Keep in mind that Brad Parscale, the President's campaign manager, has been paid lots and lots of money to do his job. Remember that when we look at the utter cluster%$#@ from last night. This link is the complete thread for all that follows, but I've selected a few highlight here.
How much of a disaster was it last night? Hoo boy!
Remember, the President is a malignant narcissist. These are "trigger words!"
Again, the President seems to be convinced that if you don't test for a disease, then everything will be okay. We had diseases for many millennia before we had tests for them.
Context for this clip: Aftermath from the brutal murder of George Floyd and 121k coronavirus deaths and this is what he talks about.
Oh, and there was racism, plenty of racism. Nothing overly blatant, just stuff like "kung-flu."
Campaign makes the wild, hysterical, utterly ridiculous charge that protesters blocked access to the rally. Really? There were no police there? Or the police put up with that? And also, uh, no video?
Ooh! NY Times asks "...has the MAGA rally lost its luster?"
As I mentioned months ago, any city that fails to get the Trump campaign to pay for everything up front is run by idiots. No sympathy for them. They'll never see that money!
The court scholar serving Hermann of Thuringia.
The scholar
2020/06/21
2020/04/27
The President's rich fantasy life
"The people that know me and know the history of our Country say that I am the hardest working President in history. I don’t know about that, but I am a hard worker and have probably gotten more done in the first 3 1/2 years than any President in history."Trump's fourth Press Secretary says:
"[White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows] looks at the president's schedule and he made the point the president is so busy and so hard at work, his concern is making sure he gets a bite to eat here and there, so you gotta put that in context."Yet, Slate says:
...the wealthiest country in history cannot seem to provide basic medical equipment to doctors and nurses and lifesaving care to its citizens during an emergency.
Slate says the problem is the same as in Eastern Europe during the 1980s:
One of the most enduring images of 1980s Eastern Europe is people queuing up outside of stores for scarce goods. But people were resourceful; they leveraged personal connections to skip lines and made do with ersatz products when something simply wasn’t available.
What characterizes a "failed state?" More than any other one factor, corruption.
An extremely consequential example of corruption has been FEMA seizing medical supplies from those states and institutions that have ordered and paid for those supplies. When someone orders supplies from a vendor, it's because they've calculated that's what they need. When the Veterans Health Administration orders 5 million masks, it's because they've calculated that's what they need, not because "Hey, it'd be cool to have 5 million masks."
How well has the US responded to COVID-19?
Reported US coronavirus deaths on date:Italy has been very hard hit and has suffered 26,640 deaths. Their death rate has declined to "only" around 400 a day. At their peak, they were around 750 a day, give or take 100. But Italy's daily death rate has been declining since late March. That of the US is still growing.
Feb. 26: 0 deaths
Mar. 26: 1,195 deaths
Apr. 26: 54,856 deaths
So yeah, it's a really nice idea that our President thinks he's working really hard, but he declared that COVID-19 was a crisis on 13 March, 46 days ago. Trump likes to grade his own performance as an A+, regardless of how well he actually does. I'd say his response to the coronavirus rates about a D-, at best.
2020/04/19
Jared Kushner: Progress Report on Dealing with COVID-19
Jared Kushner is the fellow who came up with an Israeli-Palestinian peace plan that was so awesome, Palestinians want nothing to do with it. So naturally, Kushner's father-in-law, President Trump, asked Kushner to help him with the coronavirus. The President later
...said Google had developed a coronavirus testing website that did not exist. Mr. Kushner was deeply involved in both efforts, and had sold his father-in-law on the website as a smart concept.By Sunday evening, Mr. Trump was raging to aides that the press coverage was terrible after the promised national website failed to materialize.So Kushner succeeded in coming below even my very low expectations for him and failed to contact Google about the website?!?!?! Now, that's not just Kusher's fault. The President also failed by not asking any questions about the website and thereby making false assurances.
2020/04/08
Why I prefer the unvarnished language of the blogs
When I was in college (78-82), I saw the Bertolt Brecht play Galileo and was powerfully impressed by one line in particular (quote is according to memory) "There are scholars who insinuate in Latin. I prefer to speak in plain German."
Today: "The sub-headline for a New York Times article on the Vindman controversy announced that Trump's move represented, 'one sign of how determined the president is to even the scales after his impeachment.'"
The blogger who quoted this went on to express amazement. "Even the scales, what?? That suggests the 'scales' were ever tipped against him. The Nation's Joan Walsh suggested a more accurate headline for the Times story: 'Trump's reign of lawlessness enters new stage.'"
That's why I prefer the language of the blogs. They call thieves and criminals what they are without engaging in overly polite, euphemistic language.
Today: "The sub-headline for a New York Times article on the Vindman controversy announced that Trump's move represented, 'one sign of how determined the president is to even the scales after his impeachment.'"
The blogger who quoted this went on to express amazement. "Even the scales, what?? That suggests the 'scales' were ever tipped against him. The Nation's Joan Walsh suggested a more accurate headline for the Times story: 'Trump's reign of lawlessness enters new stage.'"
That's why I prefer the language of the blogs. They call thieves and criminals what they are without engaging in overly polite, euphemistic language.
2020/04/04
Travel and immigration standards
Based on an article in TPM, I looked up the original statement on the newest travel ban (1 February 2020). One of the claims:
How many terrorists were we getting on a yearly basis from "Burma (Myanmar), Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, and Nigeria"? Heck, how many terrorists had we ever gotten from any of these countries? How many did we ever get from "Iran, Libya, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela, Yemen, and Somalia"? Wouldn't we be far more likely to be shutting the door from people trying to escape from these countries?
Of course, there was the typical Trump Administration cluster$%#@ of failing to communicate: "...the additions appeared to take some foreign officials by surprise." Because Trump's people never thought to work out anything quietly.
Update: And yes, despite the date of the new foreign travel ban, this ban had nothing to do with the COVID-19 coronavirus. ,
President Trump’s security and travel proclamations have immeasurably improved our national security, substantially raised the global standard for information-sharing, and dramatically strengthened the integrity of the United States’ immigration system.There's an old American saying: "Don't fix what isn't broken." Let's look at the statement: "raised the global standard" Okay. But from WHAT? Appears to me the "global standard" was raised from a standard that was already satisfactory!
How many terrorists were we getting on a yearly basis from "Burma (Myanmar), Eritrea, Kyrgyzstan, and Nigeria"? Heck, how many terrorists had we ever gotten from any of these countries? How many did we ever get from "Iran, Libya, North Korea, Syria, Venezuela, Yemen, and Somalia"? Wouldn't we be far more likely to be shutting the door from people trying to escape from these countries?
Of course, there was the typical Trump Administration cluster$%#@ of failing to communicate: "...the additions appeared to take some foreign officials by surprise." Because Trump's people never thought to work out anything quietly.
Update: And yes, despite the date of the new foreign travel ban, this ban had nothing to do with the COVID-19 coronavirus. ,
2020/03/24
Arguments to move quickly on impeachment
People have been suggesting that Congress is moving too quickly to impeach the President and that we need to slow down and allow the courts to force the Trump Administration to expose still more information. The piece at Reader Supported News makes a strong, but I think flawed, case for waiting.
This piece is behind a paywall, but the summary of the points is
1. "The evidence is already overwhelming."
2. Democrats are trying to "maintain the initiative with the President." That means moving quickly so he can't catch up.
3. The House can keep on gathering evidence right up until the Senate trial begins. That's likely to be well into January, perhaps even into February.
4. Acting as though the evidence is overwhelming is the best way to convince the public that the evidence is overwhelming. The best way to demonstrate that is to move forward quickly.
This piece is behind a paywall, but the summary of the points is
1. "The evidence is already overwhelming."
2. Democrats are trying to "maintain the initiative with the President." That means moving quickly so he can't catch up.
3. The House can keep on gathering evidence right up until the Senate trial begins. That's likely to be well into January, perhaps even into February.
4. Acting as though the evidence is overwhelming is the best way to convince the public that the evidence is overwhelming. The best way to demonstrate that is to move forward quickly.
2020/03/22
A comparison of the two remaining Democrats
Biden's March 11th speech after winning Super Tuesday.
Sanders' speech, same day.
I went back and compared the two March 11th speeches of Biden and of Senator Sanders. Biden spoke in more general terms, Sanders talked of a laundry list of specific goals.
I found Biden's speech to be much more focused on what he could actually get done as president. Biden was focused on general subjects he would tackle with the idea that specific agendas would have to wait until he was actually in office and actually making decisions on the issues of the day.
Senator Sanders spoke of really big subjects that would take lots and lots of work to accomplish. Getting to Medicare for All, for instance, would be a really heavy lift. Each one of the subjects Bernie mentioned would take really large amounts of discussion and consultation and working out of details. Doing all of it is way beyond the capability of anyone. If he had the record of getting big bills done, that'd be one thing, but he doesn't.
Refusing to even try to broaden your appeal is not a winning strategy! Ain't no way Sanders is going to get any of his big-ticket items through without talking to everybody!
Sure, it's useful to have Sanders acting as a gadfly to the Democratic Party, pushing the party to the left. But let's not let enthusiasm for a romantic figure blind us to the top priority of the moment, making sure that Donald Trump is a one-term President!
Sanders' speech, same day.
I went back and compared the two March 11th speeches of Biden and of Senator Sanders. Biden spoke in more general terms, Sanders talked of a laundry list of specific goals.
I found Biden's speech to be much more focused on what he could actually get done as president. Biden was focused on general subjects he would tackle with the idea that specific agendas would have to wait until he was actually in office and actually making decisions on the issues of the day.
Senator Sanders spoke of really big subjects that would take lots and lots of work to accomplish. Getting to Medicare for All, for instance, would be a really heavy lift. Each one of the subjects Bernie mentioned would take really large amounts of discussion and consultation and working out of details. Doing all of it is way beyond the capability of anyone. If he had the record of getting big bills done, that'd be one thing, but he doesn't.
[Sanders] turned down chats with South Carolina Rep. Jim Clyburn, because why work to win the black vote? “His politics are not my politics,” Sanders said. “There’s no way in god’s Earth he was going to be endorsing me," because the only people worth talking to were the ones endorsing him.
Refusing to even try to broaden your appeal is not a winning strategy! Ain't no way Sanders is going to get any of his big-ticket items through without talking to everybody!
Sure, it's useful to have Sanders acting as a gadfly to the Democratic Party, pushing the party to the left. But let's not let enthusiasm for a romantic figure blind us to the top priority of the moment, making sure that Donald Trump is a one-term President!
2020/03/09
Moderate vs Progressive Democrats
In the piece Seven Centrist Defeats, I was only around and paying attention from Mondale on, so I'll start with him. He had a good idea in promising to raise taxes. That sent the Reagan campaign into a tizzy. But Mondale had nothing to follow it up with. He had no ideas beyond that. There were no great, burning issues at the time when a challenger was trying to unseat an incumbent. That would have been a challenge at the best of times.
Yes, Dukakis tried to run as a "Reagan-lite" candidate and not as a Democrat. Plus which, he was up against a dirty trickster ("Willie Horton"). As the elder George Bush was so close to Reagan, he was essentially running as an incumbent.
I don't think anyone really doubted that Kerry would have been better on Iraq despite Kerry's stupid statement, but the Swift Boat Veterans really did him in. To their shame, the media allowed the group to dominate news coverage for the critical month of August, after which Kerry had permanently lost the veteran vote. And yes, again, by putting on the "I'm just as right-wing as the Republican incumbent is," that reduced progressive enthusiasm.
Vladimir Putin weakened Clinton and kept the contest close, plus which the Republican Party simply wasn't going to vote for a Democrat and even less for a woman. Clinton was ahead by a small, but steady margin right up until James Comey's last-minute intervention.
I completely support the Green New Deal and think much of the platform of Senator Sanders is very good. There's not much daylight between us on policy.
But very importantly, moderate Democrats did far better in their races in 2018 than progressive Democrats did. The popularity of AOC and The Squad has obscured this.
Moderate Democratic candidates were the big winners of swing congressional districts in the 2018 midterm elections, flipping most of the 28 key House districts from Republicans’ control and winning key gubernatorial races, including Michigan, Wisconsin, Kansas, and Illinois. Democrats’ net gain in the House was 26 seats.
2020/02/03
To impeach or not
I read this piece
Yes, Trump Is Guilty, But Impeachment Is A Mistake
and scribbled out a few thoughts on it in response.
1. This will probably achieve nothing.
Agree in that the Senate will probably follow the lead of the 1868 and 1998 impeachments. House will convict, but the 2019 Senate will most likely not remove the President from office.
Agree in that the Senate will probably follow the lead of the 1868 and 1998 impeachments. House will convict, but the 2019 Senate will most likely not remove the President from office.
2. We’re in the middle of an election campaign.
No, we're still over a year out from the 2020 Election Day. Speaker Pelosi is determined to get this done by Thanksgiving.
No, we're still over a year out from the 2020 Election Day. Speaker Pelosi is determined to get this done by Thanksgiving.
3. This is not what the country wants to talk about.
As Speaker Pelosi has put it, the President has forced her hand. The law-breaking here is just too severe to do anything less than impeach.
As Speaker Pelosi has put it, the President has forced her hand. The law-breaking here is just too severe to do anything less than impeach.
4. Democrats are playing Trump’s game.
No, the White House is in a state of frantic hysteria. This happened because the President has gotten away with so much for so long that he thought himself to be invincible. The word here is "hubris."
No, the White House is in a state of frantic hysteria. This happened because the President has gotten away with so much for so long that he thought himself to be invincible. The word here is "hubris."
Nope. Full speed ahead.
2019/12/30
I read a Fox News article
Disgraced former Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich looks back at the impeachment of Bill Clinton in 1998 and remarks on the differences between then and now.
Some observations about that:
1. Both the President and Congress were highly productive in 1998. This is true. According to the Clerk of the House, there were 547 roll call votes in 1998, but there were 701 roll call votes in 2019. So yes, the Congress of 1998 was busy, but the Congress of 2019 was busier.
2. Many Democrats voted to impeach Clinton. Again, this is true. The Republican Party is much more cohesive and united today then Democrats were back then. As a blogger has pointed out though, the case that Republicans have made that the President is innocent of the charges against him is awfully threadbare. "And at that point, the president and his party said the impeachment process was unfair because … well, just because."
3.
Some observations about that:
1. Both the President and Congress were highly productive in 1998. This is true. According to the Clerk of the House, there were 547 roll call votes in 1998, but there were 701 roll call votes in 2019. So yes, the Congress of 1998 was busy, but the Congress of 2019 was busier.
2. Many Democrats voted to impeach Clinton. Again, this is true. The Republican Party is much more cohesive and united today then Democrats were back then. As a blogger has pointed out though, the case that Republicans have made that the President is innocent of the charges against him is awfully threadbare. "And at that point, the president and his party said the impeachment process was unfair because … well, just because."
3.
Now, we are watching the culmination of Pelosi’s two-and-a-half-year impeachment effort – in which the Democrats failed to find anything close to a crime.Couple of quibbles: Pelosi herself has not been conducting all of the various investigations of the President and Congress did find specific statutes that he violated. There's a reason the Constitution includes the vague term "high Crimes and Misdemeanors." But certainly the President has been investigated for pretty much his entire term. Gee, I wonder why that is:
Democrats have also charged Trump with obstruction of Congress based on his stonewalling of the House’s impeachment inquiry. The White House has refused to provide documents to congressional investigators and has instructed top advisers and government officials to defy subpoenas and refuse to testify.It's not like people have examined the evidence and have decided that the President is innocent, it's that We The People have been spending this whole time trying to uncover the evidence.
2019/12/07
More presidential overreach - Puerto Rico
Acting White House Chief of Staff Mick Mulvaney on why the Trump Administration felt free to refuse to spend money that Congress had appropriated for the purpose of arming Ukraine:
Well, now it seems that there's yet another Congressional priority that the Trump Administration just doesn't feel like spending money on, Puerto Rico's hurricane damage. Ben Carson, the Secretary for HUD, is the one who's doing the actual withholding of money. His reason is allegedly that Puerto Rico is incapable of managing that money without turning it to corrupt purposes. The people from HUD made it clear to Congress that they had no statutory authority to withhold funds. They just arbitrarily and unilaterally decided to do that.
The blogger cites the case of the $31k dining room table that Secretary Carson wanted for his office and asks, quite reasonably I think, what on earth makes Carson qualified to supervise any other office to spend money in a responsible manner? Why does any Cabinet Secretary need a dining room set to begin with? If he or she wants to entertain lobbyists, citizens, friends or relatives, they have restaurants in the area they can do that at. In 2018, Carson had around $180 million in personal assets. He's perfectly capable of buying his own dining room set and moving it into his office at HUD if he likes. If not, for eating in the office, the regular government supply office can supply perfectly adequate tables.
Again, the Trump Administration is playing fast and loose with the spending of money. If the president can spend or not spend money however he pleases, the separation of powers, the ability of Congress to control spending, becomes meaningless.
BTW, my favorite example of Carson and how he administers HUD is still the "Oreo" incident. He confused the term REO (Real Estate Owned) with the cookie. What the hell is wrong with someone who had been in office for over two years and still didn't know basic terms?!?!?!
“We do that all the time with foreign policy,” Mulvaney said, adding “Get over it. There is going to be political influence in foreign policy.”
Well, now it seems that there's yet another Congressional priority that the Trump Administration just doesn't feel like spending money on, Puerto Rico's hurricane damage. Ben Carson, the Secretary for HUD, is the one who's doing the actual withholding of money. His reason is allegedly that Puerto Rico is incapable of managing that money without turning it to corrupt purposes. The people from HUD made it clear to Congress that they had no statutory authority to withhold funds. They just arbitrarily and unilaterally decided to do that.
The blogger cites the case of the $31k dining room table that Secretary Carson wanted for his office and asks, quite reasonably I think, what on earth makes Carson qualified to supervise any other office to spend money in a responsible manner? Why does any Cabinet Secretary need a dining room set to begin with? If he or she wants to entertain lobbyists, citizens, friends or relatives, they have restaurants in the area they can do that at. In 2018, Carson had around $180 million in personal assets. He's perfectly capable of buying his own dining room set and moving it into his office at HUD if he likes. If not, for eating in the office, the regular government supply office can supply perfectly adequate tables.
Again, the Trump Administration is playing fast and loose with the spending of money. If the president can spend or not spend money however he pleases, the separation of powers, the ability of Congress to control spending, becomes meaningless.
BTW, my favorite example of Carson and how he administers HUD is still the "Oreo" incident. He confused the term REO (Real Estate Owned) with the cookie. What the hell is wrong with someone who had been in office for over two years and still didn't know basic terms?!?!?!
2019/12/04
Two claims from the President
President:
Why the President doesn't want any of his people testifying at the impeachment hearings:
The Republican Party under McConnell never showed why the ACA/Obamacre was a bad thing or how it could be improved upon, it just dug in its heels and opposed it, period! During the President's impeachment hearings, we have not seen any members of the President's party crossing the aisle to condemn Trump's actions, even though Democrats have made a very clear case that the crimes he has been charged with are very real, have been amply proven and are very deeply serious.
“The Democrats have gone crazy… they have to be careful because when the shoe’s on the other foot and someday hopefully in the very long distant future, you’ll have a Democrat [sic] president, you’ll have a Republican House and they’ll do the same thing because somebody picked an orange out of the refrigerator and you don’t like it.”So, the Democrats should be aware that something like Bill Clinton's 1998 impeachment could happen. The Republican Party could undertake a completely partisan impeachment for trivial reasons. Hmm. Okay. Got it.
Why the President doesn't want any of his people testifying at the impeachment hearings:
“I would like them to testify but these are very unfair hearings,” the president insisted. “For the hearings, we don’t get a lawyer, we don’t get any witnesses. We want [Joe] Biden, we want the son, Hunter. Where’s Hunter? We want the son. We want Schiff. We want to interview these people.”So he'd prefer a lot of distractions as opposed to serious witnesses who would shed light on his actions. Why is this? Unfortunately, starting with President Nixon, but really accelerating with Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich, the Republican Party has become hyper-partisan. We saw this extreme partisanship during the presidency of Barack Obama, with the Senate Minority, then Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, sacrificing national well-being, goals and priorities for purely partisan gains.
The Republican Party under McConnell never showed why the ACA/Obamacre was a bad thing or how it could be improved upon, it just dug in its heels and opposed it, period! During the President's impeachment hearings, we have not seen any members of the President's party crossing the aisle to condemn Trump's actions, even though Democrats have made a very clear case that the crimes he has been charged with are very real, have been amply proven and are very deeply serious.
2019/11/13
Response to President's accusations
[Copied and pasted from President's Twitter feed today, 13Nov2019]
(1) The first sentence contradicts the next two. If Speaker Pelosi cared abut power and if she realizes that impeachment "is a huge loser for Democrats" then that makes zero sense.
(2) Turning impeachment "into a political cudgel" means Democrats are trying to use the threat of impeachment to push the President into doing something he otherwise wouldn't do. Nothing of the kind is happening. As near as I can tell, at worst, Democrats simply want the President out of office, which is precisely what impeachment was for!
(3) Democrats use terms like quid pro quo because that term describes precisely what the President did. Congress had allocated money for Ukraine's defense against Russia. Trump was holding up the aid and he suggested that the money could be released if Ukraine did him a "favor" and provided his re-election campaign with something he could portray as dirt on Joe Biden. It is illegal for the president to interfere with a properly-allocated grant like that. Yes, Trump did do something wrong!
(4) "Ukraine got it’s money"
Yes, they got their money without having first delivered on the bribery that the President extorted out of them, but that had nothing to do with anything the President wanted or planned for or desired.
(5) "(3 weeks early)"? More like several months late! Nothing happened to free up the money until after the whistleblower pointed out that the President was withholding the money that Congress had appropriated.
(6) "there was no investigation.” Eh? Not sure what the President could possibly mean by that as the investigation started with the whistleblower putting out an urgent complaint.
If your only source on information on the impeachment is the President, you're going to end up badly misinformed and confused.
“Nancy Pelosi cares more about power than she does about principle. She did not want to go down this road. She realizes this is a huge loser for Democrats.(1) The Founders envisioned the worst people being in politics, yet they couldn’t envision this. You have these people taking...
...the most powerful tool the legislative branch has, Impeachment, & they’ve turned it into a political cudgel, which is not at all what the Founders intended.(3) When you hear Schiff use all these words like quid pro quo, it is because they can’t specify that Donald Trump broke..
....any laws or did anything wrong, and they have to move away from quid pro quo because there was no quid, and there was no quo. Ukraine got it’s money(4) (3 weeks early),(5) and there was no investigation.” (6)
(1) The first sentence contradicts the next two. If Speaker Pelosi cared abut power and if she realizes that impeachment "is a huge loser for Democrats" then that makes zero sense.
(2) Turning impeachment "into a political cudgel" means Democrats are trying to use the threat of impeachment to push the President into doing something he otherwise wouldn't do. Nothing of the kind is happening. As near as I can tell, at worst, Democrats simply want the President out of office, which is precisely what impeachment was for!
(3) Democrats use terms like quid pro quo because that term describes precisely what the President did. Congress had allocated money for Ukraine's defense against Russia. Trump was holding up the aid and he suggested that the money could be released if Ukraine did him a "favor" and provided his re-election campaign with something he could portray as dirt on Joe Biden. It is illegal for the president to interfere with a properly-allocated grant like that. Yes, Trump did do something wrong!
(4) "Ukraine got it’s money"
Yes, they got their money without having first delivered on the bribery that the President extorted out of them, but that had nothing to do with anything the President wanted or planned for or desired.
(5) "(3 weeks early)"? More like several months late! Nothing happened to free up the money until after the whistleblower pointed out that the President was withholding the money that Congress had appropriated.
(6) "there was no investigation.” Eh? Not sure what the President could possibly mean by that as the investigation started with the whistleblower putting out an urgent complaint.
If your only source on information on the impeachment is the President, you're going to end up badly misinformed and confused.
2019/08/27
Medal of Freedom for Art Laffer
In April 2017, when debate on the tax bill that was signed in December of that year began, an economist wrote about the 43-year history of the Laffer Curve (It was first presented to Donald Rumsfeld in 1974). It has never lived up to its hype!
From 2012 to 2017, Governor Brownback of Kansas tried mightily to institute the Laffer Curve in Kansas. It was an utter and absolute failure.
In March of this year, Republicans tried to go back to the way taxes were under Brownback. The new Democratic Governor Laura Kelly held fast and refused to return to the failed past.
In December 2018, the tax cut was clearly a failure at doing anything but making the wealthy wealthier.
So it's difficult to know why Laffer is being awarded a Medal of Freedom by the President unless this is a "gaslighting" sort of thing.
From 2012 to 2017, Governor Brownback of Kansas tried mightily to institute the Laffer Curve in Kansas. It was an utter and absolute failure.
In March of this year, Republicans tried to go back to the way taxes were under Brownback. The new Democratic Governor Laura Kelly held fast and refused to return to the failed past.
In December 2018, the tax cut was clearly a failure at doing anything but making the wealthy wealthier.
So it's difficult to know why Laffer is being awarded a Medal of Freedom by the President unless this is a "gaslighting" sort of thing.
2019/06/22
Special Olympics and Trump Administration
Yeah, it's pretty difficult to cut
a small program like Special Olympics and to then turn around and
say you have a heart just like everyone else.
And keep in mind that
while Special Olympics costs $18 million a year, DeVos's
around-the-clock security detail cost $7.54 million last year and
will be $7.7 million this year.
"DeVos defends plan to eliminate Special Olympics funding"
Two statements that caught my eye:
“Given our current budget realities..."What "realities" might those be? Oooh yeaaah! The massive tax cut that's pretty much the sole legislative accomplishment of Speaker Ryan, Majority Leader McConnell and President Trump.
DeVos replied that she thinks the group is “awesome” but should be supported by philanthropy.
That's a defensible idea, but how about some sort of transition? How about a planned move from being government supported to being self-sustaining? I know, I know, that would require, y'know, work and effort and something more than just lounging around on your yacht.
Education Secretary DeVos gets overruled on funding the Special Olympics. She then desperately pretends to be okay with that. "I am pleased and grateful the President and I see eye-to-eye on this issue..." Neither one explains how the issue arose in the first place or why her initial decision was overruled.
“The White House, Not DeVos, Wanted to Slash Special Olympics Budget”
I had heard the first part of this statement, but not the second. The second makes no sense unless one “accepts the premise that the White House, not DeVos, ordered the cut in the first place.
After Trump reinstated the funds, DeVos issued a statement saying she was “pleased and grateful the President and I see eye-to-eye on this issue.” She then adds“This is funding I have fought for behind the scenes over the last several years.”
2019/06/18
Dealing with Fake News
"Baby boomers share nearly 7 times as many 'fake news' articles on Facebook as adults under 30, new study finds"
Wow! That's pretty sad. Here's my mini-solution to verifying information.
I've had people tell me to check all the sources on a regular basis. Good advice, but too general for me.
I'm currently composing a piece on our march to support Venezuela. Venezuela has a serious problem with its economy. The left-leaning Guardian said that the former president Hugo Chavez imposed price controls on basic food items like flour and that Venezuelan bakers had no economic incentive to produce flour because they couldn't sell flour products at a profit.
I said to myself "Did Venezuela subsidize the production of flour or did they simply slap price controls on it?" I ran a search on "venezuela flour" and checked the right-wing Libertarian website Mises and the more middle-of-the-road NPR. Neither of them mentioned subsidies. NPR provided a good quote from a baker in Caracas where he said something to the effect of "I'd love to produce the more nutritious bread, but I gotta pay workers, gotta pay rent, etc., so I need to produce brownies and cookies that I can sell at a higher price."
So I looked at a good variety of sources and concluded that Venezuela is shooting itself in the foot by imposing price controls without subsidizing the production of basic goods. I search, but in a more organized fashion than to just randomly reading what everybody says about everything.
Wow! That's pretty sad. Here's my mini-solution to verifying information.
I've had people tell me to check all the sources on a regular basis. Good advice, but too general for me.
I'm currently composing a piece on our march to support Venezuela. Venezuela has a serious problem with its economy. The left-leaning Guardian said that the former president Hugo Chavez imposed price controls on basic food items like flour and that Venezuelan bakers had no economic incentive to produce flour because they couldn't sell flour products at a profit.
I said to myself "Did Venezuela subsidize the production of flour or did they simply slap price controls on it?" I ran a search on "venezuela flour" and checked the right-wing Libertarian website Mises and the more middle-of-the-road NPR. Neither of them mentioned subsidies. NPR provided a good quote from a baker in Caracas where he said something to the effect of "I'd love to produce the more nutritious bread, but I gotta pay workers, gotta pay rent, etc., so I need to produce brownies and cookies that I can sell at a higher price."
So I looked at a good variety of sources and concluded that Venezuela is shooting itself in the foot by imposing price controls without subsidizing the production of basic goods. I search, but in a more organized fashion than to just randomly reading what everybody says about everything.
2019/05/25
Jon Voight and the President's record
The actor Jon Voight has a very high opinion of President Trump: "our country is stronger [&] safer... because our president has made his every move correct."
Stronger? Since 1976, views on pregnancy/abortion haven't changed much. The pro-choicers have consistently outnumbered anti-choicers by about 2 to 1, yet anti-choicers have been strengthened by this President (and by Mitch McConnell, the Senate Majority Leader who saw to it that the Supreme Court was not turned liberal by preventing the seating of Judge Merrick Garland) to the point where there are "soaring incidents of trespassing, disruption, and intimidation at abortion clinics." The President has gone all-in on supporting anti-choicers. How is this sort of divisive political action making us stronger?
Safer? Looking at a public opinion poll that examined international attitudes towards the US, there are only three countries that view the US in a more favorable light than they did at the end of the Obama Presidency, Israel, Kenya and Russia. The rest of the world, including long-time allies, view us less favorably.
Also, the US has an intelligence-sharing program with four other countries, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom, that is now endangered by the President giving Attorney General William Barr complete authority to investigate how the Mueller Report originated.
How on Earth does any of this count as making us any safer?!?!?!
Stronger? Since 1976, views on pregnancy/abortion haven't changed much. The pro-choicers have consistently outnumbered anti-choicers by about 2 to 1, yet anti-choicers have been strengthened by this President (and by Mitch McConnell, the Senate Majority Leader who saw to it that the Supreme Court was not turned liberal by preventing the seating of Judge Merrick Garland) to the point where there are "soaring incidents of trespassing, disruption, and intimidation at abortion clinics." The President has gone all-in on supporting anti-choicers. How is this sort of divisive political action making us stronger?
Safer? Looking at a public opinion poll that examined international attitudes towards the US, there are only three countries that view the US in a more favorable light than they did at the end of the Obama Presidency, Israel, Kenya and Russia. The rest of the world, including long-time allies, view us less favorably.
Also, the US has an intelligence-sharing program with four other countries, Australia, Canada, New Zealand, and the United Kingdom, that is now endangered by the President giving Attorney General William Barr complete authority to investigate how the Mueller Report originated.
How on Earth does any of this count as making us any safer?!?!?!
"Trump claims he is hard at work during ‘Executive Time’"
Hmm. Let's examine the evidence, shall we?
President claims the US was in awful shape before he took office. He lists all the problems and "improvements" he's made.
*Depleted Military
- No, the military was in fine shape.
*Endless Wars
-What exactly has he done about those? He's tried to abruptly pull out of Syria, but his lack of real preparation for doing so has led people to believe that he's headed for disaster. ISIS is doing very poorly, but it was doing poorly before January 2017.
*a potential War with North Korea
- the President did far more to heat up the situation with North Korea than the previous president did. Things were relatively peaceful and stable under Obama.
*V.A.
- Has anything about the VA been fixed under this president?
*High Taxes
- Taxes are now higher for those with modest incomes. For the wealthy, taxes are more satisfactory.
*too many Regulations
- remember the problems with Romaine Lettuce? Caused by insufficient regulations.
*Border, Immigration
- In 2013, the Senate passed a bill they were reasonably satisfied with. When it got to the House, it was filed away and forgotten. Nothing has been done to revive that earlier deal.
*HealthCare
- The Republican-run Senate tried to pass a grossly inferior bill. Citizen outrage and a few courageous Republican senators stopped it.
Nah, he can't justify all of his unstructured "executive time."
President claims the US was in awful shape before he took office. He lists all the problems and "improvements" he's made.
*Depleted Military
- No, the military was in fine shape.
*Endless Wars
-What exactly has he done about those? He's tried to abruptly pull out of Syria, but his lack of real preparation for doing so has led people to believe that he's headed for disaster. ISIS is doing very poorly, but it was doing poorly before January 2017.
*a potential War with North Korea
- the President did far more to heat up the situation with North Korea than the previous president did. Things were relatively peaceful and stable under Obama.
*V.A.
- Has anything about the VA been fixed under this president?
*High Taxes
- Taxes are now higher for those with modest incomes. For the wealthy, taxes are more satisfactory.
*too many Regulations
- remember the problems with Romaine Lettuce? Caused by insufficient regulations.
*Border, Immigration
- In 2013, the Senate passed a bill they were reasonably satisfied with. When it got to the House, it was filed away and forgotten. Nothing has been done to revive that earlier deal.
*HealthCare
- The Republican-run Senate tried to pass a grossly inferior bill. Citizen outrage and a few courageous Republican senators stopped it.
Nah, he can't justify all of his unstructured "executive time."
2018/12/06
Objective vs partisan news
Lots of
anti-democratic actions taken by legislatures in Michigan,
North
Carolina and Wisconsin.
Curiously, my local paper, the Philadelphia Inquirer, wasn’t
covering any of this. I looked through their paper edition of December
5th and checked their news, politics and opinion sections
online. Nada. No mention of what was going on in any of these states.
The Inquirer published
a piece on the 6th, looking at Wisconsin. This was
where the newly-elected governor announced that he’d try and seek
an audience with the governor who had lost the election to not
destroy democracy in his state.
I was very curious
about a paragraph in the Inquirer story:
The session unfolded a month after Republicans were battered in the
midterm election. They lost all statewide races amid strong
Democratic turnout. But they retained legislative majorities thanks
to what Democrats say are gerrymandered districts that tilt the map.
"what Democrats
say"? Why is the fact of gerrymandering in Wisconsin
treated as though it was somehow controversial for anyone to say this? Why is it treated as
though only partisans would agree that Wisconsin's House is very
highly gerrymandered?
GQ
Magazine says SB 884 passed the State Senate by the very close
margin of 17-16, but in the State House, the same bill was passed by
56-27. There were similar margins for SB 886. How can this possibly
be explained other than by politicians choosing their voters?
The new legislation tries to protect some of the GOP's achievements
in recent years.
Obviously, if the
citizens of Wisconsin felt that it was an "achievement" for
state health care to have a work requirement, then all of the statewide offices other than the Republican
State House majority would have been retained and not tossed out in
the November election. There is absolutely no excuse whatsoever for
Wisconsin Republicans to seek to retain what the the citizens of
Wisconsin have plainly rejected.
What this piece does
is that it seeks to prettify and make noncontroversial what is
plainly a power grab by legislators who've properly and fairly had
their legislative program rejected by the voters of Wisconsin. But
the Inquirer seems to feel that it must cove everything so that it's
always a matter of legitimate debate between reasonable people.
A partisan
publication like Daily Kos has no use for the appearance of being
objective and non-partisan and so can simply relate what’s
happening in Wisconsin and other states without seeking to try and
make both sides appear to be equally honest and aboveboard.
Fairness is always
good and always appropriate and partisan publications don’t always
do that, so partisan publications aren’t always the best way to
learn what’s going on. There are plenty of times when more
objective, even-handed publications are better at getting across the
facts of the case. But when the facts of a case are heavily skewed in
just one direction, when one side is plainly guilty and the other
side innocent, then a partisan publication is better for
understanding what’s going on. Naturally, this means that a good
citizen will check out the other side on at least an occasional
basis.
No, sorry, there is
no “one-stop shopping” when it comes to understanding political
issues and events. Citizens who wish to understand what’s going on
have to check out multiple sources to get the truth.
2018/11/24
Rush Limbaugh makes an interesting plea for us to sympathize with President Trump
Radio talker Rush Limbaugh presents the President as a “happy warrior” who “may be the greatest president of our lifetimes” being sorely vexed, harassed and inconvenienced by all of this liberal and Democratic dissent from his generous and benevolent rule. While reading Limbaugh’s case, I agreed with the blogger who reminds us of what Limbaugh snidely referred to as Saudi Arabia “supposedly killing the so-called Washington Post journalist, Jamal Khashoggi.” There was another right-wing talker who has also took the position of dissing Khashoggi, so I guess it’s a thing now that, as far as the right wing is concerned, murdering journalists is okay.
Also, “120 days past federal judge's deadline, migrant kids remain separated from parents.” Children were separated from their parents and until there was a public outcry, the Trump Administration didn’t have any sort of plan for getting the children back together with their parents, thereby effectively kidnapping the children. Back during June, the Trump Administration’s supposed, alleged, “self-avowed advocate of women and children” Ivanka Trump, had nothing to say about the children who had been kidnapped under her father’s family separation policy, but apparently felt it was perfectly okay to post pictures of her happy and attractive family.
Also, the President appears to feel that it’s within his authority to request that the Supreme Court take up a case that was argued in October, but that the 9th US Circuit Court hasn’t ruled on yet. This is right after the President has been feuding with John Roberts, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, because how dare the Chief Justice take exception to the President referring to a judge as an “Obama judge.” Judges are all supposed to be equally legitimate as they’re all approved by the Senate. There is certainly some justification for drawing distinctions based on who the appointing president was, but that chips away at the legitimacy of all judges when a politician makes distinctions based on that.
So yeah, when Limbaugh says:
I just have a really hard time seeing the President in any sort of positive light. I don’t see his energetic defense of his policies as anything to cheer about.
Also, “120 days past federal judge's deadline, migrant kids remain separated from parents.” Children were separated from their parents and until there was a public outcry, the Trump Administration didn’t have any sort of plan for getting the children back together with their parents, thereby effectively kidnapping the children. Back during June, the Trump Administration’s supposed, alleged, “self-avowed advocate of women and children” Ivanka Trump, had nothing to say about the children who had been kidnapped under her father’s family separation policy, but apparently felt it was perfectly okay to post pictures of her happy and attractive family.
Also, the President appears to feel that it’s within his authority to request that the Supreme Court take up a case that was argued in October, but that the 9th US Circuit Court hasn’t ruled on yet. This is right after the President has been feuding with John Roberts, the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court, because how dare the Chief Justice take exception to the President referring to a judge as an “Obama judge.” Judges are all supposed to be equally legitimate as they’re all approved by the Senate. There is certainly some justification for drawing distinctions based on who the appointing president was, but that chips away at the legitimacy of all judges when a politician makes distinctions based on that.
So yeah, when Limbaugh says:
This stuff just never ends. You know the great thing? It never seems to get Trump down. He doubles down on this stuff still.
He revs up and he rams it back down their throat every time.
I just have a really hard time seeing the President in any sort of positive light. I don’t see his energetic defense of his policies as anything to cheer about.
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