Kellyanne Conway: Biden Has A Big Problem Because Democrats Call His Behavior “Completely Inappropriate”
[guest post by Dana]
And Republicans call Trump’s behavior what, Kellyanne??
This is classic:
.@KellyannePolls on @JoeBiden: If anybody just types in “Creepy Uncle Joe Videos” you come up with a treasure trove…I think Joe Biden has a big problem here because he calls it affection and handshakes, his party calls it completely inappropriate. pic.twitter.com/MKbbw2mUIC
— FoxNewsSunday (@FoxNewsSunday) March 31, 2019
So without a hint of irony or self-awareness, Conway admits she admires the courage it would take for a member of the Democrat party to call out one of their own, yet simultaneously ignores the Huge Elephant in the room: that she herself did not call out President Trump, but instead went to work for him. And while Conway smugly claims that Joe Biden has a “big problem” because his party calls his behavior “completely inappropriate,” she also studiously ignores the fact that her own party couldn’t even do that much with regard to Trump. The GOP, which believes that the Party is firmly planted on the moral high ground, didn’t even have the will to call out one of their own. In fact, the Party happily overlooked his inappropriate behavior and made excuses for him, while periodically clucking their tongues in an obligatory shame on you, eventually leading them to look the other way in order to give Trump full support.
As a reminder, here are a few choice statements from our sitting president:
You know and …I moved on her, actually. You know, she was down on Palm Beach. I moved on her, and I failed. I’ll admit it. I did try and f*** her. She was married… I moved on her very heavily. I moved on her like a bitch. But I couldn’t get there. And she was married. Then all of a sudden I see her, she’s now got the big phony tits and everything. She’s totally changed her look.
Also:
“I’m automatically attracted to beautiful women — I just start kissing them, it’s like a magnet. Just kiss. I don’t even wait. And when you’re a star, they let you do it. You can do anything,” he said in the 2005 conversation. “Grab ’em by the pussy.”
Anyway, I realize it’s unpopular to make these observations, but Conway’s comments once again bring to light how much the Republican Party shot themselves in the foot when they got behind Trump. This is nothing new, but I think it’s good to be reminded of just how far the GOP was willing to go to see Trump get elected, and as a result, where the party is today. The tone-deaf Conway unwittingly illustrates the long distance traveled, as well as making it clear that sadly, the moral high ground is no longer something that the Republican Party can claim.
(Cross-posted at The Jury Talks Back.)
–Dana
How is it possible to be incredibly tone-deaf?
Dana (023079) — 4/1/2019 @ 2:42 pmAnyway, I realize it’s unpopular to make these observations
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/1/2019 @ 2:54 pmWhat’s up with this stuff? Where is it unpopular? Certainly not here. How are you unpopular for twisting around an issue about Biden to turn it back on Trump? Oh, wait I see what you’re doing there …
What you call shooting oneself in the foot others might call getting rid of outdated baggage.
Kishnevi (413847) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:01 pmI agree with you, but would enlarge your point. With Trump’s nomination, the GOP abandoned any pretense that it wanted integrity and competence in a politician. It merely wants to make sure that it keeps its hands on the levers of power that control who appoints the bureaucrats and judges and appropriates the federal funding. Rather like the Democrats, in fact.
Agreed, Kishnevi.
Dana (023079) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:08 pmI have long maintained that there is very, very little daylight between Republicans and Democrats. Save for the issue of abortion, there is no difference. In word perhaps, but not in deed.
Dana (023079) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:22 pmIf both groups have abandoned any pretense that it wanted integrity and competence in a politician is there any reason to keep trying to score points on Trump supporters while telling Trump supporters they don’t get a turn?
Please tell me it’s some plan to return us to the days of honest and competent politicians like McCain, Bush, and Romney. Or maybe Clinton, Gore, or Carter.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:23 pmFainting couches are now at maximum occupancy… repeat, fainting couches are now at maximum occupancy…
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:31 pmNot a problem, or insignificant in comparison to all the other factors that go into choosing a president..
And she would say the same thing for Joe Biden.
It’s Democrats who call it completely inappropriate.
She’s not weighing in as to whether it is affection and handshakes, or completely inapropriate
She’s losing sight of, or doesn’t imagine, that Biden’s being slandered, but that will become clear if Biden doesn’t abandon the race.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:36 pm6, Ford and Dole!
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:37 pmMcCain-Booosh-Mittens
mg (8cbc69) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:37 pm3 Blind Rats
https://lawandcrime.com/high-profile/its-not-affection-its-sexism-second-woman-accuses-joe-biden-of-inappropriate-touching/
I say have the FBI interview the kids he’s (at the very least) nuzzled and record said interviews, none of this “302” stuff…
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:38 pmDemocrats ignored that, because it wasn’t a crime (except for those in the military)
Democats ignored Trump’s claim that they let him do it.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:42 pm“Hi, sweetheart… heard you slipped on a little ice today, glad yer okay… and no, that’s not a .38 you feel trained on your bottom… it’s a .44 Magnum…”
—- Joe Biden
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:43 pmIf Joe Biden quits, everyone will think these women were telling the truth. If he doesn’t, and fights back, he will win the nomination.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:43 pmOr lose to somebody decent at least.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:45 pmThe CBS Evening News tonight reported ona trial for a cure for cancer that worked. Now, that wold ahve been worth bribing somebody to get into – not admission to some college!
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:57 pmand yet he was vice president for eight years, presiding over the stimulus fraud, helped turn Karzai into our enemy, certainly prevent maliki from being removed for years,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:58 pmTim Young
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/1/2019 @ 3:59 pm@TimRunsHisMouth
There are so many women suddenly coming out against Joe Biden that you’d think Trump had just nominated him to the Supreme Court.
12:06 PM · Apr 1, 2019
Dana, here is a thought: why not run candidates who don’t act like this? Crazy, right?
Simon Jester (c8876d) — 4/1/2019 @ 4:01 pm/thread
Dave (8d4d9b) — 4/1/2019 @ 4:11 pmunlike Ellison, he doesn’t have a 9/11 tape, Fairfax’s accusers were suddenly pulled out of the memory hole last week, unfortunately miss flores had her altercation when the ‘war on women’ was over,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/1/2019 @ 4:12 pmgroper joe is finished republicans don’t expect much ask david stringer rep. (R) az. or don shooter rep. (R)az.
lany (fe2421) — 4/1/2019 @ 4:14 pmthe press covered up biden with a gauzy towel for eight years, but ‘binders full of women’, I think next time they’ll nominate a serial killer, I’m only half joking,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/1/2019 @ 4:15 pm22, they’re headed to the R. Bud Dwyer Hall of Disrepute.
urbanleftbehind (78495b) — 4/1/2019 @ 4:39 pmwhere is cronwell when we need him:
https://babalublog.com/2019/03/31/visit-to-communist-cuba-by-british-royals-left-a-lasting-impression-on-the-castro-dictatorship-monarchy-or-death/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/1/2019 @ 4:50 pmGrope and Change
mg (8cbc69) — 4/1/2019 @ 5:25 pmBiden 2020
Grope and Change
Biden 2020
That would make an awesome t-shirt. Put a dot in the 0’s and hands underneath “holding” them up.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/1/2019 @ 5:46 pmTrump claimed that a well connected man could grope an ambitious woman without serious consequences. Kamala Harris has proven him right.
Gary Hoffman (7ec1de) — 4/1/2019 @ 5:47 pmNot everyone who self-identifies as Republican “happily overlook[s Trump’s] inappropriate behavior and ma[kes] excuses for him, while periodically clucking their tongues in an obligatory shame on you, eventually leading them to look the other way in order to give Trump full support.” Not everyone who self-identifies as Republican lacks “the will to call out one of their own.”
In fact, I will put my record of “calling out” Donald Trump up against anyone’s — Republican or Democrat or independent, including the authors of this blog.
I therefore take this occasion to ask the authors of this blog to stop painting with this convenient but spectacularly overbroad brush.
Regardless, I will continue to “call out” Donald Trump, to oppose him within my own party, and to attempt to persuade my fellow Republicans and indeed, my fellow Americans, to see him clearly and hold him responsible for his many and manifest failings.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 5:48 pmIf you can’t tell that Kellianne and George Conway are already vigorously pimping the book they’ll publish together, and probably the Fox television show that will accompany it, after she leaves the White House, you’re not paying close attention.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 5:50 pm“Dana, here is a thought: why not run candidates who don’t act like this? Crazy, right?”
Simon Jester (c8876d) — 4/1/2019 @ 4:01 pm
Great point. How about a Brett Kavanaugh or Bush Sr.? Tone deaf, anyone?
http://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-41987895
George Bush Snr accused of groping by eighth woman
Conway’s point is that the Dems are all about believing the accuser, when the only moral high ground is in holding to innocent until proven guilty.
Munroe (8f2207) — 4/1/2019 @ 5:53 pmFrom the same outfit:
https://www.thecut.com/2019/04/what-was-the-washington-post-afraid-of.html?utm_source=fb&fbclid=IwAR2CIHt3uxqFfetU7kxRtp2k1l96k9B8ya-9CkS820wzJDYwdjj8B0UP8SE
Narciso (63999f) — 4/1/2019 @ 5:55 pmNo, looking at Biden’s two accusers, Lucy Flores and Amy Lappos, I don’t believe that he is a sexual pervert. I believe he is concealing a deeper and maybe darker secret:
nk (dbc370) — 4/1/2019 @ 5:59 pmHe is severely visually impaired!
To the point of being considered blind. Going from my experience when I had problems with my eye, he might not even distinguish shapes, just variations in a blurry darkness. It would also explain the touching and the sniffing. Blind people learn to “see” with their other senses, primarily touch, but smell too.
https://static.pjmedia.com/instapundit/wp-content/uploads/2019/04/Screen-Shot-2019-04-01-at-19.26.16.png
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/1/2019 @ 6:01 pm@1. You don’t get it; Trumpsters do:
The ex-Veep,
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/1/2019 @ 6:05 pmDoes a squeeze he’s a creep;
But the Prez,
Slides his hands up your legs;
So uptight, the Forever-Far-Right;
That’s Entertainment!
So Bezos was covering for 60 minutes, and was scooped by farrow.
Narciso (63999f) — 4/1/2019 @ 6:17 pmConway’s point is that the Dems are all about believing the accuser, when the only moral high ground is in holding to innocent until proven guilty
No, it’s not. It’s “Caesar’s wife”: avoiding even the appearance of impropriety. Pence at least understands that. That’s the point of not being alone with any female.
Kishnevi (7289ba) — 4/1/2019 @ 6:19 pmThe standard for posting on Patterico seems to have hit an all time bottom low.
That’s a major disappointment.
McKiernan (e30982) — 4/1/2019 @ 6:29 pm@ Beldar:
I know this, Beldar, and assumed (perhaps mistakenly) that readers know that as well. This especially as I myself have identified as a Republican my entire adult life up until the 2016 election cycle. Now, while I still believe in conservative principles, desperately want to see government decrease, and would appreciate even a modicum of concern displayed by Republican leadership about the bloated budget (deficit) and out of control spending, I no longer find myself at home in the GOP. I know others here are in the same boat. It was not my intention to throw every Republican in the same basket. I’ve made it clear here on numerous occasions that good, decent people who identify as Republicans also voted for Trump. I easily accept that those voters felt it was the only option available. I’m not going to get in a competition of who has a stronger record of calling out Trump but will say that I will make a concerted effort to make clearer distinctions when discussing Republicans in the future. Thank you for your comment.
Dana (023079) — 4/1/2019 @ 6:53 pm29. That leaves one question in my mind: why bother with the Republican party anymore? They don’t espouse small-r “republican” ideals. In fact, the current state of the American body-politic looks like nothing more than a p***ing match to me, to decide who gets to hold the reins of [unconstitutional] power every couple of years.
Gryph (08c844) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:06 pmYeah, well, I’m a major disappointment to myself at times too, so I don’t know what to tell you.
Dana (023079) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:07 pmTrust me it’s gone much lower, like any post regarding avenattis client or the Wolffs wurlitzer (soon to be dramatized on showtime) as to general disappointment with center right parties look across the pond.
Narciso (63999f) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:17 pmBut if you like in califirnia or New York (where Cuomo agrees with DeVos, apparently) or Illinois it doesn’t matter what you think.
Narciso (63999f) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:19 pm@39. Welcome to 1964. 😉
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:22 pmSo slo Jo’s propensities were ignored for a time:
Narciso (63999f) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:24 pmhttps://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/436816-joe-bidens-2020-ukrainian-nightmare-a-closed-probe-is-revived
Given the character of this day and age, the only living American who could possibly beat Trump at his own game with his own weaponry is… Oprah Winfrey.
Sorry, it’s so, Joe.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:35 pm#46: there are few places anymore among conservative-leaning sites where it’s okay to say the president has done something to be disapproved. On other sites, the mildest criticism is met with a torrent of invective.
Radegunda (694c3c) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:39 pmThe extent to which the GOP has now become the “thou shalt not criticize Donald Trump” party is quite dismaying. That attitude among the faithful began in the primaries (when Trump was still getting friendly treatment in the press).
It’s weird how so many people are so personally, emotionally invested in the proposition that Trump can do no wrong, that he always knows better and acts more virtuously than any critics, and that disagreeing with that view is un-American.
47: Actually, Dana was pointing out the tone-deafness (to put it mildly) of Kellyanne’s expressions of moral disapproval of Joe Biden. Another word is hypocrisy.
Radegunda (694c3c) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:41 pmNo, it isn’t.
Dana (023079) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:45 pm=sigh= Biden is a scumbag; Trump is an entertaining scumbag.
Voting viewers at home see and get the difference.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/1/2019 @ 7:57 pmI am disappointed to see Dana criticized like this. Her post specifically calls out the Republican Party as irresponsible and hypocritical, not individual Republicans.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:02 pmBut reading these comments, there are several people who seem very sensitive. I think this post touched a few nerves.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:05 pm@53. Perhaps it would be a clearer, sharper point if conservatives were specified as opposed to the party as a whole in general. The tail doesn’t wag the dog anymore.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:08 pm@ Dana (#39): Thanks. Your future efforts will be worthwhile. Did I somehow miss the references to “Republican Party” in my original read-through?
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:14 pmYes, Beldar, you did.
Dana (023079) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:20 pmI think you’re still using an overbroad brush when you condemn the entire Party, Dana, rather than individuals, or an identifiable class of individuals, within it. So I do genuinely hope you’ll make that concerted effort you’ve promised, to prevent this sort of misunderstanding.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:36 pmIf the Democratic party is getting rid of their predators (Biden, what’s-his-name from SNL) and the Republican party isn’t, is there a point where the Democrats gain the moral high-ground that the Republicans used to hold?
Nic (896fdf) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:42 pm58. When the Republican Party starts pushing for the repeal of the 16th and 17th amendment, and when my state’s Republican Party finally allows industrial hemp production in my predominantly-agricultural home state, then I will start to believe they give a greasy brown s**t about doing right by our freedom. Until then, it’s a bunch of fork-tongued politicians who occasionally manage to say s**t most Americans want to hear — and little more.
Gryph (08c844) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:52 pm59. Given the Dems support for Moloch worship, not bloody likely. It’s okay to believe that all politicians are scummy pukes. That’s where the evidence points.
Gryph (08c844) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:54 pmThose of us who’ve chosen to remain within the GOP, despite our disagreements with and about Trump, will appreciate the greater precision of critics who take the trouble to distinguish between the Party and the various Trump factions within it. (I use the plural, “factions,” because on some issues, e.g., the Kavanaugh confirmation, even Susan Collins is part of a “Trump faction.”)
Those of us who’ve chosen to stay are going to be responsible for trying to undo as much as possible of the damage he’s left behind. I view that as a monumental undertaking, one that I expect to be engaged upon for the rest of my own life, in fact. I regret that so many have bailed out; I hope they’ll return; but in the meantime, I’d appreciate them being accurate, which will avoid misunderstandings and spare needless offense.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:55 pm62. Good luck with that. You’ll need it.
Gryph (08c844) — 4/1/2019 @ 8:56 pmBeldar, at some point can’t continued membership in an organization support a reasonable inference about agreement with the organization’s statements, tactics and actions?
Granted, any given member may make clear that no such inference should be drawn in their case (as you have done). But I agree with Dana’s point – the Republican party, as an institution, has been seduced into defending and enabling dishonest and immoral behavior that would have been castigated by its members only a few years ago.
Criticizing the organization, and criticizing its individual members, are not mutually exclusive. Certainly it is standard practice in the case of individual Democrats, on one hand, and the Democratic party on the other; why should it be off-limits for the Republican party (which as Dana and Kishnevi have eloquently pointed out, decided in 2016 to race the Democrats to the bottom, and against all odds, succeeded)?
Dave (1bb933) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:10 pm@59. Moral high ground? It was always sucker bait; a false flag. Start w/Gingrich, Dole, Hastert, Foley, Vitter and so on and work your way down the list.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:13 pm@64. ‘… seduced into enabling dishonest and immoral behavior…’
No. Just hypocrisy outed; that would be news to Newt. Or Rudy. Or Foley. Or any number of Fox employees. Etc., etc.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:21 pmCan we put a carbon tax on gaslighting? Is that a thing? I wish that was a thing.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:24 pm“Two years after leaving office, Joe Biden couldn’t resist the temptation last year to brag to an audience of foreign policy specialists about the time as vice president that he strong-armed Ukraine into firing its top prosecutor.
In his own words, with video cameras rolling, Biden described how he threatened Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in March 2016 that the Obama administration would pull $1 billion in U.S. loan guarantees, sending the former Soviet republic toward insolvency, if it didn’t immediately fire Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin.
“I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion.’ I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money,’” Biden recalled telling Poroshenko.
“Well, son of a b*tch, he got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time,” Biden told the Council on Foreign Relations event, insisting that President Obama was in on the threat.
Interviews with a half-dozen senior Ukrainian officials confirm Biden’s account, though they claim the pressure was applied over several months in late 2015 and early 2016, not just six hours of one dramatic day. Whatever the case, Poroshenko and Ukraine’s parliament obliged by ending Shokin’s tenure as prosecutor. Shokin was facing steep criticism in Ukraine, and among some U.S. officials, for not bringing enough corruption prosecutions when he was fired.
But Ukrainian officials tell me there was one crucial piece of information that Biden must have known but didn’t mention to his audience: The prosecutor he got fired was leading a wide-ranging corruption probe into the natural gas firm Burisma Holdingsthat employed Biden’s younger son, Hunter, as a board member.
U.S. banking records show Hunter Biden’s American-based firm, Rosemont Seneca Partners LLC, received regular transfers into one of its accounts — usually more than $166,000 a month — from Burisma from spring 2014 through fall 2015, during a period when Vice President Biden was the main U.S. official dealing with Ukraine and its tense relations with Russia.”
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/436816-joe-bidens-2020-ukrainian-nightmare-a-closed-probe-is-revived
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:25 pm“Pat” is Mr. Pink. He has been banned here so many times I can’t count them. I have had to ban an entire IP block in order to stop him from posting here. That is probably going to get Icy. I’ll try to refine it to allow Icy to post.
Patterico (3717b4) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:26 pmWhen we get to the point where a sexual harasser gets nominated to the high court by a handsy president, we’ve reached a nadir and become a party of hypocrites. If only we could return to the days when we took an unwavering stand on rock solid moral principles — before Bush 41 and Clarence Thomas.
Munroe (1c1251) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:27 pmOff-topic, but when I recently read this article, I immediately thought of you…
Dave (1bb933) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:28 pmBiden’s election would be the fuggin’ we get to top off the fuggin’ we got during the 8 years of the Obama-Biden Reign of Error.
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:29 pm@69. Very old news but here’s the poop on it; it’s in what they called a ‘jett bag’– all the landings left leavings. And there’s pictures of it, too! For It’s a small white bag tossed under the LM in the photos. Weight issues. OTOH, they brought some back, too, aboard the CM. Some NASA lab wag had the dirty chore of analyzing it, too.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/1/2019 @ 9:37 pmAssuming the GOP has become (*cough* not sure that’s the right tense *cough*) a pit of hypocrisy where will you go to protect your integrity? Where is this bastion of morally upstanding politicians that you can vote for who represent you as a person?
You can’t go over to the D’s. And I’m not trying to score points on D’s. Just asking where you’ll go. I would love less hypocrisy and good policies.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:07 pmSo without a hint of irony or self-awareness, Conway admits she admires the courage it would take for a member of the Democrat party to call out one of their own, yet simultaneously ignores the Huge Elephant in the room: that she herself did not call out President Trump, but instead went to work for him.
Democrats have different standards. They abhor a womanizer like Teddy, JFK, LBJ, Trump or Biden, but have utterly no problem with totalitarian dictator wannabes like AOC. When they denounce socialist and Malthusian eliminationist rhetoric and toss those folks out of their party then I’ll accept they have a higher moral plane.
Not until. And Trump doesn’t paw ladies.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:14 pmDave asked (#62):
I deny that you, Dave, or anyone can attribute to the entire GOP any particular set of statements, tactics, or actions, so my answer to your question is an emphatic “No,” at least in this context.
You seriously disappoint me, Dave. I didn’t take you for a guy who’d espouse painting with a broad brush.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:20 pm@ Kevin M (#73): Who’s the guy next to Bill Clinton in this photo, then?
Trump even let Bubba paw his wife, dude. That photo is from 2000, after the Starr Report.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:23 pm@ frost48 (#72): I’m going exactly nowhere. I was a Young Republican in the early 1970s, before I reached voting age. With the exception of Trump, I’ve cast every presidential ballot of my life for the GOP. But I’ll never vote for him, ever, for anything. Trump spent most of his life as a Democrat, still thinks and speaks like a Democrat, took longer to wrap up the nomination than any GOP candidate since Gerald Ford, and probably would have lost the GOP nomination if either of two self-obsessed prima donnas (Rubio & Kasich) hadn’t insisted on being spoilers by staying in the race through their home-state primaries despite the fact that neither had even a remote shot at the nomination. I plan to continue being a Republican when Trump is dead in the grave and his political influence has returned to zero.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:30 pm@ Kevin M (#73): Or did you mean, by insisting that “Trump doesn’t paw ladies,” that his tiny hands aren’t big enough to be considered “paws”?
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:32 pm@ Munroe (#68): Are you accusing Brett Kavanaugh of being a “sexual harrasser”?
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:33 pmThese foolish folks are tying themselves into knots trying to prevent a metoo catastrophe. Say what you will about Mike Pence (and you will be right) but he got the no-dining-alone rule right.
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/04/metoo-2020-biden-harris-gillibrand-sanders-booker/
JRH (8f59ea) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:43 pm‘@ Munroe (#68): Are you accusing Brett Kavanaugh of being a “sexual harrasser”?’
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:33 pm
I think I read somewhere that just because he wasn’t prosecuted “is no guarantee that he didn’t do it”, or something like that. Maybe I can dig up the link for that quote.
So, it’s an open question isn’t it? Can’t say he’s innocent, or exonerated, or vindicated.
We never did see the full report on the FBI investigation, which has had people out of sorts for six months now.
Munroe (a87e97) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:48 pmMcKiernan,
Take your disappointment and mull it over from moderation. You’ll emerge when I feel like it or never. Who knows.
Patterico (3717b4) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:57 pm@ Munroe (#80): I’ve now run out of things that I could say to, or about, you, without violating the blog’s policies. But let the record reflect that Trump supporter Munroe refused to answer a direct question about his own views regarding Trump nominee Brett Kavanaugh.
Further to my #75 & 77, re the photo of Kylie Bax, Trump, Bubba, and Melania: When this photo was made, Bax was an “ex-girlfriend” of Trump and Melania was Trump’s then-current “girlfriend,” not yet his wife. Or one could use the term “courtesan,” perhaps, it being reasonable to presume under the circumstances that these particular women had indeed consented to being touched by these two repulsive, immoral men.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 10:57 pm@73 Systems of government in and of themselves are neither moral nor immoral. Some of them may more corruptible than others or may have different vulnerabilities than others, or the ways in which they are implemented may be more or immoral, but in and of themselves, they are amoral.
(our system, of course, is a mixture of socialism and capitalism and I think most of us could agree we don’t want either the old USSR or the late 1800s US)
Nic (896fdf) — 4/1/2019 @ 11:12 pmI don’t think that’s what I’ve done.
Surely you can’t deny that political parties are entities that espouse “particular sets of statements, tactics, or actions.” They often refer to them as platforms. There are very often also less formal and more transient talking points or narratives that the leadership and members recite to themselves, and others.
Does that mean every single member agrees with every single element? Of course not, in fact I explicitly acknowledged that.
What I asked, specifically, was: isn’t it reasonable to suppose, a priori, that someone who is a member of a particular political party finds themselves in agreement with a significant fraction of their policies, and does not seriously *disagree* with very many of them? This seems almost tautological, if people behave with any degree of rationality.
Why don’t you belong to the Democratic Party, or the Green Party, or the Communist Party, Beldar? It seems pretty likely that it’s because you disapprove of their positions, tactics, leadership, etc.
Are you suggesting that you have never made a valid generalization about, say, the Democratic Party as an institution, based on the assumption that most of its members agree to one degree or another with the things its leaders do and say?
I’d be quite surprised if that were the case.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/1/2019 @ 11:28 pm@ Kevin M (#73): Or did you mean, by insisting that “Trump doesn’t paw ladies,” that his tiny hands aren’t big enough to be considered “paws”?
I regret the last throwaway line, which CLEARLY detracted from my main point: that the Democrats have no problem with Marxists, Malthusians or other high horrors who would drive the survivors of their terror back to serfdom, but get really upset if someone touches someone without asking. I find their priorities reversed and WILL NOT PLAY THEIR GAME.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/1/2019 @ 11:53 pmDave, I’ve been guilty myself, far too often, of carelessness in attributing positions of the Democratic Party, or at least of its leading elected officials, to individual Democrats, including some whose connection to the Democratic Party is no different than mine to the GOP, that is, whose connection is simply one of self-identification and historical voting patterns.
When reminded, I think I’ve always apologized. I certainly don’t defend the practice of using overbroad brushes, and if you spot me using one, please call it to my attention.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/1/2019 @ 11:53 pmBTW, Beldar, if Trump has a credible primary challenger I’ll gladly donate to the campaign. If not, well, “Mongo just pawn in game of life.”
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/2/2019 @ 12:04 am@ Kevin M (#87): Thanks for the apt and funny allusion, and the goodwill behind it. I’m in a p!ssy mood tonight (obviously), but Mongo always makes me smile.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/2/2019 @ 12:11 amthe republican party in 2016 was an empty vessel that was filled by trumps populism. libertarian free trade conservatives bought the nomination for romney in 2012 over populists objections as did corporate establishment liberals stole it for hillary in 2016 by keeping black candidates out of the primaries. 80% of republican party is populist social conservatives who will not put up with the other 20% (maybe less as many never trumpers have left party) buying the nomination for free trader pro immigration libertarian conservatives.
lany (b23fab) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:26 amAOC had a townhall, hope the acoustics were good as that empty head had to put off a heckuva echo.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:28 am…Yet Tucker C can’t help pulling on her braids.
urbanleftbehind (78495b) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:52 amMeanwhile, the suspect’s tocayo wishes he had the same level of huevos (los gringos dicen cojones). http://uproxx.com/hiphop/nipsey-hussle-dead-suspect-identified-lapd/
urbanleftbehind (78495b) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:58 amAnd one more time we enter a campaign season with the media doing their level best to obscure any issues that might detract from the hoopla.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/2/2019 @ 4:59 amThese comments made me think about the current Republican leaders and other elected officials. It seems to me there are three kinds:
We know what former Republicans think about Trump because they left the Party because of him. And there are current Republicans who are still Party members but who repeatedly, clearly, and vocally oppose things Trump says and does. But what about the third group, the people who stay in the GOP and who are waiting until Trump is gone so they can take back their Party?
It won’t be the same Party after Trump is gone — if he ever is gone. (Does anyone think his final day in office means we won’t hear from Trump again?) The same people won’t be GOP leaders anymore or they will have dramatically changed. I don’t think the GOP can go back to what it was.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/2/2019 @ 5:02 am@ Kevin M, #73:
Democrats abhorred Ted Kennedy? You certainly couldn’t prove it from the election results, or the general lionizing both during his tenure and after his death.
And thirty years from now, won’t a Democrat be able to make a similar observation about Trump?
Demosthenes (7fae81) — 4/2/2019 @ 5:03 am@80: “So, it’s an open question isn’t it? Can’t say he’s innocent, or exonerated, or vindicated.”
Given the accuser could not definitively point to a specific date the alleged attack happened (even having some difficulty nailing down the year), nor identify the specific location, nor find a contemporaneous witness from 30 years ago that could confirm her presence at a gathering/party with Kavanaugh (not one), or point to a family member or close friend that could recall her at that time complaining about Kavanaugh’s alleged behavior (how exactly did she even get home that evening?)…..how is Kavanaugh supposed to definitively prove an event did not happen….so that he would be shown to be “innocent” or “vindicated”? It’s an impossible standard…..that no rational person would like to have applied to himself.
But let’s be honest….the point here isn’t fairness or justice….or respecting a standard of evidence…or respecting a process designed to protect an individual’s reputation….it’s about the holy grail of partisanship and scoring one more eye gouge against civil discourse. I guess being civil and reasonable won’t ever win the internet….
AJ_Liberty (165d19) — 4/2/2019 @ 5:04 amMaybe Sessions deserves another look… https://www.facebook.com/MichaelSavageFanPage/videos/10155164351455773/
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:28 amso what is the standard, bezos, moonves, lauer and company, cover with pillows and they make mountains out of molehills, they looked the other way at biden’s actual sins against the body politic,
https://dailycaller.com/2019/04/01/fusion-gps-steele-soros-millions/
ted kennedy was probably closest to Michael foot, an entitled brahmin that served the kremlin’s interests, one might argue the education stratagem, nclb, was the real poison in the well,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:29 amactually he’s not, red daughter is a total tool, but she addresses real issues, to a populace, which has been stripped of reasoning tools, so this foofaraw which has been going on for three years has not at all,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:32 amYeah, Biden’s completely normal… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KQ-YjGmpO4Q&t=341s
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:33 amAs a musician it sounds like he is talking about groupies.
BillPasadena (3511cf) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:33 amhe was describing the practices at nbc and cbs, that’s why they buried it for 10 years,
https://thefederalist.com/2019/04/01/papadopoulos-hints-conversation-launched-trump-russia-probe-fbi-setup/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:34 am“Hair fetishism, also known as hair partialism and trichophilia, is a partialism in which a person sees hair – most commonly, head hair – as particularly erotic and sexually arousing.[1] Arousal may occur from seeing or touching hair…, ”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hair_fetishism
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:37 amkang or kodos, or some other character, yet to be named
https://www.dailycaller.com/2019/04/01/jussie-smollett-protests-rock-chicago/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:38 amwell they named a tv series after the place:
https://www.npr.org/2019/04/01/708891509/amid-scandal-baltimore-mayor-takes-indefinite-health-related-leave
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:41 amhttps://heavy.com/news/2019/04/amy-lappos
Number 5 is not about Lappos at all, but about someone associated with Joe Biden (it shwows apartial screnshot of something that seems to be from Biden spokesman Bill Russo) saying that other accusations are false and that there are some extremely false ones, and misleading and even photoshopped pictures, that have been circulating for anumber of years on the Internet. Famous accusationns that have been denied are about Stephanie Carter (the wife of Defense Secretary Ash Carter) and the daughter of Senator Coons, as well as misuse of a picture of Biden with his grandson at his son’s Beau’s funeral. These continue to be used by right wing trolls “and others.”
(there is also something about that in today’s New York Times:
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/01/us/politics/joe-biden-amy-lappos.html
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:44 amShe asks me why, I’m a hair-lovin’ guy
Love dat hair noon and night, hair that’s a fright
I smells it high and low, don’t ask me why, Don’t know
It’s not for lack of bread, like the Grateful Dead
Darlin’, lemme smell dat hair, long beautiful hair
Colonel Haiku (3d7222) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:45 amShining, gleaming, steaming, flaxen, waxen
Give me down to there hair, shoulder length or longer
Here, baby, there, momma, everywhere, daddy, daddy
Hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair, hair
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi seems to be one person who doesn’t like to join in in personal condemnatons – not of Trump, and not Biden: (maybe because she knows, or has assessed, that many of the accusations are false, except she doesn’t want to say so.)
In an Associated Press article:
https://www.nytimes.com/aponline/2019/04/02/us/politics/ap-us-election-2020-biden.html
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:51 amCol. @ 97, what do you expect, he probably had to play the hero whenever he and Roy Moore were at the same event, just the next age bracket up.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:58 amThere’s also a front page story today in the New York Times about Facebook encountering lies in India, and even some of teh facr checkers Facebook hired now are circulating disinformation. It doesn’t tell you enough to let you judge who is ying, and about what.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/01/technology/india-elections-facebook.html
At least ths sort of thing, where almost nobody is honest, and very manstream sources are extremely dishonest, and the lies are incredible, has not yet happened in the United States.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:59 amActually, Narciso, 2 TV series come to mind, one I could get into from the 1990s and one in the 2000s I felt was just a bunch of excuse-making.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:00 amI never got into the wire, it’s too much dantesque milieu, compared to the last mayor’s ‘room to destroy’ this is near beer,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:03 am109… he’s a feisty old coot when he wants to be.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:06 amthis is a book end, with the daily mail and times stories about gangs funding al queda, and the labour party
https://saraacarter.com/scandal-un-paid-10-percent-to-terror-group-al-shabaab-to-access-somalia/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:06 amI have no doubt that Sessions could kick Biden’s fundillo up and down the block all day long
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:08 am109) one wonders if podesta and co, had not sandbagged his nomination back in 1986, where would he have ended up,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:08 amcould he wait till they kill him off, before mouthing off:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2019/04/captain-america-star-chris-evans-discusses-starting-a-liberal-political-website/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:11 amSara Carter looks like the type of chick Ben Shapiro would swing and miss on.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:19 amHey Dana. A heads-up. Why is google labeling Patterico.com as “not secure” in the address bar? I notice this is not the only conservative site that googles has flagged either. What can be done to stop this harassment?
sherlock (f16cd1) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:20 am27, Kishnevi (7289ba) — 4/1/2019 @ 6:19 pm
That won’t necesarily work.
Lucy Flores and it sounds like Amy Lappos were not alone with Joe Biden when the alleged incidents happened. But neither were they in front of cameras. And it’s too long ago for anyone who might have been there to remember anything about it. Neitehr named any third parties who witnesed it or whom they told, and they don’t eve report warning other women in vague terms to keep heir distance from Joe Biden.
In what isn’t a flat contradiction, Henry Muñoz, co-founder of Latino Victory Project, who organized the November 1, 2014 Nevada event, says that Lucy Flores and Joe Biden were never alone together – but she’s not claiming that either.
Ad ethere;s something else: Both women are careful to say it wasn’t sexual, yet they both claim they felt a way that a woman might have felt if it was sexual. These statements have to be co-ordinated.
Biden doesn’t know who is it that’s organizing these attacks.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:24 amHey Dana. A heads-up. Why is google labeling Patterico.com as “not secure” in the address bar? I notice this is not the only conservative site that googles has flagged either. What can be done to stop this harassment?
Google has nothing to do with it, sherlock. Edumacate yourself here.
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:34 amFurthermore, stop taking The Master’s name in vain.
Patterico: have you heard of Kristol?
Rau8l Alessandri MD (b5d6c6) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:37 amwell the derangement comes in Yiddish, as well:
https://libertyunyielding.com/2019/04/01/owning-them-like-a-boss-netanyahu-dunks-claim-that-his-online-support-comes-from-bots/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:42 amShapiro has friends? lmao
mg (8cbc69) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:44 amcarter is half Latina,
https://pjmedia.com/trending/speaker-at-dem-candidates-forum-gets-crowd-to-chant-cop-killer-assata-shakur-quote/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:45 amthats where I was going with the Ben Shapiro reference
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:47 am119. 121. It’s not Google: it’s your browser. As of yet, Google Chrome isn’t doing that.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:53 amperspective anyone?
https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/nicholas-fondacaro/2019/04/01/nbc-ignores-100000-border-arrests-terrified-tequila-trade
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:54 amEt tu, Sammy? (@127) Your browser has nothing to do with it, either. It’s whatever website you’re at. This one is still using HTTP instead of the “secure” HTTPS.
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:59 am@Beldar(#76) I asked a similar question during the BK threads and I think we had a similar exchange. I’ve got a different process and until McCain it had me reliably checking R. In 2008 my state was not a swing state and McCain was repulsive.
In 2016 I voted Trump and I’d do it again if given the choice today. We’ll see where we are in 2020.
@Nic(#83)
A more correct label for our current situation is fascism but I think we’re calling it corporatism now. We don’t use fascism because of emotions but see Zuckerburg’s call for government censorship as just the latest example. I also suspect we don’t use that term because calling it socialism and capitalism let’s more people think they’ve got a little of what they want. Fascism and Communism consistently, and by design, produces deeply immoral results.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:07 amSome people say there’s little difference between the parties, only “words”. I don’t think that’s the case.
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/04/01/mitch-mcconnell-democrat-bills-pelosi-1243627
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:15 am“And thirty years from now, won’t a Democrat be able to make a similar observation about Trump?”
Demosthenes (7fae81) — 4/2/2019 @ 5:03 am
Because until now no one’s thought of pinning Kopechne on him.
Munroe (01ad30) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:19 am129. nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:59 am
Not all browsers handle all websites identically. And
there is no way to make a website universally accessible. It wouldn’t be good for Patterico to swotch to http. Many older browsers cannot view https sites any more, and even some http sites.
Sites like Twitter and Yahoo used to switch to the mobile versions of their websites when they encountered older browsers, but they do so no longer – they’re just inaccessible with certain browsers.
It may not be just the browser, but also the Windows version.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:27 amIsn’t there a resemblance to one Alfred E. Neuman?
https://www.bing.com/th?id=OIP.zEmY4TdjIE0ePSExJmViFgHaIN&w=159&h=172&c=7&o=5&pid=1.7
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alfred_E._Neuman
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:31 amInternet Explorer appears now way down on the list of browsers people use, but that is becase people do quick searches on mobile devices. It wouldn;’t be o way low on desktops or laptops.
The differeence between what websites it can access, and what websites it cannot, is not strictly identical to the difference between http and https.
It usually cannot access https, and occasionally https.
But this https website is still accessible with Internet Explorer 8:
https://secondcitycop.blogspot.com
So maybe there is a way to be accessible to all.
The interesting post on the SecondCityCop website is “Maggot Misstep”
He claimed;
Of course, there was nothing exactly like this.
The blog owner said that perhaps the Prickwrinkle Machine [sic] is in a state of revolt.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:39 amIm lucky my jerb lets SCC blog into my workplace’s internet. But then second city cop is the G-rated version of other stalwart Chicago cop blogs like TrueNewsUSA and LongShaved(Cork).
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:45 amIt’s like Leo affairs, which is the national police watercooler, it would make Lennie bruce blush.
Narciso (cbfddb) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:48 amoe Biden was not in the same green room with Lucy Flore. They only came together just at the end, right before going on the stage, and then were surrounded by many people.
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/436601-event-organizer-biden-accuser-were-never-alone-together
Then he has the thing where he doesn’t accuse eher of making this up:
What’s this? Biden, like Bill Clinton, performing (fake) marriage ceremonies?
Anyway, Lucy Flores was confronted with this on CNN’s “State of the Union” and said his satement was “entirely irrelevant.”
What have we “known?” This incident, or that Biden puts his hands on or around people?
This incident is not like that. It’s designed to be worse, but not too much worse. More will be coming if Biden resists. Like it did with Brett Kavanaugh. Even if they have to do it without the help of Michael Avenatti.
It is pretty hard, though, for Biden to fight back, after almost endorsing the idea that women always tell the truth when accusing men. He had just apologized for not handling the Anita Hill case properly. All he did is have a hearing where he allowed both sides to make their case. That statement of regret was the signal, I think, for his enemies to go ahead.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:54 amAlinsky Rule 4: “Make the enemy live up to its own book of rules.”
With Kellyane putting in a little bit of the 13: “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.”
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:02 amnk – Do you have a diverse ballot today?
mg (8cbc69) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:04 amI’m staying home, mg. I’m going to carry out a noble experiment and allow two historically disadvantaged minorities — LGBT and African-Americans — pick the next Mayor of Chicago.
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:09 am@139 The biggest issue with Kellyanne jumping in here is that she doesn’t need to. It would be much better to see how that plays out and if he survives this round.
But whether Kellyanne is a hypocrite on Trump doesn’t change the fact that she’s correct saying Biden and others are also hypocrites. Have you seen the media? All of the expected talking heads are explaining why this really isn’t a big deal even if it happened as it’s been described. Some of them are acknowledging that they themselves have been on the receiving end of Biden’s attention but that it’s safe harassment.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:18 amI (oops, I mean my relatives who still reside in the City of) may have been tempted to pry Preckwinkle away from the County Court System, but there are no guarantees the pro tempore would have been a major departure (unless the official payback for the not-black half of the CC patronage army was a white dude from the outer Board districts getting the bump to President). That would have been a repeat of the misguided “voting for Kamala Harris for Senate so she’s no longer Cal AG” strategy.
I’d just as soon ride it out and hope both Jerry Joyce and the shriveled stump that are Cook County Republicans make nice so he has a clear path at States Attorney next (2020) November as opposed to running in the Dem primary.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:21 amKellyanne is also a hypocrite, and nothing changes that either.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:26 amKellyanne is also a hypocrite, and nothing changes that either.
How does that help Biden? Or help Democrats pick a 2020 candidate? Or change the price of rice in China?
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:35 amThats weird, SE Texans, 2 chemical fires in 2 weeks (Deer Park and now…http://abc7chicago.com/chemical-plant-fire-reported-in-crosby/5230466/?fbclid=IwAR3pYMG26AuJPaW2wFAJQtpuTxEKyCUDPRNwg2xgr7HzOvG3vwGJ2y2ZRdk)
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:39 am@94. That ‘third group’… they have [or are in the process of] taking ‘their’ part back.
Welcome to 1964.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:49 am^party
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:49 amConnecticut woman
Joe’s got her in his line of sight
He’d look at her once
And her hair that’s all wrong
Be all right
And he strokes her
He’d like to poke her
Connecticut woman
He wants to smell you
He wants to comb you
Connecticut woman
“A Connecticut woman says Joe Biden touched her inappropriately and rubbed noses with her during a 2009 political fundraiser in Greenwich when he was vice president, drawing further scrutiny to the Democrat and his history of unwanted contact with women as he ponders a presidential run
“It wasn’t sexual, but he did grab me by the head,” Amy Lappos told The Courant Monday. “He put his hand around my neck and pulled me in to rub noses with me. When he was pulling me in, I thought he was going to kiss me on the mouth.”’
https://www.courant.com/politics/hc-pol-biden-grabbed-aide-20190401-vl7chim3hrdjtcwu2tszrhozzm-story.html
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 10:13 amI didn’t know he was an Eskimo… Eskimo Joe?
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 10:14 amOhhhhh….Eskimo as in rubbing noses, not “Eskimo Brothers” which is 2 or more dudes having ____d the same woman.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 10:19 ammighty white of you, nk
mg (8cbc69) — 4/2/2019 @ 11:53 am@130 More Oligarchy than fascist, but not quite Oligarchy, at least not yet.
Nic (896fdf) — 4/2/2019 @ 11:58 amTrue, not everyone does, but I don’t think Dana said that. I think she said the party did that. And I think that is a fair comment about the party as a whole. The party as a whole has gone Trumpist, which certainly does not mean that everyone within the party has. I routinely get mail — that goes straight in the trash — from various Republican organizations telling me to help Make America Great Again or to support Trump’s agenda. It’s Trump’s party. That’s why I left it. That observation on my part, which I contend is not just defensible but correct, doesn’t mean that everyone who remains in the party supports Trump, or that their decision is not justifiable. It just means that, in my opinion, the GOP is the party of Trump, and Dana’s observations about the way the party has behaved as a whole are perfectly fair.
Patterico (3717b4) — 4/2/2019 @ 12:07 pmAs for this question:
I think the answer is “no” as stated.
If you qualified the statement — “at some point can’t continued membership in an organization support a reasonable inference about agreement with at least some of the organization’s principal statements, tactics and actions” — then the answer would be “yes.”
Beldar has a different view than I have about the utility of remaining in the GOP at this point. I think, based on past discussions I have had with him, that he is a person who values institutions — party, political offices, and the like — more highly than I do. I think he and I can disagree respectfully about this difference of opinion and not savage the other for their different opinion. I see Dave’s point but I think his argument assumes too much about the meaning of continued membership in an organization, and perhaps reflects a different view from that of Beldar regarding the nature of institutions and the meaning of commitment to those institutions.
Patterico (3717b4) — 4/2/2019 @ 12:14 pmno we’re not just willing to throw him under the bus, for some ill considered statements, or actions to preclude mud soil spreaders like avenatti, of course chris Wallace who thought Reagan got too easy a time of it, will chime in the uniparty talking points,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 12:47 pm@155. That’s tricky one, Patterico, when you start down the path of “qualifying” membership and the ‘institutions’ they strive to preserve w/a ‘yes’- ‘no’ caveat.
Recently finished re-reading a book titled, ‘Operation Paperclip – The Secret Intelligence Program That Brought Nazi Scientists To America’ by Annie Jacobsen. The pitch that there were [or still are] ‘qualified’ “good” members of the Nazi Party along side the “bad” members of the Nazi Party more or less gives the likes of Debus, Dornberger, Von Braun, Rudolph and the criminal past of the German rocket team a pass. Which is pretty much what several American administrations of both parties did, when ‘allegiance is ruled by expedience…’
“Nazi, schmazi,” says Wernher Von Braun – Tom Lehrer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TjDEsGZLbio
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 12:55 pmFour years ago:
https://www.nationalreview.com/2015/03/joe-biden-democrats-donald-trump-john-fund/
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/2/2019 @ 12:58 pm@158. ‘Four years ago’ is ten thousand lifetimes in politics, Sammy.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:07 pmtwo years feels like an eternity:
http://meaninginhistory.blogspot.com/2019/03/do-all-roads-in-russia-hoax-lead-to.html
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:20 pmpelosi and the corporate establishment democrats in congress are threatening any democrat operatives who join in helping primarying corporate establishment stooges with with social justice democrats running for congress to keep aoc and ilmar oman from controlling congress.
lany (a529c8) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:22 pmyes the Maoists don’t have even a plurality, yet:
https://dailycaller.com/2019/04/02/peter-strzok-vulnerable-affair-spies/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:24 pm155. I think a much stronger case could be made that loyalty to an institution — any institution — is more than pointless once that institution has strayed past a certain point of abandoning the principles that were reasons for joining it in the first place.
There are the principles that the Republican Party claims, and then there are the things that the Republican Party does. And they are so at odds with each other, I think it’s perfectly reasonable and totally fair to question one’s insistence at remaining with it.
Gryph (08c844) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:25 pm@lany(#161) The progressives are getting screwed over by these guys and they’re still complaining more about the electoral college than the super delegate system.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:34 pmMarco Rubio and Ted Cruz ears must have perked up:
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/2/2019 @ 1:37 pmhttp://thehill.com/homenews/administration/436995-trump-incorrectly-says-that-his-father-was-born-in-germany
Maybe he really does have some dementia. I thought he was just relatively normal arrogant over-privileged rich-boy nuts, but maybe there really is a neurological health problem.
Nic (896fdf) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:06 pmTruth is a good thing, 145, or it used to be.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:13 pmWe will have hit Guac bottom if Trump closes the border
mg (8cbc69) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:19 pm@165. Another ‘brain fart,’ perhaps?
His grandfather was born in Germany; ‘course he could Google himself on his iPhone– the kind sold by ‘Tim Apple.’ 😉
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:29 pm@167 Yep, the truth matters. It’s not really true that everyone in his party says this is inappropriate.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:38 pm164 all democrats support popular vote initiative making a constitutional amendment un necessary. As for super delegates they have never decided who the nominee was. Democrat establishment knows it would tear the democrat party apart and they would get jill sten/ ralph nader again as many (maybe not most but enough) democrats no longer have party loyalty.
lany (a529c8) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:43 pmFred Trump was born in New York City. So what? Donald Trump’s father may very well have been born in Germany.
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:46 pmI appreciate our host’s very thoughtful and temperate responses in #154 and #155, as worthy supplements to Dana’s likewise thoughtful and temperate responses in #39 and #55.
Here’s my very favorite Youtube video of Slow Joe Biden. Essentially everything Biden claims in it was a lie, as I wrote on my own blog in 2005 (don’t miss the comments, which include things like his actual law school class rank).
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:53 pm151… I learn something new every day.
I was reading that the brain changes when exposed to air. Biden has had two craniotomies. He ain’t right… in the head.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:56 pmArticle 1, Section 10 of the US Constitution:
[emphasis mine]
The popular vote initiative would either be struck down by Congress or else declared unconstitutional when challenged in court. An amendment is the only way to use the national popular vote in a presidential election.
Chuck Bartowski (bc1c71) — 4/2/2019 @ 2:57 pmAnd those hair plugs may have been planted well below the topsoil.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:00 pmDave @62: “… at some point can’t continued membership in an organization support a reasonable inference about agreement with the organization’s statements, tactics and actions?”
See #157.
Yes.
Agree w/you.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:01 pm@176. Recall the ol’JFK paraphrase – ‘Each day the crises multiply… nd time has not been our friend.’ But if he does jump in this month, he’ll be the quintessential ‘April Fool.’
I’m puttin’ another fiver down on my bet w/myself that he won’t run.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:10 pm165. I think Trumps’s grandmother became pregnant with his father, Fred, in Germany, but she gave birth to him in the United States. That was in 1905 – October 11, 1905, in the Bronx.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frederick_Trump
Trump’s grandfather originally came to the United States at the age of 16 in 1885 and by 1891 went west to seattle, and eventually wound up in the Alaska gold rush – well, actually on the Canadian side of the border. He later went back to Germany in 1901 and got married. He took his wife to New York, but she got homesick so he wanted to move back to Germany but he was classified as a draft dodger. By that time (1904) he was an American citizen, or at least had a U.S. passport.
In those days countries still sometimes expelled people, but they were more or less free to go whereever they wanted. The restrictions tended to be on emigration, not immigration, although
that started changing in the 1880s. The last holdout was Shanghai.
That is about 4 lifetimes ago, (or, more accurately, four generations) but the world was so different before World War I, you might be forgiven for thinking it was 10,000. By 1938 people had a very hard time leaving Germany or Austria. Even though anyone could go to Shanghai, peoplr still needed a visa into China (available for the asking) to get out of Germany. That’s what a movie I saw the other day, said.
Interestingly, the almost absolute bar to immigration tended not to affect people leaving Communist countries, where the obstacle was always leaving those countries.
Trump’s grandfather died in the 1918 influenza epidemic.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:12 pm178. DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:10 pm
No, I think his enemies are going to overplay their hand. By that point, his family will want him to run so as not to ruin his reputation.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:14 pm@ DRJ, who wrote (#94):
If he returns to private life, I wouldn’t expect Trump to sink into dignified near-oblivion the way Dubya has done.
But I think his aura, and every bit of his political power, will vanish like a bursting soap bubble when he’s no longer POTUS. To use the Latin phrase, Trump is sui generis — a thing unlike any other. (This is one of the few things Trump says about himself that I agree with, although I view it as an indictment, and he views it as a boast.)
I agree with you that the GOP won’t be the same when he’s gone, or ever again — nor should it be. Trump’s critique of “the Swamp” is generally accurate, except that he leaves out the part about him being part of the Swamp. The GOP also changed, generally for the better, after Nixon resigned, and most of the credit for that goes to George H.W. Bush (who was the RNC chairman), chronically underappreciated Gerald Ford, and then, of course Ronald Reagan.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:14 pmThere’s a letter today in the New York Times about an experience a woman had with Biden last week, that I think is truthful.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/01/opinion/letters/joe-biden-sexual-harassment.html?auth=login-email&login=email
Included is:
One thing though – that wouldn’t seem to have anything todo with someone being nervous – or would it?
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:23 pmThis from Biden — and British Labour Party politician Neil Kinnoch — is also truly evergreen.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:24 pm@180. Hard to further ruin the reputation of a plagiarist, Sammy. He’ll spend all his time apologizing for the past to atone for the now w/little tak of the future. He’s run before in and flamed out; so why, now, far into the first quarter of the 21st century, does he want the gig?
He hasn’t said and nobody knows. His time has passed.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:24 pmif Biden were merely a fool, he might have done something right, well I’ll give him the crafting of the drug czar statute, in favor, against one has to way the fisa the violence against women act, the vote against the Alaskan pipeline, the support of the nuclear freeze, opposition to the Nicaraguan resistance (although not at the same level as Kerry of Tom ‘red’ Harkin, (sponsor of f chuck todd) proponent of the partition of Iraq, thanks to ameneunsis Peter Galbraith, bully against Hamid Karzai, and opposition of the counter insurgency strategy, still though, in this full hunger games clown show, he’s still fairly moderate,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:29 pmNancy Pelosi says that Biden should treat everyone like he and they have a cold, and only shake hands.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:33 pmand how should we treat norma desmond?
https://reason.com/blog/2019/04/02/waco-biker-prosecutions-over-after-nearly-four-years
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:36 pmThey are ruining his reputation in a particular way that isn’t true.
we get reminded of all kinds of things that Bidn said and did. Like talking chains in the 2012 election. And tere are smethings eople never made an issue of but could have like the way he said abortion was at stake in the 2012 election.
Biden has tended to follow party lines, but he’s been reluctant to do so.
As for someone’s tiem being passed, I think maybe former California Governor Edmund G. (Jerry) Brown, also knownas Governor Moonbeam and Governor Methuselah, would beat them all.
He’s crazy enough to not disturb the leftists, but not so crazy that he wouldn;t get support elsewhere.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:39 pmI guess they were really guilty as well:
https://thefederalist.com/2019/04/02/fbi-refuses-records-requests-for-e-mails-to-cnn-on-day-of-roger-stone-raid/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:40 pmChuck and Nancy are clever. There’s no way they can send out Chuck to defend Joe and there’s no way they can send out ‘we’ve got to pass it before we know what’s in it’ Nancy to criticize Trump for saying we can see his plan for healthcare after we reelect him.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:42 pm189… that raid was totally above board and BAU, narciso. I read it here.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:47 pmso what’s new in carmel, coronello, yes he had to reconsider because our possum congress can’t walk and chew gum at the same time, they don’t give a farthing about the insane premiums, the narrow networks, so we waste two years on other garbage, meanwhile the dems are cooking up another single payer plan,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 3:53 pmbut we must follow our betters in deciding what’s important,
https://thefederalist.com/2019/04/02/media-failed-collusion-wanted-trump-traitor/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/2/2019 @ 4:07 pmHey, kind of funny story… here in Tucson, rental car, get a call from rental car area manager asking if I could check the car’s glovebox, they think they’ve maybe left some keys in there inadvertently. I go ou to check and find two ginormous key rings with a total of 36 fobs/keys. He drives out to pick them up, thanks us profusely, takes 50% off our rental fee and gives me his biz card and says to give him a call if there’s anything we need during our vacation.
So… within 30 minutes, we’re waiting in the drivethru line at McDonalds for in-laws requested McGriddles and some hot pink haired septuagenarian rear ends us. I call him tell him about it and he says email me pics and pertinent info and he’ll take care of it. This story will turn to funny ha-ha when we see the resolution. We’re always covered by ours but next time I will purchase the agency’s coverage too.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 4:09 pmBack in 2008, some shady regional rental car chain at MIA (back when they were scattered at remote locations near 37th Ave) tried to pin all these nicks and scratches on me, so I gave them my “policy” number off by nearly half of the digits.
urbanleftbehind (78495b) — 4/2/2019 @ 4:17 pmArizona seems to dry a climate I was in Vegas in may, and it was sweltering.
Narciso (819a2e) — 4/2/2019 @ 4:32 pm195… nice touch, ULB!
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 4:35 pm@ Chuck Bartowski, thank you for your #175 and the Compact Clause of the United States Constitution, Art. I, § 10, cl. 3. Further to your point, from Cuyler v. Adams, 449 U.S. 433 (1981):
Congress hasn’t consented to this plan, and it certainly seems to be “the formation of [a] combination tending to the increase of political power in the States, which may encroach upon or interfere with the just supremacy of the United States” — specifically, the United States Electoral College.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/2/2019 @ 4:39 pmSo far, I’m finding that a lot of people in the area need some dental work, nice enough peeps, but the Gabby Hayes look ain’t appealing
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 4:40 pmThe states can do it on their own. Let’s take California as an example. It has 55 electoral votes. So, in the least election, Hillary, with 62% of the popular vote would have gotten 34 elector votes; Trump with 32% of the popular vote 18 electoral votes; and the other three would have gone to Johnson, Stein and/or whomever.
Now pardon me, while I close my computer and laugh uncontrollably.
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 5:07 pmThe look of NeverTrump is in his smirk…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oJGjqKgoRkQ
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 5:20 pmSince you accept the GOP will have changed, Beldar, what do you think will need to be done to fix it when Trump is gone? What if the next leaders are like Trump?
DRJ (15874d) — 4/2/2019 @ 5:34 pmTw more women coming forward against Biden, including one who was only 19 at the time.
They’re ratcheting this up.
This is a political dirty trick.
Thought: If all these alleged incidents took place before the beginning of 2016, then this is something that was prepared for use by the Hillary Clinton campaign.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 5:56 pmI know haberman told us otherwise:
Narciso (819a2e) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:07 pmhttps://pjmedia.com/trending/jim-jordan-blasts-oversight-dems-for-reckless-decisions-regarding-security-clearance-whistleblower/?utm_source=email
WOR radio 719 in New York interviewed a ABC correspondent about the Chicago election. The female interviewer, at least, expected turnout to be high – that shows you how little is known – it’s not.
Turnout this afternoon was runnng at about 17% and is expected to hit 35%, that’s with ll the early votes included. The Obamas vote inn Chicago and voted, but both the Obamas and people close to them who live in Chicao, have been staying on the sidelines. There’s a lawsuit against using public land for the Obama library – there was also a lawsuit against the Star Wars museum by a small group, and George Lucas abandoned the project.
There were dueling demonstrations at the state’s attorney’soffice on the Jusse Smolett case. One was by the Fraternal Order of police (mostly white, middle aged males) and the other involved clergymen. Jesse Jackson is entirely on Smolett’s side, as you might have guessed from the fact that he did his “community service there. So is Fathr Fleger (remember him??) They claim they don’t want there to be empowered black women, somehow not noticing who’s going to be the next mmayor, A big uncertainty is whether Eddie Johnson wll stay on, although Preckwinkle almost certainly won’t keep him. Murders are down in Chicago this year by 30% from last year (that was a peak) and shootings by 17$. They must be missing more, maybe using inexperienced gunman.
Chris Rock said he was not supposed to make jokes about Jusse Smilett but did anyway. He said Smoett had lighter skin, and he should just be called Jesse – he doesn’t deserve the “u” What does that mean?
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:12 pms wi
Pelosi b-tch-slaps Biden w/t “‘I’m sorry you were offended’ isn’t an apology'” smack on his kisser.
‘Trump Luck’ is on a hot-buttered-roll; buy that lottery ticket.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:15 pmThe compact is not an actual agreement between states. It’s each state involved passing a law picking Electors for president for that state on the basis of who wins the popular vote in the entire United States, but only if enough states to add up to 270 Electoral votes also pass a similar law.
Now what if it’s not clear who won the popular vote?
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:18 pmBeldar,
I wanted to take some time to reconsider your comments before responding to your concerns.
You made an assertion that I was painting with a “convenient but spectacularly overbroad brush” at #29, to which I took the time to respond to and explain where I am at with the Republican Party, my concerns, and then charitably said that in the future, I would make a concerted effort to make clearer distinctions when discussing Republicans. I made the assurance because I think I can always more concise and specific in posts. This although I did not fully agree with your “overbroad brush” assertion.
However, when it was pointed out to you further down the thread that you had missed the references to “Republican Party” in your original read-through, you came back and said at #56:
I find this a bit ungracious and unfair in light of having already taken the time to respond to you in detail. I responded to your criticism as generously as I could while still not wholly agreeing with your assertions. So for you to re-read the post and again criticize me for painting with an overbroad brush is difficult to swallow. Moreover, saying that you hope I will do X in order to prevent a future misunderstanding from occurring puts all the responsibility for any “misunderstanding” on me, without considering that perhaps you reacted with a certain sensitivity and bias based on your lifelong commitment to the Republican Party (which you view differently than me and means something different to you as well). I am hoping that this was simply an oversight on your part. I am happy to do what I can do to be more accurate in my writing. But in this case, I don’t think that I was as far off the mark as you assume. And I don’t think the responsibility to prevent a misunderstanding (when two different views of a subject are involved) should fall solely on me.
Dana (023079) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:18 pmAs regards the murders, the police have tamped down (put more manpower) on the “hood” at the expense of the tourist areas and North/NW sides which see more carjackings and assaults. There do seem to be more 5-at-a-time type shootings but it’s good odds those are tac units or cpd conducting softball practice (I learned what that was from Hill Street Blues).
urbanleftbehind (78495b) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:19 pmAarrggh…2 mini-AOCs may have took out 2 old school incumbents (Pat O’Connor, blago’s SIL Deb Mell) on the North Side.
urbanleftbehind (78495b) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:30 pmEven further downhill from this point forward, ulb
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:38 pmNo loss at all. Patrick O’Connor is Ed Burke Lite and Mell’s daughter is fortunate to avoid tar and feathers. I would have gladly supplied the rails to run them both out of town on.
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:46 pmAnd let’s not forget that what happened in both the Chicago Aldermanic and Mayoral elections stems directly from Abraham Lincoln, the Republican Party, and the Reconstruction Amendments.
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 6:51 pmRe: BIden I feel kind of bad for him because he seems like a nice guy. On the other hand, the term “read the room” comes to mind. Dude, stop touching everyone. Biden either A: assumes everyone wants him to touch them, which is narcissistic, or B: is a nervous nelly who for some reason needs to touch everyone. Or, C: he’s a creep. Or some mixture of A, B, and C.
JRH (8f59ea) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:08 pmWhile I absolutely oppose the National Popular Vote idea, it is hard for me to see how it fits that description.
Article II says:
Thus, the NPV “compact” gives no state any more power than it is already explicitly granted by the Constitution. It is simply an agreement among the participating states to use that power in a particular manner. Electors would still be appointed, just as they are now, and vote, just as they do now. As concerns “the just supremacy of the United States,” Article II says that how states appoint their electors is a matter of complete indifference.
With Bush v Gore, the Supremes seemed to affirm the absolute supremacy of the state legislatures in this area.
In my obviously amateur legal view, a constitutional challenge to the compact seems more likely to succeed on the grounds of denying equal protection and/or a republican form of government.
Dave (1bb933) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:16 pmIt’s horsesh!t. I can just see a Republican winning the popular vote nationally, the Democrat winning in California, New York and Illinois, and those three states’ legislatures telling their constituents: “So sorry, we have to send a slate of Electors that will cast their vote for the Republican. We promised.”
Pardon me while I again laugh uncontrollably.
nk (dbc370) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:33 pmgood one, nk.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/2/2019 @ 7:50 pmOne man’s horsesh!t is another man’s Lyft IPO shares…
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:14 pmYes I find that improbable against answers to questions no one asked.
Narciso (819a2e) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:35 pm@208 I originally read it as people who identify as R’s, as opposed to D’s, and thought it was another troll post. Now I’m not really sure what you mean by the Republican Party. Just elected R’s and people appointed by Trump?
But if we’re going back to the start; what are you calling full support? What’s been going on for the last two years is, at best, grudgingly trying to make the best of a situation lots of people didn’t like. You’ve got R’s fully on board a specific issue that they agreed with independent of who was in the White House and R’s who fought Trump on everything they could. The list of people saying Trump’s personal behavior is inappropriate is huge, both inside the party and out.
I’m sure Beldar will give a much better response but all R’s have to do to recover, with the voters, from Trump is find people who will listen to voters and reliably represent their values. Although what I think you mean is how are R’s going to get D’s to stop calling them names and that’s a much different problem.
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/2/2019 @ 8:48 pmThere are few gestures more pointless than joining a political party. I’ve never understood it. But joining does offer you the ability to leave, which can be dressed up with a harrumph and all manner of feigned outrage. This has appeal to the sanctimonious types, like a Comey.
Munroe (1bc8c3) — 4/2/2019 @ 9:49 pm@ Dave, who wrote (#215):
The entire point of the deal is to give all states that are participating in the compact more power than those who aren’t. And it would.
And I don’t think Bush v. Gore has anything to do with this.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/2/2019 @ 11:37 pmLast time I checked, it was a two (count-em, two) party system. So we need to support smaller smarter government, and we have two (count-em, two) choices. The less bad is better.
We face one of those moral dilemmas torts professors love, with a runaway trolley about to kill either 10 people or two people, and we can operate the switch. You can vote Dem, and kill 10 people, vote Repub, and kill 2, or refuse to operate the switch and kill 10. That’s where Patrick and Dana (good people, both) are.
Good luck, America!
vincent (da6183) — 4/2/2019 @ 11:46 pm@ DRJ, who asked (#202):<blockquote)[W]hat do you think will need to be done to fix it when Trump is gone? What if the next leaders are like Trump?In reverse order: I don’t think other leaders “like Trump” will succeed. The Veep isn’t “like Trump,” for instance, and if freed from the need to walk on eggshells to avoid publicly differing from him, would return to the same sort of very conventional politician he was before Trump won the GOP nomination. The GOP leaders who model themselves after Trump — say, Devin Nunes — don’t have his universal name recognition or the years of fake Hollywood propaganda Trump garnered from his TV show, which painted him, absolutely falsely, as some sort of business genius. They are, to be blunt about it, @ssholes without pizzazz, clouds of Roy Moores who will suffer the traditional fate of hyper-populists within the GOP. Or so I hope; obviously, one can but guess when predicting the future.
What needs to change is that the Party needs to focus on selling its most basic underlying tenets at a grassroots level through hundreds and thousands of candidates who’ve imbibed, who can speak, and who actually believe “conservatism” — fiscal conservatism, individual liberty, federalism, limited constitutional government. In our home state, to pick one example, I think both Ted Cruz and Greg Abbott are the right sort of person on whom to bet the Party’s future. Ben Sasse is another. Rubio is, at times (but only at times). John Kasich isn’t, can’t be, won’t be, doesn’t want to be, and ain’t.
This basically undertakes to take the place, throughout the entire electorate, of the high school civics that people like AOC never got. But until people understand, for instance, that “Medicare for All” is an impossible, evil proposition — just another con, no different in character from when Trump promises that we’re going to have “the best” health care, because he alone can fix things — and until their bullsh!t detectors are dramatically improved and engaged, the con men will continue to win at least some elections in at least some places. The “good news,” in a very black, ironic sense, is that where that’s happened the most consistently for the longest — places like California — the back end, the catastrophe, from the con job is going to become increasingly obvious.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/2/2019 @ 11:51 pm@ Dana (#208): Thanks for taking the time to think, and for the carefully measured tone. That isn’t a rote, insincere “thank you,” nor was my previous one for your promise to try to be more precise in the future.
On my first read-through of your original post, what caught my attention was your focus on moral decisions made by individual Republicans in response to Trump’s obvious moral failings and hypocrisies. You weren’t writing about the GOP platform, for instance, or even the collective moral responsibility, or lack thereof, in GOP positions on, for instance, health care or immigration as revealed through the legislation it’s passed, or attempted to pass. You were writing about individual decisions.
When I compared the charges you made to my own individual decisions, I felt as if I’d been included in the scope of your criticism. When I looked again, and noted your reference to the collective GOP or the Republican Party, that made it easy to accept that you hadn’t intended to indict all individual members of the Republican Party.
But the fact remains that you omitted, in this particular essay, anything which confirmed your intent to refer to a subset. That was what I thought you were undertaking to be clearer about in the future, for which I was, and am, grateful, and graciously so (I think).
I didn’t mention in any of my own comments above — and in hindsight, I ought to have — that I know, and knew, you’d been quite careful on other, prior occasions in recognizing that not even every Republican who voted for Trump (leaving aside those like me who couldn’t and wouldn’t and won’t) is guilty of Ms. Conway’s hypocrisy. And likewise, in hindsight, I see now that your references to “the Republican Party” or “the GOP” weren’t necessarily intended by you to be an indictment of each and every member thereof, despite your focus on individual moral decisions rather than anything the Party did collectively in the name, and as the act and deed of, the entire GOP. Mea culpa for that.
I don’t think it’s ungracious of me, though, to have thanked you for your undertaking to “make a concerted effort to make clearer distinctions when discussing Republicans.”
I am utterly guilty of imputing to your original post, then, an intention to condemn individual Republicans like me, one that was inconsistent with your prior writing. I’m not demanding that you confess any error in this post. I hope you’ll continue to write about Trump’s and his closest supporters’ hypocrisy; I likewise undertake, for the future, a commitment to be less quick to presume that you’re talking about people like me when you might not have intended to; and I hope we can together avoid the kind of hurt feelings that I had after my first read-through of your post.
That’s as gracious as I can be, while still being honest, and I stipulate that you’ve been gracious and honest yourself, even if we don’t quite fully agree about the likelihood of your original post being misread in the manner I did.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/3/2019 @ 12:20 amIf I lived in a state like California in which the Democrats hold all statewide elected offices with veto-proof majorities after many years of ideological purging of any moderate voices, then I might think the junk emails and mailings from GOP fundraisers attempting to capitalize on Trump enthusiasm might seem to be emblematic of the Republican Party.
In Texas, where I live, by contrast, when I think of the Republican Party, I think of Greg Abbott, Ted Cruz, and a genuinely amazing “bench” of Republicans who hold every statewide elected office, and who did so before Trump, and who will do so (I hope) after Trump, without reliance upon Trump. Why would I want to abandon that Party, just because Trump’s an incompetent, unfit, lying, self-centered, hypocritical moron?
Instead, I take great and continuing comfort from what I see as efforts to persevere as the Party of Lincoln, as the party of responsible government and personal responsibility of citizens, the party of genuine civil rights (not identity politics), the party of genuine economic and political liberty — all despite Trump, even when he’s peripherally involved.
This past month, for example, I was very heartened to see Texas Supreme Court Justice Jeff Brown — before whom I appeared when he was the presiding judge of the 55th District Court of Harris County, who’s since run successfully for the Fourteenth Court of Appeals and the Texas Supreme Court — nominated by Trump to a seat on the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of Texas. Jeff Brown is very much in the mold of Abbott and Cruz, a true Rule of Law guy who is thoroughly, genuinely grounded in traditional GOP principles that, in turn, make him an extremely fair and predictable judge. Is that why Donald Trump nominated him? Nope, Trump nominated him because Leonard Leo and the other advisers to whom Trump has outsourced judicial nominations picked him. At age 49, I expect Justice (soon to be once again just “Judge”) Brown to be an important and distinguished public servant for many years, perhaps decades, to come. When the Texas Republican Party can continue producing public servants like him despite Trump, that makes me very much value the Texas GOP, and very much disinclines me to abandon the Party and start throwing rocks at it from outside.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/3/2019 @ 12:41 am@224 You say a ton of really well thought out and reasonable things, and then you say Medicare for all is Eeeeeevvvvviiiiilllllll. It might be too expensive or unworkable or likely to be ineffective or inefficient, but eeeeevvvvvviiiiillll is a hyperbolic overstatement that would entirely undermine any case you could make that it isn’t a good solution. If Obamacare gets overturned, you (broad you, not you personally) would be talking to some people who suddenly lost their health insurance and can’t afford healthcare without it. For them, especially if they have kids, Medicare for their kids would not look at all eeeevvvvviiiiillllll. It would look like a saving grace.
Nic (896fdf) — 4/3/2019 @ 12:50 am@227. It’s a waste of electrons to argue pragmatics with an ideologue.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:16 am226 every day in texas 400 mexican kids and 100 black kids turn 18 voting age. beto barely lost. in 2016 republican arizona was next to last state called for trump. look what happened in arizona in 2018. and this with all you right to lifers complaining about all these aborted black and brown babies.
lany (409418) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:54 am2 problems in America – The democrat party and the republican party pretending to not be the uni-party.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 3:01 amThey stink on ice.
@ Nic (#227): If there could actually be such a thing as “Medicare for All” in the real world, it would not be evil. The people peddling it now know, however, that such is an utter fantasy, that it is an arithmetic impossibility, that only the financially illiterate can believe otherwise, and that what we’d actually get is government-rationed lowest-common-denominator health care spectacularly dissimilar from that which people currently on private insurance plans now have and expect in the future. Peddling this lie is evil, in my opinion, and the people who are doing it have as their purpose the aggregation of power unto themselves in an elite autocracy that would make Nikita Khrushchev blanch at its ruthlessness. “Medicare for all” isn’t about health care, Nic, it’s about controlling your life and about a fifth of the American economy. It’s a con job whether it’s being peddled by the Dems or by Donald J. Trump.
Beldar (fa637a) — 4/3/2019 @ 4:05 amThey are working to render your vote irrelevant:
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:44 amhttps://www.conservativereview.com/news/many-cnns-national-security-analysts-undisclosed-ties-oppressive-qatari-regime/
Medicare is already hemorrhaging money, and it narrows networks by choice, this is why Reagan was against it in 1962!
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:51 amIt’s like they drink, but they dont swallow:
https://www.google.com/amp/s/legalinsurrection.com/2019/04/here-we-go-again-another-hack-scientific-study-favoring-fun-control/amp/
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:52 am“the Party happily overlooked his inappropriate behavior and made excuses for him [Trump], while periodically clucking their tongues in an obligatory shame on you, eventually leading them to look the other way in order to give Trump full support.”
I took this critique to mean the functioning Party majority….with a healthy tilt toward its vocal leadership. Though certainly one must acknowledge that McCain, Romney, Sasse, and the Bush family remained outside of that camp….and Paul Ryan was visibly uncomfortable trying desperately to maintain comity in the face of what seemed intentional outrageousness and provocation. Not all Republicans believe in the efficacy or wisdom of a border wall, the broad-brush intended banning of Muslims, attacking allies with tariffs, the unseemly appearance of cuddling up to Putin, the manic attacking of the media from the chief law enforcement officer’s bedroom, or doing insufficiently little as the deficit balloons to unprecedented heights. Most Republicans desperately care about these things and ability of the Party brand to attract new governing majorities.
So why does it feeeel like the GOP has gone hook, line, and sinker for Trumpism? Our media has turned spectacularly binary…running cover….or running like Chicken Little. There is not much room at FNC for genuine Trump skepticism….like MSNBC….they just want token foils…that can be swatted away with indignation….or overwhelmed. The media is fueled by a Trump base that just loves that it seems like a Republican is fighting back….conservative justices are getting appointed….regulations are unilaterally being retired….and they have a voice echoing their concerns for border security. Wins and the appearance of wins overcome process fouls and the changing and challenging of norms governing the office. The majority likes a flawed President that they can relate to….and love the celebrity appeal ala Ric Flair….minus the inimitable “woooooo”.
Still there are other things that make me sad for the GOP more generally. The Party obviously invested mightily in “repeal and replace” without any clear strategy on how to move forward without 60 or close to 60 votes. None, zip, zilch, nada. The Party’s rhetoric outpaced its abilities….and it was a massive exposure…of…if not disunity…incompetence. The budgeting process was not far behind that….where broad tax cuts…vice just some neutral restructuring…were paired with significant increases in military spending…as if we don’t know better. Finally the GOP has led an unsavory charge on an immigration situation which has markedly improved over the past two decades. If there is a current crisis….it’s been manufactured politically by sides that have lost touch with reality. Immigration is a problem that needs bodies….some barriers….and no wall….but the GOP and disappointingly Cruz….still panders to the allure of a quick fix. Finally, the GOP…via FNC and Talk Radio…has become the Party of hysteria and over reaction….again the DEMs don’t help this…but it’s hard to sit and listen to it. Words matter….and we should be careful how we use them….
AJ_Liberty (165d19) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:12 amOne of these days they’ll find one who isnt as much a fish out of water, like Davis or o’Rourke, that was the story of Tony Blair, he transformed England with little note.
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:12 amMore people will lose their insurance because this how Robert creamer designed it, but McConnell doesn’t care, yes they got a pittance of a tax cut which will evaporate by 2024 if not sooner, they have stalled on the wall for 12 years,
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:18 amnever trumpers and the rules of engagement they prescribe are not addicting just self serving
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:21 amhttps://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/04/it_is_outrageous_that_supporting_trump_is_dangerous.html
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:24 amI think you are right. Everything is a binary choice to the GOP, AJ_Liberty, and Trump is the only answer. The Party expects any members who don’t accept that to shut up, and most have. Even the Texas political leaders do what Trump wants or shut up. I don’t think they will like what happens in the next Texas election.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:27 amOnce upon a time, California was a republican state, at least in half the contests, you see how the prog infection settled in the schools than this courts and ultimately the state house, first putting up a cipher like Davis, when he wee rejected they came back with brown a 70s retread, to make it caracas on the pacific.
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:34 amI say investigate to learn if this is “overstated… to say the least”:
Comey fears an investigation
‘Social media personality James Comey told “journalist” Christine Amanpour that he “fears” an investigation of the deep state coup, massive abuse of power and greatest political scandal in the history of America that took place on his watch.
“I don’t fear it personally. I fear it as a citizen,” he said. “Right? Investigate what? Investigate that investigations were conducted? What would be the crime you’d be investigating? So it’s a terrible cycle to start.”
What would be the crime you’d be investigating? HA! That’s a hoot. What was the crime YOU were investigating, TwitterJim? You bet your ass he fears it personally.
President Trump is also curious about the coup launched against him.
“I hope they now go and take a look at the origins of the investigation, the beginnings of the investigation,” the president told reporters on Tuesday. “You look at the origin of the investigation, where it started, how it started, who started it.”
“Whether it‘s [former FBI Deputy Director Andrew] McCabe or Comey or a lot of them, where does it go? How high up in the White House did it go?“ Trump continued.’
https://pjmedia.com/trending/the-morning-briefing-welcome-to-subpoena-city-and-much-much-more/
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:35 amTexas is Blue with Florida next.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:35 am“I don’t think they will like what happens in the next Texas election.”
Blue, blue, ‘lectric blue, that’s the color of the state where you will live… blue, blue.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:37 amKushner says let all the felons out and vote because the majority vote republican.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:37 amWhat a moron.
And I don’t think you can put most of the blame on Trump. If it happens.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:39 amAnd I hope it doesn’t. Happen.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:40 amWhat is striking is this security organ, is this same that let San Bernardino and Orlando and parkland happen, mccabe gave the second instance a sentence, well we can’t let a crisis go to waste. Specially when there are bigger game.
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:43 amOf course you don’t because you know all about Texas.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:46 amAnd the happy ending to the rear-ended rental car story is that the rental agency will take care of it.
But we never would’ve been in the mickeyD drive-thru line in front of the hot pink haired septuagenarian IF we hadn’t have to wait for the rental agency district manager to swing by in-law’s ranch to pick up the two key rings that had the keys to 30+ rental cars before we left for our excursion to Sabino Canyon.
I told my wife this was like a re-do of Bradbury’s “Sound of Thunder”, only with a rear-ended Nissan Sentra in place of the squashed butterfly.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:49 am249… I just expressed an opinion, DRJ. I would appreciate it if we just agree to disagree.
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:50 amThey voted for Ann Richards once, shes Maury maverick compared to the new crew, the Murdoch boys will soon enough neuter fox, so that there is no opposition, to get the total capitulation like New Zealand might take a little longer.
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:53 amTo the Devil with these country club republicans!
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:54 amAlthough they’ve only turned in 37 out of 1.2 million so maybe not.
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:55 amGood to hear coronello
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:58 amTruth be told, can’t wait to get home…
Colonel Haiku (eab07d) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:00 amYou look at some of the European series offered on the international channel it doesn’t seem terribly cheerful.
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:01 amMuses:
You got rear-ended by Cher?!!!!
nk (dbc370) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:16 amNow that would’ve been something special!
Colonel Haiku (437a5f) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:20 amHave you looked at what else is out there besides fox:
Narciso (36dd65) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:22 amhttps://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/04/ratings_for_cnn_and_msnbc_continuing_to_crash_as_viewers_migrate_to_fox_news_prime_time_.html
While we were waiting for the sheriff to arrive to take a report, the hot pink haired septuagenarian had left her car running with the AC on and she asked if I wouldn’t mind if she waited in her car, as her husband – who was seated in the front passenger seat – “has brain damage”. I said, please, go right ahead…
Colonel Haiku (437a5f) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:24 amCher is still alive?
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:27 amNo, thats the future version of Krysten Sinema and she thought you were in her way of hitting the falling Golden Arches which would electrocute her way back to year 2049.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:41 amhttps://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2019/04/02/hispanics_rally_to_trump_boosting_his_2020_chances_139933.html
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:59 amSave Texas, Please.
Not the brightest bulb from the Narciso/Kishnevi state, but there’s always a Dan Patrick and Louie Gohmert alongside the Dan Crenshaw and Ted Cruz; on the other hand, I thought Giuliani-in-drag was the catcher of that particular battery.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:12 amYou know what was an unlawful interstate compact? The Confederate States of America. Does this attempted coup d’ etat by California, New York, Illinois, and the other seven blue states that have already signed on to disenfranchise their citizens, rise to the level of rebellion and insurrection? Can Trump invade them, occupy them, and reconstruct them?
nk (dbc370) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:26 am263… shows how important hyphens and commas can be…
Hot, pink haired septuagenarian
or…
Hot-pink haired septuagenarian
Colonel Haiku (437a5f) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:32 am241. narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:34 am
It was a little like Caracas 20 years ago, not now, what with the blackouts and brownouts.
This actually ended while Grey Davis was still Governor, if I am right.
The cause was government planning, plus the usual very slow reaction time of goverment when things go wrong. California was not a dictatorship, so it was corrected enough to prevent it from continuing to happen.
The problem was that California limited the amount of electricity that could be generated in California AND set up a “market” to set the price that operated only a wholesale level, which was exploited by Enron and others.
The generation cap was too low because of President Bill Clinton. Electricity forecasts were based in large part on economic forecasts, because it was well known that the amount of electricity consumed tracked, more or less, the level of the economy. (There was also the fact that computers icreased electricity use, but the first point is more important.)
What President Clinton had done was to deliberately underestimate economic growth.
Yes he did. You wouldn’t expect a president to do that, but $lick Willie did, and he did it for a reason.
He did that in order to create a budget crunch, because when there was a budget crunch, appropriation bills did not get passed in Congress through regular order, and it was necessary for Congress to pass continuing resolutions, and you can put things into a continuing resolution (special spending but also changes in law) that wouldn’t ordinarily be able to pass Congress.
Clinton wanted a budget crunch so much so that he tried to get Congess to disregard the budget surplus, on the grounds that it came from Social Security taxes, which somehow were supposed to be put in a “lockbox” which was impossible.
Nobody much paid attention to the Clinton Administration’s economic projections except the loyal Democrats of California who used them as justification for the low level of electricity generation they allowed – they wanted it low for environmental reasons, not that the environemental reasons made any sense.
Today we have another serious problem caused by government in California:
Instead of fighting fires, they try to evacuate people.
Not only does this make the fires worse, but evacuating people actually gets more people killed!!
Whatever they gain in evacuation, is more than lost in the greater extent of the fire damage.
Yes, it’s true, not cutting brush near inhabited places also makes fires more likely, but the real problem is caused by evacuating people from large areas and then letting places burn. I have read anecdotes, and it is easier than you might think to prevent wildfires from destroying buildings. Of course you have to be able to tell where you can make a stand, but even a delaying action, will cut down the total number of dwellings affected and cutting down the number of dwellings affected saves lives.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:42 am266, wasnt much of a compact – the individual Confederate States also opposed the formation of centralized purchasing/procurement for their military , which would have made a bigger difference early in the Civil War when Britain and France (and France’s proxies in Mexico and Quebec) were more willing to participate in open trade with the CSA, among other trappings of parallel federal government.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:55 amBut which shade of blue? Will the party move towards more progressives or will corporatist retain control? Are all of these demographic groups driving things blue really on board with the corporatists. I’m not saying they will go red but I think some of those changes will change the party in ways that also aren’t good for the modern brand of Democrat and will create more variations than just more people voting for the current definition of blue.
frosty48 (491023) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:57 am@268 Why do we keep using Venezuela as an example of failed big government policies when we’ve got better examples right here at home.
frosty48 (491023) — 4/3/2019 @ 9:11 am@Colon3l Haiku – Your comment numbering if off by two, orobably because there must be two comments by you in moderation, which can happen when you put too many links in a comment, or use a forbidden word.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/3/2019 @ 9:13 amfrosty48 (491023) — 4/3/2019 @ 9:11 am
Because Venezuela is more horrible. That’s a cynical reason, but it is true.
And they like to say socialism instead of failed big government command and control policies.
The elctriv=city problems in Venezuela are because they stopped paying the engineers with money of any value and half the people maintaining the system quit, and they made mistakes when there was aproblem. It wasn’t resources, since 90% of Venezuela’s electrical power came from hydropower.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/3/2019 @ 9:20 amNope, maybe one
Colonel Haiku (437a5f) — 4/3/2019 @ 9:21 amyou would think they would stop at defense of eastern social democracies, but their ultimate wish is that, they don’t even realize guiado is a social democrat, neither was Leopoldo lopez, the one on house arrest,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 10:07 amthey fired all the people who actually knew how to do thing, like run power companies, it really is full brawndo down there, and Maduro, is the top dog, that’s how raul wants it,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 10:09 amI see cocaine mitch won’t close the border because the koch bros and Donohue have his nuts in a vice. 12 Republicans hate your guts Americans.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 10:35 amSalt Fat Acid Heat
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 10:43 amby Samin Nosrat
is a great cookbook
and her series on TV is great
mg, you do know that the slur “Cocaine Mitch” was made up by some West Virginia jerkoff who, having done a year in prison (for sexually molesting his neighbors’ chickens I believe), was running in the Republican primary for the U.S. Senate? That there’s no basis in fact for it?
nk (dbc370) — 4/3/2019 @ 10:59 amRe: Venezuela electricity:
276. narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 10:09 am
All of them? It wasn’t that they just quit? (left the country.)
The recent problem was caused by an emergency – something got damaged, and then it was damaged more by attempts to repair it.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/11/world/americas/venzuela-blackout-maduro.html
A Corpoelec supervisor involved in dispatching Guri’s power said he 4\\\\The latest attempt led to the explosion of a secondary substation near Guri on Saturday.
“Every time they attempt to restart, they fail and the disruption breaks something else in the system, destabilizing the grid yet further,” Mr. Aguilar said.
https://www.wired.com/story/venezuela-power-outage-black-start/
Caracas got some electricity restored by re-opening more local power plants that ran on oil.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/3/2019 @ 11:29 amIt makes him seem mcturtle seems more exciting:
https://legalinsurrection.com/2019/04/chinese-national-arrested-charged-after-carrying-malicious-software-into-trumps-mar-a-lago/
Narciso (006437) — 4/3/2019 @ 11:29 amMcIntyre thinks its malware, ala stuixtnet:
https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/273348/prince-charles-snubs-president-trump-humberto-fontova?fbclid=IwAR1_I-3V23lRdyHa4DHRUmz4n3ckM7rGAqonKOj1mwwSKSBbm_7dndauyek#.XKSneXI6Igw.facebook
Narciso (006437) — 4/3/2019 @ 11:34 amEnvious of evin prison:
https://thefederalist.com/2019/04/03/christiane-amanpour-lock-hate-speech-fbi-shut/
Narciso (006437) — 4/3/2019 @ 11:39 amnarciso:
it really is full brawndo down there, and Maduro, is the top dog, that’s how raul wants it,
Brawndo = ?
I am not sure it’s Raul Castro or Cuba. China and Russia are helping too, and Cuba is probably getting compensated by them. Any oil being exported is perobably not going to Cuba now.
We’ve also got Turkey, but That’s just erdogan trying to half ally himself with Russia. He just had abig election defeat – the opposition really watched the polls.
China is separately negotiating with Guaido and he thinks that’s good – actually all that would do is assure China that supporting Maduro carries no downside risk!
Russia actually tried to draw attention to its help by having planes land openly at the Caracas Airport.
Putin is probably trying to make his help look like it is more than it is, with the idea that the U.S. will back off, because the U.S. military and Trump will think that otherwise U.S. troops might be firing on Russians. The U.S. actually did that in Syria (to ward off an attack) but the Russians weren’t official government soldiers – they were included in a Syrian attack force going to a Kurdish base where Americans were also. But Russian involvement did sort of rule out a lot of action in Syria.
They’re trying to repeat what happened in Syria. But the reason why that won’t work is because there is nothing there like Hezbollah, which the U.S. won’t fight. If Columbian narco forces get involved the U.S. will take them on. Once a Civil war breaks out, or the U.S. or Brazil or any other country or countries gets involved, it’s over.
Maduro does not depend on the Venezualian military. he justwants to keep them neutral. It’s special forces and even outright Cubans. The U.S. (or other cuntries like Chile) have to offer the foreigners in Venezuala asylum. It’s no good for Guaido to promise venezualaians who defect will be forgiven. They are not important. The problem hwoever with teh foreignewrs is that in many cases their families are not in Venezuela.
Maduro is moving slowly against Guaido, hoping not to trip anmy wires that might lead to military action against his government.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/3/2019 @ 11:50 amNew Yirk Times story about Biden, which includes the two newest accusers, and soem statements by oters sayingthe same thing happened to them and they didn’t feel bad.
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/02/us/politics/joe-biden-women-me-too.html
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/3/2019 @ 11:57 amGoing to lunch in Tucson, driving the rental car. These AZ drivers are not the best. Please keep me in your prayers.
Colonel Haiku (0869a7) — 4/3/2019 @ 11:57 amYikes is it that bad?
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 12:01 pm@261. “National Lampoon’s Haikation.” 😉
“I don’t know why they call this stuff Hamburger Helper. It does just fine by itself…” Cousin Eddie [Randy Quaid] National Lampoon’s Vacation, 1983
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 12:27 pmBreaking– CNN airs Joey Bee’s Apology Video Tweet #1.
True to form, he even ‘plagiarized’ terms from Pelosi’s b-tchslap [see #206] looking and sounding like an Arizona car salesman trying to sell you that factory rust undercoat before you sign.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 12:35 pmCNN what is that, better check the cables.
Narciso (006437) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:21 pmhttps://www.powerlineblog.com/archives/2019/04/a-personal-note-on-the-noor-trial.php
Narciso (006437) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:32 pmmedicare for all is coming and will be paid for in way you won’t like.
lany (890fd0) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:32 pmWell his nuts are still in Donohues vise.
mg (8cbc69) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:32 pmbreaking news 75% of all jobs created in februrary were in leftist socialist run california not the minimum wage paradise of texass!
lany (890fd0) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:34 pmShe’s just making the Democrats live by their own rules.
Trump has said crude things: “Grab them by the..” and as owner of a meat market called the Miss Something or other pageant he was accused of behaving like a carnivore. This was all baked in by the time the campaign was over, and the voting began.
I’m not outraged by Joe’s behavior. By all accounts he’s an 76 year old touchy guy and if it wasn’t for all the Democrat posturing on the issue he’d be fine. I forget which number this Republican move is in Alinsky’s rules, but like I said above Conway is only pointing out that this is the Democrats own rule they are violating.
The Commonwealth of Virginia’s mess is a good barometer of what happens if you don’t hang them by their own rules… it’s kind of interesting really. Kavanaugh gets accused of sexual assault by women whose stories couldn’t convict anyone, but LT Gov Fairfax is A-OK even those his accuser and her friends seem very credible (at least compared to the Kavanaugh coven).
My guess is 98% of Americans are against sexual assault, but around 40% or less care about “sexual assault” as defined by the current Democrats.
steveg (e7a56b) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:37 pmOn the subject of slippery slopes the Republicans cannot allow, the latest attempts to tear down statues of Thomas Jefferson and any other founding fathers who held slaves.
steveg (e7a56b) — 4/3/2019 @ 1:40 pmWhats next, crossing out their words in the Bill of Rights?
294 and 295: yes.
Its unpopular, because its seen as an effort to impose a “Pure as Caesar’s Wife” test at our cost, which no one else imposes.
The bow-tied, court-courtier, and utterly ineffectual “George Will sipping martinis at the National Review” part of the party, is offended by all things Trump. “How dare he criticize NATO for not meeting its spending obligations?!” “Well, yes, he’s right but the way in which he talks…”
They acquiesced in the decades long adventures of JFK, Teddy, and Bubba. They were reduced to a group of emasculated monks by the bold moves by Obama to eviscerate the military, reduce the border to a line on a map, and undercut due process on campus. The “Flight 93 election” painted this is delicious detail.
But NOW of course, we must distance ourselves from the best bulwark conservatives have seen since the 80’s, because he essentially ‘spurned a cucumber sandwich,’ by talking crudely in private.
I can just see it: “General Washington, its just not done to attack on Christmas Eve!”
Its not a new outlook and its not hard to see the basis for it: Paul Fussel’s essay (Thank God for the Atomic Bomb)recounts the same “show me the way to the polo grounds” assessment of things in 1945. outlook: the further away from the battle line you were, the more dainty you could be in considering use of the A-bomb.
Giving up the rules after the other side has used them mercilessly against you is one reason we never seem to have any rules. The GOP’s “white glove” set were ready to give us Hillary before saying anything rude.
Harcourt Fenton Mudd (5e0a82) — 4/3/2019 @ 2:24 pm293: Moment please: If you back out the bullet train jobs (Paid for by the bonds already sold and still to be paid for). Then the government jobs– including the legions attending to homeless care. (All paid for by taxes–a transfer from me to them). Same in university hiring. How are we doing now?
Harcourt Fenton Mudd (5e0a82) — 4/3/2019 @ 2:32 pm@291. See #228.
http://content.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1916570,00.html
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 2:57 pmumcay then:
https://dailycaller.com/2019/04/02/valerie-jarrett-obama-white-house-too-macho/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 3:27 pmot, I noted the first detail from the interview of douglas Brinkley’s book about the moon landing
https://www.jfklibrary.org/sites/default/files/archives/JFKOH/Von%20Braun,%20Wernher/JFKOH-WBV-01/JFKOH-WBV-01-TR.pdf
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 3:36 pmI didn’t know about this one:
https://www.newcriterion.com/blogs/dispatch/mozart-done-right-10657
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 3:52 pm@300. Saw him on Morning Joe this morning pushing the book– w/verbal inaccuracies, of course. He noted his six hours of interviews w/Armstrong he conducted for NASA’s oral history program before he passed, refencing the well known, life-long ties between Apollo and the evolution of aviation Armstrong maintained.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 4:04 pm@300. Interesting transcript, narciso- good read; particularly for folks familiar w/the topic and know the context of the times. That Wiesner/Von Braun/JFK debate is well known; W was not really in the Apollo camp from the get-go and soon on the outs. VB’ ‘sales’ pitch- the ever present ‘talking points’ as we’d cal lit today, is there, too. But what does come through is JFK’s commitment and healthy debate on it- it wasn’t just lip service and off to something else. He efforted and cultivated support.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 4:14 pmI didn’t trust his account, so I checked the source, of course I discovered the detail that Von brauns rickets (under general medaris) could have had a shot to beat out sputnik, but the navy had priority.
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 4:30 pmIt was my grandfather who told me about goddard, and Von brauns debt to him, the patents were acquired for a song.
narciso (d1f714) — 4/3/2019 @ 4:31 pm@304/305- Right. Noticed no reference to Nordhausen in that VB list of bio credentials, either. Ike’s rationale [Corona] blocking Von Braun and the Army over the IGY civilian/Navy Vanguard project was a well kept secret for years and he took a lot of heat in the press- especially when Laika flew not long after the first Sputnik, but the plus from it was the Soviet Sputniks cleared the legalities on overflight issues for Corona.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 4:57 pm@305. Postscript- yeah, the German rocket engineers had standing order to obtain rights to Goddard’s patents; such were the times. That transcript is a good read if you know the context of the times then. Glad you posted the link to it.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:01 pm@231 people on private insurance also have signification rationed healthcare, unless they are wealthy, only the corporate version (and if you want to talk about life controlling, there are several plans out there that require you to keep track of your diet and exercise or you get penalized). There’s all this screaming about Obamacare, but the old system was very much not working for large segments of society since at least the 80s/early 90s (probably longer than that, but that’s when I started paying attention to politics) and the Republican party knew the direction things were going and did nothing. They had plenty of time and plenty of power, but they let the Democrats take the initiative on trying to find a solution to the problem and now they are stuck with that decision. I do not, personally, think we are ultimately going to end up with just “medicare for all”, I suspect that we are going to get a mixed public and private system. I don’t think we are ever going to go back to the wild-west health insurance system, so the Republican party needs to figure out what it wants instead of just reacting with “DO NOT WANT!” or they are going to be left in the dust on this issue.
Nic (896fdf) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:03 pmMr. Mudd,
You seem to be saying Trump and his supporters have no use for rules. Is that correct and, if so, does that include the Rule of Law?
DRJ (15874d) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:05 pm“As half the country goes through an unofficial period of mourning in the aftermath of the Mueller report, one thing has become absolutely clear: Vladimir Putin got exactly what he wanted.
No, I’m not talking about installing a Russian puppet in the White House. I’m talking about Putin’s actual goal: undermining faith in American democracy. And in this his most helpful, if unwitting allies have been most of the mainstream media.
Russia was seeking to delegitimize the expected Clinton victory. Facebook ads targeting Hillary Clinton in broken English didn’t undermine anything without the help of Putin’s unwitting partner: the mainstream media.
For over two years, guest after guest speculated about Russian agents “hacking our election. ” Partisan pundits blamed Russian interference for the results of every single race that turned out poorly for Democrats.
Putin got what he wanted, not from Mr. Trump but from his irresponsible critics.”
https://omny.fm/shows/townhall-review-conservative-commentary-on-todays/jerry-bowyer-putin-got-what-he-wanted
Colonel Haiku (0869a7) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:10 pm“Giving up the rules after the other side has used them mercilessly against you is one reason we never seem to have any rules. The GOP’s “white glove” set were ready to give us Hillary before saying anything rude.”
Damn straight.
Colonel Haiku (0869a7) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:16 pm@308. Nic: see #298 & #228.
Conserve electrons.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:25 pmwhat people want is a health care system that covers everybody at a cost not too high for anybody, and less than it costs now, without any form of rationing or denial of coverage or service, with complete free choice of doctors for patients, and nobody can figure out any way to do it.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:27 pmhere might be a way to do it, but it would be impossible to predict it will work. You need pressure on prices, but also pressure on quality and pressure on quality can on;y come from the consumer.
Every plan proposed has some kind of obvious defect, and the status quo does also.
You can’t even imitate other countries, because taht would halt medical progress more than it’s been constrained now.
The standard Republican plan has the obvious defect of not providing enough money from outside the regular insurance system for pre-existing conditions. The standard Democratic plan has the obvious defect of theer being, at first, no pressure on prices (more than we have now) and then, inevitably, attempts to cut costs by denial of service.
You need a James Madison to design a health care/coverage system, with numerous checks and balances.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:36 pmSammy: “what people want is a health care system that covers everybody at a cost not too high for anybody,”
I think what you meant to say is people want an all-inclusive healthcare system that’s affordable for all.
“and less than it costs now, without any form of rationing or denial of coverage or service, with complete free choice of doctors for patients, and nobody can figure out any way to do it.”
I think what you meant to say is the system should, again, be affordable for all, a person should be covered for any illness or catastrophic condition upon onset of aforementioned illness or catastrophic condition even if the person has not purchased the coverage and must have access to any doctor the person wants and that this healthcare Shangri La remains unobtainium.
Colonel Haiku (0869a7) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:41 pm“You seem to be saying Trump and his supporters have no use for rules. Is that correct and, if so, does that include the Rule of Law?”
DRJ (15874d) — 4/3/2019 @ 5:05 pm
Trump and his supporters weren’t committing FISA abuse nor turning a blind eye to it.
Munroe (7071e5) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:24 pm313&314. I don’t know that a system like that would necessarily cost more than it does now, simply because I don’t know how much our current system actually costs people. I don’t know that anyone really knows. If you work for an employer that provides healthcare, you have what they lay out for it, what you contribute in your contribution, then what you pay in copays and cost percentages, multiplied by 100 million differing configurations. Plus any number of non-obvious dis-economies. The best estimate might just be alot. It currently costs alot per person. And it’s lousy for every non-healthcare competitive market because it harms business start ups, so we, as a society, are probably losing both competition based savings and taxes from new businesses.
Nic (896fdf) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:35 pmThe us has five times the population of the next largest country, which would Germany which has profited from our security umbrella
Narciso (5df9bb) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:43 pmNo wonder he and Cortez are so sympatico:
https://dailycaller.com/2019/04/03/beto-orourke-wife-company/
Narciso (5df9bb) — 4/3/2019 @ 6:46 pmHey, wontcha play?
A somebody done Trump wrong song.
And make Trumpkins feel at home.
While they miss their Daddy.
While they miss their Daddy.
So play for them, please,
nk (dbc370) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:03 pmA sad FISA melody.
So sad that it makes everybody cry:
“Why-why-why?”
A real hurtin’ song,
‘Bout a Deep State gone wrong,
So they won’t have to snivel all alone.
I like Presidents that aren’t victimized.
nk (dbc370) — 4/3/2019 @ 7:04 pmYou seem to be saying Trump and his supporters have no use for rules. Is that correct and, if so, does that include the Rule of Law?
That still exists in D.C.? Near as I can tell it’s all about what the Times and Post publish, not what happens in any court.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:07 pmTrump isn’t the guy who says “Rules? In a knife fight? … There’s no rules!”
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:11 pmComplain about the garbage polity before you complain about what it brung you.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:12 pmDang it, nk, get it right!
“Hey, wontcha play?
Colonel Haiku (aa1d82) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:44 pmANOTHER somebody done DONALD Trump wrong song.”
322… that was just plain and pointedly mean!
Colonel Haiku (aa1d82) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:46 pmAkshually, I think that Trump has run a pretty clean administration. He’s been playing by the rules that matter. Flynn lied to the FBI. Anything else?
nk (dbc370) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:53 pm“But the thing is, they are cowardly,” “History will not only judge Donald Trump harshly, it will judge Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan and all the other cowards who refused to stand up to this president and allowed the party of Lincoln to die. They will be judged harshly. Because whatever he says goes right now.”
—- Tom Perez https://www.independentsentinel.com/more-propaganda-dnc-chair-says-trump-supporters-are-cowardly/
NeverTrump runs with this dog. Flea collars all around.
Colonel Haiku (aa1d82) — 4/3/2019 @ 9:03 pmHistory will not only judge Donald Trump harshly
They tend to rate Trump as worse than Buchanan, which is hard to fathom.
But then historians still judge Ronald Reagan harshly. They generally rate Obama higher. See if you can guess why.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/3/2019 @ 9:16 pm@318. Most of Europe has. But then, ‘occupied’ Germany- particularly in what was once known as West Germany– especially the regions left standing after WW2– was like visiting Pennsylvania Dutch country, complete w/chocolate, pretzels, beer, colorful hamlets and American military bases with lots of Woolworth’s stores along the strasse.
DCSCA (797bc0) — 4/3/2019 @ 10:05 pmOT, but I found this well-argued and spot-on: https://pjmedia.com/trending/if-mexico-wont-lift-a-finger-president-trump-should-lower-the-boom/
Colonel Haiku (aa1d82) — 4/4/2019 @ 4:24 amWe’re about to switch over from russiagate v1.0 to russiagate v1.1 – the security clearances. Personally, I’m waiting for the heel-turn when China jumps in the ring.
But until then, are we going with hypocrisy or whataboutism?
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/4/2019 @ 6:38 amTom Perez, the hammerlock on the police, with the Consent degrees, big amnesty when he was Maryland attorney general
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:23 amYes thatd the next round:
https://thefederalist.com/2019/04/03/tricia-newbold-is-not-a-noble-whistleblower-shes-a-disloyal-resister/
Wonder what she did when Ben Rhodes was negotiating with Iran and Cuba
Narciso (3f8409) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:29 amOK, so no rules if you live in DC. Is this what you do in your own lives, too? What about the Bible’s rules? Do they apply only in certain places, too?
DRJ (15874d) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:34 amBeto O’ROURKE went to town
Colonel Haiku (aa1d82) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:35 amOh man, he is a phony
Stuck the babypoo on a plate
And called it guacamole
What about with local politicians? No rules there either, right? If so, that means no rules anywhere.
DRJ (15874d) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:35 amNo they only apply to Republicans and certain targeted business interests, and the appeals court do not bring justice:
https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2019/04/04/exclusive-kobach-three-steps-to-solve-the-border-crisis/
Narciso (3f8409) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:37 amLeavin on a jet plane
Colonel Haiku (aa1d82) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:37 amDon’t think that I’ll be back again
Oh,Tucson, where life is slow
I’m heading to another state where people are nicer, smarter too.
No, that’s not true…
Colonel Haiku (aa1d82) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:39 amIf you dont believe me, ask Tom delay, you could also ask hank Greenberg the board of Lehman bros before Spitzer targeted them.
Narciso (3f8409) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:40 amRe Kobach
None of the steps he suggests need a declaration of emergency. The first two are obvious ones, but the third is unenforceable (not to mention the massive invasion of privacy involved in the government having records of every wire transfer domestic or international, and every financial transactions involving a foreign destination.)
Of course he doesn’t mention the one actual permanent solution: reforming the immigration system so that people don’t need abusive asylum claims to get into the US.
But it takes leadership in the executive branch willing to act decisively.
He said it, not me.
Kishnevi (9dfc8c) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:56 am338, Kobach must have got coached up or he is deathly afraid of Jason Sudeikis making a one-skit comeback on SNL. Rather milquetoast and non-belligerent compared to the PJM piece from Haiku.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:59 amthe system is designed to preserve itself, at the expense of the population, that’s why caproni and bowman, were promoted after they failed to flag the two 9/11 hijackers, the first became a judge, the second a high priced consultant, kobach is deadly serious, that’s why they replaced with that non entity drone, the second largest contingent of border crossers are Chinese, the third are the south Asians and africans,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 8:17 amKobach deftly avoided showing fangs or red meat in the Breitbart piece, whereas Mark Ellis would have made Pershing blush. Of course, had Kobach not insisted on resurrecting Brownback’s tax starvation policies, he’d be changing Bob Dole’s bedpans as his side job in Topeka.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/4/2019 @ 8:31 am“Of course he doesn’t mention the one actual permanent solution: reforming the immigration system so that people don’t need abusive asylum claims to get into the US.”
Kishnevi (9dfc8c) — 4/4/2019 @ 7:56 am
Capitulation to the demands of those want to get in is a really odd solution.
Moreover, if you let them in legally it becomes much more difficult to deport any that commit violent crimes and any other felonies.
It’s an unviable “solution” any way you cut it.
Munroe (b66045) — 4/4/2019 @ 8:47 amthey would find another way, this cipher they put in topeka, will balloon the Medicaid rolls, like the one in Louisiana, lightfoot is still a lizard,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 8:54 amTo your 2nd point in #344, Narciso, this should make you crap your pants a lot faster than seeing a gay 1/2 Indian Irish PM.
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:06 amhey they had a commie guerilla, as president, it’s worse than losing the cold war in that region,
the point is we need to keep an eye on everything on that border, not focus obsessively on O’Rourke’s meal choices,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:10 amChavez’s oil and organization were the fertilizer behind that left rise,
https://babalublog.com/2019/04/04/tweet-of-the-day-the-left-simply-cannot-resist-whitesplaining-venezuela-to-venezuelans/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:15 amfocusing on the big issues:
https://morningstaronline.co.uk/article/b/labour-councillors-urge-sadiq-khan-reconsider-minicab-tax
now the epidemic of knife crime, that’s just disappointing,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:18 amnk (dbc370) — 4/3/2019 @ 8:26 am
There is a distinction. The states that would form the CSA had all seceded prior to creating their Confederation (in the case of the first seven). The final four also seceded prior to joining.
The coup d’ etat states are committing their acts while presently and voluntarily subject to the US Constitution.
Matador (39e0cd) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:22 amin practice, you can’t have two separate legal regimes, that’s what 70 years of jim crowe taught us, but what does that have to do with the price of oolong tea,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:29 amDCSCA might win that special No-Biden bet he has going – white straight male Rust Belter checks in –
urbanleftbehind (5eecdb) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:32 amhttp://www.yahoo.com/gma/view-ohio-rep-tim-ryan-announces-2020-run-153205852–abc-news-topstories.html?.tsrc=fauxdal
Gephardt 2.0, probably won’t get past the first hurdle, iowa was still relatively sensible in 1988,
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:37 amyou think it can’t happen in texas, the rough analogue,
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/calgary/alberta-government-debt-south-africa-1.5083949
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:41 amMoreover, if you let them in legally it becomes much more difficult to deport any that commit violent crimes and any other felonies.
The reverse in fact. If you don’t need to chase after noncriminal immigrants, it becomes much easier to deal with the criminal ones. You can focus your resources and get co-operation from the noncriminals who are no longer afraid of revealing themselves to ICE.
Remember this: almost every argument against liberalizing immigration is false, and almost always is merely avtecycling of 19th century nativism. There is almost nothing in that Ellis piece that can’t be found in Knownothing agitation against Irish immigrants and Masons.
Kishnevi (fe0b52) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:48 amfocusing on the important things:
https://nationalpost.com/news/politics/federal-government-hunted-for-person-who-leaked-omar-khadrs-10-5m-settlement-payment-internal-report-reveals
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:52 amAs a musician, we call them groupies.
BillPasadena (3511cf) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:53 amit was common practice at nbc and cbs (bezos partnership prevented the story from getting out)
https://dailycaller.com/2019/04/04/doj-nyt-wapo-mueller/
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:59 amDRJ, did you even SEE Butch Cassidy? There are no rules in a knife fight and it is good to be clear on that.
As I said, it was the polity that was corrupted first. Trump is a symptom, not a cause, and his opponent was worse but was an untouchable “made” woman. As we have seen, the system does not intend to protect Trump — quite the opposite — so selecting him meant that his dishonesty would be held in check, rather than running amok.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:59 amShorter:
Two choices:
A) Sleazy crook, with basic beliefs you hate, who will be protected by the government and lauded by the media.
B) Sleazy crook, with basic beliefs you share, who will be watched carefully by the government, and scrutinized by a hostile press.
Which is better for America?
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:03 amOK, not shorter.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:03 amWould a upright, moral (and COMPETENT!) person who shared your basic beliefs be better? Probably, but maybe they’d be destroyed by a press and government that is neither upright nor moral and abhors those beliefs. It may be that the competence part would include being willing to fight dirty.
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:06 amyes it’s mma rules, but only applied selectively,
https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/04/muellers_chevauche_burn_everyone_and_everything_trump_loves.html
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:09 amIs there anyone here who believes that CA, operating under a compact, would change it’s electoral votes to Republican if that changed the outcome of an election? Further, reneging by other “compact” states would make it MORE likely that CA would also renege since it would make it more likely that CA’s votes would put the GOP over the top (Non-Compact states would mostly be going GOP anyway).
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:10 amnothing to see here:
https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/273369/islamist-deputy-sheriff-nezar-hamze-has-sit-down-joe-kaufman
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:19 amit’s a poser,
https://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/nb/clay-waters/2019/04/03/ny-times-cant-figure-out-why-va-race-and-assault-scandals-faded-it
narciso (d1f714) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:31 am358. Kishnevi (fe0b52) — 4/4/2019 @ 9:48 am
It’s not just plain nativism. There is also some defunct economist involved here.
As John Maynard Keynes said, although he wasn’t talking about this (he was talking about the gold standard I think)
The people in charge of Homeland Security rely on this kind of thing.
I have no idea who this defunct economist was, but by my deduction, he must have flourished in the 1870s and 1880s, and may have had a connection with, or was relied upon, by the Americam Federation of Labor or other trade unions, and he may have damaged more lives than Karl Marx, with most of the real damage occuring after 1914.
This kind of thinking is also used to justify tariffs, but not by any serious economist, especially those+ trying to make predictions. The number of jobs are not independent from the number of people looking for work. You know why? Because we are not talking about inserting pegs into holes, but joining in a circle. Empirically, you would know that even without figiring out what the fallacy is.
It’s called The Lump of Labor fallacy, which is so not taken seriously by economists in any other context, that there are even denials that such a fallacy exists,
Trump doesn’t use the economic argument too much, because I think, it’s not strong enough, and also when you have a lot of economic growth the argument disappears. He prefers to adapt tropes used by the worst racists to illegal immigrants. (Angel Moms, Steinle’s Law and that sort of thing, which could be more logically applied to people leaving the South Side of Chicago for other states.)
It’s really a case, though, of “the ends are invented to justify the means.” Look at the economic counterarguments arguments the restrictionists use. Say there’s a labor shortage in agriculture? They can use machinery! Or import tomatoes from Mexico. Maybe they can but why should they need to? Why is the law first, and its “purpose” secondary?
Because thta;s what it is, The ends are invented to justify the means. Or the ends become “the rule of law” Like the Boston Tea Party, which we all know was all about the rule of law.
Every goal of the law is invented to justify the law, and is really a rationalization. And this kind of government intrusion into daily life is something that Republicans should want to minimize. Since when do Republicans believe in big government command and control policies?
What is “merit-based” immigration but a form of central planning? Does Congress have the capability of doing that right, and even if has the capability does it have a record of doing so? Yet they want to regulate it, and regulate above all, total numbers. Numbers. That’s what most of an immigration law is. Except the law is the result of sausage making in Congress, and was never reached as a result of any kind of analysis. Everyone involved is either for more or for less. I think everyone would be a whole lot better off if we had an immigration law that had no numbers in it at all, in the executable portion at least. As was the case before 1921, and before 1968 for indepedent countries in the Western Hemisphere. If you want “merit based” immigration, don’t put any numbers in the law!
There are certain things the Know Nothings never said, as far as I know:
1) They didn’t use any economic arguments.
2) They never claiemd that the federal government had any power to restrist immigration to te United States. All their proposals concerned naturalization (and, both explicitly and by derivation, voting.)
Is there anyone who can show me otherwise?
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:57 amCorrection *
– John Maynard Keynes (when referring to the gold standard I think, buut it’s on point here.)
I just wish I knew the name of this defunct economist. The Lump of Labor fallacy has harmed more lives than Karl Marx did, because the world would be a totally different place without it, and there woudn’t be any underdeveloped countries. (there would be a bigger greenhouse effect maybe, but I don’t think that;s a problem, and if it is, you can add something else to the stew)
Maye it would be worse in some other ways, I don’t know.
Anti-colonialism and anti-imperialism has also harmed lives tremendously since the 1960s.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/4/2019 @ 11:03 amIs there anyone here who believes that CA, operating under a compact, would change it’s electoral votes to Republican if that changed the outcome of an election? Further, reneging by other “compact” states would make it MORE likely that CA would also renege since it would make it more likely that CA’s votes would put the GOP over the top (Non-Compact states would mostly be going GOP anyway).
I may be wrong but as I understand it the “compact” would automatically assign electors in the participating states to the winner of the popular vote. The politicians in Sacramento and Albany would not have the ability to renege.
At the very least it would incentivize the GOP to campaign vigorously in blue states, with the aim of minimizing the Democratic margin of victory even if they could not actually win there. GOP voters in California would be relevant again. (Balanced out by the fact that Democratic votes in red states would be equally important, even in those states that are not part of the “compact”.
Kishnevi (cd9bd1) — 4/4/2019 @ 11:40 amThere is no “Compact” unless the Congress agrees. State legislatures can do whatever they want, including changing statutes (one of which would be required to implement such a Compact).
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/4/2019 @ 11:51 amIt wure would get the GOP out in force in CA, but who would ever visit the Dakotas?
Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/4/2019 @ 11:52 am367. Kevin M (21ca15) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:10 am
But they can’t change who the Electors are after the Electors have been picked.
They might be people in court, though, arguing about who really won the national popular vote and therefore which slate of Electors really were chosen by the state of California. Or whetehr there ss some other reason the Electors who would vote for the Republican should not have their election certified.
States can’t renege because thw constitution says Congress can set the date for choosing Electors and that date has to be the same throughout the United States. Maybe they could try not appointing any Electors at all but that wouldn’t help the Democratic candidate.
What would help is a state that cast the majority of its votes for the Republican candidate not appointing electors, perhaps because of a lawsuit. But what person involved would dare to do so, in a case where the Republican also won the popular vote, on the grounds the Electoral College winner should win? And if that could happen a state that never joined the compact could also do so.
The issue of faithless elctors is more salient. There could be a campaign to get the Electors for the popular vote loser to vote for the popular vote winner. Maybe even efforts by supporters of one candidate to seed “double crossers” onto the other candidate’s slate of Electors somewhere.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/4/2019 @ 11:55 amThis is the fellow who practically served as weinsteins protector
Narciso (790c29) — 4/4/2019 @ 12:13 pmhttps://www.google.com/amp/nymag.com/intelligencer/amp/2019/04/how-manhattan-da-cy-vance-spent-usd250k-on-travel-and-food.html
the american people are fed up with the popular vote loser winning the electoral college. its is one thing for an al gore or hillary clinton to say to the infuriated voters we must peacefully except that the loser won for the good of the corporate establishment deep states profits and their donor class contributions to the national democrat party and corporate establishment democrat candidates ;but they have been discredited by trump election and now no collusion. democrats like aoc and illian omar now leading the party will demand disenfranchised voters make the country even more ungovernable then it is now. biden has to worry about left democrats yelling at him groper joe you pervert not republicans if he runs.
lany (6fe650) — 4/4/2019 @ 1:13 pmCorrection, bukele is a fmr fmln but hes a businessman elected on the splinter right party ticket, so right lizard
Narciso (366412) — 4/4/2019 @ 1:36 pm“He prefers to adapt tropes used by the worst racists to illegal immigrants. (Angel Moms, Steinle’s Law and that sort of thing, which could be more logically applied to people leaving the South Side of Chicago for other states.)“
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/4/2019 @ 10:57 am
If we could deport citizen felons (whether from the South Side, or a Dylann Roof) it would indeed be racist to limit it to felons coming in illegally from south of the border. Since that’s not the case, your argument is simply more of the typical “Yes, but…RACIST!!” nonsense.
Munroe (01ccca) — 4/4/2019 @ 1:58 pmWhat mentally unfit presidents do: Recommend someone like Herman Cain of 9-9-9 fame for a seat on the Federal Reserve Board. Cain’s 9-9-9 plan no economic or fiscal sense, and he had his own sexual harrassment problem. Hmmm, come to think of it, Cain is a perfect choice for this Trump administration.
Paul Montagu (d49d0a) — 4/4/2019 @ 4:17 pmThe bar for presidential behavior was lowered (or to be more accurate, disappeared) when Bill Clinton was not removed from office.
DN (116571) — 4/4/2019 @ 4:37 pm@380 I think Kennedy said bar? Where?
frosty48 (6226c1) — 4/4/2019 @ 4:50 pmWell cain was on the board of the Kansas city fed, yes our current tax system is much better
Narciso (366412) — 4/4/2019 @ 5:24 pmWill anything come of this?
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/democratic-venezuelan-exiles-join-gop-cause-calling-dems-ill-informed-on-humanitarian-crisis
Narciso (366412) — 4/4/2019 @ 6:00 pmWill we see a post touting the NYT/WAPO story about unnamed Mueller team members claiming the Mueller Report is much more damaging than Barr is letting on? Or have we already seen it?
Colonel Haiku (2601c0) — 4/4/2019 @ 6:03 pmNothing here yet about Trump lying about closing the southern border? I thought that would be too much red meat for even Pat to turn away from writing about. Guess I was wrong.
Gryph (08c844) — 4/4/2019 @ 6:20 pmWell we found what Rock Jason leopokd was hiding under,
Narciso (366412) — 4/4/2019 @ 6:28 pmColonel Haiku @316 on 4/3/2019 @ 5:41 pm:
That’s right. By affordable for all it doesn’t mean the same price for all, and if it is supported by taxes, the taxes are more than bearable.
You could gove everybody a standard amount of money, some of which could not be used for isurance and some of which would be ost of not spent, create a doughnut hole with amaximum out of pocket cost, and allow different ways to fill it, with everybody being abel to handle it (like it being taken out of anticipated future Social security benefits – but on;y to liit/ There”d be amotive to pay less but it could be overcome by health necessity.
I didn’t say it was unobtsainable. I said nobody can figure out a way to do it. Now the part about ot having ourchased inadvance does not present aproblem, because everybody could be automatically enrolled in catastrophic by having to pay a tax (except lower income people wouldn’t owe any) unless they had something else. Or say, everyone gets $8,000 or $5,000 in helath care money, , to play with up with up to 2/3 of that available for insurance. If they do nothing, they’re in catastrophic. The tax is a consumption gas. If an employer pla, it sautomtically reimburses tyhe cost.
The problem is making it all add up without having some peole necome real losers.
In any kind of change somebody is going to lose out. The people who should lose out are hospitals, tehir executives. doctors, nurses and other medical professionals who are unable to compete successfully. Competition must be both on quality and on price. At the ssme time, inevitable costs, like medical education or the basic cost of perating an office should be paid for up front. Otehrwise we’ll be ayingfr it quadruple. And get rid of a lot of unnesessary regulation. Electronic medical records were a terrible thing because they were a requirement so they didn’t have to be good, or compatible with other systems. They also aided hospitals in upcoding.
Also losing out are people whose jobs involve dealing with the nooks and crannies of teh present system – but otehr jbs, facilitating the workings fo competition, will be created.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/5/2019 @ 1:55 pm379 Munroe (01ccca) — 4/4/2019 @ 1:58 pm
There are certain people who haev done things so bad I don’t care if somEthing bad happens to them that doesn’t happen to other people equally culpable.
Now first of all, the argument isn’t “Yes, but…RACIST!!” but Similar to arguments used to justify racism and therefore invalid.
Second, going after bad people is not what’s going on. They are not deporting just felons, but this is used as an argument for targeting illegal immigranst in general, or stopping ilegal immigration in general It is a rationalization and not a reason.
Third, they shouldn’t target all felons. ICE often goes after people who have served their time long ago, and present no danger, and no reasonable person would want to see them imprisoned let alone deported. And it’s contrary to the idea of the criminal justice reform bill that Donald trump recently signed.
To go after 45 year olds who have not committed any offense in 18 years is crazy, if the objective is anything having to do with crime.
And then, mosr illegal immigrant criminals were not criminals when they got here.
There are also of course ongoing criminal conspiracies, but theer you have to consider what is the best way of breaking them up.)
One consequence of all of this is that lawyers have been told by the United States Supreme Court to consider the immigration consequences when negotiaring plea bargains (or it’s bad lawyering and grounds for reversal and withdrawal of a guilty plea) Do we need this? It’s like when A or B students were deferred from the draft, so college professors inflated grades. For all.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/5/2019 @ 2:09 pmTw thinsg to note on the Niden thing;
Thety cannot al be leftover accusations prepared for use against Joe Biden by the Hillary Clinton campaign in the 2016 election, because at least one of them involves a 22-year old who says she was 19 at the time (thus occurring between about April 2015 and March 2017)
Also, the number of accusers went up to 7. First two, then two more, more then 3 more. Some columns and editorials written about this were out of date when they published.
Sammy Finkelman (102c75) — 4/5/2019 @ 2:28 pmBiden accuusers now up to 8, according to the CBS Evening News. Biden quipped about it. Said he has permission to touch a child he knew.
It’s being put to him, and he’s taking it as, possibly invading somebody’s personal space.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/5/2019 @ 3:58 pmKevin M @362
I think, in general, that sleazy crook whi will watched carefully and scrutinized by a hostile press, (and opposition) is better than one who will not, but I am nt sure aslezy crook can be descriebed as havingg basic beliefs on many things – and yet, for political reasons, or because of associates can reasonably be expected to behave like he does.
Sammy Finkelman (e70ce9) — 4/6/2019 @ 6:25 pmI am now not positive the place you are getting your information, however great topic. I must spend a while finding out more or understanding more. Thank you for fantastic info I used to be looking for this info for my mission.
Candice Kolesar (2bda28) — 4/20/2019 @ 11:55 am