight.] The late Gene Cernan could tell you in an instant.
Ask Dick Cheney. Or ask Dubya. Or Pappy Bush. Or Obama– about ‘the gap’… and the lead time necessary for operational hardware development.
These clowns talk a good game for the cameras but never follow through w/t green. The most embarrassing piece of bullcrap by Republican Pappy was his bloviating about ‘return to the moon’ on the steps of the NASM, with Dummy Dan at his side and most of the stll living Apollo alumni in front of him on July 20, 1989. Problem was, unlike JFK or LBJ, Pappy made zero effort to stump for funding to support his proposal. So it died. Slayton famously said the ISS was merely ‘make work’ for the U.S. aerospace community [and Congress damn near agreed]- and for Russian engineers displaced by the Soviet collapse; better they work on a station than nukes— they gotta eat, too. The ISS should have been firmly anchored to the floor of the Ocean of Storms 240,000 miles away–not orbiting 300 miles up, going in circles, no place, fast. The Earth has a natural space station: Luna. And a cislunar system perfecting hardware, methods and procedures established to move crews and supplies routinely back an forth would have put the U.S and any parters much further along today and spawned a plethora of new firms and industries.
But no. What’s done is done– so lost 35 years of progress lost. Scuttling Dubya’s Constellation was an Obama stupidity, too. You can’t keep changing these long range plans every few years and expect the to become reality– or maintain leadership. It’s always been a major flaw to the U.S. approach. Spaceflight is rooted in Russian culture; it is not in America. Monuments to Sputnik and Gagarin are all over the place there. China is following suit and they are modeling their approach with abend of Apollo management techniques and Russian design. And they aren’t ‘quarterly driven.’ America has always had a pattern of being reactive, not proactive, in this field. It’s the nature of the U.S. system and the quixotic nature of a citizenry that cheers touchdowns, home runs, flags and footprints.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/2/2021 @ 11:48 amNorcal, I’m inordinately proud of that story, considering it was more of a fluke than an achievement. I once stopped on the sidewalk to tell the story to some rando guy with a basketball who looked friendly. Some other sports involving hand-eye coordination also seemed a lot easier when my eyesight had gotten worse, but nothing tops the basketball incident. I remember thinking “Oh, this is easy! This is fun!” Later I heard that some guys playing on the adjacent court had stopped to watch me and were impressed by my shooting ratio.
Radegunda (d5730b) — 5/2/2021 @ 11:49 amNo. It. Doesn’t.
It says “Clinton supporters”.
Surely you understand the difference, so why do you repeatedly mischaracterize the plain language of the article?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:27 pmFor Republicans, fealty to Trump’s election falsehood becomes defining loyalty test
These people can NEVER be allowed to hold power again.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:42 pmI’ve been dismayed by how 1/6 is minimized or rationalized by people I used to see as principled thinkers.
There are contradictory themes in the apologetics. On the one hand, the perps were Proud Boys and Bugaloos and other cretins, i.e. people who have nothing to do with us, the patriotic Trump supporters. On the other, the prosecutions are really a persecution of patriotic Americans who were exercising their right to make their voices heard, and maybe a few bad apples got carried away, and now the good people are “political prisoners” just because they support Trump and because they “questioned the integrity of the election, like tens of millions of other Americans.”
There’s also the claim that Donald Trump in no way incited the attack — He used the word “peacefully”! the Ellipse is miles away from the Capitol! — in conjunction with the belief that he was totally justified in encouraging his fans to be enraged and to “fight like hell” to “take back” the country.
Trumpers are being disingenuous in claiming that the faithful were there on 1/6 just to make their voices heard. Legislators knew very well what Trumpers thought — which is why few Republicans in Congress dared to say publicly that they believed the election was legitimate even if they did. The only plausible purpose for calling Trumpers to D.C. (for a “wild” protest) and authorizing a march to the Capitol (which evidently was done by the White House) was to intimidate legislators into changing the election result.
The fact that the election was certified the next day doesn’t erase the seriousness of what was attempted, or the chilling calls to execute “traitors,” or the injuries inflicted on 150+ police officers.
Trumpers assert that the real damage done that day, besides “making Trump supporters look bad,” was to give the left a way to deflect outrage from the summer riots and to excuse Dem pols for their indulgent attitude toward rioters — as though it’s not possible to be outraged by the BLM riots and the Trumper effort to “overturn” an election (to use DJT’s own terminology). Most of the “intellectual” right won’t look at 1/6 honestly because they chose to put loyalty to Donald Trump at the heart of their thinking, and they cannot bring themselves to criticize what Trump encouraged.
Radegunda (d5730b) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:46 pmIt’s true, sadly, that she speaks for many people. It’s also true that her comment is insane.
Were all those people nuts to begin with? Or does DJT have some superpower to drive people insane?
Radegunda (d5730b) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:51 pmRadegunda, and don’t forget that Trump and his terror mob tried to coerce the Vice-President into staging a literal coup-d’etat.
And all the shenanigans before January 6 (“I just want to find 11,780 votes.”)
This is what the so-called Republican Party, with about a dozen exceptions, stands for.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:54 pmHere’s a good article on the idiot adjunct, with a nice follow up on the history of actual policing.
https://hotair.com/john-s-2/2021/05/01/college-student-described-police-as-heroes-and-his-professor-didnt-like-that-now-shes-on-leave-n387166
This pathetic excuse for a woman has no business being in front of a classroom at any level, teaching any subject. She has no mind, no manners, and no sense of decorum. In addition, she is profoundly ignorant. She has no concept of what education is. Big Hint, it is not indoctrination. She’s anacephalactic (born without a brain).
You know, I would go back to teaching today, if I could. I miss the kids. But I haven’t been in front of a classroom in 18 years, and I don’t have any current recommendations. So that makes it difficult, plus I turn 60 in 22 days, which makes me too old to be hired. Any district would have to pay me a salary based on 20 years of experience, and they are not going to do that, since they could hire a rookie fresh out of college, with zero experience, for less than half the cost. That’s probably the main impediment.
That said, even if I could go back to teaching today, I wouldn’t. I refuse to do remote instruction on Zoom. No, I am a fervent believer in in-person, in-class instruction. It’s they only way a child can learn.
When I was studying for my teaching certificate, I took a course in History and Philosophy of Education. It was a survey course that covered methodologies and curricula from Plato’s Academy all the way through modern times. You’d be surprised at how education changes through the ages. But let’s focus on late 1800s, early 1900s America.
I’m telling you, if you go back just 100 years and look at the curriculum, assignments and tests in 1920, an eighth grade course would be PhD level today. Actually, it would be several orders of magnitude better. Look at this idiot adjunct. She has a PhD, but she has a vacant mind and doesn’t know anything.
Take English, for example. The emphasis was on grammar, punctuation, spelling, parts of speech, vocabulary, usage, diction, syntax, sentence construction; the assignments included memorization and recitation; the reading list was actual books, not excerpts in textbooks; and the tests were rigorous. It was the same for all other subjects. The methodologies and curricula of American education in the late 1800s and early 1900s produced the most educated, innovative and productive middle class in the world, by the way.
Question: Where can a student receive an education like that today? Answer: Nowhere.
Good grief, my grandfather dropped out of school after the 3rd grade and went to work plowing fields with an ox. After ten years, he walked into the San Antonio School of Business, passed the entrance exam, and earned a business degree. Know how he was able to do that? He helped his sisters do the homework, study for their tests, and read the books they were assigned. In other words, he received a quality education without having to attend classes. He became a bank manager. Do you think it’s even remotely possible for anyone to do anything like that today?
When I went to school, the public school system was based on homogenous grouping. At the end of 5th grade, and at end of every subsequent grade up to 11th, students were given the California Achievement Test. When entered junior high, students were placed in classes based on their test scores–bottom third, middle third, top third. In other words, in every class all the students had the same skill set. This allowed teachers to craft their lessons and instruction based on the skills of the students. The purpose was to improve their skills, raising those from the bottom to the middle, and from the middle to the top. Those with top scores were prepared for professional careers or college after graduation.
Homogenous grouping went the way of all things in the early 1980s, because it was deemed discriminatory, which is ridiculous. It was student-centered instruction designed to improve skills. The public school system became based on heterogenous grouping. Students of all skill levels are placed in the same classroom. This makes it virtually impossible for teachers to craft their lessons and instruction based on student skills. The top level students are unchallenged, the middle level students are disinterested, and the lower level students are lost. It’s the primary reason why textbooks and curricula had to be dumbed down.
Another problem with the public school system today is that district funding is based on attendance and passing rates. The higher the attendance and passing rates, the more funding the district receives. The lower, the less. This forces districts and schools to enforce mandatory attendance and artificially inflate grades. Is that any way to run an education system?
When I was teaching high school, I was assigned average students. Across the hall, the teacher was assigned advanced placement students. I looked at my student’s papers and thought, okay, these kids need real instruction. So I started teaching them grammar, parts of speech, sentence construction, vocabulary, etc.. The principal called me to the office. Why are you teaching grammar? Because the students need to learn it. Okay, so the lesson plans I had to turn into the principal were based on whole language learning. But in the classroom I kept teaching grammar. Guess what happened. At the end of the year, the students had to take the state skills test. Three times as many of my students passed than the advanced placement students across the hall. The principal called me back to the office. What do we have to do to reach your passing rate? Teach grammar. Oh, and I resign. Transferred to another district the next year.
I taught essential skills: analytical thinking, critical reading, rhetorical writing. The reason why these skills are essential is because not matter what career you pursue, all you’re going to be doing for the rest of your life is thinking, reading, and writing.
The problems in the public school system today are manifest. There are many reasons for the decline, if not utter collapse in education over the last 40 years, which I won’t go into because I’ve gone on long enough. However, if American parents are serious about their children’s future, they would call for and demand comprehensive education reform. We need to get back to student-centered, skills-based instruction. Otherwise, the next generation will be one of ignorant illiterates.
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:58 pmIt began with Trump’s preemptive refusal to accept defeat as a legitimate result — just as he didn’t believe that he legitimately lost the popular vote in 2016, or that Cruz could actually have won the Iowa caucuses over him, or that the Emmy Awards weren’t rigged against him.
Most of the GOP and most of the conservative commentariat turned themselves into servants of Trump’s narcissistic delusions — while telling themselves that they’re stalwart truth-tellers and that all others are treacherous and corrupt.
Radegunda (d5730b) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:19 pmIt’s weird that “educators” don’t think that’s a problem. Are they too worried that the top students will go on to do challenging things, like produce vaccines rapidly during a pandemic?
Radegunda (d5730b) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:23 pm@GG@165 The state doesn’t actually care about our passing rates, only our attendance ones. Also, parents have no patience for their kids earning Fs. If all we did was teach naptime and recess every day, but the kids got A’s, a significant portion of the parental population would be happy with that. Many parents just want a lifehack for A’s in school. And “You have to make your student go to after school homework help” isn’t the one they want.
Nic (896fdf) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:26 pm@137. Confronted with higher operating costs, businesses have two practical responses: hire fewer people or raise prices.
See if you can figure out the third element you’ve overlooked with this, Hint:
CEOs see pay grow 1,000% in the last 40 years, now make 278 times the average worker
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/08/16/ceos-see-pay-grow-1000percent-and-now-make-278-times-the-average-worker.html
Reaganomics.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:32 pm@Radegunda@167 How much of a rant do you want? Education theory. I can tell you about it. At length. And Volume.
My current principal is more worried about “tracking” and is trying to get rid of the honors classes and has already eliminated almost all the intervention (remedial help to catch up) classes. She thinks the teachers should be able to teach, remediate, and challenge each group of students individually in 50 minutes or less per day using curriculum that needs 50 minutes every day just to teach. And that all students will then be above average. Those other classes take up too many FTEs, doncha know.
The teachers care very much.
Nic (896fdf) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:33 pm@167
From reading many of his posts, I think GG has very strong, and fixed, opinions based on over-generalization from his own experience, and tends to state them in an exaggerated way.
An example is his dismissal of remote instruction in his post above:
Since he says he hasn’t taught in 18 years, and he doesn’t appear to be versed in evidence-based education research, it’s unclear what this sweeping and categorical generalization is based on. There is evidence that in-person instruction is more effective, but “the only way”? No.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:48 pmGlorious.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 1:51 pm@172. ROFLMAOPIP
“What was to be called the Superconducting Supercollider (SSC )began as an idea in 1983. Four years of lobbying resulted in Congressional approval earmarking $4.4 billon for the project…a site was selected in Texas… by 1993, the cost had risen to $12 billion… with limited resources, the U.S. was forced to choose between the SSC or the International Space Station (ISS.}
Congress approved $ for the ISS and on October 21, 1993, the Texas supercollider was cancelled and the site, already under construction– abandoned.” – https://sometimes-interesting.com/super-collider-abandoned/
“Reaganomics.”
Glorious!
“Where’s the rest of me?!?!” – Drake McHugh [Ronald Reagan] ‘Kings Row’ 1942
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/2/2021 @ 2:54 pmRadegunda, it’s not that teachers don’t see the problem, it’s that they’re powerless to do anything to do about it. They’re at the bottom of the totem pole. And, no, they’re not worried that top students will go on the be successful careers. In fact, that’s what they want them to do.
Dave, I do have strong and fixed opinions on certain subjects, but I do not over-generalize or exaggerate. I may use hyperbole and sarcasm quite a bit. And personal experiences are the only thing I have to go by. As to remote learning, the majority of students don’t even bother to log on. That’s a fact. Are they then to be counted absent? Remote learning does not allow for personal interaction between teacher and student. And that is to the detriment of the student. The reason why I haven’t been in front of a classroom for 18 years is because I resigned my positions when my father was dying to help my mother. That is insignificant and irrelevant to the fact that remote learning is inadequate. But thank you for going out of your way to point out the one spelling mistake in my comment. This is a blog post on a computer screen, not an academic paper subject to scrutiny. The format doesn’t really allow much for proofreading. Yet another reason why remote learning on a computer is inadequate.
Nic, if the education system does not all a teacher to student the grade he or she earned, and it does, the system has failed.
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 5/2/2021 @ 2:55 pmI should have said educrats instead of “educators.” (Scare quotes didn’t suffice.) I can imagine that people actually serving in the classrooms are frustrated.
Radegunda (d5730b) — 5/2/2021 @ 3:01 pm@gg@174 Maybe I have the dumb today, but I can’t figure out what you are saying?
Nic (896fdf) — 5/2/2021 @ 3:07 pmYour Woke Money is No Good Here
True galaxy brained editorial by Ted Cruz
Davethulhu (6ba00b) — 5/2/2021 @ 3:23 pmNic, I’m talking about grade inflation to maximize passing rates. Suppose a student turns in a paper. It’s full of grammatical errors, punctuation and spelling mistakes. At best such a paper would earn a 50. But the lowest grade the teacher can give it is a 70. Got to keep up that passing rate! If you fail too many students, you will be out of a job quick.
The result is that students are promoted year by year without having to demonstrate mastery of even basic skills. They’re just shuffled along to the next grade level. That’s why they don’t care. Why put in the necessary effort to actually learn, when you know you’re going pass, regardless of the quality of work you turn in? Students know teachers are not going to fail them, so why bother learning?
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 5/2/2021 @ 3:55 pmGawain’s Ghost (b25cd1) — 5/2/2021 @ 12:58 pm
Then Seenator Rocj Santorrum educated his children remotely (he was criticized for using a free Pennsylvania school while actually living in Virginia)
It can work, but it can’t be simply tranferring everything online.
Your grandfather had even less connection with teachers than Zoom gives. (he did have a start till the third grade, and help from his sisters)
Schools tend to deteriorate with time.
No, the colllapse started about ninety years ago, about 1930. It’s teachers like you were that tend to save school systems, but there are fewer and fewer of them with time.
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:16 pmis Dave @2 aware there’s a rage-manufacturing self-righteous partisan Dave @161 and @164?
JF (97e6be) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:27 pmRejection of 2020 election results becomes defining GOP loyalty test
So, fast forward to January 2023. The GOP has narrowly won the House and added 3 seats in the Senate. First order of business? Why, impeaching Biden and Harris for the “theft” along with the AG and FBI Director for not “doing their job.”
At which point we have a Senate trial with lots and lots of witnesses about how they saw ballots being changed, or carted in in the dead of night, etc. And of course no one is convicted, but the stage is set for Trump’s re-re-election and, should he win, a rain of indictments.
What could go wrong?
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:27 pmAsk Dick Cheney. Or ask Dubya. Or Pappy Bush. Or Obama– about ‘the gap’… and the lead time necessary for operational hardware development.
Nixon demanded a shuttle, the the design NASA came up with (a flyback booster) was insanely expensive and calamitous so they came up with a cheap thing with SRBs (always a bad idea on a manned flight). Bush was building a shuttle replacement & return to the Moon design — Constellation — which Obama canceled. Of course, all those contracts were paid off. Now we are building Orion which looks a lot like Constellation. I wonder if they will cancel it too, and pay off the contracts again. That’s a sure way to never have a fatality — never have a launch.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:37 pmIt says “Clinton supporters”.
“Oh yeah, a buffer. The family had a lot of buffers!”
Willi Cici, Godfather, Part II
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:42 pmSurely you understand the difference
And Trump had nothing at all to do with what some of his “supporters” did on Jan 6.
The brownshirts are part of the campaign, just deniable.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:44 pmThulu at #77:
Itll be smiles today, frowns tomorrow when fish face sees Heidi walking up the driveway carrying a cardboard box.
urbanleftbehind (15bc08) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:49 pmThe teachers care very much.
Nic, you should know that when I (and I think many of us) trash the school system it is largely the grossly bloated and overpaid administrations we are aiming at.
I went to a public HS with 1500 students and not that much more square feet in the administration office. I think there was a principal, two VPs an 4 councilors and some secretarial. Going back there some time later and they have build an administration building.
I think the federalization of education is part of the problem, as now there needs to be people to deal with reporting at local, district, state and federal levels, as well as all kinds of programs to administer.
Frankly, I would fire half the administration and give the money to teachers, but I fear that the rot is too deep and we need to start over. Most teachers would survive that, and even do better.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:53 pmBTW, I have great respect for several of my HS teachers, one of whom gave me some guidance and help in getting into Mudd. There were some duds, too, of course.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 4:55 pmMy grandfather educated himself. He read everything he could get his hands on. He was ploughing fields with an ox in the 1930s, while he helped his sisters with their schoolwork, so you cannot tell the collapse of the education system began then. The seeds for the impending collapse my have been planted in 1930, but it didn’t have much effect on the system itself. American education was fairly consistent up to the 1960s. The thing is that back then businesses did not require a diploma or a degree for employment, only a work ethic and the desire to learn the skills required for the job, sort of like the age old master-apprentice model. No, the deterioration began in the 1960s. It was for decades in formation, by influences like the Frankfurt School that came to fruition in the 1960s and 1970s. When Stanford dropped the Great Books program and Western Civilization courses, it set the ball rolling. The collapse began in the 1980s, when schools abandoned homogenous grouping and student-centered, skills-based instruction.
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:01 pm… unlike all those other times before.
Radegunda (d5730b) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:02 pmYou should have read the whole comment @2:
The subjects of comments 161 and 164 are a state party functionary and the former president of the United States, both of whom are dedicated to, and actively engaged in, the obliteration of American democracy.
The target of your grievance-stroking post are some random nutcases on Twitter who said stupid things to get attention.
See the difference?
For every “rabid social justice crybully” spouting “spittle-flecked rage” that you rail against, do you doubt that I could find a “rabid white supremacist QAnon cultist” spouting “spittle-flecked rage” in some dark corner of the internet? Pointing out the existence of nutcases on both sides strikes me as at best uninteresting. Pretending that one side has a monopoly on them is, as I said, just rage-manufacturing.
But one side does have a monopoly on conspiring to steal a presidential election and launching, and then whitewashing, a bloody coup attempt to overturn it, and they continue to undermine democracy even as we speak.
See the difference?
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:09 pmBut one side does have a monopoly on conspiring to steal a presidential election and launching, and then whitewashing, a bloody coup attempt to overturn it, and they continue to undermine democracy even as we speak.
Yes, but they think it’s your side that did all this. They really do; they aren’t pretending.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:15 pm@178 Ah. Fortunately most teachers have better ethics than that (and in union states you can’t be fired for too many Fs. Harassed by your principal to a limited extent, but not fired). However, students are still promoted year on year until high school. In my experience the most common year to be held back seems to be 2nd grade. The thing is, if I have a student that was struggling in 2nd grade and was either held back or promoted over the teacher’s recommendation, and we test for a learning disability when they get to us years later, there’s almost always a learning disability. I have concerns about why that doesn’t get caught earlier.
I primarily specialize in ages 11-15 (late elementary to early HS, other people do early elementary and HS graduation/credit recovery work) so I’m very cognizant of the transition periods between elementary, middle/Jr, and High school and I really think our weakest area as a country is in elementary school. In my experience, we are most likely to lose kids in grades 3, 5, and whatever year they move to secondary (6, 7, or in k-8 systems, 9). But all the public wants to talk about is High school.
Nic (896fdf) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:15 pmHere you go, Dave.
https://www.floridaphoenix.com/2020/04/29/how-can-online-learning-work-if-students-arent-online-and-what-happens-if-kids-dont-participate/
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:16 pm“Treason never prospers; for it it did none date call it treason.”
If what folks say about Trump and his Nazi tendencies, had he won a rigged election, none would hall it a steal. At least not many, and not very long.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:18 pmSometimes you impress me Kevin. This isn’t one of those times.
The facts matter. Trump stood in front of the mob and gave them their orders. It’s on video tape.
But neither Rob, nor you, can come up with a single quote from Clinton herself, or a campaign official, calling Obama’s eligibility into question.
Listen to your inner Kevin rather than your inner Rob…
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:19 pmFor those of you who enjoy the stories penned by Gawain’s Ghost, check out the end of the thread just prior to the weekend open thread.
norcal (01e272) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:22 pm@Kevin@186 IMO, there are problems at the district office level. There are so many assistant super-intendants and directors of (edu-jargon) and none of us really has any idea what the actually do. I mean, I know what the titles are, but what are they really doing all day?
On the site level, unless you have a crazy studentbody, 1 admin + 1 counselor + 1 mental health professional per 300 students is probably about right (counselors deal with academic and crisis counseling, mental-health does crisis counseling and therapy, there’s some overlap but the counselors don’t do therapy and the mental health people don’t deal with academics, credits, scheduling, and other related bureaucratic tasks).
Nic (896fdf) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:27 pmThe. Facts. Matter.
Many believe it; the majority of the leaders surely do not. But they are happy to exploit it nevertheless.
A political party willing to unquestioningly accept the word of a degenerate fascist lunatic over reality is a mortal danger to our country. They cannot be allowed to gain power again.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:27 pmThat article is from over a year ago, during the rapidly improvised initial response to the crisis.
And the headline looks like clickbait, since if you read all the way to the end, it says:
In any case, it provides no support for your assertion that remote learning is impossible.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:35 pmRadegunda @ 156. Here it is in Church mode. Byzantine Plagal First.
nk (1d9030) — 5/2/2021 @ 5:52 pmFascinating inside story of the Basecamp thing.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 6:10 pmDave,
Personal attacks are verboten.
NJRob (ffc3d6) — 5/2/2021 @ 6:49 pmIn any case, it provides no support for your assertion that remote learning is impossible.
The academic racket, comrades, no more imparts learning than speakeasies impart drunkenness. It only provides the structure and serves the product, for the most part overpriced and of indifferent quality, and the customers partake according to their mood and their capacity (and the capacity of their parents’ wallets).
So, yeah, it should be no surprise that kids are teaching themselves remotely. They were teaching themselves proximately too.
nk (1d9030) — 5/2/2021 @ 6:49 pm@182. Wrong, Kevin. Nixon shelved Von Braun’s post-Apollo proposals presented to ol’Spiro, then head of the Space Council, in August, 1969; The Big Dick and Haldeman then finally killed the “Kennedy/LBJ” Apollo program for political motives by “cratering” the last three moon missions- with the hardware already bought and paid for [operational budgets were all that were needed] and then permanently closing down the Saturn assembly line.
NASA then proposed the Apollo Applications Program using remaining leftover hardware for a prototype space station: Skylab [two were built- the one in the NASM today never flew– the other could have been saved but was abandoned by the Carter Administration and left to burn up over Australia in 1979;[have a fragment of it]. ‘Détente’ dictated the space agency do the ASTP flight which wasted hardware and produced little else but PR, per Kranz’s assessment. It was the development of a ‘Space Trasportation System’- which included a space station and a much, much smaller space “shuttle”- that Nixon totally eviscerated as well. He only approved the shuttle- which Congress voted on and reported to the Apollo 16 moonwalks as they erected the U.S. flag in April, 1972. The orbiter itself was redesigned repeatedly– a ‘committee camel’– the final design dictated by DoD requirements permitting the cargo bay to carry KH-12 spysats, as development costs came from DoD budgets and the DoD would b a primary customer– w/a shuttle launch site planned [and built BTW] at Vandenberg AFB for DoD polar orbit flights. SRBs were reliable given he AF experience- but never built the size used on the final shuttle stack design– their size dictated by American railway bridges and tunnels as they were manufactured in Utah then shipped and stacked at the Cape. When Challenger blew, the AF went back to disposable LVs and NASA lost its biggest customer.
The list of poor decision by short-sighted, brain-dead American politicians is lengthy. Cheney opposed replacing shuttles and Dubya’s NASA head, O’Keefe,– a Cheney man BTW; was a rectal bean counter even willing to let Hubble die; Carter’s people let Skylab fall; Reagan rode the wings of shuttle’s early promise seeded by previous administrations [see his PR stunt at Edwards AFB, July 4, 1982;] and he directed NASA to built space station ‘Freedom’– but that’s not what eventually evolved after he left; partners gave us the ISS. Pappy Bush betrayed his own proposal in ’89 by not fighting for it and Dubya followed suit w/a proposal which lacked any significant funding as well; then Mr. Spock cancelled Constellation and hollowed out Orion. Start, stop, start, stop – hence, “gaps.” Meanwhile, Soyuz has been flying since ’68.
The only thing that survived w/”Orion Lite”- for political reasons as well- was the HLV– and, it has development issues as well. But it will eventually fly w/Orion and rival the Saturn V. It’s now “Artemis” that’s in vogue to be the first step in the next era of human space exploration. Together with commercial and international partners, NASA plans to establish a sustainable presence on the Moon to prepare for missions to Mars. It’s a plan Neil Armstrong essentially supported– mastering methods an procedures for cislunar space ops- making it akin to what Gemini was for Apollo– before progressing out to Mars. Making the next American on the moon is mere PR; for show. You know… “stylish”– a la Dirty Harry Callahan.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/2/2021 @ 6:53 pm“And Trump had nothing at all to do with what some of his “supporters” did on Jan 6.
The brownshirts are part of the campaign, just deniable.”
Trump didn’t create QAnon, but he promoted and encouraged it.
Hillary didn’t create birtherism, and she didn’t promote or encourage it.
See the difference?
Davethulhu (6ba00b) — 5/2/2021 @ 6:54 pm^ Making the next American on the moon a woman is mere PR; for show. You know… “stylish”– a la Dirty Harry Callahan.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/2/2021 @ 6:58 pm@206 nascar is in to diversity like for women. That is why they banned jennifer jo cobb from racing at talladega for inexperience. She has only raced at talladega eleven times.
asset (bde04e) — 5/2/2021 @ 7:24 pmcan come up with a single quote from Clinton herself, or a campaign official, calling Obama’s eligibility into question
As I said, lots of buffers. Trump is stupid. The Clintons are many things, but never stupid. When Paul Jones got audited during the Monica thing, there was no one to say Clinton ordered it. And he didn’t have to, Just like Henry II didn’t order Thomas Becket killed.
If their fingerprints were ever on the knife, I’d think it was a frame.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 7:29 pmWhich is to say, there is nothing bent I would not put past the Clintons, but I’d be shocked if they got caught.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 7:30 pm@Kevin@186 IMO, there are problems at the district office level. There are so many assistant super-intendants and directors of (edu-jargon) and none of us really has any idea what the actually do. I mean, I know what the titles are, but what are they really doing all day?
I remember going to a college reunion and being met by a millennial who introduced herself as the deputy assistant dean for alumni affairs (or maybe events). Or some such. They, too, have a shiny new administration building.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 7:32 pmHillary Clinton’s campaign staff was doing just fine with slandering Obama with false Muslim innuendo and claims that his success was coming from his blackness, why would his fake Kenyan narrative, from years before, concern them?
BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/2/2021 @ 7:35 pmThe. Facts. Matter.
Unlike physics, facts are slippery things in politics
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/2/2021 @ 7:51 pmSaying the absence of evidence is no impediment to your argument admits you’ve abandoned evidence-based argument for faith-based assertion. That’s your right, so long as it’s understood that such assertions are unfalsifiable. For purposes of reconstructing material events, they’re ipse dixit conversation-stoppers, barely upstream from conspiracy theories.
lurker (59504c) — 5/2/2021 @ 9:38 pmThis.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 9:55 pmIn that position, she probably pays for her salary many times over by hitting alumni up for donations.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:18 pmhttps://www.foxnews.com/media/usa-today-stacey-abrams-op-ed-georgia-boycott
And then there was USA Today pushing leftist propaganda and actually editing an editorial after the fact to try and protect Stacey Abrams from backlash after she helped get the MLB to boycott Georgia to pressure politicians to allow fraud in elections.
NJRob (eb56c3) — 5/2/2021 @ 10:35 pmDave, a 94% attendance rate for online learning is pretty high. Most schools would be overjoyed to have an attendance rate like that for in-class instruction. It may be true for certain schools in some districts, but nationwide? I doubt it. There was an article sometime last week titled something like 70% of Students Don’t Bother to Logon Now What? I searched for it but couldn’t find it, probably because I don’t remember the name of the author or the publisher. I read it, and just shook my head.
I never said remote learning is impossible. I said it is inadequate. It lacks structure and personal interaction with the teacher, not to mention other students. Kids need social interaction, adult supervision and guidance. That’s how the learn to grow up.
Some students may be teaching themselves, but how do they know what to study? And what if they don’t understand the material? Who are they going to go to for explanation, their parents? My grandfather taught himself, but he had the benefit of helping his younger sisters with schoolwork, so he knew what to study. They both graduated, by the way. He didn’t, except from business school, where he excelled.
Look, it’s not like I don’t know my way around a computer. I drove to Harlingen every day for six weeks for in-class instruction for the six required courses I needed to take in order to get my real estate license. (The instructor was a dunce in real estate compared to my mother. I’ll never forget one day I came home from junior high, and there she was, sitting on the couch, reading this thick book on real estate law. Was that required for the coursework to get her license? No, she did it for her own benefit. I do remember that later on, lawyers, who went to college and law school, would call her for advice on real estate law.) For mandatory continuing education courses to maintain my license, I took those courses online. I didn’t understand anything, I could always ask my mother.
I never met or spoke on the phone with an asset manager. Everything was done online or by fax. I very rarely ever met with a selling agent or buyer. But I spent hour upon hour researching county records and MLS to write price opinions. The county records weren’t online, when I first started, so I had to go to the courthouse and dig through filing cabinets looking for paper records I could Xerox. That was a real pain. I will admit that once the country records went online it was a tremendous relief, made my job a lot easier. I could work from home.
Here’s how it went. I would research the county records to find the exact location of the house. I deeded the legal address–subdivision name, block and lot number–because the physical address may have changed. Cities change street names and house numbers all the time. I went to this one house, and there was one address on the mailbox and another on the curb. Also, the title may not be recorded under the owner’s name. A husband buys a house puts it under his wife’s name, for example. His name is on the note that was foreclosed on, but her name is on the title. Or the house may be on family property, next to one of their parent’s house. The title is under the parent’s name; one or both of their names is on the foreclosed name. See how difficult assignments like these are? Online, it might take a couple of hours, maybe a day or two; digging through paper records in filing cabinets at the courthouse, it would take at least a month. So I fully understand the convenience of computers.
Then I would drive to the house. If occupied, tape a foreclosure notice to the door and take a picture. If vacant, call the locksmith, then do a walk through inspection, taking pictures and making notes. When I got back, I would make a list of necessary repairs, if any, and recommended repairs, with cost estimates. I knew our contractors and could guess what they would charge. Next, research MLS for comparable sales and current listings. Finally, take all this information and write a price opinion, estimated vale as is, estimated value repaired, upload the photos, and send it all to the asset manager. Over 18 years, I wrote close to 2,000 price opinions.
Usually, the asset manager would add $20,000 to $30,000 to the estimated market value, and that became the list price. That way if an offer comes in, the asset manager can pretend to come down and sell the house for profit at above market value. See how that works? The problem in real estate is that every seller thinks a house is worth more than it really is, and every buyer thinks a dream house can be bought cheap. That makes for tough negotiating. I had this one house though, when I did the inspection, that was in pristine condition, in a nice subdivision. I thought, the house will sell quick. Wrote the price opinion, got the list price. Put in on MLS in the morning, drove to the house to put up a for sale sign, ate a breakfast taco, stopped by the office on my way home to do other work, and their on my desk was a signed contract, with proof of finance and everything, for an offer at full list price. Wow. So I took it to the secretary. Could you please scan this for me, make it into an attachment, and send it my email? Sure, she said. Do you know how long it took her to do that? Less than 20 seconds. Are you kidding me? Before I could turn around, she said, all doe, and gave me the contract. All done? Yep, it’s in your email box already. I couldn’t believe it, and as I walked down the hall, I kept shaking my head in disbelief. I told my mother, look, you need to give Amy a raise. I sat down at my computer at the office, uploaded the attachment, and set it to the asset manager. Sold! was the response in less than two minutes. Unbelievable. I sent an email to the buyer’s agent, you’re offer has been accepted. That house sold in less than 4 hours after I put it on MLS. Of course, the buyer paid $25,000 over market value, but I guess he really wanted the house, besides that’s a larger commission for me. Would that all deals could be so simple.
So, I’m perfectly capable of conducting an online course. Could I give a lecture on Zoom? Sure, absolutely. Would I? No. Children need in-class, in-person instruction. They require adult supervision and guidance by a licensed professional knowledgeable about the subject matter. An online course is no problem for me, but I’m a college educated adult, with two bachelor’s degrees and a master’s degree and a lifetime teaching certificate valid in 38 states and 14 foreign countries. Children are not adults. Do not pretend to think they are.
Gawain's Ghost (b25cd1) — 5/3/2021 @ 3:38 amKevin, Are you really arguing that the Clintons were behind the birther conspiracy? Their might be a oppo paper out there that they paid for, but I didn’t recall that being a factor at all in the primary, so if someone realized they could say it there wasn’t any effort put into saying it. Definitely not the cottage industry the racists on the GOP turned it into. (Note, not saying that everyone in the GOP is or was a racist. Only that I think the birther conspiracy is a racist and was pushed by racists.)
Time123 (235fc4) — 5/3/2021 @ 6:47 amWhen you have a legal name change, you also get a new birth certificate. The date of registration of the new birth certificate is sometimes the only giveaway. At the time, I thought that was what Obama was hiding. From Obama to Soetoro to back to Obama.
Now I think that … the Clintons have got to be innocent of something!
nk (1d9030) — 5/3/2021 @ 6:59 amthe obama birther conspiracy is as racist as it would’ve been had mccain or cruz became president
obama had many opportunities to squelch it
if i needed to produce my birth certificate it would take me all of five minutes, if that
JF (e1156d) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:00 amOn an anecdotal level, Mrs. Montagu Zoomed with her special needs students until about three weeks ago, when they went to in-person learning for four days and Zooms on Wednesdays.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:11 amI can say this: the kids are obviously doing better psychologically and scholastically by physically attending (there are still four out of seventeen kids staying at home, which presents an additional challenge), but the Zoom learning wasn’t terrible. The most important thing is that it connected the kids and teachers. The human contact brought them closer, imperfect as laptop screens are. With special needs kids, it’s all the more important for the kids to bond with their teachers, and they took a number of steps to make that happen.
For example, one day every week a different kid was spotlighted, so the teachers and kids had a great opportunity to learn more about their classmates, and each kid felt special because they were given all this attention. When they reunited in class, it was like a celebration because they became friends and grew to know each other online.
I don’t understand what you mean by this; the obama birther conspiracy is as racist as it would’ve been had mccain or cruz became president
Time123 (235fc4) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:11 amMichelle Obama “rebranded” Barack? Is that what you call courtship and marriage?
I did not realize Barack applied to Harvard under the name Barry Soetero. Do you have a cite?
And really, what difference does it make that for a few years his stepfather’s last name was Soetero, or that his nickname was Barry? Where does all this weird obsession with Obama’s upbringing come from?
And sure, some low level campaign workers for Clinton spread stupid rumors. If you;ve ever worked for any political campaign you know it sucks in large numbers of unreliable people who are best used to distribute leaflets but sometimes get near email. So the hell what. To pretend that the noxious birther conspiracy theorizing that was a mainstay of Republican politics for many years was somehow the fault of Clinton demonstrates, once again, the irredeemable bad faith of conservative America.
Victor (4959fb) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:14 amMy assumption is that he was pissed that his citizenship was being questioned by racists and opportunists so he sat on is longform out pique.
He might also have wanted to get everyone focused on that as the definitive piece of evidence for maximum impact when he did release it. There was copious evidence prior to it’s release that he was born in Hawaii. The birther’s weren’t doing a good faith inquiry into a question that was in reasonable doubt. But I think annoyance is a more likely explanation.
Time123 (235fc4) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:19 amyou honestly didn’t know that mccain and cruz had their own birther controversies?
JF (e1156d) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:20 amJF, Now I understand where you’re coming from. Those weren’t very big controversies and I don’t recall any of their political opponents trying to make those take off.
Time123 (ae9d89) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:23 amJF, seems like you’re trying to imply that a racist conspiracy theory that was embraced for years by the leader to GOP is either not a big deal, or was somewhat Obama’s fault.
Time123 (ae9d89) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:27 amThey were faux controversies, instigated by the same ilk of nutjobs who believed Obama was born in Kenya.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:30 amIt was the headstands the Democrats were doing over McCain’s birth that, more than anything else, made me think that there was really some substance behind the Obama birtherism. McCain was the son and grandson of four-star admirals in the U.S. Navy, who had battleships named after them, but his “naturalness” was questioned because he was born in the Panama Canal Zone, where his father was stationed at the time. Up to where Claire McCaskill “did him the favor” of bringing a resolution in the Senate to have him declared a natural born citizen.
So, like, I mean, you know, …, Victor.
nk (1d9030) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:32 amMcCain’s was big enough that it was necessary for Obama’s law professor to help craft a Senate Resolution to try and squelch the issue. The Senate then voted on McCains’s eligibility.
BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:32 amhttps://www.buzzfeednews.com/amphtml/mckaycoppins/romneys-birth-certificate-joke-wasnt-planned-sa
BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:36 amPlaying the victim card is what Democrats do better than anything else. I think it’s pathetic. My biggest peeve against Trump is that he taught a large portion of the Republican base to play it too.
nk (1d9030) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:41 am11. JF (e1156d) — 4/30/2021 @ 8:53 pm several weeks after the mutant strain was known, ban to go into effect immediately… meaning tuesday
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:44 am@230, I think that was politics. Repeated new stories about McCain’s family history of military service couldn’t have been helpful for the dems.
Time123 (235fc4) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:46 am@232, The trump wing of the republican party is the most easily aggrieved coalition I’ve ever seen.
Time123 (ae9d89) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:47 amQuestioning some people’s eligibility is “politics,” questioning other’s is nut-job racism.
BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:52 amJF (e1156d) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:00 am
I think he was embarrassed to admit that his family threw out his original birth certificate from 1961. It had no legal value any more. Although maybe it still had value at the time is family lost it. It was probably among his mother’s effects in 1995..
What counts now is a state certified copy.
Look at what he eventually produced.
https://obamawhitehouse.archives.gov/sites/default/files/rss_viewer/birth-certificate-long-form.pdf
Look at the bottom left. It is dated April 25, 2011. I think Obama thought it would have been worse to produce a copy dated a week or two before.
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:53 amWith the exception of the coalition of the easily aggrieved by the Trump wing. It reminds me of a joke my dad told me:
“Do you know what I really hate about atheists? All they ever do is talk about God”
BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:55 amMcCain didn’t need a Senate resolution to be qualified for president. It was a goodwill gesture by a colleague.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:00 amMcCain was fathered by a US citizen (even took that US citizen’s name) and exited the birth canal of a US citizen, and the birth took place on US-controlled territory. There’s no “controversy”.
Cruz’s mom is a US citizen who happened spit out her son in Canada. No “controversy” there either.
Not according to his body man:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.washingtonexaminer.com/youtube-video-of-reggie-love-interview-deleted-after-comments-hit-drudge%3f_amp=true
BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:03 amI agree on their eligibilities, Paul. But only McCain went through the embarrassment of a dog and pony show.
BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:05 amhttps://fivethirtyeight.com/features/american-politics-now-has-two-big-racial-divides
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:07 amIt was a goodwill gesture by a colleague.
It was a cheap shot disguised as a goodwill gesture. On the level of LBJ’s “We’ll let him deny it”. It’s Claire McCaskill we’re talking about.
nk (1d9030) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:08 amhttps://www.wsj.com/articles/schools-coronavirus-remote-learning-lockdown-tech-11591375078
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:17 amSF: I think he was embarrassed to admit that his family threw out his original birth certificate from 1961.
That was wrong.
240 BuDuh (0cb6a2) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:03 am
, I went too far in saying his family threw it out. It was that he couldn’t find it in 2008. They didn’t throw out his mother’s papers. They just didn’t organize them.
After he was president he found it — but his people dissuaded him from releasing it.
So why didn’t he release his original birth certificate?
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:30 am224. Time123 (235fc4) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:19 am
The state of Hawaii, at the time, published the names of all babies born in Hawaii in the newspapers. The Governor of Hawaii from 2010 to 2014, Neil Abercrombie, was one of the acquaintances of Stanley Ann Dunham at the time of his birth, and knew personally that Barack Obama had been born in Hawaii. It would have been totally idiotic, expensive and dangerous, to have visited Kenya during the time of the Mau Mau rebellion, and she certainly wouldn’t do it for the medical expertise.
When he finally found it, after he was president, he wanted to show it to the press, but his political advisers, some of whom could have been doubling as top White House staff, persuaded him it wouldn’t be a good idea. Was it because the controversy was dead at the time? Or because they could have argued it was a forgery?
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:41 am49,
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/3/2021 @ 9:05 amThe FDAis expected to approve the Pfizer vaccine for emergency use for people ages 12 to 15.
The MTA has announced it is going back to 24 hour service on May 17. Governor Cuomo is really retreating on closures. (he controls the MTA)
https://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/ny-nyc-mta-overnight-subway-service-returns-20210503-cmguz5wue5ehvnbpud7wlb4fx4-story.html
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/3/2021 @ 9:11 amsammy wrote
I think it was several things.
1. As you pointed out there was plenty of good evidence to prove where he was born. The birthers rejected it. I doubt one more pc of paper would have convinced them that a black man could actually be the American President. They might have wanted to hold it as part of a strategy.
2. We treat analyze this as if his feelings on the matter play no role. But it’s entirely possible that he held it because he was pissed at the accusation, didn’t want to be pushed into it, and wanted to release it on his terms after the birthers had exposed themselves for what they are.
I’d love to see an interview where he spelled out his thinking.
Time123 (ea2b98) — 5/3/2021 @ 10:23 amif i needed to produce my birth certificate it would take me all of five minutes, if that
Governments lose documents all the time. A while back I had to try to find my deceased step-father’s WW2 discharge papers (to qualify my ailing mother for a VA benefit). His original family wasn’t willing to help (my mother had pissed them off), so we had to ask the VA for the records.
Unfortunately, there had been a fire 30 years earlier in St Louis and the primary records were destroyed. The VA was able to compile enough information for other records to show that he had an honorable discharge, but it took almost a year.
When everything is on paper, lots of things can go wrong.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/3/2021 @ 11:50 amThe whole “Kenya” thing was stupid anyway, since birth in Kenya would not have disqualified him, any more than Cruz’ birth in Canada would. McCain had the extra benefit of a law making the Canal Zone US territory for this purpose.
Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/3/2021 @ 11:54 amCheney calls out Trump’s latest attempt to promote ‘BIG LIE’ amid criticism from within her own party
That she is literally alone, among so-called Republicans, in pushing back against Trump’s fascist sedition, shows how far her colleagues have fallen.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/3/2021 @ 12:14 pmIt’s Trump’s party now. Everyone who doesn’t love Trump should shut up and stay home. But I admire that Cheney isn’t willing to bend the knee even if it costs her job.
Time123 (ea2b98) — 5/3/2021 @ 12:17 pmA Republican senator who voted for the Big Lie now thinks we should all just move on
He didn’t mention whether he had shared this advice to move on with President-Reject Trump, but I think we can guess.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/3/2021 @ 12:36 pmR.I.P. Bill Gates’s Marriage
Icy (6abb50) — 5/3/2021 @ 1:43 pmHa, Icy! I saw that you had the latest comment on the top right of the screen, and I had to see who died.
I wasn’t expecting an unconventional R.I.P.!
norcal (01e272) — 5/3/2021 @ 1:52 pmPre-nup… or will her get Bezo-ed and McCartney-ed.
He could always get a gig at an Apple Store.
😉
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/3/2021 @ 1:54 pm^he
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/3/2021 @ 1:55 pmMemo to Liz Cheney:
Get your head straight, dear: the “Big Lie” was -and is– trickle down economics; Reaganomics. No why don’t you get some coffee for the boys at the party.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/3/2021 @ 1:57 pmCalling anything the “big lie” to evoke Nazi imagery is just giving aid and comfort to the radical left trying to tear apart the nation. Anyone who uses that terminology is trying to divide the country, not unite it. Carry on
NJRob (5f76f8) — 5/3/2021 @ 4:28 pmGlad you agree about this at least, NJRob:
Link at top of Dave’s 254.
nk (1d9030) — 5/3/2021 @ 4:39 pmYes, of course, Trump is trying to divide the country. He’s no different than Antifa and the BLM rioters at this point. An unemployable loser with nothing else to do except make trouble and look for a chance to pick up some loot.
nk (1d9030) — 5/3/2021 @ 4:43 pmCheney’s remarks were in response to Trump, who said in a written statement on Monday, “The Fraudulent Presidential Election of 2020 will be, from this day forth, known as THE BIG LIE!”
Except it’s not.
“THE BIG LIE” is the Neocon bull-crap droppings she shovels from the floor of Darth Daddy’s bat cave — and the trickle-down Reaganomics it rots in. The train left the station without her 10 years ago.
DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/3/2021 @ 4:50 pmWords mean things, Rob.
The phrase fits what Trump did and is still doing. If you want to whine about its Hitlerian etymology, that’s a separate conversation.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/3/2021 @ 4:50 pmHave someone read this to you slowly and loudly: Trump said “THE BIG LIE”. Liz responded.
nk (1d9030) — 5/3/2021 @ 4:57 pmHere’s a good way to find out if you live in a political bubble. For me, 59% of my neighbors are Republican, so the answer is “no”, but Seattle is just a 35-minute drive away.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/3/2021 @ 5:12 pmI mark all sorts of endings… 😏
Icy (6abb50) — 5/3/2021 @ 6:01 pmI didn’t like Trump trying to co-opt the phrase either nk. It’s obnoxious and disingenuous.
Now do the other side .
NJRob (24d956) — 5/3/2021 @ 6:09 pmCool tool, Paul.
Of the thousand voters closest to my house in Reno, 49% are Republicans, 48% are Democrats, and 3% are independents. (The Rs and Ds flip if I use my neighbor’s address. I guess he’s a Democrat. :))
Does anybody else have such a balanced breakdown?
norcal (01e272) — 5/3/2021 @ 6:26 pmIf you’re looking for a more obnoxious woman than the Cypress CC “teacher”, get a load of this. She talked like both professional BLMer, calling the traffic cop and murderer over and over, and then made a racist taunt like a veteran Proud Girl. Maybe she’s a Boogaloo. Or just plain nuts.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:24 pmOfficer (to radio): Dispatch, you copy all that?
Radio: Affirmative. *static* Use of unnecessary violence…approved.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:44 pmThe “you’ll never be white” taunt could have been along the lines of the “Uncle Tim” or “Oreo” tag. Telling him that he was on the wrong side — a running dog lackey of the white systemic racist oppressors. Maybe.
And Boogaloo works for “murderer”, too. Randy Weaver, Waco, the Bundies in Oregon, that ilk.
But I think I’ll go with “lady in desperate need of fresh batteries for her vibrator”. Because I like to think the best of people.
nk (1d9030) — 5/3/2021 @ 7:55 pmI like to think the best of people, too, as long as I don’t have to visualize that racist karen actually using her vibrating friend.
Paul Montagu (26e0d1) — 5/3/2021 @ 8:07 pmI miss Dana.
Dave (1bb933) — 5/3/2021 @ 10:13 pmShe’s a clear racist BLMer. Her attitude and lack of professionalism are a tribute to her profession.
NJRob (eb56c3) — 5/3/2021 @ 11:19 pm257. DCSCA (f4c5e5) — 5/3/2021 @ 1:54 pm
No pre-nup, but before they went to court (Melinda filed the actual petition) they negotiated a separation agreement.
Of course, I wonder what this is all about. It can’t be that couldn’t agree on where to love or what kind of a house – they have more than one house.
Did somebody have an affair?
Did somebody tell an important lie?
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/4/2021 @ 9:36 amWell, Sammy, I’ll tell you, the guess is easier if you know that
1. A pledge to charity is binding;
2. Bill Gates signed The Giving Pledge with Warren Buffet to give away 95% of his fortune;
3. Melinda is the mother of his three children; and
4. If she did not sign the pledge too, she now gets to save at least 50% of the fortune for her posterity.
But it’s really none of our business, anyhow.
nk (1d9030) — 5/4/2021 @ 10:37 amSpeaking of Proud x, are some chapters going Gun-For-Hire protecting Asians from street toughs?
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2021/05/04/proud-boys-chinese-americans-community-support-donations/7343111002/
urbanleftbehind (355161) — 5/4/2021 @ 11:19 amThey said it wouldn’t effect their philanthropy.
The only thing different thereis that Bill Gates used to be interested more in diseases and now he is somewhat more interesteddd in climate change.
There is one thing that actually was known over 20 years ago
https://nypost.com/2021/05/04/bill-gates-took-getaways-with-old-girlfriend-after-marriage
She was five years older tan he was. He met her in 1984 and they stayed a couple till 1987 when she wanted to sett;e down. She approved of his choice for marriage. (I guess by then she was too old or almost too old)
He used to have a getaway with her every year – at least until 1997.
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/4/2021 @ 12:51 pmPutting the “vice” in vice-principal or “Florida Woman: The Homecoming”.
nk (1d9030) — 5/5/2021 @ 7:48 am251 Kevin M (ab1c11) — 5/3/2021 @ 11:54 am
They lied both about the facts and about the law. Distributing the burden to make it easier.
Whoever won in 2008 would have been the first president of the United States born outside the 48 states of the Continental United States.
Herbert Hoover was the first U.S. president born west of the Mississippi. Then came Truman and Eisenhower and Johnson and Nixon and Ford (botn in South Dakota) but not Reagan (born in Illinois) or Bush I (born in Conn) – and also Clinton and Bush II. FDR, Kennedy, Carter and now Biden were als born in the eastern portion of the United States.
For awhile the Supreme Court of the United States had no Protestants on it.
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/7/2021 @ 1:23 pmTime123 (ea2b98) — 5/3/2021 @ 10:23 am
His initial reaction, when he finally found it, was to show it to the press.
The interview wasn’t with Obama and it has been taken down and also at least one YouTube copy. I’d like to hear more exactly the story of what happened when he found it.
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/7/2021 @ 1:27 pmBiden poke today about the economic statistics, which I didn’t realize till the Bloomberg news commentary came on, were not as good as expected.
He took credit for the recovery and said his plan was working. There’s not been enough time!
He seems to silently suppose a gap year between pre-K and first grade.
He’s right about the increased unemployment benefits not causing people to decline to take jobs, although he had no idea why, Everyone knows this is temporary. So less secure. The economists say fear if Covid does cause people to decline work.
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/7/2021 @ 3:39 pmThe weather is like March 27. Are you sure you want more cooling?
Sammy Finkelman (51cd0c) — 5/7/2021 @ 3:39 pmDaang! njrob and nk – standing toe-to-toe. These are my friends, and I am proud of it.
felipe (484255) — 5/7/2021 @ 3:49 pm