A Month of Outrage Overload
February 22, 2019
Tempers are flaring across America — from East to West, from right to left. In fact, the atmosphere has turned so caustic and combustible that I’ve delayed writing this piece for the better part of a month as new outrages erupt daily like California wildfires.
I’d mobilize my thoughts on this or that polarizing event, only to watch the next day’s outrage demand an instant response. Again and again, week after week. With such an abundance of discord-spawning, nation-splitting controversies bombarding us daily, how do I choose just one?
I won’t. I’ll revisit them all — or at least the most noteworthy and cringeworthy incidents of the past month — as briefly as possible, along with my own marginally sane moderate’s takeaway on each unholy incident. Come along, if you dare…
- The Covington Catholic boys vs. the tribal elder. A perfect storm of prickly 21st-century political prejudices: the students were predominantly white, male, conservative, Christian, privileged, jock-ish, pro-life and pro-Trump. (In short, they were embryonic Brett Kavanaughs.) Their primary antagonist: a noble native tribal elder beating a drum in their faces — although the confrontation was preceded by an hour of relentless taunting from a flaky black supremacist religious cult. One boy’s smirk went viral, and so did the outrage from the left. No matter that the noble tribal elder lied about the confrontation (among other matters), or that the rush to judgment was based on a cherry-picked snippet from a nearly two-hour video. The boys from Covington Catholic were roundly vilified by the “Hate Has No Home Here” crowd. Takeaway: The Covington students withstood the confrontation with commendable restraint, other than a little mock war-whooping in time with the drumbeats. The left rushed to judgment because the incident seemed to support their ongoing “arrogant white male” narrative. (The more reasonable news outlets acknowledged their error.) The boys’ unpopular political leanings are irrelevant to the incident. Postscript: Now that alpha-smirker Nick Sandmann has sued the Washington Post for the jaw-dropping sum of $250 million, he’s shed some of his right to our sympathy.
- The strange case of Jussie Smollett. A niche TV personality, black and gay, reports that he was beaten by a pair of white males who poured bleach on his person and slipped a noose around his neck while uttering racist and homophobic slurs. Adding insult to injury, they reportedly yelled, “This is MAGA country!” I was outraged on his behalf — until I started wondering why racist homophobes would be prowling the streets of Chicago (hardly MAGA country) carrying a noose and bleach at 2 a.m. in subzero temperatures. How would MAGA men even recognize Smollett, a featured player in the musical TV series “Empire”? (Not exactly “must-see” MAGA TV.) Subsequent revelations pointed to Smollett himself as the author of the incident, aided by two Nigerian brothers he recruited to rough him up. Now he’s been arrested for filing a false police report, a felony. Takeaway: If Smollett orchestrated this “hate crime,” as it appears he did, I’d guess that he did it to 1) cause further outrage on behalf of blacks and gays, and 2) boost his celebrity status. He succeeded on both counts, but his success has blown up in his face. This wouldn’t be the first time a misguided soul staged a crime and blamed members of another race. Both blacks and whites have cried wolf, and it reflects sadly on our hyper-tribal society. Moreover, crying wolf casts unfair doubt on subsequent (and legitimate) hate-crime cases.
- Virginia Governor Ralph Northam’s racist yearbook photo. The popular Democrat resorted to some desperate (and inconsistent) damage control after a photo of his medical school yearbook page went viral – complete with one figure in exaggerated blackface and another in a white KKK hood. It was never clear which figure (or either of them) was Northam; his story kept changing amid calls for his resignation. So far, he’s standing his ground. Takeaway: If neither figure in the photo was Northam, why would he have included it on his yearbook page? Granted, the photo might have been a tongue-in-cheek prank dating from less P.C. times, and we need to acknowledge that flippant young people are capable of growth. But Northam’s evasiveness does him no credit. Should he resign? Probably not. But he should have fessed up, admitted his youthful folly, and stressed how he’s matured. He squandered the potential for a “teachable moment.”
- Kamala Harris and the Democratic “purity test.” The California senator and presidential hopeful underwent a surprisingly intense round of scrutiny from her own party. The accusations: she’s “not black enough” (her mother is Indian and her father Jamaican, which actually makes her a shade “blacker” than the half-white Barack Obama)… she was overly zealous in prosecuting blacks in Oakland (she was a D.A. in a majority-black city; it was her job to prosecute)… and (drumroll, please) she’s married to a WHITE MAN! Even her own father got into the act, denouncing Harris for associating her pot-smoking ways with her Jamaican heritage. Takeaway: Democrats seem hellbent on devouring their own, a habit that could easily result in a dreaded second term for Trump. By the way, Harris favors reparations for African Americans. (So much for the “not black enough” mantra.)
- Gillette’s controversial “toxic masculinity” commercial. Sure, it was filled with images of enlightened males in nurturing roles, but the implication was that this isn’t the norm – that men need to be “tamed” if they’re to be considered fit members of post-#MeToo society. A gentle message designed to make us all sing “Kumbaya” only succeeded in fanning the flames of two increasingly bitter American factions: anti-masculine neo-puritans (including virtue-signaling feminist men) vs. defensive macho males and their allies. Takeaway: The Gillette commercial was probably well intentioned but irritatingly condescending toward half of humankind. For every male exhibiting loutish behavior, there must be five or more decent men who don’t. Yet we all need to be lectured? Sorry – not buying it (or the razor, for that matter)
- Rep. Ilhan Omar’s anti-Israel rant. The newly elected (and immediately controversial) Somali-Minnesotan caused a stir by accusing AIPAC, the Israeli-American lobbying group, of buying political support in Congress. Cries of anti-Semitism quickly filled the air; how dare she revive the libelous trope of “Jewish money” buying influence in America? Takeaway: Israel does have a powerful lobby in the U.S., and lobbies tend to buy influence. It’s not anti-Semitic merely to point this out. For that matter, it’s not anti-Semitic to criticize Israel when it oversteps certain boundaries. (More often, anti-Israeli sentiment is the by-product of the left’s knee-jerk sympathy for “oppressed” “brown-skinned” Palestinians.) On the other hand, it most definitely is anti-Semitic to call for the destruction of Israel, vandalize synagogues and Jewish cemeteries, or gun down worshippers on the Sabbath — and there’s been an alarming spike in that kind of lethal Jew-hatred lately, in Europe as well as here.
- The FBI-CNN raid on Roger Stone’s house. In the early morning hours, the Feds staged a dramatic arrest of the former Trump aide and political trickster while CNN covered the event live. The charges: lying and witness tampering. But why the unnecessary theatrics for alleged white-collar crimes, and how did CNN just happen to be on the scene? Meanwhile, progressives whooped with glee while the Trump faction intimated that the “Deep State” was engaged in a slow-motion coup to dethrone #45. Takeaway: I’m normally skeptical of wacko Deep State conspiracy theories, but this incident made me wonder. CNN has morphed into the unofficial news outlet of the Democratic Party’s Clintonist/corporatist wing, and it’s obvious that the pro-Democrat FBI tipped them off. Collusion between a government agency and a favored media outlet should disturb us almost as much as the alleged collusion between Trump and Russia.
- The escalating border wall showdown. As Robert Frost put it, “Something there is that doesn’t love a wall.” Of course, Trump wants his wall and so does his base — despite the likelihood that it won’t stop the incursion of drugs, criminals or even the most determined poverty-stricken migrants from south of the border. But Trump risked his alt-right street cred on the wall, making it the signature proposal of his presidency despite staunch opposition from Congress. He risked it to the point of lunacy by insisting that Mexico would pay for it. He led us to a costly government shutdown over it. And he finally went over the top by declaring a national emergency to raise the necessary funds. The issue remains unresolved, and neither faction is willing to compromise. Takeaway: Both factions need to compromise. First of all, there’s no “national emergency.” Even with the recent Central American caravans massing at the border, illegal crossings have declined in recent years. Completing an ocean-to-gulf wall would uproot countless property owners along the border, disrupt wildlife migrations and send a hostile message to Latin America. On the other hand, we can’t leave our southern border unprotected. New Mexico Gov. Michelle Lujan Grisham actually pulled National Guard troops from the border, a foolhardy move that tickled the “all people are legal” crowd while it probably drove Trump’s base toward a collective stroke. There’s a sane middle ground here, and we need to find it.
- New York’s loosening of restrictions on late-term abortion. Predictably, pro-lifers butted heads with pro-choicers over the decision, signed into law by Gov. Andrew Cuomo, to essentially allow abortion-on-demand until full term. Yes, the law specifies that the fetus must be non-viable or that the mother’s health be at risk, but critics justifiably point out that “health” is open to interpretation. They argue that doctors might perform an abortion if the mother feels that delivering a baby would be hard on her nerves, for example. Numerous Catholics called for Gov. Cuomo to be excommunicated. Meanwhile, the pro-choice faction celebrated the decision while the Empire State Building glowed in jubilant pink lights that evening. Takeaway: Aborting a fully developed fetus is no cause for jubilation, and the pro-choice movement needs to stop viewing abortion solely through the lens of women’s rights. (After all, there’s another body inside the woman’s body… why do we automatically assume that the smaller body has no rights?) On the other hand, it seems reasonable to allow late-term abortions if (and only if) the fetus has a fatal condition or the mother’s health would be permanently compromised by giving birth.
- The arrest of a Coast Guard officer who planned a white nationalist terror attack. While Jussie Smollett was still dominating the news, Feds nabbed a 49-year-old Coast Guard lieutenant who plotted a terrorist attack on left-leaning politicians and journalists as part of his dream to establish a “white homeland” in the U.S. The suspect had gathered an extensive cache of weapons and performance-enhancing drugs, along with a list of targets ranging from politicians like Sen. “Poca Warren” to CNN’s Don Lemon and Van Jones, both of whom are black. Modeling himself after far-right Norwegian uber-terrorist Anders Breivik, the deranged lieutenant couldn’t seem to decide if he merely wanted to assassinate prominent leftists or “kill almost every last person on the earth.” Whew — disaster averted. Takeaway: Nobody in their right mind would defend this madman, but here’s my lament: once again, a neo-Nazi nutjob has fed the leftist argument that whites, males and, for that matter, Western civilization are pathologically toxic. The truth is that all three have been under assault lately from loud partisans on the cultural left, so it’s not a stretch to see why many white Western males feel maligned and threatened — and occasionally consumed by the fevers of hatred. Tribalism has always been the curse of our species, whether we’re talking about ancient Greeks vs. Persians, Christians vs. Muslims, blacks vs. whites, or even jocks vs. geeks. The solution seems like an easy one: emphasize our common bonds instead of our differences. Why is it so difficult, then? Maybe we should start by asking the President.
Rick Bayan is founder-editor of The New Moderate and the author of three collections of essays for Kindle. (Look for them on Amazon under “Bayan books.”)
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THE NEW MODERATE 
Wow! So much in so little time. Couple of comments
1. Nick Sandmann. Smirk? Depends on how you look at the situation. I see a young man standing in front of an older man that got in his face and began beating a drum. He stands there smiling and does nothing else. ( I also see someone who could be Joey Logano’s younger brother. He also has that “smirk” smile) So I say $250M is not enough, should be more. They will settle and he will not have to worry about college cost to say the least. Maybe reporters will be more inclined to check facts before reporting
2.Again another case of reporters with premature ejaculation. And politicians with the same. Harris and Booker, and maybe others, jumped on the racist train. And the bad thing is their followers will not care.
3. Northum, he has weathered the storm and our 48 hour attention span has moved on. Same with the sexual abusing Lt Governor. And this was just a few years ago, not 30+.
4. CNN being at Stones house. Didnt know that. But not surprised that the democrat supporting FBI would tip them off.
And finally 5, the wall. Queen Nancy says “The wall is, in my view, immoral, expensive, unwise,” . So I’m with Beto on this one. Since a large majority of existing wall is in California and it is immoral, Beto says tear down all the walls. Good idea and they can enter in SoCal where the danger of crossing open pairie and rivers is decreased as well as better passage through Mexico exist.
But you might want to plan for more reports on situations like these as it is only going to get worse with the democrats moving so much farther left, the GOP stuck with Trump and probably 40% of moderate America ready to puke.
All good points, Ron. Who really knows what Sandmann was feeling when the photos and video were shot? I think he was entitled to smirk, as long as it was a “Why is this nutty old Indian banging a drum in my face?” smirk as opposed to an “I’m superior to this nutty old Indian so I’m going to stare him down” smirk. You’re probably right about future “outrage overload” as long as Trump is president and the Democrats keep shifting left. Maybe it’s time for a third major party after all.
Well Rick I don’t think it was a smirk because his smile is exactly the same as Joey Laganos smile (NASCAR Driver), unless Joey smirks and does not smile.
Maybe this is jumping to conclusions on my part that it was not a smirk. Or your that it was?
1),. In the longer version of the video – Phillips invaded the students space not the other way arround.
There will be many more suits – WaPo is just the start.
2). there was good reason to be suspicious from the start – Chicago went for Hillary by 83% – it is not “MAGA country”.
White Trump supporters do not wander arround Chicago at 2am with gasoline or bleach – depending on the version of the story, and a noose wearing MAGA hats and hoodies.
If they do – they are in far more danger than Jussie.
The lesson is do not jump to conclusions.
There are about 7000 claims of “hate crimes” in the US each year that is actually a very very very small portion of all crime.
About 1000 of those turn out to be FRAUDS each year, a larger number do not warrant charges.
We should remain calm and wait for the facts.
3). The fundimental issue with Northam is that he ran the race baiting adds against Gillespie that won an election with a razor thin margin of victory.
He is not going to – but he should resign.
Had he not made an issue of race with Gillespie – this would be a non-issue.
4). everybody is denying CNN was tipped off. Mueller has been forced to file court documents that his investigation did not tip off CNN.
Do you beleive that ? They arrived minutes before the FBI.
They were not there any time prior.
There is a separate issue that Mueller staged a pre dawn SWAT raid.
That is quite litterally a NAZI Night and Fog tactic.
The courts really do not like it.
You are supposed to need special permission for this type of raid.
It is pretty much never used when you have a target that is represented and has been working with you for months.
It is pretty much never used when you have charges that are quite honestly NOT that serious. Lying to congress by failing to recall exculpatory material ?
Dave I fully believe our Democrat FBI tipped off CNN. Either that or they have wire tapped the FBI communication system.
🥴🥴🥴🥴🥴
I think this is a more accurate image of how CNN found out – but it you prefer that they used tin foil hats – fine by me.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/content/dam/men/2017/05/22/header-image_trans_NvBQzQNjv4BqxC2hHEAV_5EFwJiQY8XjGVjTP5mgawLp_nl7-ifzbVo.jpg?imwidth=450
I understand this was CNN’s source.
I would not be so specific as the FBI. Just some associated with the Mueller probe.
But there will be no consequences.
It is really disturbing when the US government is litterally using the tactics that the Gestapo did.
Dave, I agree with all your points here. I didn’t know about Gov. Northam’s race-baiting ads, though, so he emerges as more of a hypocrite than I suspected.
Northam has likely weathered the storm.
As democrats go – he is moderate.
But Gillespie was moderate as Republicans go.
In fact one of the problems with the election is there was little distance between them on many issues.
Ordinarily I would give Northam the benefit of the doubt.
https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2017/11/02/uh-oh-it-looks-like-northam-signed-off-on-horrific-racebaiting-ad-n2403834
But if you live by the sword you die by the sword.
I would make one other point.
Northam is a MODERATE.
In the TNM world he is supposed to be one of the “good guys”.
Always remember that power corrupts, and that those on the far left and far right have no monopoly on hypocrisy and corruption.
Moderate does NOT inherently mean “moral” or even correct.
Barry Goldwater said
Extremism in the defense of liberty is no vice. And moderation in the pursuit of justice is no virtue
But Martin Luther King could just as easily have done so.
Right and wrong, good and evil, Truth and lies, virtue and hypocracy.
Neither conservatives, nor progressives, nor moderates nor libertarians have a corner on these.
We should never presume that because we agree with a person’s label or ideology that they are inherently right, good, virtuous and truthful.
Your article was excellent. Most of yours are. Even when there are points I diverge on.
Mostly my “points” are just more information or personal input, not disagreement.
Though disagreement is NOT inherently a bad thing. We find our way to common ground and hopefully to the truth by discussing the points we disagree on.
.
Applauding response: yup, Rick – I’m in accord with all your observations.
(Coherent & balanced writing, as usual 👍)
Thanks, Jay. (Does that mean I can be prepared for a tirade from Dave? Who knows? Even Dave might agree with much if not most of my post.)
1). I am with Ron – no smirk.
Further this is the first of many defamation lawsuits.
Next there are two parts to the amount – real damages and punatives.
Punative damages must be high enough to prevent this from happening again. $250M is about right for WaPo.
Sandman should agree to donate the punatives to say right to life groups.
2). The big deal is the instant reaction of the press. People were attacked by tbhe media for calling the Smollet incident Alleged. Despite the fact that it was very fishy from the begining.
There are actually extremely few crimes like this – they are very very rare.
There is also a disproportiuonately large # of “fake” hate crimes.
And “fake” hate crimes have spiked post Trump.
There are still people defending Smollet – EVEN IF this was faked.
I am very disappointed – I liked Smolletts character on Empire.
3). Northam should have resigned. The big deal is that he smeared Gillespie as a racist during the campaign. But for that this is a tempest in a tea pot.
But hypocracy is the worst sin.
4). Harris is a lousy candidate and not a particularly decent person. I have followed her – or actually cases that she prosecuted for a long time. She is responsible for some of the most egregious anti-first amendment prosecutions and laws in recent years.
I do not care what color she wants to call herself.
5). The judgement regarding the Gillette commercial will come from the market.
6). Omar is anti-semetic – but attacking israel is NOT.
Generally I support Israel, but you can legitimately oppose Israel without being anti-semetic.
Arabs, Jews, Mandaeans, Samaritans, and Assyrians/Syriacs are all SEMITES.
7). It is obvious that CNN was tipped off, Further the SWAT raid was offensive. But nothing will come of either.
8). The efforts in NY and VA to esentially legalize what Gosnell was doing are offensive – even to those who support “abortion should be legal and rare”.
i.e something like 80% of americans. Regardless it is REALLY REALLY stupid of democrats to provoke pro-life voters before 2020.
This will not play well with Catholics and Hispanics.
Huge political mistake.
9). Is someone defending Hassan ? No one I am aware of.
It is to early to be absolutely certain BUT
A# – Hassan seems to be a typical garden variety nut job. i.e. someone with serious mental health issues. Pretending that the rantings of such people are somehow meaningful is not merely stupid it is wrong.
B# – Hassan did not ACT. There is no way of knowing if he ever would have.
I am glad the FBI did act, and I am glad someone tipped them off.
Hassan needs help. Unfortunately he is unlikely to get it in Jail.
Regardless of people with the type of problems Hassan appears to have – only a small portion actually ACT. We should do something – they need help.
They are about double the risk of ordinary people, for violence – but that is still low.
We should not be confusing the possibility that Hassan would have acted, with actual crimes where people did act.
A man assaulted someone for wearing a MAGA hat this weak.
That is an ACT, a real crime.
It is a more serious crime than Hasson.
There is more reason to be afraid that Hasson MIGHT have acted,
I am not suggesting there is no reason to be afraid of Hasson.
But we still punish ACTS.
Hasson needs mental health treatment, not jail.
So I responded Rick.
Mostly minor quibbles.
The biggest is that you are buying into the Fear with Hasson.
We should not be pretending that the political expressions of people with mential health issues are meaningful.
The only actual political violence in this country today is from the left.
Antifa is left on right political violence.
The people stealing and punch people for wearing MAGA hats is political violence.
Attempting to silence speakers at colleges and elsewhere is a form of political violence – it is even more so when it turns to actual violence.
The Hodginson’s and Hasson’s and Christisons, and long list of nut cases that have some political ranting on their social media is NOT political violence. I beleive it was “Loughner” who shot Giffords, had some political rant about grammar.
It is probable that a significant portion of the “islamic” terror in the US is people with mental health issues.
Lets not politicize Mental Health.
More like a quibbling s—– storm.
Dave: Again, I agree with most of your points here. But I don’t think we can dismiss all would-be terrorists like Hasson (and Anders Breivik, for that matter) as mental cases. Some of them strike me as relatively sane men whose hatred and resentment pushed them to the dark side. Breivik wrote a long manifesto and was systematic in singling out a camp favored by liberal families. Hasson, in his photographs, looks sane and focused, unlike, say, Adam Lanza and Jared Loughner, who both looked like lunatics. What kills me is that the Breiviks and Hassons think they’re dutifully defending Western civilization — a noble calling — but they’re the worst possible ambassadors for the cause.
I am not asking you to dissmiss anything.
There are plenty of people who are the danger that you are concerned about – Mao, Stalin, Hitler.
These are people with extreme ideologies who sold others on those extreme ideologies
I would bet money that Hassan will prove to be just another garden variety mental health case.
Why ? Because no one is following Hassan – nor is he really following someone else.
People with serious mental health issues are neither leaders nor followers. They are influenced by others – but in ways that are often unrecognizable.
The presence of a manifesto is meaningless – the Unabomber had a manifesto, Loughner had a manefesto.
There are dangerous right groups in europe. Brelvick is not really part of that.
To be clear I am not saying that he is not saying many of the same things. I am saying he is litterally not part of them whatever he says. Just as the Unabomber was not part of the greens or the post modernists despite strong resemblenaces and borrowings in his manefesto.
People with serious mental health issues that lead them to violence are not actually members of groups or leaders. They are incapable of group interactions.
The truly dangerous people not merely write manifesto’s but the are charasmatic, they get others to follow, they usually get others to commit violence – they get people who want to be part of groups to commit violence. The people like Hasson are to broken to be part of groups.
Regardless, I could be wrong about Hasson. But thus far the clues are he is a garden variety dysfunctional person with severe mental heatlh issues.
.
“But I don’t think we can dismiss all would-be terrorists like Hasson (and Anders Breivik, for that matter) as mental cases. ”
Breivik ACTED – that is enormously important.
I do not think americans understand Europe (or Europeans understand America) well enough to make generalizations about acts of terrorism and of the rising right there. No do I trust the press to accurately report it. I do not as an example no if Marine Le Penn is the re-incarnation of Hitler or just the French Donald Trump. The same is true of what is occurring in South America.
“Some of them strike me as relatively sane men whose hatred and resentment pushed them to the dark side.”
I can agree with that when we are talking about Richard Spensor or members of Antifa.
I would suggest that you strongly consider that people who were not part of some group are more likely to have mental health problems – and I would include most of what we call islamic terrorism in the US. People with Mental health problems who resort to violence will often either manufacture or adopt a cause. Sayoc’s fixation on Trump is no different from Hodgkinson’s fixation on Sanders – their acts DO NOT reflect on the causes they adopted.
“Hasson, in his photographs, looks sane and focused, unlike, say, Adam Lanza and Jared Loughner, who both looked like lunatics.”
I am not going to determine whether someone is sane based on photographs.
If someone photographed you just out of bed or the shower – would you look sane ?
“What kills me is that the Breiviks and Hassons think they’re dutifully defending Western civilization — a noble calling — but they’re the worst possible ambassadors for the cause.”
Loughner thought he was defending Grammar or god only knows what.
The guilt by association game is dangerous.
There is a common claim even here that the left is better at messaging.
To an extent that is true. But primarily the left is better at emotional appeals.
Guilt by association as an example.
There are many of these killers, and alot of them have either pushed clearly leftist manifesto’s or amalgams that had enough leftist political nonsense to use them as an anchor arround the left.
For whatever reason the right does not do that, but the left does.
We are here arguing that the left should not be held accountable for Antifa – they are just the fringe. Yet Antifa is an organized left group, and their ideology and action are the natural extension academic post modernism – which is merely a modernized marxism – with culture and victim status replacing class and even more nihilism.
Conversely we are falling all over ourselves to blame Trump and the right for Hasson, or Sayoc, or the alt-right – despite the fact that the Alt-Right – like the Nazi’s is more left than right.
Both the left as a whole and the extreme right are completely fixated on race today.
To the extent that they very nearly want the same thing – special treatment for their own race.
They are even making the same arguments – Modern White Supremecists speak the language of racial victimology.
#metoo has ensnared so many on the left it is difficult to beleive – and yet if I asked I have little doubt you would define misogyny as somehow right wing.
I am getting off point. My point is that though sometimes both sides seek to divide us, division and tribalism are at the core of leftism.
One of the differences between the american revolution and the french is that the american revolution was not about groups or identity, it was about individuals and rights.
The french revolution was the first Class war, it rested on the same intellectiual foundations that eventually became marxism. Modern Academia has substituted other forms of identity beside class – though they do frequently return to class. Regardless, all leftism is this intellectual self contradiction requiring a revolution driven by some form of identity follow by a utopia in which all differences are extinguished and an elite rule a world of happy homogeous drones.
Hey Rick, I was wondering what was taking you so long To write about the Covington boys. Now I realize, it was dreaded “outrage overload!” A great review of the issues of the last month ~ although, as is now routine, new outrages even since you hit the “publish” button!”
Some thoughts on 1) the Covington boys ~ the key word here is boys. What kind of sick adults verbally attack and try to intimidate young adolescent boys waiting for a school bus to take them home? When David Hogg was running around the country (on somebody’s dime, I wonder whose?), ranting against the 2nd amendment, disrespecting Republican lawmakers and whining about his college acceptances (which apparently worked, as he got into Harvard with SAT scores less than 1300), I recall that any adult who criticized him was attacked as a bully.
2) The whole late-term abortion/infanticide thing. As I’ve said before, I’m moderately pro-choice. But the idea of killing a child, as it’s being born, or even after? That is infanticide, dressed up as “women’s health.” At best, you could consider it euthanasia, if the baby were horribly deformed or likely to die of some congenital disease. At worst, it’s murder.
3) The FBI needs to be brought under control. We’ve got a law enforcement agency, that’s breaking the law and terrorizing private citizens, who have not been charged with any crimes, other than ~ wait for it~ “lying to the FBI.”
4) We’ve got crazy people trying to kill political figures on both sides. The closest anyone came was the Bernie bro who shot up the GOP baseball team, and would have killed most of them, if the DC police hadn’t been there as part of Scalise’s security detail. The level of hatred and insanity is off the charts, and we’d all be wise to demand that our leaders and the media simmer down with the rhetoric, or we’re going to end up in a real civil war.
5. Jussie Smolett… poor, poor guy. A gay black man, starring in a hit tv show, living in an expensive high rise in one of the best neighborhoods in Chicago, and making over $1M a year. And what does he really want to be? A victim! But, because there aren’t any real MAGA racists hanging out at 2 am in his fancy neighborhood, he had to pay 2 Nigerian guys to pretend to beat him up. Just more immigrants doing the jobs that Americans won’t do…. 😉
The past month almost called for daily New Moderate news briefs, although I don’t get paid enough to exert myself to that degree. 😉 Great insights here, Priscilla, although I’m not as critical of David Hogg — even as he parlayed his public speaking tour into a spot at Harvard. (If anyone has a right to gripe publicly about lax gun laws, he does.)
I had almost forgotten about the leftist who shot up that baseball field full of Republicans. (Still another crazed white guy, of course.) I probably should have held Trump a little more accountable for the atmosphere of hatred that’s enveloping the country, but now I’m not sure that even a moderate president who calls for unity could unite our tribalized society. Even though I tend to lean right on social and cultural issues (especially in academia), I’m starting to live in fear of a far-right insurgency if Trump gets himself removed from office or defeated in 2020. I think they’re angry enough to mobilize.
“I’m starting to live in fear of a far-right insurgency if Trump gets himself removed from office or defeated in 2020. I think they’re angry enough to mobilize.”
And the left is not?
Why is it bad for one side to hate, but not the other. And I am not going to go back and pull all the info that I and Dave have shared concerning the left. If those that accept your position about the left have not paid attention, they never will.
Ron: I don’t doubt that there are plenty of angry leftists who would love to bring down the whole capitalist white Christian male establishment. But they tend to express their anger by throwing hissy fits, staging irate protests with placards, teaching “grievance studies” courses and electing leftist representatives. The antifa are a potential threat, of course, but they seem to act primarily against far-right demonstrators.
Rick, I am not defending any violence. But I believe there are two sides to every issue. I am getting tired of every ill of this country being blamed on straight white America. Every cure for our problems seems to come down to giving something to someone at the expense of white America. At sometime, rebellion starts.
Hogg has a right to complain – though I have a bit of a problem asserting that victimhood convey’s a special right to speak with authority.
That is begging for more Jussie Smollet’s
At the same time Hogg made himself a public figure.
When you do that – you are no longer entitled to the privacy and protection from defamation that the Covington Catholic Students are entitled to.
Further Hogg has publicly argued nonsense and false facts.
Victimhood is not carte blanche for error.
The left and the right fear each other, and fear can drive moderate people into extreme positions.
However, it is undoubtedly the left which, since Trump was elected, has begun to openly advocate against freedom of speech and debate. When normal, everyday people, who happen to support Trump’s policies, feel that they must keep silent or lose their jobs, lose their friends, be forced out of places of business, fail their college courses, or be attacked with impunity, they tend to “go underground,” rather than engage in healthy debate.
This happens over and over again, in millions of different ways, all over the country. The fact that the Covington teens were vilified by the left was because a number of them were wearing MAGA hats. The reason that Smolett had his phony goons wear red baseball caps was so that he could blame his phony victimhood on Trump supporters, and feed the narrative that anyone wearing those caps is a modern day Klansman.
This past week, we’ve seen Liz Warren and Kamala Harris come out in favor of reparations for slavery (Warren also came out for reparations for Native Americans, lol). This, of course, is a gigantic pander to the black vote, but it is unbelievably cynical, irrational, and dangerous. 150+ years after slavery, who even can be identified as someone who descended from slaves? And whose money will be taken to pay the reparations? What if you’re black, but not African, or African American, but your ancestors arrived only in the 20th century? What if you are of mixed race and descended from both slaves and slave holders ~ does that cancel out your free money? What if your ancestors were Jews, Italians, or Irish, who fled 20th century oppression, only to face bias and prejudice in this country ~ do they get a cut of the action? Or do they have to pay? How about whites who descended from families of Union soldiers who fought against slavery?
No, this is only a position for these politicians to pander for the votes of black people, while at the same time, vilifying every white American, even those whose ancestors may have been starving in a potato famine while slavery was ending in this country. Or whose ancestors were fleeing ethnic slaughter in their native countries…
How the right is at fault for the fear, the bitterness and the anger that is stoked ~ on both sides~ by leftist candidates, I don’t know. Of course, Trump will call this out…will opposition to reparations open him up to further charges of racism? Will right-wingers protest this? Or will they just vote for Trump again?
Emotions are not a justification for acts – particularly acts of force.
If you are on the right – and afraid of the left – fine. But your actions should be in response not to your fears but the acts of the left. Mostly I think that has been true of the right.
If you are on the left – and afraid of the right – fine. But your actions should be in response not to your fears but the acts of the right. That has not been true.
I am very much afraid of the left and do not have much fear of the right – not that the right has not done stupid things in the past, But the potential consequences of the actions of the left are enormous compared to those of the right.
We will survive Trump. We would even survive the fictitious Trump the left has created.
The nation will still be here if the wall is built, if immigration is severely restricted, if Trump proved to be a racist homophobic mysoginist. We have had presidents that were before.
Progressive Woodrow Wilson comes to mind. We would survive the repeal of every law favored by the left in the past 5 decades. Right back tot he civil rights act and the reversal of Rowe. Much of that would not be good but we would survive. Some of it would assure a democratic sweep of the country. Not only would we survive – but most of that is just not going to happen – not even those things that should.
As bad as some of those things might be our survival and even thriving as a nation despite that is not even in question. It is not a probability it is a certainty.
But we may not survive a return to power of the left.
The lefts supression of speech is desparate and dangerous. If it succeeds it is very destructive. Further that type of totalitarianism – the use of force to restrict rights, justifies responding with force. Today the left is using violence to supress speach. If they succeed, the restoration of free speach may well be violent.
I am not talking about acting in response to fear. I am talking about acting in response to bad actions.
It is not certain we can survive the burdensome social programs the left has already weighed us down with. It is a very serious gamble assuming we can survive more. And the left wants more. AOC now tells us that our refusal to offer solutions to problems that are mostly in her head – makes her “the boss” – The left wants control over everyone else’s lives.
We can and will survive Trump – even the scary boogie man Trump of the left.
It is unlikely we will survive if the left returns to power.
Priscilla: Yes, the left can be diabolical in its opposition to free speech, its intimidation of conservatives and independent thinkers, and especially (I should write a column about this) its penchant for a kind of revisionism that keeps shrinking the circle of acceptable ideas. For example, most of us grew up hating the KKK but respecting Confederate soldiers as honorable enemies. Now we have to favor removing Confederate statues or be tagged as racists. Ten or twenty years from now, we’ll probably be exiled from polite society for defending George Washington, that slavedriver and embodiment of white male privilege. And you’re on target about reparations; do biracial people have to pay themselves? Do West Virginia coal miners have to pay Obama’s daughters? (The way I see it, the Civil War, the 13th amendment, Brown vs. Board of Education, 1960s Civil Rights legislation and affirmative action were all forms of reparation.)
But getting back to the threat from the left vs. the threat from the right, here’s how I see the difference: the threat from the left is primarily intellectual brainwashing and Soviet-style persecution for wayward thinking; bad enough, of course. The threat from the right comes from its affinity for weapons; I see a combination of lone-wolf terrorists and rogue militias eventually running wild. The leftists tend to be shrill and dictatorial, but no match for the carnivorous renegades on the right. I hope I’m wrong.
The constant efforts to rewrite history are NOT accident.
The are driven by the extremes on the left, AND they are driven by thought out ideology, philosophy and intention. We should be careful in our presumption that the ideas that may come from the extremes do not often have great impact.
Absolutely Washington is a target. The objective is the destruction of the values of modern western thought. All the easier to substitute a different form of marxism in its place.
I would suggest watching a few Jordan Peterson video’s on the problems with the left.
What is going on in our colleges MATTERS, Even when it is at the fringes ideas shape our future. Just as people like Locke, Hume, Smith Bastiat, Mill had a profound effect on the world that followed – even though they were from the fringes of their time.
The ideas that are driving the extreme left are shaping the world for ALL of us.
The destruction of Columbus and Washington and eventually all of western thought is the objective. And the left will succeed – and already has to a huge extent, if we are unable to separate the great ideas from the flaws of the men who gave them to us.
In the middle of the Peterson video I linked Peterson makes the point that driving us to tribalism is the INTENT of identity politics. It is the natural end and it is not accidental. It is deliberate on the part of the left.
Everyone in this country, everyone on this blog, shares far more values than we have conflicts over.
If you are looking to destroy what exists, you must distract people from the common ground they share and get them amplified on their differences.
The Tribalism you bemoan is intentional and driven by the left.
Just to be clear – the right plays the same game – sometimes very Well, But the the modern left is INTENTIONALLY seeking to divide us.
Trump in particular did not invent the game, he just grasped that the left had overplayed the hateful haring hater card the identity politics card and that he could construct a winning coalition from those Hillary called “the deporables”. All that was necescary is to convince people that when the left says “hateful, hating hater” – they mean you. That was an easy sale for Trump – because it is true.
Rick, you should write a column on the “Overton Window,” and the ways in which the left has moved what passes for reasonable discourse, in its direction. It’s very much the same as what you’ve described as the left’s “penchant for a kind of revisionism that keeps shrinking the circle of acceptable ideas,” and I don’t know of anyone who could handle it with the perception and balance that you have (and that’s as suck-uppy as I’ll get for now 😉 )
As far as the right’s rogue militias? I suppose I don’t fear them to the degree that I fear the left’s insatiable desire for power. Any uprising of crazed right-wingers would be crushed by the military…what I fear is the subsequent crackdown on civil rights that the left would demand in order that “this would never happen again.”
There is an inherent, and fragile, tension between security and liberty. We all want to be safe, and keeping us safe and free are the two primary responsibilities of our government. Political demagoguery, on either side, that exploits our fears for the purpose of restricting our liberty is dangerous. I guess that I’m more likely to see that demagoguery on the left, although I recognize that there are extremists on the right that could blow things up ~ quite literally~ at any time.
Thanks Rick, great MODERATE and sensible observations on a lot nonsense.
Thanks, dduck! I try to make sense of events when the public is split along tribal lines, with two radically different interpretations of the same incident. It’s challenging but fun.
Maybe there is a tribalism theme to your points – but another theme to many of them is not to jump to conclusions.
Covington turned out to be something different when you got the full story.
I would ask what would have happened if there had not been nearly 2 hours of video of the entire event to refute the story sold by the media based on a few seconds.
Absent that 2 hour video – several of these kids would get expelled, The narative of wite male racist catholics in the face of a noble indian would be deemed the truth.
What if the police had not thoroughly investigated Smollet’s report ?
What if there had been no surveilance video ?
We have lost the presumption of innocence. We have lost the ability to avoid prejudging stories when they conform to our world view.
In 2009 after Obama was inargurated we were all told the right went Bonkers – we had the Tea Party – and massive opposition,
While there were a few on the extremes calling for impeachment throughout Obama’s presidency – they were really on the fringe. I do not remember a single GOP cogressmen calling for Obama’s impeachment.
Republicans challenged Obama’s policies – not his legitimacy as President.
There have been times in the past when members of each party of sought to supress speach. I can not recall a time in the past 40 years the right – even the extreme right sought to silence anyone. Conversely while it is gtting worse the Left has been moving closer and closer to total censorship of thought and word for the past two decades
With very few exceptions mostly on the right fringes though these got alot of media attention Opposition to Obama was about policy and law.
That opposition was loud and forceful.
Once Republican Rep. Wilson of SC called Obama a liar.
While I beleive Wilson was correct on the point the remark was inappropriate.
Wilson formally appologized and he was censured by the house.
I can go on – but as hyped up as the GOP was during the Obama administration there are many critical difference.
The personalization by the GOP was the rare exception not the norm.
As angry as Republican seemed then – they do not compare to that of democrats today.
Republicans for the most part focused on legitimate means of opposing Obama – and were so successful that Obama and democrats increasingly acted lawlessly.
As to democrats under Trump:
Whether you agree with What Trump does or not – he has acted within his lawful powers as president. You should seriously think about that as you reconsider this idiocy that he is some crook. President Obama routinely went beyond what the law allowed – and was bitch slapped by SCOTUS 9-0 more than any president ever. Conversely Trump has been upheld near universally and often 9-0 by SCOTUS.
Why is it so hard to beleive that Obama DOJ/FBI behaved lawlessly when Pres. Obama behaved lawlessly ?
Why is it so hard to behave that Trump as a private person acted Lawfully when Pres. Trump has acted lawfully ?
Rick;
The Covington Catholic incident was more than a “hissy fit”.
It may not have been outright violence but it was absolutely lies and deception on a large scale by large numbers on the left who did not care what the truth was – until they got caught on the wrong side of it.
The Jussie Smollett incident sickens me. I like his character on Empire. But this is a very serious crime. A “fake” hate crime is itself a hate crime. Smollett was trying to fan the flames of hatred for his own benefit. I would be less bothered if I thought it was just for money.
The FBI is now investigating the ‘death threats” mailed to him. It appears likely they were fake too. Regardless, this was not some hissy fit either. the ultimate end of Smolletts actions if successful was the use of force against someone. Whether it was the punishment of specific innocent Trump supporters or just moving us all one step closer to violence.
The Northam incident was not some hissy fit either. The big deal is NOT that he appeared long ago in blackface of a KKK robe. It is that he defeated someone who is certainly no more a racist than Northam is, by racially smearing him. That was not a “hissy fit”.
That was a lie with consequences.
The Stone mess is Not a “hissy fit” either.
It is a reflection of the level of lawlessness that our law enforcement has reached.
Manafort, Cohen, Stone, … are not particularly sympathetic figures – But Mueller is a thug and a bully. He was before this, and he has not changed. This is not a “hissy fit” either.
No one – not even your worst enemy, not even actual criminals should have to deal with someone with Mueller’s power used in the nasty vindictive way that Mueller is doing.
This abuse of power is something we used to associate with southern racists, or those like Joseph McCarthy. This is not a “hisy fit”.
New York’s change to its laws accomplishes nothing of any value, but is near certain to result in backlash – whether we end up with another Eric Rudolph blowing up clinics or merely assure that Republicans sweep through 2020. It is not just a “hisy fit”.
Hasson is just a nut case – one we are AFRAID might have acted – likely with good reason.
But real acts of violence occur all the time every day.
There are almost 50 murders each day. Real murders are of more consequence than those were are afraid might have occurred. There are over 3500 violent crimes – rape murder, assault every day in the US – and this is DOWN from the past.
Each one of these is of MORE significance than some possibility that Hassan might have done something. Of those real violent crimes – several were assults by Antifa, or leftists on conservatives or Trump supporters. These are NOT hisy fits either.
Real violence is always more important than whatever we fear.
“The antifa are a potential threat, of course, but they seem to act primarily against far-right demonstrators.”
Did you actually just write that ?
We need not be concerned over antifa – because we do not like there victims ?
This is the nonsense that allowed us to turn a blind eye to lynchings.
And BTW NO Antifa’s victims are not “far right demonstrators”.
One of their big targets is “patriot prayer” that is essentially a non-violent evangelical group.
Are we now equating evangelical christians with the KKK ?
I do not need to like Patriot Prayer to beleive that they should not be swarmed and assaulted.
But Antifa is far from limited to targeting the alt-right.
In portland they are beating on senior citizens who just want to drive home.
There is no justification for Violence except ACTUAL PRIOR violence.
This guy could be a formidable Dem candidate.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sherrod_Brown
That’s nearly 70 degrees F.
Just an anomaly, right…
https://www.standard.co.uk/news/uk/uk-weather-latest-new-february-record-as-mercury-exceeds-20c-for-first-time-in-winter-a4075966.html
Do we have to play this stupid game ?
Just a few weeks ago we had an extended polar votex. The US was cold as Hell.
This was a event that aparently does not happen on this scale more than once every 50 years. Australia however had record breaking heat.
Febrary is not over – so I would be very reluctant to accept any claims regarding February yet.
UAH has the “anomaly” through the end of January at 0.37C,
That is up from December when it was 0.2C.
The Anomally is the deviation from the mean since 1979.
In otherwords 40 years of purportedly human warming have raised global temps LESS than 0.1C/decade – while during the almost 200 years before they rose without any human contribution by 0.11C/decade.
Further almost ALL of that modern warming is BEFORE 1998.
There is two sides to each issue. Check this site. Access the “Saturday Update” and listen. Information explaining how sea temperatures and weather patterns repeating over the years can explain weather in different parts of the world.
https://www.weatherbell.com
I have been following climate for 20years.
I have read the IPCC reports.
BTW there are NOT “two sides ” to every issue.
There are many, and nearly all of them are wrong.
It is irrelevant what the issue is.
Pick any position at random – it is near certain to be wrong.
Getting things right is hard.
The article below is just one of myriads on this subject.
the high priests of warmendom have been consistently adjusting past temperatures DOWN to make modern warming look more dramatic.
This is not unique to Darwin AU – the US has had scandal’s in the area.
It is now true that in the US the only trustworthy records of pre-1979 temparatures are those downloaded from NOA years ago,
As NOA no longer has credible raw records from the past.
https://www.manhattancontrarian.com/blog/2019-2-24-the-greatest-scientific-fraud-of-all-time-part-xxi
Who knew there were so many Dems opposing Trump.https://int.nyt.com/data/documenthelper/633-joint-declaration-on-trump-s-e/76f930315f374f84827e/optimized/full.pdf#page=1
Why would you be surprised that a phalanx of people who beleive firmly that big government is the salvation of the world would oppose a president who does not ?
BTW while many of the facts cited are correct – they DO NOT inherently lead to the conclusions reached.
I would have zero problems declaring a national emergency regarding Social Security or Medicare – I beleive both are now in the red and they will slowly bankrupt the country.
Almost nothing has changed since a decade ago – except that they have significantly increased our debt.
A reconning must come. Can we wait 5 minutes ? Sure. 5 Years – I would say no, but it is near certain we will. Is this an emergency NOW ? Yes, because the longer we wait the more crippling the effect will be.
I do not beleive that Trump should have declared an emergency.
At the same time his declaration is less insance than many of the past emergency declarations and many that are still in effect. Regardless, is there anyone who doubts that the left will declare somekind of future stupid emergency – such as a CAGW emergency on an even more lame basis and endeavor to do even more draconianly stupid things.
Any hint at expanded executive authority under Trump will be used to justify a tidal wave under the next democrat.
I would have prefered that Trump continue the shutdown.
I would further note that Opposition to Trump’s emergency declaration suffers EXACTLY the same problem that Trump’s emergency declaration does.
There is no crisis.
PPACA reshaped the american economy, It costs trillions over a decade, it was widely opposed, and much of it was imposed by executive fiat.
That would be an action of the president warranting petitions with dozens of names.
Trump is spending the equivalent of 3 B-2 bombers, About 1/2 a reagan class aircraft carrier.
About 4 days worth of the US illegal drug trade. The cost of a dozen Hollywood blockbuster movies. About 1/20th the cost of the CA rail project. About 1/3 the cost of the Boston Big dig – 1.5 miles of road and tunnel.
About 1/100th the cost of ARRA.
A month of outrage! This one should make anyone with an ounce of moral fiber blow up!
There are some people who do not accept abortion at any time. Even the morning after pill. Some say 20 weeks. And some anywhere between up until delivery.
That debate is for another time. This is about the sick people that find it acceptable to allow a physician to withhold medical care for an infant born alive during an abortion procedure. How can democrats defend this action? Almost all of them!
https://www.catholicnewsagency.com/news/born-alive-abortion-survivors-bill-fails-to-beat-senate-filibuster-61557
After reading this, I researched other sites. Some info almost made me sick. How physicians can be allowed to continue practicing while the medical community overlooks their failure to follow their oath is deplorable.
Wonder what our next progrssive step will be. The Chinese infanticide for children of the wrong sex?
The left is about as amped up as it can be.
There is pretty much nothing that can happen that will make existing anti-trump voters more likely to vote.
But the rest of the electorate is pensive.
Trump’s re-election prospects depend not on how angry the left is, but whether the right votes and in what numbers.
Provoking conflict over abortion will not buy the left more votes.
But it will get Trump more votes.
BTW Trump is over 50% in something like 18 states.
Dave, as I said, abortion is not the debate issue here. The issue here is “harm”. If a woman goes through with a procedure to end a pregnancy and that procedure results in a “live birth”, then harm is now taking place on another living individual.
All these self righteous left leaning gun control advocates can talk about how wrong it is for anyone to own a gun that can cause mass murders, but stand up for this crap that allows physicians the right to allow infants to die without medical treatment. Why is one life anymore important than another life? What gives a doctor the right to practice euthanasia such as this?
And the GOP will have their normal hissy fit about how bad abortion is and frame this so the democrats can claim womens rights instead of framing this what it is. Murder of infants someone does not want.
“Dave, as I said, abortion is not the debate issue here. The issue here is “harm”. If a woman goes through with a procedure to end a pregnancy and that procedure results in a “live birth”, then harm is now taking place on another living individual.”
I am trying to avoid debate on abortion itself. For the most part it does not matter – because there is super majority support for something close to the status quo independent of the moral or legal arguments. Though that position is shifting slightly right.
Almost everyone outside of the far left is queasy about 3rd trimester abortions. and particularly about “partial birth” abortions.
Most of us have little problem with Jailing Gosnell. NY has just made his conduct (and worse) legal. That was a huge political mistake.
Republicans and democrats are making abortion an issue for 2020. Thus far they are doing so on ground that the Republicans are certain to win overwhelmingly. I do not understand why Democrats have made that mistake.
All I can figure is that democrats beleive (and they may be right) that republicans will screw up and go too far. But they have not thus far.
But democrats have created an opening allowing republicans to repeatedly raise the issue in the way most unfavorable to democrats.
Trump and Senate Republicans have forced a vote on legislation to prevent killing “newborns”. Senate democrats voted against it – that looks bad.
No democrat will gain votes because of that vote. All democrats will lose votes.
A poll I linked in a prior post indicated that something like 1/3 of democrats self identify as pro-life.
Once the door is opened to the murder of infants who have survived abortion, it is much easier to move on to all forms of eugenics and euthanasia.
Eugenics (advocated by Margaret Sanger, the celebrated founder of Planned Parenthood) purports to improve the human race, by ridding it of genetically weak or unwanted people. If that sounds a lot like Hitler’s Final Solution to rid the world of troublesome non-Aryan races, well, that’s exactly what it is. I’m not saying that we are there, I’m just saying that, as a society, if we can enthusiastically support the intentional infanticide of unwanted or “damaged” infants, we can move on to many other forms of socially acceptable state murder. Geronticide, or the killing of elderly, is likely the first, easiest to justify (“they’re suffering”, “they have no quality of life”, etc) and, should we end up with a state-run healthcare systems, the most cost effective next step.
Liberals will roll their eyes at this, and call it tin-foil hat stuff. History tells us that it is not.
I am not arguing the traditional conservative positions on abortion and euthanasia
I am not a conservative. I am libertarian.
My positions hinge on maximizing individual freedom absent ACTUAL harm to others.
If a fetus can not survive on its own or with the ordinary medical care one would provide a newborn – so be it. No one can be forced to sustain the life of another with their body, even when morally they should. There is an enormous gulf between a morning after pill and allowing essentially a fully formed infant to be born and die from lack of ordinary care.
Regardless, the issue for me is still freedom.
If you wish to kill YOURSELF – that is your right. I may think it is a mistake. but you are still free to do so. I watched my parents and inlaws die.
My mother and mother-in-law died in ways I can live with. My father-in-law should have been allowed to end his suffering two weeks early. Watching him suffer horribly and needlessly when death was inevitable was bad. My father had vascular dimensia and managed to die even worse. Further. the courts and two of my siblings managed to use the courts to thwart his wishes on everything associated with how he lived his last months and what he wanted to happen after he died. That was horrid.
You will never persuade me that each of us should not have the freedom to die as we please.
Our family, doctors, the medical system, the government are there to assist us in our wishes whatever they are – not substitute their own.
I think the right to control your own death is a microcosm of everything libertarian.
The issue is not about whether you live or die, or how, or what is best, but of WHO CHOOSES.
The right wants to say we can not choose to die – we must suffer through.
The left wants to say – the choice should be made not by us, but by “society” what is best for all.
Dave, I am not talking about assisted suicide, or about families choosing to withdraw medical treatment from a dying loved one. I am talking about state mandated euthanasia. The idea that the state, not the individual, can choose to end what it considers a life that no longer has value. Big distinction.
State mandated euthanasia?
What law have you seen that enables the state to mandate any particular individual be put to death?
Don’t euthanasia laws take the state OUT of the equation, and let patient/doctor make that decision?
Same with abortion. The state isn’t ordering anyone to have an abortion. The trend is to REMOVE the state from interfering in a patient/doctor decision.
Simmer down, Jay. I was referring to my previous comment. There’s no state run healthcare system, euthanizing the old folks…yet. Right now, it’s just Democrats refusing to acknowledge that born babies are human beings, with the right to life, because their mothers preferred them dead, and the abortionists botched the job.
Whatever is not prohibited by law is permitted.
You do not even need a law to allow people to do something.
Any law on abortion or euthanasia or anything else is ALWAYS an infringement on individual rights.
While we hope and expect those infringements are justifiable, they are still always infringements.
So in answer to your question – Yes the law interferes with an individuals rights ALWAYS, that is pretty much exactly what every law is.
Absent the laws against suicide you would be free to make your own choices regarding your life.
Next, I have first hand experience with the state interfering in peoples autonomy,
My father had determined the criteria of his own medical care.
He had multiple medical conditions with conflicting treatment.
He had a choice between medical treatment that would increase his risk of stroke or treatment that would increase his risk of bleeding to death.
He also explicitly and repeatedly documented this in pretty much every possible way – through his lawyer, on video, in multiple statements, formal documents concerning his wishes regarding his medical treatment. At the same time and in the same ways he documented his direction that his resources were to be used to allow him to die at his home – the home that he designed and built, and loved.
False reports to the local Office of aging that were contradicted by his doctor’s statements in their own court filings were used by the court to justify removing him from his home, and the care of his chosen doctors, But the court bungled even that – as the local hospitals refused to treat him against his will, and contrevening his wishes in the documents in his medical files for years, and he ended up in a nursing home, where he neither received the medical care he had directed nor the medical care he was purportedly deprived of.
Further all of the family and freinds who he had asked to and who had participated in providing him the care that he had requested were either barred from visiting him or otherwise restricted in doing so. He died in less than a month of pneumonia contracted at the home, not any of the life threating issues he was being treated for.
So yes, in the real world the state absolutely meddles in each of our choices as to how we die.
The facts above are all a small part of a much much larger and even more egregious story which the state plays a starring and villanous role in that I was personally intimately involved in.
But they are no even slightly extraordinary. The same happens in a very high profile was several times a year in my county, and with a lower profile every single day.
False equivalences all over the place.
A person chosing the place, time, and manner of their own death is something specific.
Euthanasia is something much broader.
The laws you are discussing pretty much universally either allow or prohibit third parties from being punished for determining how some one else dies.
Abortion – regardless of your position on it is NEVER the choice of the fetus.
So the law passed in NY and debated in VA, would have removed the government from interfering with a newborns choice as to whether it lives or dies ?
Priscilla;
I deleted a long post highlighting our exchange on this as an example of a GOOD exchange.
the gist is we have a different focus. At this time in my life I am more focused on what I recently experienced with the death of my parents and inlaws, and the fact that I am not so old as to be counting my breaths, but old enough to be more concerned about my own death, than the death of unwanted babies.
That and what everyone here should long ago have grasped – I will ALWAYS gravitate towards government restrictions on our liberty.
I don’t think our focus is all that different, Dave. We were just talking about two different issues….(which, perhaps, is what you meant, lol)
Leaving a newborn baby to die, without medical attention, is what the Democrats are advocating. It’s not merciful, it’s barbaric. And it’s all in the name of “abortion rights”which, in general, I have always supported, as long as it takes place before viability.
“We were just talking about two different issues….”
OK.
“Leaving a newborn baby to die, without medical attention, is what the Democrats are advocating. It’s not merciful, it’s barbaric. And it’s all in the name of “abortion rights”which, in general, I have always supported, as long as it takes place before viability.”
As issues go – Abortion is one of the least complex.
The facts are reasonably well understood. It is unlikely that some future development or need will turn things upside down. If we had agreement on whether and when a fetus had rights, abortion would be easy to resolve. The differences in values are relatively clear and actually small. And still we can not find broadly accepted answers to abortion.
Almost anything involving the economy is 10.’s of thousands of times more complex, with dynamic shifts in facts and facets on a near instantaneous basis.
Abortion is atleast marginally in the legitimate domain of government and it is still impossible to find solutions that we agree on that do not have highly undesireable side effects.
Few of us think that Gosnell was not a heinous criminal. Few of us would seriously risk the life of a woman to save a Fetus. Most of us are sympathetic to the plight of women who have discovered that the child they desired is going to be born incapable of anything close to a desireable life. With all this common ground, we still can not find answers acceptable to most of us. We can not find answers that do not inherently cause as much harm as good.
“I do not like you or your brother
I do not like the life I live
But I am me, I am Aldonza
And what I give I choose to give”
Aldonza’s song from Man of La Mancha.
“I choose”.
The Vermont House just passed a sweeping abortion rights bill by a landslide with no limitations whatsoever on abortion, as a protection against Roe being overturned.
Which sounds really crazy. Except that it changes nothing.
Vermont previously had no legislation on the subject restricting or permitting abortion. The new bill if passed by the Senate (it will be) and signed by the Governor (doubtful) would simply make the present status quo law in Vermont, put it on paper.
In fact late term abortions do not actually happen in Vermont unless the mother’s life is in danger. Physicians here will not perform such abortions.
Years ago I was talking about abortion with a very dear friend while we were at UVM as grad students. I told her I was an abortion moderate adn did not like late term abortions for any reason other than to save the health of the mother. She told me she had worked as a volunteer at Planned Parenthood, and that, contrary to my concerns, if a woman was much more than 4 months pregnant they were going to have the baby. Planned Parenthood would not help to arrange an abortion. People leave this information out of the debate.
Less than 1% of abortions are late term nationwide.
This last year according to one news article I just read, 5 states have done the exact opposite of what the Vermont House is trying to do, they flat out outlawed abortion in the case that Roe is overturned.
I do not believe that many if any democrats like killing viable unwanted babies or approve of it. They believe that late term abortion does not happen for anything other than severe medical reasons and want unrestricted access to abortion within the Roe framework, which means the 2nd trimester and they want that existing situation set into law.
That won’t stop many conservatives from claiming that democrats are baby killers with an almost unlimited appetite for abortion.
As to what is going on with conservatives the 5 states (Oklahoma is trying to join them) that wish to outright ban abortion, that has to be based on religious views I believe.
https://www.google.com/search?q=five+states+outlaw+abortion&source=lnms&tbm=nws&sa=X&ved=0ahUKEwiXsIOxi9_gAhWiTN8KHVZ1AP8Q_AUIDigB&biw=1366&bih=625
Roby;
I am not inherently pro-life. I would prefer that government has the most limited role in abortion as well as everything medical as possible.
I am not even a proponent of regulating abortion or any other clinics – though I find it amusing that the right is using the regulatory theme of the left to increasingly make abortion difficult.
Regardless, facts are facts and misrepresenting them is not helpful
I do not know your friend. Nor does it matter. What people say is reality, is not more relevant than actual reality.
I think your “friend” is completely wrong about Planned Parenthood. I am near certain that as part of the Gosnell story it was made clear than PP performs abortions up to 6months and will arrange for them much later.
But PP and their policies are NOT the issue – beyond that government should not subsidize them PERIOD.
The issue is the real world. Pennsylvania has some of the toughest abortion laws in the country. Yet Gosnell happened in PA.
Whatever claims you make about late term abortions Gosnell refutes them.
Few if any of Gosnells’s abortions had anything to do with the life of the mother or serious issues with the fetus. Gosnell was aborting fetus’s extremely late for money and because the women waited until the last minute to have an abortion. None of the compelling reasons for 8 and 9 month abortions were present.
There were thousands of these.
They occurred at a time and place where these women had plenty of other options.
These were NOT difficult and tragic decisions that no one should have had to face.
The women who received abortions from Gosnell are at best tragically stupid.
They ignored cheaper and safer options ultimately choosing the stupidest, costliest,. messiest, most ethically questionable, dirtiest and most dangerous ways to end their pregnancy – because they could not be bothered earlier. In some instances that cost them their lives. Ultimately THAT is what brought gosnell down.
Further what Gosnell was doing was illegal at the time – but government had turned a blind eye to Gosnell until several women died.
BTW Less than 1% in the US would be about 5,000 abortions a year.
There is about zero chance of SCOTUS making abortion illegal – it is not inside their power.
All they can do is reverse on Rowe – which would return the decision to the states.
I think Rowe was decided badly – or more accurately that the decision is approximately correct, but the reasoning is crap.
I do not think that States should have carte blanche.
I also do not think that would be the end of the world.
The claim that NY, VA, and apparently VT are “protecting” the right to abortions by passing laws is poppycock.
As things currently stand SCOTUS limits the power of the state increasingly towards the beginning of the pregnancy.
Completely reversing on Rowe would not change the law in any state in the nation.
ALL that it would do is allow individual states to choose more restrictive laws than the currently have.
Nothing NY, VA or VT can do would change that in the least.
The law passed in NY, and offered in VA and VT is stupid.
They are inherently exactly what you claim they are not – decreases in the restrictions on late term abortions – they are invitations to have more Gosnells.
Gosnell could not have been prosecuted under the NY or proposed VA law.
They are at best legislative virtue signalling by the left.
If you want to do something from the left – that I would support, and that so would super majorities in the country – get the government out of regulating drugs.
The assorted “morning after” pills should be readily available and cheap.
There are inumerable things that could be done.
This should be one issue where you can CLEARLY see the way that regulation HARMS us by depriving us or what we would have otherwise.
The cost to develop a “morning after pill” dictates a higher market price.
The same regulations that make it take decades for safe medicines to become available without a perscription also effect morning after pills.
It is near certain that women have had millions of abortions, and many women have died because a cheap drug was tied up in regulation
The catholic church might still oppose Morning after pills – but almost no one else does.
I am specifically using morning after pills as an example – but the exact same arguments apply to ALL medication. The effect of government regulation – even in the area of medicine is HARM greater than any benefit. But it is rare that people understand the value of the loss of what might have been.
“I think your “friend” is completely wrong about Planned Parenthood. I am near certain that as part of the Gosnell story it was made clear than PP performs abortions up to 6months and will arrange for them much later.”
a Link please.
“PP performs abortions up to 6 months…”
Once in a blue moon? Routinely? How often and why? What are you claiming to know and can you back it up with hard facts? Or are you extrapolating from Gosnell?
I had not previously ever heard of Gosnell, I just looked him up. Yes, he committed murder and is in prison, for life. Gosnell owned and operated the Women’s Medical Society clinic in Philadelphia. He was, in other words, one of those sacred individuals whose sacred actions Libertarians protect as being their personal freedom.
Is there any way to stop such things? If you think they should be stopped, who should do it, Government? How? If abortion is outlawed or restricted is there any way to prevent a Gosnell other than prosecution when some such person is caught?
I will continue to believe my friend (no need for scare quotes around friend) about what goes on in Vermont PP, since she was there in person as part of PP. As well, what she says has also been stated by Vermont physicians in the coverage of the House bill.
It would be helpful to all parties to understand the true frequencies of abortions at every stage and their reasons. There is a tremendous amount of hand-waving arguments about these statistics.
I am NOT trying to start an abortion debate here.
But I do think that POLITICALLY, the left has made a large mistake on its recent abortion moves.
We have had a status quo for 40 years that is pretty stable – reqgardless of what any individual thinks – attempts to significantly expand or contract abortion rights triggers a backlash.
The right has been wise in that they have focused on small shifts in their own states.
The fear the left often successfully inspires that the right is going to take over the supreme court and criminalize abortion tomorow is politally effective.
Conservatives can not too strongly deny that – without losing their own base, but they can not support it without loosing the middle.
Democrats have more recently placed themselves in the same uncomfortable place.
This was an unforced error.
https://www.axios.com/abortion-rights-marist-poll-pro-life-pro-choice-7170b431-eb2f-4292-b801-8ed56cf2d056.html
Dave, I agree with your comments in this thread – mostly.
Yes, politically the recent abortion legislation is an unforced Dem error. I also agree with your remarks about ‘right to die’ assisted suicide issues. If I’m sick and in constant pain from an incurable disease, I want to be able to tune out into eternity peacefully, with physician aid, not with a bullet to my head.
But should mothers carrying a fetus with pre-diagnosed tragic disabilities, mental or physical, be forced to give birth? Doesn’t the birthing woman have the right to make that determination BEFORE her deformed fetus is naturally born? And if a woman instructs her doctors not to employ any heroic measures to keep alive a fetus that has been diagnosed with something like Down Syndrome, should she be prevented from doing that?
Throughout history deformed infants out of the womb were quickly terminated by midwives or family members not wanting to saddle women or their babies with the burdens of those deformities. Were those midwives murderers? Are doctors who abort fetuses diagnosed with Down Syndrome at a woman’s decision to do so murderers? Are the women accessories to murder? It appears many on the right think so.
All these mewling cries of murderous infantacide are merely incitements of political violence against Democrats. 3rd term abortion is rare, and only allowed under law to protect a mothers life and health, or if the fetus isn’t viable. But if a woman’s health is at question, abortions are performed sooner then later. Therefore aborted ‘live’ fetal births are of ‘babies’ that have ALREADY been determined to be severely mentally or physically damaged, a statistically minuscule number.
We seem to have a great deal of common ground on this issue.
With respect to an individuals right to choose the time, place and manner of their own death – presuming they do not actually harm others in doing so, or use others without their consent, I entirely agree with you – but I would go much farther.
I do not care if you are in pain – my father was not in all that much pain, he was essentially experiencing the mental decline that occurs with Alzheimers at an accelerated rate.
He did not chose to die. But he did with deliberation chose to increase his risk of dying one way to decrease his risk of further decline.
In his specific instance it was quite litterally a toss of the dice as to whether his choice would have shortened or lenghtened his life. It was entirely possible that his choice would have had no effect and he would have died in the way he sought to avoid.
I am specific about that, because the details matter, because each person is different, and each death is different. There is no way that any law can address every possibilty.
The only thing the law can do is bluntly determine who gets to decide.
BTW this is pretty much true of ALL LAW,
I long ago and repeatedly expressed my position on abortion – which conforms to centuries of common law, but though different from Rowe, is like Rowe in that neither side would be happy with it.
“3rd term abortion is rare, and only allowed under law to protect a mothers life and health, or if the fetus isn’t viable.”
That is true on occasion. But Gosnell performed many thousands of 3rd trimester abortions very very few of which met that criteria. Under the NY law and the proposed VA law Gosnell’s actions would have been legal. Further though Gosnell’s actions were illegal, they were well known for more than a decade, and though government constantly interacted with Gosnell they did nothing.
Almost no one – pro-live or pro-choice wants the Gosnell’s back.
I do not know what I feel regarding parents faced with infants with serious problems.
A decade ago we had a high profile murder trial where a nurse was accused of using morphine to euthanize a very severely handicapped child who was unlikely to live more than a few more years. I have very good reasons to suspect that it was one of the parents rather than the nurse that gave the child morphine – if that is actually what happened.
And if they did – you can morally judge them as you wish, but they never should have faced legal judgement.
At the same time born children of all ages are murdered frequently for the convenience of the mother. Gosnell absolutely demonstrates that occurs in the last months before birth too.
Further I use Gosnell as an example as it occured close to me, and had national prominence. but there was a nearly as egregious abortion clinic in Texas at the same time, and many throughout the country that conducted late term abortions using extremely liberal interpretations of your “life of the mother, or viability of the fetus” argument.
I do not have the answers to all of this.
As I noted before – the law is a blunt instrument. It is NEVER going to get this right.
An absolute bar on 3rd trimester abortions would prevent the heinous late abortions of conveneince that you are pretending do not happen. At the same time it would force some people in ways that offend me.
We can not get this right.
I want to stress that over and over and over with regard to the law.
We can not get it right.
ALWAYS we will criminalize the innocent or let the guilty go free.
Most of the time I am going to favor the latter over the former.
Further I am not opposed to making our laws better – when we can actually do that.
But it is quite often extremely difficult to do.
This is one area conservatives are right most of the time.
Absent provable near certainty that we are making things BETTER, we should leave things alone. The status quo is nearly always wrong. But MOST OF THE TIME change is WORSE.
The JP interview below is on workplace sexual harrassment, not abortion.
But the fundimental point is the same. Here is an issue were there is reasonably close to concensus that some things are wrong, and yet at the same time the problem is NOT all that easily solved. We have not even necescarily figured out what the right questions are yet.
Peterson also does with his interviewer the same things that I do in many posts here.
He uses reductio ad absurdem, he challenges preconceptions that are generally accepted, many of which are wrong and all of which are not well thought out.
We can run our personal lives without confronting all our preconceptions, logical errors, misperceptions. We can even do so successfully.
But we can not impose our will on others through force using the same criteria that are acceptable for decisions that only effect us and for which we will be personally responsible for.
Governing is HARD – it is supposed to be. It should be done far more carefully than we do.
“All these mewling cries of murderous infantacide are merely incitements of political violence against Democrats. ”
Are there those on the right (and the left) for which the entire abortion issue is purely part of a political game – absolutely. Look to our legislators red and blue and that is near certain the case for almost all of them.
Are you honestly claiming that the catholic church which has had one consistent position on this forever, one that is consistent with its views on the death penalty and other issues regarding the sanctity of human life is really just railing against democrats ?
Until recently most catholics were democrats. As a recent poll indicated about 1/3 of democrats are pro-life.
It might be possible for you and I to agree that those oposing abortion are wrong.
It might be possible for you and I to agree that SOME of them are purely political.
But you make exactly the mistake that elected Trump when you badly caricature pro-life and pretend they are hateful and insincere.
Many of the very same people marching in front of abortion clinics are also marching at state executions.
Right or wrong these are decent and sincere people.
The worst error of the left is the presumption that because they beleive their opponents are wrong they beleive they are evil.
I sometimes make a similar but not identical argument regarding the left.
But there is an enormous gulf between merely sincerely beleiving something that is evil, and doing evil.
When those in the prolife movement resort to violence they do evil – regardless of their sincerity.
When those on the left infringe on the liberty of others or empower government to do so – they do evil – regardless of their sincerity.
Will democrats continue to hold the house in 2020?
Not if the debate is over socialism.
NYT!!! I don’t believe a word they say!!!
NYT!! I don’t believe a word they say.
No one is asking you to beleive anything beyond that the NYT accurately quoted the NAMED voters that they interviewed.
Regardless, the “story” is not an oppion peice, nor is it investigative.
It is just straight reporting on what people confronting democratic represenatives are saying in townhalls.
No. I do not trust NYT to get that right.
I would expect given their biases that they would be reporting that everything is honky dory.
They fact they are not should scare YOU.
It would be like Pravda reporting that the people had lost faith in the communist party.
dhlii permalink
February 25, 2019 4:49 am
NYT and other left media can be useful.
But it is alot of work to strip out all the unnecescary and biased adjectives and spin, the personal oppinions masquerading as facts, and the unnamed sources and after you have done that there often isn’t a story left – and I am talking about hard news stories not Op Eds.”
Ron P permalink
February 24, 2019 11:18 pm
1. I dont read or believe anything in the NY Times
2. I dont read or belueve anything in Huff Post
3. I care more about the impact on the sailors and their familiesimpact
Show me an article in another news outlet.
Wow!! Extra!! Extra!!!
Ron and I have SLIGHTLY different views!!!
Hold the Presses. News at 11!!!!
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/02/25/former_federal_prosecutor_sidney_powell_the_entire_russia_collusion_narrative_was_made_up.html?jwsource=cl
Mueller Appointment LEGAL:
“Special counsel Robert Mueller scored one of the biggest legal wins of his tenure on Tuesday, as a federal appeals court rejected claims that his appointment was unconstitutional.
In a unanimous ruling, a three-judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals turned aside arguments that Mueller wields so much power as a special prosecutor that he should have been nominated by the president and confirmed by the Senate.
The appeals court judges also found no flaw in Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein’s appointment of Mueller in the wake of the recusal of then-Attorney General Jeff Sessions. The court said that because the attorney general can repeal the regulations used to appoint Mueller at any time, he remains under the control of a Cabinet official.
“Special Counsel Mueller effectively serves at the pleasure of an Executive Branch officer who was appointed with the advice and consent of the Senate,” Judge Judith Rogers wrote, joined by Judges Sri Srinivasan and Karen Henderson.”
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/02/26/robert-mueller-appointment-legal-1186701
The court only determined that in a specific narrow sense Mueller was not appointed improperly. It did not address any questions related to the legitimacy of the investigation at all.
I think the court got it wrong – even on that narrow point, and it will be interesting to see how SCOTUS rules – as some – including I beleive Ginsberg have previously opined that the apointments clause of the constitution would require a presidential apointment and congressional confirmation of a person with the power that Mueller has been given.
That is the issue that this panel of a Clinton. Bush, and Obama judge ruled on.
While I am not sure that SCOTUS will agree with me – I have no doubt they will not rule as this court did unanimously.
The constitution is pretty clear, if you have independent authority, you must be appointed by the president and confirmed by congress.
This court fixated on the fact that Mueller was supervised by either the AG or DAG,
That is NOT in the constitution. Everyone is supervised by someone – even the president is inherenly supervised by the courts and congress. It also fixated on the fact that Mueller can be fired by the AG – AGAIN, everyone including cabinet apointees can be fired by the president. Finally the court noted that the AG could change the regulations. And again – that is not the standard.
Frankly I think that both the constitution and 250 years of practice make it clear that the SC statute is unconstitutional. For exactly the reason that Miller raised (and many others).
Every US ADA is appointed by the president and confirmed by the senate.
The SC is the only member of the entire executive who can empanel a grand jury without being appointed by the president or confirmed by the senate. I am pretty sure he is the only member of the entire executive who can issue a subpeona or signoff on a warrant without the co-signature of someone who was appointed by the president and confirmed by congress.
This court has essentially ruled that Mueller is merely a lapdog of the DaG, that he is LESS consequential than a US Attorney.
I think we all know much better than that.
This case by the Way as NOT about Mueller, it was about the constitutionality of the SC statute and they got it wrong.
Miller’s lawyers indicated before the decision they did not expect to win at this level.
This is NOT as your article made it some consequential victory.
This issue will not be seriously explored before the case reaches SCOTUS.
I would note that the IC statute – the one Ken Starr operated under was widely regarded as unconstitutional. The SC statute was supposed to correct the deficiencies. Instead it created new ones, and has proven actually worse. Starr had real supervision. He needed actual permission from courts and congress to do almost anything. No one has supervised Mueller.
It does not appear that anyone even knows what he is doing.
Put simply we still have not figured out how to properly constitutionally investigate something that would raise a clear conflict with DOJ.
I would further note that though not likely its intention this court has essentially ruled that Trump can order Mueller into the Oval and direct him to terminate any or all parts of the investigation as Trump pleases.
All of you continuously ignore the fact that the entire executive is completely constitutionally accountable to the president. Actual appointees who are confirmed by the Senate have MORE not LESS independence.
This court has just ruled that Mueller’s appointment by Dag Rosenstein is constitutional, because Mueller does NOT have any independent authority – that is the standard in the constitution.
Is that really what you beleive ?
Do you think that is really what the judges beleive ?
If they do not beleive that – then they ruled in error.
“Special Counsel Mueller effectively serves at the pleasure of an Executive Branch officer who was appointed with the advice and consent of the Senate,” Judge Judith Rogers wrote, joined by Judges Sri Srinivasan and Karen Henderson.”
Close but wrong.
Everyone in the executive serves at the pleasure of the president – even senate confirmed appointees.
Further the constitution does not allow – nor has SCOTUS ever permitted the delegation of constitutional powers of the president to anyone not appointed by the president and confirmed by the senate.
The argument these Judges have offered would apply equally to the lowest clerk at the IRS.
It is clearly fallacious and makes the appointments clause of the constitution meaningless.
You have indirectly raised an issue that you and the left have been entirely unwilling to address.
For the moment forget Trump, Forget Mueller, even forget the constitution.
How should we proceed in the future ?
I would hope it is beyond any doubt at this moment that Obama (Strzok’s text document this in Dec. 2015) directed DOJ/FBI to open an investigation of a politcal candidate of the opposing party.
Is that acceptable to you ?
Obviously there must be some circumstances that is allowed.
But what are those ?
While the politics alone should have required more scrupulous adherenence to the rules.
This still raises the more broad question – what is the criteria for DOJ/FBI to open an investigation of anyone ?
There are guidelines and they were not followed. At a certain point the 4th amendment must apply and quiet obviously the 4th amendment was never seriously confronted.
Taken seriously it is a bar you can not get over TODAY.
Regardless, I am not trying to make this about Trump.
I am trying to make this about the future.
It is near certain at this point that Trump will survive Mueller.
It is unlikely at the moment that Trump will be able to use the DOJ/FBI against democrats in the same way that Obama did to Trump.
But it is near certain that anything we allow today, will be repeated by some future president.
Maybe democrats will be lucky and only future democratic presidents will be able to investigate future republicans.
Though I would note that something like 57% of americans now want a 2nd SC to investigate the DOJ/FBI – essentially to investigate the investigation.
Regardless I am asking you to be honest with YOURSELVES.
Remember that the least rights that you allow those you hate are the most you can expect to have yourself.
So what is the standard that DOJ/FBI must meet before it can open an invectigation ?
McCabe provided an answer on 60min. He asserted that fear was sufficient.
Do you beleive that the fears of those who wish to investigate is sufficient to open an investigation ?
There has been a claim that Trump’s foreign ties were sufficient.
Clinton’s ties to foreign countries – including Russia were far greater than Trump’s.
Can DOJ/FBI investigate John Kerry, because he has met with Iranian leaders privately and in secret ?
If you think the Trump investigation was legitimate – please explain the criteria that you use.
Remembering that whatever criteria you choose that will be what the next president, the next DOJ/FBI uses.
I oppose Trump’s emergency declaration – not because it is unconstitutional – because it si perfectly legal and constitutional. But because it is a bad precedent.
This is also the most significant if nto the first instance in which Trump has sought to interpret the power of the president broadly rather than narrowly.
I oppose because we will see this used again, and the next time will be more offensive.
But the same is true regarding the actions of Obama, the DOJ/FBI/CIA and NSA.
If ultimately SCOTUS gives it impramatur to what has occurred – it will be repeated.
Had Nixon had the ability to direct the DOJ/FBI and CIA as Obama was able – there would never have been “the plumbers”.
Excellent Jordan Peterson interview on what is wrong with Trump.
I think I absolutely agree on everything but one thing.
I am not sure that a return to “normal” stupidity and corruption is desireable.
“Trump is a strange person”. You got that right, JP.
“Trump is a strange person”. You got that right, JP.
Is there anyone here who disagrees with that ?
What of the rest of Peterson’s assessments ?
He is such an honest guy, cough:
“Updated Feb. 25, 2019 12:58 p.m. ET
WASHINGTON—The Trump Organization said Monday that it had donated $191,000 in profits it received from foreign governments in 2018 to the U.S. Treasury, nearly 30% more than it reported the previous year.
Last year, the company said it donated about $150,000 to the Treasury, an amount the company said represented its 2017 profits from foreign governments.
“Unlike any other luxury hospitality company, we do not market to or solicit foreign government business,” Trump Organization executive Eric Trump, President Trump’s son, said in a statement. “In fact, we go to great lengths to discourage foreign government patronage at our properties.”
The company has declined to specify how it calculates its foreign profits. Last year, it said it arrived at the $150,000 figure “in accordance with our policy and the Uniform System of Accounts for the Lodging Industry,” but declined to provide further details on what its policy entails and how the company was tracking which guests’ stays were being paid for by foreign governments.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-organization-details-level-of-profits-from-foreign-governments-11551116974
So Trump enterprises – of which Donald Trump no longer has any managerial position, voluntarily donates the profits from its foreign bussiness
And your response is to quibble over how the profits are calculated ?
You understand they are not obligated to do this ?
That if they are lying and they just used a Ouija board that it would not actually change anything ?
Has Clinton donated the profits from her Books to the Treasury ?
Obama ?
Maybe the Clinton foundation should just give the contributions it received from Russia to the Treasury – that would be the equivalent ?
Are you going to launch a criminal investigation – because it would be a crime if Eric Trump miscalculated the foreign profits of the Trump Organization ?
Really – you think that would be a crime ?
Maybe he is even lying – what if he is not following lodging industry standards ?
Unfortunately it is not a crime even to lie about how you did something you did not have to do.
Another Republican Shithead Tweets.
(Trump’s next VP)
https://www.cnn.com/2019/02/26/politics/matt-gaetz-tweet-michael-cohen/index.html
Actually, I think it is a pretty good tweet.
Forget Cohen. The real hypocrits and target are congressmen.
If Democrats really wish to waste their time cross examining Cohen over something that is only illegal in the minds of those on the left, and only when Trump does it, then go at it.
But expect to find yourself drowning in your own hypocracy.
Almost right in the middle of this the House was paying off myriads of claims – millions of tax payer dollars to keep secret sexual harrassment charges against congressmen – most of them democrats.
Whether Trump’s NDA’s were legal or not, the use of public funds to cover up the misconduct of legislators is or should be HIGHLY illegal.
But go ahead. This worked vary badly for republicans in the 90’s. Do you actually expect it is going to work any better for democrats ? Trump is not nearly the sexual preditor that Clinton is.
So you’re in favor of an elected official threatening a congressional witness with retaliation prior to his testimony if he reveals negative information about the leader of your party?
Atta boy, Dave.
“So you’re in favor of an elected official threatening a congressional witness with retaliation prior to his testimony if he reveals negative information about the leader of your party?
Atta boy, Dave.”
If Trumps tweet was a threat, than Obama and Clinton should be in leavenworth
Rather than telling me what I said and think – or what Trump said and thinks.
Try reading what each of us said – what we actually said.
And then evaluate it by the same standard you would use for those you favor.
GOP – Gonifs On Parade
Max Boot praising Reagan is hillarious.
Boot is a Neo-Con.
Reagan LEFT Lebanon when our forces were attacked.
Reagan’s great War was invading Grenada.
“The Case for American Empire”
MAX BOOT
Is that who you want to get behind ?
One of Chenney’s henchmen ?
So you must also have labeled John McCain as a NeoCon as well, and dismissed his criticisms of Trump too, because McCain and Boot favored a no fly zone over Syria?
And if you’re so anti NeoCon why do you share their critical views of modern American Liberalism? They must be wrong about that too, right?
“So you must also have labeled John McCain as a NeoCon as well, and dismissed his criticisms of Trump too, because McCain and Boot favored a no fly zone over Syria?
And if you’re so anti NeoCon why do you share their critical views of modern American Liberalism? They must be wrong about that too, right?”
Do you know how to make an argument that is not some kind of twist on a fallacious appeal to authority ?
McCain is not a neo-con. There are more attributes to neo-cons that just a hawkish stance on the military.
That said – yes, I disagreed with McCain on a belligerent foreign policy – whether that is a no-fly zone over Syria or the mess in Libya or the mess in Iraq or …
Then you jump into this binary fallacy. As if there is a perfect answer.
Leaving Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan will have positive and negative effects.
Staying will have positive and negative effects.
Nothing we can do has only beneifts and no negatives.
Given the choices we have – we should get OUT!!!!!.
Will that have negative effects ? Absolutely. So will staying, albeit different ones.
At the same time, I do not accept – as you do (today), as Boot does, and as McCain did, that we have either a right or a need or even that it is actually in our interests to meddle in the affairs of other countries.
I honestly do not care if you think or even if it is true that atleast temporarily that might advantage China or Russia or …
I do not view our relations with the world as some zero sum competition.
Most things are not zero sum.
If Putin wants to sacrifice Russia’s children for influence in the mideast, that is his business.
I doubt it will work out so well for him, but that his his problem.
What is odd is that you beleive it.
I have asked you repeatedly to read “the ugly american” – there is an enormous amount of scholarly work that reaches the same conclusions, but most of it is dry and tedious.
The Ugly american is readable. One of its points is that the majority of international relations has little to do with government. What matters occurs at the level of people.
Put simply – all the bombs and deals and soldiers are not all that important. Not when they are american, not when they are russian. and overall they do more harm than good.
Last, it is not only not our business, but it is usually immoral for us to pick sides in conflicts we are not part of and to send our soldiers to determine the outcome.
No I did not support the Syrian No-Fly zone.
Assad is an evil dude. So were a significant portion of those he was fighting.
From the outside it is easy to wag our fingers at the misconduct or either or both sides.
Once we take sides, we share some responsibility for the evil that whichever side we picked does.
My criticisms of the modern left are my own. To the extent I have learned from others, I still remain personally responsible for my own views and choices.
If Neo-Con’s share the same criticisms – which is at best superficially true as neo-cons are progressives from a different era who for several decades left democrats and joined republicans over the more anti-russian stance of the GOP at the time.
At their core neo-cons are big government statists, and always have been.
McCain was a bit of a hawk, he was not a neocon.
Nor am I understed in your twisted and fallacious claims of guilt by association with neocons.
I do not share their defining attribute – their insistance on a miliatant and beligerant foreign policy. I do not share their statism.
If perchance there are some arguments that we have shallow common ground – so what ?
For those of you who think Kamala Harris is in the slightest appealing.
Mummm. Wonder if Trump declared this check as a business expense on his taxes?
Is tax fraud impeachable?
This was addressed almost a year ago.
Wow, Cohen has a check to prove what ?
That something that was not a crime over which there is no despute about the actual facts actually occurred ?
I have no idea how Trump reported it on his taxes.
I beleive that payments for NDA’s would qualify as a business expense.
Regardless that would undermine your claim that it was a campaign finance law violation.
If the NDA served a legitimate business purpose – and preserving the value of a brand is a legitimate business purpose, then it is not a campaign expense.
If ANY of Cohen’s assertions are true, Trump is a scumbag of the worst order.
Oh, I forgot, Trump supporters already knew that but voted for him anyway, and continue to support him. Doesn’t that make them Scumbag Supporters?
Given that I did not vote for Trump your insult misses me.
But I presume that you did vote for Clinton.
“Doesn’t that make you a Scumbag Supporter?”
It is pretty inarguable that Clinton is actually and proveably worse than anything trump has been accused of.
WTF?
COHEN PRESENTED: • “Copies of letters I wrote at Mr. Trump’s direction that threatened his high school, colleges, and the College Board NOT TO RELEASE his grades or SAT scores.”
HE THREATENED TO SUE THEM!
#RELEASEHISGRADES!
Absent actual letters, recordings, emails from Trump, anything Cohen produces is not particularly relevant.
We all already know that Cohen threatened people. Letters by Cohen threatening people have no import.
There is one and only one point of consequence that Cohen exposes regarding Trump,
and that is that Trump hired him.
Kushner “quietly meets with Saudi Crown Prince.”
Two dogs chewing on Quid Pro Quo bones
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/jared-kushner-saudi-mohammed-bin-salman-cohen-testimony-trump-jamal-khashoggi-a8800441.html
Clearly the meeting was not quiet.
Regardless, an arab meeting with a jew – it must be a plot !!!!
Kushner has been working effectively to bring peace to the mideast since Trump took office.
That generally involves meeting with people in the mideast.
Let’s review what Cohen asserted today.
Trump:
-lied about knowing ahead of time about the release of hacked emails
-Fraudently devalued his assets for property taxes
-Misused his charity for personal gain
-Lied about not paying off a mistress, committing election fraud
Oh yeah -lied about his business dealings with Russia
Best hearing exchange so far:
Rep. Paul Gosar to Michael Cohen: “You’re a pathological liar. You don’t know truth from falsehood.”
Cohen: “Sir, I’m sorry. Are you referring to me or the president?”
Fox News Andrew Napolitano about Michael Cohen’s Trump testimony
“He paints a potentially grave picture for the president. If the conversation he says he overheard with Roger Stone is true, then the president lied under oath.”
But Trump supporters won’t care: when they voted for him they knew he was the kind of person who would lie under oath, but they don’t give a damn if it’s true.
“If the conversation he says he overheard with Roger Stone is true”
From end to end there have been myriads of “If X was true” then Trump is in trouble,
Thus far “for all X, x is false”.
But if you wish to bet on this time – fine.
My bet is Cohen can not even prove he had the oportunity to overhear said conversation.
I would further note that Neither SDNY nor Mueller have offer Cohen any kind of deal.
If either Mueller or SDNY beleived anything Cohen had said – he would not be headed to jail for 3 years.
As of yet Trump has not testified.
He has however provided answers to Muellers questions.
We do not know what Mueller asked,
We do not know what Trump answered.
We certainly do not know what the Truth is based on Cohen.
So to conclude Trump has lied under oath (wrong crime, it would actually be sworn falsifications they are different, but it would still be crim-in-false.
But to conclude that we would have to KNOW that Cohen was telling the truth.
Given the actual facts, cohen’s plea, the lack of interest prosecutors have in him,
That would be a very poor presumption.
We would have to know what Mueller asked – which we do not.
We would have to know what Trump answered – which we do not.
That is 3 huge assumptions.
I would guess you know what is said about making assumptions.
“Let’s review what Cohen asserted today.
Trump:
-lied about knowing ahead of time about the release of hacked emails”
There remains to this moment no evidence that ANYONE knew anything about the hacked emails prior to their release.
Even Mueller is not claiming that anyone did.
There is a reason that Cohen must come to the table with EVIDENCE.
“-Fraudently devalued his assets for property taxes”
Because you say so ? Property values are not magical.
The value is set by assessment – i.e. the government.
To change that you must appeal – persuade the government.
“-Misused his charity for personal gain”
Already been litigated – nothing there – except maybe Barron Trump’s scouting dues.
Regardless it is a closed private trust. That is NOT actually the same as the Clinton foundation. The ONLY question regarding private trusts is whether there is tax fraud, and generally Trusts only pay taxes on INCOME, which is not applicable here.
The use of a private trust for personal benefit is not merely not a crime,
it is typicaly how a private trust works.
“-Lied about not paying off a mistress,”
The purpose of an NDA is to asure silence.
I know you think you are entitled to know everything about everyone.
But you aren’t.
It is not lying to deprive you of knowledge you have no right to.
“committing election fraud”
Just about every FEC commissioner in the past 3 decades has said NOPE.
“Oh yeah -lied about his business dealings with Russia”
Thus far the only evidence is that Cohen has lied about his dealings with Russia”/.
“Best hearing exchange so far:
Rep. Paul Gosar to Michael Cohen: “You’re a pathological liar. You don’t know truth from falsehood.”
Cohen: “Sir, I’m sorry. Are you referring to me or the president?””
Good exchange – aggreed.
But you seem to miss the fact that Cohen has plead guilty to lying to congress.
We have covered crim-in-falsi before.
It means you are legally useless as a witness absent mountains of corroboration.
Opinion (not genuine news) Fox broadcaster Sean Hannity will have the first sitdown with Trump at the conclusion of his second summit with Kim on Thursday.
Anyone who doesn’t protest this propagandist Trump maneuver to misinform the American public is FUBARed beyond reason.
Trump, the great deal maker (read that as shit brained negotiator) just dropped the US demand for North Korea to hand over a full accounting of its nuclear weapons and ballistic missile programs.
Numerous commentators (some NeoCons, Dave) have been predicting for days that Trump would throw away bargaining chips to get a faux deal with North Korea (any deal) to distract from Cohen’s predicted devestating congressional testimony.
I don’t expect any of the Trump traitorous Right to protest.
In what way are you worse off than you would have been otherwise ?
Regardless, are you capable of atleast waiting for the summit to be over before presuming you know what the result was ?
As to Cohen – if Cohen actually delivers anything substantive – the greatest deal in the world will not help Trump. And if Cohen does not, it is irrelevant.
I do not have high expectations for the NK summit.
In 2017 it looked like Kim was actively seeking a nuclear war.
That has not happened yet,
Trump has already won.
Anything beyond that is a bonus.
Are you capable of hoping that Trump is successful ?
I beleive I quoted something from CS Lewis earlier to the effect you know your soul is rotten when you are praying for pestulance so long as those who you hate would be blamed.
“Anyone who doesn’t protest this propagandist Trump maneuver to misinform the American public is FUBARed beyond reason.”
So it is a bad thing for Trump to try to do something about NK ?
Absolutely we should take whatever Trump says post summit with a grain of salt – or better still wait until we see what is done, rather than said.
Absolutely we should not trust what our leaders tell us.
Democrats, republicans
“One pair of arms is like another
I don’t know why or who’s to blame
I’ll go with you or with your brother
It’s all the same, it’s all the same”
Your hearts burns with some special hatred for Trump.
I have no idea what Cohen has said.
Nor do I care.
I am interested in what that is actually criminal can be proven.
Something is not criminal merely because you do not like it.
“Trump’s Shifting Net Worth May Bear Clues for Investigators Inflated valuations went to insurance firms, Cohen testified
Property bought for $7.5 million, then valued at $291 million ”
““We would provide them with these copies so that they would understand that the premium, which is based sometimes upon the individual’s capabilities to pay, would be reduced,” Cohen told lawmakers. Asked if that was done at Trump’s direction and with his knowledge, Cohen said, “Yes,” adding that he believed the numbers had been inflated.
Such a misrepresentation could lead to the policy being torn up, or worse, according to Maria Vullo, the recently departed superintendent of New York’s Department of Financial Services, which oversees insurers in the state.
“False statements made to an insurance company in order to obtain an insurance policy, or a particular policy provision, or a reduced premium, could create a basis to an insurance company in order to obtain an insurance policy, or a particular policy provision, or a reduced premium, could create a basis to void the policy on the basis of fraud,” Vullo said. “In addition, there are various state and federal laws that proscribe and penalize the making of false statements for purposes of personal gain.”
I have no idea what Cohen purportedly was talking about.
But do you really beleive that Banks and insurance companies are this easy to defraud, and this naive ?
One of the side jobs I have, is assessing commercial properties.
When a bank writes a loan or refinances a commercial property, or when an insurance company writes a new policy on a commercial property
Not only is someone like me sent to assess the condition and the value,
But special accountants are sent to go over the books.
We are going to check everything. We are going to check the cashflow – there are fundimental rules of thumb regarding cashflow on commercial properties.
One way of determining value is the rents less the expenses times standard multipliers.
We not only check the cashflow, and verify the rents, we also veryify that the rents are in line with similar properties in the area, and that the occupancy of the building matches the rent roles. Then we assess the physical buildings, We check the condition of the mechanical systems, the finishes, the appliances, the site conditions the landscaping, the roads and side walks.
It is not possible to do this perfectly – that is one of the reasons that multiple different valuation methods are used. And loans insurance and refinancing are always based on the lowest result.
The fact that you and the congressmen actually beleive this kind of garbage.
Have you ever changed the homeowners insurance on your home ?
I have – it resulted in an inspector assessing the value of my home.
So do you really think that some bank or insurance company is getting snookered by a peice of paper with a value that is off by a factor of 40 ?
The only place you see the kind of fraud that you are saying that Cohen is describing is in deals with governments – and even there it is extremely rare.
Even your own quote – “this type of fraud could lead to the policy being torn up – or worse”.
Think about that ?
People – including Trump buy insurance because in the event of a disaster they want reimbursed.
Over valuing what you are insuring – means your premiums will be much much higher.
Undervaluing means that should something bad happen you will not get the value of the property back – you will lose money.
Any form of fraud means the insurance company can tear up the entire policy.
They keep your premiums and you get screwed.
Next, there is no benefit to a fraudulently high value on a property unless there is a disaster and the insurance must pay out.
Are Trump buildings burning all over the place ?
If Cohen’s testimony as you presented it is truthful – which is laughably unlikely, then Trump is stupid as a post and massively overpaying his insurance for no possible benefit.
Is that what you beleive ?
This nonsense is not that hard to debunk.
What seems obvious is that Cohen is playing democrats in congress – and you.
SDNY and Mueller were wise enough to pass on this.
“False statements made to an insurance company in order to obtain an insurance policy, or a particular policy provision, or a reduced premium, could create a basis to an insurance company in order to obtain an insurance policy, or a particular policy provision, or a reduced premium, could create a basis to void the policy on the basis of fraud,” Vullo said.
Absolutely!!!! – So THINK ABOUT IT. What Cohen is selling is that Trump is stupid and lying to screw himself.
If you inflate the value of a property that you insure – you pay much much higher premiums.
For nothing. It is highly unlikely you will ever be able to collect. Insurance companies will near certainly value the property before writing you a policy – it is called due dilligence.
But even if they do not, should you file a claim – it is absolutely certain they will investigate and properly value the property.
If you deflate the value of the property – the insurance company MIGHT take interest – but probably not. If you want to insure a high value property for less than it is worth to save money on premiums – that is your business. The insurance company does not care.
There is no fraud. If you insure a 200M building for $10M and it burns to the ground – they will pay you $10M not $200.
The type of fraud Cohen is selling is nearly impossible. It is pretty much non-existant in the world of assets. You just can not game the system in the way you are trying to outside of intangible areas – such as personal injury law, or very high risk areas such as derivative investing.
“In addition, there are various state and federal laws that proscribe and penalize the making of false statements for purposes of personal gain.”
Yes, it is called FRAUD.
But to be fraud – there must be a false statement and a gain as a consequence.
Neither overvaluing or undervaluing a real property will accomplish that in an “insurance scheme”.
Lets go one step further.
Insurance is just a form of gambling that is all.
The fundimental thing the insurance company cares about is that the person purchasing the insurance is unable to cause a specific outcome to the bet.
If I go into a Casino and bet $1 that the roulette wheel will land on 1, the Casino will take that bet – even though they will pay out much much more if I the wheel lands on 1.
The know the odds, my $1 is the premium and the odds determine the payout.
Insurance is nearly exactly the same.
Except that the payout is determined in advance, the odds are known and the bet is determined by working backwards from the payout and the odds.
So long as just with the roulette wheel I have no means of influencing the outcome – so long as I have not committed arson or something like that,
The actual value of the property insured is completely irrelevant.
The most fundimental reason insurance companies care about the actual value is NOT because of the cost of the premiums or the pay out,
But because quite often one of the options an insurance company has is to restore the property.
In the construction industry I have dealt with construction bonds – probably the types of insurance Cohen was talking about, all the time.
Bonds are demanded by owners, or sometimes government. Projects are nearly always bonded at values in excess of their real value. Because the odds of a contractor defaulting on a bond are much higher than a fire or earthquake.
When that happens the bonding company comes in and finishes the project.
Bonding companies are notoriously bad at this so everyone tends to demand high bonds to ensure that the bonding company has reserved enough money to complete the project.
Finally – why are we supposed to beleive this ?
Trump Enterprises has an army of lawyers and accountants.
My guess is that Trump has 50 or so accounts whose sole job is to deal with taxes.
So you think that Trump is going to eschew the army of lawyers and accountants he has and put together a fraudulent insurance application in Cohen’s basement ?
The most hillarious part of this claim is the part where Trump has personal involvement in insurance applications.
I did the insurance applications for my families business for 22 of the 45 years it was opened.
The property insurance amount was determined by the mortgage. The mortgage value was determined by the bank. The bank required 3 outside appraisals.
That was all for a property valued at about 500K,
As noted I do PCA;s for properties in value from about $1M to about $100M.
Banks require much more than just 3 certified appraisals for those.
Most of the insurance applications I produced took days to process and were reviewed by our lawyers and accountants – as well as our insuance agent before the application was transmitted. All this despite the fact that after 45 years in business we had very few claims.
Yet if I over estimated our sales or made some other mistake in the pages of information provided in our applications – the insuance company would have returned the application for correction.
I highly doubt Cohen ever had anything to do with an insurance application for Trump.
I doubt Trump ever handled one himself.
While I responded to many of the comments regarding Cohen’s testimony.
It appears I was wrong on several.
The Summit was scheduled long ago.
Cohen’s testimony was supposed to have taken place several weeks ago.
It is democrats that are using Cohen to distract from the Summit not the other way arround.
there are claims regarding the purported agreement – but there is no agreement yet.
Many things are discussed. What is disturbing is that there are leaks about those discussions.
The administration has clarified that – while there are many deal scenarios, there is no deal in which sanctions are lifted that does not include verifiable denuclearization.
Much of what has been claimed that Cohen purportedly said is FALSE.
As an example Cohen did not say that he knew (or stone) Trump knew about the wikileaks before it occured,
Cohen said he BELEIVED that to be the case, He was questioned further on that and confirmed he had no direct knowledge.
In fact most of what he “claimed” was not based on direct knowledge.
Essentially Democrats used Cohen to testify to rumours, not facts.
The testimony had no more merit than that of an ordinary New York Times reader being asked what they BELEIEVED.
Evidence is not what you BELEIVE to be true.
It is what you know to be true.
Further Democrats set the rules for the hearings and prohibited republicans from asking a wide assortment of questions of Cohen – presumably because they would interfere with the Mueller investigation – even what is public regarding the Mueller investigation.
All this despite the fact that neither Mueller not the SDNY requested that Cohen’s testimony be limited.
What is increasingly self evident is that Cohen really knows almost nothing about much of anything except his own crimes.
Neither SDNY nor Mueller care about his testimony – because he does not know anything.
Cohen was unable to get any consequential deal from Mueller or SDNY – because he has nothing of value to exchange.
Cohen did confirm that he had absolutely no personal involvement in anything Russia related.
You need not beleive Cohen – as he is an admitted liar.
But picking and choosing what he says that you beleive is pretty hypocritical.
http://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/02/27/sharyl_atkinson_how_comeys_fbi_spied_on_the_trump_campaign.html?jwsource=cl
The left is so fixated with russian unicorns it can not see the problems right on its own back door.
https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2019/02/19/true_confessions_of_texas_vote_harvesters.html
One More Trump Diplomatic FART!
https://thebulwark.com/the-three-problems-with-the-north-korea-walk-out/
Dopy Donald’s Diplomatic Disaster
(So, Dave, how did that trip of wasted taxpayer dollars, time, effort, and disinformation leading up to it, help us?)
For two years now, NK’s Nuclear program has been stalled.
That has not occurred in 4 decades.
I think that is worth the cost.
Further, do you really think we are at the end of this ?
Kim and Trump held a press conference before this where Kim ceded publicly most everything that Trump AND the rest of us were after – a denuclearized NK.
I would have prefered a good deal with NK today.
The press created, and Trump allowed for the possibility of that.
That is not what happened.
I would also prefer a million $ income to my current one.
This is not happening either.
Wanting something does not make it happen.
Regardless, how well did that NK is all about Cohen story pan out ?
How did the Trump is going to give everything away story pan out ?
“For two years now, NK’s Nuclear program has been stalled.
That has not occurred in 4 decades.”
Prove that you didn’t pull that statement out of your anus.
LINKS!
“For two years now, NK’s Nuclear program has been stalled.
That has not occurred in 4 decades.”
Prove that you didn’t pull that statement out of your anus.
LINKS!
Why do I need a link to prove to you that your nose rests on your face.
When was the Last NK nuclear test ?
In late 2016 and early 2017 “rocket man” was lobbing missles and conducting tests on a practically weekly basis.
It is very near impossible to continue to develop nuclear programs without real world testing.
That is why the “test ban treaties” were so important. Many US programs were canceled because continuing them would have violated the test treaties.
The US was days away from a Nuclear powered Cruise missle test before the 1964 above ground test ban. The test was cancelled and shortly after the program. Though alot of the technology eventually became part of our conventional cruise missles.
Regardless we were days away from testing a cruise missle cable of traveling at Mach 6, carrying 4 or more nuclear warheads that could each be deployed independently that could remain in flight for MONTHS.
Testing matters. According to outside analysts NK is now a few years and many tests short of EMP weapons and Hydrogen bombs. There last tests were a generation AHEAD of Nagasaki weapons, but a generation behind actual fusion bombs.
They do not yet have the guidance systems and nor have they reduced weight sufficiently to be an actual threat to the US, but with further testing they WILL get there.
Yet, there has been no such testing.
You know that.
I know that.
Do you really need a link to tell you what is obvious ?
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-northkorea-usa/trump-wont-rush-north-korea-on-denuclearization-as-long-as-no-weapon-tests-idUSKCN1QE09R
In a speech on Sunday, however, Trump appeared to play down the possibility of a major breakthrough, saying he would be happy as long as North Korea maintained its pause on weapons testing.
“I’m not in a rush,” he said. “I just don’t want testing. As long as there’s no testing, we’re happy.”
North Korea has not held a nuclear or missile test since 2017,
The combination of scatalogical insults and obvious error should be embarrassing.
There will be no deal on NK today. Tomorow is another day.
There are numerous posts here and links to stories elsewhere as well as criticism that you have leveled that is quite obviously refuted by Trump’s actions that you are criticizing.
Whether NK or left wing nuts planted the story that Trump “had’ to have a deal, and that he would cave to get one – that is clearly FALSE.
Now you are ranting because Trump did not cave as you expected.
I guess now you will tell me that Trump deliberately walked out to flush Cohen from the news cycle.
EVERYTHING is dog whistles and wagging the dog with you.
Possibly the #1 rule of negotiation is that to get anywhere you must be prepared to walk away.
What seems self evident is that Trump easily could have had the deal that the media was claiming he was going to agree to.
I do not know whether this was a wise move – nor do you, nor does anyone else.
It may not ever be possible to know.
I do know that the absolute hysteria on the part of the press and the left is tedious and annoying.
You can legitimately criticise Trump for walking away. But you can not do so without contradicting everything YOU were saying over the past couple of days.
Maybe it would be wiser to REPORT the actual news, instead of trying to create the news.
I keep telling you how stupid it is to pretend you know what others are thinking.
Here you have a perfect example of the fact that you clearly are unable to assess what Trump is thinking.
I’m going to have to give trump credit where its due on the NK negotiations. In the end it may be nothing, it may even lead to a worse situation. Its worth trying. No one else was about to talk with NK one on one other than a completely unconventional president. That fact that he did not make a bad agreement on this trip is not a mark against him. For the first time in my eyes he has looked and acted like a president.
If he and Kim were to end the Korean war during the trump presidency they, both terrible people, will have earned a Nobel peace prize and something even much more substantial, a defused conflict. Life is funny.
I have no idea whether that will happen. But my hat is off to trump for trying on this one, adn I hope it works out. There is a win-win situation possible here.
Given the walkout, the story below seems irrelevant.
But I do not think it is. In front of the Press atleast Kim was saying the right things.
It certainly sounded to me like Trump could have easily gotten MORE than the deal that Max Boot, Neo-cons and the fake news leak of yesterday claimed he was going to take.
It is pretty much self evident that Trump is not going to settle.
I should think that the Left and Kim should have learned that from the border Wall fight.
We were told repeatedly that Pelosi had humiliated Trump by getting him to end the shutdown. Yet, the deal Pelosi agreed to and voted on including Wall funding something she claimed would never happen. And AFTER signing that deal Trump found MORE money than he had asked for, other ways. He will have a court fight over that. He may even lose.
And if he does – by the time he does we will be facing another shutdown.
Any wise person would have grasped that Trump is not a push over.
That he will get what he beleives is necescary.
Maybe this is over. I doubt it. We have had constant bumps like this along the way.
https://www.politico.com/story/2019/02/27/kim-jong-un-media-1194855
Kim is already back pedalling – claiming that he did not demand that all sanctions be lifted or that they be lifted immediately.
It is increasingly clear that the stories the media leaked regardless of their sources WERE what Kim wanted, but NOT what Trump was willing to do.
So much for the Media getting it right.
Arguably the media was aiding and abetting Kim.
Regardless, there are starting to be many take-aways from this.
The NK opportunity is not ended just delayed.
Next we will hear stories that this is all some Trump plot to assure that the good news of any deal comes closer to the 2020 election.
Regardless, several analysts have noted this strengthens Trump in negotiations with Xi.
We have listened to more than a week of gibberish from the Media, Samantha Powers, and Susan Rice claiming that the Iran deal should be Trump’s model and Trump should not give away the farm to get a deal. Yet the “bad” deal they were claiming Trump was making was EXACTLY the Iran deal and that is EXACTLY the deal Kim wanted.
Honestly – I would have given Kim the Iran deal. While that deal was a BAD DEAL.
There are fundimental differences between NK and Iran.
NK is in far worse shape economically, but far more capable technologically.
NK is a totalitarian cult of personality NOT a theocracy
Further, though I think Kim is definitely Angling for the best possible deal.
He ABSOLUTELY is angling for a deal – that Was NOT true of prior NK leaders.
Nor do I think Iran wanted a deal – atleast not as much as Obama did.
The IRan deal completely flipped our entire Mideast policy in very bad ways.
It was about much more than Nuclear weapons.
A NK deal does NOT destability the region, it stabailizes it. And it has the support of everyone in the region.
It is likely to take more than a decade for NK to join the world. But it appears that is GOING to happen. In a decade or two NK will be close to SK.
The mideast is NOT made of countries like Taiwan, Japan, SK, Thailand, even china that are booming and seeking to join the modern world.
Iran is seeking to be the dominant country in a part of the world that outside of Israel is 7 centuries in the past.
Anyway, I would have supported Trump reaching an Iran type deal with NK.
Because NK is different from Iran – both more and less dangerous at the same time.
Regardless, that is not what he has done.
Further Kim is already reacting, and not in the way of a tyrant. But in the way of someone who wants this deal MORE than we do.
And that is EXACTLY where we want him.
And Trump just sent a very loud message to Xi.
And to Pelosi and democrats and the american people.
Do you honestly doubt there is going to be an NK deal eventually ?
Trump has just LOUDLY asserted AGAIN, that he is going to get what he wants or there will be no deal, and he will get what he wants eventually.
Trump denies he interfered:
“WASHINGTON — President Trump ordered his chief of staff to grant his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, a top-secret security clearance last year, overruling concerns flagged by intelligence officials and the White House’s top lawyer, four people briefed on the matter said.
Mr. Trump’s decision in May so troubled senior administration officials that at least one, the White House chief of staff at the time, John F. Kelly, wrote a contemporaneous internal memo about how he had been “ordered” to give Mr. Kushner the top-secret clearance.
The White House counsel at the time, Donald F. McGahn II, also wrote an internal memo outlining the concerns that had been raised about Mr. Kushner — including by the C.I.A. — and how Mr. McGahn had recommended that he not be given a top-secret clearance.”
And Trump is an honorable man. 🙂
Your having a great deal of trouble getting this.
Constitutionally ALL EXECUTIVE POWER IS THE PRESIDENTS.
There is no “interfering”.
The root of all decisions regarding classification, or security clearances is THE PRESIDENT.
After her email server fiasco the only job in the entire federal government that Hillary Clinton could qualify for is President.
Because the president is always cleared for everything and can always release anything they please to anyone they please or direct others to do the same.
I have no idea what Trump actually did vs. what he said he did.
What I do know is that anyone in the executive, any reporter and any poster here who thinks this is a story is completely ignorant of the constitution.
“And Trump is an honorable man”
Can you name someone in government for the past several decades that is an honorable man ?
I can’t.
I can name a recent president that engaged in politically corrupt and criminal actions that no president – even Nixon has managed in my lifetime, and possibly no president has ever.
That would be our last president – who I did actually think was mostly an honorable man. But the facts have proven otherwise.
Define “honorable man”.
Then explain to me how any definition of honorable that does not include Trump, includes either of the clinton’s, Obama, or bush ?
Clue: William Shakespeare.
I did not ask for a “clue” I asked for YOUR definition.
I asked for that because I doubt there is broad agreement on what constitutes being an honroable man. And debating whether someone is or is not honorable without a common understanding of Honorable is futile.
I also did it because on this as myriads of other issues, I actively seek to get you, Jay, DD, anyone to commit to any actual value or principle.
I seek that – because I do not honestly beleive you have values and more particularly principles. Because universally you want to pretend that you can peer into your gut and decide every single thing uniquely. Because that is the only way in the world that you can hate the people you hate, without also hating an awful lot of the people you value.
Jay is constantly lobbing tweets from neo-cons.
Trump is not a neocon, jay is not, I do not think you are, Ron, Priscilla, pretty much no one here is a neocon.
Hopefully most of us do not share the values of neocons.
It is one thing to use one leftist (or conservative) to refute another – when there are significant shared values. Pointing out some conflict between AOC and Sanders as an example.
It is another to cite Marx in opposition to Pelosi or Schumer when pretty much no one values marx.
That is called hypocracy.
There is lots of hypocracy in politics. I was bothered By Rep. Jordan’s remarks at the Cohen hearing, – not because he was wrong, but because aside from actually being mostly right his remarks were indistinguishable from Rep. Cummings who is just a hypocritcal blow hard idiot who will say whatever wins points with his constituents.
But I am not talking about hypocracy in politics.
I am talking about it HERE at TNM.
I am told by You and Roby and Jay that I misjudge you all the time.
To the extent I misjudge you by identifying you with the left, is by presuming that you actually have values or principles.
If we had a debate on some important issue that Trump has not expressed an oppinion on
I can not predict how you will choose.
Conversely if you can not predict how I will choose – based on my expressed principles, then you are not paying attention.
But I can always predict where you will stand on anything Trump has taken a position on.
You will oppose Trump.
That is a reflection of an absence of values and principles.
You are not even willing to express your OWN meanign for the term honor.
But you are still willing to decide who is and is not honorable without providing any criteria for doing so.
So I am left presuming that you have no criteria, no values, no principles.
Cohen lied, Cohen lied, oh wo is me. We didn’t know he was a liar. Oh, he may have mentioned it, “Who cares what he says.”
LMAO, next time Reps control committees, they call in Pinocchio.
“Cohen lied, Cohen lied, oh wo is me. We didn’t know he was a liar. Oh, he may have mentioned it, “Who cares what he says.”
LMAO, next time Reps control committees, they call in Pinocchio.”
As others have noted – this might be the first time in history that Congress has recalled a witness that has been convicted of lying to congress with the expectation that he would tell the truth.
From what I have seen the Cohen testimony was a disaster for democrats.
Just as here – naked derogatory assertions are not facts, they are not evidence.
They would not be if Cohen had a reputation for telling the truth.
For the most part it really does not matter if Cohen was lying or telling the truth.
I think it was a mistake for Republicans to refer him for prosecution. The vast majority of his testimony was insult and oppinion – not fact. You can not lie about an opinion and insults are neither evidence nor perjury.
Cohen continued to undermine the Russian Collusion nonsense – in other words we still have zero EVIDENCE that something that is not a crime, but was investigated criminally happened.
Cohen DENIED that he knew of any collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia.
He added NOTHING to what we already know – his “checks” work against democrats.
No matter how you characterize the “hush money” payments – they were legal.
If you actually wanted a crime – it was better if Cohen had paid Daniels from his own moeny without being reimbursed. But Cohen just proved that was not the case.
Trump is free to pay for an NDA – either as an individual to protect his reputation, or to protect his relations with his family, through his businesses to protection of the brand or through contributions to his campaign of his own money.
Parading Cohen arround does nto change that. Nothing Cohen said changes the law.
Cohen could be lying, or he could be telling the truth.
But he did not provide any FACTS or EVIDENCE that got the democrats anywhere.
If this is the star witness for the “get Trump” crew – they are in trouble.
AS I have said repeatedly – I have ZERO problem with democrats holding hearings in the house. In the at this point nearly impossible instance they actually uncover something substantative – then kudos. And if they do not – they are engaging in what is typically called a self punishing act.
I did listen to Rep. Jordan’s remarks, and while I generally respect him and I think he was correct, I think that much of what he said should have been toned down.
Let the democrats engage in the obvious partisan circus. For the most part the investigation the house republicans conducted when they were in power was focused and credible – with a few expceptions. While democrats foamed and frothed. Jordan looked too much like Elijah Cummings did a few months ago.
Republicans should let democrats behave like fools. They should not join them.
DD;
The only direct evidence of actual crimes Cohen testified to were his own.
Even those – he was unsuccessful in demonstrating that anyone else participated in the crimes he says he committed.
Both Cohen and the left have promised us Tapes of Trump directing Cohen to commit crimes.
We Know Cohen recorded Trump – which is illegal in many states and unethical for a lawyer always. Even so – we are left with Cohen’s beleifs, not anhything that can be corroborated in anyway. In fact not even a statement that if false would be perjury – because you are free to beleive things that are not true – what you beleive is NOT EVIDENCE.
Another amateur hour for Trump’s gang that can’t negotiate straight:
“Hanoi Summit Failed Because Trump Refuses to Prep”
“Typically, summit prep begins with the president and his intelligence community agreeing on a baseline assessment of the state-of-play, in this case the status of North Korea’s nuclear program and Kim Jong Un’s intentions. The intelligence community’s assessment that North Korea will not denuclearize, the open-source analysis that Pyongyang is still proliferating weapons of mass destruction, and reporting that North Korea is taking extra steps to disburse its arsenal seemingly fell on deaf ears.”
https://www.thedailybeast.com/after-the-hanoi-fail-heres-a-textbook-for-trump-summiting-for-dummies
The only thing missing from this fiasco was Un doing the Pelosi clap. (Some call it the FU clap.)
Yes, Brooks is 100% correct. We have observed this in microcosm here with several TNMers.
What I have observed at TNM is massive TDS – a hatred of trump so virulent that you are willing to beleive any nonsense and end Trump’s presidency “by any means necescary”.
That you are willing to forgive the most egregious and criminal conduct on the part of anyone else seeking to “get trump” – solely because they are after Trump.
This all started in December 2015 – more than 3 years ago, the public has been aware of much of it since the fall of 2016.
I have understood from the begining, that no amount of misconduct on the part of those out to “get trump” would result in consequences – if anything of substance turned up on Trump.
That is not how the law is supposed to work. Those who act lawlessly are to be punished even if some of us beleive they did so for good cause.
But it is the reality – whether the target is Trump or a black kid on a street selling drugs, that those tasked with law enforcement can get away with most anything – including actual crimes, so long as there is little doubt that their target is a criminal.
That is unfortunate, but it is true. We should hold those tasked with enforcing the law
to a higher standard of conformance with the law actual criminals – but we do not.
Regardless, 3+ years later that is not what we have. What we have is the same as what we had at the start – nothing. Nealry all the original nonsensical claims are GONE. Every day we get myriads of new ones.
We get an assortment of fake claims of fake crimes by anonymous sources.
We have pretty much exactly the moral and ethical disaster than CS Lewis warned of when we are so consumed by hate that we wish for evil outcomes that will harm innocent people so long as that destroys our enemy
And you dare to wrap yourselves in some kind of moral mantle.
We have labeled a part of our history – the MacCarthy era – because partisan politicians and many people in this country lost sight of there on moral and ethical foundations.
They sought to thwart the freedom of those who disagreed with them politically.
At that time it was the “right” castigating the “left” because it did not full throatedly condemn the russian boogey men of that era. Villians like Stalin who make Putin look like a pussy cat.
And hear we are today – 70 years later with the left doing the same thing.
We hear “Russia, Russia, Russia”, And everything that those we do not like do is inherently suspicious – if not obviously wrong – because we do not like them.
“You’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?”
Yes dduck, I hear you, I do recognize all the symptoms of trumps “I know best and don’t need any stinkin advice” syndrome that infects everything he does. The thought of trump going one on one with people like kim and putin without advisors or the traditional prep by security, intelligence, and military advisors is properly terrifying. Its possible that this is just a fiasco. As I say so often, history will judge. History and the next news cycle are very different things.
I am still pulling for trump to have changed the game to everyone’s advantage in the Korean frozen conflict. If in the end the trump-kim negotiations ratchet down the tension and risks in the Koreas that will be a win no matter how it comes about.
I am glad that you are rooting for Trump to succeed.
There are too many even here – who would welcome a nuclear conflict if it ended Trump’s presidency.
I would note that “I know best and don’t need any stinkin advice” is also what those who are ragging on Trump are essentially claiming.
I do not think Trump is “expert” in the things that he does. But the track record of those claiming he needs to follow their advice is abysmal.
The mideast is the way it is because presidents from Clinton through Obama followed that “stinkin advice”.
North Korea is as it is because presidents following that “stinkin advice”.
You and other posters here – would have agreed that the advice of these “experts” in government stunk – when George Bush was president.
Trump does NOT have to be expert – to do better than the so called experts.
I do not think there is a single person in the defense department or the state department who can claim to have been instrumental in some past US success.
Most of us DO NOT want more of the same foreign and military policy that we had with Bush and Obama. We like Trump are not “experts”. but we do not have an unrelenting track record carreening between failure and mediocrity.
Trump shunning the advice of “experts” might be arrogance, but it can just as easily be seen as ignoring what those who have no past records of success advise.
“The thought of trump going one on one with people like kim and putin without advisors or the traditional prep by security, intelligence, and military advisors is properly terrifying.”
Why so ? These are negotiations. The details are not resolved at the level of heads of states. Further while negotiations between nations are often personal, actual deals are not.
Trump can not come to a “secret” deal with anyone. He can negotiate in secret, but in the end any deal can not take effect without becoming public.
As Pompeo said to democratic congressmen grilling him on Trump’s private conversations with Trump – Putin and Trump can talk about whatever they want, in the end, the Policy of the US towards Russia has not changed, nor can it change as a consequence of a secret meeting.
“Its possible that this is just a fiasco.”
Trump has a long history of volatile negotiartions long before getting elected.
Most of us do not like volatility. We want peace quit and security.
But real change is always volatile.
“If in the end the trump-kim negotiations ratchet down the tension and risks in the Koreas that will be a win no matter how it comes about.”
It already has. That could change, but thus far it has.
Do we have to keep this nonsense up ?
Above there are inumberable posts Claiming Trump was going to give Kim a deal almost no matter what. Posters here said it, Pundits said it.
It was a foregone conclusion that Trump was going to fold and give Kim Un a deal much better than Iran. And lost of bad reasons were offered as to why Trump was going to do so.
Mostly stupid.
But that is not what happens. what appears to be the case is Kim went for more than he was going to get, refused to back down, and Trump left. Now we have Kim saying “no, no that is not really what he meant” and offering pretty much what Trump wants.
If you have been paying any attention – this has been going like this from the start.
Trump and Kim will be back at the table soon enough.
In the meantime:
Trump’s bargaining position with China is stronger.
He just sent ANOTHER message – pretty much like the emergency declaration on the Wall, that he is not to be triffled with. That he will get what he wants. That things can be easy or hard.
Trump’s bargaining position with Kim is stronger.
Kim is the one who is now publicly assuring everyone that he was willing to give up his nukes.
Regardless the argument you are making is that in a negotiation you MUST continue to try to negotiate NO MATTER WHAT.
If you beleive that – then you are going to be taken to the cleaners in any negotiation.
You say Trump did not prepare ?
What is there to prepare for ?
Trump has been negotiating his entire life.
He has personally negotiated probably hundreds more deals than Obama, or anyone one on either side in any of these negotiations.
What facts do you think he had no gasp of that were important ?
There are really very few things that get directly negotiated at the level of the president.
The big deal here – the one that people were sure Trump was going to cave on, was NK verifiably ending its nuclear programs. Trump left because Kim was either unwilling to do so, or unwilling to be clear that he would. there is very little else that is of consequence.
There is no “prepared” or “unprepared” here.
What Trump was PREPARED for – was walking away if he was unable to get what he wanted. That has nothing to do with anything these nonsensical news articles are fixating on.
What seems self evident – is that the media, the left, and you have no idea how to actually negotiate.
Trump does.
Trump has just done in Vietnam, what Obama was unable to do in Iran.
Walk away from a bad deal.
The only way you can be assured of getting a good deal, is if you are willing to walk away from a bad one.
BTW – read the quotes you cite.
If what they claimed are facts regarding NK are true – why are you surprised that Trump walked away ?
I would further note that the facts cited are NOT that important – with respect to the negotiations.
It does not matter whether NK was “cheating” prior to the “summit” what matter was whether Kim would agree to denuclearize in a verifiable way.
The ASSUMPTION that an actually wise person – rather than the idiots who are foaming over all of this is that Trump pressed Kim on PRECISELY the things you claim he was not paying attention on, and Kim ducked the issues.
You do not seem to understand – none of the “facts” offered matter. Trump was wise enough to grasp he did not NEED to know the details.
All Trump needed to know – was that Kim was going to try to cheat, and that he should not give him an agreement where he could.
On 11/16/16 the Liar In Cheif said this:
“I am not trying to get “top level security clearance” for my children. This was a typically false news story”
Today’s New York Times:
“WASHINGTON — President Trump ordered his chief of staff to grant his son-in-law and senior adviser, Jared Kushner, a top-secret security clearance last year, overruling concerns flagged by intelligence officials and the White House’s top lawyer, four people briefed on the matter said.
Mr. Trump’s decision in May so troubled senior administration officials that at least one, the White House chief of staff at the time, John F. Kelly, wrote a contemporaneous internal memo about how he had been “ordered” to give Mr. Kushner the top-secret clearance.
The White House counsel at the time, Donald F. McGahn II, also wrote an internal memo outlining the concerns that had been raised about Mr. Kushner — including by the C.I.A. — and how Mr. McGahn had recommended that he not be given a top-secret clearance.”
Let’s hear those BS refutes from Trump Ass Smoochers. I can hardly wait…
I would assume that you have those memo’s ? That Kelly and McGahn have corroborated the story ?
Or is this just another of those anonymous sources stories with lots of details that prove false ?
Regardless, it does not matter. The president is free to share classified information with whoever he pleases. And free to trust whoever he pleases with it.
This entire nonsense was addressed AT THE TIME.
What KELLEY said AT THE TIME, was that the Whitehouse Office responsible for the final review of security clearances was SLOW WALKING EVERY CLEARANCE in an effort to handicap Trump.
That stopped when Kelley required that the FBI repots came to HIM before going to the carreer whitehouse security staff, because that made it impossible for them to manufacture obstacles.
What you are actually demonstrating is that Trump has not fired enough people at the whitehouse yet.
That a substantial portion of the purported carreer staff at the whitehouse. Leak like a sieve and are engaged in political obstruction.
I would further note that Jared Kushner has been Trump’s special envoy in the mideast since the inauguration. And he has had more success in the past two years than Obama had during his entire 8 years.
I do not give a damn if Trump trusts people he has worked with for decades who are also family.
I do care about his/their ACTUAL successes and failures.
Dave, your namesake at NYT just nailed your trumpanzee metamorphosis
… tolerant of any corruption… BY YOUR OWN SIDE that is.
Please identify ACTUAL corruption ?
The vast majority of what you spray about Trump is NOT corruption.
It might offend you. but it does not violate the law or the constitution.
If you do not like the rules for the conduct of the president – CHANGE THEM.
Then whatever changes you wish will apply equally to ALL presidents.
Too my knowledge Trump has not directed the DOJ or FBI to open an investigation of Bernie Sanders or Joe Biden or Elizabeth Warren. Yet, Obama did.
That is pretty much TEXT BOOK corruption.
Most of what we get is the garbage of the past two days:
Trump is NOT going to stand tough with Kim Un,
Oh, God no! Trump stood Tough with Kim Un!!!
I do not pretend to know the right approach to negotiating with Kim Un.
But you are certain that you know exactly what the wrong approach is.
Whatever Trump does. It does not matter what that is.
You have redefined right and wrong in most everything – such that if Trump does it, then it is wrong.
You have destroyed your own credibility.
I am very intolerant of actual corruption. Find me some actual corruption involving Trump want you can hang him.
Not innuendo, not fake stories about fake crimes, from unnamed sources, not things you beleive. Actual crimes.
I see a long list of actual crimes. Crimes committed by those in government – those Trump called “the swamp”, who were determined that Trump would not become president, would not become their boss, and when he did, that he would not remain.
I see leaks of classified information.
I see leaks of grand jury material.
I see likes leaked for personal gain or to harm ones enemies.
I see actual abuse of power for political or personal advantage.
I see lies – often under oath, by those with a public trust to honestly and failfully enforce the law to follow the constitution and to protect the rights of the individual.
That you do not care about.
All this fake garbage that keeps burning to ash – that you care about.
Every single claim made thus far regarding Trump has PROVEN either
Not true, or not a crime.
Every day you tell me that everything is going to hell.
And yet we are not in hell. And in fact things are getting better.
Once again – we are not doing as well as Trump brags.
You want to slam him for bragging – absolutely.
Trump paints medicrity as excellence.
But if that is a great offense – then what is it when you paint doing poorly as doing good ?
Regardless, given a choice – I am less interested in what either Obama or Trump brag about themselves and more interested in what has actually been done.
The most recent economic numbers just came out – 2.6% growth.
There are competing stories about whether that is above or below projections – both stories true – it is above some projections and below others.
What is also true is that of the 8 quarters that Trump has been president every one except the first has had growth above Obama’s average.
That we have had 7 straight quarters of 2.2% or higher growth with no end in sight.
The longest streak of growth over 2% during Obama was only 5 quarters, and the next longest 3. It is likely that by 2020 Trump will have had more quarters over 2.2% growth than Obama had in 8 years. Thus far Trump has not had a single quarter below 1.8% – Obama had 5 quarters of negative growth – 3 of which were AFTER the recession had ended.
and 19 quarters out of 24 total with growth below 2%.
Trump has claimed greater success in trade deals than I think he has actually had.
even so at WORST he has done no worse than Obama.
In pretty much every way Trump has done no worse than Obama.
In most ways he has done better.
Your ranting and anger at Trump would not be hypocritical – if you had the same anger and ranting at Obama – but you did not.
Every day you tell me how things are going to hell.
And yet every day – they are not.
“The most recent economic numbers just came out – 2.6% growth.
There are competing stories about whether that is above or below projections – both stories true – it is above some projections and below others.”
Trump PROMISED economic growth of “4%, 5%, maybe 6%.”
Shame on you for not chastising him for spurious inflated bullshit.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2017/12/16/trump_were_going_to_see_economy_growth_of_4_5_and_maybe_6_percent.html
“Trump PROMISED economic growth of “4%, 5%, maybe 6%.”
Shame on you for not chastising him for spurious inflated bullshit.”
Again you can not read.
He did, I have – repeatedly.
The numbers are not “inflated” they are from multiple sources and widely accepted.
The numbers I use for Both Trump and Obama are from Trading economics – not a government source.
2.6% growth is POOR. It is also nearly 1% HIGHER that Obama Managed.
I beleive the 2yr AVERAGE growth for Trump is over 3% – that is a little short of DOUBLE Obama.
Absolutely we should be seeing 4-6% SUSTAINED growth.
Absolutely Trump promised that and he is not delivering.
At the same time – as noted Obama NEVER delivered growth this high or a growth streak this long.
It is bad that I have to celebrate an accomplishment of Trump’s that is so poor.
At the same time it is not merely MUCH better than Obama’s, it is likely better than any other republican would have delivered, certainly much better than Clinton would have delivered and better than any democrat running in 2020 will deliver.
How do I know that ? Because as I have told you REPEATEDLY Economic growth correlated strongly to only two things.
Negatively to the scale of government,
and positively to individual liberty.
Every democratic candidate intends to EXPAND government, merely trying will ensure less growth.
Nor is there a candidate republican or democrat who would have nearly as effectively as Trump chocked government regulation.
Those things matter.
If you are riding a tricycle and some promises you a BMW and the give you a Subaru
How much should you complain ?
If they asked me to vote for them to be president of my bank and promised me in exchange enough profit the following two years to buy a BMW, I’d vote them out at earliest opportunity, and sue to recover half their salary as a BMW costs twice a Subaru.
There must be some words or something missing from your reply.
Regardless, you seem to have entirely missed the point.
It is irrelevant what people promise. What is relevant is what they can deliver.
As much as we carp about Trump’s promises – he has NOT delivered, nor will he.
But he has still delivered more and better to all of us than any recent president, or anything we could have expected from Clinton or anything we can expect from the current crop of pygmies.
If your response is asserting otherwise – it is sufficiently muddled I can not tell,
Then it is wrong.
Regardless the analogy I provided correlates to reality.
Yours correlates to nothing.
I am voting based on the real world – not a fantasy world.
“There must be some words or something missing from your reply….
Regardless, you seem to have entirely missed the point.
It is irrelevant what people promise. What is relevant is what they can deliver.”
There must be some crucial brain function missing from your mind, Dave-John.
If people don’t deliver what they promise, that’s called swindling. Tell the hundreds of small businesses and contractors Trump swindled who filed lawsuits, liens, judgements against him for fraudently failing to pay the full amounts of money he promised for work they did, that their claims are irrelevant.
Tell it to the people he swindled with inflated promises at Trump U their anguish was irrelevant (or to the judge who ordered a $25 million dollar settlement to students who were ‘defrauded.’)
Tell it to 48 servers at at Trump’s Miami golf resort he promised to pay overtime for a special event, who had to sue for settlements averaging $800 each.
As our pal Tea Party Joe said today: “History will hammer these Trump sycophants … who proudly defend Trump’s lying and refuse to stand up for the truth.”
That goes double for people like you who smugly kiss his butt with ends-justify-means rationalizations.
“If people don’t deliver what they promise, that’s called swindling”
No actually it is not.
The law – as well as most people distinguish between promises and binding commitments.
Fraud, Swindling, is when you break a promise that was offered in return for something else.
“If you pay me $3 I will provide you a burger” is binding. There is actual harm if I give you $3 and you do not give me a burger.
“I promise not to post tomorow” – is not not a binding commitment. I am free to change my mind.
“Tell the hundreds of small businesses and contractors Trump swindled who filed lawsuits, liens, judgements against him for fraudently failing to pay the full amounts of money he promised for work they did, that their claims are irrelevant.”
I have no idea how many of these there actually are and I doubt you do either, nor of the merits of each claim.
I do trust that the legal system we have has done its best to resolve this appropriately.
Trump U was “settled”, The court approved the settlement, it did not ORDER anything. It did not reach any conclusions.
I do not for the most part have much sympathy for those subscribing to Trump U.
They got exactly what they paid for. They wanted the secret to success. While it is not a secret, they were given exactly that – be driven, motivated and work your ass off.
That is it.
You keep using the word “settlement” as if it means something different from mutual agreement.
You also spray such things as “had to sue”. No one “has to sue”.
I do not know what your servers were promised or who promised it to them.
Nor do you.
I do not know whether they were egregiously abused or are gold diggers.
We have courts to sort that out.
But this – as many other cases usually settle, because our courts are way to expensive.
Regardless a “settlement” is NOT a conclusion regarding who was right and who was wrong.
You have claimed to have business experience – you should know this.
If we are going to punish people who lie, who do not keep their binding promises,
Then we should start with Joe Walsh.
Why should I place much weight in what Joe says about keeping commitments ?
Aren’t commitments to your spouse and children the most important ?
The ends do not justifiy the means.
Give me a choice of someone proposing good means to good ends and you have my vote.
Given the real world choices I actually have,
I will take following the law as it is, combined with a 50% gain in the economy over
Lawlessness with a weaker economy.
The ends do not justify the means is typically an a priori agument against the use of bad means based on HOPED FOR ends.
There is a presumption you are obligated to rebut that when the outcome is better that the means were more legitimate.
Amen, bro:
https://twitter.com/TheRightMelissa/status/1102222141041315842
You do understand the significance of economic growth ?
Higher growth improves most EVERYTHING. It is not merely about consumerism, it is about improving our LIFE.
Further all gains in growth are cumulative and compounding.
So if you get 4% growth for 2Q follower by 3% – the benefits of the 2Q’s of 4% remain forever and all subsequence growth is on top of those.
The difference between 1.8% and 2.3% over a decade is nearly $2T in our economy.
That is almost 10% additional total growth.
And that difference grows exponentially with Time.
Absolutely Trump has lied. He promised better.
We got a Subaru, not a BMW, But atleast we are off the damn tricycle.
No matter what any of them promised NONE of the other choices were going to improve on the Tricycle.
No Jay;
The “moral corruption” is yours.
When Obama was elected Republicans did everything they could to constitutionally obstruct Obama.
From BEFORE Trump was elected – democrats, the left, the administration, the media, have done anything they think is necescary to thwart trump – without regard for the law or the constitution.
What you call “rationalizing” – is expecting that YOU will not just make things up as you go.
You want to be outraged at Trump – unless you hold the similar or worse actions of democrats in the same disregard – you have zero credibility.
Stomping up and down and frothing in moral outrage is only meaningful when YOU are not a hypocrit, when YOU are consistent, in your judgement, when YOU follow the actual law and constitution. And when those you claim to support do the same.
There is ZERO doubt at this point that Trump faced an actual criminal conspiracy within our government both prior to being elected and continuing right to this day to thwart the law and the constitution.
There is some question as to how LARGE that conspiracy was. But the only evidence of actual collusion with Russia is on the part of the Clinton campaign.
The only actual evidence of illegal campaign activity is that of the DOJ/FBI/CIA both during and after the election. Mueller has a handful of people on process crimes.
There is an equally long list of people WITHIN DOJ/FBI/CIA who are being investigated for and clearly guilty of crimes that are NOT process crimes.
Nearly the entire upper tier of DOJ/FBI/CIA is admittedly guilty of leaking:
Classified information.
Information from grand juries
Information from ongoing investigations.
For most the only hope they have – is that much of what they leaked was FALSE.
It is actually a crime to leak lies about an ongoing criminal investigation if you are part of that investigation.
But that is the least of what was done – just the most clearly TRUE – usually by the admission of those involved.
Right now – nearly the entirety of the Obama upper tier in DOJ/CIA/FBI are being investigated for crimes.
Unlike the members of Trump’s campaign, they are being investigated by mostly honest people, often by their peers who are highly unlikely to look to prosecute people they worked with in government – for more heinous acts than have been alleged regarding the Trump campaign.
If Trump had ACTUALLY had secret meeting with Putin seeking to “influence” the 2016 election that would be LESS corrupt than those inside the federal government seeking to influence the election.
Dave, you’re a full-of-shit apologist for GOP-Trumpian one sided ass-kissing.
But of course you will respond with paragraphs (multiples) of rationalization for your distorted cult adulation of the Orange Dingbat.
Daily reminder: GFY.
Jay
I have refrained from commenting the last few days because it is the same crap on this site day after day after day. I tried to open a discussion about the far left blocking legislation requiring doctors to provide medical care to infants born alive and it only ended in an abortion debate, and not a debate concerning the facts. Then it only got one comment about the right making false claims and that this never happens. (If it never happens, then why should the left block legislation for something that never happens? If it never happens, then let the legislation go through because it will never impact anyone!))
Buton to the point. I am going to say this as I think it is important to those that do not have TDS.
Anytime anyone says anything positive about what is happening in this country economically, that person is accused here of being a Trump apologist. The only way someone can not be an apologist is to attack anything in the news as being negative news and blame Trump. Example 2.9% economic growth compared to 1.6% in Obama’s last year is not good news, its bad news because it was not 3%, 3.5%, 4%…..
Go back and read what I have said and what Dave has said in numerous comments. If you open your mind you may find that neither of us has said we voted for Trump, that we like Trump or that we support Trump personally.
I believe you will find that both of us have said we support Trump’s policies.That his policies have been good in some respects. Me much more than Dave since I support his China trade policies much more than Dave. Dave is basically a free trader where I am much more a “fair” trader where fair is defined as “tit for tat”. You have a tariff on $100B in products, we have an equal tariff on $100B in products.
I believe you will find that both of us has said we are not making any judgements on legal or illegal actions committed by Trump until the facts are presented. Neither of us support the SC in the way he has conducted the investigation, but when those findings are released and the complete facts are known, then and only then will I make a decision on those issues.I would hope anyone would wait for the facts, but that is not happening. Guilty until proven innocent.
And I believe you will find that both of us have stated that Clinton is just as guilty of crimes as as the TDS’ers claims of Trump being guilty of crimes.
Ask me if I prefer a different GOP candidate and I will say yes 100%, even Ted Cruz. Ask me if I would vote for Harris, Booker, Sanders or others running on the far left, and I will say I will vote for a third party or not vote for the president at all. I can not and will never vote for someone who supports issues like the Paris Accords, gun control, high taxes, Medicare for all, free college education, forgiveness of student debt, repatriation for ancestors of slaves.and other economically and socially unacceptable far left socialist positions.
Ask me if I would vote for Beto, and I would have to give that much thought because he said he would tear down all the walls if elected president, and we all know queen Nancy thinks walls are immoral, so since he supports my thinking on this, I could vote for him if he is the nominee. We all know democrats keep all their campaign promises compared to the GOP. His wall position may trump all his other socialist positions. I can “compromise” if the walls come tumbling down!
The left does an incredible amount of fighting against laws and actions that are solutions to problems they claim NEVER HAPPEN.
We have compelling evidence of Voter Fraud in most every state that has significant mail in voting. We have a tiny amount of evidence of that fraud in one republican campaign in NC,
And the left is frothing over that. We have evidence of much larger frauds in TX, AZ, and CA
And we here NADA from the left – the only states that have laws against this – are red states, and god forbid those states should try to enforce those laws against democrats, but should a single republican engage in the same fraud democrats are doing accross the country – pillory him.
Laws are only for those on the right. Those on the left are free to do as they please, because, well “feelings”.
The Wall is purportedly going to be ineffective. If that is the case – why this MASSIVE opposition to it ? As government waste goes the cost is small. Trump is managing to pay for it with rounding errors in other budgets.
The left has fought a holy war against voter ID laws. Thwarting them for over a decade, despite the fact that SCOTUS blessed them long ago.
more than 70% of people support them. Including minorities and democrats – and yet democratic politicians and judges attempt to thwart them with a virulence that one would expect of an existential threat.
I do not agree that we need the federal legislation that republicans are pushing and democrats are opposing. Murder remains a crime, and the murder of a newborn is still murder – even in NY. Nor will a federal law matter in places like NY that will ignore it.
The republican measure is fundimentally symbolic and a waste. At the same time you are absolutely correct – even as a symbol it does not merit the virulent opposition it has garnered.
The left in this country is entirely UNHINGED – and that includes those posters here who foam and froth at every word from Trump and celebrate every word against him and beleive anything negative no matter how thin the evidence.
Jay pointed out that Trump promised 4-6% growth – and JAY IS RIGHT.
I will be happy to have a rational discussion about why Trump is falling short on his promises regarding Growth. But even that discussion must ACCEPT that he is doing nearly 1% better than Obama. Because if we are unable to accept the facts about the past and the present – how can we possibly figure out what does and does not work ?
None of this is magic.
We can substantially reduce Voter Fraud and more importantly the perception of voter fraud.
It is not even hard.
But we can not accomplish it by wishing that it would go away as we work to make it easier.
I think that we can actually improve growth, I think we know how. Knowing what to do is not hard. The hard part is that it involves goring the sacred cows of the left. It requires recognizing that many things we have done in the past do not work and ending them.
Though we have different views on many issues, Ron, we both share high levels of frustration with idiots both Dem & GOP.
I’ve never been this ANGRY 😤 at duplicitious politicians in my adult life, but this slew of GOP hypocrites are far worse than the Dems – for defending and enabling this lying devisive asshole president.
Trump – a truly morally defective human – his defects amplified under the spotlight of Presidential power – has deteriorated the office, possibly beyond repair in our remaining years.
Some positive legislation or accomplishments occur during ALL presidential terms. Hitler’s economy BOOMED during his elected rule. Mussolini took credit for Italy’s trains running on time. Nixon ended the military draft. But history doesn’t judge rulers positively for a few good ticks performed at the expansive cascades of disaster they engendered. Trump has lowered the standards of probity for high elected office, so don’t be surprised as that spiral continues downward.
My criteria for the 2020 Vote matches the views of respected conservative Tom Nichols @RadioFreeTom :
“I’m #NeverTrump and will vote for whoever is nominated against Trump. (Well, unless it’s Jill Stein or something, but I mean among the obvious Democratic Party figures.) But if the Dems move too far left, Trump will win the EC – again.”
“I’m #NeverTrump and will vote for whoever is nominated against Trump. ”
Glad you have given it so much thought.
So lets say Obama was able to Run against Trump.
And you KNEW for certainty that if Obama won – the economy would return to volatility and a max of 1.8% average growth. But if Trump remained – we would continue to have 2.3% to 2.6% growth.
Or if Obama won – we would end up with more troops in the mideast and more endless war.
Or if Obama won – the NK negotiations would be off and NK would return to missle tests and coming closer and closer to a hydrogen bomb that it could deliver to the US ?
My question is not about either Trump or Obama.
It is really about what do you want for the country ?
I think you have answered that. Your hatred of Trump is so deep you would not merely spite yourself but spite the country to be rid of him.
I do not know how I will vote in 2020 – we still have 2 years.
But ultimately my vote will be about the best interests of the country, not who I hate the most.
Jay;
You are pretty much exactly like Trump – you are full of insults and trash talk for anyone who disagrees with you.
Though there is one differences – Trump is and has accomplished many things of consequence, you have not.
Further your corruption goes significantly beyond that of Trump.
You insult nearly everyone.
I have no tolerance for those who claim moral superiority over everyone else – and are not merely absent any evidence to support that assertion but self evidently WORSE than those they assault.
I keep harping on Facts, Logic reason. When you make claims, when you pass moral judgements on others, and you CAN NOT back those claims up with FACTS, LOGIC, and REASON, The moral failure is YOURS.
You can complain about the length of my posts. Fine do not read them.
But yours are full of insults – and you go beyond merely insulting Trump to insulting ANYONE who does not hate him as thoroughly as you do,
And you do so WITHOUT FACTS, LOGIC, REASON.
THAT IS A MORAL FAILURE – and a larger one than you are accusing anyone else of.
If I’m just like Trump why aren’t you constantly validating me?
If as therefor follows Trump is like me, why don’t you chastise him more often?
And at best I read one out of four of your comments (or less when they tediously clog my email notification of New Moderate posts)… any more than that and my anti acid Tums budget surpasses my Irish Whiskey costs.
“If I’m just like Trump why aren’t you constantly validating me?”
Do you have accomplishments that entitle you to that kind of validation ?
“If as therefor follows Trump is like me, why don’t you chastise him more often ?”
I have Trump’s actions to judge him by.
All I have for you is the same garbage words.
“And at best I read one out of four of your comments (or less when they tediously clog my email notification of New Moderate posts)… any more than that and my anti acid Tums budget surpasses my Irish Whiskey costs.”
Read, don’t, your choice.
Your need for Whickey or tums is your own responsibility, not mine.
If facts give you heartburn, maybe your body is trying to tell you something – like that what you beleive and what is true are in conflict.
Ron, your comments were possibly not aimed at me, but I will stick in my two cents. Jay is a well behaved tabby cat compared to your fellow libertarian as far as posting habits go. Its not so easy as you may think to navigate the issue of coexisting with Dave.
Lets say I were to give myself a new screen name and be Dave… to you. You would not be able to ignore, or tolerate the Treatment. We can’t either.
The site dynamics flow from there.
Roby..Jay.. First, being able to tolerate Dave and his excesive words to make point s that could be made in single paragraphs. I scan his comments. But I know his positions for the most part. And maybe because his positions are more aligned with mine, I am not offended by the positions he supports.
As for Jay and his position that Trump needs to be replaced at all cost, I cant support this given the choices the democrats are giving us. For those like me and our belief that the PPACA did little other than make insurance companies richer than they already were. The PPACA was minor league stuff compared to what the new breed of democrats will cram down our guts.
I would not want Trump in my house. I would not want Trump anywhere around my daughters. I would not attend any functions Trump was attending. But if I had a choice of someone like Trump running my company making long range decisions that positioned my company for long range success, while constantly appearing in the news with negative issues, or I could hire someone with the character of Jimmy Carter that would make long range decisions like the new breed of democrats that would position my company for long range financial devestation, I would have to hire the Trump character.
And that is the shitty choice we have. Once we have entitlements enacted, we never get rid of them, even with parties totally in control that object to entitlements unable to reverse them. So many think Medicare for all is good until one accepts that the current Medicare so many depend on will get totally replaced to fit the majority in the program. To pay for pediatric care, maternity care and all those services that seniors do not utilize now, what will seniors lose?
If we resign Paris Accords, how many companies will move overseas to China that does not have to meet the same standards as us until sometime in the 2050’s. China already has salary expense advantages to us. And add energy advantages?
Whatever the decision in 2020, I am making financial plans early to protect my investments now ( what little I have) because I look for substantial declines if the democrats take control. And I have a very pessimistic outlook for 2020 to at least 2025.
Ron;
Thank you.
I am not writing editorials for the NYT. If I were I would put more effort into saying in a few words what I often take many paragraphs. I am not paid to write here. I get to choose whether I spend more effort to be more concise.
I am not – atleast not here. I do a great deal of writing as part of life, I have been published and separately write professional reports and papers all the time.
Alot more effort goes into concise in those.
There is a difference between disagreement over positions and personal offence.
I reserve personal offence for hypocracy, of which there is way too much.
Disagreement over positions does not justify personal offense.
Atleast not unless your position involves advocating the use of force against others.
Please give me a democrat with Jimmy Carter’s character. Please!
He was a unicorn in 1976 and is more so today.
Roby;
What are your criteria for “well behaved” ?
Have I called you a Pig or a Hog ? Or a Robot ? Have I attributed a variety of mental illnesses to you ?
Is that expression that you would call that of a “well behaved tabby” ?
In fact have I actually harmed any of you in any way ?
What are your standards ?
That is the entire point. You are free to have whatever standards you want – or just go with your guts. But you are judged bother by your own conformance to your own standards, as well as the actual standards or your lack of them.
In the end – you are rarely interested in engaging on any issue of substance – and Jay pretty much never.
I would ask why do you post at all ? That is a serious question, that I am honestly trying to understand.
If as Jay, all you post is insults fallacies and ad hominem – you are free to do that, but why ?
How does that benefit you or anyone else ? And what does that say about you ?
Honestly, I do not care how you feel about me or Jay. I care about the respect of the person I see in the mirror. If what you post leaves you respecting yourself – that is up to you.
I could not tolerate that lack of values and principles or conformance to them in myself.
For the first 16 years of the 21st century we have had presidents that wore their hearts on their sleeve. They spoke soothing words, they “felt our pain”, and 16 years later we have their sympathy, but are little better off. Many of us are worse off.
A whole generation of us – rich and poor is substantially less well off than we would have been with a president who “felt less of our pain”, and threw less monkey wrenches at us.
We have had only two years of Trump – seven quarters in a row of sustained growth about 2% – we had not seen that for a decade.
That is jobs, and raises, and time with our family, that is better ability to afford healthcare and better heatlhcare.
Is Trump the great success as president he claims he is – thus far NO!
Is he substantially better for all of us than the past two ? Indisputably.
Is there a single challenger of consequence who is not near certain to bring us back to the mess of the prior 16 years – or worse ? In Nov. 2020 your get to place that bet.
You want me to disparage Trump ? He is merely average but he is competing against pygmies.
We should be demanding more – better. Thus 2.6% growth – that is not enough.
This nation is better than that and our government is still in the way.
But you honestly have some hope of better form the pygmies ?
Not a chance.
So what is Trump’s great sin ? that he talks like someone from the Bronx ?
Dave, “So what is Trump’s great sin ? that he talks like someone from the Bronx ?”
Trumps sin is acting in public how many strong business leaders act in private. I guess where I overlook many of Trumps sins is due to my 40+ years, many of which I attended board finance committee meetings at the Health System. We had furniture compwny executives, textile executives, bank presidents and many other business leaders. Withoutva doubt, many had the traits Trump exhibits. All that did were obnoxious asses that I tried to ingore, but in that setting that was difficult.
But for some that nevef experienced that, Trump is an outlier. For those that have experienced what I have, Trump is more the usual and not an outlier.
The business leaders assholes that you had to contend with came about their arrogance honestly. They took risks – usually large ones, personally, worked their asses off and succeeded. They are entitled to beleive they are better than others – than “the Experts” at make decisions – particularly about finance – because they have a track record that proves they do.
You are absolutely correct that these people are rare, they are outliers.
They are also the people the rest of us depend on.
” They took risks – usually large ones, personally, worked their asses off and succeeded.”
Except the worst of the bunch were the second and third generation leaders that took over for their fathers and grand fathers. And there financial acumen was no where near those that worked hard and created succesful companies.
“Except the worst of the bunch were the second and third generation leaders that took over for their fathers and grand fathers. And there financial acumen was no where near those that worked hard and created succesful companies.”
Creating a successful business for scratch is just about the most difficult thing that can be done. 1 in 7 startups succeed.
Maintaining an existing business is no where near as difficult.
But do not pretend it is easy.
Go find top 20 companies on the fortune 500 list from 1975. I think only One remains in the top 20. The majority of them do not exist anymore. Once a business has survived its first two years – it has a 50:50 chance of surviving 15 more.
I have no doubt the people you dealt with were asses. But presuming they are also idiots is a mistake.
There is actually plenty of room to make mistakes in a business and survive. Those in business at the top of successful businesses make mistakes – and survive.
But every mistake makes survival harder and no matter what there are competitors out there waiting to capitolize on your failures.
Think of business as a HS math test – you must get 9 of ten things right to get an A,
You do not need to be perfect. But there is a new test every week. You can even get a B sometimes, maybe even a C rarely, but get a D or F ONCE and you are toast.
Get C’s over and over and you will not survive. To grow you must get A’s most of the time.
Small business is in my DNA. My great great grandfather started a business, His father started a competing one, my grandfather went into competition with his father. My grandfather through my father out of his business and my father started his own business that grew to 55 people over 50 years – I was part of that business from the time I could add a column of numbers, and I ran the business part of the business for 22 years.
Today it is gone. Partly my mistakes, partly my fathers mistakes, partly difficult times, partly a cordinated effort by one family member to destroy the business from the inside. One less mistake, one less problem, and it would still be here today – providing 50 or more jobs.
And that is just my fathers side. My mother’s father started a business in 1930 that is still running today. That is REALLY REALLY hard.
My Great Great Grandfather, …. through my father, and my mother, and my self those people are the assholes you were dealing with. And I would agree with you that they and their friends from the SMB community are stuborn oppinionated bastards used to getting their own way. They know they are not always right. But they also know they are right more often than the rest of us. They also know that being right is not what is important. Two things are important. Getting things done, and not being wrong.
If you are looking for people to bet on with the highest probability of a big payoff – those are who you should choose.
If you wonder why Trump’s (and mine) disdain for “experts” – I would suggest reading Nasim Taleeb. If you do not have “skin in the game” you expertise is very nearly worthless.
Do not get me wrong – I read experts, I listen to what they have to say. I allow their expertise to inform me. But when a decision needs to be made – if you do not have a stake in the outcome, if you are not going to benefit from the right decision and lose from the wrong one, your expertise is not that important.
DB: A little holier than thou. These are just two sleaze bags, one perhaps a Fagin, but the other not nearly an Oliver, more of an artful dodger..
DD;
What kind of person insults others obliquely as you do ?
If you are going to call someone a “sleaze bag” or a “Fagin” or an “artful dodger”,
Then do so openly.
It is not cute or a sign of intelligence, it is a sign of dishonesty.
It is what people who want to throw insults but do not want the responsibility for their own words.
I have offered the truism before – that when you call someone else a liar – that the burden of proof is on you, and that if you can not prove that assertion than it is your credibility that is suspect.
The same is true of pretty much EVERY insult. If you accuse someone of being a “sleaze bag” or any of the myriads of other insults that make up the bulk of comments by the TDS crowd here – then you can either prove it, or the presumption is YOU are the sleaze bag – or whatever your childish insult of the day.
Regardless you are making the same error that cost democrats the election in 2016.
You are demonstrating the evil of identity politics.
You pretend that truth is determined by labeling and insulting your opponent, not by arguing your ideas, Facts, logic reason.
Much of what is sprayed out here is trivial to deal with – your arguments and claims are full of self contradictions and hypocracy.
DAVE: Wake up. What kind of schmuck are you. Not oblique, eh.
Now, my comment was to David Brooks (DB) and Fagin is Trump and artful dodger is Cohen. Everyone that has a human brain could figure that.
Are you a f—— robot or what, you seem to be.
dduck: Squawk Bot
Not an argument.
“DAVE: Wake up. What kind of schmuck are you. Not oblique, eh.
Now, my comment was to David Brooks (DB) and Fagin is Trump and artful dodger is Cohen. Everyone that has a human brain could figure that.
Are you a f—— robot or what, you seem to be.”
No DD, they can not. We have been over this before, these types of indirections, sarcasm, etc work HORRIBLY over the internet.
TNM is a small audience – but even there – I do not share the same shared background that several of the rest of you do. Certainly you can not expect that with an even wider audience that such things will be understood.
I do not honestly care that much if you insult the crap out of public figures, and aside from the confusion I do not care if you use oblique references to them.
But my reading of your remarks was that you were refering to other posters HERE by these names. Presuming I understood your oblique references was an error on my part.
Presuming others would is an error on yours.
Anyway – you can insult the crap out of Trump or other public figures.
Insulting them is still not an argument, but we have lowered public discourse sufficiently that pretty much anything goes regarding name calling of public figures, and I am not looking to address any aspect of that – beyond that it is not an argument.
But when you start insulting ordinary people – other posters or just people on the streets because of their views, or sometimes with little or no basis at all – you had better be right about your claims.
That is what went wrong for the left, the press, and Nathan Phillips with the Covington Catholic Kids.
Nick Sandman is NOT a public figure, He did not ask to become one.
He tried to figure out how to navigate a minor public confrontation.
We do not expect people to do that perfectly – and yet he did it pretty well.
We do not transport ourselves into the lives of ordinary people, slime them and then jet away.
That is immoral.
That is at the core of what is wrong with political correctness and identity politics.
The left has been over reaching on that for decades. The overreach gets worse each year.
Trump’s “genius” is that he figured that out, and he figured out how to take advantage of it.
He set himself up as a pinyata for the left to bash and counted on the fact that tens of millions of people would see the attacks on Trump as attacks on them.
The left doubled down on this by ACTUALLY attacking ordinary people who did not choose a place on the public stage.
Further that is occuring HERE at TNM.
“DAVE: Wake up. What kind of schmuck are you.”
One with blathering Logorrhea? 🥴
All insult, no argument.
“Where’s the beef ?”
Wasn’t an argument, Dave; was a response in accord with DD.
But, congrats! Your response was brief.
Still an insult, Still no beef.
Now blaming others ?
Ah Humans, still good for something:
I took my wife on a cruise on the Ethan Allen a big boat with dining and music and all on Lake Champlain for her birthday a few years back. We got the DJ onto the early Beatles and the next thing you know my wife was leading a big group of Chinese tourists through the dances of the 60s. Everyone got into it, everyone could dance. Ha, a nice American former Soviet girl dancing up a storm with godless asian commies to the British invasion.
Make music not war.
Thumbs up 👍😊
A different kind of music, to the chin….
https://twitter.com/ffs_omg/status/1101125276187144192?s=21
Careful, your wife might be “influencing” the chinese.
The chinese version of Meuller might charge her and seek to extradict her.
Democrats might maintain their control of the House, but doing so will mean letting a large block of moderate democrats vote with republicans on many issues.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/powerpost/house-democrats-explode-in-recriminations-as-liberals-lash-out-at-moderates/2019/02/28/c3d163fe-3b87-11e9-a06c-3ec8ed509d15_story.html?noredirect=on&utm_term=.2135d84ccf8f
Tea party Joe and I TOTALLY agree on Trump.
Have you actually looked into Joe Walsh ?
Is he honestly someone you wish to be associated with ?
I guess you like “dead beat dad’s”
“I guess you like “dead beat dad’s””
Right, that must be it.
Dave, you are serving up huge amounts of very, very, very weak dribble as arguments.
We have all met the proverbial woman whose mouth is not connected to her brian, who blathers on and on incontinently. People run screaming when they see her coming.
The same thing has happened to you and your typing fingers.
You would far rather say something that is completely stupid than simply control your impulse to say something, anything, even if its laughably idiotic whenever Jay or I or dduck comment. Saying nothing when you have nothing intelligent to say is never an option for you.
There is a weird oblivious sort of lack of self respect involved in never editing oneself.
The discussion is where it is because Other posters here – you, jay, DD, would rather fawn over neocons or lunatic #nevertrumpers, continue with insult as a substitute for argument, froth in TDS outrage, and try to make moral assertions without a strong moral foundation.
Of course my “arguments” are weak, that is a reflection of the smallness they are responding to.
Who in their right mind would be offering up Joe Walsh, Max Boot ?
Regardless, most of what you are critiquing as small, is a reflection of YOUR arguments.
I would be happy to have a serious debate of serious issues.
Most of you avoid that like the plague.
Next, neither I nor anyone else here is composing “the federalist papers” or “Crime and Punishment”.
I may produce a significant volume, but I do not spend time on it, as I would if I was actually writing for publication.
Any criticism you have regarding that has merit, and I do not care.
I have not read any budding Shakespeare here.
What is it that you think I am saying that is stupid ?
I will openly admit that I do not put any effort into making short concise arguments – that is not worth the effort for this forum.
But I still stand behind what I say short of typos.
Regardless, I would suggest looking at your own comments. I think your criticism applies more appropriately there.
“There is a weird oblivious sort of lack of self respect involved in never editing oneself.”
You and Jay and DD continuously seem to beleive that you can make observations about others that are not self evident from their remarks.
Actual psychiatrists are extremely poor at that – why do you think you are better ?
TNM is one small part of my life – not the entirety of who I am.
I guess this is not all that surprising as the entire left seems certain that it knows what others think and intend.
I heard an apt quote recently.
“The right things the left is wrong,
The left thinks the right is bad”
I think that is an excellent observation.
You DD, Jay spray moral pronouncements of others constantly.
You are certain you know the intentions, the motivations, the thoughts, the feelings of others.
And that is pretty much all you care about – your guess as to what is inside the soul of others.
We all judge others. But I focus on what people DO first, and what the say to a much lessor extent. I also judge based on the CONSEQUENCES of their actions or their openly expressed intentions. I not know presume to know why you do something – unless you actually say so. But I will judge what you actually do, or what you seriously say you will do, and what the consequences of that will be.
Some of what you support or oppose is not as Bat Shit crazy as AOC, but exactly like AOC you presume that because what you assert is appealing that it is also true, that because what you expect – though it defies logic is good, that makes you a good person.
Being moral, being a good person, is not so much about what you beleive as what you DO.
Good intentions do not excuse bad outcomes – especially where they are forseable.
Conversely your presumptions about someone else’s intentions do not make them evil particularly when the consequences of those actions are good.
Trump has not improved things to the extent he promised.
At the same time he has done much better than Obama.
If you say that you are for minorities, women, etc. and what you do is either harmful or does little good for them, you are LESS moral than the person who does not offer the same platitudes but whose acts have better outcomes for those same people.
This is particularly true when the results are foreseable.
I do not care whether you are selling AOC’s green new deal or just a small increase in the MW. If the outcome is predictably bad for the very people you seek to help, acting on those is IMMORAL.
Yes, dummie, I constantly describe him as Tea Party Joe, DUH.
Yes, numbnuts, he and I strongly disagree on many issues, and I twitter argue with him when he’s promoting some of those asshole views. I agree with him that we need a stronger southern border; not that ALL illegals should be expelled. I generally disagree with his abortion view. I agree with him when he’s speaking in favor of police who risk their lives on duty; disagree when he ignores obvious police over reaction.
I totally agree with his views on Trump. And Trump underlings. And the Mueller Investigation. And Trumps stupid-dangerous National Emergency ploy. And that Trump’s tariff plan is a stupid idea. And his DIGUST with Trump’s serial lying.
I respect that he’s an issue first, party second guy. I’d vote for him over Trump for president.
I bet you’d find excuses to favor Trump in that face off.
Amazing – a post from you where you actually own up to holding specific views.
In fact incredibly Trump like views.
You are an incredible self contradiction.
I really do not know where to start.
Beyond noting that I can not grasp how so much self contradiction can exist inside the same mind.
If you do not want to deport the “illegals” that are already here – CHANGE THE LAW.
My strongest criticism of Trump is reserved for the rare times he does what Obama did constantly – and ignores the law and does what he pleases.
I do not agree with the law much of the time. I still expect the president and the executive to enforce the law as written.
If your prefered president wishes to rail about the deportation of illegals – fine, if he wants to “shut down the government” as a negotiating tactic to change the law – fine.
But as president he must still enforce the law as it is.
Actually addressing the law – how exactly is it that you expect what you appear to be proposing to work.
You seem to be saying – you are fine with laws that say Outsiders can not try to get into the country – while at the same time saying that if they manage to run the guantlet of the wall, and CBP they get a free pass to stay ?
Obama merely hinted at relaxing the policy on unaccompanined children and the number of unaccompanied children increased by a factor of ten.
Incentives matter. Tight Border security without deporting those who manage to beat it just ensures increasing numbers attempting to cross.
Either let these people in or DONT! but quit playing stupid games that screw over the immigrants, and the country and increase the cost and complexity of government.
Nobody opposes “police who risk their lives on duty”.
That is just nonsense.
But trying to address what I think is at the core of what you are saying:
Policing is a job – it is a very difficult and challenging one.
But it is still a free choice on the part of those who elect to be police.
If what you are arguing is that because the job can be dangerous (it is NOT in the top 10 most dangerous jobs, it is not as dangerous as farming or fishing). that we should allow ever greater violation of peoples rights to improve the safety of the police – the answer is NO!!!.
I recently watched “The Hate You Give” on Amazon.
Not perfect, but still a very good movie.
If I shoot and kill someone, because I THINK they are pulling a gun – that is a crime, Manslaughter, Criminally negligent Homicide, My beleif they had a gun does not alter the fact that I killed someone who was not an actual threat to me.
If I do so, I will absolutely assuredly be prosecuted and likely convicted.
The odds of that event occuring are far greater if I am a police officer.
But the law is not different. It is still a crime to kill someone who is not an ACTUAL Threat to you.
Even in states with Stand your ground laws, there is an obligation to retreat if you can do so safely UNLESS you are defending you own property, or retreating would increase the risk to another.
I respect and support the police too. But I do not place them ABOVE THE LAW.
I expect them to abide by the same laws that I must – whether that is not killing people or not running stop lights.
I EXPECT the police to risk their lives – THAT IS THE JOB.
If you can not do that, get another job.
It is not something that I think I can do – so I have not chosen to be a police officer.
Further what has this got to do with Trump or Joe Walsh ?
I would imaging that both Trump and Joe Walsh and you and I are all agreed that murdering 4 year olds is bad.
I do not recall trump ever going after “police who risk their lives on duty”
Presumably you know what a red herring or a straw man is.
“If I shoot and kill someone, because I THINK they are pulling a gun – that is a crime, Manslaughter, Criminally negligent Homicide, My beleif they had a gun does not alter the fact that I killed someone who was not an actual threat to me.
If I do so, I will absolutely assuredly be prosecuted and likely convicted.The odds of that event occuring are far greater if I am a police officer.
But the law is not different.”
Dave, please clarify your statement and reconcile with this decision.
https://www.npr.org/2019/03/02/699719214/officers-in-stephon-clark-shooting-wont-be-charged-says-sacramento-d-a
Thanks
I am not trying to reconcile the difference. I am trying to highlight it.
We have one law for all of us.
In my example I refered to the law as it applies to ME.
In the acticle you linked to – if the officers were instead private citizens not on their own property – they would have been charged and likely convicted.
Much of what is in the article is extraneous and irrelevant.
What is relevant are the facts of the incident.
The officers were chasing an unknown person possibly guilty of breaking a window.
They had ZERO reason to beleive they were chasing someone armed and dangerous.
I understand their job is difficult.
I understand that they are called on to make snap judgements regarding the use of deadly force.
Still they killed a man who was NOT a credible threat.
They were not only wrong in their perception, they transfered the risk of THEIR judgement to their victim.
The punishment for suspected property damage is not supposed to be execution.
The FACT is that even real dangerous armed criminals almost NEVER pull a gun on police officers.
According to the Officers down web site, in 2018 150 officers died in the line of duty.
52 were firearms fatalities.
There were 33,000 firearms deaths in the US in 2018.
In the month of February 2019 there were 54 people killed by police.
The Mueller investigation is Trivial.
While the courts have thus far not been willing to go there it is still OBVIOUSLY
AGAINST THE LAW.
We do not investigate people merely because we want to.
We do not investigate people because of our fears.
Provide a basis for The obama administration to have opened an investigation of the Trump campaign, a basis for McCabe to have opened an investigation of Trump, a basis for the Mueller investigation.
We quite litterally have exactly the abuse of power that Nixon dreamed of come true.
And way too many of you are happy about it because you do not like Trump.
That is not the basis for an investigation either.
I would not support the Mueller investigation if it was actually being conducted by someone who was truly reputable and honest.
But it is being conducted by someone who is a thug.
Unfortunately a thug who has acquired a respected reputation in Washington, but that merely speaks of the corrupt nature of Washington.
There are a long list of egregious thuggery in Mueller’s past.
I DO NOT support police or prosecutors who without sufficient basis tear appart the lives of innocent people.
Muller should have been FIRED decades ago for his conduct of the Jewel and Ivens investigations – as well as numerous others.
No one having done what he has done in the past should ever serve in government again.
You talk about supporting the police. Who does not ?
Do you support police who kill innocent people because they assumed they had a gun when they did not ? Do you suport police and prosecutors who continue to hound innocent people long after it is clear from the evidence they they are innocent.
Do you support police and prosecutors who decide who is guilty based on who they like and who they do not, and hound them relentlessly ?
You and Joe Walsh are free to hold whatever views you wish or Trump or anyone.
I do not mostly care about your views.
I do care about the lawless actions that you are prepared to take based on those views.
Your dislike for someone is NOT a basis for using the power of government against them.
Here is a list of the 28 currently active presidentially declared “national emergencies”
The last 10 were instituted by Obama.
1. Blocking Iranian Government Property (Nov. 14, 1979)
2. Proliferation of Weapons of Mass Destruction (Nov. 14, 1994)
3. Prohibiting Transactions with Terrorists Who Threaten to Disrupt the Middle East Peace Process (Jan. 23, 1995)
4. Prohibiting Certain Transactions with Respect to the Development of Iranian Petroleum Resources (Mar. 15, 1995)
5. Blocking Assets and Prohibiting Transactions with Significant Narcotics Traffickers (Oct. 21, 1995)
6. Regulations of the Anchorage and Movement of Vessels with Respect to Cuba (Mar. 1, 1996)
7. Blocking Sudanese Government Property and Prohibiting Transactions with Sudan (Nov. 3, 1997)
8. Blocking Property of Persons Who Threaten International Stabilization Efforts in the Western Balkans (Jun. 26, 2001)
9. Continuation of Export Control Regulations (Aug. 17, 2001)
10. Declaration of National Emergency by Reason of Certain Terrorist Attacks (Sept. 14, 2001)
11. Blocking Property and Prohibiting Transactions with Persons who Commit, Threaten to Commit, or Support Terrorism (Sept. 23, 2001)
12. Blocking Property of Persons Undermining Democratic Processes or Institutions in Zimbabwe (Mar. 6, 2003)
13. Protecting the Development Fund for Iraq and Certain Other Property in Which Iraq has an Interest (May 22, 2003)
14. Blocking Property of Certain Persons and Prohibiting the Export of Certain Goods to Syria (May 11, 2004)
15. Blocking Property of Certain Persons Undermining Democratic Processes or Institutions in Belarus (Jun. 16, 2006)
16. Blocking Property of Certain Persons Contributing to the Conflict in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (Oct. 27, 2006)
17. Blocking Property of Persons Undermining the Sovereignty of Lebanon or Its Democratic Processes and Institutions (Aug. 1, 2007)
18. Continuing Certain Restrictions with Respect to North Korea and North Korean Nationals (Jun. 26, 2008)
19. Blocking Property of Certain Persons Contributing to the Conflict in Somalia (Apr. 12, 2010)
20. Blocking Property and Prohibiting Certain Transactions Related to Libya (Feb. 25, 2011)
21. Blocking Property of Transnational Criminal Organizations (Jul. 25, 2011)
22. Blocking Property of Persons Threatening the Peace, Security, or Stability of Yemen (May 16, 2012)
23. Blocking Property of Certain Persons Contributing to the Situation in Ukraine (Mar. 6, 2014)
24. Blocking Property of Certain Persons With Respect to South Sudan (Apr. 3, 2014)
25. Blocking Property of Certain Persons Contributing to the Conflict in the Central African Republic (May 12, 2014)
26. Blocking Property and Suspending Entry of Certain Persons Contributing to the Situation in Venezuela (Mar. 9, 2015)
27. Blocking the Property of Certain Persons Engaging in Significant Malicious Cyber-Enabled Activities (Apr. 1, 2015)
28. Blocking Property of Certain Persons Contributing to the Situation in Burundi (Nov. 23, 2015)
I disagree with Trump’s declaration of a national emergency to fund wall construction.
That does not make it stupid or dangerous.
I do not agree with Tarrifs no matter who pushes them.
Obama slapped Tarrifs on China in 2009.
I continually point out to you that – While Trump has made numerous mistakes as president.
NONE are as egregious as those of Obama. In many instance they even make the same mistakes.
If you wish to evaluate Trump as a poor president – fine, but unless you are a complete hypocrit, by the standards you use to judge Trump Obama is worse.
I want less government power – I will be happy if you use Trump as a justification to reduce it.
But I have zero intest in this nonsense that something you think is stupid when Trump does it is not when Obama did.
I am not looking to diminish the power of Trump, I am looking to diminish the power of government.
Joe Walsh today:
“Defend Trump’s policies all you want. I do often. But if you want to be taken seriously, don’t defend Trump’s veracity. It’s nonexistent.”
Criticisms regarding veracity from a dead beat dad ?
“But if you want to be taken seriously, don’t defend Trump’s veracity. It’s nonexistent.”
If you want to be taken seriously – do not say things that are stupid and patently false.
Further Walsh is borrowing from the typical left win playbook that cost Hillary the election.
Walsh – and you, are not merely attacking Trump, but you are attacking anyone who does not assess Trump the same as you do, and you are doing so on an issue where you are obviously wrong. .
We can each assess Trump’s veracity differently, but no one can credibly assess it is non-existant.
“Of course my “arguments” are weak, that is a reflection of the smallness they are responding to.”
So, what would happen if you just accept that you have your opinions and we have ours after 11 years here and gave it a rest instead of generating literally millions of words of weak arguments?
Eleven years times 365 days in a year times 500 words per day (which is an obvious underestimate of your daily output) gives 2,007,500 words. An obvious underestimate but OK as an order of magnitude estimate.
A 300 page book with 300 average words per page has 90,000 words.
Division produces the result that, conservatively, you have produced the equivalent of 22 books of your rhetoric, in spite of the fact that you are addressing most of it to people you consider to be inadequate.
Why not do something more constructive? Why not create your own Libertarian site and carefully write out well composed and thought out posts that are not directed towards Jay, dduck, and myself who are immune to your charms? Why not address people who are actually interested in your philosophy?
Telling us we are wrong, wrong, wrong day and night is really worth 22+ books full of sentences such as
“I guess you like “dead beat dad’s”?
Really?
“So, what would happen if you just accept that you have your opinions and we have ours after 11 years here”
I do.
“and gave it a rest instead of generating literally millions of words of weak arguments?”
Non sequitur.
You are not asking for me to accept that we each have different opinions,
You are demanding that when my oppinion disagrees with yours that I must be silent.
You are the one making the error you are accusing me of.
I do not seek to silence you.
But you seek to silence me.
Is it EVER possible for you to argue without myriads of fallacies ?
I already pointed out the non-sequitur.
Over generalization is also a fallacy
The fact that sometimes my responses to the crap you right are poor because you refuse to discuss anything substantitive does NOT mean every argument I make is weak.
Why do you CONSTANTLY presume the right to dictate other peoples lives to them.
Write a book, create a different blog, ….. post here.
I CHOOSE.
When debating someone’s veracity, citing as an authority on others veracity someone who did not keep commitments to their family is a very bad argument,
If you are going to engage in fallacious appeals to authority – then atleast pick someone who is an actual authority rather than a counter example.
If you do not wish to be told that you are wrong, the easiest was is to not be wrong.
That is not all that hard. Check your facts before asserting them, and do not use fallacies.
You are not obligated to do this. Nor are you entitled to silence criticism, particularly when you have not bothered to check your facts.
We can go on about this endlessly.
You are the one who choses not to discuss anything of substance.
“If you do not wish to be told that you are wrong, the easiest was is to not be wrong.”
You fail to grasp what this is about. I don’t mind being wrong. Words may in fact show a person errors in their thought when used judiciously and skillfully in argument. In your case you have so overused and abused the power of “no” that your targets don’t listen or care.
Your campaign here as an noisy incontinent contradiction machine is as ineffective as it is boring.
You seem to imagine that you are, metaphorically speaking, a ferocious and formidable German Shepard of fact, logic, and reason bringing the fear of error to us left wing nuts. Whereas we your targets perceive as one of those incessantly yappy 8 pound furball dogs of noise and spit and we want to know when the old lady is going to take you back into the house.
Being a perpetually noisy unedited nuisance is not the sign of a great thinker.
https://scontent-iad3-1.xx.fbcdn.net/v/t1.0-9/19598913_10159166929770107_1997703648143642556_n.jpg?oh=377fd7caa5d185c8ea59c0d5b31a3cc5&oe=59D5A04C
I disrespect him for more than his incontenent babbling. His hypocrital response to dismiss Joe Walsh – a Tea Party Conservative who’s views are generally far right of mine by accusing him of being a dead beat dad, thereby dismissing Walsh’s anti Trump accusations is ripe with double-think irony. He’s willing to overlook far worse accusations against Trump for groping, tax malfeasance, habitual lying, multiple adultries, nepotism, swindles fleecings and film-flammery of contractors when it’s convenient to his blathering arguments. As it is hypocritically convenient for him to take the high road against ad hominem tagging of himself, coupled with assurances he never utters them against others – including public officials or celebrities – because it’s beneath him.
I am not accusing him, the courts, his wife, his kids, the facts are accusing him.
Walsh is a “dead beat dad”
More importantly he is not someone anyone should be looking up to – left, right ….
I highly doubt you hold him in high regard, so why are you bothered that I do not ?
Walsh has been all over the place politically. I would offer that calling him a Tea Party conservative is insulting to the TP. But I am not here to defend the Tea Party, If Walsh wants to claim to be TP, that’s fine. It is not a reason to take him credibly.
Further if you think he represents Trump voters, I would suggest you prepare to be disappointed.
But you can beleive whatever you want.
I would ask you to explain how criticizing Walsh is hypocritical ?
I share very few of his values. I might have more shared values with Walsh than AOC – but not by much.
You constantly seem to be confused about what libertarain is.
And to be clear it is not “hypocritical” to criticize other libertarians when I think they are wrong.
Hypocracy requires a conflict in your own values – not between your values and someone else’s.
Yes, I am absolutely going to universally dismiss all your attempts to pretend that an appeal to a stupid authority is a valid argument.
If you want to criticise Trump – criticise Trump – yourself, using YOUR WORDS,
Facts, logic reason.
There is much about Trump to criticise. I am unlikely to agree with you on all of it.
Most fundimentally I am not going to agree that in Net Trump is worse then either of the past two presidents. Because that is obviously not true.
He is absolutely worse at some things.
I did not vote for him, but I am used to having people I did not vote for win.
I have figured out how to live with sucky presidents, senators, represenatatives, Governors, and even county commisioners. A local Judicial race has a strong resemblance to 2016 – trying to figure out who is the lessor evil.
That is life, that is politics, I am far more concerned with reigning in the power of government, then it is irrelevant which sucky asshole wins.
You claim you are not on the left, but you have bought this left garbage that it is possible to somehow sustainably elect good people who will administer your powerful government in a way that is also good and not harmful, and that this will happen year after year without interruption.
It is not. The people who run for public office are exactly the people we should not allow to have public office – does not matter which party. The incentives for politicians attract the worst people to give that kind of power to. We can feel fortunate that we do not end up with Chavez or Mao or Stalin or Hitler.
Trump was elected president.
You want to call him mediocre – fine, I will buy that. We deserve better.
But there was not a better choice that was going to get elected in 2016 and there does not look like one in 2020. Further if Trump is mediocre thus far – and he is. Obama and Bush were both POOR. Inarguably they were on net worse.
In every area – nope.
Finally, the actual odds of getting a good president (or senator or …) are SMALL.
I am not telling you not to criticise Trump – using YOUR words, not bizzarre appeals to bad authorities. I am not even telling you you are wrong about many of your criticisms of Trump.
What I am telling you is that everything that is wrong with him would only warrant the tremendous outrage you express if it was George Washington who lost to Donald Trump – and maybe not even then.
I did not vote for Trump, and could not, and likely will not in 2020.
But I wake up each day thankful that Hillary Clinton is not president.
Or that we do not have a third term of Bush or Obama.
I did not expect much of Trump as president. And he has been less than stellar.
But he also has been better than I expected – not worse.
But the left – and YOU have been much worse.
This hissy fit over 2016 has gone on long enough. You have been lobbing rotten tomatoes for 3 years. Get over it. You want to actually do something – try to advance specific policies that you favor, or oppose specific ones you do not, Go for it. We can argue about those.
But I honestly do not know whether I can trust anything that you say regarding politics,
Because it is pretty obvious that today your political touchstone is to oppose Trump – whatever you think he supports.
There should have been a deal on the Wall. Trump was fully prepared to deal. No one doubts that. He would have sold the GOP down the river to get a deal that included the wall.
There was no deal. No matter what you can not blame that on Trump. The failure their last squarely on the shoulders of democrats.
Compromise is a value YOU claim to hold dear. Yet, you would rather celebrate a short lived Pyrrhic victory against trump than advance the interests of the country.
“He’s willing to overlook far worse accusations against Trump for groping, tax malfeasance, habitual lying, multiple adultries, nepotism, swindles fleecings and film-flammery of contractors when it’s convenient to his blathering arguments.”
Absolutely. Accusations are not facts. They are accusations nothing more.
My attacks on Comey, Clinton, McCabe, … even Mueller are not founded in mere accusations.
Comey lied under oath. It is self evident now. He leaked confidential information – admittedly.
And whatever you say about the FBI during 2015 and 2016 under his leadership they were an absolute disaster.
Clinton violated the law – actually multiple laws. The evidence is incontrovertable.
While Comey is WRONG about the standard – intent is not required, even that is irrelevant.
You can play games over whether and what Clinton’s punishment should be, you can pretend she did not have bad intentions, but there is ZERO doubt she violated the law.
McCabe lied to the IG, Lied to people in the FBI conducting internal investigations, and lied under oath. This is not an accusation, it is a FACT.
Mueller has repeatedly through his carreer hounded innocent people in horrific ways.
Whatever you wish to beleive about Mueller and Trump, it is beyond despute that his investigation of Richard Jewel was vicious and wrong – and the COURTS decided that, not just me. As was his botched persecution of two innocent people in the Anthrax case – one of which he lost a multi-million dollar judgement against the other of which he hounded to suicide. And in the end the NSF determined that the anthrax came from the mideast.
Those are just the highlights. Mueller has been intimately associated with every botched and criminal disaster at the FBI for the last 30 years.
These are not accusations – they are FACTS.
I can add a long list of actual accusations – all of which are much more credible than anything you have from Walsh. But I am not going to.
If you are going to get outraged – get outraged about things we KNOW occured.
Not bad things you are hoping occured.
How bad is that – that you actually hope that something bad will turn up ?
I was not happy with Obama as president. But I never hoped he would fail or screw up.
Even after he left office I hoped he was NOT tied to the mounting pile of corruption that is spewing from this mess. But that hope was dashed.
So lets look at your accusations.
I am not going to defend Trump’s conduct regarding women.
Though I have no evidence that it is as bad as Clinton’s or Kennedy’s or a raft of other presidents. I have no evidence that his actual conduct is as bad as Biden’s or Franken’s.
Hillary does not to my knowledge “grope” women, but her treatment of women is appalling.
You want to call Trump a misogynist – fair enough. In the #metoo era he is pretty tame.
Regardless give me a better choice. And not one who is a closet socialist – though most of them are out of the closet now.
Tax Malfeasance – there is no such thing. There is actual crimes as defined by the law.
Thus far no one has demonstrated that anyone – including Manafort has done anything worse than botch legally avoiding taxes – which as Lehrned hand noted is a civic duty not a crime.
Regardless, provide actual evidence not accusations.
You desparately want Trump’s tax returns – while the IRS has them – and it has had Trump tax returns forever, and it id pretty much guaranteed that for all of that time they have gone over those tax returns with a fine tooth comb -0 long before Trump was president.
Nothing would have made the IRS happier than to take down Donald Trump like Leona Helmsley – and yet they have not. Maybe they are incompetent, maybe they missed things.
Or maybe Trump’s 1200 page tax return is scrutinzed by an army of competent lawyers and accountants. The fact that Trump hired Cohen is deeply disturbing. And Cohen was more than just another lawyer in Trump’s employ. But Cohen did not do Trump’s taxes, and army of lawyers and accountants did. If you think you are finding something there you are nuts.
Habitual lying – after Obama and Clinton you can get outraged ?
Trump exagerate and plays fast and lose with the facts.
At the same time thus far not a single accusation against him has stuck.
Put simply that means that alot of people – including the press LIE about Trump.
I will start thinking about holding Trump accountable, when you stop trusting the people who have repeatedly LIED to you.
I admit I am surprised at the extent to which Trump has KEPT campaign promises. I did not expect that. But I should not have been. You can be a braggart, a blow hard, you can exagerate, you can play fast and loose with the facts in business. but you get to renige on your actual commitments ONCE only and then you are done.
Multiple adulteries. Absolutely – did you care when Kennedy did that, Clinton, Martin Luther King ? I am with Ross Perot, if a man’s wife can not trust him the rest of us can’t either.
But that ship sailed long ago. And AGAIN need I remind you – I did not vote for Trump.
That is one of many reasons. I get to not vote for him again for that and other reasons in 2020. In the meantime, I have not heard that he got a blowjob from an intern in the oval office, lied under oath about it twice and convinced the intern to lie under oath.
Bting me something like that and you will get me actually outraged.
I thought Clinton had to resign. He did not.
Nepotism. Inside his own businesses Trump is free to hire whoever he wants. Have you ever heard of a family business. I beleive Kushner and possibly Ivanka are the only ones he brought with him into government.
Kushner has been instrumental in several Trump foriegn policy accomplishments in the mideast. He also lead the efforts for criminal justice reform. Something that numerous people right and left have failed at for a decade. Obama failed at it, several republicans failed at it.
Kushner succeeded. If by nepotism you mean bringing successful billionaires in to help you who deliver – I am fine with that. I do not care if you play favorites. I care greatly if they do not deliver. As to the garbage you have thrown out about Kushner and security clearances.
Can you explain to me why it took the FBI and the carreer whitehouse officers half of forever to approve a security clearance for numerous top people who long before their final clearances were granted had a long list of accomplishements.
But then you are part of the looney toons group that thinks that Donald Trump is a russian spy. How nuts can you be ? Do you think Jeff Bezos might be too ? What the hell do you think the Russians have to offer a billionaire ? You think some stupid non-existant pee tape was going to blackmail Trump ? You do understand that BILLIONARE Jeffrey Epstein WALKED on peodofilia charges, sex trafficking, human trafficking. Do you honestly think that Trump has any real fear of jail ? He can buy a fricking country and never get extradited.
How well did blackmailing Bezos work ? The level of stupid on the left is beyond beleif.
Swindles, fleecings, flim flam with contractors. I think the people who bought into Trump U got exactly what they paid for. They were after the secret to success, and Trump U told them that. Some of them might have hoped that there was something magical – there isn.t
Regardless Trump settled. A contract is a contract. One of the purposes of government is to enforce contracts. Anyone beleiving they were “fleeced” by Trump is free to go to court. In a multibillion dollar business I would expect that occurs constantly. I was part of a small business that was scrupulously honest, and I have been sued multiple times. Most of the suits were stupid. I settled a lawsuit that claimed that I engaged in age desrimination, health discrimination, religious discrimination, ….. I settled, because I liked the guy. I did not want to let him go. I paid the Corba for his health insurance for a year after he left because I knew he had health problems and I did not want to see anything happen to him. I settled because the Administrative law judge told me privately part way in that there was no way I was losing, but that it was going to take 3 more days and after his decision the employee could appeal and he thought he could get him to settle for less than my legal fees would be. I said sure in a heart beat. I beleive I have settled just about every lawsuit ever filed against me. None had merit. You claim Trump screwed contractors. I have worked with construction contractors all my life. I like most of them. Near uniformly they as sure they have been screwed by owners (and pretty much everyone else) If you have a valid breach of contract claim take it to court.
If it is clear you will win. You have repeatedly claimed to have had a significant role in business. Your ignorance on pretty much everything associated with business leads me to seriously doubt that claim.
Accusations are not facts.
I have been accused of stealling from my father – and murdering him, by sibblings.
My actual crime was stopping those who were stealling from him and would have killed him through neglect if they could. I have been investigated multiple times for these allegations.
Worse as ludicrously stupid as they are and despite the fact that not merely was there insufficient evidence but I was fortunate (or prepared) and the investigations not merely found no basis to procede they found the accusations actually FALSE. That is really rare.
Yet, I still have to face rumours an people who can not beleive that anyone would make accusations like that if they were not true.
Do you really think I am the person who is going to take a long list of baseless accusations seriously ?
My question is WHY DO YOU ?
“As it is hypocritically convenient for him to take the high road against ad hominem tagging of himself, coupled with assurances he never utters them against others – including public officials or celebrities – because it’s beneath him.”
You keep putting words into my mouth and thoughts in my head.
I greatly prefer valid arguments to fallacy and ad hominem.
But I have never claimed that I have not included depractory adjectives in my comments.
My arguments would likely be more effective if they had less “stupid” and “idiotic” references in them. but I am free to make my arguments as I wish. And sometimes calling an argument stupid is pleasurable and warranted.
I would further note that sometimes the facts are insulting. Joe Walsh IS a dead beat dad.
We are not barred from referencing the facts because doing so would insult some one.
Do you know what Ad Hominem is ?
If you say the sky is brown.
I say the sky is blue
and you respond “your a pig”
That is ad hominem.
Insults are generally bad form in an argument and they do not add anything even if they sometimes make you feel good.
Every insult is not ad hominem.
Ad Hominem is like a red herring. It is were you use an insult as a means of moving the argument from the issue to the person.
Most of the posts you make from twitter are attacks on character.
That means the issue is character. When the issue is character it is not ad hominem to accurately assail the character of the person making the character argument.
Or put more simply – people in glass houses should not throw stones.
Max Boot is a neo-con. He likely beleives the neo-con arguments he makes.
I am NOT a neo-con. Trump is not a neo-con. I would be surprised if ANYONE on TNM was a neo-con. The most likely candidate would be Priscilla – and I do not think she is.
If you are announcing that you are a neo-con – fine. We can then have that debate.
But I do not think you are. It is therefore pretty odd and likely hypocritical for you to be trying to sell a bunch of dribble from neo-cons to the rest of us.
Do you think we should have gone to war with Iran towards the end of the Bush administration ? If you do not, you are near certainly NOT a neo-con.
I am using Boot as an example – you have cited a number of neocons regarding Trump and the mideast. Particularly leaving Syria. But Neo-cons are the FIRST #nevertrump ers.
I do not really care if you want to lob tweets by Walsh and Boot and a raft of other fringe never Trumpers.
I respect George Will alot. I understand that he can not cope with Trump’s style and complete lack of decorum. We have litterally put the guy with Golden Toilets in the whitehouse.
Trump is as my grandmother would have said a “queer bird”. He is a multi-billionare with the taste of trailer park trash. I do understand how he offends alot of people – including Will.
I take Will’s critques far more serious than most of your appeals to authority.
As I said Will is someone I respect. He is also someone I can respectfully disagree with.
It is not hard to get my respect – you do not have to share my values to do so.
At the top of the list is do not be a hypocrit.
George Will is not a hypocrit, Glenn Greenwald who I disagree with over many things is not a hypocrit. The left in this country is drowning in hypocracy.
Next, you seem to think that your assorted insults etc. are touching some sore spot.
They are not.
I honestly do not care how you post.
If anything your ad homimen and fallacious posts provide cover for all the problems you claim regarding my posts.
I do not control how others think – but your assorted complaints about the frequency and scale of my posts is unlikely to gain any traction so long and your own conduct is offensive.
I get angry sometimes – I do not BTW see being angry as a fault – so long is the level fo anger and what you do with it is appropriate. But you appear out of control.
Roby.
I do understand much or what you are saying.
I do not care.
I get to choose how or whether I make my arguments.
Maybe it is true that if I spent alot more time and made them more concise and fewer they would have more impact on you.
That remains MY choice.
Even if you are right – you are still wrong. You do NOT get to control how others make their arguments.
Even more broadly – outside of a very limited scope – the legitimate scope of government, you do not get to control others on ANYTHING, Not even if you are right.
Inherent to not only the debates we have on walls and Trump, but also those we have on what is acceptable in posts here is the effort to control what you have no right to control.
I can not stop Jay from spewing insults. But I can leave him with the expectation they will be answered and that he will not look good in the answer.
I may use means that I beleive are more acceptable than his but otherwise there is no difference.
I am not interested in being told by you or anyone else – politiely or by abuse how to comment, or how to run my life.
I can not stop you from doing so, and you can not stop me from pointing out that it is immoral to do so.
You keep constantly presuming that you know my thoughts and motives.
That is childish and stupid.
If I was seeking some form of intellectual masturbation – Rather than post here, I can write articles and editorials for professional publications. There is a far more consequential orgasm from publishing an article in a professional journal that commenting on a web blog, and far less effort to do so.
Nor is that all that I could do.
My point is that let go of your fixation on trying to figure our why I or anyone else does what they do. You are near certain to be wrong. whether it is me, or Trump.
When you judge others based on YOUR impression of their thoughts, their motives, their reasons and intentions YOU are the one engaged in cognative masturbation.
You are always inherently right when you judge that way – because it is irrelevant what the actual reasons and motives are and you will likely never learn them – those involved might not know them themselves. But you can not be proven wrong when your judgement is fixated on things you can not know but only beleive.
You can not know as an example why I or Trump does or says anything.
Since you can not know any hypothesis you make can not be refuted.
The domain of the unfalsifiable is religion not reality or science.
“You seem to imagine that you are, metaphorically speaking, a ferocious and formidable German Shepard of fact, logic, and reason bringing the fear of error to us left wing nuts. ”
Nope Robby. That is in your head not mine.
I am extremely good at logic. That is primarily a consequence of nature for which I personally deserve no credit. and partly as a result of practice.
I have confidence in my own skill and abilities based on decades of experience.
But worse for your argument – unlike much of my life we live in an era where most anyone even without my natural abilities and skills can do anything that I can – atleast in the sphere you and I are debating.
As I have said repeatedly – if you do not wish to be wrong – CHECK YOUR FACTS AND LOGIC before posting. That might be EASIER for some, but it is accessible to ALL.
If I think about you in anyway close to the way you claim it would be that in this sphere you are capable of anything I am and your accusations that I am some prima donna are really confessions that you are too lazy. But mostly I do not try to think about your motives and feelings and intentions.
To the extent I address those at all it is to drive home that whatever your motives – good motives do NOT excuse bad results. You are RESPONSIBLE when you use force on others, and you are RESPONSIBLE when you advocate for it.
Regardless, all your odd metaphors and insults are your problem and inside your head not mine.
I rarely if ever think about the things you seem to think I do.
A while ago several posters here felt a compelling need to internet diagnose me with Aspergers or autism. I have been tested for both. I do not have either. But I test out oddly.
Most people have the those attributes distributed on a curve that has a center closer or farther towards one end or the other of that spectrum. I have a two humped curve with a large number of attributes that are strongly associated with being “on the spectrum”, as well as large number that NEVER coexist with people “on the spectrum”.
Personally I DO NOT CARE. I am who I am. That is morally neutral. I am not a problem to be fixed or some idol to be emulated.
I am I. I am happy with who I am, and to whatever extent I might not be – that is MY business, and I get to choose how and whether I wish to change that.
I am neither your german shepard or yappy shitzu. I am who I am.
I do not think there is some great merit in being right. Particularly today. It is not much of an accomplishment.
To the extent that posting here provides the type of mental rush that you seem to think I get from it, there are only two things that get me “high” posting here.
The most common is coming up with an expression of an issue, problem or thought makes things clearer for ME.
The other is the extremely rare instances when someone here says something that causes me to think about something in a new way.
I am disappointed when you will not engage in the actual discussion of the real issues, because I will never get anything of value from inumberable Max Boot or Joe Walsh tweets, or more if this “Argh Trump!” or streams of insults – once in a blue moon someone hear comes up with a clever insult. I can find that in southpark I that is what I want.
Nor do I understand – or pretend to understand what is going on in the rest of your heads.
I not only do not think of myself as this German Shepard you are fixated on, but I do not give a shit about that discussion. I do not understand why you wish to waste your breath on insults or outrage, or fights over how to post, or other posters motives, when we could be discussing the actual issues.
If you post an actual comment on an actual issue – I am typically going to attempt to shred it.
That is how debate and analysis works. The impact of what you argue on me will be based on how difficult whatever you assert is to tear apart and what kernel is left after I have done so.
That process is NOT evil or about ego, it is the normal process by which ideas are explored and tested.
Nor is having your idea torn apart some intellectual or moral failure – on your part or some victory on mine.
Most ideas are WRONG. That is not personal, it is just how it is. Of those that are not obviously wrong. a tiny few are more right that others.
Whatever you linked to – the link is expired.
Drat link failed try this. Its my favorite far side ever, the names we give dogs, the names they give themselves.
Good carton.
My name is David, Dave, dhlii, sometimes asmith or jbsay.
my name here is not all that important.
My image of myself has little to do with anything at TNM.
It is as someone who solves difficult problems and accomplishes things.
Oddly as intellectual as I am I get as much or more from doing things that are not inherently intellectual, so long as I have never done them before.
Replacing the fan motor in a fridge, changing a wheel bearing, replacing the sash ropes in old windows, laying a hardwood floor.
In my work with computers – no two projects are the same. They are rarely even similar.
In am not hired because I am the worlds foremost expert in Canbus/J1939 (I am not), or low level network protocols, but because I succeed in solving complex problems, and usually problems that others have failed at.
Those are the things in the world that give me a rush. Not debating TDS with you or DD or Jay.
“I am not interested in being told by you or anyone else – politiely or by abuse how to comment, or how to run my life.I can not stop you from doing so, and you can not stop me from pointing out that it is immoral to do so.”
Nowhere have I told you what to do. I have made my observations and suggestions.
How many times have you used to imperative voice to give the command: Grow Up?
No poster here can force or control the others but we can use our choice to make pointy comments, observations, and suggestions about style and substance. Considering that you make it your job here to criticize nearly everything that moves then you should not be much put out by getting a bit of criticism yourself. That is not me controlling your life or attempting to. It is me telling you what I think of your style and what its effects are, even complaining. I am free to do that and choose to.
Grow Up.
“you should not be much put out by getting a bit of criticism yourself. ”
I am not.
I criticism your arguments, you criticism me, i criticism your criticism of me.
I give you a choice.
We can debate the issues.
Or we can debate how the arguments are made.
You are pretty much in control of that.
Whatever you post – that is what I am going to address.
So what do you want to debate ?
Actual issues ? Or commenting style ?
your choice.
You continue to presume you are inside my head.
You remarks constantly presume you know what my motives, my thoughts, my feelings, my intentions are. That should not surprise as you do that with pretty much everyone.
The national debate is mostly not about the issues. it is about motives and feelings, and words not actions.
You and the left have determined that is what we will debate.
I follow where you lead. When I can I use my response to what you say to make the points I care about.
You also keep trying to pretend I am somehow hypocritical.
As an example – I have no problem at all with having a debate about morality.
I have constantly made moral claims regarding my arguments and yours. I think those are self evidently correct. I welcome it when you attempt to make moral arguments in return.
I am well aware of the dangers of stepping up onto a moral soapbox and I do so knowing those dangers and expecting you to seek out the slightest inkling of actual hypocracy.
You seem blind to those dangers.
I do not care if you refuse to engage – that is not completely true, I would prefer you did, but as I said before if you want to make the discussion about how to argue, that is what we will discuss.
When you attack my free speech – whether you wish to call that a command or a suggestion – is not relevant – I am going to respond. And by now it should not be hard for you to grasp how I am going to respond.
If you or Jay or DD wishes to use ad hominem or fallacy – you should have no problem knowing how I am going to respond.
We get these constant laments that TNM is going to hell because of me.
But YOU are all in control of the content for the most part.
You may not be able to control the length and frequency of my posts, but you have substantial control of the content. You claim I will criticise anything – that is partly true,
but my responses are driven by YOU posts.
You have far more control of me than I of you.
I am pretty predictable.
“It is me telling you what I think of your style and what its effects are, even complaining. ”
So you want to debate style rather than substance ?
That has pretty much been the theme of the past 3 years – so why should that surprise me.
Do you really think that stylistic outrage is sustainable ?
“I am free to do that and choose to.”
Good for you! But isn’t it incredibly hypocritical to be claiming free speech for yourself while at the very least wishing for the silence of others ?
And probably more accurately wishing and often arguing for the power to shut others up.
Each of our involvement in the process of governing – down to our political discussion and our votes are a Trust as well as a right. Actual rights do not come with much in the way of obligations or duties. Trusts do. When you are discussing what government should do, you are discussing the use of force. You are free to speak as you please – though that does not excuse the immorality of advocating the use of force against others. But when you vote you do more than speak, you act and when you act to use force against others, you take on a high moral responsibility for those acts.
“I am disappointed when you will not engage in the actual discussion of the real issues…”
But, I am not here to please you.
Over the years we have argued many times about real issues using facts. I found that to not be worth my time in my case because of our very different views of what a fact is and what it means to test a theory and support it or disprove it.
As a quick example, if Rasmussen has trump at 50% favorable and all the other pollsters have him at 42% or lower, you will claim that trump is at 50% approval. If you are challenged on that cherry picking exercise you will make an unsupportable claim about Rasmussen being the most accurate pollster. If trump improves in the polls over a month or so period you will often note it with satisfaction. However, if one of us notes that he is in one of his declines you will tell us that polls don’t do what we claim them to do. If some complete idiot says something that supports one of your theses and we note that the person in a complete idiot you will lecture us that its not important who says something, just whether its true. If someone here posts a comment by some person that contradicts your opinion, you will turn around and ask us how we can believe anything that person said because you have some dirt on him. This is just a tiny sample of the inconsistent way you use facts and logic.
So, I mostly avoid the swamp of discussing issues concretely with you, I doubt most of your facts and you doubt nearly all of mine. Meanwhile you make wild generalizations that I never try to make any actual argument, I merely insult and make logical errors.
Now, why exactly would any rational person dive into that kind of swamp? I did more than I should have of that years back and its just hours of my life I could have been using to better purpose that I can’t have back.
Put succinctly I post for my own purposes, not to please you.
“Over the years we have argued many times about real issues using facts.”
Nope. That has been incredibly rare and you almost instantly shift from the issue to whatever your favorite fallacy of the moment is.
“I found that to not be worth my time in my case because of our very different views of what a fact is”
And you wonder why I label you as a leftist.
There are reliable tools for assessing what constitutes a fact.
Without those science would be impossible.
“and what it means to test a theory and support it or disprove it.”
The rules of logic have not changed in centuries,
Where actually controlled experiments can be conducted if done correctly the results are very near absolute.
When we can not conduct controlled experiments we have statistical techniques
When these are correctly followed the results may not be absolute but they are reliable.
To an enormous extent what we debate is not what I beleive that is not true, but what you beleive that is not true.
I constantly harp on the 3 legitimate roles of government – punishing the initiation of violence,
punishing failure to keep agreements, and compelling people to make whole those they harmed.
Do you disagree with any of those ? Is there anyone here who disagrees with any of those ?
My disagreements with everyone here – whether it is you or Priscilla or Ron, is that that are no further legitimate purposes for government. That nothing more can be morally or practically justified – and to be legitimate it must be morally AND practically justified.
Fundimentally the burden is on YOU, When you chose to abandon the argument you are ceding, because you MUST justify the use of force.
Or are you going to claim that there are legitimate uses of force that need not be justified ?
The tools of logic, science, mathematics and statistics are as available to you as to me.
I would note you have a further problem, that I typically do not have.
A theory, argument or a justification fails if any portion of it fails.
Finally – beyond morally justifying the use of force and practically justifying it, you must also have MORE THAN super majority support.
“If all mankind minus one, were of one opinion, and only one person were of the contrary opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person, than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”
John Stuart Mill.
Mill is talking about speech and we do not give quite the same breadth to other rights.
At the same time, they remain rights, they are NOT subject to the whim of the majority otherwise they would not be rights.
You have three hurdles to overcome when you wish to use force. They are difficult hurdles.
It is not only easy for me to attack, but I will always have a large number of vectors to do so.
And that is how it should be. It should be very difficult to use force.
“As a quick example, if Rasmussen has trump at 50% favorable and all the other pollsters have him at 42% or lower, you will claim that trump is at 50% approval. If you are challenged on that cherry picking exercise you will make an unsupportable claim about Rasmussen being the most accurate pollster. If trump improves in the polls over a month or so period you will often note it with satisfaction. ”
Again you seem to think you understand my motives and thoughts.
I do not care much about polls.
Virtually every post I make about polls is because the rest of YOU care about them and beleive they are horribly important. I beleive they are a weak clue.
Sometimes I use Rassmussen, but I will use ANY poll that at the moment runs counter to whatever you are claiming.
My purpose is NOT to prove I am right or Rassmussen is right or Pew or Marista or whatever counter I am using. The POINT is that it is a COUNTER.
It is NOT the Truth of Rassmussen that is important but the lack of support for whaterver assertion you or someone else made previously.
I think fixating on the daily noise of the polls is an excercise in stupidity.
A few posts ago I responded to the idiotic article on FOX’s bias by noting that in the last months of the 2016 election Trump and Clinton were NEVER tied.
That is according to RCP. They are the only source I have that will graph Clinton vs. Trump over time that is readily available.
I do not think ANY poll should be taken as gospel. I do not think ANY poll of a given moment should have significant weight. At the very best long term trends matter more.
Further favorability polls have become increasingly useless since Bush atleast.
Bush’s unfavorability ratings should have guaranteed his loos to Kerry, Obama based on unfavorability should have lost to Romney, Trump based on unfavorability should have lost to Clinton.
Polls are a poor metric. I throw them at you – because some of you seem to fixate on them.
I do not consider polls to be facts – or atleast meaningful ones. Some oppinion polls provide information – but anyone who thinks that a few points on any poll of any type is consequential is nuts. But other posters here thing polls are very important. So I have no problem pointing out that they are running at odds with your argument.
My objective in my use of polls is almost always to point out the contradictions with your preconceptions. It matters very little whether the poll contradicting you is Rassmussen or ABC, only that it contradicts you and you value polls. I don’t
As to Rassmussen If I recall correctly Rassussen has been the most accurate in 3 or the last 5 elections and close to the worst on 2. That is not excellent, but no other poll has done better. You can weight that however you wish. You can decide that 2020 is going to be the 3rd time that they are going to be way off, or it could be the 4th time they are spot on.
No one knows and we will not know until election day 2020.
“However, if one of us notes that he is in one of his declines”
But that is not what you do. Most of the anti-trump posts that are poll related are nearly always on old data, and are full of breathless expectations that polls matter and that the world is ending and that all of this is unusual. My responses pretty much always are:
The world is not ending. You are the ones cherry picking. nothing unusual is happening, and Trump’s long term polling is indistinguishable from Obama’s.
I am not fixated on day to day swings
YOU are.
The fact that Trump is above 50% with Rassmussen one day and blow 40% in something else the next is pretty much noise as far as I am concerned.
But YOU care.
I am doing little more than pointing out to you that if your arguments are going to live by the poll, then they are going to die by it to.
“you will tell us that polls don’t do what we claim them to do.”
They don’t Again I am not fixated on the polls. The only one that matters is the vote on election day. All others have value only to the degree they predict that one.
“If some complete idiot says something that supports one of your theses and we note that the person in a complete idiot you will lecture us that its not important who says something, just whether its true.”
While your assertion is horribly vague the conclusion you are attributing to me is correct.
True is true false is false, no matter who the source is.
“If someone here posts a comment by some person that contradicts your opinion, you will turn around and ask us how we can believe anything that person said because you have some dirt on him.”
I am presuming you are addressing my responses to Jay’s never ending stream of #never Trump posts.
First you do not seem to be able to grasp the difference between a fact and an oppinion.
The reputation of the person providing an actual fact is irrelevant.
The reputation of the person providing and oppinion is extremely relevant.
Oppinions are not facts.
Past that you are also dealing with another example of your Poll nonsense.
When I attack Jay’s never ending stream of #nevertrump tweets I am confronting him using his OWN values. Not mine. It is extremely difficult to expose hypocracy without demonstrating the conflict between the persons OWN values.
Jay seems to think that the world should care about an endless stream of #nevertrump tweets from people that I doubt he would ever give any credibility to if they were not #nevertrumpers.
Is there anyone here that is an actual neo-con ? ANYONE ?
If not, then why should any of us care even slightly about the oppinion of ANY neo-con regarding whether we should stay or leave syria or …. ?
I am unlikely to give alot of weight to those who are NOT neo-cons.
If however you are offering an actual FACT not an oppinion – and what you are offering is REALLY a fact, then it is irrelevant where the source is.
I do not think there is a determinative fact regarding US policy in the mideast.
There is little doubt there is risks leaving. There is little doubt there is risks staying.
No matter what we choose we will NEVER truly know if we made the right decision.
But finally on that issue – can any of you say that If Obama had chosen to leave Syrian and afghanistan you would be foaming at the mouth screetching “but Russia” But ISIS ?
I think not.
I think we should have left both long ago. That view has nothing at all to do with Trump.
Are the rest of you capable of oppinions that are more than negative knee jerk responses to Trump ?
I would further note that I was ANGRY HERE with Trump for NOT LEAVING afghanistan when he kicked Bannon out. I am glad he has changed his mind.
My views are not driven by Trump.
To me yours seem to be nothing more than “I oppose Trump”
“This is just a tiny sample of the inconsistent way you use facts and logic.”
It is a demonstration that you do not understand the difference between an oppinion and a fact.
It is also a demonstration that you do not understand that it is not error to use YOUR own values to trip you up.
You care who says what. I don;t. You care about polls I don’t.
My use of your tools and values to undermine your arguments
is an inconsistent use of facts and logic but it IS consistent with YOUR misuse of facts and logic.
I would further note it is an example of how much YOU control the conversation.
You want to talk about polls – so we talk about polls.
You want to make everything about bizarre appeals to authority – so we debate the credibiltiy of neocons and pseudo Tea Party members. You think who someone is, is important so I point out WHO that person you are using actually is.
You want to fixate on opinions rather than more substantive issues – and we deal with opinions.
I would note that the rules of logic regarding opinions is different from facts.
Quite often you can disprove an opinion using normal logic.
You can also point out the inconsistency and hypocracy of an opinion in pretty much any way – a contradiction is a contradiction and all contradictions falsify something.
“So, I mostly avoid the swamp of discussing issues concretely with you,”
Your examples of concrete issues are Polls and the tweeted opinions of neo-cons and faux TP members ?
“I doubt most of your facts and you doubt nearly all of mine.”
Again facts are facts. You prove or disprove them. Thus far you have not addressed an actual conflict over facts.
I would prefer to discuss real issues of substance with all of you.
You choose to make the converstation about Polls and twitter nonsense.
“Meanwhile you make wild generalizations that I never try to make any actual argument, I merely insult and make logical errors.”
You are not the worst, and wild is a superfluous adjective – but otherwise true.
You want to discuss polls – we discuss polls.
Jay wants to fixate on the latest outrageous Tweet – that is what we do.
None of that is substantive. It is close to meaningless.
But it is what you want to discuss.
“Now, why exactly would any rational person dive into that kind of swamp? ”
Your doing the driving.
Now and then I post some things I find interesting in the hopes of starting a conversation on something of substance. Sometimes that triggers something.
“I did more than I should have of that years back and its just hours of my life I could have been using to better purpose that I can’t have back.”
Trying to find the truth is not time wasted.
“Put succinctly I post for my own purposes, not to please you.”
And so many of your and the posts of others here are all bemoaning how I post.
If that is the evidence of your purpose it is pretty sad.
““Over the years we have argued many times about real issues using facts.”
Nope. That has been incredibly rare and you almost instantly shift from the issue to whatever your favorite fallacy of the moment is.”
Ah, the magic power of your “no.” The above is simply your opinion and its an absurd one. You have spent millions of words on me in spite of your denialistic claim, So, what were we arguing about? According to you, nothing at all! What does that make you? (It makes me look silly, but at least I know it and don’t want to continue this nonsense.)
My point is that this is pointless, I cannot get past the No wall, the reflexive denial. I have put a much, much smaller effort into this than you have, but its still too much. Many others, Pat Riot stands out in my memory, have tried and then given up trying to have a sensible conversation with your wall of No.
““I found that to not be worth my time in my case because of our very different views of what a fact is”
And you wonder why I label you as a leftist.”
Your statement is a non sequitur, the connection exists only in your mind. You have leftists obsessively on the brain. This is a pretty representative example of your idea of using logic and reason. Its not logic and its not reason. I can go through your posts and find an endless number of these logical nonsenses. You consider yourself very talented at logic. I look at this mess and think that you are flat out delusional and your endless lectures on what is wrong with the logic of others here are simply hilarious.
“And so many of your and the posts of others here are all bemoaning how I post.”
You still don’t grasp the obvious connection between the endless pompous rain of your often hilariously illogical attacks (attacks is your own word to describe your own posts BTW) and the consistent feedback that you get, which you hysterically take as an attempt to infringe upon your freedom.
Now, if I have any self restraint I will refrain from trying to hit any of the hanging curves you will serve up as a rebuttal, allegedly using facts and logic, but in my perception using old banana peels and chewing gum. (If I do not explicitly warn you that my last comment was not meant literally you will take it so and give me a lengthy dissertation on chewing gum and banana peels.)
“Ah, the magic power of your “no.” The above is simply your opinion and its an absurd one. ”
You are using words in confused fashion. Typical of the left.
What we have debated is NOT a matter of “opinion” – your posts and mine are all readily available. they are a matter of fact. The ration of those addressing an issue, and those addressing semantics and style complaints is also a matter of fact, though it would be alot of hard work to produce an exact quantitative assessment.
“You have spent millions of words on me in spite of your denialistic claim, ”
The number of words I have written is entirely irrelevant to what proportion of YOUR words have dealt with an actual issue as opposed to debating rhetoric, syntax, style, or other personal issues.
Ad hominem means “arguing the person”. It means converting an argument over the issue into an argument over the person making the argument.
It is fallacy because it is meaningless with respect to the issue being debated.
The entire exchange we are having RIGHT NOW – is either ad hominem or a closely related fallacy – not because it is composed of insults, but because instead of debating whatever issue this started on – YOU have insisted on turning this into a debate about me, or about how arguments are made.
Anytime you move from debating the issue to anything else – you are engaged in one fallacy or another.
Pretty much everything here quickly devolves to fallacy because very few people here wish to actually argue any of the issues.
“So, what were we arguing about?”
We are arguing about how arguments here are made
We are doing that because that is YOUR choice.
“According to you, nothing at all!”
Is it possible for you to ever accurately represent what I say ?
Where did I say we are arguing about nothing at all ?
We are not arguing about the important issues that I thought were what mattered to all of us.
Instead we are arguing about how arguments are made and about people – you and I.
That is not nothing at all.
But it is not what I would prefer to discuss.
But it is what YOU have chosen to discuss.
“What does that make you? ”
Even in an argument about how arguments are made – you have to try to shift the argument to be about the person not any issue.
Classic ad hominem.
“(It makes me look silly, but at least I know it and don’t want to continue this nonsense.)”
We leave discussions about actual issues when YOU decide to shift that discussion from the issue to a debate about how to argue.
That is YOUR choice.
I have used a wide variety of techniques to nudge you back to the issue or any other issue.
But YOU consistently want to debate the personal or style or other less consequential matters.
If you wish to leave that argument – you are free to do so.
No one is stopping you.
What I want – but get very little of is a serious dissussion of actual issues.
I would note that that actually occurs when Ron or Priscilla or even Rick when he makes his rare appearances engage each other.
Sometimes we agree sometimes we disagree, sometimes a bit of both.
The arguments made are not perfect harvard debate rules arguments,
bits of fallacy creep in on occasion,
but the discussion remains throughout on the issues.
It does not shift to being an argument about either of the persons making the arguments.
I do not treat them differently from you.
You, and Jay and DD each make your own individually different choices as to how to continue a discussion. But what all of you have in common is that you rapidly shift the discussion from issues to something else.
To rants about the person
To invalid rants about the style and form
To anything that will divert the discussion from the issue
And you are fairly successful at it.
I have experimented with numerous techniques to nudge you back to the issue – or any actual issue. With little effect.
“My point is that this is pointless,”
No, you just refuse to stay on point.
“I cannot get past the No wall”
You seem to presume that you have some right to have your assertions accepted as truth.
There are an infinite number of possible assertions.
Almost all of them are FALSE.
Truth is RARE, We put enormous effort into finding it.
If you are making an assertion – the presumption is that it is false.
The burden to “get past the “no wall” is YOURS
That is particularly true when the discussion as nearly all of them here are, is about government.
You may not use force without justification.
Do you really think that is a controversial statement ?
If you do not agree with it – then lets have that discussion.
Though much of human history has addressed that.
That is the core of a great deal of thousands of years of thought and philosophy and discussions on government, political economy, law,
Fundimentally I think you accept that – most everyone does.
But if I am wrong and you don’t – lets have that discussion – it is foundational to everything.
More commonly you muddy things by eliding what constitutes force and what constitutes justification. What constitutes force is pretty much a fact,
But you constantly what to make things that are not force into force and pretend things that are force aren’t.
I have offered myriads of different frameworks for what constitutes justification.
When anyone here engages, they typically do so by claiming that a majoritarian consensus is justification. I think that is obviously wrong, and I would be happy to address that issue.
But no one here will.
“the reflexive denial.”
Not reflexive, regardless, as I said before – there is NOT an assumption that some assertion is TRUE, the default presumption is that it is false.
“I have put a much, much smaller effort into this than you have, but its still too much. Many others, Pat Riot stands out in my memory, have tried and then given up trying to have a sensible conversation with your wall of No.”
I do not allow you or anyone else to make assertions that I beleive are suspect without proving them.
There is nothing at all wrong with that.
When you have a discussion among those who share very nearly your own views you do not have to support most of the assertions you make.
That is NOT a feature it is a flaw.
Shared confirmation bias is a means to arrive at tragic error.
What you call the wall of NO, the “denialism” is the default in ALL legitimate argument.
Interestingly you are echoing the nonsensical rhetoric that is often used in “climate science”
Skepticism in science – and really in everything, is the NORM. To be accepted things have to be PROVEN.
Facts are things that can be proven.
We are supposed to have a broad pool of things that have already been proven and accepted from the past – that is the purpose of a proper education, though modern education has been transformed from passing forward the discovered truths or the past to inculcating students with ideology.
I am constantly refering to Adam Smith, John Lock, JS Mill, Bastiat, Thoreaux, Hayek, Coase, Nozick. …..
Technically these are appeals to authority – but they are also supposed to be requests that you accept something without proof, because it was debated in great depth in the past and RESOLVED. You are not required to accept something because Smith concluded it 250 years ago and almost no one has challenged it since. But it is probably a good idea.
But there is a vast difference between an appeal to a credible historic source that has been tested over the course of several centuries, and an appeal to the consensus or your friends.
Do you seriously think “everybody I know beleives” – or is unwilling to challenge me on, has the same merit as James Madison ?
Regardless the default is NO. Your dislike of that does not change things.
Most things are false. Truth is a rare and precious commodity.
Railing that I do not let you elide proving your assertions is railing against reality.
Fact: A thing that is proved to be true or a thing that is universally assumed to be true.
Are you challenging that as the defintion of a fact ?
I sure hope we do not have different views on what a fact is ?
From the defintion – if you and I agree that something is a fact, for the purpose of our discussion we can assume it is a fact, and that it is true.
We do not expect every scientific or mathematical proof or every argument to start by proving 1 + 1 = 2.
Your “wall of no” is nothing more than that I do not accept as fact many things you beleive to be fact.
When there is not agreement that something is a fact, the party asserting it must prove it.
Either to the satisfaction of the other party or to a logical certainty.
There is no right to have something accepted as fact.
““I found that to not be worth my time in my case because of our very different views of what a fact is”
And you wonder why I label you as a leftist.”
We disagree on what assertions we accept as fact.
That is resolveable – prove something to my satisfaction or to a logical certainty.
What is not resolveable and what justifies my association of you with the left, that you are challenging the meaning of fact.
Post modernism is a disasterously nihilist philosphy that starts with the presumption that there are no facts, that everything is an opinion and all opinions are equal, and then contradictorily jumps from there to a specific set of opinions that one is obligated to accept as true.
So where are you ? If you are going to pretend that there is no difference between fact and oppinion – my claim that you are a leftist – and a pretty extreme one is self evidently true.
Conversely if you accept that there is a difference between fact and opinion – we are each obligated where we do not agree on a fact to prove it to the satisfaction of the other or to logical certainty.
That is NOT a non sequitur.
“You have leftists obsessively on the brain”
At this moment in time the most substanative threat to both order and liberty is from the left.
You may be unfamiliar with Post modernism and Foucault and Derrida,
I doubt AOC or Warren, or Harris or the primary leaders of the left are familiar with them.
But the entire ediface of the modern left – the intersectionality the political correctness, the rejection of the modernists – from Locke through Nozick not merely rests but is driven by their philosophy.
Mill stated that he who understands only his own side of an argument understand little or nothing.
How ignorant are those who do not even understand the foundations of their own.
You want to disassociate yourself with those “crazy lefties” like AOC – fine, but you then need an independent foundation. The alternative to post modernism is modernism. That is the foundation of liberalism – not “leftism” not “progressivism” but actual liberalism, what today we distiguish by calling “classical liberalism”
The competing foundational philosophy to the post modernism of the left is classical liberalism – MY PHILOSPHY.
Again this stuff has consequences.
You are free to pick and choose what you wish to beleive – bits from post modernists, and other bits from actual liberals. But absent forming some unifying philosophy you are going to end up with a self contradictory MESS.
I do not actually beleive you are a post modernist.
But you have unequivocally been infected with significant elements of post modern thought that you have not questioned.
I am pushing you to question it.
And yes post modernism is something I am deeply concerned about.
Ideas matter – they have influence far beyond that of the actual progenitors of some philosophy and those intimately familiar with it.
Post modernism is unfamiliar to most people, even most recent college graduates,
But there entire lives, their world view their politics are permeated by it.
Post modernism is an inherently destructive and nihlist philosopy.
It is a re-imagining of marxism with potentially worse consequences.
Nothing in the entirety of human history has ever had the massively incontrovertably bad consequences of marxism and socialism. Whatever ideas of the past you think are bloody and evil they are dwarfed by the bloody consequences of socialism.
And post modernism has the potential to be worse. It is even more nihilist.
It is not accidental that antifa is violent – that is what happens when you obliterate fact and make everything an opinion and all opinions equal – force becomes the only legitimate means to impose one opinion over another.
“This is a pretty representative example of your idea of using logic and reason. Its not logic and its not reason. I can go through your posts and find an endless number of these logical nonsenses. ”
You asserted that we do not agree on what constitutes a fact. That is very close to the nihilist post modern view that there are no facts, only opinions.
It is perfectly logical to note that in accepting something very near the central premise of postmodernism that you tie yourself to the radical left – whether you perceive that or not.
Your assertion that this is not logic or reason is nothing more than a distaste for the outcome.
You do not seem to grasp that something is not illogical because it produces results that you do not accept.
I am sure you do not think you are an alcolyte of the radical left.
I doubt you are all that well informed regarding post moderism.
That does not change the fact that many of your assertions – you premises, your proposed facts, are not found or philosophically justified anywhere but marxism, socialism and post modernism.
Marxism and socialism are MORE than economic schemes, more than political arrangements, they are philosophies. Post modernism is its predicessors on steriods.
It leads to anarchy and/or totalitarianism.
And yes, the fact that you and myriads of others who do not consider themselves part of the extreme left are making assertions that have no foundation elsewhere.
“You still don’t grasp the obvious connection between the endless pompous rain of your often hilariously illogical attacks (attacks is your own word to describe your own posts BTW) and the consistent feedback that you get, which you hysterically take as an attempt to infringe upon your freedom.”
More putting thoughts and words into my head.
I consider your willingness to use force through government as an attempt to limit freedom – because it self evidently is. You wish to elide responsibiltity by pretending that elections release you from moral responsibility for actually voting for restricting the freedom of others.
I do not think that your inconsistent and illogical feedback – which is near universally confined to the few who whether on the left formally or not consistently adopt nonsencial leftist arguments, is a restiction on my freedom.
If fact I have argued exactly the opposite – that my freedom to post as I do, is the same as your freedom to rant about it.
On the rare occasions I attack you for infringing on freedom directly – rather than through government, it is when you edge away from lamenting my posts to allusions and threats that you should do something about it. A threat to take action against another is a threat to freedom.
Yes, I characterize some of my posts as attacks. though you are guilty of another fallacy of false generalization.
I attack your false facts,
I attack your poor logic.
I attack your constant fallacies.
These are all errors that are not difficult to avoid.
“You still don’t grasp the obvious connection”
No, I do not care about the connection. You fixate on style, I am interested in substance.
“Its not logic and its not reason. I can go through your posts and find an endless number of these logical nonsenses.”
Then do, because that is how you counter an argument by identifying specific assertions that you claim are false.
That is what I do, and it is what offends you.
Countering with a blanket assertion that something unidentified is not logic or reason is a fallacious generalization. It is not true until you prove it.
the hanging curves
old banana peels
chewing gum.
Insulting an argument through metaphor is not rebutting it.
“(If I do not explicitly warn you that my last comment was not meant literally you will take it so and give me a lengthy dissertation on chewing gum and banana peels.)”
You are absolutely correct that when you say something stupid I will flag it.
You are incorrect that I will presume that a metaphor is a literal reference – at least when you actually provide sufficient context to ascertain that.
A metaphor is not an argument. Particularly when it is not even being used as an argument.
Speaking of purple rage against politician there is this latest attack on moderation and moderates from our radical ignoramus sensation, AOC. She knows pretty much as little about the nuts and bolts of any issue as our ignoramus POTUS and is as arrogant as she is ignorant. She is the champion of radical left ideas that are doomed to failure because of both economic facts and political facts. But, since she is as empty of real understanding of one as she is of the other, she is free to be the campus chapter of the ISO.
Ted Cruz with lipstick. Bernie started this disaster, I loath him too. I loath the whole set of campus leftist heros, the progressive democrats. Reparations! Genius! Add it to the whole rest of the delusional issues the moderate and ordinary liberal democrats have to try to survive.
If I were the moderate dems in the House I would walk, en masse, and switch to independents and then stand up and give the progressive pirates a piece of my mind!
AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRRRRRRRGGGGGG!
https://nypost.com/2019/03/01/ocasio-cortez-led-closed-door-crackdown-on-moderate-house-democrats/
Roby, the problem is Queen Nancy has a very small majority of moderates and blue dogs compared to the AOC progressives willing to follow the far left agenda. According to The New Democrat Coalition, the numbers are 114-95. When AOC has that many willing to follow, she has the attention of the liberal press and there are so many voters willing to accept her asinine political beliefs, her influence on the party and voters is substantial. She IS the Democrats Donald Trump. Just like Trump was for the GOP, she is the democrats worst nightmare.
And I point out that I am including Queen Nancy in the moderates. That is a huge stretch for me!!
Why are you assuming AOC is a force among the Progressive Dems?
Yes, she’s getting a lot of media coverage (thank the GOP for demonizing her into prominence) but she has about as much (or less) influence in the group’s decisions as Jerrold Nadler (Manhattan) or the other Manhattan, Bronx, Brooklyn Progressive who make up the majority of NY progressives.
And in California the progressives are borderline moderates, like Ted Lieu (LA) who has spoken out for a moderate approach. And ALL of the CA progressives voted to confirm Pelosi as speaker.
If the Dems nominate a cook progressive (including Bernie or worse) and GOP runs with Trump again, I’ll hold in my vomit and vote Dem- anything to remove the Orange Disease now in office – and then do whatever I can to prevent Dems from damaging the nation – unlike those Trumpsters said they’d vote for him, but energetically rein him in if elected, butinstead joined the cult.
“Why are you assuming AOC is a force among the Progressive Dems?”
You keep asking that question. But get a f ‘ing answer.
I remember many in the GOP who said ” why do you think Trump has any support with the GOP primary voters”?
Had they answered that question instead of splitting 65% of the remaining vote between multiple candidates, maybe we would not have the “orange desease” in the Whitehouse.
If people.on the left dont answer that question and ignore it, we may have a campaign between Democrat socialism(red) and orange.
Sorry I cant buy in that long range socialist programs are better than 4 years or a liar, or even tax evasion or illegal financial dealings.
You seem to be under the delusion that the GOP controls the media.
AOC is featured constantly in the media – because the LEFT media wants to hear from her.
AOC’s oversized political voice is not due to the right, it is entirely due to the left.
Absolutely republicans love to hear her speak. She is such an incredibly carciture of the left – you would think Roger Stone invented her.
No republican criticism of AOC is necescary. She is so out there that her won remarks generate the desired negative response. I find very few republicans criticising AOC.
They do not need to.
Nadler BTW has incredible influence. He is also an idiot, but not nearly such an entertaining one.
No one buys California as “moderate”.
So your answer is you will F;over the country if necescary to get rid of Trump.
“unlike those Trumpsters said they’d vote for him, but energetically rein him in if elected, butinstead joined the cult.”
Who said that ?
I do not recall anyone saying that.
Sorry about the typos – that was kook progressive; and a space between but & instead.
House democrats have the same problem that house republicans had in the majority.
If they wish to remain in the majority they can not cut the earth out from under the moderates.
The most disproportionately powerful group in a multiparty parlimentary system is the one that provides the last few votes needed to form a majority.
Democrats need to recognize that and respect their moderates – if they wish to continue to hold the majority.
Ron, thanks for the numbers on the moderates. I was not aware of that ranking site.
According to my father, who reads it, but is also disgusted by it, the NYT has been pushing the AOC point of view pretty hard. I don’t read it, paywall, etc. so I don’t exactly know what is in the NYT and whether they give any voice to the moderates.
There is still a chance that this lunacy burns itself out by the time the primaries are underway under the weight of actual economic analysis of their programs and reality sets in that that this is a delusional and politically doomed movement. There is still a chance that a moderate democrat such as Amy Klobuchar will be able to attract votes and attention to criticism of the free heroin to everyone progressive politics that Bernie has unleashed.
If only one or two moderates run against the giant field of prog-clones they should have a chance to change the momentum of the conversation. There is a lot of time.
As of the present, I have as much heartburn and anger over AOC (and not just her, the whole idiotic pack of progs) as I do over trump.
If the primaries produce a Warren/Sanders candidate and they lose to trump I will be ready to join trump in calling the NYT the failed NYT. Not that they will go out of business, but they will have contributed mightily to empowering everything they are against by joining, or actually leading, the naive parade.
Well the thing that is scary is Sanders received more of the under 40 age group votes in 2016 than either Trump or Clinton. And the positions held by Sanders have become more acceptable to the democratic voters, so someone from the far left has a better chance today than in 2106.
Whatever the outcome in 2020, I don’t think it is a good position to be in.
I beleive Silver did an analysis of the Sanders vote and found that the #neverHillary portion was sufficient that he could not have won the democratic nomination under any circumstances, and a sifgnificant portion of the Bernie vote subsequently went for Trump
This is a debate of political strategy not actual facts.
Democrats are free to embrace socialism or reject it.
I do not personally see leading democratic candidates acheiving any sanity on this prior to the general election.
Primaries inherently drive candidates towards the parties extremes – towards those they count on for all the GOTV efforts etc. In the democratic party today this “base” is far to the left. Just about every candidate – not merely Sanders, But Warren, Harris, Booker, … has embraced an more socialistic set of polices.
Both democrats and republicans have framed the debate in 2020 as one over socialism.
There is going to be little semantic conflict over “real socialism” because the left For the most part the left is EMBRACING both actual socialism and the term.
AOC and the democratic left seem to think they can mirror on the left what the Tea Party did for republicans at the start of Obama’s administration.
They are free to try but are likely to fail horribly.
The TP was NOT a shift right for the GOP, It WAS a shift away from Neo-Cons and Social conservatives. It empowered fiscal conservatives and small government conservatives – those are NOT the extreme right fringes of the GOP. The TP essentially marked the end of the culture wars. The TP unfortunately also embraced the anti-immigrant and punative trade positions that are reflected by Trump.
But the equivalent movement on the left IS towards the extremes.
You are going to see MORE advocacy of socialist programs between now and the moment a single democrat has locked the nomination. It is unlikely that democrats will shift toward the center before that.
If democrats actually want to defeat Trump – they should flush their entire slate and embrace someone like Howard Schultz NOW.
Biden appears to be the leading candidate at the moment, and is the only significant democrat not fawning over socialism. I do not think that Biden can defeat Trump, but I think he has the best chance. He is the only candidate that would pressure Trump in the rust belt.
But Biden will not have the support of the democratic base. He is an old white man, and he has a history that is MORE misogynist than Trump.
Biden is to Trump what Romney was to Obama – Biden is “Trump-lite”
“punative trade positions that are reflected by Trump.”
Some call it punitive. Other call it “fair”
Fair is defined by me as equal, same, tit for tat. A dollar you put on as tariffs results in a dollar I put on as tariffs. A Ford going into China getting slapped with 25% tariff results in a 25% tariff on Buicks coming into the USA. If it makes Buick to expensive, build the damn things in Michigan!
Yes, it is absolutely fair to screw over americans and make their products more expensive because the chinese have been stupid enough to screw over their own people.
If the american people valued the buick from michigan more than the buick from China, they would have bought the buick from michigan.
No one is stopping you from “buying american” But you are not entitled to force others to.
https://www.usnews.com/news/blogs/data-mine/2014/12/11/outsourcing-to-china-cost-us-32-million-jobs-since-2001
“Yes, it is absolutely fair to screw over americans and make their products more expensive because the chinese have been stupid enough to screw over their own people.”
Yes and it is absolutely fair to screw over americans and make their jobs less abundant because the chinese are smart enough to screw over stupidcAmericans that think free trade is good trade.
BULL SHIT!
Lets stop this debate, because I WILL NEVER accept unfair free trade agreements that people are dumb enough to think benefits us. Telk that to those who have lost jibs.
Your source is EPI – it would be hard to find a less credible source on an economic issue.
“Yes and it is absolutely fair to screw over americans and make their jobs less abundant”
A job is not a right. You are not being screwed over because someone else delivers the same value at a lower cost.
“because the chinese are smart enough to screw over stupidcAmericans that think free trade is good trade.”
Free trade is good trad.
“Why are you assuming AOC is a force among the Progressive Dems?”
I can only say ????!? Is this a typo?
Jay you live in California, I live in Vermont. So, forget about our votes. Something we can do is help in other ways. Would we send money to help the dems if they go full prog?
Not me. The prog movement is a cancer. I am never prog.
Jay
“Why are you assuming AOC is a force among the Progressive Dems?”
Because, Duh, Reality.
but this is not worth arguing. This will play out as it does. You think one way. I think another.
AOC has gone toe-to-toe with Pelosi, Feinstein and numerous other leaders in her own party.
If she was not a “force” – if she did not have sufficient political base, she would have been bitch slapped into oblivion.
Purportedly AOC has a degree in economics – from a cereal box ?
Regardless she was legitimately elected by the voters in here district.
Further while every criticism you make of her is true, it is also true of every single democratic candidate for president at the moment – though to a lessor extent.
Further – No Ted Cruz and Donald Trump are not like AOC.
They have their own negative traits – but being uneducated and ignorant of the facts are not among them. Having never succeeded at anything except politics is not one of those.
I am glad that AOC is in congress.
If she did not exist someone would have to invent her.
I would say that she is a carciture of a democrat – except that way to many democrats beyond AOC have carcitured themselves.
I love some of the stunts she pulls. Marching into Feinsteins office shaming her with a bunch of children was beautiful.
By using the same stupid techniques that the left often uses against conservatives, against her own peers who are insufficiently left wing nut for her, she exposes how fraudulent those techniques are.
AOC did to Fienstein just the kind of thing Feinstein would have done to a republican in the past. She never immagined she would be on the receiving end.
Here is a real trumpster for you.
History Reminder:
The Founders put the mechanism of impeachment in the Constitution.
They did NOT require an indictable crime.
Rampant assholeness is impeachable.
The language of the constitution is:
“The President, Vice President and all civil Officers of the United States, shall be removed from Office on Impeachment for, and Conviction of, Treason, Bribery, or other high Crimes and Misdemeanors.”
“The Founders put the mechanism of impeachment in the Constitution.
They did NOT require an indictable crime.
Rampant assholeness is impeachable.”
I would also suggest reading Federalist 61.
Regardless, the impeachment process is not merely a test of the accused, but also of the congress itself – BOTH are on Trial.
Despite the fact that Bill Clinton was OBVIOUSLY Guilty of both serious and real crimes – multiple counts of perjury, inducing false statements in others, and actual obstruction of justice, the consequences of impeaching Clinton fell on House Republicans NOT Bill Clinton.
Most lawyers and constitutional scholars have asserted that “high crimes and misdemeanors” does NOT mean a public officer can be impeached for anything. That it means that the can only be impeached for a SERIOUS crime.
At the same time – congress gets to determine its own rules regarding impeachment, and there is no appeal. SCOTUS is NOT going to review an improvidently imposed impeachment and reverse.
Finally this is all lunacy. I have no idea what House democrats will do post Cohen. But his testimony was a disaster for the left. Cohen repeatedly smeared Trump’s character – if character assassination is your goal – big victory! But he not merely did not provide any new actual evidence but he vociferously denied and undermined everyone of the core claims of the left. Worse still his own self agrandizement placed him in a position where he would have had to have known of any actual misconduct.
You can argue that Cohen was lying – easily. The man is a self professed and convicted liar.
But he was YOUR witness.
Cohen EXPLICITLY DENIED any personal involvement in “russian collusion” of any kind.
He EXPLICITLY DENIED any knowledge of it involving others in the campaign and testified that it could not have occured without his knowledge. There was no trip to prague, no secret meetings with Putin or any other russian.
Cohen explicitly denied having ever been asked or directed by Trump to lie or otherwise obstruct justice.
Cohen established that Trump’s payments to him regarding the NDA’s were made from Trump PRIVATELY – not with campaign funds.
Further Cohen undermined himself and further efforts to get Trump by lying repeatedly about himself and his own importance and conduct.
I am NOT with house republicans refering him for further prosecution.
Prosecuting people in an investigation for process crimes is abhorrent, and itself should be a crime.
Neither Cohen nor any of Mueller’s other targets should have been prosecuted for anything that did not substantially impede the investigation.
But if you and democrats wish to go forward. If you wish to use Impeachment as a means of altering the outcome of an election – which absent and actual crime or actual maladministration is all that it is, be my guest. The electorate will judge you and should it not do so harshly future congresses will judge your politicians in the same fashion.
So here is a short, distinct, straight forward question.
If you are Queen Nancy and want to insure your candidate is running against the weakest possible GOP candidate, do you impeach and send it to the senate where the facts might sway a handful od GOP senators, allowing the GOP to run someone else, such as a Rubio, Kasich or another moderate, or do you keep doing what your doing to make Trump very weak, but still in office?
I think she is all for the second choice and I would think most democrats support that
Trump has had the most contentious 2 years of any president ever. He has faced the strongest effort to thwart him ever,
Yet, he has numerous accomplishements.
Ron, Trump is “not weak”, and he is not going to be.
Here is Nick Gillespies assessment from CPAC.
Gillespie is very libertarian. He is not and never was a trump supporter.
As I recall when he has not voted libertarian he has voted democrat.
https://reason.com/blog/2019/03/02/trump-just-might-have-won-the-2020-elect
“Trump has had the most contentious 2 years of any president ever”
Your inability to recognize the obvious reason for that is astounding. Like asking why so many drunk drivers get arrested.
So what are the REASONS for that ? Jay.
What are the actual ACTS of Trump that justify the outrage and contentiousness ?
What are the horrible CONSEQUENCES of Trump ?
You have been searching for 3 years for a crime – and you still do not have one.
The most powerful law enforcement branch in the world has been searching for 3 years.
The entirety of the press has been searching for 3 years.
Trump has not tanked the economy.
You bitch about purported problems in foreign affairs – yet we are negotiating with North Korea. something that has not happened for 75 years. And though slow we are making progress. Trump did not take an unverifiable deal from NK that he was expected to, Obama took such a deal with Iran.
Trump has successfully renegotiated several trade agreements.
While he exagerates his accomplihments, none of those made things worse.
It will take time, but he will get a deal with China.
The mideast is still bad – but it is clearly LESS bad.
So tell me what is it you are outraged by ?
His style of speaking ?
I am not that happy with his rhetoric either.
But Outrage ? You are clearly very easily outraged.
I rant here alot.
But I rant about the actual use of force against others.
Trump has the power to do so, but he just talks, he does not do anything.
Dave, then it appears your answer to Queen Nancy would be to imoeach because Trump is a foregone conclusion. I dont subscibe to that thinking as just a few votes in 3-4 states need to flip. And I look at the enthusiasm of left wing voters in NC in 2018 as an indication of voting in 2020. It may not be the same nationally in 20 months, but there was a large increase in younger voters, minority voters and unaffliated voters. That led to three counties that had not had democrat sheriffs for years, even decades, voting in democrat sheriffs.
And the enthusiasm does not need to be nationally, only in a few states! And just a fraction of percentages.
But that comes from a perspective that did not support Trump in 2016 and is being influenced by local political news, which can be much different than the news and info you use to develop your thinking about the future.
If democrats choose to impeach AND voters accept that – that is how it is. I am fine with that.
I think both of those are highly unlikely.
My oppinion of the likely election outcome in 2020 is quite different from yours.
We do not get to find out about that for almost 2 years.
They we have finally crossed into perpetual campaign.
At this point, I think the Democrats are doing themselves more harm than good. Trump’s approval numbers have gone up (and even if you don’t believe that, they have not gone down) and more and more independents are being turned off by the out-front socialism and anti-Semitism of the Democrats. Queen Nancy is having a hard time holding on to her crown, what with AOC trying to grab hold of it…
I think an impeachment before the election will backfire. Trump thrives on defining his adversaries, and humpty-dumpy Jerrold Nadler and bug-eyed Adam Schiff are not a good look for the party. But Nadler and Schiff have nothing to lose, because they’re both in uber-safe districts. On the other hand, voters in Wisconsin and Pennsylvania are looking to elect someone who will do something for the country, and they’ll be pretty steamed if all they hear about for the next 2 years is how the Dems are FINALLY gonna get back at Trump for beating Hillary.
On the other hand, the Democrats have worked their base up into such a lather of hatred and insanity, that they might believe that they have to impeach , in order to placate their pitchfork and torch-wielding voters. I think that the majority of voters who don’t live in the Northeast or the West Coast want the Democrats to shut the hell up about Trump and DO something – just not a socialist something. We’ll see.
My caveat is this…if Michelle Obama gets in, all bets are off. Everyone will ~rightly~ see her candidacy as the second coming of their god emperor Barack, and she ~ and he~ will be swept into office, on a golden cloud of progressive dreams….
I would not sweat Michelle.
People are more appealing as candidates when they AREN’T.
Dems are doing everything they possibly can to implode.
Given that we have real voter fraud in significant amounts in TX,
That we have real vote harvesting in CA, AZ, TX, and NC – where is it ONLY illegal in TX and NC, the democrats are choosing to “investigate” voter suppression in GA.
The Dem’s have made it perfectly clear their house agenda is hyperpartisan.
They have no interest in actually accomplishing anything.
For two years R’s have passed a budget, We have had only one short term CR in the midst of the shutdown to give time to negotiate. Even in an election year.
I would bet there will be no budget in 2019 and 2020. Nothing of consequence is coming out of congress.
If D’s can not continue to fan the flames of TDS through to 2020 – they are not merely going to fail, but they could well fail spectacularly.
I am honestly surprised that the wing nuts on the left have managed to keep everything hyped this far. But they are slowly building anger in the rest of the country – even in moderate D’s.
Further I think they have a tiger by the tail and can not let go.
I keep hearing that Nadler is a brilliant politician not to be under estimated.
He has never left me the impression that he is anything but a pompous ass.
Regardless, even if he is brilliant his political experience is in NYC NOT the country.
No one doubts he will be relected in his own district.
I think he is clueless about how the rest of the country is perceiving him.
The DNC has barred Fox from moderating its debates – which it is free to do,
but that is an incredibly stupid move, That will drive the debate questions and answers farther to the left. A recipe that is not good for D’s.
One of the things that the left does not understand about there war on free speech is that you can shut people up. But you can not stop them from voting.
So maybe the Libertarian Party will make a wise decision and nominate this individual as their candidate.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Justin_Amash
He does not support everything I support, ie free trade v fair trade (Dave, I define fair as we both have no tariffs or we match tariffs dollar for dollar), but he sure as hell matches my beliefs 179% opposite anything the democrats are offering as a alternative now.
The GOP should nominate him.
But they want Party over Nation candidates & that excludes him:
Amash: “”I’m not here to represent a particular political party; I’m here to represent all of my constituents and to follow the Constitution.”
Jay, I noticed that comment myself and decided he would have to be thrid party.
Both parties have walked over the constitution so much that going back to what is written instead of what founders “meant” instead of written would greatly impact government overreach and regulations.
The conservatives would have a fit when things like the Patriot Act would be reversed, the liberals would gave fits when regulations by the EPA, Department of Labor and Health and Human Resources would be reversed. Both parties can not accept returning power to the people.
But the major hissy fit would come when presidents are reigned in and congress becomes the most powerful leg if government.
I mostly agree with what you’re saying Ron, but I don’t want any leg of Govt to be most powerful. Like a three legged stool, legs need to be equally balanced.
“Like a three legged stool, legs need to be equally balanced.”
Well when Obama signed us up for the Paris Accords and did not go through congress, that leg grew much longer than the others.
And research the constitution. Of all the legs of government, the president is suppose to be the weak link. He can only negotiate treaties, but has to have the Senate ratify. He can fill positions in his cabinet, but has to have Senate confirmation. He can not put into law legislation. Only he can sign it or veto it, but who has the most power. Congress because they can override a veto. He is not suppose to involve Americans in wars without congressional approval.
So.look over the past years and how many Americans have lost their lives in “wars” that are not declared wars? Too much Presidential power!
Then our President says things like ““We’re not just going to be waiting for legislation in order to make sure that we’re providing Americans the kind of help they need. I’ve got a pen and I’ve got a phone. And I can use that pen to sign executive orders and take executive actions and administrative actions that move the ball forward in helping to make sure our kids are getting the best education possible, making sure that our businesses are getting the kind of support and help they need to grow and advance, to make sure that people are getting the skills that they need to get those jobs that our businesses are creating.” That is by-passing congress. Too much presidential power.
And if I had time, I could look up all of Obama’s E.O’s and find plenty that most likely should have had congressional approval. And most likely Trump has some hidden in there also that would not pass.
Then add that the “National Emergency” Trump is trying to cram down on the country, would you not say these last two presidents have a leg much longer than congress? (And I am not talking about a middle leg as Trump might refer to)
The problem is that it is a skyscraper not a stool.
Encouraging Justin Amash to run is not all that different from endorsing ME.
There is very little daylight between Amash’s positions and mine.
I think Amash would make a good president.
If elected you would hate him as much as Trump
I would absolutely support Amash.
But I do not think he is running either as a libertarian or a republican.
If you take a libertarian and substitute your view of Trade – what would distinguish that Libertarian from Trump ?
Morals
😊👌
Then why arent you loudly criticizing Trump for declaring a faux National Emergency?
Why am I not …. ?
Try reading – I have been.
I have criticized Trump’s declaration of national emergency repeatedly.
Possibly as frequently as you have.
But criticism and going bat shit crazy are not the same thing.
First the Declarion is NOT “fake” or atleast not any more fake than 20 still active declarations of emergency by Obama, and the 28 from prior presidents that remain active at the moment.
Next the declaration is not illegal or unconstitutional.
When you misrepresent something you undermine your won arguments.
Ron wants to change the law – I am with him on that.
The current vote in congress conforms to the existing law.
Where am I ?
I am right here where I have always been – opposed to the expansion of government power.
In favor of limiting government power further.
I initially presumed this was outside of Trump’s power – the Truman/US Steel decision seemed decisive to me, But in the 60’s and 70’s congress gave the President sufficient power to declare national emergencies, and Trump’s action conforms.
It is less ridiculous than many of those in the past, including many still active.
It is more of an actual emergency than most of those.
It is therefore legal.
Legal does not make it a good idea.
Amash is ALMOST correct.
The existing law gives Trump the power to declare a national emergency.
It also gives congress the power to reverse that declaration.
Congress is free to do so – that is the law.
If they fail – the declaration stands – that is the law.
In my “perfect world” we would not have come to this. Congress would have struck the obvious deal that everyone wants and given Trump wall finding for protection for the dreamers. That would not only have been doing the right thing. It would be following the law and constitution.
but it did not do that.
I would have prefered had Trump not declared an emergency and shutdown government until that deal that nearly everyone wanted was struck.
Trump was NOT the impediment to that – Democrats were.
But I am not getting my perfect world.
And I am not going to get outraged because things are better than under Obama but far from perfect.
Fake AOC Board Game Coming This Spring: “Where In The World is AOC”
https://nypost.com/2019/02/23/alexandria-ocasio-cortez-is-nowhere-to-be-seen-near-bronx-home/:
My wife lived in Parkchester/Bronx and my cousin lived in Yorktown Heights, Two different economic areas.
But hey, NY is famous for carpetbaggers.
The brilliant insightful Gary Kasparov has another scathing indictment of President Crud’s deleterious disservice to the nation:
https://www.nydailynews.com/opinion/ny-oped-kasparov-korea-20190228-story.html
This on Cohen’s testimony:
“Cohen was as convincing as a confessed crook can be. It’s impossible to find an honest man to testify against Trump since he tends to surround himself with people as corrupt as he is.”
And this on the scumbag president in general:
Trump “has been exposed as…a thuggish con-man with no regard for decency or the law…Yet the damage he is doing to the presidency, the standing of the United States, and the global world order is of greater consequence.”
Or you could just listen to Cohen’s testimony.
“Cohen was as convincing as a confessed crook can be. ”
Was Cohen convincing ? If we accept that he is telling the truth about facts – his testimony undermined pretty much the entire left attack on Trump.
We call witnesses for facts, not opinions.
Jay, I don’t think GK likes Trump. 🙂 (this put in for those that aren’t able to discern sarcasm on the internet. Haven’t they improved robots to do that yet. :-))
Ron, how long will it be before Trump starts calling him a Palestinian-Syrian Terrorist?
This morning, on CNN:
Rep. Justin Amash, one of 13 Republicans to oppose Trump’s emergency declaration: “The President doesn’t get to decide that he can override Congress simply because Congress doesn’t do what he wants … If there were an emergency … there would be a lot more consensus.”
I could care less who calls who what.
What I care about is Queen Nancy, Shumer and McConnell getting off their asses and putting the dead brains to productive use. I want all the executive order shit, emergency order crap and any other “pen and phone” anal discharge eliminated and the constitutional powers AS WRITTEN enforced on the president.
As for Amash, I think he would be a good alternative to Trump, but might tip the election to Sanders/Warren/Harris/Booker.
If that happens, Trump just lied again. Just a day or so he said “Tonight, we renew our resolve that America will never be a socialist country,” Guess he cant say anything truthful!
I doubt Trump will tweet about Amash, but we shall see.
Rand Paul has announced he will vote against the emergency declaration.
Trump and Paul are frequently at odds on issues – yet Trump and Paul treat each other with respect, Trump and Paul talk to each other about once a week, and Paul is said to have frequently influenced Trump.
Here is where I disagree with Amash, and every other member of congress who is dishonestly grandstanding on this.
The National Emergencies Act was passed in 1976, and every president has used it, without a peep from Congress. Obama, in addition to creating legislation that was not even tied to an emergency declaration (DACA), did declare that Mexican drug cartels were an emergency in 2011, and his emergency declaration that Iran was a threat to the US is still in effect.
So, there has not been, until Trump, any pushback from Congress, on a law that has been in effect for over 40 years. They gave away their own power, and now they want to get it back, but only temporarily.
Plus, if Amash thinks this is an unconstitutional use of executive power, why not try to repeal the law that allows it? He’s just grandstanding to get “libertarian cred” for his presidential run, knowing that, even if the Senate votes against Trump, he will veto, and there is not nearly a 2/3 majority in either house to override his veto. Rand Paul, same thing. I like Paul, but now that Amash has pulled this, Paul has to do it too, or lose HIS libertarian cred.
Democrats want to keep Trump from using the law, but they’ll never repeal, because they want a future Democrat prez to use it for whatever s/he wants.
The 1976 law allows congress to reverse the president.
That is what is being attempted.
This is little different from another act that SHOULD get passed – REIGNS.
If we can not get Congress to directly do its job, we should atleast require them to vote on it when the executive excercises delegated powers.
Has Amash said this is unconstitutional ? I have not heard that.
He has said that he sees no emergency and expects congress to vote Trump’s emergency declaration down. I would agree with that.
I do not think Trump should have gone the emergency declaration route.
I think he should have veto’d the deal.
Priscilla;
I do not think Amash is running as a libertarain.
But if he does he has plenty of “libertarian cred” already.
If he runs as a libertarian – he will win the libertarian nomination – unless Austin Peters also switches back from Republican to Libertarian.
Bill Weld appears to be looking to run as a Republican or independent.
He is not likely to get the votes to be the libertarian candidate.
Lots of libertarians are REALLY PISSED that during the 2016 campaign – one in which we had a real shot at gaining serious national party status, Weld our VP candidate was encouraging people to vote for Clinton.
It is my understanding that the law has a legislative override provision.
I am a VERY STRONG supporter of laws with legislative overrides.
If Congress can meet the threshold necescary to override Trump’s emergency declaration – then we are acting lawfully,
That is to be encouraged.
If they do not – then the courts should stay out of this.
The court should address a SINGLE issue – is the 1976 law constitutional ?
If so they have no further role.
I would support the court deciding that the 1976 law was an unconstitutional delegation of legislative power – but they are just not going to do that, it would effectively reverse the entire regulatory state.
Dave, Amash DID say that the emergency declaration was unconstitutional. Which of course, it is not, unless the law itself is unconstitutional. He was on CNN this morning:
“”We have a separation of powers under the Constitution. The legislative branch, Congress handles legislative powers. And this is something that we have had going through Congress for the past several years,” Amash told Tapper. “There’s been discussions about border wall or fencing. We’ve passed appropriations bills. The president has signed the bills. He hasn’t vetoed the bills. If he wanted to say that there was a crisis, he could have vetoed the legislation. He’s never vetoed appropriations. I think the president is violating our constitutional system”
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/justin-amash-trumps-emergency-declaration-for-southern-border-is-unconstitutional
So, Amash is objecting on both constitutional and legal grounds, which sort of makes us both right. But, here’s the thing…virtually everyone has been calling the border crisis a “crisis,” for the last 10 years. Including Obama, who used his emergency powers to address it, as well. And, I fail to see why Trump’s attempt to deal with the crisis through the appropriations process, means that the crisis is not a crisis, that the Border Patrol, and ICE are not being overwhelmed by tens of thousands of illegals, that the Congress has failed in its own obligation to pass immigration reform, that human trafficking is not a humanitarian crisis that has been worsening.
I think that Amash is trying to raise his national profile for a run. Perhaps, as you say, he already has libertarian cred, but, unlike Rand Paul, 99% of the country has never heard of him. So, he’s grandstanding, knowing that going against Trump will get him on CNN, and highly unlikely that the Congress can stop Trump on this, so Amash is reasonably safe from any backlash from GOP voters.
The courts will decide this, and Trump will likely win, because this is at least as much of an emergency as Obama’s Mexican cartel emergency. In fact, Trump has been using Obama’s declaration to build portions of the wall.
I still think that Amash is grandstanding. And of course, the Democrats are…
Amash is a VERY libertarian republican.
He has consistently voted Libertarain for as long as he has been in congress – long before Trump.
Is He Grandstanding ? I do not really know. He is doing exactly the same thing as he has been as long as he has been in congress.
He is near certain to get more press attention today when he Defies Trump than in the last administration when he defied either Obama or House republicans.
But Amash has not change.
I am not sure that I agree with your or the presses spin on Amash’s remarks.
But he did lean close to the ED is unconstitutional.
I think it is Unconstitutional too – meaning that Congress can not delegate.
But non-delegation is a non-starter in todays federal courts.
Assuming that we except congressional delegation as constitutional – which I do not, the 76 Act is MORE constitutional than most because it includes a legislative override.
Next I want to be clear – the determination of whether the border situation is an “emergency” is between the president and congress. You and I can debate whether there is a border emergency – I do not think there is – but then I would not have passed any of the other 28 currently active emergency declaration.
But the courts have no role in this. Johnathan Turley had an excellent article on this several weeks ago.
Congress has the power to decide that there is no emergency. If they do not – then they are blessing the fact that Trump says their is.
Regardless, You, I, Ron are on the exact same page on one thing.
IF YOU DO NOT LIKE THE LAW CHANGE IT.
What should have been done here – is the DACA for Wall Deal. The oportunity was also there to address other issues like family separation.
That is called CHANGING THE LAW.
If Amash wants to run for President as a libertarian – that is fine by me.
And maybe I am wrong, but I do not think that is happening.
If Amash and Paul BOTH ran for the libertarian party presidential nomination
Amash would likely win.
I like Paul ALOT. But alot of libertarains see Paul as a sell out. They want Ron Paul, Not Rand Paul.
Amash is generally regarded by libertarians as a real libertarian – but not a nutcase.
I beleive that John MacAffee is likely the current leading libertarian contender.
There are rumours about Bill Weld – but too many libertarains think he betrayed them in 2016. I beleive Gary Johnson has said he is done. Austin Peters sees his future in the Republican party now.
MacAffee will make an incredibly entertaining libertarian candidate, But he will strongly reinforce the view that Libertarains are nuts.
I think that Amash – like Peters sees his future in the GOP not the libertarian party.
I have little problem with that.
Libertarains have a greater probability of political success by becoming an influential minority within the GOP than by challenging the two parties.
People like Paul, Amash, Peters, Lee understand that.
Dave, we agree that the law itself is unconstitutional, and also that it is not going to be overturned, at least not in this case, which will be decided on the merits of the emergency declaration, not its constitutionality. The Dems would freak out if it were anyway, because they WANT their presidents to be able to use it.
If Amash is arguing that the border crisis is not an emergency, because Trump has been convinced to deal with it through regular order, his argument is very weak. Trump has been calling the border crisis an emergency, since the day he entered the presidential primaries. It’s been his signature issue, and one of the main reasons that he was elected.
And I’m not trying to bash Amash, although I’m not a big fan of his. This whole thing is just a matter of everyone making the whole border security issue political, rather than treating it as a national security issue. Which it is.
“which will be decided on the merits of the emergency declaration”
Maybe at the lower court level. But at SCOTUS the deciding question will be is the 1976 law constitutional – and as you and I have agreed SCOTUS is not going to find it was not.
I do not even think they will be asked to.
Which means this is a slam dunk for Trump.
If Congress gives the president to power to decide what constitutes an emergency while reserving for itself the power to override, there is no role for the courts in trying to second guess either the executive or legislative, and I do not hink SCOTUS will touch that.
Someone at CPAC recently said “Republicans think democrats are wrong. Democrats think republicans are bad”.
That is relevant here.
SCOTUS has allowed congress to delegate its power to the executive – that is wrong, the constitution has no provisions for that. But it is the current state of constitutional law and has been for nearly a century. That is a given whether I like it or not. The consequence is not “evil” – atleast not directly, it is just weakening checks and balances.
We are each Free to decide what we think constitutes and “emergency”.
I have not found any declared emergency ever to meet my criteria for an emergency – so no the border is not an emergency.
But by constitution and law Congress decides what constitutes and emergency and what does not. Congress has delegated that to the executive while preserving a legislative veto.
It is irrelevant as a matter of law and constitution whether I think that there is an emergency.
It is however relevant whether Rep. Amash does – he has precisely 1 vote out of 538 on the issue. However he is unlikely to have the deciding vote.
You can argue that Amash is wrong, or Trump is wrong, or Pelosi is wrong or Scotus is
wrong about this issue.
But you can not leap from another party being WRONG to anotehr party being bad,
Which is inherently exactly what identity politics does
You are more conservative than libertarain – you are unlikely to beleive he is right on many things. But I would not doubt his sincertity. You can look at his record. There is significant common ground between republicans and libertarains. But outside that common ground Amash votes libertarain.
Saying he is grandstanding is a tautology – he is a politician, of course he is grandstanding.
But that does not mean he is not sincere.
I wish we had Ron Paul back. We need someone capable of getting to the debates of a major party and saying to an audience – If Heroin were legal tomorow raise your hands if you would shoot up ? What many here call “extreme” – might be extreme, but it is very often the only rational, and practical approach.
Anyway, if that is grandstanding – “please sir can I have more ?”
Of course the border is a political issue.
My problem is trying to pretend that political differences are moral differences.
That depends on whether the use of force is involved and whether that use is justifiable.
I think Trump is wrong on this – primarily because the next president on the left will use this to go much father.
But being wrong, is not the same as being evil.
We had a discussion concerning the new tax laws when it was first reported that refunds were down and the tax law was really “an increase”. We debated withholding plus refund being less over a 12 month period than the previous years. Well here is an update, which the #nevertrumppress will never publish.
https://www.fool.com/taxes/2019/03/03/bigger-tax-refunds-are-back-heres-why.aspx
I assisted a friend, a nurse, married, 2 children, two salary income with $300,000 mortgage on 6 acre piece of land. Property taxes, state income taxes plus personal property taxes just exceeded $10,000. AGI income for 2017 and 2018 averaged $140k, in 2016 was about $155k.
Tax liability from tax return 2016, 15.3%; 2017 13.8%; 2018 10.45%
According to pew research, this income level is reached by 53% in NC and 52% nationally. Taxes might be slightly higher due to ownership of property, but land values in NC are largely less than in metropolitan areas.
So could it be that the tax reform bill designed to reduce taxes actually did? In this case, around $2500.
Come on Ron, if it reduced taxes for the vast majority of Americans, the reductions are minuscule compared to the huge give-back to the wealthiest Americans, Like informing the middle class they’re only hanging by their necks two feet off the groung instead of two and a half feet.
Overall, how much did those tax cuts improve the economy; how much did they increase the deficit? Aid or deter needed infrastructure?
Jay “Overall, how much did those tax cuts improve the economy; how much did they increase the deficit? Aid or deter needed infrastructure?”
I love this. 💗💗💗💗💗!
We debate tax cut not being tax cuts, later I find info that tax cut are tax cuts, so now WE MOVE THE GOAL POST! Now its about the economic impact.
You already.know.my thinking on deficits. You know my position on SImpson- Bowles. You know my position on extreme government waste. You know my position on entitlement spending You know.my position on government in general!
If you dont, you have not been reading what I have been.posting and I am not going to repeat it.
No Jay;
The debate on tax policy has ALWAYS been about economic impact.
No Jay, I do not “know” your positions on this list.
I am not going back 11 years to find out exactly what you posted on Simpson Bowles.
I can guess. But I could guess wrong.
Simpson-Bowles had good and bad parts.
Our government does NOT have a revenue problem. Anyone claiming otherwise is paying no attention. It has a spending problem. SB pretended it had a little bit of both. Had SB been implimented it likely would have been less bad than What subsequently occurred – though the sequester was a very good thing. but it would not have been good.
Nearly all government spending is extreme waste.
I have for YEARS cited Robert Barro’s data on the efficiency of government spending.
The average efficiency of government spending is .25-.35 – that is 2/3 of every dollar of govenrment spending is WASTE. That is pretty extreme.
You repeatedly post essentially the same nonsense from Joe Walsh.
Is repeating some positions we have not heard in years so much of a burden ?
“Come on Ron, if it reduced taxes for the vast majority of Americans, the reductions are minuscule compared to the huge give-back to the wealthiest Americans, ”
Naked assertion – do you have facts ?
In the past lower marginal tax rates have consistently resulted in higher tax revenues (and higher growth). The data so far indicates that. Further past data indicates that lower upper margin tax rates shifts a larger portion fo the cost of government to the rich.
I have only seen a little data on the Tax cut to this point.
But what I have seen conforms with what has occurred in the past.
AOC tells us all that hypocracy is “just living in the world”.
https://nypost.com/2019/03/03/ocasio-cortez-responds-to-carbon-footprint-expose-im-just-living-in-the-world/
The co-founder of Greenpeace tweeted that AOC is a “pompous little twit” whose GND would cause mass death.
Which, of course, she is, and it would. The fact that she is massively popular among millennials should alarm all of us.
By the way, I watched an interview with Andrew Chang, who is running for president, and is proposing a universal basic income, to be funded by a VAT of 10%. He was very interesting, and I think that what he is proposing makes sense. I have no idea what his other positions are.
Has anyone here heard of him? What do you think?
FYI, Jay, Chang is a Democrat, worked for Obama. I’d be interested in your take.
My son find Chang interesting so I am going to have to learn something about him.
UBI’s are a Bad idea. they are a massive moral hazard.
BUT, as a substitute for the existing social safetynet they are “the lessor evil”.
But you are never going to get people to give up SS and medicare for a lower paying UBI.
And if you do not get right of the social safetynet entirely and replace it with a UBI all you will do is thoroughly destroy a large part of the incentive to work.
BTW the standard tax deduction is ALREADY a form of UBI.
EIC is another.
A vat without repealling the 16th amendment is a huge mistake.
Priscilla, Andrew Chang was on Cavuto Coast to Coast on fox a few days ago. Here is a clip from that interview.
https://video.foxbusiness.com/v/6005316771001/#sp=show-clips
They did not include the parts where he explained the funding for UBI. If I remember correctly, he stated that most all entitlements would be eliminated because they would not be needed with the UBI for everyone. PPACA would also be replaced by “Medicare for all”.
But we all know if its Medicare for all, it is really “Medicare lite for all” (actually Medicaid) and I suspect seniors will have a fit when they find out they will not have Medicare any longer. Instead of Granny going over the cliff, it will be a bull dozier pushing a nursing home over the cliff and bodies falling from the building as it tumbles down the canyon.
But he does have some interesting thoughts on jobs, economy and capitalism.
Eh, too bad. The “Medicare for all,” is a deal breaker for me. So, I’ll be sticking with Trump in 2020 😉
But, Chang does make some very good points about the effects of automation and artificial intelligence over the next decade. There are going to be millions of people put out of well-paying jobs, without satisfactory alternatives.
And, Chang also talks about the dishonest way that we gather data on unemployment, and how life expectancy has gone down over the last 10 years, primarily due to suicide and drug overdoses.
I doubt that Chang has the answers, but at least he’s not talking about getting rid of cars, planes and air conditioning. By the time Bernie and AOC are done with us, we’ll be roasting dead rats over an open flame for food….
Apparently it is Andrew Yang not chang.
There is not alot about what he supports beyond UBI. but I did trip over M4A somewhere.
I do not like his UBI plan – you MUST pay for the UBI by using it to replace existing programs.
Otherwise it is a bad idea.
Tucker Carlson has been sucked into this robots and driverless cars with destroy all the good jobs idiocy too.
I wish these people would study history. This is NOT the first time we have faced massive automation. The Luddites date back to the early 18th century.
In the event that you can actually successfully automate away huge numbers of jobs – which is USUALLY quite rare. More often you have a variation of the John Henry theme – the new automated approach can not compete with existing trained skilled workers, but it is superior to new hires, so the automation process proceded by attrition not wholesale replacement.
That is the norm. But SOMETIMES the automation is disruptive. But that does not matter.
If you introduce 4M skilled workers – and by skilled I mean people capable of learning a task of equivalent complexity, then someone will sit back and say what can I do with this massive new pool of labor that I can profit at.
Everytime someone says we lost jobs to this or to that – it is BUNK.
If something occurs that releases a significant pool of labor – absent government interferance there is ALWAYS something useful they can do. Just because you or I have not thought of it.
That is why Warren Buffet and Jeff Bezos are rich as god, and you and I are not.
The dangerous thing is when government tries to improve things for those towards the bottom. When you increase the cost to an employer without increasing productivity, you increase the minimum skill level required for a job.
Minimum wage laws were initially put in place to assure good jobs for WHITE PEOPLE and to take them from BLACKS. The original authors of Minimum wage laws understood economics and knew who they were screwing. It drives my nuts to here people today saying we have to raise the MW to help poor minorities. Do that and you SCREW them. We know that.
Oops, yes, it’s Yang. Sorry about that!
So, I understand that if I’m a truck driver (the example that Yang uses), and driverless trucks become the norm, and I lose my livelihood, I can go ahead and be a waiter or something (but not work at a fast food place, because they will have already transitioned to touchscreen ordering and robotic cooks).
But, without satisfactory skill set or aptitude, and a shrinking base of jobs that would pay what I made as a truck driver, will I be able to pay my bills? Will I derive the same personal satisfaction as I did from being out on the open road, will I have to go back to school, which I dropped out, at 16, without graduating?
I think that Yang is proposing the UBI so that people like the hypothetical truck-driver Me, is able to survive the transition. When you talk about 4M people put out of work, and fairly abruptly, over, say, a ten year period, what do we do as a society to help that “pool of labor” (who are actually individual human beings) move on to being productive members of the economy?
Do we expand the social safety net, and, if so how? Do we overhaul the educational system, and accept that there will be a “lost generation” on some level?
Isn’t a UBI better than a minimum wage?
The most important attribute of a Truck driver is NOT driving trucks.
It is their self evident ability to learn the skills necescary to drive a truck.
If technology precludes them from driving a truck, they will always be able to do any other task with similar skill requirements.
If “suddenly” 4 million drivers are supplanted by machines, those people will still have the ability to perform other tasks with similar skill requirements.
Someone – MANY people, at all levels of entrpeneurship will consciously or subconsciously grasp that there is a huge resource that is now available and they will find many ways to make productive use of it.
The principles of free markets are trivially simple the actual working of them is both incredibly complex and dynamically changing.
But one of the most fundimental mechanisms in the free market is restructuring available resources to maximize the production of whatever we value.
I have repeatedly stressed that free markets will AUTOMATICALLY give us cleaner water and air – IF THAT IS WHAT WE VALUE, so long as we become more productive and therefor wealthier and able to afford more of what we value.
But must the same occurs at the opposite end. Markets will automatically arrange themselves to optimize the use of the resources available to produce as much as possible of what we need and want. That means that if a large pool or labor becomes available, a use will be found for it.
One of the corallaries to Says law – the law of supply and demand is that supply creates its own demand. Aside from the fact this means that large numbers of unemployed truckers will be employed – it also means that any form of pollution will automatically diminish in a society with increasing wealth – because the polution itself is a SUPPLY – a Raw material. It will get converted into a product when there is enough of it and the cost to make beneficial use of it exceeds the disposal costs.
We should absolutely NEVER be worried about the displacement of skilled workers at almost any skill level – whether by machines or by foreign workers. The economy will ALWAYS adjust to make use of them.
That is not to say that the process will not be scary and tense, nor that for a few it will be seriously harmful. But the NET outcome will always be an improvement.
Yang is not the only one talking about this – even Tucker Carlson who should know better has bought into this concept that today’s automatic is somehow different.
It is NOT. This has happened many many many times over history.
It is completely irrelevant whether your job is replaced by a spinning jenny, or a steam engine or an illegal immigrant or transfered to China or Mexico or you are replaced by a computer.
It is the same thing – semi-skilled workers in large numbers are temporarily without jobs.
Not only have we survived that in the past – but in fact those are typically periods of rapidly RISING standard of living.
If as an example all human truck drivers are replaced by computers. The cost to transport goods will TANK. A computer can drive 24×7, it requires no pay, no benefits.
We will all benefit from faster and cheaper delivery of goods. The positive effects of that will be massive. Cheaper delivery of goods – means entirely new businesses become viable.
A small business that can not survive selling in a small community can afford to serve a much larger one. Cheaper transportation means NEW products. Which BTW means new jobs.
Next if tomorow 4M truckers become unemployed – they become a resource – someone. Actually MANY people will find a way to profitably use them.
The effect will be ENORMOUSLY positive. If the job the Truckers used to do AND the new job they do are both being performed we are producing MORE – we are ALL better off.
Further the WORST thing we can do is try to cushion this.
Periods or rapid change are very uncomforatable and scary, but efforts to soften them make things worse not better.
With the collapse of the USSR – most eastern european countries shifted to free markets OVERNIGHT. There was massive disruption, and it was over quickly and their econoomies started growing strongly rapidly.
Conversely Russia and SOME of the soviet block tried to delay and cushion the blow. This is where we have Oligarchy today – Not Poland and Chekoslovakia.
Any effort government makes will:
Become permanent
Will decrease the benefits that come from moving to greater production.
We will be doubly or tripply poor.
No government aide program has ever worked. Most of them have OBVIOUSLY cause more harm than good.
One of the most targeted by the left groups of speakers – often NOT conservatives are those who are looking at the data and saying things like what has destroyed minorities and particularly blacks in this country has been
Failure to complete high school
Failure to form families and intact marrages.
Failure to find and keep jobs,
Failure to establish homes
Failure to have kids inside intact families
….
These are the CONSEQUENCES of government efforts to HELP.
Helping people who are in need is probably the most difficult thing to do effectively in existance. Government does it DISASTEROUSLY.
Pretty much everything that is wrong today can be laid directly at the feet of government.
Our medical system is the worst regulated mess in the world.
I am vehemently opposed to Single payer. The last vestigage of free markets in medicine that remain in the US system are driving innovation that is benefiting the entire world, and that will DIE with more government.
At the same time it is ACTUALLY arguable that the arrangements in Nordic countries and some of europe though in SOME WAYS more socialist than the US are overall freer and efficient. Most of Europe has private healthcare BUT mandated by government.
Regardless my point is that while whe MIGHT have a healthcare system in the US that has SOME elements of free markets left, it is arguably more socialist than that of social democracies, and certainly more under the thumb of government.
All of the problems of our healthcare system can be laid at the feet of government.
The same is true of education – both public and college.
You can just go through the list of things government is involved in and those are ALL the things that are bad and getting worse.
This is not an accident.
Please do not F things up even more by trying to help truckers.
A UBI is a bad idea – but it is the lessor evil when compared to the existing social safetynet.
I am vigourously opposed to a UBI as a new program in addition to what exists.
I am opposed to funding it using any form of new taxes.
I will only support a UBI as a replacement for existing programs that are WORSE.
I do not think that is possible politically.
I would further note that EIC, The Standard tax deduction are ALL forms of UBI.
Any form of UBI that is not near universal – you could probably start phasing it out over 100K or income. but below that any phase out will create a DISINCENTIVE to work.
That is a massive problem with the existing social safety net. Reducing that disincentive is one of the appeals of a UBI.
Regardless, if you want to move to a UBI, you need to look at eliminated SSI, SSD, unemployment, Food Stamps, Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security, SNAP, Minimum wage, Most labor laws, pretty much the entire social safetynet. Replace them ALL with the UBI.
A single cash grant to nearly everyone working or not, to be spent however they wish.
And you need to accept that some people are going to actually CHOOSE to be dependent on it to be drug addicts or alcoholics.
I do not profess to have the answer – but there is one significant area in society were there is a problem of the type Yang is trying to address.
That is with people with IQ’s 80 and below. These are people who take DAYS to learn how to do a job that most of us learn in 15m.
These are very low skilled people and they have no hope of significantly raising there skill level. They are permamently barred by virtue of biology from living the american dream.
Further we will ALWAYS have them For every single person with an IQ over 120 there is a person with an IQ below 80. That is inherent in the way IQ works.
They are a resource that can easily be replaced by machines, and one that can NOT easily be used elsewhere.
My take on OAC is similar to Roby’s.
So the media continues to demonstrate serious ethical problems with their election participation.
Need I remind you that the big revelation from Wikileaks was that the DNC and the Media and the Clinton campaign were “colluding” to F’over sanders.
That the entire “russian/Collusion” narative is that Trump worked with Russia to expose the miconduct of the Clinton Campaign and the press.
Talk about the left shooting the messenger.
https://www.mediaite.com/online/cnn-fails-to-disclose-democratic-party-ties-of-questioners-at-bernie-sanders-town-hall/
The Scotts are a canny people:
I’m willing to bet MILLIONS of Americans would donate to that cause.
Would it be moral for us to vote to take your land for you – even if we pay you what we decide is appropriate, then throw you off your land and ban you from the country ?
Rights are not subject to the whim of the majority.
More asinine observations from Dubious Dave.
Scotland and other members of The United Kingdom have Eminent Domain laws permitting them to seize property for the common good. Elected officials in those places have an obligation to consider the MAJORITY views of their constituents for those seizures.
And the Home Office, a United Kingdom government department, has legal authority to ban individuals from the UK who have “engaged in unacceptable behaviour.”
And surely you agree being a loud mouth lying obnoxious asshole is unacceptable behavior.
Every nation has eminent domain laws.
You seem to be under the delusion that wrapping yourself in some technicality changes the morality of something.
Stealing is stealing – even when the government does it.
Passing a law to say we can steal, does not make it not theft.
I would suggest some familiarity with emient domain history in the US.
That right wing nut Caroline Kennedy wrote excellently about it in one of her books on the constitution.
Or you can go on Netflix and watch “the little pink house”.
The Social Contract, the absolute foundation of government and law, the MORAL justification for Government is that the individual gives up to government their right to initiate force in return for the protection of their rights from the force of others.
Read the declaration of independence, or Locke or …..
There is no mention anywhere in there about MAJORITIES.
The entirety of western law and government and self government is NOT about majority rule.
Rights belong to individuals ONLY. Abridgement of individual rights absent compelling justification is NOT moral – not even when blessed by majorities.
The folly of majority rule was demonstrated as a failure by the Greeks 2000 years ago and exposed by Plato.
Any subsequent talk of majority rule is a PLATITUDE. I do not beleive there has been an actual majority rule government since Athens.
While you are reading – try John Stuart Mill “On Liberty” – he has several pages explaining in excrutiating detail whil majority rule is the MOST morally offensive form of govenrment in existance. Why it will inherently fail worse, faster an in a more totalitarian fashion than any other. You are far better off with Stalin as an absolute ruler than an actual pure democracy.
So please quit selling this garbage.
Further you are way to old not to have gotten past this kind of crap in High School.
If you managed to get a high school education at your age without learning atleast some of the problems with majority rule – then you went to a far shitty school than I.
You are not a millenial who had an education so bad they have an excuse.
Presumably you actually had some american history, greek and roman history, some government and civics.
“And surely you agree being a loud mouth lying obnoxious asshole is unacceptable behavior.”
Absolutely NOT.
I do not agree that you can take from someone else what is theirs for any reason other to compensate people they have actually harmed for harm they have done and to support the very limited government necessary to do that and to protect people from invaders and criminals.
Even marx eventually had to grasp that you can not form a workable society or government without property rights.
Regardless if you won nothing, if nothing you own is safe from government – then neither is your person. Your body is just another bit of your property.
If you can take someones home from them because you do not like them, you can take their life from them too.
“Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.”
Above is Kant’s catagorical imperative. It is quite similar but not identical to the “golden rule”, the fundimental differences is that the catagorical imperative imposes no enforceable positive duties on you and the golden rule does.
Regardless your rant about eminent domain violates both the “golden rule” and the “catagorical imperative”
The catagorical imperative if you are having difficulty in the context of this discussion means, Make no law that does not apply uniformly to ALL.
It requires that any law must be univeral AND that it must be enforced universally.
So are you going to take adverse posession and toss out of the country anyone you think is an asshole ?
I would BTW love to see you legal definition of asshole – and I would have great fun applying YOUR defintion to you. I doubt you can construct a defintion of asshole that aplies to Trump and not also yourself.
Do you actually think before posting ?
Jay
Here is the IRS talking about congress and tax returns.
So lets be clear – ANYONE even congress making ANYONE’s tax return public has committed a serious crime.
You desire to know about other peoples income does not change the fact that you are NOT entitled to.
You’re as full of crap as ever.
“1924 provision in the Internal Revenue Code, the chairmen of the House Ways and Means Committee and Senate Finance Committee are authorized to request the president’s — or indeed anyone’s — tax returns from the IRS to conduct an investigation.
The chairmen of the tax-writing committees — whether they act together or alone — don’t need to disclose that they’ve requested the president’s returns. But they may choose to — and likely would — share the returns with their committee members in closed session.
If the committee thinks releasing the returns to the House or Senate would further a legitimate committee purpose, they’re permitted to do so…”
Did you bother to review the testimony – under oath ?
BTW – what you are saying DOES NOT conflict with anything I have said or what the witness says.
The public release of a tax return is a CRIME.
Even the private release of a tax return to someone not otherwise authorized by law to access it is a CRIME.
There is a very limited ability for congress to request tax returns from the IRS and to share them with people who are otherwise allowed to access them.
But the slightest screw up IS A CRIME.
I have no idea what the House will do. But if they do not ask for Trump’s tax returns they can not possibly ever be accused of criminally leaking them.
If the House requests and receives Trump’s tax return and even the slightest bit of it leaks out anywhere there is GOING TO BE a very serious investigation of the House.
I have no idea what they will do. But my GUESS is that the risk is so high they will back off.
If the house asked the IRS for Trump’s tax return, and Trump found a way to secretly leak some part of it, there is a strong possibility he could trigger and investigation of the house democrats. And though it is a crime for others leak a tax return you are always allowed to leak your own.
I do not think Trump would do this – it is a risky maneuver, and would explode in your face if caught and very hard to pull off without getting caught.
But I do not think is not the same as he wont. And House democrats do not know what Trump might do. Nor do they know what their own aides might do.
Regardless, the house requesting Trump’s tax return will NOT result in it becoming public.
It will not even result in public accusations (mostly) as revealing ANY information from his tax return would be a crime.
My Guess is that Trump would be ecstatic if the House requested his tax return.
If your political enemy wishes to march voluntarily into a mine field – LET THEM.
BTW democrats would have a higher than normal bar – because they F’d up the handling of IRSGATE and Louis Lehrner.
If Trump Tax information leaks -democrats will get blamed.
The only way democrats survive such a fiasco is if the leak is so damaging to Trump that no one cares how it occurred.
And unless you are clueless about Tax returns you should be able to know that is not going to be the case. A tax return has very little of the information needed to find a crime or to fully understand the sources of revenue of a business in anything but the most cursory fashion.
But go ahead – walk right into that minefield.
“Sen. Paul vows to vote against giving Trump ‘extra-Constitutional’ power”‘
““I can’t vote to give the president the power to spend money that hasn’t been appropriated by Congress,” Paul said just moments after drawing applause for his praise of some Trump policies and his ridicule of some congressional Democrats. “We may want more money for border security, but Congress didn’t authorize it. If we take away those checks and balances, it’s a dangerous thing.”
https://www.bgdailynews.com/news/sen-paul-vows-to-vote-against-giving-trump-extra-constitutional/article_07a8adb1-e02d-5add-9b0f-d3e4aef3513e.html
Paul said he was voting against this long ago.
I would repeat what I said to Priscilla about Amash.
It is highly unlikely that Trump is going to attack Paul.
Trump does not go after people who treat him with respect, even if they disagree with him.
This is from the NYT, so you don’t have to believe one word, or many words, no one is forcing you:
“‘You Have to Pay With Your Body’: The Hidden Nightmare of Sexual Violence on the Border”
Trump has been harping about this for months.
I would note that the number of Men illegally crossing the boarder who are victims of violence sexual or otherwise is enormous.
And your idea of how to solve this is ?
duck, as the Democrats tell us there is NO humanitarian crisis at the border!! And all of the illegal drugs are coming in through legal ports of entry (we, know this for certain because the media tells us so)! All of the adults with children are those childrens’ loving parents, and it is our evil Border Patrol and ICE agents that are ripping those loving families apart, while they try to find out if the loving parents are actually child traffickers, which of course we know could not be true, because all illegals are coming across the border for a better life, and, if we disagree with that, it’s because we’re racist and don’t like brown people.
Wealthy elites in metropolitan areas all over the country need people to clean their homes, cook their food, and landscape their properties, for low wages. They need nannies for their children. If a few thousand women pay for this by being repeatedly raped in border towns, that’s just a small price to pay, and the politicians who enable it, by refusing to enforce our immigration laws will never have to see those women anyway.
So, no emergency.
The New York Times is blaming the US for the rape of migrant women. The article claims that migrant women don’t get raped on the way to America, but after they get here.
If Americans are to blame, it is the Americans who encourage the breaking of our laws and the refusal to deport those who enter illegally and/or commit crimes.
Amen
Nobody is going to actually get rid of airplanes. Nobody is going to enact medicare for all. They are simply blathering. None of the extreme ideas of the progs are anything that would make it to first base once the election is over. And, if Vermont is any measure, the prog voters are unforgiving. They in their naive way utterly believe the promises: what do you mean you failed to enact single payer health care Governor Shumlin, you sold your soul to the big insurance companies. We are done with you.
In other words the prog coalition will unjoin the dem party just as soon as a prog gets elected and does not provide antigravity lollipops to all.
But a lot of this bullshit is likely to die during the dem primaries, facts and polls will kill it.
I hope so, Roby, but I think that the idea that millions of more people will believe that bullshit is a bad thing.
I agree with you that the far left of the Democrat Party is doing damage to the party’s electoral chances (most of the new Dem reps elected in 2018 were far more moderate than AOC, Omar,and the other one, whose name escapes me), but there is no doubt at all, that AOC has influenced millions of young voters to believe that “democratic socialism,” i.e. voting to take away other peoples’ money, and give it to themselves, is a far better system than what we have now.
The GOP is not providing answers, nor are the Libertarians. So we have one party providing a path to economic destruction, and a bunch more providing no path at all. Another fine mess the DC swamp has gotten us into, while they enrich themselves….
“I think that the idea that millions of more people will believe that bullshit is a bad thing.”
Millions of people believing any cunning bullshit is a Terrible thing, especially when the bullshit is becoming increasingly popular and increasingly bullshit. Watching the naive dreams of the parties’ most rabid activists become the political principles of both major parties in this latest era has given me goose bumps that won’t go away.
One side is fanatically convinced that antigravity lollipops are what we must get to have a happy future while the other party proposes a time machine to their imagination of the happy uncomplicated world of 1947. So, how do they negotiate to find reasonable policies for the issues of 2019? Its like bringing the Moonies and the Scientologists together to discuss economics. Gremlins was a great movie. Its a lousy reality.
While we go through this surreal exercise in democracy gone loony in the internet era, the countries with authoritarian governments and nuclear arms are efficiently playing chess without the distraction of input from the proletariat. Among skilled chess players just one lost move often means a lost game.
You are free to beleive whatever you want.
Others are free to try to persuade you whatever they want – even left wing nuts and russians.
What no one may do, is use force to get their way without justifying the use of force.
You may not do so directly, you may not do so by proxy, and you may not do so through government – not even with the support of the majority.
“So, how do they negotiate to find reasonable policies for the issues of 2019?”
Trivial – we may not use force – aka government absent a compelling justification.
Most if not all of what you call policies – are things that people can work out on their own in their own lives. There is no need for “negotiation” over most of this.
The overwhelming portion of each of our existance is the domain in which we make decisions for ourselves. That is the default – ALWAYS. If you are seeking to make significant changes – you can persuade people, but you can not force them.
Not even if what you want is a really really good idea.
Not only is that the solution, it is the ONLY reasonable solution. Every other solution inevitably means one group using power which should not belong to it over others.
“Among skilled chess players just one lost move often means a lost game.”
I have not played chess seriously in years – but it seems you never have.
Nor BTW is chess different in this regard to any other competitive event.
At the top of any competitive domain – actual skills are very nearly equal or inconsequentially different. The game is almost entirely psychological.
Go read the book on the Fisher-Spasky Match. Fisher played like crap – often deliberately.
2/3 of the game was not even occuring on the chess board. Fisher had a deserved reputation as a complete nutcase and concurrently the worlds most brilliant chess player and he used that. When Fisher did something stupid Spasky was unable to determine whether it was actually stupid or whether a move by Fisher was stupid or a brilliant trap.
The vast majority of the Fisher-Spasky match reads like a bunch of class E players blundering at each other. Anyone with a few years of chess could have beaten either of them. Except that could not happen because they would have known that the blunders of an inferior player were blunders and would not have thought twice about capitolizing on them.
This is also what you are clueless about Trump. You think that the Summit in Vietnam was about a few words back and forth between Trump and Kim Un.
What was going on was about Trump and Kim Un, It was about what Trump needs in the US, it was about what Kim Un needs in his own country, It was about Vietnam, it was about negotiations with China, it was about negotiations with Pelosi in the house.
It was about the wall and the emergency declaration and the UK and EU and Mexico.
It is entirely possible that the whole thing was as shallow as the media claims.
It is also possible that Trump never intended to strike a deal at this Summit, or that Kim Un did not. Or both, or …..
Humans even the best humans do poorly against the best computers at chess and other competitive contests specifically because computers are somewhat immune to this.
But not completely. Chess as an example is NOT fully calculable, a computer can at best analyze more deeply than a human. But we have seen in computer human chess matches at the top levels some of the same tendencies that we do between the best humans, they are just more rare. Even computers play a psychological game and face opponents who attempt to psych them out.
The danger of these things – is not inherent in the ideas themselves.
They are stupid ideas and if actually put into practice would fail dramatically.
They danger is that the more broadly they are accepted the more viable a means to power they become.
The Pelosi’s and Schumer’s and McConnells will NEVER end air travel as an example.
But they are near certain if given a chance to regulate the crap out of it
By regulating – artificially controling, and by seizing the POWER to control, everyone must come to you to gain access to that resource.
Elites will determine who gets the contracts to mangle air travel.
Elites will decide who gets to fly and when.
That is power – it is power TAKEN from you, and it is ordinary people that will ALWAYS suffer the loss.
I would further note that to a limit the more they F’it up the more power they have. The more broke whatever they regulate is , the more they can interfere, the more broke it becomes.
Our medical system has become a huge disaster BECAUSE of constant government interference. It gets worse with every intervention.
That is NOT accidental.
You can not prevent even good ideas from being corrupted by government.
Libertarians are ABSOLUTELY providing the answer.
The answer is quite simple. The problem is ALWAYS when some of us have POWER over others of us. The rationale is not critical. It is not important whether it is driven by the left or the right.
With very very few exceptions people – individuals can solve their own problems on their own. they need protection from those who would use force against them, and a very few other things. All else we can ultimately do better on our own.
It is irrelevant what the problem is – if your proposed answer is to give POWER to others to solve it – taking power from individuals and control of their own lives, the answer is nearly always NO.
THAT is our largest problem. Not automation or immigration or outsourcing.
Dave, small “l” libertarians may provide us with a useful ideology, that can help us understand why big government is dangerous, and why limits on the power of the government is important, but the big “L” Libertarian Party hasn’t provided any kind of platform that gets us from “here” to “there”. And conservatives struggle to find common ground with each other.
Perhaps I should have used the word “plan” instead of “answers.” or “path.”
Socialists say, tax the rich. When there are no more rich (other than those in power, but shhh!) then tax the middle class. When there is no more middle class, the poor will have it all. Except that “all” really means “nothing”, but that’s something that the socialists never address, because they’re too busy promising the free stuff. Yay, for the collective.
I have not seen today’s GOP (other than Trump, who is more of a populist than a Republican) or Libertarian Party provide clear alternative plans. I realize that it’s a lot easier to promise free stuff than it is to get people to take responsibility for their lives. But, other than cutting taxes (good), what have the GOP and/or the Libertarian Party provided in terms of concrete proposals? Education reform? Immigration reform? Real tax reform? If it weren’t for Trump actually having a platform,which everyone criticized, the entire 2016 election would have been about whether we would elect the first woman president. Gary Johnson had a golden opportunity, but didn’t take advantage of it, by explaining how the Libertarians could do things better.
I’d just like to see some pushback on these dangerous leftist policies that the Democrats seem to think is their ticket back to power. Where are all of the moderate Democrats? And, I had such high hopes for Andrew Yang 😦
I am not into the small l big l thing.
If a given race has a democrat or republican that I can actually get behind – that does NOT require me to agree with them on everything – I will probably vote for them.
If a race is predetermined – I am going to cast a protest vote – probably for the libertarain.
There have been some quacks running as libertarians.
There have also been some excellent people.
Absolutely the Libertarians have a credible platform that would greatly benefit the country.
Have you read the republican or democratic platform ?
No one reads platforms.
I will also vote and poll libertarain to get them into debates.
You want to change the existing parties – lets here voices that are not republicans or democrats. Ron Paul was incredible in the Republican Debates. He forced the discussion of issues that every body else ducked. And he mounted a credible national political campaign within the GOP that the Republicans did as much to choke as the democrats later did to sanders.
Regardless, his voice was incredibly important and if we can not get that message on the stage at a Republican debate then I will support the very difficult efforts of big L libertarians to do so.
I like Rand Paul alot, but he is NOT the powerful voice that his father was.
The press tanked Gary Johnson.
The platform you get does not depend so much on what you say – but what gets reported.
The press deliberately tried to paint Johnson as uninformed and gaff prone by falsely spinning his response to setup questions.
There is plenty on Johnson/Weld online if you want to find it.
But you can not get attention from the press if they do not want to give it to you.
Trump conversely gamed the press in 2016.
Trump completely bought that there is no such thing as bad press and so he gave the press the remarks that they thought would tank him, but assured they would keep coming back to him over and over when it did not.
The Press thought Trump under a spotlight would wilt and Trump made sure they put him under the spotlight.
There was no way Johnson could manage the same thing.
Ok, Dave, you make two very good points.The first is that, far too often, the GOP platform, as well as the Libertarian one, end up like the tree falling in the forest, which no one ever hears, due to the refusal of the mainstream press to cover all sides of a story.
Your point about Trump “gaming the press” is also well-taken, although I might say that the press gamed itself, by giving hours of free TV exposure to someone that they considered 1) a major celebrity , who would drive high ratings (true), and 2) a candidate who would be easy for their anointed one, Hillary, to beat (false). No Republican has ever had that kind of media focus, and will likely never have it again.
Maybe it was Weld who tanked the Libertarian opportunity to push a powerful and policy-specific platform, but, for whatever reason, the Libertarian ticket did not campaign very energetically. Certainly not like Ron Paul, who, like Trump never shied away from a tough question.
Priscilla, have you ever seen a time the Libertarian Party actually campaigned? I think they just use the L convention as a time to get together, drink ( and as many believe smoke dope) and have a good time. They nominate some off the wall candidate and then go home for another 4 years.
Johnson was the only person with some name recognition, but even then the L party gave little assistance.
Since the last 5-8 years, the name of the game has been social media and it does not take much money to mass distribute information on social media. I get bombarded with democrat and republican propaganda daily as a result of clinking on some link to info I want to read, but that never happens with the Libertarian party. Its like they must think sending info on the internet is harm to someone else.
So I suspect they will do the same thing this year they always do. Wait until the last minute, nominate a candidate, close up shop, go home for another 4 years and wonder why their candidate gets less than 10% of any vote anywhere.
The liberatian party quite actively campaigns.
They are even reasonably well funded for their size.
I beleive Johnson Weld received and spent $40M in 2016.
That is 1/20 of what Trump spent and 1/40 of what Hillary spent.
It is proportinate to their vote total.
Johnson in particular was very active in campaigning, but he got little attention.
You can not force the press to cover you.
So what activates unsolicited crap into email, Facebook and Twitter? Because my computer was full of unsolicited info from PAC’s, national parties and other special interest groups.
Except nothing from Libertarians, groups supporting Libertarians or the Libertarian Party.
So I still say the Libertarians are inefficient and less capable in messaging than the GOP and that takes wkrk!
I get myriads of emails from liberatarian groups – almost daily,
But then I visit places like FEE, FFF, Cato, Reason, Libertarian.org.
I also get atleast one offer for breast enlargment every day.
I do not thing I am not female or Trans. but maybe they know something about me I do not.
If you want to get bombarded by libertarain spam, it should not be very hard to arrange that.
Johnson was confirmed as the libertarian candidate on 5/29/2016
That is two months BEFORE the democrats and republicans.
There was a very active Libertarian primary in 2015 and 2016.
The leading candidates were “Austin Peters”, John MacAffee, and Garry Johnson.
You can find numerous campaign adds by all of these on youtube.
The MacAffee adds are incredibly funny.
Well big WHOOP! If adveftising on you tube was efficient, we would not be bombarded by ads on TV, Social Media or email.
Who the hell goes to you tube to look at ads?
The only person who gets into my facebook account is my wife.
Conversely I look at several videos on Youtube every day – about half business related – either computers or construction.
I see far less adds and get less spam and have a faster browsing experience and less computer problems as I switched to Brave-Browser a few months ago. I have a few issues and still have to run chrome and chromium for a few things.
Once in a while there is some platform fight that is serious and attracts peoples attention.
But that is rare.
I remember reading that Mueller was investigating whether there was some change being made to the GOP platform as a quid pro quo to russian.
When I first heard that my response was “huh ?” – Who knows or cares what is in the GOP platform regarding Russia or Ukraine ?
Most of the time we pray to god that party platforms are NOT legally binding – which they are not.
In the end it turns out the clause was strengthened against Russia not weakened – but who cares ?
We have had myriads of these spittle battles over nothing.
There was a big hullabaloo over whether Trump Jr. Called Trump during before or after the meeting with Natalie. The Trump’s denied that. Turns out they were correct.
Would the world have changed if they had talked ? No ?
A legal act is legal – even if you talk about it before during and after.
It is legal – if you conspire to do it. It is legal if you lie about it.
There has been a massive effort from the start to the end of this to catch Trump and others in the tiniest inaccuracies.
Flynn, Papadoulis, and Stone are labled as criminals – for what ?
Possibly inaccurate statements about legal activities ?
Stone is facing charges for failing to recall that he had exculpatory evidence.
Further this is in reference to congressional testimony which he was permitted to correct – that is the norm, but he was denied transcripts of his own testimony so that he could review and correct any errors.
Covering Trump has made a fortune for the media.
Ranting about Trump is incredibly profitable for the media.
Roby, make sure Jay sees this!. Maybe you can convince him that when candidates promise something, they are not “really” promising anything. He keeps pointing out things that Trump said that is not happening. I have tried showing him how he is being sucked into the promises happening leg pulling, but he has not acceoted that from me. Maybe you can do better.
“Nobody is going to ….”
Absolutely. While that MIGHT be the goal of the true beleivers in this idiocy, the danger is that the “movement” will become a vehicle to permit greater government control.
For most of the “leaders” that is the actual goal. I have little doubt that if Nancy Pelosi thought that she could get sufficient popular support for GND she would be 150% behind it.
Not because it is a good idea – but because it is a means to greater power for her and her political tribe.
I keep harping that ALL apriori regulation is net harmful – and it is, there is plenty of economic data to support that. No one in their right mind would support Minimum Wages if they were familiar with the real world data on their negative effects. Nor is this some modern secret.
The people who first came up with Minimum wages did so with the explicit expectation that they would favor whites over minorities – and that was and still is the effect.
All these ideas such as the need for regulation thrive – not because they are good ideas,
But because they increase the power of the governing class.
As I have said many times before – Lord Acton did not say “Money Corrupts”, he said POWER corrupts. Money is a second order or less concept. It is not even necessary it is just convenient.
But POWER is the ultimate aphrodesiac.
I am constantly harping that government is force.
Everything we debate here is about increasing or decreasing the amount of power that those in government have over the rest of us.
Are their lots of people on the left who sincerely beleive in M4A or Single payer or GND or ….
The vast majority. BTW “Socialism” is no different. Forget the ideological portions – because to the people like Stalin, Mao, Chavez, Castro the ideology is secondary, what is important is that it is a vehicle to power. It can be represented with sufficient attractiveness to ordinary people that they will surrender power to “leaders” in return for its benefits which but for small numbers they will never receive.
Any ideology or arrangement that can be co-opted as a vehicle for power WILL BE.
It is irrelevant whether it is right or left, the GND or Nazism, or Socialism or Income inequality of Global Warming, or Clean water.
I rant about the left and Progressives all the time.
They are nothing more than the preeminent vehicle for empowering an elite AT THIS TIME.
Their ideology is wrong and broken – but even if it was actually possible to make one of these ideologies work – it will STILL fail because it WILL BE CO-OPTED as a vehicle for power.
While there is much more going on with the left than just that, the fundimental conflict between the left and Trump is that he is a threat to their POWER, to the control they exercise over everyone else’s lives.
Again some true beleivers might actually seek to use that power for good,
But either they will be corrupted or they will be replaced by others who are going to wield power for their own benefit.
Is Trump inherently dangerous in exactly the same way – ABSOLUTELY.
Power corrupts – always, in everyone.
For the moment MOST of Trump’s use of power has been to shrink the power of government or to bring it back into conformance with the law.
My opposition to his use of emergency declarations to build the wall is not because it is illegal, or that I object to the wall, It is not even about Trump, it is about the fact that it will justify slowly increasing use of emergency declarations to increase the power of future presidents.
“The people who first came up with Minimum wages did so with the explicit expectation that they would favor whites over minorities – and that was and still is the effect.”
References? Links?
I just read the Wiki article on minimum wages and found nothing that hinted at this.
I am no great proponent of the minimum wage and never was. I think that the 15 dollar minimum wage is nuts, it will put people out of work, possibly in the millions in the US.
Google the “racist roots of the minimum wage”.
But here is a very short clip of Diedre McCloskey interviewed by Dave Rubin on this.
McCloskey is and extremely important american economist.
If there are facts that are harmful to the left they will get purged from wikipedia.
Wikipedia is an incredibly important and useful tool, but anywhere where there is an obvious interplay between politics and fact – wikipedia articles are near certain to be “cleaned”.
There is no difference beyond scale between a $7 MW and a $15MW.
at $7 that means you can not get a job if your productive value is less than $7.
At $15 your productive value must be $15.
There is more than half a century of research on this. There has only been a single study pretty much ever that has not found the effects of a MW bad.
That is Card and Krueger. And C&K found that tiny increases in the MW had no effect on employment. I think they were wrong and they made several statistical and methodological errors and there are several excellent critiques of their work. But Even Card and Kreuger have explicitly rejected the premise that large increases in the MW will not be net negative.
What C&K did expose is that reducing employment is only ONE of the possible negative effects of an MW increase. C&K found only minor decreases in the number of people employed after an MW increase – just ot be clear their study was limited to a small region in PA and NJ where they did a comparative cross border study to see the effect of an MW increase where it effected only half of a demographically similar population.
What C&K did not examine and subsequent work DID, was the structure of employment.
More recent studies have demonstrated that when the employment impact of an MW increase is small it does NOT mean there is not lots of people who lose their jobs.
What tends to happen is that employers replace lessor skilled people with fewer higher skilled people.
The effect of MW increases on teens, on minoritees is well documented over decades and is disasterous.
Quite simply the higher the MW is the harder it is to get and keep your first job.
The effect is larger the less well educated you are, the poorer you are and for minorities.
Fox News Propaganda Bosses Protected Trump From The Start
https://twitter.com/kt_so_it_goes/status/1102582401035845633?s=21
Wow! Extra Extra, guy who owns network actually gets to decide what stories he wants to see run!!
Crime of the century.
We have had 3 years of Trump Derangement Syndrome.
The left media rarely if ever runs any of the stories that refute the garbage they push.
You do not think that maybe they make choices about what their readers want or should see too ?
Grow up. The GOOD thing about the modern world and near infinite media is that NO ONE has sufficient control to dictate what people can and can not find out about.
Falzone could have taken the story elsewhere. Further there are bazillions of other reporters out there – so Fox Spiked the story – why didn’t it run on NYT or Wapo ?
Do those reporters Suck ?
You seem to think that not only must the left wing media report what YOU think is important, but so must all other media.
I think the NYT is a huge embarrasment – Fox would have to F’up alot to catch up.
But I do not care – both are what they are, as well as myriads of other outlets.
If you want control of what is published – start your own paper or network.
You keep telling me that you are not on the left, and yet constantly you want to dicate not only what can not be said, but what must be said.
You want control of not only what everyone does, but now what they think and say.
A n actually free press means a press free to print whatever it decides to print.
Your article claims that this occurred when Clinton and Trump were in a dead heat near the end of the election.
That NEVER occurred.
Clinton and Trump were within 1pt 3 times
Dec 15, 2015
May 25, 2016,
July 30, 2016.
Late July was the ONLY time Trump was EVER ahead of Clinton in the polls.
From Aug 2016 through to the election Clinton was on average 5pts ahead.
Trump closed to 2 pts for a day in Sept.
And again for 1 day in Nov.
On election day Clinton was 3.2pts ahead in the polls.
This is also why virtually no one predicted a Trump victory.
If your story is so wrong about such trivially verifiable facts – why is it trustworthy in other regards ?
I do not know what the actual truth is. Nor do you.
I do not care if the story is approximately true as written.
I do not care if Rupert wanted Trump to win.
Do you think that Bezos Sulzberger did not want Clinton ?
Do you think that the overwhelming majority of those in the media (and apparently DOJ and FBI and CIA and NSA) wanted a Clinton victory and were actively seeking to make that happen ? Fortunately those in the media were not violating the law to do so.
The only “influence” or “interferance” in the 2016 election that needs investigated and people need to go to jail over is that of the Obama Administration.
There only “influence” that is criminal, is that of our government.
The editor at Fox responsible has responded to this story.
You can find his published response on line.
The elements are simple.
The story claimed that Daniels confirmed this affair, Daniels was contacted through agents and attorneys and asked to confirm.
They refused.
While THEY wanted the story published, they were quite clear that they refused to have their finger prints on it.
There was no other corroboration of the story at that time.
Fox was NOT ALONE, several major outlets had the same story.
Daniels agents and attorneys were shopping it.
No one published it before the election.
Because responsible journalists do not publish stories particularly stories like that without confirmation.
In otherwords the allegation against fox is that they were NOT less ethical than other outlets at the time.
Yeah right, Fox policy isn’t to acccentuate (exaggerate) Trump positives and eliminate (ignore) his massive negatives.
You’re as full of crap an apologist for Trump and his cultists as usual. Fox is a propaganda tool for right wing Trump conservatism. Period! Apparently your head has been up your butt on this site for more then a decade; that immersive anal marination has permently clouded your judgement, allowing you to conveniently ignore the fact that Fox ALWAYS does that with Trump news.
For instance on the day when the Cohen and Manafort stories both were in the news everywhere else, Fox had it’s Prime-time lineup covering a Trump rally in West Virginia, with no on air mention of the Trump Chumps’ tribulations. That was not an isolated Fox News Right-Biased decision. It was and IS Fox policy.
I do not know what Fox’s policy is – not MSNBC’s nor ….
I do not really follow any “news media”.
Beyond that I have no right to control Fox or MSNBC – beyond deciding whether to watch or not. That is it.
That said – I do not think any of the media – not Fox not MSNBC ran the story before the election.
If you think Fox committed some Sin or crime – so did MSNBC.
The fact that you do not know who at MSNBC Daniels agents were trying to shop the story to, does not alter the fact that the media as a whole were aware of the story, and none were able to get the corroberation necescary to meet THEIR standards to publish.
However low or high you think Fox’s standards are in this instance they were the same as the rest of the media.
We get this kind of nonsense all the time.
Oh, My! The Trump inaugural received donations from a Delaware corporation that might be owned by someone in india – Political Corruption!!!! Obama received millions in creditcard donations from the mideast – just an unimportant mistake.
You presume every rumour about conservatives is both true and evidence of evil. and ever truth about progressives is false, or harmless error.
The Right beleives the left is wrong.
The left beleives the right is evil.
The differences explains US politics. It also explains you.
I do not expect Fox to cover what MSNBC does.
I do not expect MSNBC to cover what Fox does.
The media has NEVER been unbiased. The difference between today and walter Cronkite is the bias was much more subtle.
I prefer this. NYT and MSNBC and Fox are overtly bias – I can factor that into my judgement.
I am not an apologist for Trump, I am a proponent for facts, logic reason.
I did not start as a libertarain. In My 20’s my views were somewhat similar to yours.
I shifted slowly over time as I was unable to continue to accept the contradictions in my views.
I do not think Trump is a particularly good president – but we have had several lousy president’s in a row.
I can see Trump’s actual flaws and I am not warped by the massive efforts of the media to find what is not there – though I want them to remain vigilant.
When following the rule of law, you find actual evidence of real wrongdoing, I will be fine with sanctioning trump.
In the meantime I will oppose Trump when he is wrong and support him when he is right.
And my support and opposition will be in scale to the benefir or to the harm.
The same as I would judge Bush and Obama.
And in contrast to you who could not agree with something Trump said or did withong givving yourself a stroke.
Well lets review the ” sky is falling” impact on insurance coverage due to repeal of the individual mandate.
According to this, enrollment was down 400,000 PPACA subscribers.
Congressional studies and consultants estimated 9M to 20M over 10 years would “lose” coverage.
https://www.cbsnews.com/news/obamacare-enrollment-dips-slightly-for-2018/
So if you buy the calculation ( which I do not) that each year another 400K would “lose” coverage, that is 4M over 10 years and not 9-20M. I think 400K is the high humber as this is the first year those that want to drop coverage can and any subsequent years will find fewer dropping coverage.
I suspect if an independent, non- political organization did a study they would also find no where near 9-20M people would “lose” coverage.
And I would suspect that this would also show that government force was the reason for subscribing to begin with and individual choice was the reason for not signing up this year.
But people are not allowed to make their own choices regarding their healthcare damit. !!
Priscilla, it appears from this that he proposes another VAT @10%, thus raising prices for everything by 10% without removing any other taxes. And if something goes through 10 steps from beginning to end, raw material, sheet metal, formed metal, etc, isn’t that really a 11% increase at the end of the process where everyone adds 10% ten times to the costs?
And what happens to that Buick that comes from China? If a Ford has 10% to 11% added and is built in America and can not be shipped to China due to their 25%+ tariffs, does that Chevy now have an additional 10% price advantage or does GM make 10% more since they can match the Ford price?
And if he does add VAT’s, does that drive more companies overseas since there is not VAT in some countries they would move.
I don’t like the smell of this dead fish!
https://www.yang2020.com/what-is-ubi/
Yeah, I do think that Yang has some interesting things to say about how we should be addressing the potential loss of millions of jobs to robotics and other technologies, and I am not necessarily opposed to considering some form of UBI, which could take the place of programs like unemployment and SSDI.
But instituting a national VAT, without eliminating the federal income tax, other taxes and tariffs would be a disaster. So much for Yang 2020……
I also agree with what the co-founder Of Greenpeace has to say to her:
Jay, thanks for that link, I am beating my head against the wall trying to alert some folks against the danger that progs could get Trump reelected, and the media is greasing the skids..
AOC is not the threat to Trump getting re-elected. Warren, Sanders, Harris …. almost the entire democratic field is.
If you want to defeat Trump BEG Howard Schultz to run as a democrat and through the progressives out.
Frankly D’s have a serious problem no matter what.
The progressivess – are the foot soldiers of the DNC. You can not win an election without them. But you can not win an election if you give them a real voice either.
Republicans have better worked this problem out.
ALERT: The following has nothing to do with AOC or Trump:
“Multibillion-Dollar Money-Laundering Scheme Run By Russia’s Largest Private Investment Bank Uncovered, Report Says ”
https://www.rferl.org/a/money-laundering-scheme-set-up-run-by-russia-s-largest-investment-bank-occrp-says/29802833.html
In this article is the following statement.
http://www.watcherofweasels.org/john-podesta-hillarys-campaign-chief-one-real-russia-ties/
“There’s also this inconvenient fact: In 2016, Russia’s largest bank, Sberbank, where Joule board member Reuben Vardanyan formerly served as head of its investment banking division, had a $170,000 lobbying contract with the Podesta Group — which is owned by John Podesta’s brother, Tony Podesta.
In short, Clinton’s top campaign chief and a senior counselor to Obama sat on Joule’s board alongside top Russian officials as Putin’s Kremlin-backed investment fund funneled $35 million into Joule. No one looking at the Podesta fact pattern can claim to care about rooting out Russian collusion and not rigorously investigate the tangle of relationships.”
Reuba Vandanyan is identified in the article that you linked about the money laundering firms in Russia. I tried to link Trump to Vandanyan, but n othing popped other than being on the list of Russians identified as interferring with our election.
So what link between Podesta, Clinton, Russia and collusion exist?
If americans are deeply concerned about the links financial and otherwise between our candidates and campaigns and the russians – those of the Clintons DWARF Trump’s by an order of magnitude. As BTW do those of Clinton to the Saudi’s and every single other despotic regime in the world. The vast majority of Clinton Foundations money – hundreds of millions of dollars came from the most depotic people and governments in the world.
Good, I don’t like the Clintons either. Podesta can be the Manafort of the Dems.
Manafort is an amatuer compared to the Podesta’s.
One of the claims agains Manafort was that he failed to register as a lobbiest for a foeign government.
Manafort ABSOLUTELY was paid by foriegn governments to arrange for lobbying in the US.
Manafort and his company did ZERO foreign lobbying.
Manafort Hired Tony Podesta to do the lobbying.
If we were not making the law up to suit – Tony Podesta is guilty of violating FARA, Manafort is not. The Law is about the ACTUAL lobbiest, It is about making sure that Congressmen know that the person accross the table from them is in the employ of a foreign government.
Manafort Registering would not have met the requirements of the law.
Manafort did NOT lobby the government for foreign countries.
Podesta did.
What I read was a story about massive political corruption, and graft.
Money laundering has a meaning. There was little or nothing that I read that constituted actual money laundering.
Just to be clear it was all illegal – or appears to be.
Today in my inbox I received a link to a Wapo article explaining why Republicans were wrong and transparency was possible in the Mueller probe.
The claim was Troubling because I had just finished a youtube clip where Devin Nunes was asked what he wanted, and he said that what is necescary today is RADICAL transparency.
He had a list of 5 things he wants made public.
All the testimony of all witnesses to the house and senate investigations. He was particularly critical of the closed door testimony of Micheal Cohen. Noting that Cohen has no security clearance, and is not a member of government, and there is nothing he can say in private that can not be said in public. He asserted that Cohen’s private testimony is no different from his public testimony – that it was just a collection of defamatory oppinions and exculpatory facts. Regardless, Nunes wants all testimony made public.
He wants the entire FISA application made public.
He wants EVERYTHING associated with Mueller made public – not just the report, but his witness interveiws EVERYTHING.
I think that is 3 things there were several more.
Regardless, last time I checked Nunes was not merely a republican but one of the more important republicans on this issue.
Too my knowledge the closest remarks to a “republican” asserting that something would not be public was the grilling of AG Barr at his confirmation. Barr would commit to nothing except following the law and favoring as much transparency as possible.
Given what his job will be and that he knew pretty much nothing at the time he was testifying, I think Barr’s testimony was appropriate.
WaPo claims it is traditional to release everything when a criminal investigation ends.
That is BUNK!!! It is highly unusual and possibly illegal to release any information about any investigation or portion of an investigation that does not lead to a successful prosecution.
It should be trivial to understand why that is the rule. It is likely a crime to do otherwise.
Most of us know it is a crime for the government to leak grand jury material. Private parties are Always free to talk about their own testimony.
Regardless, While I do not think that standard should be changed, I do think that Trump and other targets should agree to the release of EVERYTHING – not merely Muellers report, but all the intervierws EVERYTHING.
But regardless of what I think the headline by Wapo is incredibly deceptive, and the parts of the content I read are just false.
Actually I think I would go farther – Mueller should NOT issue a report, the AG should just dump the entire Mueller file. We are all capable of coming to our own conclusions.
We do not need Mueller to tell us how to think.
We are near certain to disagree anyway.
So AFTER Comey FIRED Steele, and after Trump Fired Comey, McCabe rehired Steele.
What does it take before some of you grasp that this was Nixon’s wet dream ?
That you can not bless this without saying Nixon never should have resigned and no democrat should have sought to impeach him ?
Do you understand it is MUCH worse when it is the FBI that is engaging in political corruption rather than private parties ?
https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2019/03/02/mccabe_of_fbi_re-engaged_with_fired_dossier_author_after_comey_firing.html
WaPo – Trump Lies, Lies, Lies, he is just making things up, no “expert” agrees.
NYT – Oopsie, interviewed women who crossed the border not merely confirm Trump’s remarks but expand on them.
Could we get the few reporters at NYT and WaPo who actually bother to go out into the world to gather real stories rather than sitting at their desk and manufacture opinion masquerading as news to get together and form a REAL newspaper ?
I would further note that until we can trust the media – we can not accurately assess the claims that Trump “Lies, Lies, Lies”.
Whether something is a lie and how consequential it is depends on the facts, and quite often our primary source of facts is the media. When the media is not a trustworthy source of accurate information, then we can not know whether accusations are true or significant.
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/new-york-times-backs-up-trump-claim-yes-there-was-duct-tape
“UPDATE: A lawyer for the Trump administration, pressed by a Boston judge on whether the “115 mile long” border wall contract the president tweeted about exists, just said in court: “Your honor, so far as I know, there is no such contract.”
Now lawyers working for Trump are lying about his lies too – right Dubious Dave?
Why is a boston judge asking anything about the border ?
Why would one expect a government lawyer to know about procurement ?
A FEDERAL JUDGE in Boston.
In a freedom of information suit filed by ACLU.
Requesting the relevant database be searched which would contain government contracts for Homeland Security projects along the stretch of the Rio Grande border Trump claimed was signed.
That lawyer reporting had knowledge of the requested search, and outcome.
Get it?
No I do not get it.
The only borders in the first circuit are those with Canada.
Homeland Security and ICE and CBP are not headquartered in the 1st circuit.
ACLU cases brought in the first circuit will be defended by DOJ lawyers in the 1st circuit who have little or nothing to do with DHS, ICE, CBP or the border.
Further Governement contracts are normally administered by GSA – again NOT headquartered in the 1st circuit.
I would be completely shocked if there were a single government database for any of this.
Further the tiny government contracts I have had to deal with often take months even years to go through all the steps. Frequently execution starts long before they are finalized.
I doubt that 20 people in the entire federal government knew of the contracts that I had with the government. I would expect more would know about a 115 mile wall contract.
Just to be clear – I am not challenging the ACLU’s FOIA request – just your presumption that the musings of the judge and a lawyer in court are meaningful.
I expect ACLU to get what they asked for. I would like to see all government contracts online for everyone to peruse.
There are very few secrets government should be allowed.
But just because ACLU is entitled to this information does not mean that I think court exchanges prior to actual delivery are meaningful.
The lawyer said he was unaware – that is the correct answer when you do not know.
He said I do not know in the safest way possible.
That is his job.
“That lawyer reporting had knowledge of the requested search, and outcome.”
Because you say so ?
I do not actually know about contracts for the border wall – though a relative had a contract to design a section of border wall more than a decade ago.
But neither do you, and likely neither does anyone else in the court.
What we all know is that something like 230Mi were built LAST YEAR.
Those were part of the budget, and the NORM is that budgets continue as they are.
Most contracts have renewal provisions. It is near certain that GSA, ICE, CBP, DHS are CONSTANTLY negotiating and writing contracts for the boarder wall.
They do not stop when they are unsure they will get budget approval.
The budget that was approved had 1.37B for border wall.
I would be completely shocked – it would be malfeasance if the government was not negotiating contracts for that – prior to and immediately after the shutrdown – with the appropriate conjtingencies to deal with whatever congress approved.
Given Trumps repeated remarks that he would use an emergency declaration, it would be my guess that contracts for everything Trump intends to spend were negotiated in 2018 and that the only question was where the money comes from.
The ACLU is entitled to the information they are after – but your presumption that there is something damning in it is nuts.
How dense are you?
(Asked and answered)
The POINT (not the one on your head) was that this was another Trump lie.
He said a contract was signed to extend the wall/fencing along this area.
The lawyer said an investigation of the relevant data base base did not discover said contract.
You think the government lawyer was lying?
What proof do you have of that?
Question: who’s a bigger jackass, you or Donnie?
Be objective.
“The POINT (not the one on your head) was that this was another Trump lie.
He said a contract was signed to extend the wall/fencing along this area.”
Given that I am well past trusting you – please provide a cite to exactly what Trump said.
Though I do not know why I am bothering – because in the most egregious case – and the most unlikely one. Where Trump made a very specific reference to a single specific contract for a specific section of fence at a specific place (BTW Trump is NEVER that specific), and that specific contract just plain does not exist, it is still indsiputeably TRUE that the Wall was onder construction in 2018 (and every years since 2006), that it continues to be under construction, and that construction including new contracts continued even during the shutdown.
So what is it that is SIGNIFICANT that you think Trump lied about ?
Do you think the wall was NOT being constructed in 2018 ? 2019 ?
Do you think there were no contracts in 2018 ? that none of them had extension provisions ? That there will be no new contracts ?
Or is the great lie that Trump purportedly committee some imprecision that only you are abel to identify and care about ?
We just had Wapo proclaim boldly that Trump was full of shit about women getting raped during illegal border crossing – and then NYT interviewing ACTUAL immigrants says – nope Trump was wrong it is WORSE than he said and Wapo is full of shit.
Wapo btw cited “experts” and claimed no one at CBP is aware of this, and yet NYT interviewed people at CBP who were quite aware of this.
If your big issue is some lack of precision on the part of Trump’s tweets – grow up.
Tweets are 200+ characters, They are not legal briefs
“The lawyer said an investigation of the relevant data base base did not discover said contract.”
Again cite – that is not what you said previously and that is not the quote in the article you linked to
“You think the government lawyer was lying?”
No I do not. I think you are:
Misrepresenting what he said.
And further misrepresenting the facts to alter the meaning of what he said.
“What proof do you have of that?”
The article YOU linked to, it quotes the lawyer.
Do you know what “unaware” means ?
“Question: who’s a bigger jackass, you or Donnie?
Be objective.”
Is there a debate over whether Trump is a jack ass ?
He is the jack ass we picked as president – not you.
Jackass is not among the requirements or disqualifiers for president.
Voters get to determine the significance of various character traits of candidates.
I think character is important. People who voted for Clinton(either) or Trump obviously do not. Nor am I particularly interested in a diatribe about how our president has horrible character from someone that voted for someone with horrible character.
If you google “border wall contract” you will get myriads of stories.
The fact that a lawyer in the 1st circuit is unaware of something happening in the 9th or other circuits is unsurprising.
The fact that different parts of the government do not know what the other is doing is unsurprising.
They should – but they do not.
Next time before starting one of these stupid debates – that really boil down to trying to make what someone somewhere states quite obviously “as an oppinion” into a fact that somehow proves that something someone else said – usually Trump is a lie
Try googling.
BTW there are also articles that note that the emergency declaration allows Trump to skip the normal procurement process and competitive bidding.
I oppose the ED, that is a new reason to oppose it.
But it is still a fact whether I like it or not.
SLSCO Ltd. of Galveston, Texas, was awarded a $101 million contract in December, with options for an additional $30 million.
It’s amazing how dense you are.
The doubt that any contract was signed as Trump stated, has been ongoing in the media.
But NO ONE in the Trump administration has produced proof the contract exists.
Why not? If it was a faux charge from the left that Lying Donald lied about that, Trump or his people would have produced the contract.
Are you so stubbornly in denial not to understand that?
Answer: yes you are.
Trump lies all the time.
You deny it all the time.
That’s why I have zero respect for your opinions.
BTW, have I told you to GFY lately?
“it’s amazing how dense you are.”
Not dense just doing to you EXACTLY the same thing you are trying to do with Trump to point out how stupid and hypocritical it is.
You are demanding more than linguistic perfection from anything Trump says or you brand it a lie. It is irrelevant to you whether the details you piss over matter, It is even irrelevant to you if they are actually correct if you can misrepresent them as incorrect.
Welcome to the linguistic hell you have created.
I have no idea what Trump actually said so I have not gone after you on that, but it is near certain that you misrepresented that – you never correctly represent anything anyone says.
But you have OBVIOUSLY inaccurately reported what the Lawyer said.
Is the difference between what the lawyer said and what you represented large ?
Significant ? Probably not, nor is the difference between what Trump said and the truth large or significant.
If Trump is a liar for lack of precision – then so are you.
“the doubt that any contract was signed as Trump stated,”
Doubt is not fact. Fear is not fact.
I do not know what Trump stated, but I know that I do not trust you to report what anyone else said accurately.
Further you demand perfection from others – or you call them liars.
But you make no such demands of yourself.
This is from the american conservative. But it largely quotes a story in the atlantic that is on a study demographic study of intolerance.
I read it and thought – Jay, Robby, DD.
White Male Well educated living in an urban bubble – absolutely the most intolerant group in the country.
The left – pro-active – sure they can see all the worlds problems and they they have solutions, which pretty much always mean telling OTHERS that they are racist, homophobic, mysoginst, hateful, hating haters, and then telling them how they must live and prepared to use force to impose that. And angry because they have discovered that everyone does not agree with them,
Everyone else – reactive. They just want to be left alone. But they are getting ever angrier from being bated, poked, prodded, told they are hateful, hating haters, and that they must change who they are voluntarially or by FORCE.
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dreher/educated-white-liberals-intolerance/
“has been ongoing in the media.”
Media ? Why am I supposed to trust the media ?
Regardless, again you are misrepresenting. ACLU massachusets filed an FOIA request.
I have no problem with that.
The media are reporting that – I have no problem with that.
Everything else is spin.
“But NO ONE in the Trump administration has produced proof the contract exists.”
I just linked a large number of wall contracts – there was a plethora of them issued in Nov. 2018 using spending authority that had already been approved. ALL of those had extension provisions for 2019 – that is not even slightly unusual. Further new contracts were issued this year and more will be issued in April.
“Why not? If it was a faux charge from the left that Lying Donald lied about that, Trump or his people would have produced the contract.”
You have an incredibly broad beleif in government competence, as well as your own self importance and that of the media. As well as this odd beleif that every attorney int eh US government is a Trump toady.
McCabe, Ohr, Baker, Comey, Rosenstein – these are all Trump administration lawyers who have NOT done what Trump wanted. It should be self evident to you now that While constitutionally everyone in the federal government is answerable to Trump, that in real life a large number are part of the resistance and a larger number are just disconnected and clueless.
“Are you so stubbornly in denial not to understand that?
Answer: yes you are.”
I am holding you to the same standards you hold others.
If you are going to demand absolute precision of petty and inconsequential things, and cry liar, liar, liar, then so am I.
But I will give you one advantage – I will not deliberately misrepresent what you say.
“Trump lies all the time.
You deny it all the time.
That’s why I have zero respect for your opinions.”
No Trump does not lie all the time. The overwhelming majority of what you and the press call lies – it ACCURATE, and a larger segment is generally if not specifically true, and another section is inconsequential.
When you make stupid mistakes – such as this one. I call you on it.
You clearly misrepresented the remarks of the attorney.
There are a couple of other misrepresentation I am very suspicious that you made, but I am not going to try to find the Trump tweet or the court transcript.
If Trump “lies all the time” – but YOUR criteria so do you.
And in fact you lie about Trump lying.
BTW, I am not obligated to accept or deny anything. I am perfectly free to do as I mostly do and pay no attention to what Trump says. I am not compelled to read every Trump tweet and establish the veracity of each.
I do not have to accept that Trump lies all the time, conversely I do not have to deny that he lies all the time. And in fact I do not accept Trump lies all the time and I do not deny anything either. This is not a binary issue – except to you.
“BTW, have I told you to GFY lately?”
Does that make you feel better ?
And the distrustful Media can’t be trusted about Trump lying about releasing his taxes, or lying about his reason for reneging- because these clips don’t honestly portray what he said, right Dubious?
Benghazi was a spontaneous protest over and internet video.
If you like your doctor you can keep them
If you like your insurance you can keep it.
While many of the clips here do not say what they are supposed to,
Trump did say he would release his taxes, and he has not.
And in nov. 2016 you got to decide whether that was important to you.
If you did not vote for Trump – then he made no binding promise to you.
If you did, then you already had your chance to express your views in nov. 2016.
We are not talking about an issue of government conduct or policy.
We are talking about renigging on a choice to do something that Trump was not obligated to do, to providing you with information you do not have a right to.
Trump had no right to your vote – and I am gathering you did not give it too him .
You have no right to his tax return.
You are square with trump.
Roby;
To be clear – this is a POLL, it is not a fact, it is just a summary of people OPINION at the time the poll was taken.
The only thing it tells us is that americans have a better view of their position in the world Since Trump was elected, A better one than they have had since 2003.
Whether Trump has actually made america Great Again is an independent question.
But more americans than any time in the past 15 years think that is the case.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/247064/americans-perceptions-world-image-best-2003.aspx?g_source=link_NEWSV9&g_medium=LEAD&g_campaign=item_&g_content=Americans%27%2520Perceptions%2520of%2520U.S.%2520World%2520Image%2520Best%2520Since%25202003
Just as Murdoch told Fox editors to squelch the negative story about Trump paying hush money to Stormy, Trump has squelched negative info release about those who help richen Trump World.
Rosenstein has still not testified
Lots of things have not occured that should have.
BTW why is it the US’s responsibility to investigate and report on an alleged murder than took place probably in turkey committed probably by saudi’s ?
How many times does it need to be said “We are not the policemen of the world”.
If Trump was obligated to provide a report – he should have done so – long ago.
My suggestion:
“We do not know, and it is not any of our buisiness. “
Your suggestion is like most of your opinions- out of step with political norms.
There is bipartisan agreement that it IS our business. But you must blather, you can’t help yourself… so blather away…
https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/05/politics/trump-congress-khashoggi-magnitsky-act-angry-senators/index.html
For more than a century there was bipartisan agreement that Women could not vote.
There has been bipartisan agreement that being gay is a crime.
I can go on an on.
I do not care what political norms are.
I do not care what there is bi-partisan agreement on.
We are not the policmen of the world. That is a fact, it is not a quesiton of bipartisan agreement. In the event that we tried to investigate in SA and Turkey without the permission of either government – we would have zero power, and arguably doing so would be an act of war and certainly a violation of national sovereignity.
We do not allow foreign police in the US to investigate, issue warrants, etc.
We arrest spies who try to investigate in this country.
Political reality MUST yeild to ACTUAL reality.
Large majorities of Americans think Trump is a shitbird. Dishonest in many different categories.
“President Donald Trump committed crimes before he became president, American voters say 64 – 24 percent in a Quinnipiac University National Poll released today.”
“American voters believe Cohen more than Trump 50 – 35 percent. Cohen told the truth, 44 percent of voters say, while 36 percent say he did not tell the truth. “
“Voters approve 41 – 36 percent of the way Democrats in Congress handled Cohen’s testimony before the U.S. House Oversight Committee. Voters disapprove 51 – 25 percent of the way Republicans handled the Cohen hearing.”
“Voters say 65 – 30 percent that Trump is not honest, his worst grade ever on that character trait. He gets negative grades on other traits:
39 – 58 percent that he has good leadership skills;
39 – 58 percent that he cares about average Americans;
22 – 71 percent that he is a good role model for children.”
https://poll.qu.edu/national/release-detail?ReleaseID=2603
Not more of this polling nonsense.
If I respond to you – I will get a tirade from Robby that I am offering opinions not facts.
Duh!
Polls are not facts.
There is a mess of new polls coming out.
Purportedly Trump has had a bad week – and yet his numbers seem to be steadily rising.
Trump purportedly has 17 states locked for 2020, and there are 6-7 states that are in play FOR trump in 2020 that were not in 2016. Several election handicappers are predicting a Trump landslide.
Another article intervied democratic voters in Pennsylvania, Ohio, and Michigan and they are very angry with democrats. voters who voted FOR Trump in 2016, For a democrat in 2020, are saying that the Democrats must Put up or shutup NOW.
That they sent people like Conner Lamb to congress because the promised to STAND UP to Pelosi – and they did not, and now the voters are angry – and these are DEMOCRATS.
They are saying that democrats need to nail Trump on Russian Collusion NOW, or cut this shit out and get back to governing.
AGAIN these are democrats.
Other election forecasters are saying using their economic election projection models – Trump wins 2020 in a landslide.
Oh, and the economic news ? Not only did the economy beat the dower projections for the end of 2018 – 2.6% Q4 rather than 2.3% – but the indications are the numbers will be revised UPWARD. There is aparently a fight now over whether the 2018 growth was 2.9% or 3.1%.
Further all the stories that the economy was slowing down, that the effects of the tax cut had faded – oops, not true. There was some odd inventory mess in q4 2018 – businesses increased their inventory before xmas more than they should have and this is dangerous, but the danger has passed the problem is resolved and investment has rebounded.
Myriads of numbers like consumer confidence are at 15 year highs.
For sure – Trump is surely romantic…
That is actually funny.
Ah, Presidential emoluments under Trump never cease.
“T-Mobile admits it spent nearly $200,000 at Trump hotel while lobbying for Sprint merger”
hill.cm/ZeRctdH
“No Person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under them [i.e., the United States], shall, without the Consent of the Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.”
The emolument’s clause is NOT specific to the president, it applies to everyone holding office
It prohibits gifts.
Appiontments,
titles
paid jobs
from:
Kings,
Princes,
Foreign states.
It does not prohibit businesses that you own stock in but do not manage from doing business with foriegn governments or heads of state.
It says absolutely nothing at all about any types of relationships with entities that are NOT kings, princes, foriegn states.
George Washington had significant business dealings with the Federal government WHILE HE WAS PRESIDENT.
Presumably those who wrote the emoluments clause knew what it meant.
emolument : the returns arising from office or employment usually in the form of compensation or perquisites
Most places define it as the salary and benefits of someone who is employed by another.
Trump is employed by the federal government. He is not employed by any King Prince or foreign government.
2016 was a serious blown opportunity for libertarians.
Johnson/Weld was practically a dream ticket.
Two respected experienced politicians running against cooks and crooks.
There was a bumper sticker
johnson/weld 2016 we are not the crazy ones this time.
They did well, but not nearly as well as hoped.
They did not get libertarians out for under the onerous and probably unconstitutional burden that third parties have of producing millions of signatures to get on the ballot.
Most states have laws that require a very small number of signatures for the candidate of one of the two parties, but several orders of magnitude more from anyone else.
One of the big goals for 2016 was to hit 5% which would have qualified the LP as a major party in many states for decades.
Weld’s endorsement of Hillary after Trump was nominated was disasterous.
If you accept a parties nomination – you have committed to be the candidate.
You do not get to have second thoughts. If you can not do that – do not run.
Johnson made some mistakes. But I am not sure it mattered.
The press did NOT want Johnson to get attention, and they did not give it to him.
This is not much different than the collusion between the press and the DNC to tank sanders.
And aparently similar nonsense already taking place in the DNC.
I would remind everyone that this entire russian hacking narrative, rests on the premise that the DNC should have been able to conspire with the press to F over sanders
and no one should have been allowed to expose that.
Lets presume that Trump actually colluded with Russia.
To do what ?
To hack the DNC and publicly release emails that showed the press was in the tank for Clinton and F’ing over sanders.
If Trump did conspire with russia to hack the DNC – that means they had FORE KNOWLEDGE and MATERIAL CONTRIBUTED – that is a crime, Trump should be impeached.
But that does not alter in the slightest that Clinton and the DNC behaved reprehensibly.
It is their conduct that cost them the election.
Saying that Clinton should have won becuase she should have been allowed to keep her dirty deeds secret, sounds pretty revolting.
I’m waiting for Frump to say King just called to say he doesn’t know anything about this:
As I noted earlier – there is far more going on than the simple exchanges between Trump and Kim.
Just ONE of those is that Kim has a strong hardline faction in NK that is opposed to a deal.
The general concensus is that Kim Un – while ruthless and beligerant, WANTS A DEAL.
That he is prepared to sacrifice ALOT to get one. But that others in NK do NOT want a deal.
It is also probable that Kim NEEDS a deal.
One of the likely reasons that Trump did not agree to a partical deal with partial sanctions release is that allowing even SOME goods into NK would eliminate the pressure on NK.
We do not know alot about NK intenerally – often we do not find out about famine and starvation until long after. But there is a general concensus that NK is in pretty bad shape.
“Just ONE of those is that Kim has a strong hardline faction in NK that is opposed to a deal.”
Really? And you know this because they called you in for consultation?
“”Just ONE of those is that Kim has a strong hardline faction in NK that is opposed to a deal.”
Really? And you know this because they called you in for consultation?”
I know this because I read.
Google is your friend – or you can read the dozen or so stories on the NK summit and its aftermath, There are SEVERAL that reference Kim’s issues with hardliners at Home.
But beyond that – why is it that you presume that this is trivially simple and one dimensional ?
Why do you presume that neither Kim nor Trump are factoring anything else at all into the offers they make or the choices they make ?
A few days ago you – and all the obama alcolytes who negotiated the shitty deal with Iran so that they could say they had a deal, were writing op-eds telling Trump to use the Iran deal as a model and not take just any deal to get a deal – as if that is not exactly what they had done.
And now the very same people are angry because since Trump did not see a good enough deal he walked away.
A week ago we were Told that Trump was going to take a deal with NK to drive cohen off the news. Then Trump didn’t and Cohen turned into a flop.
Now your angry because he did not take the bad deal ?
When reality, as in visiting an ER crowded with migrants and for each, two (“regulations”) Customs and Border Patrol guards, hits at home, the dducks in this case in San Diego and is probably hitting many along the border and dozens of miles north of the border. What would normally be a quiet Monday night with adequate and timely medical care available, has according to the nurse at Coronado Sharp Hospital ER (16 miles from Tijuana) been “a mess since January” – unlike prior years.
Hence long wait time for the migrants, supposedly “low trauma ones”, said one of the CBP guards that drove them up from the border. the CBP guy said “we don’t have much medical training” and that the more severe cases get sent by ambulance to the big facilities in San Diego. Meantime communities like Coronado, Chula Vista, Grossmont ERs are also crowded. “Since the recent death of two migrants, they are more vigilant, he said”.
As a result what would have taken a couple of hours for the migrants, CDP guys and neighborhood patients now took more like five hours.
For more background on this medical situation, the NYT has a huge article on it today:
“Border Patrol Facilities Put Detainees With Medical Conditions at Risk
The deaths of two children in Border Patrol custody point to shortfalls in health care provided to migrants, who sometimes arrive with serious illness and injury.”
P.S. Mrs. Dduck appears to be OK now.
One of the consequences of the wall construction that has already occured is that those going arround the wall are going farther and farther out in to the boonies into places where it is more dangerous. Further when they are aprehended they are farther away from hospitals, and facilites that would have cared for them in the past.
Overall crossings are way down. but many many remote locations are being flooded with crossers who can no longer cross where it was easier.
https://www.cbp.gov/newsroom/national-media-release/border-wall-contract-award-arizona
From a study in the Atlantic
“In general, the most politically intolerant Americans, according to the analysis, tend to be whiter, more highly educated, older, more urban, and more partisan themselves. This finding aligns in some ways with previous research by the University of Pennsylvania professor Diana Mutz, who has found that white, highly educated people are relatively isolated from political diversity. They don’t routinely talk with people who disagree with them; this isolation makes it easier for them to caricature their ideological opponents. (In fact, people who went to graduate school have the least amount of political disagreement in their lives, as Mutz describes in her book Hearing the Other Side.) By contrast, many nonwhite Americans routinely encounter political disagreement. They have more diverse social networks, politically speaking, and therefore tend to have more complicated views of the other side, whatever side that may be.
We see this dynamic in the heat map. In some parts of the country, including swaths of North Carolina and upstate New York, people still seem to give their fellow Americans the benefit of the doubt, even when they disagree. In other places, including much of Massachusetts and Florida, people appear to have far less tolerance for political difference. They may be quicker to assume the worst about their political counterparts, on average.”
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/february-marked-12-year-high-for-illegal-immigration-76-000-encountered-at-southern-border
Apparently AOC means something different by “the GREEN new deal”
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/politics/ocasio-cortezs-chief-of-staff-ran-1m-slush-fund-by-diverting-campaign-cash-to-his-own-companies
the NYT is lying about these checks, right dhlii.
And the implication that they were paybacks to Cohen for hush money hasn’t been proved to your satisfaction, right.
And the fact that Trump lied about the payoffs, lied about knowing about them, lied that he knew anything about them AT ALL doesn’t convince you he wasn’t-isn’t lying about any of it. Right?
“The NYT is lying about these checks, right dhlii.”
Do not know, do not care. The NDA issue has always been a nonstarter.
The ONLY potential crime involved would be if Daniels claim that someone physically inteminated her is proveably true and if that person was or is tied to cohen and if Trump directed Cohen to intimidate her.
That died long ago.
At this time the evidence is Cohen paid Daniels for the NDA’s, and Trump personally reimbursed him in 2017.
The campaign was not involved.
Even by your ludicrous definition of campaign finance law violation – one in which every one of the FEC commissioners has rejected – Cohen would be guilty of a campaign finance law violation. Trump would not.
“And the implication that they were paybacks to Cohen for hush money”
Don;t make it an implication – call it the god’s honest truth – it is legal.
“hasn’t been proved to your satisfaction, right.”
The evidence is that Trump paid Cohen personally in 2017. That might change, but it does not matter. There is no possible arrangement of known or possible fact that constitutes a crime on the part of Trump and even your lunatic expansion of CF law makes it a crime for Cohen.
“And the fact that Trump lied about the payoffs, lied about knowing about them, lied that he knew anything about them AT ALL doesn’t convince you he wasn’t-isn’t lying about any of it. Right?”
Lost of assumptions there. Also lots of you telling me what other people have said – which you pretty uniformly do highly innaccurately.
First lets start with is there a crime – NO! There is no possible arrangement of the known facts and any probable suplimental facts that would make this into a crime.
Cohen negotiated a very badly drafted NDA – possibly at Trump’s direction, and he was likely reimbursed for it by Trump personally.
Completely legal.
To my knowledge (and yours) Trump has never said anything under oath, to the FBI or to Mueller about this. And if he has neither of us know what he said, so I do not know how I can know that something I have never seen or heard is a lie.
As to Trump’s public remarks. I do not recall Trump saying the specific things you claim he did.
In the event that he did – WoW! Trump lied about an NDA.
Isn’t the purpose of an NDA to prevent the information in the NDA from becoming public ?
Trump has publicly denied having sex with Daniels.
That is PROBABLY a lie.
Though I would point out that NDA’s are quite often negotiated to prevent people from spreading lies.
We also learned from Cohen that Trump has no love child running arround nor had an affair with the maid.
And we learned long ago that Trump has a small NDA with the doorman at his building.
As best we can tell to pay him not to repeat FALSE gossip.
So “Where is the Beef ?”
NYS Insurance Department. They can be tough and thorough when they want to. Too bad they have taken so long.
“Trump Organization’s Insurance Policies Under Scrutiny in New York”https://www.nytimes.com/2019/03/05/nyregion/trump-aon-risk-services-subpoena.html
“NYS Insurance Department. They can be tough and thorough when they want to. Too bad they have taken so long.”
No they can’t. They will not find anything – because there is nothing to find.
How do I know ? Because there is no bank or insurance company suing trump for Fraud.
Outside of Law and Order and CSI, can you name a single real world instance of business insurance fraud in the US in the past 40 years ?
There are myriads of instances of individuals engaging in medical insurance fraud.
There are some instances of doctors offices engaging in medicare fraud, or maybe something like the scooter fraud about a decade ago.
There is absolutely nothing even vaguely close to what you are fishing for.
If Mr. Omidyar wishes to spend his money attacking Trump I am fine with that.
But how do the rest of you like learning that you have been trolled by paid #nevertrunmpers ?
And what is the difference between Russian spending $1M to send stupid political adds that no one who has looked at any of them would beleive were effective, and Mr. Omidyar spending $100M to assure that you were fed an unending stream of #nevertrump drivel ?
I keep trying to point out to you over and over.
“influence” is just another name for persuade and that is legal, and unstopable.
This is how the media manipulates the ignorance of the American public. Few people know that a President can keep gifts that cost less than $350.00 (I believe that is the right number), but if it is $350.01, it is cataloged by the state department, a value is placed on the piece and it becomes a gift to the American people and placed in the National Archives.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/foreign-leaders-lavish-trump-diplomatic-gifts-162322484–politics.html
Now if the president, any president, wants to keep that gift, then he/she can buy it from the American people for the value placed on it by the state department.
So why is that not part of the article? Because the press in this country knows that American people are ignorant of critical information, they know the American voters can be manipulated into believing almost anything, they know they can add to the misconceptions already in place and Trump will take these things himself without paying for them.
I have no idea what the answer is because a free press should be the foundation to a democracy. But when the press becomes the voice of a political movement, such as seen in Russia, Cuba, Venezuela and any other dictatorial nations, then those that have some knowledge of the truth should become extremely worried because their numbers are far fewer than the ignorant that have no knowledge of facts.
I don’t want to quibble with you over this Ron, but although the linked article doesn’t note the gifts can be purchased later on, in the first paragraph it does says “Like all of the other gifts to Trump, his wife, daughter Ivanka and son-in-law Jared Kushner, those were turned over to the National Archives.”
Those gifts are held in the National Archives for a president’s term of office, and then turned over to a Presidential Library, where that president can buy it back at market value.
The question to ask next is why do foreign entities present expensive gifts to presidents (and family) that they know must be turned over to the US government? Because the gifts are symbolic ass kisses, to curry favor – and perhaps to insinuate to said President ‘be nice to us, and further gifts will be yours when you leave office (Clinton’s high priced speech fees for example).
Of course I’m not in office, so any gifts you want to send my way (Irish Whiskey 🥃) I’ll primptly put to good use… 😇
Amazing – agreement !
I can fully understand how the prospect of massive future speaking fees – from THE RUSSIANS as well as pretty much every despot in the mideast could be alluring to the Clinton’s – at the pinnacle of the Clinton’s income prior to becoming president they made less in a year than Trump makes in a minute.
Do you think that you can attract Bezo’s with personal gifts ?
Aparently he is facing one of the most expensive divorces in history.
He will STILL be so rich that 100 of him could not spend it all in his life time.
If Trump is worth about 1/2 of what he claims and his is managing a 5% ROI – which would be LOW, Buffet would never settle for that. Then he is making something like 250K/second.
And he is doing that with very little effort – it is fundimentally a passive investment.
Alternately if he liquidated now, invested everything is 0% return to be extra safe, and spent something like 100K/minute he would not run out of money before he died even if he lived to 110.
If you add in almost any positive ROI he would die with more money than he has now.
So how is it that you “buy” trump ?
I am not saying that is impossible. I am saying that it is not with gifts and money.
I would suggest looking up Maslow’s heirarchy of needs.
As we meet more fundimental needs we seek to fulfill higher order needs.
Trump has pretty much total security with regard to his physiological and safety needs.
His efforts are going to be directed at higher needs – love, admiration, self esteem, self actualization.
Slapping his name on buildings all over the world – is one manifestation of that.
Trump seeks the respect of the world, the love of the world – or atleast his followers, he seeks to be remembered – and it is pretty certain that one way or the other his presidency WILL be remembered.
You ask why he keeps those campaign promises – it is the integrity of a business person,
It is also because when historian write about immigration they are going to write about TRUMP’s WALL. He hopes and beleives that will be a great success.
They are going to write about Trump’s improvementes to the economy,
they are going to write about Trump’s negotiation of better trade deals.
Trump is not merely promising to “make america Great Again” – he wants MAGA to be real, to be remembered and to be permanently associated with Trump.
FDR is universally remembered as having save the nation from the great depression – even though that is false, and as the great war leader – which is true.
FDR is never going to be forgotten.
Coolidge was a far better president and almost no one remembers him.
Trump aspires to be Reagan, FDR, Kennedy.
Not by doing precisely what they did, but by transforming the country as they did.
That may not happen – but that is what he wants. ‘
If you are going to try to bribe Trump – that is what you have to be offering.
You could give him personally a fleet of gulf streams and he would not care.
Congrats To Trump: your Administration has produced the GRRREATEST TRADE DEFICIT in the nation’s history.
Last year it reached $891 billion.
Keep us ‘winning’ with your exemplary economic deficits.
Future generations will thank (curse?) you!
Trade between nations is one of the very few things in economics that is absolutely positively ZERO SUM.
Trump is Wrong about Trade – but your criticism makes EXACTLY THE SAME ERROR.
Trade deficits are not ACTUAL deficts. They are NOT the same as government budget deficits.
If there is a dispartiy in the flow of goods and services between two nations that disparity MUST be corrected elsewhere. Though not necescarily in Trade in goods.
A major part of the problem with the fixation on Trade Deficits is the complete misunderstanding of money.
Money is not wealth – atleast not in any significant sense. If we massively increased the money in the world without altering production we would be no more wealthy than before.
Sending massing numbers of green slips of paper to China in return for goods, if china does nothing but horde those green slips of paper is incredibly POSITIVE for the US.
BTW Trade within a currency domain – such as between states of counties or cities is zero sum on the whole but not for each individual city or state or county.
No one is fixated on the Trade deficit between Kansas and Texas.
Why because it is meaningless.
“Trump is Wrong about Trade – but your criticism makes EXACTLY THE SAME ERROR.”
BZZZ! WRONG!!!
We have lost 7 million jobs to China (Forbes 2016)
We have added 33 million jibs.
But most of the jobs added were in medical (Nursing, techs, etc) and leisure and hospitality.
Yes, medical pays as well as manufacturing, but how many steel workers are interested in becoming an RN?
And how many leisure and hospitality jobs pay as well as manufacturing?
“You tax my product with 25%, I tax your product 25%” .
Sorry Ron – Nope.
“We have lost 7 million jobs to China (Forbes 2016)”
We lose jobs to automation all the time.
A job is not a right.
Conversely when government prevents consumers from getting a better price on a product, because that produce is offered by a foreigner, then the GOVERNMENT is STEALING.
“We have added 33 million jibs.”
Absent labor restricting regulations such as the minimum wage law, the market will always find a use for nearly all available labor. If 7M jobs are lost in some area, Someone will find a way to profit from utlizing that labor in some other way.
“But most of the jobs added were in medical (Nursing, techs, etc) and leisure and hospitality.
Yes, medical pays as well as manufacturing, but how many steel workers are interested in becoming an RN?
And how many leisure and hospitality jobs pay as well as manufacturing?”
How well something pays is irrelevant. Absent government and central banks historically both prices and wages slowly go DOWN. They are intrinsically linked.
Given a fixed moneysupply or one hard linked to GDP, or population, if prices decline because lower cost goods from China, then Wages must also decline – essentially to a net zero. EXCEPT for one thing, and that is that the shift to lower priced goods from china means an available labor supply in the US that will now produce MORE goods likely at lower wages and therefore cost – the amount that is produced will go UP – but since money supply is fixed the price of goods and wages must go DOWN. But we are more wealthy because we can afford more goods.
““You tax my product with 25%, I tax your product 25%”” .
One of the problems with Trump’s economic nationalism is that it suffers the same intellectual failure than the lefts identity politics does.
Rights belong to individuals – not groups, not even countries.
There is no American product, There is what is made by Joe Doe – or Chrysler.
Nor is there a RIGHT to tax, there is just a power to do so.
This is better understood by reframing your statement.
If you punished your people by stealing 25% of cost of a product from them, I will punish my people by stealing 25% of the cost of some products from them.
There is a right for the buyer and seller to engage in any exchange they agree to mutually.
Though it has been ignored the constitution litterally prohibits not just the federal government but the states from interfering in free exchange.
Rights belong to individuals. Not groups, not nations.
Often when we try to look at information through the lens of groups that distorts the truth.
As an example the GINI index for the US is rising (or it has over the past 40 years).
That means greater income inequality – purportedly.
There is no doubt about the statistical distribution of wealth.
But at the same time the poor today are NOT the same people as they were 10, 20, 40 years ago. The average person in the US rises by approximately 3 quintiles during their lifetime and declines by approximately .5.
Further the so called destruction of the middle class, when graphed is merely a representation that our wealth curve has become stretched and there is no longer a bulge in the center. The average wealth of each class has increased, the range of wealth in each class has increased as the wealth curve gets stretched out further and further.
Sometimes we can see important things from group data. But more often we have to look at what is happening with actual individuals.
You used steelworkers as an example. Rising steel production elsewhere in the world drove lower prices – that everyone in the world has benefited from. US steelworkers lost jobs in steel mills – PERMANENTLY. Those jobs will NEVER come back.
But almost no steelworker was PERMANENTLY out of a job. Almost all of them ended up with other jobs. Not as SteelWorkers though. Many of them had to take jobs that paid less, but only rarely drastically less. This is reasonable, the lower price of steel inherently means that the value of labor to produce steel DECLINED – their skill (producing steel) is not worth as much as it was.
BTW that is actually a good thing.
They subsequently adapted their skills – some found jobs paying MORE than before – they found more profitable uses for their skills. But must ending up with jobs paying less in other areas. But they found jobs. Further the net result overall – was NEW JOBS – jobs that did not exist before. Producing something that was not produced before – we know this because GDP rose, it did not drop. The US produced less steel, but it still produced MORE value than before (this is actually false, the US has NEVER had a decline in steel production, but we have had a decline in steel production jobs)
Most likely the steelworkers displaced people from other jobs and on and on down the line, until some people ended up in jobs that did not exist before.
Regardless, the laws of supply and demand – says laws, tell us that supply creates its own demand. An abundance of ANYTHING – labor, pollution, will at some point be converted into a product that people want.
Honestly, Dave, you act as if China has not been lying, cheating and waging economic warfare against the US for the past 30 years.
“The Trump administration fortunately seems to understand the dangers to a greater extent than its predecessors did. Unfortunately, our major trading partners do not seem to be aware of the enormity and dangers of the problem. In my view, the multilateral trading system is not to blame – it is the right approach to raising standards of living in the U.S. and abroad, and building international security. The problem is that one major player thinks playing by the rules is for suckers. ”
https://www.forbes.com/sites/cblock/2018/03/13/yes-china-does-cheat-in-trade-the-rest-of-the-world-needs-to-wake-up/#182badeb6ed2
“Honestly, Dave, you act as if China has not been lying, cheating and waging economic warfare against the US for the past 30 years.”
I do not doubt any of that. Nor do I care. Everything that a nation is able to do with trade to try to game it is MORE HARMFUL to themselves than to others.
If China tarrifs US goods – it decreases the standard of living of its own people.
Further the economic theory that protectionism fosters industries in your own country – has been repeatedly and thoroughly debunked by studies and data.
Protecting an industry pretty much ensures that it get stupid, and non-competitive.
Kind of like the US auto industry in the 70’s and 80’s.
Subsidizing exports – means you are REDUCING your nations standard of living and RAISING that of another in the hopes of buying jobs – it does not work.
The US has also ranted constantly about Chinese currency manipulation – again assuming China is doing it – which I think they are though less than we accuse them of – it is still ultimately a subsidy of the standard of living of your trading partners at the expense of your own people.
We are fixated today on Intellectual property.
The US has the worst most evil and offensive intellectual property laws in the world and we have been intent on using our economic might to impose them on others.
It is so bad that – in the 60’s we actually had among the best IP laws in the world, and our trade negotiators and successive administrations used the trade/treaty process to BYPASS much of our constitutional protections against bad law to borrow the worst IP concepts from other countries. We often had trade negotiations where the other countries wished to adopt our mor lienient IP laws and WE demanded that the trade agreement impose THEIR laws on us. This then ends up with a fast track up down vote by the senate in a process that can not be fillibustered and does nto go through the house.
Our IP laws are evil.
Further the whole IP thing is a red herring – even IBM did a study back in the 80’s and found THEY would be better off with NO IP LAWS – the economy would do better and grow faster.
I am not sure I am so libertarian as to abolish all IP laws – but given the opportunity, which will never arrise. I would return to those our founders imposed.
Copyrights limited to 14 years with ONE renewal of 14 years. Unpublished works are automatically protected, but published works must be FORMALLY copyrighted.
Patents that only apply to tangible things that you can DEMONSTRATE – you can not patent an idea, and patents that expire 14 years after they are issued.
No derivative patents.
But addressing things as they are – sort of, We already know from history, that YOU CAN NOT GET AHEAD by stealing the IP of someone else.
It is just not possible. The USSR tried to do that to the US forever – they pulled our patents and engaged in agressive spying of all kinds.
It guarantess you will ALWAYS be behind.
Fundimental to entrepeneurship, inovation is NOT just the idea, but the process of discovery.
Let me use a different example – there are TWO great maritime powers in the world – the US and the UK. Briefly Japan arrose as a great naval power. No one else has ever been a significant naval power (since the 1600’s). At various times in History France, Germany, Russia, China, India have on paper been competitive naval powers.
No one has ever been competitive in practice. A navy is NOT just about the ships, or technology it is about knowing how to sail them and how to fight them, there are infinite numbers of bits and peices to be a great naval power.
The germans probably were among the best submariners in the world for 50 years.
But that did not translate to the rest of their navy.
It is estimated that it takes 50 years atleast to build a navy – and I am not talking about ships. I am talking about the traditions and knowledge and experience.
All of which is readily available to anyone in books. But you still have to DO IT for 50 years.
Russia has spent more than a century trying to be a great naval power – they are not, and they are not close. The Chinese have been working on that for 50 years. They are NOT a naval power. There exist today many many threats to us naval power that make it increasingly difficult for us to park a Carrier Battle Group off SOME nations coasts and survive. But despite the fact that other countries MIGHT have the ability to threaten a US Carrier Battle Group off their coast and MAYBE force us to keep our distance.
There is no other nation in the world that can park a CBG off THEIR OWN COAST and control the sea in that area.
Technology is the same. It has taken nearly a century for the rest of the world to be able to touch the edges of Hollywood. Even today the entertainment industry in the US is larger than the rest of the world combined. There is no secret source. Absolutely there are periodically some fantastic productions from other countries, But no one else in the world can produce the megahits that roll out of Hollywood over and over and over.
There are narrow areas of technology where the chinese are AHEAD of the US, but the fundimentals – no one else in the world is designing CPU’s as an example.
There are others who make them, but no one else designs them.
I am heavy into some aspects of the cutting edge of technolgy and TODAY, there is a slow drain of technolgy production BACK to the US.
Why ? That same entrepeneurship I talked about before. If you want to produce 1million of some component – the US can not compete. If you need to produce a million – in 50 differnet individually customized versions – no one else is the world can do that besides the US.
If you think economics is about producing millions of identical widgets as cheaply as possible (they is the basis of the US’s brain dead anti-trust law) then take a look at the grocery aisle in your supermarket. If that were true – there would be 3 large makers of cornflakes and NOTHING ELSE. There are 3 large breakfast cereal makers – and atleast 30 smaller ones.
The larger companies are continually required to produced ever more different types of breakfast cerial or lose their market.
Economics is NOT about producing vast quantities of identical goods at very low prices, it is about producing as close as possible exactly what each individual person wants.
And this problem gets WORSE as standard of living rises. They more wealth we have they less willing we are to settle for exactly the same thing as the next guy.
Henry Ford’s assembly line was fantastic, the modern assembly line must move towards producing every single product customized. No one else in the world can do that.
Just to be clear – China is not going away. The US is always going to have to compete.
We are way ahead and will be for the foreseable future, but anything we are very good at now – the chinese will be in 20-50 years. We can not sit on our hands.
Ultimately competition – between China and the US or between Ford and GM is good for ALL of us. It means we are better off, we have more of what we want and need – WHATEVER that is.
“The Trump administration fortunately seems to understand the dangers to a greater extent than its predecessors did. ”
Bunk. Absolutely politicians are completely clueless about Trade and economics, including Trump’s predescessors. Absolutely prior administrations have screwed up.
But all governments will screw it up.
Trump is using trade to pander to a specific class of voters that is instrumental to his winning.
Fortunately much of what he is doing is kabuki theater.
Manufacturing was returning to the US before trump, and not because of Obama.
It may have accelerated during Trump for a few Trump related reasons – more like having a better tax and regulatory environment.
I do not think Trump’s trade deals thus far have been bad.
For the most part his goal and what he does effectively move towards is closer to real free trade. But politics aside we would have been as well off had he done nothing.
One of the most fundimental problems facing Brexit is that the UK is looking to bolster its position as a global trading nation – that is their history. Joining the EU gave them access to European markets – at the cost of access to india, china, austrailia, the US – basically all their historic trading partners.
The US has offered the UK a trivially simple free trade deal – if a US company can sel it in the US, it can sell it in the UK and if a UK company can sell it in the UK it can sell it in the US.
That is one of the problems with the UK and EU trying to work out a deal.
When you hear discussions about not errecting border controls in Ireland, that is what it is about. It is about preventing US products from entering the rest of europe through the UK.
One of the complexities in the negotiations is that if the UK can get a real free trade deal with the US and the rest of the former british commonwealth – it probably is better off than trading with the EU. UK trade with EU is enormous, but it is declining, UK trade with the rest of the world is large and rising.
Or we could just get rid of all the rules. that would provide a level playing field.
Niobody would have to “play by the rules” because there would be none.
BTW – though slowly that is where we are ultimately headed.
Government can not possibly keep up with the advances of technology.
TODAY, I can buy anything I want from anywhere in the world relatively easily regardless of whether it is legal in the US.
That is only going to improve over time.
Less and less of sales go through the entire supply chain. More and more purchases are person to person and often accross the world.
If I buy a single children’s toy from a company in Thailand or the Philpeans, or India, and it is shipped directly to me – who checks to see if it complies with US regulations ?
Do you think that the maker in India even knows US regulations ?
Do you think US customs, or regulatory agencies can even dream of being able to enforce our regulations ?
Just to be clear – this is not about deliberately thwarting laws like our drug laws – though you will get lots of that too.
But it is about the fact that toy manufacturers in Thailand do not have to go through an expensive and rigorous approval process to certify that their toys have no lead in them, when there is no lead in them and they aren’t even thinking about lead.
The US keeps making small business harder – that just drives americans to foriegn small businesses.
I keep telling you the difficult to see negative effects of all regulation are larger than any benefits.
Dave, did you read the Forbes piece? And, are you seriously DEFENDING the Chinese? The column doesn’t mention our “evil” intellectual property laws, it uses steel and aluminum as examples, and specifically references China’s refusal to abide by fair trade practices:
“The focus on new tariffs the U.S. is levying on steel and aluminum, and our trading relationship with China misses this bigger point. The entire multilateral trading system – not just the U.S. – is the victim of China’s cheating. Government ownership of China’s banking system, and the enormity of its state-owned enterprise sector give China the tools to illegally subsidize industries in ways that are hard to detect. To be clear, China’s activities are not the same as a country exploiting the economic principles of comparative advantage.”
China has clearly been attempting to subvert the US economy, and the fact that they have a totally state-run economy, gives it the ability to cheat in all kinds of ways, which I won’t go into, since I’m sure you are aware of them. The fact that they have thus far been unsuccessful in upending US economic superiority does not mean that they have stopped trying, and doesn’t mean that we should not call them out on it and demand reciprocity.
Your position on the millions of Americans who are or will be put out of work sounds too much like the whole “learn to code” meme, which comes from the position that the left holds on shutting down the coal industry and saying that 50 year old coal miners (many of whom didn’t even use computers) should “learn to code” if they wanted other jobs.
The whole “‘learn to code” attitude is why candidates like Andrew Yang present policy ideas that catch on. And why power hungry socialists like Bernie Sanders become popular icons.
And what do libertarians and conservatives do to help? Zip.
Priscilla, you are debating unfair Chinese trade and economic subversion with an immovable rock when it comes to Dave. He seems to be incapable of understanding the difference between economic advantages like cheaper human and natural resources and government manipulation to damage trading partners economies.
But remember, Dave also accepts no regulation of any companies and believes settlements are fine if one of your kids dies from inferior products and you sue the company for harm.
Its called Libertarianism on steroids.
Ron – this is not an issue about regulation.
There is not a problem to be fixed.
The actual economics of this are well known, the chinese are distorting trade in a way they think will help them but it really will not, they are doing so at great cost, and the benefit is to american consumers. The harm to US steel workers merely advances a change that was inevitable and they will find other work.
there is zero reason to go nuts to fix this
I can feel sorry for those displaced workers, but I am not going to war with china over something that is NET GOOD for the US.
Dave your mind is set. My mind is set. You say it is good economically for us. I say it is not just because we get to buy cheap Chinese shit that is throw away crap after a few hours or times using.
So tell me how it is so great that the Chinese manipulate trade, monitary valueband other things to make it difficult for us to export, but benefit them to export. They get “chits” as youvsay. They buy USA bonds. And at sometime they own enough bonds that they can stop buying and destroy our economy. They would be hurt, but no where near the damage to us.
“Dave your mind is set. My mind is set. You say it is good economically for us.”
I do not say this 200 years of economics and myriads of studies and analysis do.
“I say it is not just because we get to buy cheap Chinese shit that is throw away crap after a few hours or times using.”
Then do not buy it – and the entire problem is solved.
What you completely ignore is that US jobs did not go to China because the Chinese came here and forcibly took them.
They came to china because americans freely chose chinese goods over american.
I do not buy the “junk” assertion – but I do not care – if americans want to by cheap junk, their choice. Not governments.
“So tell me how it is so great that the Chinese manipulate trade, monitary valueband other things to make it difficult for us to export, but benefit them to export.”
The costs of their import tarrifs AND their export subsidies is paid for by THEIR people.
“They get “chits” as youvsay. They buy USA bonds. And at sometime they own enough bonds that they can stop buying and destroy our economy. They would be hurt, but no where near the damage to us.”
There is a saying in banking.
You borrow 100K from me, I have you by the balls.
You borrow 100M from me, You have me by the balls.
One of the reasons the US can afford its deficits, is that if the US economy sneezes the world economy gets the flu.
When any government subsidizes its own production to gain advantage in foreign trade – that is a foreign government subsidizing US consumers. China is quite litterally stealing wealth from its own people to give to americans. Why would we try to stop that.
The idiocy of trade subidies is well know. Further – this is just a special case of the broader nonsense of predatory trade. I do not think there has EVER been an actual demonstrated instance of predatory trade practices (outside of governments) – the conventional tropes like Standard oil have been thoroughly debunked. Economists spent a great deal of effort try to analyze this – some trying to prove it some trying to debunk it. Even if there have been actual instances, the economics is very well understood at this point. Predatory trade – not by dominant companies, not by governments DOES NOT WORK. It always benefits consumers, and harms the companies trying it.
No I did not read the peice.
With respect I do not need to.
ALL of the means of trying to game trade have been debated in economics journals for decades. ALWAYS the harm to the nation doing the gaming is higher than the benefit,
and the harm to the nation being targeted is lower than the benefit.
Nearly always jobs lost, are just jobs lost early, they were going away anyway.
Today manufacturing is returning to the US from China. But manufacturing jobs are not – though there were large jumps in manufacturing jobs recently.
That is because of automation.
A job is neither a right, nor should it be the goal – no matter how appealing that may sound.
The net improvement in standard of living is the goal. That is always the result when value is improved – as by lower prices.
Most of the arguments related to trade also apply to outsourcing, to automation, to every form of productivity increase. ALL the things that raise our standard of living eliminate some existing jobs. That is inherent in the way the economy works. Producing greater value with less effort always means LESS EFFORT – aka JOBS. This always means that resource is available for other uses, and they will get used.
Do I think China should “abide by standard trade practices” – yes. It is to their benefit.
Do I think we should or are even entitled to – NO.
BTW there is no “illegal” in the relationships between countries – all initernational law is “voluntary”. There is no world government or world police.
The relations between nations are a millenia long working example of anarcho-capitalism (basically libertarianism on steroids) and it is likely they ALWAYS will be.
Anyway there is just conduct we do not like, or conduct they voluntarily agreed not to do, in return for voluntary agreements by us.
Personally I think government – even if only our government should get out of trade almost entirely. Businesses will work this out on their own.
If China wanted to “subvert the US economy” – they would have to orchestrate a global embargo. Subsidizing products to american consumers is subsidizing the US economy not subverting it.
My position is not some meme – it is actual economics. There are myriads of reasons that workers are displaced in a functioning economy. It not only happens all the time, it is a sign of a growing economy. Joseph Shumpeter called free markets “creative destruction” – and that is absolutely what they are. The stronger growth is the greater change and disruption their will be. So I ask you – do you want to be NET better off ? If you do then you are going to have to live with disruption.
No this is not “learn to code” – though the only thing fundimentally wrong with that meme is fixating on coding. If your specific job is disappearing – and there are very few jobs that do not change over time, and pretty much no jobs that do not involve greater productivity over time, then you MUST increase your value. Either become so productive in your field that the losses happen to others, or learn to do something else.
If your job is a skilled job – then you have the ability to learn new skills.
Lets presume that China subsidizes steel by 50% and completely destroys all steel production jobs in the US.
The cost of anything that uses steel – appliances, bridges, buildings will decrease, so we will make more of those.
Even if that is not specifically true what we do make will cost less – so the nation benefits.
Because we paid less for steel we have more wealth to spend on something else.
And production and consumption will always very nearly equal each other.
Every single improvement in productivity – everything that makes us able to produce more at a lower cost – and that includes chinese steel subsidies, means we are DOUBLY better off.
We pay less for what we have produced and we have freed labor to produce more of something else we want.
You are litterally railing against the actual mechanism that raises our standard of living.
No I am not saying 50 year old coal miners should “learn to code”.
All I am saying is that they should and most will find a job. The best outcome is they learn new skills and find a better job, but overall we are better off even if the just dig ditches for MW.
We pay less overall and get more.
During the shutdown I was practically begging for it to last as long as possible.
The economic benefits of shifting 800K people from non-productive government jobs to productive jobs would be incredible.
Increasing standard of living ALWAYS means greater productivity which nearly always means reduced employment in a give field.
“The whole “‘learn to code” attitude is why candidates like Andrew Yang present policy ideas that catch on. And why power hungry socialists like Bernie Sanders become popular icons.”
Unfortunately you are absolutely correct here.
I refered to Schumpeter earlier. While Schumpeter was a great economist and advocate of free markets – he was pessomistic about them.
He essentially beleived as Marx did that the SUCCESS of free markets would bring about their demise, that strong growth is so disruptive that people would revolt and demand stability. That would would choose to be less well off rather than face constant change,
And Schumpeter (and Marx) might have a point – we know that deep social safetynets are net economically harmful – the US knows it, the Europeans know it. And yet we do it anyway.
Because disruptive change is scary. Almost no one likes being pushed into changing jobs constantly – but that is how free markets work.
“And what do libertarians and conservatives do to help? Zip.”
“helping” is incredibly difficult. Most efforts at helping are expensive failures.
As an example the net assessment of all job programs since the 80’s is that they have REDUCED the employment prospects of those participating. Government does not know how to aide job creating or job training.
The danes actually conducted a massive CONTROLLED study – it is easier to do that in more authoritarian countries. What they learned was that their employment assistance programs had ZERO effect on overall employment. What they did change was WHO got jobs.
If you want to help – start a business and grow it until you need to hire people.
You will be better off, and so will they and so will everyone else if you are producing something people value.
This article notes the many layers to this, as well as the huge internal stresses in the democratic party and their hypocracy.
I think Omar is hateful and racist. I do not think that she is much different from the republican Rep. King or white supremecists.
I suspect she is not getting re-elected as she promised voters in here district that she would NOT be the divisive figure she has become. But that choice belongs to her voters.
HOWEVER, she was elected, and even though I think some of the things she says are wrong, and mirror perfectly the tropes used by those who committed genocide.
They are still free speach and often raise questions that should be raised.
Israel is without any doubt at all the nation in the mideast that we should treat most favorably.
No other mideastern nation comes close to being as decent or democratic. In fact Israel mostly governs better and is a better ally to the US than most european nations.
But Israel is not perfect – and we should be free to condemn Israel when she is wrong.
Regardless, this motion condemning anti-semitism should not have been hard.
But all the nonsense going on demonstrates the corrupt intellectual foundations that have taken over the democratic party.
I am constantly harping on the dangers of post modernism – whether they are conscious of it the conflict going on within house democrats is about post modernism.
Democrats can not condemn anti-semitism without at the same time having every single other group with a claim of discrimination crying #metoo, Then we must weaken the condemnation of anti-semitism lest we be perceived as racist and anti-islam.
Further this is fracturing the coalition that makes up democrats. Jews have has disproportionate influence in US politics particularly within the democratic party. American Jews have been the pre-eminent bastion of ACTUAL liberalism. but we are starting to see strong fractures between american jews and progressives. Progressivism has historically been racist and anti-jewish. Modern progressives have oddly fawned over islam despite the fact that even moderate islam opposes nearly all the purported values of the left.
But that can be papered over because the value of post modernism is NOT actually inclusion, or equality, it is a heirachical scheme of victimization. Muslims have a higher intersectionality quotient than jews or women or gays so the left must suppress criticism of islam for its oppression of jews, women and gays.
As a consequence democrats can not vote to condemn anti-semitism without watering that condemnation down to the point of meaninglessness without enraging one wing of the party, and can not fail to do so without disappointing another.
Its as if Republicans were unable to condemn Nazi’s – because some of their most outspoken members were nazi’s.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-06/anti-semitism-rebuke-threatens-rift-among-house-democrats?srnd=politics-vp
Why are the significant lies under oath of highly placed members of the Obama administration treated radically differently from far less significant misstatements of Trump associates ?
If we are going to prosecute Gen. Flynn for failing to inform an FBI agent that in a conversation with Kislyak Kislyak raised Sanctions and Flynn postponed discussion – then why isn’t Clapper’s totally false statement about mass data collection being prosecuted ?
If we are going to prosecute Papadoulis for getting the dates wrong of his emails, why are we not prosecuting Clapper for false testimony regarding the dates of his leaks to the press (leaks that are themselves atleast two different crimes).
I can go on and on. I can make the same argument regarding Comey or McCabe,
Or we can talk about actual crimes – there is BTW no longer any doubt that there was a “conspiracy” within the upper levels of the Obama administration continuing into the early Trump administration to entrap and handicap Trump – first as candidate and then as president. We know this – because we have the emails and texts of the conspirators.
Why isn’t all of this being prosecuted ?
Just to be clear – I do not think that former Obama administration members should be prosecuted for SOME of these acts.
As an example of what should NOT be prosecuted – Cohen testified that he never sought a position in the Trump administration, yet there is substantial evidence to prove that is a lie.
A lie – to congress, to the FBI to the courts, should only be prosecuted if that lie actually impeded establishing the truth with regard to an underlying crime.
That BTW is the standard that is used by the courts for crimes in falsification. Or atleast it is supposed to be.
Flynn’s remarks to the FBI are not prosecutable – because the FBI had the transcript of the conversation at the time of the interview. The FBI had Papadoulis’s emails when they questioned him, They had Stone’s texts and emails when they questioned him.
Self serving and vanity lies like Cohen’s should not be prosecuted. Vanity may be offensive but it is not criminal.
Prosecution of “process crimes” should NEVER be used merely to kowtow people into submission, it is one thing to use crimes as leverage to get the truth. It is completely different to use them to silence people or to alter their non-criminal conduct.
Finally the misconduct of those in government – particularly those in law enforcement is ALWAYS much more serious than those on the outside.
Locally we have a DA who has just be caught in an elaborate scheme involving the use of asset forfeiture funds. The majority of the conduct is wrong, and for the most part should be barred by law, and is just more reasons to end asset forfeiture or atleast make it far more transparent. But one element – the DA was being reimbursed for mileage for a vehicle that was being leased using government funds. Put simply he was being repaid personally by government for an expense the government was already paying for.
The amount was small, but this is clear fraud. This is stuff that happens in business all the time – and quite often results in threats and loss of job, but almost never prosecution.
But the DA is not just some employee. He is a member of government. He is a member of law enforcement, and he is the Chief Prosecutor of crimes.
He should be prosecuted to the greatest extent the law allows.
There should be no excuses accepted, his prior service (no particularly exemplary in my oppinion) should NOT mitigate.
If you are prepared to stand in front of the court and demand that others go to jail for shoplifting or other minor crimes, then you should be help to a HIGHER standard for your own conduct.
http://thefederalist.com/2019/03/06/four-different-lies-james-clapper-told-about-lying-to-congress/
Fake news, oversight, or another Trump lie exposed: you rationalize your answer:
https://dparchives.library.upenn.edu/cgi-bin/pennsylvania?a=d&d=tdp19681025-01.2.27&e=——-en-20–1–txt-txIN——-
It would not surprise me to find that Trump had actually claimed to be first in his class or on the dean’s list.
But a quick google search finds no evidence that Trump has personally said anything beyond that he did well and got very good grades.
If you have a link to a stronger statement – great.
What I am able to find is other students who claim he was unremarkable and average.
I suspect that is true – to the extent that Anyone who goes to Wharton is unremarkable and average.
We still do not have records for Obama at other Columbia – where the some kind of contemporary accounts claim he was essentially a pot head. BUT somehow he managed to get into harvard. You can give him bonus points for race etc. I have met the people who get into ivy league law schools (and Wharton) – and average student pot heads rarely get it – even if they are black. Both Trump and Obama managed to get into two of the most perstigious schools in the country.
Obama’s record at Harvard is also unavailable. All we know is that he was a law review editor, and that Lawrence Tribe remembers him as a brilliant student, he also remembers Cruz as a very smart student. I am suspicious of Tribe’s recollection of Obama as most everyone at Harvard Remembers Ted Cruz passing through, yet almost no one remembers Obama passing through. He edited law review – about 1/3 of law students make law review. but he wrote no law review articles – that is unusual. There are numerous other means by which one stands out in law school, My wife went to UofP, She graduated with honors, was a law review editor, published a few law review articles won the keaty cup, nearly got a clerkship with a supreme court feeder judge, my wife did clerk for a federal judge. I have zero doubt that Tribe is influential enough that if Obama really was an A+ student of his, Tribe would have gotten him a Supreme court clerkship.
Even students in the top 10% should be able to get federal clerkships.
Elaine Kagan clerked for Scotus, Neil Gorsuch clerked for Scotus, Kavanaugh clerked for scotus Ted Cruz clerked for Scotus.
Obama did NOT clerk for any judge. He moved to an adjunct professor position of little note in chicago. That is not the typical career path for an A+ student in Lawrence Tribes Constitutional Law class at Harvard.
Put simply we have no evidence of any significant academic graduate school performance by EITHER trump or Obama beyond getting into a very prestigious school and not flunking out.
Both has reasons beyond their own personal academics – There is little doubt that Obama was competent enough to graduate from columbia and that plus being black would likely get him into harvard law at that time.
Trump went to fordham, and did well enough to get into Wharton. But he benefited from a wealthy family. So really his move to Wharton is no more prestigious than Obama’s.
There is no fundimental distinguishing difference between them academemically.
If Obama did as well in Law School as Tribe recalls – and Tribe was lobby for a seat on SCOTUS when he was praising Obama – he left no fingerprints anyway to show that he was anything more than an average student.
Pretty much the same is true of Trump.
Both Trump and Obama have exaggerated their own academic achievements.
As best as I can tell the only current politician bragging about their college performance who is not lying is “lying ted cruz”
Let me summarize your long winded gurgling:
Lying Trump lied about his grades.
You don’t care that the President is a serial liar.
“Let me summarize your long winded gurgling:
Lying Trump lied about his grades.
You don’t care that the President is a serial liar.”
It is only a summary if you are accurate.
The only Trump quote I can find is that he “got good grades”
What is “good grades” ? Getting in to Wharton is impressive, graduating is impressive.
Am I strongly suspicious Trump is the source of the claims that he graduated at the top of his class – a rumor that is 40 years old – probably.
Do I care that nearly everyone on the planet (myself excepted) exagerates their resume ?
Can I go through yours with a fine tooth comb ? Is every assertion in your resume perfectly accurate ? Have you implied a larger role in something than you actually had ?
I have read LOTS of resumes. They are all full of spin.
What is True of Trump is that he has succeeded greatly in multiple areas. That is rare, it is also indesputable.
Terrific, now the CBP is acting like state police. Is this now Turkey or Hungary?
“U.S. officials made list of reporters, lawyers, activists to question at border
Several people on the list told NBC News they were questioned at the border as part of what U.S. border agents called a “national security investigation.”https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/immigration/u-s-officials-made-list-reporters-lawyers-activists-question-border-n980301
If there has been infringement of rights on American citizens in this action or others during border enforcement, then this is just anoter readon BETO IS RIGHT!
Open the birders and tear down all existing walls.
We effectively have that now, Ron, with the flood of migrants overwhelming our ability to stop them. And, it’s all due to the inability to send back anyone arriving on US soil with a child. We don’t have the ability to send them back, and we don’t have the facilities to house them properly. So they are effectively free to enter the country, after they get their court date, which the majority of them will never appear for.
Trump should shut down the border right now, and demand that Congress pass legislation that either opens our borders or secures them. The president has the constitutional authority to do that, with or without an emergency declaration. The emergency is what gives him the right to reallocate military construction funds.
“We effectively have that now, Ron, with the flood of migrants ”
Well yes and no. If you march to the border and find a way to get on USA soil, yes. But if you apply the legal way in your home country, or come to the border, meet with legal help, ask for asylum in Tijuana or Mexicalli, then no. Because many doing it legally are being turned away due to piss poor immigration laws.
There is no gray that is acceptable in my mind in this case. Enforce the law 100%, meaning you step on USA soil, you are immediately returned, fami!ies and all. No jail, no waiting for a hearing, etc. That is the black in black and white!
And if our politically motivated government to keep this for election issues will not change, then do what Beto proposes. Tear down all walls, starting with Queen Nancy’s southern border and let everyone in. That is the white in black and white!
No more political gray!
NAFTA actually pretty much ended illegal immigration from Mexico.
There are lots of parts to NAFTA and there is no analysis of it that has not found it a huge benefit to the US and Mexico.
But one provision allowed for the immediate deportations of illegal mexicans crossing the border.
Barr was grilled on immigration, and questioned as to why we should not spend our efforts on port security or drones.
His answer was that we not only must do EVERYTHING, but we must expect that whatever we do, the illegal immigrants will adapt.
If we secure the ports – drugs will flow through borders, if we secure the borders, they will fly in, Whatever we do those seeking to get here illegally or bring drugs in illegally will adapt.
The current glut of “families” is specifically an adaptation to US laws and enforcement.
The illegal immigrants have learned that if single males cross they will be detained and deported. So we see more “families” because they know that we do not have the resources to detain them until their hearing if we are required to detain their children too.
Congress has only provided something over 3000 beds for “families” being detained at the border. We have about 70,000 people being arrested at the border per month right now.
They can be deported quickly – if they are caught within 100M of the border and held in custody for 30-90 days before a hearing.
If they are released the process takes 18m-4y.
In the recent “deal” congress actually reduced the number of beds for families.
It was offensive watching the very same congressmen who had reduced CBP’s facilities for families thrashing Nielson over “familiy” separation.
I would further note that we do not have good data on this, but we know that alot of these are NOT families. That people lookijng to cross are bringing children with them to increase their odds, That we have increased “trafficing” as a consequence of this.
We do not know if those increases are small or larger – but lets say they are small,
Of the 70,000 arrested each month only 500 kids are being trafficed.
That is a huge problem.
Regardless the point is – however we change our law – those trying to get in will adapt.
The changes in the past we thought were good, are what has resulted in large numbers of “families”. crossing and few single males.
“Trump should shut down the border right now, and demand that Congress pass legislation that either opens our borders or secures them.”
He could TRY to do that, under his National Emergency umbrella.
But the majority of those migrants ask for amnesty, under law.
That border shut down would IMMEDIATELY be challenged in the courts. Let’s say SCOTUS quickly affirms his right to do that… Does the US then dump any migrants intercepted or already in custody back across the Mexican border? Men, women, children, infants?
This migration is a humanitarian nightmare in the making. Either way – we let them stay; we dump them in Mexico – I don’t see a just outcome. The people we have governing us are not up to the task. The idiot in the White House will only make it worse.
“Does the US then dump any migrants intercepted or already in custody back across the Mexican border? Men, women, children, infants?”
BINGO!!!!!!!!!!!!
But the laws and regulations pertaining to amnesty would have to be changed first. As it stands now, persons who have committed no other illegal activity apart from being in the country illegally can request it. They then are supposed to be processed and accepted or rejected in a reasonable time.
The main ‘priority’ that applies to the current swarms of migrants seeking amnesty from South American nation’s are these:
“persons facing compelling security concerns in countries of first asylum; persons in need of legal protection because of the danger of refoulement; those in danger due to threats of armed attack in an area where they are located; or persons who have experienced recent persecution because of their political, religious, or human rights activities (prisoners of conscience); women-at-risk; victims of torture or violence, physically or mentally disabled persons; persons in urgent need of medical treatment not available in the first asylum country; and persons for whom other durable solutions are not feasible and whose status in the place of asylum does not present a satisfactory long-term solution.” (Wikipedia)
What changes in the protocols do you suggest be written?
A few years ago my response would have been ‘screw them all, round them up and dump them. Nobody gets amnesty unless they apply for it first!” Like Victor Laszlo did in Casa Blanca! But then I hear echoes of “Send me your huddled masses” and I’m reluctant to turn my back on what appears to be a gigantic humanitarian crisis in blossom.
We obviously need a better solution than either side of the debate are promoting: open border or zero tolerance.
“What changes in the protocols do you suggest be written?”
1. Trash the current system completely.
2. A three tier immigration criteria. A) Work VISA based on employer needs.B) Family based VISA and C) Humanitarian VISA
3. Work VISA’s determined by employer needs, job openings and skills offered by immigrant.
4. Family based using predefined criteria, such as immediate family. No aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.
5. Humanitarian based on countries detmined by the state department to be human rights violators. No one accepted because they say they live where some gang is threatening them.
6. Any military base that is no longer used by the military could be converted to ” half way” facility where asylum seekers would be housed until their case was heard. Mothers, fathers and.kids. And they would be “prison” level so no one leaves.
7. If you are approved, then you would need a sponsor to assume your needs until you could survive on your own.
8. If your case was not approved, you would be returned to your port of entry.
9. Any illegal entry would result in immediate deportation. Second time mandatory 5 years in jail.
10. No one not a citizen counted in census. (No more misallocation of representatives based on illegal immigrant counts)
11. No entitlement or social support programs available except for emergency medical care which the federal government would cover.
12. No one born in America without one parent being a citizen would be considered a citizen.
13. Anyone serving in, having served or is a spouse of anyone military, past.or present, would become a legal immigrant.
14. Anyone over 18 who has has graduated high school in America would become a legal resident.
So you asked. Thats my thoughts. Never happen.
So open the borders and get rid ofvall walls.
The fundimental problems with the current laws are NOT things like who can get asylum.
It is that the courts have transformed the law from what is written to a mess.
There is also a separate “flores agreement” – that is essentially a settlement between the government and some people suing it during the Obama administration.
This is a favorite modern tactic of the left. The administration gets some group to “sue” the government over some law or policy, or regulation or lack of regulation, or just about anything. And they the administration “settles” the suit, making the “settlement” have the force of law, yet the merits of the suit were never tested, and congress nor the courts really were involved. By wink wink, nod, nod, seeking groups to challenge whatever exists the administration working with groups that wish to change the law manage to do so without due process.
Further congress often defines the law but makes its enforcement impossible.
As an example – Trump can deport anyone illegally entering caught within 100 miles of the border in I beleive 30 days. But to do so he must detain them for the full 30 days.
But he can not detain children in the facilities used to detain adults for more than 48 hours.
And congress has provided insuficient facilities for families and Trump does not have the authority to change that.
Making the law is congresses responsibility. But we often have a mess where congress makes law but then imposes budgetarry or other constraints on enforcing it. Like limiting the number of beds.
“1. Trash the current system completely.”
It is not that bad. The key problems are that there are a large assortment of obstacles to implimenting the law as it is.
The courts keep expanding the law.
Congress writes the law but does not provide the resources needed to impliment it.
“2. A three tier immigration criteria. A) Work VISA based on employer needs.B) Family based VISA and C) Humanitarian VISA”
We can do whatever we wish, but I would do differently.
Mostly I would keep the law the same – but strictly enforced AS WRITTEN.
Asylum is for people who have a legitimate fear of THEIR GOVERNMENT.
I would probably eliminate work Visa’s Family Visa, and Humaitarian visa’s and say that anyone, Business, organization, family, church can sponsor any immigrant.
If you do you are responsible for them. You will find them a job, a place to stay or YOU will take care of them – the government will not.
“3. Work VISA’s determined by employer needs, job openings and skills offered by immigrant.
4. Family based using predefined criteria, such as immediate family. No aunts, uncles, cousins, etc.
5. Humanitarian based on countries detmined by the state department to be human rights violators. No one accepted because they say they live where some gang is threatening them.”
If you do as I recomend you get government out of the business of trying to decide these things.
Microsoft as an example decides who they are prepared to sponsor for a visa.
If it does not work out – microsoft mus cover their costs – including deporting them.
Same with families, or humanitarian visa’s.
Deciding who gets to come in is based on who those doing the sponsoring choose.
“6. Any military base that is no longer used by the military could be converted to ” half way” facility where asylum seekers would be housed until their case was heard. Mothers, fathers and.kids. And they would be “prison” level so no one leaves.”
Just determine that if congress writes a law, the president is empowered to enforce it.
Jay wants to interject “reasonable” – if you are going to give “reasonable” a legal meaning, then you can say the president is OBLIGATED to enforce the law, where he has many ways to do so, the court can review the choices he makes to assure that he has not elected a bad way over a good one.
As an example if there is a choice between using military bases, building new facilities and renting private ones. The courts could say that keeping detainees in Trump Tower Arizona rather than a military base was “unreasonable”
The court can not interfere with the president enforcing the law, but where congress has not been clear and provided resources, but a legal requirement exists, then the courts can preclude stupid or self serving choices, but not preclude implimenting the law.
“7. If you are approved, then you would need a sponsor to assume your needs until you could survive on your own.”
If you have a sponsor – much of the rest is irrelevant.
“8. If your case was not approved, you would be returned to your port of entry.”
The burden of proof is on the immigrant, not the government.
“9. Any illegal entry would result in immediate deportation. Second time mandatory 5 years in jail.”
You do not want to jail them – that can be attractive to them.
“10. No one not a citizen counted in census. (No more misallocation of representatives based on illegal immigrant counts)”
We should count everyone, We should count noncitizens and identify them as such.
Allocation of government resources and congressional districts is based on citizens
“11. No entitlement or social support programs available except for emergency medical care which the federal government would cover.”
They have a sponsor – EVERYTHING is the sponsors problem.
“12. No one born in America without one parent being a citizen would be considered a citizen.”
Nope. Every nation without birthright citizenship with significant immigration has far worse problems than the US. You end up creating an ever growing class of temporary residents who do NOT identify with the country they have been in their entire life.
“13. Anyone serving in, having served or is a spouse of anyone military, past.or present, would become a legal immigrant.”
No spouses, and they are Citzens, not immigrants.
You serve in our military – and you are more than an immigrant.
“14. Anyone over 18 who has has graduated high school in America would become a legal resident.”
Maybe.
Asylum != Amnesty.
The law as written does not permit economic claims for asylum.
It does not permit asylum for domestic violence.
It only permits asylum where you are in danger FROM YOUR OWN GOVERNMENT.
The left is again selling broader interpretations that the law has.
If they do not like the law – CHANGE THE LAW.
There is nothing wrong with the asylum law as written.
Except possibly an absence of we REALLY REALLY mean this tacked to the end.
My recollection is that the asylum law does not allow those who have committed crimes in the US to ask for asylum. In the past that included crossing illegally.
Starting under Obama that was interpreted to exclude the crime of crossing illegally.
Trump is trying to return to the language of the law.
That is also what he is doing with “child separation”.
The list you provided from Wikipedia is incorrect.
The threat that you face that you are requesting asylum from MUST be a GOVERNMENT threat.
You can not get asylum (atleast not until recent court misinterpretations), for domestic violence or persecution that is NOT from government.
You can change the law if you wish – but if you expand asylum beyond GOVERNMENT persecution, you open the flood gates.
Jay;
I will be happy to discuss channeling “the new collosus”.
I do not have a problem with open borders – but only if we do so in a way that will not cause disaster, and only if we do so with open eyes.
But that is not the current law – and we do not change law by having the courts change how it is interpreted that is LAWLESS.
Federal law is changed by congress.
You are not allowed to request asylum if you have committed a crime in the US.
In the past – before Obama, and new judical interpretations, that meant if you entered illegally you could not ask for asylum. I beleive when the law was drafted that was INTENTIONAL.
Regardless if you want illegals to be eligable for asylum – CHANGE THE LAW.
MANY of the Times I say “CHANGE THE LAW” – you will likely get my support.
I would substantially increase legal immigration. But absent the changes necescary to sustain open borders I would Build the wall and strongly enforce laws against illegal immigration.
I would deport people who crossed illegally with bare minimum due process.
Deportation is not death. If you are legally allowed to be in the US – cross legally.
If you are requesting asylum, cross at a border checkpoint.
If you are requesting asylum – come wiuth the evidence to support your claim.
The burden of proof and the burden of conduct and process is on YOU,
There is not a right to enter the US.
“We obviously need a better solution than either side of the debate are promoting: open border or zero tolerance.”
No we don’t.
The LAW should always be enforced with “zero tolerance”.
If we deem that a law that is ALWAYS enforced produces a result we do not like we CHANGE THE LAW.
When we interoduce tolerance, discretion we are lawless.
FEW NARROW CLEAR LAWS NARROWLY READ AND VIGOROUSLY ENFORCED
Those are SOME of the requirements for “the rule of law”
The opportunity to change the law – particularly on issues like family separation and the dreamers has existed for over a decade. Pelosi had an excellent opportunity to get the law changed in return for “the wall”, she choose to fight over the wall.
It has been the beleif of democrats that the wall is a losing political issue for Trump.
It is the losing political issue that got him elected.
Jay, Section 215(a) of the Immigration and Nationality Act gives the president near plenary authority to indefinitely close all border traffic. It’s been done before, by Johnson, Nixon and Reagan.
I agree that it would be immediately challenged by the progressive Lawfare warriors, who know that there is a massive crisis, but refuse to let it be ameliorated by a barrier, because Trump.
Trump would be doing the right thing to close the border, just as he did the right thing to declare the emergency. I understand that you would never in a million years admit that the complete obstruction by Democrats to reforming our immigration laws has hurt everyone : Americans. migrant women and children, law enforcement, DACA and TPS residents. But the rush of illegal migrants at the border has become unsustainable. Child traffickers are “recycling” the same children, back and forth, to allow phony asylum seekers into the country, where they ultimately sell these children into virtual slavery. But, no matter, some more Democrat voters!
And lest you think I believe that the GOP has been blameless in this, I most certainly do not. They have stonewalled immigration reform for years, because of massive lobbying efforts by the Chamber of Commerce. But they are not in favor of “open borders,” and the Democrats are.
They are going to lose in 2020 because of this, unless they can figure out a way to steal elections. Which they might, because the Republicans remain the stupid party.
Pricilla, the legal check to that presidential authority you cite is written into 1185-a
“(1) for any alien to depart from or enter or attempt to depart from or enter the United States except under such reasonable rules, regulations, and orders, and subject to such limitations and exceptions as the President may prescribe”
Neither you, me, or Trump gets to decide what rules, regs and orders are ‘reasonable.’ That will be the court’s authority.
As to Johnson, Reagan, and Nixon – none of them shut the border to limit immigration. LBJ sealed the border after the JFK Assassination, quickly reopening it when Oswald was caught. Nixon closed the border with Operation Intercept for two weeks, to stop the flow of marijuana into the US. It was a total failure. Border states from Texas to California lost multi millions of dollars from their local economies and almost no marijuana was seized – drug traffickers simply shifted to safer air supply routes. Reagan tried the same border shutdown policy to harass Mexico into finding and freeing a US Drug Enforcement officer who was abducted by drug cartel members. That didn’t work too well- the officer and his wife were found tortured and murdered.
“subject to such limitations and exceptions as the President may prescribe”
I hate to break it to you, Jay, but Trump IS the president ( much to your dismay, I know).
Actually Jay – no the determination of what is reasonable is NOT the courts.
Technically it is congresses, but congress as delegated that authority to the executive.
It is the courts role to determine if a law is constitutional.
If it is in conflict with other laws,
and if it is being followed as written.
Whether it is “reasonable” or not is NOT within the jurisdiction of the courts.
I would separately note than ANY law or regulation that includes the word “reasonable” should be struck down as unconstitutionally vague.
Making a law clear and well defined is the duty of the legislature.
The courts DO have the authority to determine that a law is UNCLEAR.
The failure of Johnson, Nixon and Reagan’s efforts, and the reasons for those efforts are not important – the relevant question is whether the president has the authority to do so.
He clearly does.
Your evidence sugests it is a bad idea.
This report puts it in perspective, Priscilla:
https://www.vox.com/2019/3/6/18253444/border-statistics-illegal-immigration-trump
Glad you are slowly starting to understand.
And yes this is “unusual” a “crisis” an “emergency”/
“Border Patrol agents aren’t equipped to deal with large groups of families who travel through Mexico by bus and then turn themselves in at the border.”
What CBP is “equiped” for is determined by congress – that has REDUCED their ability to deal with families in the most recent shutdown deal.
If CBP is given the resources to detain whatever mix of people cross the border in whatever numbers they cross in for 30-90 days they can then deport them directly to their country of origen. If they can not detain them for that period it takes vastly more money and years to deport them.
I do not support interfering with the press.
And likely this is something stupid being done by someone down the food chain.
But there are good reasons for CBP to pre-identfy press operating arround the border
As an example so they do not confuse them with drug dealers and illegals.
The question is not whether they are making a list, but what they are doing with it.
Hide the bad stuff, just like all politicians, and do it with a EO for cover.
“Trump Cancels U.S. Report on Civilian Deaths in Drone Strikes
By Margaret Talev
March 6, 2019, 9:22 AM PST Updated on March 6, 2019, 2:41 PM PST
Defense Department must still report casualties to Congress
Report was part of Obama-era effort to stem civilian deaths ”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-03-06/trump-cancels-u-s-report-on-civilian-deaths-in-drone-strikes
Yep, another example of Presidential over reach never included in the constitution. Maybe one small reversal will take place since congress may hate Trump enough to take back a fingernail of the power they have given up.
“House Intelligence Committee Chairman Adam Schiff, a California Democrat, called Trump’s move “a troubling retreat from transparency.” He said in a statement that he’ll seek to reimpose the intelligence community’s reporting on civilian casualties through a provision in this year’s Intelligence Authorization Act.”
One teanie step for citizens, one giant leap for congress!
So Obama – the king of the drones responsible for the largest civilian deaths instituted policies to reign in his own bloodthirsty ramapage ?
As to Trump – to what extent are we still heavily using Drones to kill people ?
That is a serious question. I do not know. I would GUESS that as Trump has less interest in the mideast that Drone strikes would decline. But that is just a guess.
Regardless, it would make sense to end a report if there is little or nothing to report.
So rather than “Argh! Trump” Can we found out if this is somehow meaningful ?
Or should we have a presidential report on buggy whip production too ?
“Regardless, it would make sense to end a report if there is little or nothing to report.”
As you have little or nothing of sense to report, why don’t you stop commenting?
PS: you don’t know if there’s little or nothing to report if the reports have stopped, dummy. Duh 🙄
“PS: you don’t know if there’s little or nothing to report if the reports have stopped, dummy. Duh 🙄”
I keep telling you it is not hard to be right all the time today – do not say something that you have not checked first.
Yes, actually I DO know there is little to report. There are plenty of sources besides the US government. There are journalists and NGO’s that track these things. You can do so from press reports.
There are four major areas of US drone activity – Pakistan, Afghanistan, Syria, and Yemen.
Unfortunately the data on each is tracked separately. Regardless, in ALL regions Drone casualities have dramatically declined since 2010. More importantly civilian casualties – killing people we did not target, has gone from 4:1 to almost non existant.
The data is out there is you want to bother to look.
When you call someone else a dummy because you assume they made an error that they did not – who do you think the dummy is ?
Why did Obama think that a report would stop Drone casualties ?
The rise in civilian Drone casualities was a result of Obama’s massive use of Drones.
I started to look up the data – Trying to get overall data is near impossible.
But peak Drone casualties was in 2010 at 765 in pakistan. There are several other regions in which drones are used, but the peaks and patterns are the same.
In 2016 that had dropped to 11, In 2018 there was 1 drone casualty in Pakastan from Drones.
Further in 2010 the overwhelming percentage of the casualties were civilians not targets.
Since 2015 there are almost no civilian casualties.
I am not sure why we need a report to say – 1 person was called and that person was a terrorist,
Given there was one drone death, not a civilian in Pakistan in 2018 compared to 15 in 2017 and 765 in 210 I do not think that is “hiding the bad stuff”.
Typical bullshit. Trump hasn’t been droning civilians ~ that was Obama. The probable reason for not reporting, was so that our adversaries could not use “civilian deaths” as a bludgeon to defame the US military. Civilians are always used as human shields in the ME, so even Obama probably was blamed for civilians who should not have been in harm’s way, but were, to deter strikes against AlQaeda leaders. Then again, Democrats never did blame Obama for droning civilians, even when they were American citizens….
Left leaning professors conducted an accademic experiment to see if they could get completely insane nonsense published in presigious academic journals. And they were incredibly successful and would have been even more so had someone in the press – not the journals they were targetting not figured out what they were up to and published an expose before their experiment was complete.
Even so they managed to get 7 research papers published in prestigious journals pushing thesis that were deliberately and obviously ludicrously stupid.
In one they claimed to have found a link between the behaviour of dogs at dog parks and rape culture, in another they submitted and got published a near direct translation of a section of “Mein Kampf” substituting radical feminism for nazi values.
Truth is stranger than fiction – who knew that bees are racist ?
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2019/mar/5/hate-crime-against-sc-mayor-turns-out-be-pollen-po/
Stupidity reigns supreme. 1, whoever wrote this piece needs to researcg bees. They dont deposit polen anywhere except the hive. Why use a picture of a bee when the wind is the culpret? 2, the people need to ask this mayor for a mental eval. She has lived in SC all her life and thinks pollen is spread by vandals? Early.onset Alzheimers? I can wash my car in NC, the water runs yellow down the drive and 4 hours later my car is covered with pine and oak pollen. I have to pressure wash the house yearly to get back to off white instead of lite yellow/green.
Right, the left is tolerant ?
ADF a legal orgainzation similar to the ACLU that focuses on defending religious liberty and has won numerous cases before the Supreme court is labeled by SPLC as a hate group.
Get a clue – SPLC is now a hate group.
The federalist society – which is at the very least a libertarian form of conservatism – i.e. Classical liberalism, is being targeted at one of the most prestigious universities in the country.
Yale law students are demanding to know of any law school students that are affiliated with ADF ? Should we also publish the names of all students affiliated with BLM or SPLC ?
On Joe Rogan one of Twitters executives responsible for deciding who gets banned openly admitted that anyone who gets into a heated exchange with someone who is a member of a twitter defined protected class – aparently something that changes from country to country, will be banned. Of 26 high profile banning incidents 25 of those were conservatives. The one that was not was a radical feminist who asserted that only those with two X chromosomes were women in a dispute with an MTF trangendered person.
Aparently Martina Navrotalova has been warned repeatedly by Twitter and is in danger of being banned – because lesbians are not free to oppose the participation in womens sports of biological males.
Finally The Colorado Civil Rights Commission and Master Cake have “burried the hatchet”.
CRCC has dropped all claims against MC in return for MC dropping its harrassment lawsuit against CRCC. Aparently in the process of discovery AFTER the SCOTUS decision on MC that hinged only the publicly expressed religious hostility of one CRCC member to MC, MC found numerous emails of other CRCC board members demonstrating the same hostitily.
Further they found evidence that the new plantif targeting MC for Transgendered discrimination engaged in harrasment of MC – possibly with the encouragement of CRCC.
http://thefederalist.com/2019/03/04/thought-christian-constitutionalist-yale-law-school-wrong/
Dave I watched that Joe Rogan podcast with Dorsey and his “Minister of Truth”, and thought it was fascinating. First of all, I think that Tim Pool is an amazing journalist, secondly, I give credit to the Twitter folks for at least coming on the show.
But third, Dorsey and I think her name is Vijaya Gadde, are very obviously blind to their own bias, and do not think that they are infringing on the rights of conservatives to speak on what has become the major platform for public, political debate. It’s disconcerting to realize that leftists do not even understand that some of their closely held beliefs are just opinions, and that other reasonable people think otherwise. On Twitter, if you object to the belief that a biological man with gender dysphoria magically becomes a woman, once he “identifies” himself as such, you do not get to be part of the discussion. Even if you’re Martina Navratilova.
The represenatives from Twitter were elloquent. and honestly I was disappointed because Rogan ceded way too much ground – YES, you let NAZI’s speak.
But despite the eleoquence to anyone who can listen twitter was discussing a process that is impossible that must result in personal biases. That inevitably results in bazillions of judgement calls.
There is a Jordan Peterson video on why post modernism must fail – in a very evil way, and twitter was exposing it in this interview.
They have put themselves not merely in the position of trying to arbitrate the relative moral merit of conservatives vs. the left which they stupidly believe that they are able to do easily, but they are getting tangled in the nonsense of weighing the relative morality of radical feminism vs. transgenderism or islam vs. homosexualtiy
There is an inherent presumption in Twitter’s approach that THEY are able to predetermine the moral merit of every conflict. The PURPOSE of debate – free speach is to make that judgement based on the arguments made, not to PREJUDGE the outcome.
We allow people to speak – smart people, stupid people, offensive people,
so that WE can device what to beleive. Everyone (including the russians) has the opportunity to persuade us. And WE decide who is good or evil. not the government, not twitter.
Conservatives think progressives are wrong.
Progressives think conservatives are bad.
It is clear the twitterati were educated inside schools that believe that it is actually possible to make the distinctions they are trying to do.
For the most part I beleive that twitter should be allowed to do this – meaning government should not interfere. But that does not mean that the rest of us can not push back.
I also think social media is risking an enormous flight of users.
Gab unfortunately has attained a reputation as a forum for neo-nazi’s.
But they are still an alternative, and those being banned from FB and Twitter and … are going there. Dave Rubin and Jordan Peterson have left Patreon over this.
These companies are incredibly vulnerable, all you need is a 5% drop in users from a single social media site and within a month shareholders will crucify them, their stock will tank, and we will end this nonsense. The question is when that happens.
Another Issue I am hearing that I have not looked into, but some analysts are arguing that we have a 2nd tech bubble – that we have had an enormous number of very large IPO’s from tech companies particularly in social media that have never generated a profit and have no prospects of ever doing so, and are ridiculously highly valued. I have not looked into that – but I have a sense that it is correct.
For the most part I do not give a damn whether you identify and live as a man or a woman.
I do not care about the biology. I do not care about the mental health aspects.
I do not care whether it is a choice or nurture or nature – I do not care about this with respect to homosexuality either.
There are a very few issues that are of consequence.
When the person claiming gender dysphoria is not an adult there are numerous messy issues. It is self evident that some parents are nuts and warp their kids (pick a direction, it does not matter), at the same time generally the state getting involved only makes it worse.
The only thing worse than having bad evil parents (whether that is parents who push you towards or away from this nonsense) id the even worse outcomes when government steps in. MOSTLY I would prefer that outside the most egregious instances of obvious abuse – government stayed out of it. Bad parents are better than bad government F’ing over kids.
At the same time – in HS what showers do TG students use ?
That is a real issue.
Most of the rest we can sort out. More and more we are going away from gang restrooms to multiple individual unisex facilities. There are many things driving that. When the restroom no longer says men or women other issues die.
Participation in sports is an issue. Navrotolva is correct – XY women should not compete in womens sports with XX women that is nonsense.
A possible resolution is the elimination of gender selective sports – but I do not think that is happening.
Radical feminists also have an issue – whatever I might think of the issues of feminism, someone who is TG is not the same as someone who is an XX woman. They have not had the same life experiences, they do not live in the same world. That is not to say they do not have issues of their own, but they are NOT the same issues. There is something very discordant about a TG person stepping up as a representative of the Gender they have chosen. Just the fact that they have CHOSEN a gender changes everything.
At the same time as I do not care, and I think the issues that Government has a role in are very small. I fully grasp that other people DO CARE.
Navrotolva can be irrate that womens sports are being taken over by XY women.
She is entitled to a voice on that. She might lose the argument – or not, but even if there was some CLEARLY absolute moral way to resolve the matter – she is entitled to a different oppinion and should not be banned for expressing it. Even specifically expressing it targetting a single individual.
Dave, the issue of women’s sports is more than unfair. It will destroy women’s sports. Already, we are seeing biological boys, some of whom have been accused of faking their transgenderism, grabbing Title IX scholarships to colleges, after becoming record-breaking athletes in HS sports that they would not have made first string in as boys…and certainly not gotten full rides to prestigious universities. In the upcoming Olympics, trans women will be allowed to compete, and biological female athletes, who worked their whole lives to have a chance at a medal in sports like track&field, soccer, swimming and others may find themselves losing to biological men, with more massive bone structure and musculature, larger hands and feet, and entirely different body proportions. The trans women will not have to have undergone hormone therapy or reassignment surgery. And, again, they will be athletes who, for the most part, would have had no chance to compete at a world-class level as men. But they will reap the glory and, most importantly, the economic rewards of being Olympic medalists.
This is not the same as saying “Ih, Martina was bigger and stronger than Chris Evert, but Evert beat her many times”. This will be as if Evert had to play Federer.
If Caitlin Jenner had competed in the 72 Olympics as a woman, she could have won any track and field event that she wanted.
And what happens when some of these trans women transition back to being men? Will they have to repay the money, or have their records taken away? Highly unlikely.
Forget radical feminists being incensed….ALL women athletes should be.
What I am saying is that either there is sufficient BIOLOGICAL difference between men and women to have separate womens sports – and if that is so then only XX women can compete, or there is not sufficient difference and there should not be separate womens sport.
There are some other complexities.
A male who begins HRT before puberty will have the same musculature and bones as a women. But I am really really really resistant to HRT before puberty. prior to puberty we are all somewhat androgenous, Basically you have a catch-22, you have to allow puberty to progress to truly be certain (if that is even possible at all) that you have gender dysphoria, and if you allow puberty to start – you will develop alot of male physical characteristics before transitioning.
But my primary point is that you just can not jump up and say that because an XX women has a problem with including an “XY woman” in some parts of the womans domain, that is not inhernelty Hate.
You can say that TG women are free to not be men, even to be women as much as they are able on their own, but you can not force everyone, and particularly women to accept them fully as women, because they are not, and it is more than chromosomes.
Not onlhy is they biology not the same, but their life experiences are not.
Twitters policies and process also point out the mess we make when we mangle language.
Which is the part that Rogan disappointed me on.
Absolutely – there are things that people should not say.
I am still going to defend the right of those who say them to do so – even if they are nazi’s or bigots or ….
There are no obvious bright lines between acceptable and unacceptable speech. Anyone who thinks they are is doing so from their own cultural and educational bias.
But more importantly – words are NOT violence. They are often harsh and painfull
They can cause emotional pain they can not cause physical harm.
Ultimately we are responsible for our own emotions.
We sanction actual violence with law.
Unpleasant rhetoric is not a justification for force.
The twitterati used words like bullying.
I was bullied – many people where. People said mean things because I was different, a nerd.
Sometimes it was very mean. That is life.
Sometimes people beat me up – or tried to – that is violence.
Schools and parents should not tolerate either.
But government and law are only about violence, not saying mean things.
Further the twiteratti wanted to assert that various papers and studies proved links between bad speech and suicide or violence. Maybe so – though the amount of recent psychological and socialogical research that is being thrown on the trash heap is enormous – and it is not insignficant works. At this point there is almost no psychological or socialogical research fo the past 70 years that you should rely on without rigorous independent verification.
We have to get past the insanity that if you can get something published and lots of others in your field respond “that makes sense to me as it confirms my ideology” that somehow that makes it science.
We should be extremely careful sanctioning things merely because we do not like them.
I have no problem with an adult person choosing to identify and live as whatever gender they choose. It is a deeply personal decision to reject your biological gender, although I believe that gender dysphoria should not be celebrated, any more than “toxic” masculinity (or femininity) should be.
As far as competitive sports go, however, there should be no question that a biological male should not be permitted to compete against biological females. If as you say, that male has had hormone suppression and estrogen therapy as a child, prior to puberty, that poor boy has major problems that will far supercede whether he wants to be an athlete or not. Frankly, I think that any parent who does that should be brought up on charges of child abuse.
But, for anyone who thinks that there aren’t men who will falsely identify as women to take advantage of the opportunity to achieve athletic glory, we have this:
https://bigleaguepolitics.com/rapper-briefly-identifies-as-female-smashes-female-deadlifting-record-goes-back-to-identifying-as-male/
“I have no problem with an adult person choosing to identify and live as whatever gender they choose. It is a deeply personal decision to reject your biological gender, although I believe that gender dysphoria should not be celebrated, any more than “toxic” masculinity (or femininity) should be.”
My only issue here is force. I do not know whether chosing to alter your gender is a good choice or a bad one.I am highly suspicious that is it not a good choice, or that it rarely addresses the actual problem. But that is irrelevant – unless you are seeking my personal counsel. Government is not entitled to a position on the issue. You can not use force to interfere with peoples free choices that do not harm others.
I am dubious that switching genders is good for people.
I am pretty damn sure than shooting herion is not.
I think there are some legitimate instances where it is morally acceptable to kill yourself, but mostly it is not.
I can add to this a long list of choices that I think are always or usually bad, but that directly harm no one but yourself.
I understand that ones personal choices can wreak emotional havoc on others – and if you do so, you are likely morally culpable.
But I am talking about that area of morality that we call law – and make no mistake, law is about morality and ONLY morality. Using force to harm others is immoral.
But legitimate law requires ACTUAL Harm to OTHERS – not emotional harm, and not real damage to yourself.
I do not know how I feel about Transgender Issues. But I know that with few exceptions they are outside the domain of law.
Kamala Harris has recently come out for the legalization of prostitution.
That is as radical as Bob Barr who has several anti-drug laws – even anti-marijuana laws that bear his NAME. Not as a sponsor or cosigner but refered to as the Barr act, or Barr amendment, coming out for drug legalization – as he did. In 2008 Bob Barr former proto conservative became the libertarian candidate for President having in the past decade renounced just about everything he had done previously in his life as a conservative.
If that is where Harris is – I applaud her. Harris certainly has been at the forefront of the war on prostitutes – and I worded that deliberately. Harris has not merely fought against prostituion, but fought vigorously to keep prostitution on the streets and alleys where Johns’ and pimps can abuse and torture the women involved. She was one of the leaders of the successful effort to get Craiglist to seriously restrict “personals” adds. She destroyed and imprisoned the founders of backpage and she authored the recent congressional legislation that is likely unconstitutional and that makes talking about prostitution favorably online a crime. All of this has been incredibly damaging to the women who end up by force or choice in the sex trade. All of this has also been spitting into the wind.
If Harris has had a sincere change of heart – I am happy, now how do we undo the damage she has done.
At the same time, unlike Barr I am more suspicious of Harris. Barr shifted to libertarain over a decade. He reversed positions that would have left him favorably treated in many circles to join the small circle of libertarians – who with very few exceptions are not the movers and shakers of the world. His reward was a presidential run as a libertarian – he had a far better shot at getting re-elected to anything as a conservative.
But if Kamala Harris is putting her toes into libertarain waters – she is welcome.
“As far as competitive sports go, however, there should be no question that a biological male should not be permitted to compete against biological females. ”
I would agree – BUT this is a question of oppinion not FACT. Who should compete with who is just not a factual question.
What is true is that XY males who have entered puberty before transitioning will have a distinct advantage over XX females. Bill Jean King did manage to defeat Bobby Riggs.
Does anyone think she could have beat John McEnro ?
“If as you say, that male has had hormone suppression and estrogen therapy as a child, prior to puberty, that poor boy has major problems that will far supercede whether he wants to be an athlete or not. Frankly, I think that any parent who does that should be brought up on charges of child abuse.”
I have very serious problems with a parent that approves transitioning a person before the are well into puberty. Mental gender identity is not set until hormones kick in.
At the same time I am extremely reluctant to involve government.
While not about Gender Identity, I would suggest reading “weeping in the playtime of others”.
It is a very old work on our child welfare system – though almost nothing has changed, that found that much of the time the child welfare system is WORSE than the abuse of all but the most heinous parents.
I am much more willing to allow parents even bad parents the latitude screw up their kids, as heinous as that might be than to have the state do it to them.
“But, for anyone who thinks that there aren’t men who will falsely identify as women to take advantage of the opportunity to achieve athletic glory, we have this:”
The appoint point was not whether TG men should be able to compete in womens sports, but whether one should be censored for holding and defending a strong oppinion on it.
So according to Project Vertitas under cover videos the execs on Twitter who spoke on JRE were LYING – repeatedly
Ha, leave it to O’Keefe to get the goods.
Tim Pool went on Dave Rubin’s podcast the day after the Joe Rogan one, and they apparently spoke about the Rogan podcast, and what Pool thought of Dorsey/Gadde’s responses, and what his own journalistic investigation has shown.
I haven’t listened to or viewed Rubin’s show yet, but I plan to later today.
What kind of idiot thinks that America is the most significant source of the world’s woes ?
I am pretty openly hostile to the vast majority of what our government does with respect to the rest of the world. But as much of a bumbling incompetent I think our government is in the world, and as certain as I am that the effect of our GOVERNMENT is net negative on the world. America’s total negative impact on the world is miniscule.
Even in the places we have F’d up the most – such as the mideast – I want us OUT because these countries and peoples need to quit blaming the US and figure out how to solve their own problems.
I have been watching economic analysis videos of various nations in Africa over the past 75 years, and these are appalling. Much of Africa was weakly growing under colonial and immediate post colonial governments. Whether the white and generally disparaged rhodesian government of Ian Smith or that of ethiopian haile selassie – had these continued large parts of africa would be experiencing the same kind of improvements that are occuring in China and India today.
Why is africa one of few places in the world that has not significantly improved over the past 50 years ? Why is africa one of the places where frequently things have gotten worse ?
Because Africa was overrun by Castro style socialist governments – who took countries like Zimbabwee (rhodesia) and Ethopia, that were slowly improving them and wreaked havoc on them.
Nothing in all human history has caused nearly so much misery as Socialism in ANY form.
The effect of our government on the world has been a small negative during most of my lifetime. The effect of the US overall has been strongly positive, The most negative impact on the world is still socialism in any form – by far.
https://townhall.com/columnists/timothydaughtry/2019/03/04/rising-antiamericanism-and-the-lefts-big-lie-n2542571
Tell me if you think this is OK?:
Jared Kushner while representing the USA, has been conducting diplomatic relations with the same countries that he’s also pursuing business personal opportunities with.
Prediction: after Trump & Family are out of office they will suddenly (surprise) find themselves involved In immensely lucrative business opportunities in those same countries.
Please provide an accurate citation.
Post election the Trump’s resolved how to divide up responsibilities
Don Jr. and others in the familiy and close friends have taken over the businesses.
Trump, Kushner and Ivanka have entered government and have no current role in the Trump businesses.
Given Kushner’s list of accomplishemnts over the past 2 years – if he is concurrently also negotiating large business deals for himself – he must not ever be sleeping.
Kushner is almost single handedly responsible for bringing democrats, and republicans together to pass criminal justice reform. He did so with tepid support from Trump, and with near open opposition from Sessions and several very powerful senators.
Criminal justice reform has had bipartisan support for two decades. It has also opposition from powerful figures on both sides of the aisle. Kushner managed something Obama could not do, rubio could not do, Hatch could not do.
And that was only a small part of his efforts which have mostly been in the area of diplomacy.
Absolutely Kushner is dealing with the same people in the mideast he dealt with when he was in business.
I find it extremely interesting that an orthodox jew is going throughout the mideast and successfully negotiating peace.
Maybe Omar has something here – those rich jews are bribing arabs to acheive peace.
“Prediction: after Trump & Family are out of office they will suddenly (surprise) find themselves involved In immensely lucrative business opportunities in those same countries.”
You do understand that Kushner alone is worth about half of what Trump is worth.
Trump and family have had “lucrative business deals” in these countries for a long time.
You actually have things backwards. Kushner is successful diplomatically BECAUSE he has done business with these people in the past.
He is an orthodox jew doing business in arab countries and they TRUST HIM.
They did not stop trusting him -when he went to washington.
They are not going to stop when he leaves.
One single thing done openly pretty much guarantees Kushner a bright future in the mideast.
That is TANKING the stupid deal with Iran and shifting US favor in the mideast away from Iran to SA and Egypt.
That also improves the stability of the mideast. Amplifying Iranian influence was a serious threat to peace in the mideast.
NOT from lying New York Times:
“U.S. Budget Gap Widened 77% in First Four Months of Fiscal Year
U.S. tax revenues declined 1.5% over past 12 months, Treasury says ”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/u-s-budget-gap-widened-in-first-four-months-of-fiscal-year-11551812519
What dkes it say about expenses and revenues. Cant read other than first sentence. Paywall
No actual data I can find anywhere thus far support the claim that revenue is ACTUALLY down.
Any claim of lower revenue I have seen is a claim that revenue is less than projected, not less in real terms.
@Ron: “WASHINGTON—The U.S. budget gap widened in the first four months of the fiscal year as tax collections fell and federal spending increased.
The government ran a $310 billion deficit from October through January, compared with $176 billion during the same period a year earlier, a 77% increase, the Treasury Department said Tuesday.
Federal outlays climbed $115 billion, or 9%, in the first four months of fiscal 2019, which began Oct. 1, driven by higher spending on the military, veterans’ affairs and interest on the debt. Total receipts declined $19 billion, or 2%, due to weaker corporate and individual income-tax collection.
Part of the percentage increase in the deficit was attributable to a shift in the timing of certain payments, which made the deficit appear smaller in the first four months of fiscal year 2018, the Treasury said. If not for those timing shifts, the deficit would have risen 40.2% so far this fiscal year.
The Republican tax overhaul that took effect last year has constrained federal revenues, while a bipartisan two-year budget deal has boosted government spending, particularly on defense, pushing the deficit up sharply over the past year.
On a 12-month basis, government revenues declined 1.5%, while outlays have risen 4.4%. The budget deficit rose to $913.5 billion for the 12 months ended January, or 4.4% of gross domestic product. The last time the 12-month deficit exceeded 4.4% of GDP was in May 2013, when the deficit was still coming down from high post-recession levels.
“It’s hard to imagine this is sustainable,” said Director Keith Hall of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office this week at a conference of business economists in Washington.
Treasury officials have said they expected the tax law to reduce corporate tax revenue in the near term because certain provisions, such as the immediate expensing of capital expenditures, were intended to have a bigger effect at the outset.
A senior Treasury official noted the decline in individual withheld income taxes in the first four months of the fiscal year reflected the fact that the tax cut hadn’t yet been implemented in the same period a year earlier—October 2017 through January 2018.
One revenue source that is partly offsetting the decline in tax receipts: tariffs. Customs duties totaled $24.4 billion from October through January, nearly double what the government collected in the same period a year earlier.
Deficits are expected to be on an upward trajectory in coming years as an aging population continues to drive up the cost of Social Security and Medicare. Interest expenses on the federal debt are also expected to swell, swamping spending on discretionary spending before the end of the next decade.
The Congressional Budget Office projects annual deficits will exceed $1 trillion starting in 2022 and will average 4.4% over the next decade, significantly higher than the 2.9% average over the previous 50 years.”
” Federal outlays climbed $115 billion, or 9%”
And that is 99% of the problem. When I was at the health system, our budgets were about $350M expense. When we had suppliers, like drug companies come in and tell us drugs were increasing 25%, there was no way we could raise rates on patients enough to cover those increases. Administration told manager right from the beginning “dont bring us a budget more than 5% ( or some target) or administration will cut the expenses and its best you do it yourself”
There is NO WAY government should be spending any more per capita now, plus inflation, than it did 20 years ago! Government has to get a handle on SS, Medicare and Medicaid, along with interest expenses. Cuts in other expenses needs to occur.
When congress gets off its dead ass and does something about spending, then I will jump on the TDS train and complain about tax cuts.
I can not support higer taxes just so congress can spend more money! So lets see what Queen Nancy does with her budget. Will she cut spending or just propose more taxes to support continued inefficiency in government.
While I want across the board cuts.
The primary problems are entitlements first and defense second.
The rest of spending is a distant third.
Trump and republicans increased defense spending – or deficits would be growing more slowly. But even slashing defense 50% – which is actually quite reasonable, would still leave us with huge deficits.
We must tackle entitlements.
And we are not going to.
Not D’s not R’s.
FY2018 ended in October. The ACTUAL Revenues for FY2018 were 3.3287T
That is UP from 2017.
Estimates for FY2019 remain at 3.42T.
When an article cites inaccurate or distorted data, that cast doubt on anything else it claims.
Absolutely deficits are a problem. Republicans should not have increased defense spending.
That was a mistake. But non-entitlement spending everywhere else has been CUT – that is REAL cuts. We do not have a revenue problem. Even it revenues actually declined – we do not have a revenue problem.
We have a spending problem – though there is alot more cutting that can and should be done in the basic portion of the federal budget, there is no enough total spending outside of defence and entitlements to address the deficit in any meaningful way.
And even if Defence spending was slashed to zero and non-entitlement spending slashed 25% we would still have a deficit.
Trump promised not to touch SS when he ran. Without addressing entitlements deficits will grow.
Neither party has the cahones to address that.
You want to blame Trump – fine, Trump and Bush and Obama, and all the republicans of the past decade and all the democrats.
FY2017 Federal Revenue 3.32T
FY2018 Federal Revenue 3.34T
FY2019 Federal Revenue 3.42T (est)
Can we get past this nonsense that if revenue did not grow at some government projected rate that is always wrong that it declined ?
The “tax cut” has had negligable effect on Revenue.
The federal government has a SPENDING problem.
Trump has significantly reduces non-entitlement domestic spending.
But increased military spending – a mistake.
But we will get nowhere until we are ready to tackle entitlements.
Are you ready to do that ?
“U.S. Consumers Hit Hardest by Trade Tariffs, Studies Find
Importers passed most costs to American consumers, who shouldered an added $69 billion last year, researchers estimated” WSJ
The projected economic impact was 0.2% the number you cite is double that.
I absolutely oppose Tarrifs.
I also oppose misrepresenting data. This is NOT getting hit hard.
I also suspect the data is an overestimate.
Regardless. it is also exactly what I keep telling you Tarrifs hurt your own citizens.
“But the majority of those migrants ask for amnesty, under law.”
Not amnesty – Asylum.
“That border shut down would IMMEDIATELY be challenged in the courts. Let’s say SCOTUS quickly affirms his right to do that… Does the US then dump any migrants intercepted or already in custody back across the Mexican border? Men, women, children, infants?”
The primary objective is to create the incentives to discourage them from coming in the first place.
There are 70K people trying to cross now, and they are doing so with children and asking for asylum because that is the most effective way to game our laws. They know we can not detain 70K people/month. They know that congress has made it harder to detain families.
The purpose of the wall is to stop them BEFORE they cross, and to reduce the numbers to a point we CAN detain them and then return them.
And BTW that IS what we do. Typically we put them on a plane back to their country of origen.
“This migration is a humanitarian nightmare in the making. Either way – we let them stay; we dump them in Mexico – I don’t see a just outcome. ”
What is unjust about sending someone back to their home ?
If you pound on your neighbors door demanding to be let in an the police come – they either arrest you or take you back to YOUR home.
“The people we have governing us are not up to the task.”
What is the “task” ?
Are you saying that the US is obligated to take anyone from a poorer country who wishes to come ? There are just shy of a billion people throughout the world who would come to the US if they were able. You going to take them all ?
These people are poor by US terms.
But they are wealthy compared to people in Ethopia or Somalia, or Zimbabwee.
What exactly is it that you think Justice is ?
A man said to the universe:
“Sir, I exist!”
“However,” replied the universe,
“The fact has not created in me
A sense of obligation.”
If you wish to help others in the world – that is wonderful. I do, most people do.
When I do so, I make my own choices, I give my own time, or money.
I do not steal from others to help the people I choose to help.
I have not seen the worst of the world, But I have seen the conditions in Chinese orphanages and I have to avoid watching Save the Children Commercials on late night TV or my checkbook will bleed.
If you want to help others – I salute you – so long as you do not steal to do so.
I may even join you.
My family sponsoered a familiy of Burmeses muslim immigrants for 2 years sometime ago.
I would encourage you do to something similar.
I would absolutely support changing our law to allow ANYONE into this country who had a sponsor who took REAL responsibility for them. Let our families, churches, other groups decide WHO they wish to sponsor. The choice as to whether we take people from Haiti or Guatemala or Burma belongs with those sponsoring them.
But but but…Trump’s new bro wouldn’t lie to him! This must be more progressive lefty liberal faux news.
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/north-korea/new-photos-show-north-korea-rocket-site-back-normal-operating-n980536
Correct me if I am wrong, but didn’t Trump just WALK OUT of negotiations because Kim was unwilling to agree to VERIFIABLY denuking ?
How does evidence that NK is less than trustworthy make Trump look bad ?
There is an enormous amount of game playing and posturing.
I still expect a deal eventually – because it appears that Kim wants a deal.
He is not going to get the deal he wants, so the question is can he live with the deal he can get.
If nothing else we have descalated in NK for 2 years.
Sorry, yes, asylum …
” Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross acted in “bad faith,” broke several laws and violated the constitutional underpinning of representative democracy when he added a citizenship question to the 2020 Census, a federal judge ruled Wednesday.”
WAPO
All you are doing is demonstrating why it is critical for Republicans to clean out the federal judiciary.
You can not do as the judge asserted by restoring the citizenship question to the census.
The judge seems to think they were elected and given a policy role.
Attacking the inclusion of the citizenship question was a stupid and hyperpartisan move by democrats. It is another instance where they are WAY out of tune with ordinary americans.
We actually ask people about their race on the census – in increasingly fine detail – because those on the left WANT to make race based decisions.
Well guess what ordinary americans want to know how many citizens there are.
The left is scared of the outcome. Just as they are scared of the outcome if voter ID was required and can not win elections without ballot harvesting.
Shut up unless you are Fox News:
“Jessikka Aro, a Finnish investigative journalist, has faced down death threats and harassment over her work exposing Russia’s propaganda machine long before the 2016 U.S. presidential elections. In January, the U.S. State Department took notice, telling Aro she would be honored with the prestigious International Women of Courage Award, to be presented in Washington by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
Weeks later, the State Department rescinded the award offer. A State Department spokesperson said it was due to a “regrettable error,” but Aro and U.S. officials familiar with the internal deliberations tell a different story. They say the department revoked her award after U.S. officials went through Aro’s social media posts and found she had also frequently criticized President Donald Trump.”
The federal government should not be giving out awards.
It is inherently going to be political propoganda.
Do you honestly beleive that government awards are apolitical ?
All that you have demonstrated here is that the lower levels of State are owned by the left and they got caught trying to propgandize one way when the administration leaned the other.
Do you think people who criticized Obama received awards during his tenure ?
We are talking about a president who sicced the FBI on journalists that said unfavorable things about him.
It is very fortunate for millenials that no knowledge of american history is required to vote
I think only one person got “who was the first president” correct.
The “history major” got EVERYTHING wrong.
Interesting. Wonder how this will go over for millinials who depend on Amazon for most everything.
https://www.geekwire.com/2019/elizabeth-warrens-bold-plan-break-big-tech-unwind-amazon-acquisitions-thats-just-beginning/
Warren is getting desperate for an issue on which she can be farther left than Harris. She sees that AOC took on Amazon and “won” (if you call chasing 25,000 jobs out of NYC winning) so she figures that she can pretend to be against tech monopolies and it will make millennials see her as brave and bold.
Meanwhile, the millennals just think she’s like an embarrassing grandma, trying to be cool and edgy….
I think they will find her much worse than an embarrasing grandma when they find she want Amazon to get rid of whole foods, not sell Amazon branded items under their website, and would stop them from entering into delivery of healthcare through different mergers/agreements with other third parties.
Then companies like google,facebook or yahoo would have to undo anything from their structure like instagram, youtube etc. And there are others.
So millenials well buy the left wing tax the rich, screw the corporate structure environment until it affects their personsl convenience, then they will bitch and moan because they got what they ask for.
“Trump Has Been Bad for Farmers
Bankruptcies are way up, in part because of his immigration and trade policies.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/trump-has-been-bad-for-farmers-11551916875
Find an actual graph of farm income and you will get a completely different story.
The authors statistics are correct, but his analysis is completely off.
Farm income INCREASED through the great recession – peaking in 2010 and has since dropped preciptously. The rate of decline started to SLOW with Trump’s election,
But farm income is still declining.
Farm income declined from a high of 125B in 2010 to about 55B in 2016, and has been roughly stable at 55B since.
Therefore this can have NOTHING to do with Trump’s trade policies or immigration.
For every negative, there seems to be a positive. This was in our recent paper.
Today, the Labor Department released its February jobs report, which showed more good news for the U.S. economy. Wages are going up, unemployment is going down, and thousands of new jobs were added last month.
Wages have increased by 3.4 percent in the last year, the most in a decade.
The unemployment rate fell to 3.8 percent.
The U.S. economy added 20,000 new jobs last month.
Since 2016, we’ve added 5.3 million jobs total.
Open jobs outnumbered the number of people applying, the 10th straight.month of this happening.
We have the highest labor force participation rate in more than 5 years due to people returning to the labor force after leaving in the past.
So for every “the sky is falling” we have “its never been better”.
So I suspect its somewhere inbthe middle. For every GM worker who has lost a job because Buicks are now made in China, there is someone else who now has a jib they did not have 3 years ago.
There will ALWAYS be good news and there will ALWAYS be bad news.
And there will ALWAYS be news that appears bad but is not, or appears good that is not.
It will always be possible for Jay and DD to cite some “everything is going to hell” editorial.
And it will ALWAYS be possible for you to find some jobs somewhere that went to china.
As I have noted quite strongly an economy running well will DESTROY jobs and businesses all over the place – but it will create more than it destroys.
There is no requirement that for every winner there must be a matching loser.
A well running economy has far more winners than losers, but even a poor economy has some winners.
The objective is NOT to pick winners and losers, it is to get the largest increase in standard of living. that is best acheived the most government stays out.
“Trump administration responsible for even more separated children, judge rules
“The hallmark of a civilized society is measured by how it treats its people and those within its borders,” the judge wrote.”
“Trump administration responsible for even more separated children, judge rules
“The hallmark of a civilized society is measured by how it treats its people and those within its borders,” the judge wrote.”
https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trump-administration-responsible-even-more-separated-children-judge-rules-n981296
The fix is to open the borders, tear down all the walls, including the ones that protect Queen Nancyland and concentrate enforcement and imprisonment on those that commit crimes.
You’ve made this open border remark a number of times: I assumed you were making an ironic joke.
You’re not serious about that I hope.
I am 100+% serious. If you are not going to enforce the laws of the country, then dont have the laws. There should be no catch and release. It is not really law. It is a bunch or E.O’s, court interpretations and other actions based on whatever someone s political persuasion happens to be and who is in office.
I am f’in sick of the queen talking about how immoral walls are, but she made sure her state began building walls in the 90’s, shifting the illegal crossings from her state to some other state to worry about. Piss on her and her high and mightly.liberal bull shit. If she does not want Arizona, New Mexico or Texas to have border walls, the eliminate all walls!
If they dont work, like she and her far left asinine followers say, then get rid of them all like Beto wants to do!
Either that or enforce the damn laws, jail those here illegally, INCLUDING people with kids and stop playing political games like they have since 43.
So to summarize, enforce the laws as written, if your illegal, jail or deport, or if you dont agree with the law as written, stop changing the law based on political administration positions, change the law and eliminate interepretations, E.O’s and other political double talk. Be specific and use every current situation incorporated into the law to reduce substantially any interpretation. If the law is not updated, then repeal the law, open the border and allow every border state the same opportunity to accept immigrants. Dont force them onto one or two states due to existing walls like what is happening today!
Absolutely!!!
The ROLE of the executive is to enforce the CURRENT LAW,
The Executive has one voice in law making – it can sign or veto the laws congress writes.
If the law as written is bad – it must enforce it!!!!
If the law as written is bad – congress should change it.
That is how we govern.
The courts get to decide if a law runs afoul of the constitution.
It also gets to decide if a law conconflicts with other law.
If neither of those occur – the intentions of the law givers is irelevant to the court.
Courts do not get to decide of laws are right or wrong, of the intentions of those imposing them. Only whether they are legal and constitutional.
Oh, so you’re not in favor of open borders, but in favor or repealing laws you deem ineffective?
By that standard of logic you are in favor of repealing all homocide laws as 40% go unsolved.
Hell, let’s repeal all criminal laws, we’d save a lot of money on law enforcement, prisons, and policing.
“By that standard of logic you are in favor of repealing all homocide laws as 40% go unsolved.”
that standard of logic would be REAL logic.
We enforce laws against murder. We do not CHOOSE not to solve murders.
If you are not going to enforce a law as written – get rid of it – that would include homocide laws.
The excercise of discretion in law is NOT doing what you can to enforce the law.
It is doing what you WANT to. They are not the same and the latter is immoral.
FACTS MATTER. As does the actual law, rather than platitudes.
The executive branch of the federal government is not the totality of civilized society – even the federal government is NOT congruent with civilized society, They judges remarks are extraneous nonsense.
Government is about law – not aphorisms. If you do not feel the law conforms with your basic principles – change the law.
BUT if you are a federal judge – your obligation is to the CONSTITUTION – as written, and the law, Not to sweeping truisms.
I would further note that the aphorism expressed by the judge is nothing more.
And it is actually FALSE. There is not even a moral principle that says – if you can manage to get into a country others are obligated to care for you.
How should government treat you ? Even Citizens are owed NOTHING beyond government upholding the law. We are not entitled to be fed or clothed. Government owes CITIZENS nothing beyond the protection of their rights.
The executive branch is responsible to enforce the laws.
Our law makes crossing the border without permission a crime.
If you do not like that change the law.
Changing the law starts with CONGRESS – not the executive.
The executive can – and has asked that our laws be changed,
There was hope and expectation that would occur as part of a grand bargain on immigration.
No such change has occurred.
Today nearly all those crossing illegally are legitimate or faux families.
Those sheparding and encouraging illegal crossings are often drug dealers or associated with drug dealers. They send people to cross at one point to tie CBP up so they can bring drugs accross at another. Further they profit from sheparding illegals, as well as raping them – men and women, and extorting from them, and even supplying them with faux families.
Essentially drug dealers have a well diversified business at the US border involving drug trafficking, and both economic and sexual human trafficking
When “family units” are apprehended, CBP is obligated to follow the law.
The law provides for the rapid deportation of anyone apprehended within 100m of the border, with relatively simple process. Provided they remain in custody.
Congress has provided limited resources to keep families units in custody. These were sufficient when almost all border crossers were single males
A consent decree – NOT THE LAW, requires that children can not be detained in the same way adults are for more than 48hours.
CBP has 48 hours to figure out if people who claim to be a family are – typically without documentation. Most of the Family units crossing ARE, but many are manufactured for the purpose of increasing the odds of those crossing, and to expedite human sexual trafficking.
If that is only 1% of the 70,000 people that crossed in February – that is 700 people involved in sex trafficking. The odds are it is far larger. Nor is all the trafficking sex related. MS-13 has in the past sent teenagers alone and as part of “faux” families across to supliment is footsoldiers in the US – that according to the Obama administration.
After 48 hours CBP must either:
Move the family to one of the limited family detention facilities.
Separate the children from their putative parents and detain the parents,
or release the family and hope they show up for a much later hearing.
There is not some magical other choice. Congress has not expanded the number of beds for families – in fact in the “deal” budget they REDUCED them.
Sorry DD – if you create a problem you do not get to bemoan how others solve it.
If you drag your family accross thousands of miles to try to get into the US illegally – you had better be escaping something far more dangerous – because the burden is on you
if as a consequence of the dangers you subject them to – you, or your family get sick, killed injured, or separated – the responsibility for that is YOURS
In the US – if you are a citizen and you commit a crime – you will be incarcerated.
If you have children and can not provide alternative care for them – they will be separated.
That happens throughout the US many many many times a day.
Family separation at the border is not unusual.
If you wish to stop it – change the law or provide more resources, or build the wall so that fewer families can cross illegally. Regardless the burden is on Congress.
Though there is an alternative – and keep gaming this and it may be coming.
Trump can use his current border emergency declaration – or he can expand it to find other means of detaining family units. To allocate more resources to that.
As usual, follow the money: “Trump inauguration took money from shell companies tied to foreigners
Creators of firms that donated revealed by Guardian as Indian financier, lobbyist with links to Taiwan and Israeli real estate developer”
“US election law prohibits non-resident foreigners from contributing to political campaigns, including inaugurations. Donors or campaigns who “knowingly and willfully” breach this rule may be fined or prosecuted.
One of the $25,000 donations to Trump’s inauguration was made through a Delaware shell company for a wealthy Indian financier based in London, who appears to not hold US citizenship or residency.”
Oh My god!!! That explaing all the preferential treatment India has been getting !!!!!
Impeach NOW !!!! DAMNIT!!!!!
It would be nice if it was possible to trust you or your source to be accurate about the facts or the law.
I suspect you are wrong about both.
The first question is is this story even true ? So much or what is reported about Trump is not.
Next – you do know that Trump does not run the inaugural ?
The inauguration is not a political campaign and I do not think it is covered by election law or the FEC. I can check – but you will not beleive me anyway.
Personally I think all of our campaign finance laws are unconstitutional garbage.
But SCOTUS has not obliterated all of them yet.
Though I would suggest that Citizens United probably applies to the inauguation committee – if congress actually was stupid enough to put it under campaign finance law.
The inauguration is handled entirely by a private company.
It is much like A PAC – and pretty much exactly Like Citizen’s United – the company that SCOTUS said FEC laws did not apply to.
As to foriegn contributions – We KNOW that HFA was getting assistance from the ukrainians.
There was actually some campaign related efforts coming from the DC ukraininan embassy.
The DNC and HFA’s entire process of constructing the Steele Dossier and feeding it to the FBI was – or should have been legal. The CRIME was where anyone in the administration made use of it without verifying what they used FIRST.
That said – Steele was a foreigner. Our law makes no distinction between Brits and Russians (or indians). More importantly Steeles sources were purportedly Russians – I say purportedly, because it is increasingly appearing that much of the Steele Dossier did NOT come from Steele’s russian sources but from Glenn Simpson’s extensive collection of Trump rumours.
The good news for Hillary is that including lies and rumours collected by Glenn Simpson in the Steele Dossier would NOT be a KNOWINGLY illegal campaign contribution.
But anything Steele got from Russian sources would.
But that is merely Hillary. During Obama’s 2008 campaign (and probably 2012) Obama was taking donations by credit card. Nothing was done to verify any compliance with FEC law.
BEFORE the election the Obama campaign became aware that they were receiving LOTS of small credit card donations from the mideast. This is not secret it made the news. The campaign did nothing about it. McCain also had probles with unverifiable CC donations and took measures to assure that no one donated more than they were allowed – even by using CC’s and that he accepted no foreign contributions.
I should have read your link more accurately.
There is no special form of company called a “shell” company.
A Delaware corporation is a Delaware corporation.
It pays taxes in the US, and Delaware.
In the unlikely campaign finance law requires any thing that it actually applies to to go to the trouble of researching the nationality of the shareholders of the stock in the company.
I presume you are aware that some contributors to move-on are foreigners. That Exxon has non-us shareholders.
Aside fromt he fact that I doubt that campaign finance law prohibits contributions to the inauguration from US companies formed in Delaware that have some foreign shareholders.
I would pretty much bet it does not require the innaugural committe to reasearch the shareholders of Delaware corporations.
The actual campaign finance news of the week involves AOC – who pledged that she would have nothing to do with “dark money”.
Well she has all kinds of problems.
There is a financial mess involving her “significant other”.
It is sufficiently convoluted that I might not have it straight.
Aparently AOC maxed out her credit cards on her campaign Early on.
So she hired a policial consulting firm – owned by a mulit-millionarie.
They then formed A PAC – which she controlled, He secured donations to that PAC which were then paid to her Signifcant other and she used that to pay off her credit card debt.
But it gets worse. She also formed an LLC, that was either her campaign or an adjunct to her campaign – this is legal. But then she paid money from the PAC – I will call that “light money” to the LLC where she was able to do with it whatever she pleased without having to report it.
i.e. DARK MONEY.
A recent FEC chair was asked about this – one of the ones who said the Daniels NDA was legal and he said the payments to the LLC were illegal. As a candidate she can not “coordinate” with a PAC that is aiding her campaign. Normally this just involves a fine.
But since she was actually a part of both organizations it is hard to see how the violation was not “knowing” and there fore CRIMINAL.
I have no desire to see AOC go to jail – it is far too useful to have her arround.
Besides I do not beleive the campaign finance laws are constitutional,
and I think AOC can raise money however she pleases and spend it as she pleases.
The only potential issues is where there is an obvious quid pro quo for a contribution – i.e. a clear bribe in the form of a contribution.
The level of hypocracy is beyond beleif.
For all this campaign finance nonsenes, emoluments nonsense, and this general political money idiocy I would suggest you look at McDonnell v. United States
Which I think was actually wrongly decided, but it was decided UNANIMOUSLY.
This is the case that made convicting Sen. Menendez nearly impossible.
This case makes a public corruption charge pretty much impossible to meet anymore.
And it directly relates to every idiotic claim regarding Trump.
If you do not like this
CHANGE THE LAW
Once upon a time when the world was young
😊 Made my morning!
And when the world was even younger
Excellent.
Influence Peddling In Trump America
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/03/a-florida-massage-parlor-owner-has-been-selling-chinese-execs-access-to-trump-at-mar-a-lago/
What is the difference between this and Clinton’s pay for play scheme ?
Clinton and her staff and foundation were actively involved and controlled the latter.
In clinton’s scheme we KNOW that influence seekers received MORE than an autographed picture.
When this happens with the moderates on the democrat team, you know th is party is now the Sanders/Warren/AOC party.
https://freebeacon.com/politics/hickenlooper-refuses-to-call-himself-a-capitalist/
Blah, effing blah.
Calling someone a Capitalist has had a NEGATIVE inference for a century in the US.
It’s a term used to denote pejorative behavior associated with Big Buck Bozos who manipulate and abuse the working class.
Next time anyone on the left is asked that they should respond that they’re entrepreneurs, not money grubbing labor haters.
Yes, for more than 100 years The left has taken what should be a term of respect and made it into a perjorative.
Do you beleive there are any honest politicians ?
Can you specifically identify and actual corrupt capitalist and the actual crime they have committed ?
Jay, you do not get to choose what laws you want to follow.
No city official, state official or federal official should be able to choose which laws they want to follow.
The courts are not there to make law, or change laws. They are there to make sure laws follow the constitution.
The president is not there to choose which laws he instructs officials to enforce. He swears to uphold the constitution and that includes the laws on the books. He is not king, although congress has given that office king like authority, but that is not part of the constitution.
Congress, and only congress can write, make and pass laws.
So if the immigration laws are bad laws that should not be enforced, then congress should change that law. No one should be circumventing the law or making law, including the 9th district court.
If ANY law is a bad law, including homicide laws you so sarcastically used as an example, that law should be changed, not ignored, circumvented or changed unless the appropriate level government, congress, assembly or commissioners change the law.
I dont like the federal governments marijuana laws and I have said many times the feds need to change the law. There should hardly ever be laws that the federal government has that is stricter than state laws unless the federal law is explicit in the constitution. And immigration laws are specifically covered in the constitution since congress, and only congress, can create immigration laws.
So if walls are bad and immigration laws are bad, thengetnrid of
them!
Excellent post.
Most of what you wrote is specific to government.
If YOU do not like a law – you as an individual, not as a government employee, you are free to disregard that law – that is “civil disobediance” but you should expect consequences.
ONE way we get rid of bad laws – is to figure out they are bad. that requires government to enforce them and atleast some people to disobey them.
More recently the senate has going through all kinds of nonsense regarding various nominees asking about their religion and they personal moral views.
These are irrelevant. What matters is whether they will enforce the laws as written.
If you are as an example catholic and oppose abortion but the law requires you AS A GOVERNMENT EMPLOYEE to do something you are morally opposed to – you must do it or quit.
AS AN INDIVIDUAL – you can choose to obey your conscience.
As a government employee if you beleive a law is UNCONSTITUTIONAL, you must still follow it and impose it.
The exception – to the later is the courts.
Judges may NOT use their own morality or political views to determine the validity or constitutionality of the law. But they are obligated to strike down unconstitutional laws.
Just as Congress is obligated not to make them.
The left has made a morass of government and the law.
In the left world view – congress, the president, the members of the executive, judges are all free to allow their own personal view of the constitution, morality, the intentions of others to supercede the actual law.
The morality of a law is determined by congress and the people alone.
The constitutionality of a law is determined first by congress, and then by the courts, with SCOTUS getting the ultimate decision – absent overriding through amendment.
We do not have “the rule of law” when throughout the federal govenrment everyone is individually deciding which laws to enforce, which laws are moral, which laws are constitutional.
As a government employee you are free to disagree, you are free to express that as a voter, But you are obligated to uphold the law and constitution as determined by SCOTUS or resign.
You have anarchy when everyone in government does their own thing.
Lower courts are free and expected to determine the constitutionality of issues of first impression. But they are obligated to follow precident for all else.
SCOTUS is supposed to value precident highly but is NOT bound to it.
Though some of this started earlier, mostly begining with the Obama administration judges have been appointed that seem to think they are independent on everything. Precident does not matter, That they are all their own supreme court justices.
In many but not all cases, Obama acted unconstitutionally and lawlessley, and much of the time favorable federal courts ignored this, driving issues that were easy to resolve to SCOTUS – often with 9-0 reversals.
As an example – voter-id has been determined to be constitutional more than a decade ago.
Every state that has passed a voter-id law has modeled their law after the one that SCOTUS approved – I beleive that is the Indiana law. Yet more than half the states that have passed Voter-id laws have spent almost a decade fighting to get them through the courts.
The ultimate outcome is clear. SCOTUS is going to uphold these laws.
We have had near the opposite under Trump.
Like it our not Trump’s actions as president have been constitutional – they are not even for the most part unusual. But most everything he does is fought in the courts and ultimately must go to SCOTUS – even though these are often issues SCOTUS resolved long ago.
If you wish to try to get SCOTUS to overturn a precident – you are free to try, but any lower court that disregards precident is not qualified to be a federal judge.
There are several federalist judges that have ruled following current precident, while writing an oppinion arguing that SCOTUS should reject precident. If you disagree with SCOTUS as a judges – you are free to argue that in your oppinions, BUT the decision must follow precident or we are lawless.
Jay and dduck, the battle between you two “lefties” and the libertarians/conservatives here somehow reminded me of the expression about “turtles all the way down” and I had to look it up. This is the story I remember and its a pretty good allegory for your battle with our dogmatists.
Turtles all the way down is all answer you will ever get when you butt heads with conservative/libertarian dogma (for that matter its all the satisfaction you would get from confronting Bernie Sanders progressives either, the root issue is rigid dogmatists.)
“Your theory that the sun is the centre of the solar system, and the earth is a ball which rotates around it has a very convincing ring to it, Mr. James, but it’s wrong. I’ve got a better theory,” said the little old lady.
“And what is that, madam?” inquired James politely.
“That we live on a crust of earth which is on the back of a giant turtle.”
Not wishing to demolish this absurd little theory by bringing to bear the masses of scientific evidence he had at his command, James decided to gently dissuade his opponent by making her see some of the inadequacies of her position.
“If your theory is correct, madam,” he asked, “what does this turtle stand on?”
“You’re a very clever man, Mr. James, and that’s a very good question,” replied the little old lady, “but I have an answer to it. And it’s this: The first turtle stands on the back of a second, far larger, turtle, who stands directly under him.”
“But what does this second turtle stand on?” persisted James patiently.
To this, the little old lady crowed triumphantly,
“It’s no use, Mr. James — it’s turtles all the way down.”
Roby
Excellent story
I sometimes say their arguments are like whale farts loud but under water
It is a great story. One that is incredibly ironic. because if you looked in the mirror Roby and Jay and to a lessor extent DD are obviously the old lady.
Ron and I have quite clearly defined the foundation.
While I have gone a bit philosophically deeper than he has, we have still both argued that you can not have functional government, and society without some foundation.
We have both offered to consider alternates to our own positions – ones that though not seriously examined by most people are still actually shared by nearly everyone.
But all we get from Roby. Jay, DD is “turtles all the way down”.
there are no principles
“all animals are equal, but some are more equal than others”.
Even a bad arrangement works better than complete chaos.
It should not be difficult to understand that
The story is about dogma, any rigid dogma, taken to the point of absurdity.
Meaning no disrespect to followers of organized religions, most especially Christians, a religious mindset consists of believing that following a document, the Bible, will literally save you.
While I mean no disrespect to the Bible, it is not my belief system and I do not live literally by its stories or expect that life on Earth is arranged according to the holy trinity, being saved by accepting Jesus as my savior, etc.
It is not surprising to me that the more religiously inclined people are the more they also view the Constitution in a manner that is analogous to the Bible, as a rigid Dogma that will save them.
The Constitution has direct answers to very small percentage of the questions and issues that perplex out society. Its a process, not an answer.
This leads, just as a quick for example, to the dogmatic belief that one must revoke the 2nd amendment if they wish to enact gun control laws.
In fact, according to the process of living and deciding by the Constitution we have many gun control laws on the books and have for many, many years. They are Constitutional. The dogmatists appear to believe that these existing gun control laws are not Constitutional and are in error.
As in the case of my opinion that I respect the beliefs of reasonable Christians, I have the same attitude towards those conservatives who believe that their rigid dogmatic view of the Constitution and Bill of Rights make gun control (gun control is just an example it is not my actual argument) UnConstitutional. I respect their opinion, but do not live by it. The long existing gun control laws are Constitutional in my universe.
The turtles all the way down story is humorous approach to criticizing the absurd idea that one has a dogma that answers all questions, for example, the Bible and the Constitution.
“The story is about ..”
If you think you need to explain it you have lost.
But worse still, the actual point which you have continued to expound on repeatedly is hostile to YOU in multiple ways.
You are actually arguing that tenaciously defending something is evidence of error. It is not.
Galleleo was right, others were wrong, both sides were tenatious – dogmatic.
The “moderate” thing to do would have been to compromise. But facts do not change because people compromise.
The Turtle story was also about a lack of foundations.
While Ron’s constitutionalism is more of a sill plate than a footer, it is still not about turtles all the way down. Both Ron and I have very clear foundational principles.
What we offer is falsifiable – meaning that if there were significant facts that conflicted we would be wrong. We offer foundational principles that if you can successfully undermine would topple much of the edifice we offer.
What of you ? Are there any foundations to what you offer ?
No !! It is “turtles all the way down” – and yet you can not see that.
Your own story is incredibly ironic, and you do not see it.
There are no fundimentalist christian here that I am aware of.
Analogizing anything to them is just bizarre.
BTW I spent years, decades ago engaging thoroughly with fundimentalist christians.
To the extent that are distinguishable from you or the left today, it is that they do have foundational principles. Those principles are unfalsifiable – you beleive or you do not, they are not possible to disprove.
But like everything you offer – ultimately it rests on “FAITH” – not facts, or logic or reason.
Dogma is “that which one thinks is true”. It is usually what you must beleive by faith – not evidence, logic or reason.
Again YOU.
I do not place the same signifcance on the constitution as Ron does.
But beyond some issues of emphasis and that Ron tends to use the constitution as a foundation, while it is merely a convenient reference point BOTH of us a pretty clear.
The constitution is NOT like the evangelical bible. Or fundimentalist christian salvation. It is not an immutable truth, something you must except by faith.
Both of us have said REPEATEDLY – if you do not like it as it is CHANGE IT.
Neither I nor Ron are claiming that it or anything else must be accepted entirely on faith.
As I have made clear repeatedly – it is in our interest to get the law, and the constitution right. We will thrive even more as we find the way to bring each closer to whatever is optimal.
but the first objective is NOT perfection, uptopia, it is order. Relatively limited order, but order nonetheless.
Without any rules at all – there is chaos – and violence.
We can tolerate a constitution that is far short of perfect.
But the more we transform that constitution and our into a collection of suguestions that will sometimes be followed rigidly and others not the more lawless and chaotic society is.
I have repeatedly asserted that the responsibility for the modern bitterly contentious nature of the world rests with the left – and YOU.
That is not just because you are shifting left. It is also because you are moving away from few clear enforced rules, to many unclear and randomly enforced rules.
You do not seem to see that as a recipe for disaster.
I think both Ron and I beleive we can make a compelling case – not merely for our understanding of the constituon.
But of the requirement for a constitutional foundation for government, and for a means of understanding that constitution that produces results than nearly all of us understand.
Roby.
I would venture my experience with actual evangelical and fundimentalist christians dwarfs yours.
My high School was in a region Jerry Falwell called the buckle on the bible belt.
I made the mistake of telling my classmates in 4th grade I was catholic. In the schools I attended catholics go straight to hell, do not pass go, do not collect $200.
In High School I read the bible – the entire thing, cover to cover, every single begat.
I have gone to the lions den – REPEATEDLY. I have debated the fundimentals of chrisianity with evangelicals and spent more time and effort doing so than I have spent on TNM.
Fundimentalist christians are now and have always been LESS dogmatic and LESS religious than the modern left.
Though many of the resemblances are incredible, and uncanny.
“The turtles all the way down story is humorous approach to criticizing the absurd idea that one has a dogma that answers all questions, for example, the Bible and the Constitution.”
You remain clueless to what Dogma is.
The constitution does answer all the questions about government.
But it is NOT immutable, it is not something we can not change or must accept by faith.
While it is a reflection of a mostly libertarian world view, we are free to change that.
Your argument is the proof of your won absurdity.
Neither Ron nor I treat the constitution the way an fundimentalist treats the bible.
What it is is our foundational law. Without the constitution we are lawless.
It is not sacred or immutable or the word of god. It is not even inherently correct.
But it is the supreme law of the land, and remains so until we change it, which we are free to do.
You have ranted that libertarianism is anarchy – but anarchy is what you are offering.
Your gin control example is perfect.
No Gun control laws are not constitutional – that is self evidently true from the language of the constitution and 2nd amendment.
Even today the linguistic relationship of the militia clause and the infringement clause is independent.
The 2nd amendment does not say “the federal government may not infringe on the states right to have militias”, even the most left interpretation (and wrong) is because militias are necescary the government can not infringe on the right of the people to bear arms.
It could as easily have said “because blue bellied sap suckers are necescary”.
The operative clause is independent of the purported justification clause.
That does not mean that the US can not ever have gun control laws.
If you want gun control laws, you must change the constitution to do so FIRST.
That is important for myriads of reasons.
If we are going to change the constitution – then we must have a national discussion about that. There is not some automatically “right” way that the constitution should be changed.
Should we repeal the 2nd amendment entirely ? Should we remove some types of weapons but not all ?
I am not proposing the answer. I am pointing out that you have ignored the fact that there are even any questions.
Nor is this even about guns. Whatever aspect of the constitution we are dealing with,
it is supposed to require thought and debate to change.
It is also supposed to require the overwhelming support of the people.
The constitution is about the powers of government and the rights of individuals.
Rights are what we have even when the majority says NO!
It is NOT sufficient to have majority support to infringe on a right.
Can we run a lottery and engage in human sacrifice – if 51% of the people support that ?
You think Gun Control is a good thing – that is an entirely different debate, one in which you are sufficiently obviously wrong that you will never get the popular support necescary to ammend the constitution. And that is the point. It is not about gun control it is that the purpose of the constitution – any constitution is to bar every tom dick and harry who is as sure as you are that they know what is best for all of us from imposing that on the rest of us by force.
It is NOT sufficient for you to beleive you are right. It is not sufficient for you to have the power to do what you think is right.
Hitler met both those criteria.
The constitution is supposed to be understood rigidly – no matter what it says. It is supposed to be understood that way so that both you and I am everyone else can clearly understand what it means. What we are free to do and what we are not. What government is free to do, and what it is not.
It would be nice if the constitution said what I want it to say. But what is most important is that I understand what it says even if I disagree.
The constitution MUST be read narrowly – meaning all ambiguity must be read as individual liberty, and rigidly – using rules of interpretation that produce a single specific outcome,
When it says “no” it must mean no.
“The long existing gun control laws are Constitutional in my universe.”
Bzzt wrong.
The first gun control laws were in the mid thirties and applied specifically to machine guns.
Our founders owned privately military grade weapons, The Pennsylvania rifle remained in production until the late 19th century. There is no difference between a capable sniper rifle and a hunting rifle for large game. You need stealth, range and accuracy.
Our founders owned cannons – and you are allowed to own your own cannon today.
Our founders owned their own warships.
The 14th amendment was EXPLICITYLY passed to grant blacks the right to own GUNS.
That was about 80 years AFTER the bill of rights.
Outside of the south there were no gun control laws in most of the US until the 60’s and 70’s.
California’s earliest gun control laws were in response to the black panthers marching on sacremento with loaded rifles.
You are a fabulous writer/thinker, Roby.
You should be publishing a column or blog of your own.
I don’t know how the process works, but you should think about submitting this comment (and others you have posted here) at sites with substantial traffic.
Thank you Jay. I do have a writing bug that I try not to overindulge because I also have a music bug and a family bug and a fitness bug (and I still work) and there are only so many things one can do before it becomes thin. If I could only focus all my energy on one musical instrument and one style I could be a pretty fair musician. I dilute my efforts in a very classically ADD manner, impulses.
I think I am here addictively in spite of trying to kick the habit mostly to try to find (make) some humor in the darkness of the dogmatic extremes that are surrounding the bedraggled moderate common sense and common decency world that I want to inhabit (not to mention that I want for my kids).
We can all predict the tsunami of thundering NOs that my comment will attract from the drekmaster. There is no such thing as a moderate, if there were they would be bad, common sense does not exist, common decency is a fallacy, humor is not understandable on the internet, there is no problem with extremes, there is no such thing as a drekmaster… One paragraph may be needed to quibble with and add footnotes to every word of little moderate dream… ooops, there are no dreams, the only thing that actually exists is market forces… So, before the tsunami of denial arrives I preemptively choose to see the humor in its absurd predictability.
As a tangent, the music videos I sometimes post are irrelevant but they are an attempt to lighten things up and remember the beautiful and joyous things. We certainly need to lighten things up, the gloom and dismay that follow from political affairs can be life sucking.
I would suggest sticking to music.
I have no doubt your writing would be popular – there are way too many people who are intellectually challenged and have no understand of logic.
But my guess is that you would attract an audience that even you and Jay would ultimately find offensive.
At the same time I would suggest participating in some of the most radical left wing blogs you can.
Though I doubt you are self aware enough to see yourself there, I have no doubt that exposure to lost of actual leftists would drive you to the right – maybe even to libertarain lite.
But the most fundimental intellectual obstacle that you need to overcome is the belief that ideas that are appealing are inherently true and can be imposed by force.
One of the most critical features of free markets is that new ideas FAIL.
coming up with ideas to change the world is not difficult at all.
Coming up with ones that work is nearly impossible.
One of the many problems with government is that bad ideas are not allowed to fail.
You are incredibly blind to the FACT that most ideas are BAD – though not always in an obvious way.
“At the same time I would suggest participating in some of the most radical left wing blogs you can.
Though I doubt you are self aware enough to see yourself there, I have no doubt that exposure to lost of actual leftists would drive you to the right”
and yada yada.
I love it! I went for humor, I struck pure gold! A fine belly laugh to start my day with.
Thank you, thank you!
Given what passes for fact logic and reason, I should not be surprised at what passes for excellence and humor.
Roby, there is no turtles that my beliefs are based on. Unlike the post turtles on the left, my political positions and arguements are based on solid foundation. The constitution.
While I can win almost any debate using that as my basis. They will blow smoke out their asses by basing any arguement concerning laws on anything but the constitution.
Roby does not understand that he is the proponent of “turtles all the way down”.
One of the issues being addressed is chaos vs. order.
While infinity is involved – it is NOT the infinity of “turtles” all the way down”.
It is that of yin/yang.
The pinacle of society has chaos and order balanced (that is not the same as equal).
Improvement does not exist without chaos, Absolute order is a zero growth stagnant world. If that is a world were free will exists – it is also an oppressive and stressful world.
But Improvement is difficult to impossible without order. Unbridled freedom includes the freedom to murder, and steal, and that degree of freedom precludes improvement too.
Chaos and order are opposing forces, but they are also both necescary forces.
We are not dealing with “turtles all the way down” we are dealing with yin and yang, chaos and order, each of which is necescary but too much of either and we do not improve and may even decline.
“Jay and dduck, the battle between you two “lefties” and the libertarians/conservatives here somehow reminded me of the expression about “turtles all the way down” and I had to look it up. This is the story I remember and its a pretty good allegory for your battle with our dogmatists.”
There is no “battle” Gravity as an example – just is. debating it, having an oppinion over its existance does not change the fact that you are not going to spin off the earth into space.
Even if you claim that what Ron and I are asserting is merely ONE way to do things – it is a way that actually works, if you wish to change it the burden is on you to come up with something that does not result in chaos.
You make this claim that libertarianism = anarchy – but it is anarchy that you are advocating.
The postion of the entire left – even the most moderate, is little different from
“all animals are equal, but some are more equal that others”.
Throughout human history people have shifted their views on numerous things – race, sex, nationalism, slavery, religion. Culture. In each prior generation the people of that generation were as certain of the truth of their values as you are of yours today.
In a century the people of that era will look on YOUR values and think of them as primative and quaint. Your “feeling” that something is moral, right and true, is the product of your personal culture – it is not an objective fact – not even on the many issues that I am likely to agree with you. Further even today those things you are certain are truth – does not have an absolure factual foundation – and even my agreement on many issues does not change those from good oppinions to facts. Nor does it change the fact that tens of millions of people do NOT hold precisely the views you do.
Put simply we can not government 350M people based on some feelings based standard that is NOT even uniform accross the left.
You bemoan the current strife and conflict. That is a direct consequence of the shift over the past 250 years from the limited government narrow constitutional and legal framework that Ron and I are discussing to the disorganized mess that the left has slowly impossed on us.
If Judge A and Judge B disagree on some issue – why is Judge A right and Judge B wrong ?
The left’s answert to that is nothing more than “because I say so” and “because it is obviuous”. Get a clue that is a recipe for conflict. It always has been.
That conflict is getting worse – because the left is getting more dogmatic and religious, But the foundational problem is there is no foundation at all to the means by which the left seeks to govern. Even the majoritarianism which is common among the left, which we know is a quick route to totalitarianism – even that is not truly a foundational value.
Obama Care was OPENLY imposed on a hostile majority in the HOPE that we would eventually grow to like it. While it now has a weak plurality supporting a significantly reduced version that does not alter the FACT that it was imposed by force by a minority.
Put simply when the left beleives it is right it does not even adhere to its supposed democratic principles.
Or more simply the left – and in this instance I mean pretty much everyone from moderate to left extreme has no principles at all.
I am not debating what the CORRECT principles are – that is a step beyond where we are now. I am pointing out that what the left has/is driving us towards is govenrment by power, and that WILL NOT WORK. It WILL cause SERIOUS conflict, and it WILL cause Chaos.
Ron and I are arguing a specific form of originalism with respect to understanding the constitution. While I think there is a compelling argument for that – and though not as formally defined as it is becoming, that has until the 1930’s been the standard for applying the constitution. The most important issue is NOT originalism – it is that there is some standard that allows people to make decisions and establishes to EVERYONE a basis for determining whether those choices are constitutional or lawful.
We do not need absolute consensus on what the standard ought to be.
But we must have ONE standard whose meaning can be understood approximately equally even by those who disagree that that should be the standard.
Libertarians are NOT proponents of lawlessness. We are vigorous proponents of law and order. But NOT arbitrary law and order. We want FEW rules, easily understood and rigidly enforced, in a system where it is possible but difficult to change those rules when we determine that is necescary. We want as Reagan stated – the maximum of individual liberty consistent with order.
If you wish something different – great – DEFINE that.
But recognize – broader government MEANS more CONFLICT.
More rules MEANS more CONFLICT.
More discretion MEANS more CONFLICT.
More ambiguity regarding the rules MEANS more CONFLICT.
More discretion MEANS more CONFLICT.
The right is not the heroes of the moment. I am not sure they completely understand what they are doing. But at the same time they are actually moving towards LESS CONFLICT, while the left is moving for MORE.
The left is angry that Trump is not merely shifting the courts irhgt but shifting them a very federalist direction. Given the massive number of judges Obama put on the courts, and that those judges are an eclectic collection without any guiding principles that has created a crisis in the courts that effects all of society. These judges and justices can not even agree among themselves. The supreme court has not yet realized that the lower federal courts are completely out of control and inoperable. They are chaos. If you removed every conservative judge – you would still have massive conflict and chaos – though maybe slightly more collegial (probably not) chaos and conflict.
I think it is incredibly important that we have the right rules. But even a consistent set of the WRONG rules is superior to the mess the left has created.
I have used the courts as an example – but this problem is NOT confined to the courts.
Strict majoritarian democracy is evil. but even it is an improvement over chaos.
Probably the single most important reason the economy has improved with Trump, is a radical drop in uncertainty. It is not Trump’s “deregulation” – though that is good. It is not the Tax Cut, it is the fact that people, the business, the economy have a SLIGHTLY greater sense that they will not be surprised by new government constraints tomorow.
The more unpredictable government is – the less likely people are to take risks about the future and the lower our standard of living will be.
Roby;
You continue to assert several things that are in multiple ways inherently FALSE.
The first is that being dogmatic is inherently evil.
I do not think you honestly beleive that, but you say it all the time.
If someone strongly beleives something you do not – the mere fact that they strongly beleive something is by your argument proof that they are wrong.
The argument that you make – your faux moderation, is that all strongly held views are wrong.
It is true that strongly beleiving the earth is flat is dogmatic and wrong.
It is also true that strongly beleiving that the earth is round and orbits the sun is NOT wrong.
We do not have absolute truth – but quite OBVIOUSLY all positions, all viewpoints are NOT equal, and many are WRONG.
A dogmatic beleif in gravity is not only not evil -t is actually a necescity.
Human progress is the effort to increase the domain of things we beleive that have an extremely high probability of being TRUE.
That is a difficult process – we have at many times held strong beleifs that were wrong.
But our past dogmatism about things that proved error, does NOT mean the world would be better if we did not beleive anything strongly – even things that are near certain to be truth.
Your entire response what this nonsense that:
libertarians are wrong because they hold a small number of core values strongly.
And they are of course wrong – because all strongly held views are wrong.
I address the foundations of conflict in my prior response.
As best as I can tell your position on the foundations of conflict is that it is routed in anyone holding a position strongly. As best as I can tell – NOTHING has any high probability of being
true, that all oppinions and viewpoints are equal – actually that is not true, you are certain that some viewpoints – racism etc are so obviously untrue that they can not be heard.
But you offer no basis beyond feelings for that choice.
You are certain that you know what is right and wrong – without some foundational values to confirm that, and inable to grasp that you can not run any society or govenrment on such a weak foundation.
You seem to think that the world of his time should have yeilded to Galleleo because he was obviously right, yet I have no doubt that had you lived at the time of Galleleo you would not merely have rejected his views – but called them extreme and dogmatic and been certain that even if he was right, he should shut up because that would end conflict.
You are also on the wrong side of the turtles argument.
There are only 4 FOUNDATIONAL positions.
Free will exists or it does not.
Everything is determinist or it is not.
The fact that you are unfamiliar with these metaphysical and philosophical debates does not change their truth or relevance.
Even if we make each of those values gradient rather than binary that does not fundimentally change things – there is still a single plane.
Morality can not exist without free will.
Nor can it exist in a fully deterministic universe.
If you beleive that somethings are more moral than others, if you beleive that slavery is wrong. You have already accepted the foundational tenants of libertarianism (and in fact pretty much all western thought) and you have REJECTED the foundations of progressivism and post modernism.
Individual liberty is the foundation of morality.
It is the BOTTOM Turtle. Below that is the non-human world. The turtles below that have instincts, not free will, and have no morality.
If you disagree – fine – provide an atlernative foundation. I will be happy to discuss that with you.
Regardless, it is you and the left that live in the world where you have no foundations.
In your own example – YOU are the old lady.
What dreck
What fallacy.
If there is error in an argument – point that out. Facts, logic reason.
Insulting arguments you do not like is bad intellectual masturbation.
Maybe you get off, but no one learns anything.
Your dogma is attempting to run over my Karma. Cease and desist your attempts to oppress me, Libertarian.
“Your dogma is attempting to run over my Karma. Cease and desist your attempts to oppress me, Libertarian.”
You keep saying that you are not looking to use force – and yet you constantly resort to demands.
And not merely demands – but these comical demands.
“Quit telling me that I am not permitted to use force against you, dammit!!!”
I “demand” that you cease using unjustified force against me, directly or through proxy.
Yes, that is a demand, and it is also a threat. It you use force against me without justification I may use force in response. That is an ancient accepted justification for the use of force, older than history itself.
What is “I demand that you stop trying to interfere with my efforts to use unjustified force against you!” ?
I can not think of a justification. There is no traditional much less ancient basis for that.
You “Karma” is the mistaken beleive you can control others.
My dogma, is not dogma. it is an expectation that you will conform to the social contract.
Roby, not sure where this is going to post. Tread too long, wordpress sucks with hand held device, etc.
So will try to keep this short and reply to your comment about dogma, religion, constitution and spcifically gun control.
No, the constitution does not answer any questions. It is the foundation that all other laws are based. You asked questions concerning current gun control laws. The laws were written, they addressed the question and the constitutional ruling only answered, ” is this law legal”?
If you read the bible, there are many different books, and sometimes different opinions on what the bible dictates. That is why we have so many different organized churches. Just like King Henry, he wsnted to divorce, so he formed his own church.
The constitution, on the other hand, provides for one central authority to decide if “divorce” is allowable. SCOTUS. It decides to preclude anyone who disagrees with a rule from following their own law.
Ron, There is nothing in your answer for me to disagree with. It sounds like we both believe that the Constitution gives a process but not a direct answer to most issues of law.
Dave, as I knew he would, stated that all gun control laws are UnConstitutional according to him.
Out of curiosity, I would be interested in your view as another (but very different!) conservative/libertarian. Are gun control laws that have been long in place Constitutional? Are all attempts to regulate “arms” UnConstitutional? Are you with Dave on this, or is there a difference?
From your answer above I am now expecting that you will tell me that you believe that it is possible to regulate possession of arms without violating the 2nd amendment.
Roby, I will make this a qualified yes, the laws on the books are constitutional. I say qualified because I would think any that are in the gray area have already been ruled on by SCOTUS and the fact I don’t know all the laws that are there now.
I also think that anything that is proposed today is very different than anything proposed years ago. For instance, machine guns that were made illegal years ago may find a very different response to gun control rights individuals today. Not because everyone wants the right to own a “Tommy gun”, but because of the government we have today compared to many years ago. Restrictions on the number of shells a shot gun can hold (3 shells) also would not get a favorable response today compared to years ago.
So this may open up a barrage of comments, but I do not believe our government was as divided many years ago as we are today and I do not believe that there was as much “creeping legislation” as there is today. And where the divisions did exist, it was not based on rights of citizens, it was based more on who was a citizens and what rights should that group of individuals have. I believe it would have been much easier to pass background check laws for gun shows, clip restrictions and other regulations back in the day than now since ltiile had occurred to make people skeptical of government overreach.
There was much more trust in government to “crack the barn door”, let in a few rules and to close the barn door after that happened. Today, there are way too many people that believe as I do. An almost complete distrust for government when it comes to rights infringement and that once the barn door is opened, the regulations will flood the legal landscape. SCOTUS was also not as extreme as it is today with the Gingsburg’s, Sotomayor’s and Kagan’s, so the rulings by the high court were much more moderate (except during the Roosevelt court and even then it was not as extreme)
I have no problems with the actual legislation for background checks, limits on the number of bullets a gun can hold or the mechanism that allows rapid fire of bullets. However, I have huge problems that once that door is opened today (not years ago when shotguns were restricted in number of shells) that the far left will take that as an opening to further restrict the number of guns one might own, licensing of all guns (so government knows the total number and where they are) and elimination to the size of bullets, etc that one might buy without a certain permit. Once that interpretation of the 2nd amendment is made, I believe the second amendment will be based only on flint lock guns and state militias (national guard) and private citizens will have very few ways to own guns.
And please don’t say that will never happen. Who the hell ever thought this country would have a Sanders getting as much support for a presidential nomination as he is getting or the GOP would have brain farts so great that a Trump would ever win the presidency?
We are blurring together many things.
1), What the constitution SHOULD say,
2). What it DOES say,
3). What the courts say it says.
4) how the courts are supposed to establish what it says.
1). Gun laws do not work. It is never justifiable to infringe on liberty without ACTUALLY producing a benefit that substantially outweighs the cost.
This should not be a “libertarian” view. We do not want lots of feel good laws that do not work. It does nto matter what they are. It does nto matter that we WISH they were magical.
2). The constitution says:
the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.
That is not unclear, the prior militia clause is not a limit or conduction in any ordinary application of english grammar.
Shall not be infringed is the strongest language used in the constitution.
Whether you beleive that there are circumstances in which government can infringe on a right, the STANDARD the constitution chose for arms was the highest.
In otherwords, even if you beleive that some laws regulating arms are permissible – the burden of proof that a law is necescary, that it is efficient, that it is the least infringing means of resolving the issue and that the need is compelling should be very very high.
If you believe the standard for the right to bear arms – should be lower or non-existant change the law.
3). SCOTUS had studiously avoided rulling on the 2nd amedment prior to Heller – Heller had extremely weak support from conservatives and the NRA because they were very concerned they would lose. Since the 30’s SCOTUS has bent itself into a pretzel to duck the plain language of the constitution. The expectation of most of the right was that Heller would produce a BAD decision.
But in Heller, SCOTUS was provided an enormous amount of historical support for the meaning of the 2nd amendment – not merely at ratification, but also that the 14th amendment DELIBERATELY intendended to impose the 2nd amendment on the STATES.
Contra Robby there are NOT long standing gun laws. There is almost no federal precedent of any kind.
Today it is very difficult to legally own a machine gun.
Beyond that there is very little federal legislation regarding arms.
You can legally own a cannon today. I am pretty sure you can legally own a gattling gun.
You can legally own a warship – and private warships existed in the early 19th century.
3). I have addressed 4 repeatedly.
“It sounds like we both believe that the Constitution gives a process but not a direct answer to most issues of law.”
BZZT wrong,
Not merely wrong, but you are GUARANTEED to have the horrendous mess of bitterness and polarization if the constitution is not a direct answer to the powers of government.
The less you are willing to ascribe certainty to the constitution has the more people will fight over what it purportedly means.
It is not a process, it is an ANSWER. When we do not like the answer, we change the constitution – ACTUALLY CHANGE IT, not wish it away, or pretend it means something different.
“Dave, as I knew he would, stated that all gun control laws are UnConstitutional according to him.”
Not according to me – according to the actual meaning of the words in the constitution.
This is the text:
“A well regulated militia being necessary to the security of a free state, the right of the people to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed.”
There is only one correct way to read that that is actually proper in the english language as used at the time it was written.
If you do not like that – CHANGE THE CONSTITUTION.
BTW even the lefts non-sensical misreading would REQUIRE “a well regulated millitia”
Which again to our founders was an organized an armed populace independent of the state.
If you have ever bothered to read the federalist papers – you know the editorials written by Hamilton, Madison and Jay to persuade people to ratify the constitution, they make it crystal clear that “a well regulated militia” – or just people who have the right to bear arms, is a critical bulwark against tyranny.
There is a reason that Heller was decided as it was – because not only is the text of the constitution clear, but the intent of its authors and the understanding of the people who ratified it were ALL clear.
Just to be clear, no one says you can not have gun control laws.
ONLY that to do so, you must amend the constitution.
I doubt that Ron agrees with you that the constitution is a process.
The constitution is quite explicitly intended to ANSWER with finality the same question whenever it is asked: Does the federal govenrment (and in many instances the state government) how the power it seeks to use ?
The plain words of the constitution are the final authority on that.
Our founders HOPED they got it perfect. But they knew better. The constitution is not intended to provide the RIGHT answer to questions about govenrment power, nor even the FINAL answer. But it is ALWAYS the defintion of the actual powers of the current government, and remains that until we change it.
If you do not like what the constitution says – you are free to debate and persuade us as to what it SHOULD say.
Word play with the intention of changing the constitution by changing the meaning of words is Immoral. It is like playing monopoly and deciding that you are free to play by different rules without getting the other players to go along.
“Are gun control laws that have been long in place Constitutional? ”
There are two issues with this statement – the first is there are no such thing.
Are laws that are facially unconstitutional, but have long existed constitutional by virtue of age ?
Are you really asking ? Are we today bound by Plessey or Dred Scott because they are ancient ?
Do you really wish to claim that when SCOTUS says “oops, we screwed up” i.e. reverses that they were wrong to do so ? That would legitimize separate but equal.
The next federal gun control laws were in the 1930’s That is not “long in place”.
That is 150 years AFTER the constitution was written.
From 1787 to 1865 there was an open question as to whether the bill of rights applied to the states – sort of. the 9th and 10th amendments explicitly refer to the states. And explicitly note that the bill of rights was not intended to specify all rights, and that all rights not addressed in the constitution are reserved to the people.
There is also BTW significant documentation that our founders considered our rights innumerable. SCOTUS however did not, and from 1787 through to approximately the fifties disregarded the language of the constitution and refused to apply the bill of rights to the states. This despite the fact that as I stated the conception that rights were intended to be consttrued broadly was the intent of the founders and the ratifiers, and this was a sufficiently strongly held view that one of the MANY purposes of the 14th amendment was to bitch slap SCOTUS and assert that ALL RIGHTS – not just those in the Bill of Rights are limits on ALL GOVERNMENT, not just the federal govenrment.
Again read the history of the 14th amendment.
And I would go one step further. By the time the 14th amendment was ratified – militias were non existant and the federal govenrment had a standing army.
The authors of the 14th amendment were well aware that the “justification” clause of the 2nd amendment was no longer meaningful. The STILL using the normal rules of english understood the 2nd amendment to bar laws restricting arms.
Regardless the history of the 14th amendment makes it crystal clear that the intention of its authors and the understanding of those who ratified it was to assure that southern negros would be free to have guns to defend themselves.
“Are all attempts to regulate “arms” UnConstitutional? Are you with Dave on this, or is there a difference?”
Fundimentally your question is what level of scrutiny applies to the 2nd amendment.
The correct answer – not the one SCOTUS follows, is that strict scrutiny applies to ALL rights.
That does not bar government from regulating guns – just as government is not barred from regulating speech. But it imposes a list of condictions on laws that infringe on rights that are very difficult to meet. You can look up what the requirements for strict scrutiny are.
Roby;
I have no problem rearguing the past.
But you seem to beleive that you are not only free to do so but can do so at any time for no reason.
Though the mythical “long in place laws” do not exist, it is true and it SHOULD be true that lower courts should NOT be free to reexamine decided issues, and that SCOTUS should be reluctant to rexamine issues that have been long decided.
This principle is called Stare Decisis. It is not new. Nor is it immutable.
The presumption when an issue comes before the courts is that past decisions will be conformed to. That is not always possible – sometimes as with Citizen’s united multiple past decisions are in conflict.
But it is also true that sometimes the court determines that it erred in the past
Brown was one such instance.
Heller was NOT a reversal or prior decisions.
If you wish to regulate guns, you should not be trying to game the constitution.
A mistake that SCOTUS has made that is ancient is pretending that it could wish away the plain language of the constitution.
If you are unhappy with the language of the constitution, if you want more latitude – change the constitution.
I do not care whether we are talking the right to arms, or free speech, or trial by jury,
We want to read the constitution as it is written, and if that does not produce the results we want – change the constitution.
If you have another method of defining government and law, that you can persuade nearly all of us to accept that leaves us with law and constitution that all of us will know what it means – even if we do not agree with it – I am open to discussion.
What is called extreme conservative, textualist, strict construtction is just a formalized form of the way law and constitutions have been understood starting long before the revolution.
It is not necessary for us to all or nearly all to agree on what the constitution and our law ought to be.
It is necessary that nearly all of us can understand what our law and constitution IS, whether we agree with it or not.
We may not all know the nuances of the differences between first degree murder, and manslaughter, But we know that killing others without justification is not only wrong, but a crime for which we will be punished if caught.
The constitution is essentially the law for government. It dictates what government may and may not do. The means by which we understand the constitution must be such that the courts, the executive and the legislature and the people are clear on what it means.
They can disagree on what SHOULD be constitutional, but not on what is.
Further lack of clarity is NOT a game. The objective is not to find the most obtuse means to understand the constitution.
I am open to discussing the “process” – meaning alternate methods of reaching that certainty and clarity that are available to nearly all of us. But ultimately if there is not ONE method that is broadly accepted that is essentially intuitive or close to it, then we are lawless.
My objective is NOT to find them means of understanding the constitution that fits my beleifs.
It is to find the means that is intuitive (even if the explanation is not), clear, and accessible to all, even those who want it to mean something different.
If we have that “process”, then each of us is capable of working to change the constitution to say what we beleive it SHOULD say, with the assurance that if we succeed, that is what will be accepted.
The constitution does answer all questions regarding the legitimate powers of the federal government. That is its purpose. If the federal government is not given a power in the constitution that you beleive it ought have – the answer is that it does not, and that if you think that is wrong, the process to change that is open to you.
The constitution does not answer who you should marry, or whether you should have kids.
But it near absolutely answers questions about the powers of the federal govenrment
It is NOT however the 10 commandments, It is not immutable – it is as the left asserts a “living constitution” not a dead one. The left merely fails to accept that change is accomplished through a process not whimsy.
What double dreck (one dreck on top of a lower dreck).
In other words, double decker dreck: he is a double decker drecker.
Maybe you want to find “The New Punster” or “the new slurster”.
So you provide a reply that is unmored from any thread that really says little more than that you have had a visceral reaction to something you read, without any reference to what you have read.
What is dreck and why ?
Calling something names tells us about nothing beyond your emotional state.
dreck has become a synonym for dhlii comments… accept & embrace it.
You speak for the world ?
That would make sense – you continually beleive you are entitled to wield power over others.
Regardless, the definish of dreck is trash, rubbish.
There is no mention of my comments.
Not listed as a synonym.
Your assertion that there is some correlation is something you must prove
and an assertion that is wrong.
Further “dreakmeister” whould be a “garbage person”.
So we are back to ad hominem.
Words have meaning.
When you misuse them you miscommunicate.
Worse still most humans think in words, so when you missuse words, you actually distort your own thinking.
BTW Roby, the dreckmaster has call me a liberal many times, and I don’t mind the label cause he probably gets off on it.
On another blog I am sometimes, especially when I fought against the Clintonistas, was called a conservative, although I feel like a right-leaning moderate Republican. But no more, Trump and his enablers in the Rep party have caused me to turn towards the Dems who I really don’t like, out of necessity to kill this political cancer invading our country.
dduck, As with any plague or pestilence, (it could be trump, it could be AOC, it could be dogmatic progressives or conservatives/libertarians) humor is a necessary tool for holding one’s sanity intact. A good laugh will do more good than anything else in our situation.
We are not on “The New Comdian” either.
I have no objection to comedy.
At the same time YOU are the plague and pestilence.
No one is seeking to use force against you EXCEPT to resist your use of force against them.
BTW stringing a bunch of things together does not make them a group, or similar, except in your head.
ex.
“it could be Hitler it could be Stalling or it could be Mother Theressa/Ghandi”
“BTW Roby, the dreckmaster has call me a liberal many times, and I don’t mind the label cause he probably gets off on it.”
When you make oblique remarks like this, it is a kind of consciousness of guilt.
Insult is not argument. But making an insult this obliquely is cowardice.
If you are going to insult someone – do so directly.
Further you can not be talking about me. I deliberately almost never use the word “liberal” and when I do, I usually use it as a compliment. Liberal as is obvious from the root of the word is someone who values liberty highly.
Alan Derschowitz is a liberal. I am a liberal, though I usually sue clasical liberal or libertarain, to avoid being confused with people who are most definitely illiberal.
“On another blog I am sometimes, especially when I fought against the Clintonistas, was called a conservative, although I feel like a right-leaning moderate Republican.”
What you feel is irrelevant to facts.
“But no more, Trump and his enablers in the Rep party have caused me to turn towards the Dems who I really don’t like, out of necessity to kill this political cancer invading our country.”
Again what you feel is irrelevant.
You seem fixated on people not issues.
You make it clear that Trump personalities – not facts, not issues, not principles or values are
the driving force in your life.
Even your remarks regarding “clintonistas” reflects the same error.
You are not republican, democrat, conservative, progressive or actual liberal.
You are just anti-trump and anti-clinton.
I am not particularly enamour of other Trump or Clinton as people – Though Bill and Hillary are in my view more “cancerous” than Trump.
But overall Bill Clinton was and is a bad person, but a good president.
Thus far Trump is working towards matching Clinton as a president.
Again with the oblique s____. You are a robot and with that and many other DIRECT insults I have pelted you with, and yet your robot brain (can’t they program a little humor in there yet) can’t get it.
You idiot, I was having a nice discussion with Roby and I guess you felt we were talking behind your back. Poor schmuck, you think this blog is all about you and your distorted libertarian views. RonP is light years ahead of you, and yet you insult him, you call it corrections, just as you do with all of us here on TNM. Even with all of that, you insist it is your right and your style/whatever to regurgitate your voluminous rambling dissertations, that I’m sure you think are brilliant and convincing- admit it, you feel better.
Non-oblique enough?
“Again with the oblique s____. You are a robot and with that and many other DIRECT insults I have pelted you with”
So direct you are posting as anonymous.
BTW the point is not that you are hiding, it is that being oblique is just stupid.
Insult me directly – maybe you have, regardless I do not care.
But you did not have the courage to write an insult that was do ME and from YOU.
That is just cowardice – and stupid cowardice at that.
It might not be absolutely clear what you intended but it is clear enough,
It is also pretty clear than you did not (and still do not) have the courage to say what you actually mean.
“and yet your robot brain (can’t they program a little humor in there yet) can’t get it.”
Well atleast it is clear than “anonymous” is insulting me.
Does that make you feel better ?
“You idiot, I was having a nice discussion with Roby and I guess you felt we were talking behind your back.”
This is a public blog, not a private chat. You are never having a nice conversation with one person – you are never acting behind someones back. If you want a private conversation take it to email or text, or whatever.
“Poor schmuck, you think this blog is all about you and your distorted libertarian views.”
No I think this blog is a public forum, and I think that if you are going to publicly insult other people, you should do so directly.
Further I do not chose what you or anyone else here posts. Almost all of my posts are reactive. You decide what topic you want to discuss and what you want to say and I react.
“RonP is light years ahead of you, and yet you insult him, you call it corrections, just as you do with all of us here on TNM.”
What I have only two choices ? I must either fawn over Ron or Loathe him ?
There is nothing in between ?
I do not recall having ever “insulted” Ron, If I have I apologize.
I frequently disagree with Ron. Expecting any two people to agree on everything is insane.
I try to be polite with Ron – as he is polite with me.
I am less polite with some of the rest of you than I ought to be,
I regret that not because you deserve better,
If you are going to spew insults and nonsense that is what you should expect back and all you are entitled to.
But because those other posters here who do not spray this blog with stupid insults all the time deserve better.
” Even with all of that, you insist it is your right and your style/whatever to regurgitate your voluminous rambling dissertations, ”
Right ? Not exactly, this is Rick’s forum, I do not have a right here.
Rick can censor whoever he pleases for any reason he pleases.
But you do not have a right to censor me here, just as I do not have a right to censor you.
“that I’m sure you think are brilliant and convincing”
It is pretty self evident that I am not convincing.
I do not need afirmation of my intelligence from blog posts.
And if I did I would put more effort into it that I do.
I do use this blog as a way of testing and polishing arguments, as well as improving my skills at certain specific forms of writing. In case you can not figure that out, the only person I am comparing myself to in that regard is me.
“- admit it, you feel better.”
Still beleive you can read minds and psychoanalyze over the internet.
Grow up, you are not clairvoyant.
Not with Trump,
Not with me,.
Not with anyone else.
The thoughts and motivations that you should concern yourself with are the only ones that are knowable to you – your own.
“Non-oblique enough?”
You are posting as anonymous and asking that ?
“I do use this blog as a way of testing and polishing arguments, as well as improving my skills at certain specific forms of writing. In case you can not figure that out, the only person I am comparing myself to in that regard is me.:
I am glad you have a philosophy that pleases you. We All figured out long ago that you are most of all talking to yourself, proving to yourself again and again that you are right.
Its your internal universe, live in it, by all means. Just don’t imagine that its anything other than your own personal view of the world. To an outsider to your head it looks like “turtles all the way down”, simply dogma.
All you have ever proven here is that Dave is Dave, that Dave believes Dave. Daily proof that Dave is Dave is not actually wildly interesting to others, other than in a sort of perverse zealous street preacher making a spectacle sort of way.
“We All figured out long ago that you are most of all talking to yourself, proving to yourself again and again that you are right.”
You did ? You are constantly telling me that I am here to impress others, Now apparently I am here to impress myself.
“We All” – did you get appointed representative for the rest of TNM ?
“Its your internal universe, live in it, by all means.”
Back to your certainty that you know what others think.
“Just don’t imagine that its anything other than your own personal view of the world.”
Back to issuing commands.
“To an outsider to your head it looks like “turtles all the way down”, simply dogma.”
Now you speak for the world.
And again factually inaccurate.
“turtles all the way down” is your world not mine. Nor is it the same as Dogma.
Absolutely, my accpeteance that Free will exists and that the world is not deterministic, is something that I take by faith. You can call it Dogma, You can also call it an axiom.
Regardless it is the foundation. There is no Turtle below it.
Further, there are only four other possibilities, or quadrants if you wish to beleive these are not binary values.
If you want to discuss the possibility that free will does not exist – and the implications of that, or the impact of hard determinism – I am open to that discussion.
But I do not expect to have that conversation with you. As you and I both live in the same quadrant of that matrix. You just don’t accept the consequences of that.
You seem to beleive that you can have this principle or that value, without the follow on effects of that. You are like a vegetarian who eats bacon. It is not necescary for your values or principles to be consistent.
You can pick and choose what you beleive, without any need for it to work, or to work together.
And you ask why I think you are a creature of the left ?
I do not think you know what post modernism is.
At the same time as it is still at the core of what you beleive.
“All you have ever proven here is that Dave is Dave, that Dave believes Dave. Daily proof that Dave is Dave is not actually wildly interesting to others, other than in a sort of perverse zealous street preacher making a spectacle sort of way.”
It is possible to prove things using facts, logic reason. I do that all the time. It is my job.
It is not ever possible to prove things to people, to compel another to accept something, no matter how solid the proof or argument. If you choose to beleive in unicorns and rainbows – no one has the power to fix that.
All that I ask – demand of you is that you do not impose your unicorns and rainbows on others by force. You have no right to.
To make this clearer to you. I do not think there is anything that I have asserted as the legitimate domain of government that you or 95% of the rest of the world does not agree with.
I am not imposing my views on you by force. I hope that we agree that government can punish rapists and murders. Nearly everyone does.
If there is some act of government – “force” that I seek to impose on you – raise that issue.
I do not have that right.
I do have the right to say – “Stop, no farther”.
You are always free to do what I obect to enitirely volunatarily on your own with however many like minded people you find.
It is even possible I will join you. In myriads of instance I actually share your values.
What I do not share, is your immoral drive to impose them on others by force.
We continue to hear rants from the left AND posters here that Trump is a treat to the “rule of law”. And yet, though he has done things that I would prefer he had not, he has not as of yet done anything lawless or unconstitutional.
He is not even come close to straining the limits of constitutional presidential power, much less rupturing them as Obama had.
What is the greater threat the person on the park bench ranting, and fuming who has been there for years and never hurt anyone, or the quiet minister who is a leader of the community and it turns out murdered his last two wives ?
I would add to the list below that a federal court has ORDERED Trump to continue DACA, despite the fact that prior to Trump’s election the federal courts had determined that DACA was unconstitutional. Exactly how is it that it is constitutional and lawful to FORCE one president to continue a program that has already been deemed lawless and unconstitutional by another ?
It is near certain that the 9th or some other left leaning court will determine that Trump’s ED is unconstitutional. Though it would restore some of my faith in left judges if they determined that it was undesirable, but legal. It is also certain that after a lengthy litigation process that judgement will be overturned. Just as Trump’s immigration EO was.
A court has found against adding a citizenship question to the Census – and we will have a protracted legal holy war over that. The basis for the decision ? Not that adding the question to the Census is unconstitutional – it clearly is not, and has been there for almost half of the nations history, but because Wilber Ross might have wanted it for improper reasons.
What does it take for the left to grasp – an act it legal or illegal. It the action is legal further analysis ENDS. There is no – this is illegal if Trump does it, or Wilbur Ross does it, or if I do not like their reasons for doing it.
Your guesses as to someone else’s intentions do NOT make their actions into a crime.
This is just another example of official lawlessness.
President Liar
Trump Mental Disorder
Mr. Conway is making a specific claim about something Trump said.
Unless Trump actually said that – the only liar would be Conway.
We get alot of this Trump said nonsense that either Trump never said or is out of context.
Next “I heard that I was first in my class” is a very odd sentence structure.
It is not something that people typically say.
As and example who would say “I heard someone say I had brown hair” ?
Further, though I doubt Trump said that, it would only be a lie if no one said it to him.
It would be a lie if no one said it to him even if he was head of his class.
It would be true if someone said it to him even if he was not head of his class.
Finally this is not really all that consequential.
I have heard people say Obama was top of his class.
No one has provided evidence that is true.
I heard (me personally) Lawrence Tribe say That Obama got A+ in his Con law class, and Cruz Got A’s. Yet there is no evidence to support either. At the same time Tribe recalls Cruz and his discussions in class in fair detail, but not Obama. Further Cruz left harvard and clerked for a federal judge and then a supreme court justice – that is what people who get A+ in con law (and everything else) at law school do. I know all the accolades my wife Got at UofP. They are several times more than we know of Obama, They are slightly less than we know of Cruz. My wife could not get a clerkship with a supreme court feeder judge – though she got one of only 3 interviews with one. She did get a clerkship with a federal judge.
Obama left harvard to become a community organizer, and later an adjuct law professor – that means he taught at most 1 course a semester, and not at a top law school.
So I am deeply suspicious that Tribes recollection is faulty.
Regardless, we have neither Obama’s nor Cruz’s actual grades.
And Obama can truthfully say I heard Prof. Tribe say that I got an A+ in Tribe’s con law class.
One should always pay attention to oddly constructed sentences.
They are nearly always deliberate.
Another distinguished Mar Al- Trump Member:
https://www.motherjones.com/politics/2019/03/the-massage-parlor-owner-peddling-access-to-trump-has-ties-to-chinese-government-linked-groups-cindy-yang/
So, has trump benefited from a head job or hand job?
Inquiring minds want to know
“If the President of the United States is letting a Chinese madam sell access at Mar-a-Lago to Chinese business people while his friends are getting serviced at businesses she started, he is making himself and the country vulnerable to massive blackmail risk. It is a textbook story of how foreign actors gain leverage over senior officials. ”
https://www.thedailybeast.com/cindy-yang-affair-from-hand-jobs-to-grip-and-grins-with-donald-trump-should-not-obscure-the-huge-national-security-risks
You do not “let other people”
People do what they want.
You are responsible for your own actions.
BTW this is a textbook example of how stupid the media is.
Please explain to me how the country or Trump is going to be blackmailed over this ?
This is about as nonsensical as the nonsense that Flynn could be blackmailed by Russia for a small item the Russias did not and could not even know – what he did or did not tell Pence of the phone call with Kislyak.
Sally Yates was screaming that Flynn could be blackmailed.
Right Gen. Flynn – who was willing to fight the Iran deal vigorously enough it cost him his job, was going to allow russians to blackmail him with information they did not have over a minor discrepancy that at MOST would cost him his job, and that could be dealt with trivially – just be revealing it. All Yates had to do to eliminate the non-existant Blackmail threat she feared was to Tell Pence that Kislyak had mentioned sanctions to Flynn.
All done, no blackmail possibility.
I have no idea what is going on with this woman. I have no idea whether what is being said about her is true or not – and I am suspicious it is not.
We like to call all successful Asian business women “madams” as if no asian woman can succeed without engaging in prostitution.
I have not yet heard a report that she has been arrested – ever. or even that she is being investigated. I would expect the Secret Service has THOROUGHLY checked every single person who comes to Mar Lago. And that if a madam and her John’s were getting in they would have done something about it.
But lets assume that is true.
How do you blackmail Trump for this ?
The nonsensical interpretation of this is insane
Trump Derangement Syndrome.
Well, it looks like he has decided to branch out in touchy-feely ways in China.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/china-donald-trump-branded-without-us-congress-permission-trademarks-spas-escort-services-hotels-and-a7619136.html
“The presidents lawyers” are government employees and if this story is true as written that would be a very very serious crime. One which none of them would be so stupid to commit.
Trump’s lawyers are the people that Donald Trump hires, not that work for the President.
Though I would bet that these are NOT Donald Trump’s lawyers, but the lawyers for some Trump enterprise. Since the inauguration the entirety of Trump enterprises has ben run mostly by Donald Trump Jr. and others – more specifically NOT by Donald Trump, or Jared Kushner.
As to the other nonsense being argued.
No that is NOT what the emoluments clause means.
If it did Obama would not be able to profit from the book he wrote about his own presidency.
More of this insane TDS.
Just saying something is a conflict does not make it one.
“Cindy Yang, who’s had such access to the Trumps and Trump associates, was deputy director of the Florida branch of the Council for Promotion of Peaceful National Reunification of China, which is basically a front group of the Chinese Communist Party.” @BillCrystal
Fusion GPS is a “front group” for Putin.
And Bill Crystal ?
If we are going to play this 7 degrees of separation nonsense – lets.
Obama, Bill Ayres – terrorist – checkmate.
Obama, Frank David – Communist Party member.
Obama, Saul Alynsky
Obama, Jeremy Wright.
Obama, Louis Farakahn.
Obama, Ayres, Dohrn – terrorist
Obama, Tony Resko, Nadhmi Auchi, Saddam Hussein
Obama, Khalid al-Mansour, Saudi prince Al-Walid bin Talal,
Should we do Hillary ?
Hillary, Bill, Russia,
Hillary, Podesta, Russia.
Need I go on ?
Establish something beyond a mere association or freindship or move on.
And BTW – if you are going to defame Yang – come to the table with facts.
So in TDS world it is worse for a private chinese american woman to get people handshakes and autographs from Trump than for Clinton’s own foundation to take hundred’s of millions of dollars to expedite favorable decisions in the state department ?
What about Bill Clinton taking 500K from Russians while Hillary was running for president ?
Do you have any evidence that any has ever gained a benefit from government, for a private benefit Trump received from them ?
That would be the textbook defintion of graft.
Too much. THIS IS DDUCK. I had to do an anon because the f@#%6 computer screwed me up.
You jerk. You accused me of oblique, so when I responded, you couldn’t figure it was dduck insulting you———- with all your super brain cells.
Pathetic.
“Too much. THIS IS DDUCK. I had to do an anon because the f@#%6 computer screwed me up.”
Words matter – you did not HAVE to do anything. Not having the choices you want is not force.
“You jerk. You accused me of oblique,”
No you were oblique – and actually under your own name, and I called that cowardice – which it was. If you want to insult me – have the courage to do so directly.
Everyone likely knew what you meant, that is not particularly relevant.
When you are not forthright, that is a form of deception, it is a way of pretending not to be hostile when you are. The indirect insults are like straw men in logic. You are not beating up your actual target. You are not taking responsibilty. Nor being honest.
:”so when I responded, you couldn’t figure it was dduck insulting you———- with all your super brain cells.”
Yes, we all know in your world, anything that goes wrong is my fault.
It is not my responsibilty to “figure out” who anonymous is.
Robby was posting as anonymous for a while. As have others here.
I have had problems and done so too.
If I have posted as anonymous while making a personal insult or something else that required my taking personal responsibility for my words – I appologize – though I doubt you can find an example.
Most of my posts – anonymous or otherwise are arguments and criticisms. Facts logic reason, I have allowed the culture of insult that has arrisen here to influence me in adding too many deprecatory adjectives but I still try hard to target them at arguments, not people.
When I confront people directly – when I accuse you of something – besides being wrong, I do it openly and clearly and again with arguments.
It is cowardice to lob an insult by indirection. Do you really want to argue otherwise ?
“Pathetic.”
That would be blaming others for the confusion you create.
I am more focused on the cowardice of the oblique insults that you did in your name – I think – note in the above this is nothing oblique – YOU, DD, Cowardice,
Not some vague allusion to ambiguous drekmeisters who we all know who are wink wink.
As to this presumption that I would know who it was.
What if I figured it was Robby, or Jay ? In broad strokes your posts and theirs are different – though you have started mimicking Jay’s pattern of spraying TNM with tweets insulting Trump. That is much the same form of oblique cowardice.
Regardless, some of your posts and some of Jay’s are not distibguishable without your names.
And it is not everyone else’s job to figure that out.
Regardless, I am not going to.
If you post as anonymous for whatever reason, and you WANT to be identified as yourself,
then identify yourself.
Otherwise I am going to treat you as a complete unknown with no history.
I am not even going to presume that two anonymous posts are from the same person – except possibly if they are in the same thread – which yours werent.
If I guess wrong about who anonymous is then I am making a moral error.
One is was not forced to make.
We have all posted as anonymous on occasion. I understand the technical problems.
I have 4 different browsers installed on my computer.
One comes with it and I do not like it. Two will grind my computer to a crawl if they have too many tabs open. One if which is the only one that will properly identify me on TNM, and the other is the only browser that will stream video.
The last browser that I use for everything else is fast and does not choke my computer, but I can not do everything I want with it.
These are my problems not yours.
If I post using the wrong browser on TNM and come up as anonymous – any confusion about who is posting is MY responsibility not yours.
If I want, I can make it clear really simply
By noting who I am in the body of the post.
If I do not want confusion – I can acheive that.
I am not obligated to. Nor are you.
But when anyone posts as anonymous any confusion about who they are is their own responsibility.
I happen to beleive strongly in the right to anonymous free speach, and so does the supreme court. But the credibility of anything you say is diminished when you will not identify yourself.
There are sometimes good reasons for that – fear of reprisal. but you STILL diminish what you say.
Should the police treat an anonymous report of child abuse with the same seriousness as a named one ?
When the Steele Dossier was presented to FISA – Comey’s name was on it, McCabe’s was, Rosensteins was as well as several others. These people swore the evidence they provided was credible – and that their source – Steele had a track record as a credible source.
They pretended they were NOT bringing anonymous allegations to the court.
But they were. Steele was NOT the source. Steeles actual sources were Russians or others, none of which have ever been identified.
What was presented to the court as justification for a two hop warrant – a warrant that likely allowed spying on several thousand people, was ANONYMOUS assertions.
Steele did not witness anything in the Steele Dossier.
Dave, give it a rest.
Visualize yourself as NCIS Special Agent Anthony DiNozzo, taking periodic earned slaps to the back of the head to reorient him to reality. Insult as therapy.
https://giphy.com/gifs/ncis-csi-gibb-slap-zKls8LkYpjbbO
I can not stop your juvenile insults.
You actually can not stop my responses.
Simply do not post stupid juvenile insults and you will not have to deal with any responses to them.
Another Trump promise reneged by the Liar in Chief (to protect Medicare & Medicade.)
Trump’s budget proposal calls for cutting $BILLIONS FROM THEM!
Cuts Medicare by $845 billion.
Cuts Medicaid by $241 billion.
How the hell does it cut it by 845B when onebyear is only 700B or so?
Projections are usually calculated over time.
Here’s an analysis that agrees and disagrees with the numbers now being tossed around by the Dems:
https://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/statements/2019/mar/06/bernie-sanders/sanders-attacks-trump-cuts-medicaid-medicar/
If those are for more than one year, its just more political baffle gab to indoctrinate those in their political persuasion into more B.S. You can have a good idea numbers will pan out in one year. The second year you can be close. The third year abiut 50/50. After that, no one would bet money on them. Just crap to brainwash party voters.
Agree, Ron, both parties do it; GOP has been claiming money saved thru cuts in programs over 5 to 10 year spans.
The Trump proposal budget “calls for $845 billion in total, or gross, spending reductions to Medicare over 10 years, mainly by cutting future payments to hospitals and other service providers.”
Those most in jeopardy if that goes through (doubtful) would be seniors, who will see their drug prescriptions and other related hospital costs spike – seniors (like you?) who have private health insurance policy costs supplemented by Medicare Part B.
Trump says he will reduce prescription drug costs substantially, and therefore his proposed cuts won’t harm anyone. That’s like his promise to protect Carrier jobs and substantially reduce the number of US jobs shipped to Mexico and elsewhere – and we know how that worked out.
When Trump was elected I saw the future, and it was glum.
I was told to cheer up, things could be worse.
So I cheered up, and yes things got worse.
With more worse to come.
Well Jay, if you think these cuts would actually happen and thing would get worse for seniors, just wait until President Sanders or President Warren get Medicare for all. Most people do not realize how insufficient Medicaid is until they try to find physicians that accept Medicaid. And that is due to the extremely low reimbursement rates. When I left the health system 10 years ago, the cost of an oil change at Jiffy Lube cost about $15.00 more than doctors were reimbursed for visits taking about the same length of time.
So when MFA becomes a reality, it will be Caid for all, services covered by Medicare will be eliminated to match Medicaid today and anyone with any medical talent will find ways to put their talents to use, leaving more of the doctors like today with higher malpractice suits in the medical field treating patients.
“Those most in jeopardy if that goes through (doubtful) would be seniors, who will see their drug prescriptions and other related hospital costs spike”
So you and Politifact and Sanders are now speculating on how regulations that have not specifically been proposed much less written will impact third parties twice removed, based on a budget that has been proposed and will never pass intact, to claim that based on YOUR view of how those non-existant regulations will work, Trump has lied ?
I do not know what the impact of Trump’s efforts to reduce Waste and Fraud.
BTW he can – and likely already is engaged in doing that.
He does not need a budget to do so.
All the budget does is inform us what he beleives the likely savings of those efforts will be.
“Trump says he will reduce prescription drug costs substantially, and therefore his proposed cuts won’t harm anyone.”
Reducing drug costs is trivial, there are many ways to do it.
They are unlikely to occur because they are not politically viable.
There are ways to do so that are politically viable – those will not work.
The most trivially effective means of reducing drug costs is to allow the re-importation of US manufactured drugs.
US Drug companies sell US produced drugs at significantly lower costs throughout the world.
This is a consequences of stupid government.
If government did not interfere in the drug market the price of all drugs would approximately level across the world.
This is an enormous subsidy that the US government gives to the people of other countries for no benefit.
“When Trump was elected I saw the future, and it was glum.
I was told to cheer up, things could be worse.
So I cheered up, and yes things got worse.
With more worse to come.”
How have things actually gotten worse ?
In debate over truth with sources of politifact, Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump regarding future predictions the answer to who to trust is NONE OF THE ABOVE
As to the actual issue:
Trump promised not to cut benefits.
I think that is a stupid promise.
Regardless, to the extent that a presidential budget has much significance – it does not.
I do not trust the “experts” to get projections right.
As to politifact – debating who is correct about a projection – as if that is inside the domain of fact checking just demonstrates how biased and useless they are.
What is absolutely certain – is that everyone is wrong about the future.
If you want more certainty about the future – most things will be better in the future,
?Most things government tells us about the future – whether budgets or other things will be WRONG.
The cost of anything related to government will be higher than predicted, and fail more than predicted.
To the extent anything about the future can be certain those are.
Over the long run the future has ALWAYS been better.
Over almost any period, government has always performed worse than projected.
As to debates over details of Trump’s budget – they are meaningless.
Trump’s budget is propoganda. All modern presidents budgets are propoganda.
Whether the projections are correct or not, whether the budget will work as reported or not, congress is going to do what it pleases and that will NOT be what Trump budgeted.
So why are we debating this nonsense ?
You do understand that you are arguing that Trump is breaking a promise based on the difference between your oppinion and Trump’s over how something that is never going to happen would have played out in the hypothetical world were presidents budgets have meaning ?
Trump says that he will save $1T by cutting waste and fraud. That will not happen.
It is actually possible, but not on a planet that includes Washington DC.
You do not have to take trump at his word, but arguing that he is a liar based on future events that will never occur is deranged.
The video that you link to demonstrates that Trump has promissed not to cut MEDICARE BENFITS repeatedly.
It not only does NOT contain a promise not to reduce the budget for Medicare, it pretty clearly includes a promise to CUT the budget by reducing Fraud and Waste.
You did not provide links to your purported cuts. but they can be found.
Those cuts are to be accomplished by reducing fraud and waste.
I think Trump is smoking wacky weed if he thinks he is going to reduce medicare costs by 845B in 10 years through the elimination of fraud and waste.
I have zero doubt that there is much more than 845B in waste and fraud, but cutting waste and fraud in the federal govenrment is a task that even Trump is unlikely to be successful at.
Jay, just because he said it, did you believe it? When did politicians ever do what they said they would do? Do they really tell the truth in CA.
So the facts. Estimated cuts are $266 billion over 10 years by newsweek.
Based on this budget over 10 years is about 4-5%
https://www.hhs.gov/about/budget/fy2017/budget-in-brief/cms/medicare/index.html
In 2010 fraud and improper payments in Medicare was $47 billion. That is $477B over 10 years.
So if the reduction comes from enforcement of rules, then I have no problem with the cuts. However, if that government agency continues to ignore some of the clearly fraudulent billings as well as add more difficulty to the billing requirement leading to overpayments, then the problem lies with government and not the program.
Why the hell are liberals so accepting to government wasteing this much money each year in programs where the solution to cutting fraud is very easy? Eliminate 7000 billing codes that make fraud easy and replace them them with less than 100 and one could cut most all fraud and save $500B, twice what Trump wants to save!!!!!!!
This is the problem with voters today. They drink the cool aide that the media pours and they dont educate themselves to the facts before having brain farts that cause them to jump off the emotional political cliff.
I dont know everything I need to know, but I try to research info before having an anal hemmorrage.
From what I can tell Trump has not broken any actual promises in his budget.
He promised not to reduce benefits. He did promise to cut costs and waste and fraud – even int he video that Jay linked to.
Further I wish him well – Truly.
But no one has ever successfully reduced government waste and fraud.
I am pretty sure Trump NEVER promised not to cut medicaid.
IF he is actually cutting Medicare – which I doubt, Kudo’s for having the balls to confront the fact that the emporer has no cloths.
Wrong again.
Google ‘Trump promises not to cut Medicare or Medicade”
I’m CERTAIN you’ll follow with numerous ‘buts’ …
Before we continue this debate, please go back over the past 98 years since presidents were required to submit a budget and look at how many were actually passed.
Then look at how many were even considered.
If you can find any number that is statistically significant to make this debate worth while, then lets continue.
But other than employing over 600 employees at a cost of over $90 million dollars a year for these employees to produce this budget, what is the reason for this expenditure? And why the hell does it take 600 people to prepare it. What do they do, type hundreds of individual copies on a typewriter? Remember, all they do is look at this years numbers and increase or decrease by a certain percentage. They never look at any programs and justify their existence.
Now for Medicaid! “You expand your state Medicaid program to cover more people and the federal government will cover 90% of the added cost”
And how many states bought that cool aide? So now, if they cut (which they won’t!), who pays the tab for that?
How gullible are people these days? I can’t wait until Sanders/Warren get elected and then lets see when free education, free health care, free free free is enacted.
While Jay is deep into TDS over this, the fact that presidential budgets are nearly meaningless is not relevant.
The fundimental question is do Trump voters think Trump’s budget is consistent with his actual promises.
George Bush’s defeat by Bill Clinton demonstrated that conservative voters actually care greatly about SOME campaign promises. The same can not be said of those on the left.
If Trump voters think that Trump’s budget is the same as GB’s lying about tax increases, Trump will not be re-elected.
That is a question of perception – NOT FACT.
It is not relevant whether Trump actually renigs, It is relevant whether his voters beleive he has and that it is important to them.
If Jay thinks a proposed budget that is actually fully consistent with Trump’s remarks is going to cause Trump voters to abandon him, he is spitting into the wind.
I found ONE very early instance in which Trump included medicaid.
Subsequently he has not included it in his repeated promise not to cut SS and Medicare BENEFITS.
Every time he has said he would not cut SS or Medicare has has ALSO said he would cut waste and fraud.
There is no “but” here – his ACTIONS are fully consistent with his words.
Trump is WRONG – we need to cut SS and Medicare.
He is WRONG – as great as fraud and government waste are the likelyhood of his successfully reducing either is zilch, though I applaud his efforts to do so.
Being wrong is not lying.
Misrepresenting the truth as a lie is immoral.
I would further note – as I always do – that the determination as to whether Trump’s actions conform with what voters perceived as promises rests with TRUMP VOTERS. Not you.
What you call promises and lies are actually offers, or the form “if YOU elect me president, I will do X”.
To the extent they are a binding agreement – it is an agreement between Trump and those who voted for him. Not those who will never vote for him.
Just as the various democrats promising M4A are not making a binding promise to me.
I am unlikely to vote for them. I hope they DO NOT deliver on their promises.
Just as I have hoped Trump would NOT deliver on some of his.
This entire “Trump is a liar” nonsense, is a plea to the people that voted for him to not do so again, based on actions he has taken that please them while offending you.
That is why it is called Trump Derangement Syndrome.
You think YOUR values are the center of everyone else’s universe.
Jay, you provided a youtube video with numerous instances in which Trump spoke on the issue.
That is good! I certainly Trust video of Trump saying something more than the NYT or you or some twitter twit, telling me what Trump said.
You also made an assertion that was purportedly supported by that video.
The video has one instance in which Trump mentions medicaid – out of more than a dozen. If you wish to say that Trump ONCE said he would not cut medicaid – that would be correct. At the same time its ommission in nearly all his speachs is significant.
Next just about everyone one of those clips is a promise not to cut BENEFITS. Trump is absolutely crystal clear nearly everytime that he is going to cut COSTS, and FRAUD and WASTE.
I beleive Hell will freeze before his is successful in significantly cutting costs and waste. Reigning in government spending is a politically impossible task.
That does not mean I would not celebrate if he succeeded.
Regardless, I worked from YOUR evidence, and it does NOT support you claim. trump’s budget – whether viable or not is FULLY consistent with his promises.
Painting it any other way is DELIBERATELY DECEPTIVE aka LYING.
“President Donald Trump’s 2020 budget breaks one of his biggest campaign promises to voters: that he would leave Medicaid, Social Security, and Medicare untouched.
“I’m not going to cut Social Security like every other Republican and I’m not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid,” Trump told the Daily Signal, a conservative publication affiliated with the Heritage Foundation, in 2015.
Over the next 10 years, Trump’s 2020 budget proposal aims to spend $1.5 trillion less on Medicaid — instead allocating $1.2 trillion in a block-grant program to states — $25 billion less on Social Security, and $845 billion less on Medicare (some of that is reclassified to a different department). Their intentions are to cut benefits under Medicaid and Social Security. The impact on Medicare is more complicated, which I’ll get into a bit later….”
https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/3/12/18260271/trump-medicaid-social-security-medicare-budget-cuts
I cant copy the link to Healthcare Financial Management facebook post, so will copy the part concerning Medicaid. That is in ” “, while I have added notes in my own words.
….. “The highest-profile Medicaid component of the administration’s budget was the inclusion of payment changes included in the 2017 Graham-Cassidy-Heller-Johnson legislation to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act (ACA). That legislation, which was narrowly defeated in the Senate, would allow states to choose between a Medicaid per-capita cap or a block grant or end the ACA’s Medicaid eligibility expansion. The measure was projected to reduce future Medicaid spending by $1.4 trillion over 10 years.”
Note: Trial programs with specialities, such as mental healt services, have proven in NC and other states to reduce cost, while also improving services. The reductions come from cost being moved from illness expenditures to wellness care. Medicaid has been very slow to move to this model. I can only wonder if that is due to it being government.
“The budget also would require “able-bodied, working-age individuals” to find employment, train for work, or volunteer in order to qualify for Medicaid. The provision was expected to garner $130.4 billion in savings over 10 years.”
Note: Is it really that terrible to require people to work if they are able. I know th at their are many that believe work is cruel and unusual punishment, but isnt it time to teach responsibility? And that was my position when Bill Clinton threw this out in the 90’s.
“The budget would increase the statutory limit on Medicaid copayments for nonemergency use of emergency departments if state ask for the authority to increase the limit. The change is projected to provide $1.6 billion in federal savings over 10 years.”
Note: Many Medicaid patients use the emergency room as a clinic. Unless more doctors are available for Medicaid patients, this would most likely become a bad debt to hospitals.
“The ACA required cuts to Medicaid Disproportionate Share Hospital payments, and Congress subsequently pushed back those cuts to begin in FY20 and run through FY25. The new budget would extend those cuts through FY29 to obtain an additional $26 billion in savings.”
Note: This is not a cut. It eliminates a moonlight prevision in earlier bills that removed a provision that reduction approved already would be extended for another 4 years. At sometime, that will be made permanent by slipping it into some legislation no one pays attention to
“States would be allowed to more frequently check the eligibility of their Medicaid enrollees under another provision, which is expected to garner $45.6 billion in savings over 10 years.”
Note: Why are they not doing this now. Once a Medicaid recipient, always a recipient? This is another example of government stupidity. They should be reauthorizedvat least every 2 years!
So you make the decision if the cuts are really that bad. I dont think so.
I can also provide the Medicare changes, but they are much longer due to the number of changes.
Back to presuming you know the intentions of others.
So your idea of logic is,
something is a lie – when there is no actual conflict between the statement and actions, but you BELEIVE there will be in the future when “true intentions” which – you are capable of grasping are known ?
Trump will not get his budget – that should be a given,
so everything beyond that is moot. We are debating the color of a unicorns horn.
Trump will likely try to reduce fraud and waste – and probably already has started, and he does not need a budget to do so.
He will fail at that.
“I would further note – as I always do – that the determination as to whether Trump’s actions conform with what voters perceived as promises rests with TRUMP VOTERS. Not you.”
Ah, more “logic and reason. ”
A candidate makes a promise, gets elected, clearly breaks it. Only those who voted for the candidate are permitted to determine that he lied. (Because Dave, who has claimed the right to determines the rules of logic and reason here, say so.) Others are not to get involved in the politics of the lie the POTUS made as a candidate. Right.
I am sure that I could find a gazillion cases of you bellyaching about Obama’s broken promises over the years here. Did you vote for him? No. So, you are completely full of shit, as usual.
You just say whatever weird shit will pass as an “argument” here, while having no self respect based on the transparently low quality of your BS.
It is however, first class entertainment.
The point Roby,
which is quite logical, is that unless you are actually harmed by the purported lie, your judgement as to whether some remark is a lie has no meaning.
Trump promised voters while running for president that he would nominate Supreme Court Justices from a list of I think 25 names. In 2017 he revised the list, and he appointed Kavanaugh from the new list.
Maybe you through a hissy claiming Trump lied. Though I do not recall one.
Regardless, you and others who did not vote for Trump were not going to like anyone he nominated. Why would it matter to you whether Kavanaugh was on the list or not.
However to Trump voters – Kavanaugh was of the same nature as the other names on the list. Trump did not get elected and then appoint Merrit Garland.
You are free to hold whatever opinion you wish, but unless there is some credible chance you are going to vote for Trump in 2020, or better still unless you voted for Trump BECAUSE he promised not to cut medicare and you know beleive his is going to – which is just a beleif, nothing more, than your oppinion – whether true or false has no import.
I have already addressed the facts:
Trump’s “promise” was not to cut benefits.
He was quite clear he intended to reduce waste and fraud and save money.
BTW in other speachs he also made it clear he intended to reduce the cost the government paid for services.
There is nothing in this budget that he did not telegraph loudly before the election.
So the FACT is any claim that Trump “lied” is pretty limp.
Your argument is that Trump lied because at some time in the future things will not work as Trump predicted AND when that occurs that will not result in change.
I can not conceive of a way that you can lie about the future.
If and When the consequences you beleive will occur do, THEN and only then will Trump’s remarks become a lie. –
“The point Roby,
which is quite logical, is that unless you are actually harmed by the purported lie, your judgement as to whether some remark is a lie has no meaning.”
Because you say so.
Trumps statement was quite clear, “I’m not going to cut Social Security like every other Republican and I’m not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid.”
He has now proposed to do exactly that. That is real news and legitimate political fodder. I think he has made a political error that will cost him.
This marvelous new principle you have just invented about not complaining about the lies that a POTUS makes if you did not vote for him is one you have never previously adhered to in all you bellyaching about the lies of previous POTUSes you did not vote for.
But, perhaps you will now adhere to it in the future, as we know you are a stickler for obeying the rules you set for others. <– Humor, Sarcasm.
“”The point Roby,
which is quite logical, is that unless you are actually harmed by the purported lie, your judgement as to whether some remark is a lie has no meaning.”
Because you say so.”
No because history and the world say so.
ONE Example – you can sue someone for breach of promise – but not unless you are harmed.
In general you can froth all you want about the misrepresentations of others, but your viewpoint has less weight unless you were harmed.
Trump’s remarks were clear – even in the clips provided. In just about every clip provided in the video intended to claim Trump was lying, Trump ALSO said he was going to REDUCE FRAUD AND WASTE in SS, Medicare and Medicaid.
I expect that if we found the original sources for the few snippets that did not have that qualification, that he said the same everywhere.
Further in all the clips, he only mentions medicaid ONCE out of probably a dozen times, and my guess is that if you work hard enough you will find Clips of Trump saying he is not going to cut SS or Medicare BENEFITS multiple dozens of times. I suspect that the one clip mentioning medicaid may be the only time he mentioned it.
The Bottom Line is that Trump is trying to do and what he said he would do are FULLY CONSISTENT. There is no lie here – except that of people claiming Trump is lying.
If this is your idea of lying – I am glad I do not share your morality.
If you wish to claim that Trump is not going to get the waste and Fraud reduction he is budgeting – I am completely with you. But that is still MY OPPINION regarding what I think is a bad judgement.
Trump is wrong, but he has not lied.
Pretending that an overly optimistic assessment of the impact of waste and fraud reduction is a lie about benefits is a LIE. So it is not Trump lying but those accusing him.
If at some point in the future – Trump ACTUALLY cuts SS, or Medicare Benefits – Then you can accuse him of lying.
No this is not real news, this is the perfect example of “fake news”.
I do not agree with what Trump is doing. It is time for a politician to grow some balls and actually cut entitlements. But Trump promised he would not cut SS and HI benefits, and he is not. He specifically promised he WOULD reduce waste and fraud – and he is.
You are manufacturing a lie from whole cloth. When you accuse others of lying – the burden of proof is on YOU, and it is HIGH. The claim that something is a lie can not be based on YOUR micro-parsing or editing.
ANOTHER reason that the ACTUAL audience matters, is that it is not YOUR oppinion of what Trump said that matters, but THEIRS.
Trump’s audience was potential voters dependent on SS and HI.
What Trump said to THEM and what they wanted to hear from him was
I AM NOT CUTTING YOUR SS AND HI. They do not give a damn about other people or total SS spending or total HI spending. To the extent they care about fraud and waste – they WANT Trump to reduce it.
I am not arguing some new morals. I am arguing ordinary moral.
You are the one making the unusual moral claim.
What Trump has proposed to do is EXACTLY what he promised – reduce entitlement costs without reducing SS and HI benefits.
You are trying to make the truth into a lie – in my morality – and that of most people I know, and most of western thought THAT is lying, that is immoral.
I have told you repeatedly – step onto the moral soapbox and you better be sure of the ground you are standing on.
We can fight over facts, and logic and reason. Your deficits in those are not a moral failing.
But when you make moral judgements of others – and you are wrong, you are also immoral.
It does not matter who you accuse of lying. It does not matter if you accuse a profligate liar of lying. If your accusation is wrong – YOU are the liar.
That is not some new morality.
The actual Lies I cite frequently of Obama, or the Clintons do not require massaging.
Adding context does not change the fact that they are lies.
Obama did not say “If you like your doctor, you can keep them” – “except that I am going to drive them out of business, and force you into insurance that does not cover them”.
Clinton did not qualify “Benghazi was a spontaneous uprising by the people over an internet video” – adding “by armed terrorists who planned the operation weeks in advance”.
Clinton did not qualify “I did not have sex with that woman” – atleast not until much later when he tried to claim a blow job is not sex.
“I am not going to cut SS or Medicare, but I am going to reduce fraud and waste” is not made false by Trump’s budget. If you beleive it does – you have serious moral problems.
Further. Obama actually did force people to change doctors, he did not propose a budget that in someone’s interpretation might have resulted in that. He ACTED and those ACTIONS, resulted in people being forced to lose their doctor.
Benghazi WAS an actual planned terrorist attack – not a spontaneous uprising further there is no “Fog of War” argument – Clinton knew the truth and we now know told others, including foreign leaders BEFORE she told the lie.
Clinton had already “had Sex” with Monica Lewinsky, at the time he said that he did not.
There is no moral equivalence. Each of these claims that someone lied is different, and of all of them the only one that is not (as of this moment) a Lie is Trump’s.
The “new morality” is yours.
“This marvelous new principle you have just invented about not complaining about the lies that a POTUS makes if you did not vote for him”
Not a principle. Not even a value. Nor a correct representation of what I said.
You are ALWAYS free to bellyache about whatever you want.
But you rants about Trump are presumably efforts at persuasion.
You want everyone to beleive as you do that Trump lied.
If you want others to take your ranting seriously, it needs to be relevant to them.
You are demanding that the rest of us get outraged by Trump.
I reserve outrage for things of consequence that matter.
I beleived some things Trump said – and not others, and I chose not to vote for him.
Trump did not let me down – I did not vote for him and not receive what I was promised.
In fact even though I did not vote for him, I have mostly received what he promised, even when I think those promises were wrong.
You and the left keep asserting that Trump is a massive liar.
And yet campaign promise after campaign promise keeps getting moved into the kept column.
Trump may be a liar – though not on this issue. But however big a liar he is, he is less so than any politician I know.
I think that you and the press fixate on finding the minutest discrepancy – even if you have to make it up, specifically because Trump is self evidently NOT a liar.
And a politician who actually delivers on their promises is very dangerous.
So much projection in your comments.
You really need to stop trying to live in my head – as you have never managed to actually get there. You are actually in some bus stop in Chicago or something.
I have set no rules for you. The rules I expect you to comply with are not of my invention and they are ancient.
If you accuse someone else of lying – you had better be right, and you had better be able to prove it – no matter who you are accusing.
Lying is a moral failure.
False accusations are a moral failure.
BTW do you know what Sarcasm is ?
“I have already addressed the facts:”
or, God has spoken.
You have already given the facts a deep tissue massage followed by a spinal adjustment, liposuction, and implant surgery. Their own mother no longer recognizes them.
“You have already given the facts a deep tissue massage followed by a spinal adjustment, liposuction, and implant surgery. Their own mother no longer recognizes them.”
Jay posted the Youtube video with clips of numerous statements by Trump.
The video was intended to prove Trump lied.
All it does is prove the derangement of the left.
Watch it over and over. I have little doubt that the claim that Trump lied will get even more ludicrous absent the selective editing. But what Jay provided is ALONE sufficient to refute the claim Trump lied.
There is one reference to Medicaid as an afterthought. It is clear throughout that Trump is talking about benefits – in several instances he is EXPLICIT about that. Many of the clips include Trump EXPLICITLY stating at the same time the he WILL cut Fraud and Waste in SS and medicare.
To conclude that Trump lied requires you to beleive that Trump was saying “I will never cut the total amount of federal money spent on SS & Medicare” rather than “I will never reduce SS and Medicare benefits”
I would also guess that BOTH statements remain true – as I will bet that Trump’s “budget”
does not actually ever reduce SS/HI spending, it just reduces the rate of increase through fraud and waste reduction. But that is just a guess.
Regardless, when you accuse someone of lying the burden of proof is on YOU.
Finally – if this is your standard for what constitutes a lie – then you lie all the time.
I have asserted repeatedly that you are WRONG – when you are wrong.
I do not recall ever accusing you of lying – except when you are accusing others of lying.
If all that one needs for something to be a lie, is to be able to find any means of reading a statement that might be false – then almost nothing you post is truthful.
Use the same standards for Trump as you expect of yourself
https://image.slidesharecdn.com/higherrmps-kantianethics-111206135323-phpapp01/95/higher-rmps-kantian-ethics-slidecast-17-728.jpg?cb=1336377532
Shame Shame Shame.
You Libertarians should be boiling with anger.
Imagine allowing a government agency to shut down restaurants.
https://www.miamiherald.com/miami-com/restaurants/article227400699.html
Not this Libertarian! I favor food safety. I worked in a resturant and know what can happen.
Ron, How about this one? Agree?
“Currently, it’s illegal in New York to ride without a seatbelt in the front seat, and in both the front and back for anyone under 16.
It’s not contested that rear seatbelts save lives: A 2007 study found that crash mortality could be reduced by as much as 75 percent for people in the back seat if they wore seatbelts.”
dduck, this is a multi part answer.
If you are under 21, I have no problem with a law requiring everyone to wear a seat belt.
Once you are over 21, then if you are dumb enough to ride/ drive a car, then that is your personal choice. Just like helmets for motorcycle riders, government is not your mother or father.If you ride motorcycle and want to bash in your head, thats your choice. Same with seat belts. And if you dont and are injured by others in an accident, then the other party is not liable since you contributed to your injuries.
And anyone over 21 with people under 21 should be required to make sure everyone under 21 is buckled.
And I use 21 and not 18 because those today at 21 have the common sense of kids about 16 when the voting age was changed to 18.
dduck, I left this out. I dont agree with a mommy law like this, but there is no right to drive a car. The state can make any law concering motor vehicles they want, including helmets in cars if they so choose
“but there is no right to drive a car.”
False – the courts – I beleive including SCOTUS have consistently ruled that driving is a right.
It is not however a right they have afforded “strict scrutiny”
I beleive it is subject to the lowest standard of review which is pretty much any faux public interests trumps our rights.
Dave, “False – the courts – I beleive including SCOTUS have consistently ruled that driving is a right.”
I tried to find anything that would support this statement. There is nothing ,”NADA”, on the internet to support this statement.
So until you provide a link, this comment is false.
Stop posting comments like this unless you provide ways to verify. Thanks
I gave you a long list of case law.
Just to be clear – The courts including SCOTUS have given the states enormous power to infringe on your right to drive. But they consistently atleast pay lip service to the assertion that it is a right.
Anyone who claims driving is a priviledge not a right is WRONG as a matter of law.
What the constant infringement on that right demonstrates is that any right nor afforded “strict scrutiny” – the standard that applies to the first amendment rights, is tissue paper thin.
“it is not contested”
What is not contested is that rear safety belts have much value at all.
The actual statistical evidence from crash investigations is that rear safetybelts cause as much death and injury as they prevent.
It is incredibly rare that a rear passenger dies in a car accident. and those accidents are so horrendous safetybelts are useless.
Even the data for front PASSSENGER seat safety belts is equivocal.
The overwhelming majority of highway fatalities and injuries are to the DRIVER.
Thats the data – now how about law.
It is actually uncontested that the health of americans improved during prohibition.
Should we return to prohibition ?
Saving lives by taking peoples choices away from them is EVIL not good.
You seem to think that the objective is to assure that people get to take the maximum number of breaths during their tenure on earth. You want long lived drones.
You are not free to use force to take away the freedom of others – not even for their own good. not even to prevent them from harming themselves.
Do you want to re-open the debate over sugary drinks – should we ban all soda ?
It would save lives ?
What about candy – lets ban that ?
You are free to eat where you please.
“Driving is a Privilege, Not a Right
Driving is not a constitutional right. You get your drivers license based on the skills you have and the rules you agree to follow. ”
https://driversed.com/driving-information/the-driving-privilege/driving-is-a-privilege-not-a-right.aspx
To the extent “constitutional right” has meaning, its usual meaning, is one of those enumerated rights in the constitution – usually the bill of rights.
Driving is not an enumerated right, Privacy is not an enumerated right, Birth control is not an enumerated right, Abortion is not an enumerated right. Marraige – straight or gay is not an enumerated right.
I posted several landmark federal cases over a long period of time.
Get over yourself, Driving is a RIGHT. Just like myriads of other rights that are not identified in the constitution.
BTW there are lots of rights in the constitution that the courts have nearly obliterated.
The constitution itself – not the bill of rights provides for the right to contract without interferance from the state or federal government.
Regardless, the question of whether driving is a right is either a philosophical question – where the answer is trivial – it is. Or a legal question, in which case the COURTS have determined that it is.
Why would I use a drivers education web site’s views over actual federal courts ?
Why do you want to argue over this ?
The federal courts long ago determined that driving is a right and that it is subject to “rational basis review” – that essentially means the courts will bless almost any infringement on that right. But that does not alter the fact that it is still a right.
I provided SOME of the federal cases on this question several posts ago.
Why are you bothering to contest this ?
If you do not like the decision of the courts – take it up with them.
BTW state courts quite frequently publish oppinions that say driving is a priviledge,
Many states and state DMV’s explicitly state that in their law and regulations.
When such questions get to the federal courts they laugh at those assertions.
The write oppinions that follow decades of precident and pronounce that driving is a right,
and then they determine that whatever restriction the state is trying to impose meets rational basis review.
“The not-so-sad fact is that there is no “right” to drive. In the U.S. – and in any country you care to name – driving is a privilege. In order to obtain the privilege, you must apply for a license and abide by the rules of the road.
Freedom of Movement = Right to Drive?
People who insist that driving is a right invariably point out that the Constitution guarantees freedom of movement. And it does.
So can I get into a car without a license and drive? No. You can ride as a passenger anywhere you want – that is your constitutional right. But operating a motor vehicle still requires a license, because the states have reserved the right to require one.
The matter came up in California in 1999. The case was Miller vs. Reed, in the 9th Circuit of the U.S. Court of Appeals. The decision stated:
While the ‘right of travel’ is a fundamental right, the privilege to operate a motor vehicle can be conditionally granted based upon being licensed and following certain rules. If rules are broken or laws are violated, the State reserves the right to restrict or revoke a person’s privilege.
So the matter is settled in California, and courts in other states are not falling all over each other to rule otherwise. So we can expect to see the “driving is a constitutional right” pages fade away as people discard their mistaken ideas and embrace the truth.”
https://www.lifesafer.com/blog/no-right-drive-car/
Your actually citing the 9th circuit ?
The right to drive has been referenced in federal court oppinions during the obama administration.
You are confusing the standard of review that a given right is subject to with whether it is a right or not.
I want strict scrutiny for ALL rights. But that is not where we are.
No the legal issue is NOT merely about “freedom of movement”
BTW Freedom of movement is NOT an enumerated right. It is not found in the text of the constitution. The courts have recognized it in the same way as “right to drive” – and pretty much all other “right to do whatever I dam well please” through the priviledges and immunites clause of the constitttution itself and the 14th amendment.
I have addressed the 14th amendment priviledges and immunities clause in Gun Control.
The framers made perfectly clear in the text of the constitution and the bill of rights that they intended government of specific enumerated powers, and everything else was outside the domain of government. There are myriads of treasties by prominent founders and legislators at or after the ratification of the constitution making clear than the rights of citizens were innumerable.
But the Courts strongly stuck to only those rights explicitly identified in the constitution.
From 1787 through to the passage of the 14th amendment this conflict between the courts and the clear language of the constutition existed. An attempt was made to use the Constitutions privildges and immunities clause to make it clear that not merely did citizens have broad rights that could not be infringed – but that government was not free to infringe on things that we not rights. At that time “rights” generally were what Man in nature was free to do – such as speech. While priviledges and immunties encompassed both those natural rights and government created rights – like due process and the right to vote.
The courts rejected the post Civil War priviledges and immunities argument because if they had accepted it, it would have undermined slavery.
The 14th amendment was not just an effort to secure the rights of the former slaves,
it was also explicitly intended to bitch slap the courts and re-affirm and expand the privildges and immunities language in the constitution.
It was an effort to give the 9th amendment and the constitutions priviledges and immunities clauses FORCE.
Unfortunately it failed. The 14th amendment like the priviledges and immunites clause and the contracts clause and the 9th amendment and myriads of other provisions in the constitution were swept into oblivion because the were inconvenient to politicians seeking greater power and SCOTUS was a tool of politicians failing its most critical role as a check on that power and a protector of the rights of the people.
Starting in the 50’s the 14th amendment was used as the basis for subsequent civil rights decisions. Absolutely the authors of the 14th amendment intended that it would protect freed slaves. But the EXPLICITLY intended it as a rebuke to SCOTUS’s narrow concept of rights.
No riding as a passenger is NOT a constitutional right.
It is however a right – just like driving, and one the courts have determined is subject to rational basis review – which means pretty much any whim of government is sufficient to infringe. But that does not alter that it is legally a right.
I am typically the one that argues that rights are absolute – that the can not be infringed on by government at all, or at the very least without any infringement meeting a very high bar.
But the state of the law. – Not the libertarian state, but the actual state is that government can infringe on rights.
Your right to free speech does not allow incitement to violence as an example.
There is no right in existance that the courts have ever found is absolute – even if they should. What they have found is that our rights – and the courts recognize myriads of rights including the right to drive. are each subject to one of three levels of scrutiny.
Strict scrutiny – MOSTLY enumerated constitutional rights, such as those in the first amendment are subject to strict scrutiny. You can read exactly what that means elsewhere. But as a rule of thumb few laws infringing on a right will meet the strict scrutiny standard.
The next level down is intermediate scrutiny. It is difficult but sometimes possible to get a law infringing on a right subject to intermediate scrutiny declared iunconstitutional.
The lowest level is rational basis review. That is little more than the courts rubber stamping govenrment. Rational bases cases usually go.
Yup, that is a right, but government has a “rational basis” for infringing, so it may.
This is a 2009 DC Circuit Court of appeals – generally considered the back porch of the Supreme Court.
MILLS v. DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA
United States Court of Appeals,District of Columbia Circuit.
“The harm to the rights of appellants is apparent. It cannot be gainsaid that citizens have a right to drive upon the public streets of the District of Columbia or any other city absent a constitutionally sound reason for limiting their access. As our discussion of the likelihood of success has demonstrated, there is no such constitutionally sound bar in the NSZ checkpoint program. It is apparent that appellants’ constitutional rights are violated. It has long been established that the loss of constitutional freedoms, “for even minimal periods of time, unquestionably constitutes irreparable injury.”
I have not found it but there is a 2013 case.
Today the most common area where “the right to drive” comes up is with mass traffic stop checkpoints – such as for alcohol or drugs.
Most of us understand that the police can not just grab you and search you whenever they want. The claim by States that “driving is a priviledge” is among other things and attempt to circumvent that. The police and states like to beleive that when they give the “priviledge” of driving to you, you waive your right to search and seizure protections.
While the courts have generaly given the police overly broad powers to infringe on the rights of people in vehicles, they have NOT accepted the argument that driving is a priviledge.
Driving is a right – if it were not, the police could pull you over for no reason at all.
Driving is a right – while states can impose conditions on issuing a drivers license,
the process is NOT discretionary. They must have rules. Those rules must be followed strictly. Each of the rules MUST have a plausible “rational basis”.
No state can say Joe can drive but Bill can not.
They can say people under 16 can not drive because they do not have sufficient judgement or skills. They can say people who are mentally incapacitated can not drive.
The can say that people who have repeatedly violated traffic safety laws can not drive.
Every restriction the state imposes on the RIGHT to drive, must have a “rational basis”.
“Even the legislature has no power to deny to a citizen the right to travel upon the highway and transport his property in the ordinary course of his business or pleasure, though this right may be regulated in accordance with the public interest and convenience.”
Chicago Motor Coach v Chicago
US Supreme Court.
“The right to travel is a part of the liberty of which the citizen cannot be deprived without due process of law under the 5th Amendment.”
Kent v Dulles
US Supreme Court.
“Undoubtedly the right of locomotion, the right to remove from one place to another according to inclination, is an attribute of personal Iiberty, and the right, ordinarily, of free transit from or through the territory of any State is a right secured by the l4th Amendment and by other provisions of the Constitution.”
Schactman v Dulles,
US Supreme Court.
There are lots of web sites that use these and myriads of other cases to assert CORRECTLY that there is a “right to drive”. Most of these sites fail, because the presume that all rights are subject to strict scrutiny, that states can not make laws regulating driving. such as requiring licenses.
The 9th Circuit case that claims driving is a priviledge is in error. That does not mean it was decided wrong, only that the language is in error.
Driving is a right. Like all rights the government beleives it has SOME ability to regulate that right. It shouldn’t, but that is not the issue being debated.
My fourth attempt to post this, I will omit the link itself, which is to a law firm.
Fundamental rights are a group of rights that have been recognized by the Supreme Court as requiring a high degree of protection from government encroachment. These rights are specifically identified in the Constitution, or have been found under Due Process. Laws limiting these rights generally must pass strict scrutiny to be upheld as constitutional. Strict scrutiny means that the law infringing on a fundamental right is “necessary to achieve a compelling governmental interest”. Examples of fundamental rights not specifically listed in the Constitution include the right to marry, the right to privacy, and most importantly for this discussion, the right to interstate travel.[1]
Although the Supreme Court has found that the right to interstate travel is a fundamental right, it has not gone so far as to say that driving it’s self is a fundamental right. This has meant that States have been largely unfettered in their ability to enact legislation that restricts, regulates, and revokes citizens’ ability to drive.
Roby,
We are talking at each other saying very nearly the same thing.
Your “fundimental rights” argument is GENERALLY correct.
The courts jurisprudence is MUCH more nuanced.
There is no two catagories of rights, but SEVERAL.
Each of which SCOTUS permits different degrees of infringement.
Yes, the supreme court has litterally stated that citizens have the right to travel, on public highways, in a car, that they drive.
They have also said that the state may pass laws that infringe on that right.
They have further said that the standard those infringing laws must meet to be constitutional is much lower than laws infringing on speech.
I have no idea what you mean by “largely unfettered”.
SCOTUS has required that states JUSTIFY their laws infringing on the right to drive.
But they have used a very low bar for that justification.
States are NOT free to infringe however they please.
They are generally free to infringe when they can offer a weak justification.
Oh, No! An Arby’s had 35 flies in Florida!!!!!
Don’t eat there if that bothers you.
In fact, as a matter of libertarian principle you should make it a point to eat at only restaurants that have been cited. Enjoy !
“In fact, as a matter of libertarian principle you should make it a point to eat at only restaurants that have been cited. Enjoy !”
A very bizzarre conception of “principles” and “libertarian”.
The entire POINT of libertarianism is:
I CHOOSE!!
A resturaunt that delivers food that is harmful to its customers will be “shutdown”,
Customers just do not keep eating at places that cause them harm.
The issue is how is it “shutdown”.
Buy faux experts in government how have the own agenda that at best slightly overlaps my own,
Or as a consequence of MY choice not to frequent a resturant that for WHATEVER REASONS does not satisfy me.
If resturaunts fail all the time because their food is bland or too spicy or their service poor.
Why do you think they will not fail quickly if they are making customers sick ?
Ron. I guess not eating in restaurants would be an option if you want to avoid the bad stuff.
And, why can’t parents or friends allow young people to not wear seats belts- illegal in NY under 16) it’s their kids.
Ron, Trump wants to cut the EPA budget 31%, will that hurt anyone’s health, is the EPA inefficient or even necessay, or don’t we give a f—- as long as he gets his wall- sorry I got carried away, sorry.
dduck, So I am going to accept these questions as legitimate and not like a poke in the eye of someone with differing opinions like I have experienced at other sites.
1. Yes, not eating out would fix that problem. If we did not have restaurants, one would not have to worry about unhealthy practices like a restaurant in our area that was storing deer carcass recently killed by hunters in their refrigerator with other meat. Given diseases that deer can have, a good possibility of cross contamination could have occurred. Had there not been a health inspection, that would have never been discovered and not until a large number of people had come down sick would this ever have been traced to that restaurant. It comes down to this being a way to protect people from harm others are willing to inflict on people. It does not work all the time, but it catches many issues that stop health issues from occurring.
2. People do not have any rights guaranteed in any document concerning cars or driving. The states can make any law they want that they feel improves safety. If they say everyone has to wear sun glasses while driving in the day light, that is their prerogative. If the state says parents have to make their kids wear seat belts, that is is in their authority.
3.So this is not an easy question to answer. Trump wants to cut the EPA by about 2 billion or $8B to $6.1 billion. So I tried looking at the budget information and find it takes a government idiot to understand their budget documents. I did find that they have 14,172 employees, but nothing to say what they do or what the total salary budget for the EPA is. So I will continue to research this agency and see if I can did out more information as to their exact reasons for existence, but I doubt that is available to the public. But why the hell do they need 14,000+ employees????? They only document total expenses by program, not line item budgets.
However, i did find information that they have a division, The National Health and Environmental Effects Research Laboratory that has a budget of $120M. Of this, research on fumes is a large part of their studies. In those studies they use rats, rabbits and other rodents, they pump diesel fumes into their living quarters and then measure the impact. They also underfeed the animals and overfeed the animals to determine the impact on fumes on thin and fat rats. This has been shown to be junk science a number of years ago, but since the program is a government program, it is still funded. Once a government program is created it never is repealed. How many of the 14,000 employees do this research?
They also cover the cost of conference calls between employees. Many of those conference calls are for less than 6 people. They paid over $1.6M for that service. Isn’t there free services to talk on the phone? When was the last time you paid for long distance calls? Does the internet charge for conferencing services. I don’t know since I don’t use that for calls.
A recent audit found that the EPA paid employee salaries of over $1M for employees that did not show up for work, nor use benefit time. Some were not even active employees other than getting a check. Who the hell is responsible for insuring time submitted is approved?
The EPA pays for employee parking. Why? How many employers in this country pay for employees to park? They paid $1.5 M in parking cost and then it was found that $700,000 was for excess parking spaces never used.
So before attacking any cuts, maybe its time for Americans to start paying attention to what the government waste our taxpayer money on! Maybe it time for a zero based budget! Maybe bitching about the massive waste that no one wants to pay attention to is more reason to get someone panties in a wad instead of a politician cutting a budget.
And maybe Trump proposing cutting a budget will open up a few peoples mind to look at what the government spends instead of just accepting this years expenses plus 5%-10% every damn year.
But I have little hope that will ever happen. Government does not waste money never has. William Proxmire can testify to that using his Golden Fleece Award (1975–1988). Really!
Major court decisions affirming a “right to drive” or a “right to travel”
Chicago Motor Coach v Chicago, 169 NE 22
“The right of the citizen to travel upon the public highways and to transport his property thereon, either by carriage or by automobile, is not a mere privilege which a city may prohibit or permit at will, but a common right which he has under the right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”- Thompson v Smith, 154 SE 579.
“The right to travel is a part of the liberty of which the citizen cannot be deprived without due process of law under the 5th Amendment.” – Kent v Dulles, 357 U.S. 116, 125.
“Undoubtedly the right of locomotion, the right to remove from one place to another according to inclination, is an attribute of personal liberty, and the right, ordinarily, of free transit from or through the territory of any State is a right secured by the l4th Amendment and by other provisions of the Constitution.” – Schactman v Dulles, 96 App D.C. 287, 293.
The federal courts have RARELY found a state infringement on that right to be unconstitutional. But I am not aware of the federal courts EVER accepting the contention that driving is a priviledge not a right,.
This is a false trope.
The EPA budget should be cut 100% it is inefficient and unnecescary.
Ron, I apologize, I didn’t mean to cause you to do a time consuming research project.
Instead, I should have just stated my opposite views, of what I thought were libertarian views on some matters. I assume there are different varieties of libertarians and that you are the middle or milder variety. I don’t like the very strong version, BTW, just as I abhor the extreme versions of the left and right in the two major parties.
It’s simple, I just don’t like absolute, black and white types of libertarian views, except for the cool populist “smaller government” and “government can’t do anything right” memes.
Be well.
And please, dhli, DON”T post a long rebuttal, I don’t read them anyway- thanks.
There are many kinds of libertarians just as anything else.
“I don’t like” – you are free to like and dislike whatever you want.
It does not change facts.
There are lots of things I do not like that are also true.
“It’s simple, I just don’t like absolute, black and white types of libertarian views, except for the cool populist “smaller government” and “government can’t do anything right” memes.”
The world is complex – myriads of shades of gray.
Libertarianism is NOT about the world. It is about government – force.
The rules regarding the use of force should be as absolute as we can manage.
There should be as little shades of gray as possible in the use of force.
I do not see how that is particularly libertarian.
Do you think it is OK for government or others to put a gun to your head on whimsy ?
To the greatest extent possible – all the shades of gray and all other shades and nuances belong OUTSIDE of government.
Even when we are making rules for the use of force that do not involve government – we do not want shades of grey.
Is this somehow controversial ?
“And please, dhli, DON”T post a long rebuttal, I don’t read them anyway- thanks.”
If you do not read them – why do you care if I post them ?
duck, I don’t think that a person has to be a libertarian in order to believe that a lot of government spending – and by “a lot, ” I mean billions of $$ is completely wasteful. Not to mention the fact that it is nearly impossible to fire federal employees, even those who apparently spend the majority of their days watch porn on government computers.
https://www.nbcwashington.com/investigations/Dozens-of-Federal-Employees-Watched-Abundance-of-Porn-on-the-Job-in-Recent-Years-414743293.html
And, not to mention the money that’s spent on government websites, which tend to be very poorly built and difficult to navigate, even in this day and age, where, for $50 you can build a beautiful website of your own, using any one of many do-it-yourself web hosting services.
Priscilla, and to add, if you look at any government budget, it is just a bunch of government “baffle gab”. Constructed to make the majority of any group that checks on numbers think it is viable budgeting. But there is nothing “budget” in those documents, just a bunch of fancy slides, pictures and words that mean little.
Any company of any size is going to identify their products or their projects. Then they will create a budget based on a costing method that identifies the man hours by job class needed to produce that project/product. Once that is identified, the average hourly salary (and sometimes specific salaries by employees) are applied to those manhours to develop a salary budget. Knowing that, benefit expenses can then be budgeted by benefit class. Then line items are budgeted down through supplies, utilities, depreciation, travel, etc. Any significant expense is budgeted by line item and by specific expense need within that expense class. And that is done yearly. For strategic purposes, a future years budget may be prepared knowing full well nothing will be exact. And that is done in total dollars only.
Now if your in the government, the agency directors will look at the current years expenses. The first thing they do (or did until recently if they changed procedures) is to look at the current years budget and make sure they spent or will spend all the budgeted dollars. If they have not spent or committed all the dollars they lose it. Its call spend it or lose it year end spending. So any administrations agencies will spend whatever is left, regardless of need. Once that is done, then they look at some number pulled out of someones rear end and apply that number as an inflator to current years expenses. That gives them next years budget. Only then will new dollars for new projects/program be added, but that too is total dollars, nothing specific as to salaries, supplies, etc. just a number.
the last thing they do is they take that budget number and they project out 10 years. So when the congress gets a hold of that number and make changes that reduces a programs expense that has been projected to increase 10% over 3 years and they only allow that to be a projected 5% increase, all hell breaks loose because program X was cut 5%.
And the American voter drinks that cool aide and never ask why it taste funny.
Robert Barro – NOT a Libertarian. The 4th Ranked IDEAS RESPEC economist in the world (the most cited), has several areas of expertise and research, one of those is the efficiency of government spending. He has collected the worlds most extensive database of public spending data and efficiency and made that data public. He has analyzed it in great detail and reported his results.
The highest level of efficiency of government spending – is government spending on the military in times of war. That has an efficiency of 0.85. An efficiency of 1 means the some of the positive impacts and negative impacts is the same as if that spending were done privately. So the comparison is to not to some theoretical maximum, but to real performance in the real world.
The average efficiency for government spending is between .25 and .35 – in other words 65-75 cents of every dollar government spends is wasted.
This is not about $400 toilets seats. This is not a hunt for egregious examples of stupid spending – this is not about a few Billion dollars, This is about 2-3TRILLION dollars in inefficiency in government spending.
We have an approx 20T economy, About 4T of that is consumed by the federal government.
By definition the other 16T delivers 16T of actual value. While the 4T government spends delivers slightly more than $1T in value.
Ron and Priscilla, as long as I don’t have to identify as a libertarian, I agree with you both. 🙂
I beleive 75% of americans beleive that 50% of government spending is waste.
75% of americans are not libertarians.
Though they are wrong – according to Robert Barro’s data – 65-75% of government spending is waste.
Spring is here! Not! I have 3 feet of snow on my place and more still arrives daily. But it is finally getting warmer, 30+ on some days. The skiing in the woods is great. Now, I could A) take the stream of consciousness product of some poor sufferer seriously and get bent out of shape and pound the keyboard all morning rebutting the nonsense, or B) have a little laugh at the predictability and irony of it all and go to the nordic center and enjoy the snow.
What would a wise person choose?
Hint: according to the news the world is going to hell in a bucket. If so, can I stop it by having as Ron puts it, an anal hemorrhage (who decided how to spell that word?)?
Roby, or C) you could state that each snowflake is “different” and cause an avalanche of rebuttal posts.
Whoops, I oblique again.
“Hint: according to the news the world is going to hell in a bucket.”
The world is not going to hell in a bucket – we have been over this repeatedly.
What is surprising is that anyone over the age of 10 can not tell so with their own eyes.
The world is not perfect, and a few things – mostly those associated with government are getting worse. But overall we can count on waking up each day to a slightly better world than the day before. This has not only been true my entire lifetime, but it has been true to an extent that just about every human should have been obviously aware of it for the past 4 centuries. And it has been true for the entire 150,000 years of human existence – though past the modern era the rate of improvement was glacially slow.
If the news is telling you otherwise – then you should not trust the news.
So much of the debate here would be entirely unnecessary if instead of trusting talking heads who have no expertise in anything except provoking uproar, you trusted your own observations.
And once again you presume to know what others think and feel.
I do not have 3ft of snow to enjoy at the moment. But there is always something to marvel at.
You can actually sum the entirety of what you call “anal hemorrhaging” with
“Go out and enjoy the snow. Enjoy life. because the crisis that the media, the left, most of those in government are claiming demand your immediate attention – are inconsequential,
they are all emotional appeals to justify taking power from you and giving it to them”.
That is the core of pretty much every argument I make here.
Further what you call “anal hemorrhaging” is no threat to you of any kind.
But your perception that the world is going to hell in a basket is an enormous threat.
That misperception, deliberately fostered directly threatens the actual daily improvement of the world, it threatens your liberty and anything it offers in return is chimera.
By the way, Trump’s signed bibles are now being sold on line! In the $300 range.
Those buying them can pray they don’t suddenly burst into flame 🔥
I have to agree that a bible signed by Donald Trump is incredibly ironic and farcical.
“A Shipping Manifest Said the Container Held Dried Fruit. Inside Was 3,200 Pounds of Cocaine.
A shipping container intercepted at Port Newark on Feb. 28 was found to contain 3,200 pounds of cocaine.CreditDrug Enforcement Administration”
That would take a lot of “migrants” to smuggle in across the border.
Image
Immigrants do not generally smuggle a significant amount of drugs.
But drugs do cross the same borders as immigrants, and druig smugglers do use immigrants to smuggle drugs.
The primary method is that drug smugglers provide BOTH coyote services AND drug smuggling – SEPARATELY.
When the send a group to cross the border and CBP engages that group, the smugglers can then transport drugs accross with impunity nearby as the CBP is tied up with the illegals often for hours. Frequently CBP knows that the drug smuggling operation is going on while they are processing immigrants, but still can not drop what they are doing.
WSJ——–“There’s a Crisis at the Border, but a Wall Won’t Solve It
Legal loopholes are behind last week’s sharp spike in alien apprehensions.
By David Inserra”
“The problem isn’t gaps in physical barriers, but in legal ones. Loopholes in U.S. immigration law, combined with a weak asylum process, are creating incentives for adults to use children as pawns to get into the U.S.”
https://www.wsj.com/articles/theres-a-crisis-at-the-border-but-a-wall-wont-help-11552245432
I do not like Bill Barr,
But his congressional testimony on this was excellent.
A wall alone is insufficient. Any effective effort to reduce drugs and or illegal immigration, requires many things. ALL of which are important.
Changes in the laws, more resources, more technology, more agents, AND A SIGNIFICANT PHYSICAL IMPEDIMENT.
Further even the above are insuficient. If all that is necescary is done, and works,. the problem will STILL come back. Immigrants and drug smugglers will adapt – and we must too.
The current shift from mostly single men to families is driven by learning how to game our laws.
“I’m not going to cut Social Security like every other Republican and I’m not going to cut Medicare or Medicaid,” Trump told the Daily Signal, a conservative publication affiliated with the Heritage Foundation, in 2015.
That is as clear as you can want it, no weasel words.
Now he is proposing to cut all three. Yes its a process and who knows how it will come out. A properly significant part the political response to his budget is noting that he is proposing something that as a candidate he said he would not do.
I think its a significant political error. It may delight a lot of his base, unless they figure out that if his proposed cuts were to actually occur it would hit them. It will play badly in the 53% who are definitely not enjoying or approving the trump presidency. It will provide a distracting counter weight to the legitimate criticism of the wild economic plans that most of the dem candidates have proposed, Sandersnomics. If conservatives/libertarians want to play semantic games with the meaning of the word “cut,” let them try that tactic. I think it will blow up on them.
The critical response to the bernie sanders crackpot democratic socialism is legitimate political criticism, even if the politics of this idea is a process and one that we all know ends without medicare for all and free college for all. In the same way, the response to trumps budget is legitimate political criticism, even if the proposal is merely a proposal and not an end product. If the GOP congresspeople are foolish enough to get in line with cutting Social Security, Medicare, and Medicaid it will cost their party dearly.
Jay and I will enjoy watching that unfold.
You are going to honestly try to claim – given that he has stated numerous times – including in the same interview that he was going to reduce waste and fraud, that the “quote” means that he is not going to change the federal budget rather then he is not going to reduce peoples benefits ?
That is the hill you actually want to die on ?
Sorry Robby – but YOU and the media are LYING. Your objective is to get people on SS and medicare to get furious at Trump because you have convinced them FALSELY that he is cutting their Benefits. And you KNOW that is what you are doing. And you KNOW it is FALSE. You are attempting to deceive people.
It is further obvious that what you are doing is Lying because even in most of your OWN clips, Trump EXPLICITLY states he will reduce fraud and waste.
You are trying to lie to people and convince them that reducing Fraud and waste is the same as reducing their benefits.
You are trying to claim the moral high ground through immoral acts.
And you wonder why you have no credibility ?
And that is only the most OBVIOUS problem with your claim.
No one – not me, not anyone else I can think of will argue that if there is any significant reduction in SS or HI benefits – in fact if Trump even breaths in a way that suggests there might be – he is TOAST. If he actually does that, the debate over what constitutes a lie will not matter. Lie, no lie, still toast. Trump knows that Republicans know that.
Fortunately voters – particularly trump voters know that too.
Further if Trump could somehow manage to reduce the budget for SS & HI to ZERO and still deliver everyone their benefits, only wing nuts such as yourself would whig out. No one else cares about reducing the SS budget, and no one else thinks that is what Trump meant.
Just as in the opposite sense no one thought Bill Clinton was thinking “BJ’s are not sex” when he said “I have not had sex with that woman”.
Finally, I am pretty sure that Trump’s budget does not reduce SS spending in absolute terms.
It reduces the rate of increase. Only left wing nuts think that is a cut.
So in multiple ways it is not Trump lying but YOU.
“Sorry Robby – but YOU and the media are LYING. Your objective is to get people on SS and medicare to get furious at Trump because you have convinced them FALSELY that he is cutting their Benefits. And you KNOW that is what you are doing. And you KNOW it is FALSE. You are attempting to deceive people.”
You are, as usual, living in your own reality. Trump said what he said, now he is doing what he is doing. Me and others simply noting that is, according to you, lying. Why your caps-laden freakout? Is it because it is your dream that these programs you hate so much can be dismantled, starting from trumps budget? Is that why people exercising their free speech rights puts you into a frothing rage?
Its been, what, about two months now that you have had CAPS FEVER?
Putting stupid stuff in CAPS does not make it true. Everyone with a brain knows that except a certain zealous breed of rabid internet commenter.
Who can take you seriously? How can you take yourself seriously?
Your junk bond posts are so devalued that they are not worthy of even the contemptuous responses you attract to your playpen here. Its a low grade of entertainment, Dave Porn. I hope I can say that this is my last reply to your drivel, no matter how temptingly and obnoxiously idiotic your reply will be to it.
In advance, let me say Cry me a river if you think you detect a fallacy in my words. I enjoyed writing them. If you don’t enjoy reading them then, well, you have free will, sort of. So, no whining.
You are simply broken.
This is not about Trump, or SS or HI.
It is about you. It is about lying about lying.
I have already wasted too much time proving the obvious to you.
If you sincerely beleive that Trump’s remarks are a “lie” – honest discourse with you is impossible.
If you do not – then you are immoral.
If you fail to understand – then you should not ever make moral assertions about anyone, as you have no moral foundations.
Making moral pronouncements about others is the most dangerous speach you can engage in. It is very nearly binary. When you assert someone else is lying – either they are lying or you are. There is little room in between.
When I say that what either of the clinton’s said, or what Obama said is a lie – I had better be right.
When I say that you are lying about Trump – I have better be right.
That is true of you too – though you do not seem to understand that.
Straw men and red herrings all the way down.
This is not about what what you think I dream.
This is not about whether SS or HI should exist.
It is not about your fixation on my posting style.
It is not about the mouse in your pocket that you seem to be speaking for.
Once again – you refuse to address the actual issue.
You called someone a liar, and failed to prove it.
That is on you.
Have I ever said that caps make something true ? All they do is stress that some words are more importing. Merely asserting something – whether in caps or not does not make it true.
And you pretty much never offer more than assertion and fallacy.
I do not care about your criticism of my posting style.
That is just another red herring or straw man.
A fallacious attempt to avoid addressing the issue.
Re-read your own post. How do you feel entitled to criticise anyone else, after that stream off evasion, red herring’s ad hominem, and straw men.
All of your responses are this evasive garbage.
Accuse others of lying,
Attack everything you can possibly think of, but do not get near the actual issue.
Shift the debate away from the issue, to an attack on the poster.
Not only are these all fallacy, they are all evidence of moral bankruptcy.
This post is the evidence of why your posts are so wrong.
When you engage in character assassination – particularly when you can not back it up,
that is what you get back – except that your initial poor conduct becomes the evidence of your own bad character.
This is not where I want discussions on TNM to go.
But it is where you insist that they must.
When you argue fallacy and emotion, everything becomes personal.
Facts, logic, reason that are not friendly to your argument are not a personal attack.
But pretty much everything you post is, and that is what it provokes in return.
So you enjoy insult and character assassination ?
I do not. Another difference between us.
I have posted some nasty comments about you.
I do not regret them. But I do regret the need for them.
When anyone – you or I steps onto a moral soap box, that changes the character of everything. Why you do so – you had better be right.
You do not understand that at all.
In fact you revel in moral attacks on others.
I regret that they are ever warranted.
Worse while you constantly case moral judgements, you have no concept of morality.
“Jay and I will enjoy watching that unfold.”
It has already unfolded and died.
The Hollywood college scandal – as well as numerous other inconsequential, but still more important stories have displaced it.
I have no doubt that left wing nuts will try to raise this from the dead.
But absent a ludicrously stupid ACT (not remark), this story is already done.
Whatever your pleasure – it is over.
Ordinary people actually know real lies when they see them – and this was not one.
OK, I posted a comment about all the “cuts” in Medicaid. Here is one, the highest reduction, for Medicare.
The first, and largest, reduction concerns payments for like services based on location. Medicare cuts for hospitals would be generated from the adoption of site-neutral payments for on-campus hospital outpatient departments for some physician-office services, such as clinic visits. That would save the federal government $131.4 billion over 10 years.
According to Hospital CFO Report “Medicare payment policies use two different payment methodologies for outpatient procedures based on the site of service. The hospital-based procedures performed at hospital outpatient departments are paid on the Hospital Outpatient Prospective Payment System while freestanding clinics are paid on the Medicare Physician Fee Schedule. As such, hospital-based procedures receive higher Medicare reimbursement than ambulatory and office-based procedures: In 2016, ASCs received 53 percent of the amount paid to HOPDs, according to the Ambulatory Surgery Center Association. Site-neutral payments seek to close that gap by lowering payment to HOPDs, with the most recent legislation focused on off-campus provider-based sites located 250 yards or more away from the hospital’s campus.”
So briefly, years ago doc’s were private providers. They were reimbursed based on a fee schedule. Prostate exam $xx.xx. Then a hospital realized if they purchased the physician practice, they could pay the physician the fee schedule and also bill the facility charge. So they get paid for the building and equipment, where the doc’s did not.
So why should a doctors office owned by a large health system get paid almost twice what a private physician who is not part of a healthsystem gets paid? Is that fair? Right? Or did some consultant find a great way to game the system and government is just catching on 20 years later?
“Medicare cuts for hospitals would be generated from the adoption of site-neutral payments for on-campus hospital outpatient departments for some physician-office services, such as clinic visits.”
Now, what does it actually mean? This may as well be quantum mechanics to me. This is your area of expertise, its not mine. I don’t know what site neutral payments really means. I don’t know what advantages/disadvantages occur in having the hospital absorb the private practices? Better equipment, broader expertise?
You are always will to talk about real things using actual facts. For that you get a lot of credibility.
I will tell you that UVM medical center is doing about that same sort of thing. They have their tentacles everywhere, in my physicians office, in many other hospitals, they are spreading everywhere. They caught my first wife’s thyroid cancer this year and then my early stage colon cancer and dealt with both in a mega professional manner. They are a fantastic unit. Between my wife and I their have been surgeries, procedures, multiple specialists, blood and pathology work, you get the picture. I have been incredibly impressed/comforted by their professionalism at every stage. Dartmouth Hitchcock medical center in NH is a similar unit. The bass player in my band was diagnosed with stage four colorectal cancer that had metastasized to his lungs 6 years back now. He is still alive, apparently cancer free. He has had everything, chemo, radiation, surgery on both lung and colon.
If there is a way to save 13 billion per year on average and it does not harm patients then who would complain? But, is the whole story really so simple as someone gamed the system? Dave will say yes! in a million and a half words as soon as he sniffs this conversation out. But before the deluge begins perhaps you can tell me what the actual pluses and minuses are in your very well informed opinion.
I also saw that trump’s budget would save quite a few tens of billions by ending the program by which student loans are forgiven if the recipient works for a non profit or public agency for ten years. Sounds most likely OK to me. My wife was in that category BTW, the non profit was a nursing home. It is damned hard to get people to work in a nursing home. She left before she qualified for the forgiveness.
Now, all of these ideas have consequences intended and unintended. They are worth considering.
To a government doubter it sounds like pure positive. I hope that the actual consequences of these kinds of cuts get a thorough analysis. I have an open mind as to what that might show.
Roby, I will try to explain in better terms than I did before.
Until around the mid 00’s, most all physicians had offices by themseoves oras a large physician group, maybe 25-200 doc’s. When you went to that doctor, they billed insurance for your visit. So lets say you had a complaint that you felt weak, no energy and just lazy. They examined you and did a blood test. Medicare paid for a visit of a certain lenght, say 30 minutes and that fell into an intermediate visit which reimbursed $75.00. In addition, another $50 was paid for the blood test.
So along comes ” experts” and finance individuals like me and we identify that if these doc’s are part of the health system, we can bill for all that, plus what is called a facility fee. That covers the cost of equioment use, supplies and salaries of staff required to support the doc in your treatment. And for the service you just had, that is $60.
Now I was involved with these “deals”. Our facility bought physician practices. We paid the docs the fee schedule. That immediately increased docs income because they yad no practice cost. We billed the facility fee. Out of that came to staff salary, building costs, etc. We made money and the docs made more.
The losers. The docs that stayed separate.
Also there are issues if the docs are mikesfrom the hospital, but in the immediate area, this wroks.
So all Medicare wouod do is go back to paying $125 instead of $185. Everyone is paid the same, no benefit for hospitals biloingbfor service.
Robby correctly asks about unintended consequences.
All actions have unintended consequences.
The rules being revised had unintended consequences, the new rules are intended to address those and will also have unitended consequences.
Robby notes this is complex – and it is. Too complex for government.
Insurance companies deal with the same issues.
It is more efficient for an insurance company to deal with a big provider.
But if the price of the big providers services are too high then the benefits are outweighed by the cost.
An insurance company does NOT need to write no regulations to make shifting choices based on the market at the moment. Insurance companies will change their rules, in time the providers will find new ways to game those rules and the insurance companies will change them again.
But government change is SLOW. So when providers figure out how to game government it takes years before government adapts.
We KNOW that PPACA forced massive medical consolidation.
My personal doctor was part of a 3 doctor practice at the begining. He grew that practice to about 8 doctors and then got bought by a consortium that owns half the doctors offices and hospitals between Philadelphia and Harrisburg.
I have no problem with whatever changes occur naturally in the market. Shifts between big and small business are natural and cyclic. ‘
But it is CORRUPT when government is behind those changes.
And PPACA which has almost nothing of consequence left, massively changed providers.
If you are unclear what all of it means – then you should not be claiming Trump is lying.
Today’s Quick Political Quiz Question:
Which American Presidents in their first term had a Campaign chair: Deputy campaign chair: Personal lawyer: Foreign policy adviser: and National security adviser convicted of felonies?
Second term?
After office?
Tick. Tick.
Followup Question:
Which New Moderate commenters will say Trump is right to pardon any or all of them?
Everyone but Cohen and Manafort will get pardoned.
Manafort will likely get his sentence commuted.
Just as John Deutch did by Clinton.
Further, unless you are going to AS VIGOROUSLY prosecute the same misconduct by democrats, then this is appropriate. What is not appropriate is the prosecutions.
Flynn is purported to have lied to the FBI – there are no 302’s that say he lied, the agents that interview him say he was truthful, but still we are prosecuting a lie we can not ever find.
Yet the transcript of Flynn’s conversation with Kisylak was leaked to WaPo.
That was extremely highly classified information. It is likely that less than half a dozen people in FBI had access to it. It is near certain the FBI knows who leaked it.
There is no indictment, no prosecution – for a very serious crime.
Tony Podesta was paid by Paul Manafort to lobby for Ukraine.
That actual FARA violation was podesta’s not manafort – why isn’t podesta being prosecuted ?
McCabe, lied during an FBI investigation, and lied under oath about leaking information about an ongoing investigation. No prosecution.
Comey admitted under oath to leaking information he KNEW was classified, No prosecution.
Glenn Simpson lied to congress repeatedly on matters more important than Papadoulis. No prosecution.
AOC appears to be guilty of several very serious campaign finance law violations that appear to have been deliberate efforts to circumvent the law and to gain PERSONAL benefits.
No prosecution.
In TX we have prosecutions for Ballot Harvesting. In NC we will have a new election over an allegation to small to have effected the outcome.
In CA and AZ the outcome of more than 2 dozen significant races was altered as a result of ballot harvesting, and no investigation.
I would prefer to see everyone prosecuted. But until that is the case, lopsided politization of the DOJ/FBI should result in lots of pardons.
What president EVER has used the DOJ/FBI/NSA/IRS to go after:
The press
Political enemies
and to protect Friends.
Lisa Page’s testimony has just been released.
Page testified that the FBI – including Comey had concluded that Clinton had met the “reckless or grossly negligent” standard necescary to violate 18 cfr 793(f) and that DOJ (Lorretta Lynch) told the FBI that there would be no prosecution on that basis.
So what do you care about more – actual public corruption ?
Or this garbage that you are selling ?
BTW what president ever perjured himself – atleast twice, and suborned perjury – WHILE IN OFFICE ?
What president is widely acknowledged to have REPEATEDLY stuffed ballot boxes to win elections by fraud ?
https://gazette.com/news/el-paso-county-declared-second-amendment-preservation-county-as-legislature/article_8f0038d8-44ee-11e9-b6d3-671f6b65dc3d.html
This is as nutty as the sanctuary immigrant state or city.
Just pick and choose which law your going to enforce. Illegal immigrant, big deal, stay here, dont worry. Oh in Colorado, your mentally ill, shown to be a threat, dont worry, El Paso County will let you keep your guns.
Person identified as mentally ill and a threat, sheriff serves court orders, but refuses to search home for weapons they want out of those people hands. Just keep your guns and dont let us know you have them.
WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH THIS COUNTRY?
If it is a law, follow it!
If you think the law is unconstitutional, go to court and get SCOTUS to rule!
If its legal and you dont like it, work to overturn the law.
If people support the law, ENFORCE IT or get the hell out of law enforcement or gorvernment position your in and let some who will in that position who will.
🎶🎶 I can’t give you anything but lies, Baby…
That’s the only thing I have pleanty of, Baby…
https://www.rawstory.com/2019/03/foxs-john-roberts-calls-trump-lying-cleared-collusion-manafort-trial/
“Have we ever seen this degree of brazen, pathological mendacity in American public life?”
“Have we ever seen this degree of brazen, pathological mendacity in American public life?”
Are we completely ignorant of history ?
Kennedy was practically running a brothel out of the whitehouse.
Johnson is pretty inarguably the most corrupt president in history.
Nixon ran his own private spying and burglary organization out of the whitehouse.
Clinton – “I did not have sex with that woman”
Brazen, pathological medacity!!
Do we have any president who has perjured themselves ever ? Much less TWICE ?
Do we have a president who suborned perjury ? Every ?
Jay, grow up. Your worst Trump nightmare beleifs are tame compared to reality.
Nor have I addressed Obama yet.
I wanted to beleive that Fast and Furious, IRSgate. Benghazi, and spying on reporters and spying on congress were not connected the the whitehouse.
But the ongoing investigations get worse by the minute.
The Page, and Ohr transcripts were just released and they are pretty bad.
But there are 80 additional transcripts that will be released eventually as soon as he can get DOJ to allow that. He said expect ALOT more of the same. He said, the public story is that the Trump investigation was triggered by Papadoulis’s purported drunken rantings to Downer, but the evidence the House collected has the investigation begining in late 2015. There is lots of evidence that it was driven by the whitehouse from the very begining.
Nunes says that as of the moment he can not confirm this but he does not beleive that much if any of the steele dossier was written by Christopher Steele, that Steele was just a willing pawn and was used because his credentials as a MI6 Russian spy lent credibility to the Dossier that it did not have.
You do not think that Obama was capable of using the executive branch to go after political enemies ? The CIA under Obama had to appologize to DEMOCRATS on the senate for spying on them.
Brazen Pathological Mendacity ?
Ken Starr was interviewed recently. Starr BTW post impeachment developed a friendship with the Clinton’s. Starr said all indications are the Mueller report will be a dud. At the same time he noted that while they will grind forwards slowly, that we should expect alot of indictments and prosecutions of former Obama staff.
Page has just revealed that DOJ directed Comey and the FBI against his own judgement NOT to recomend prosecution of Clinton on a Gross Negligence standard. Despite the fact that Clinton’s own CIA director had been CONVICTED of handling classified information in a grossly negligent fashion.
There even appears to be documentary evidence – FBI charts noting that DOJ will not prosecute based on gross negligence.
At the Bare minimum BEFORE Lynch recused herself she put her thumb on the scales of justice,
Brazen Pathological Mendacity ?
What does it take to sic the FBI on Congress, reporters, political enemies ?
The left goes batshit if Trump even suggests that “someone” should look into actual misconduct by his enemies. Obama blessed it.
Why is this a story ?
The russian collusion meme is D-E-A-D DEAD.
It was fake garbage from the begining.
It is self evident now, that it was not only false, but there is not even today and never was sufficient basis to investigate something that is no more than gossip – and bad gossip at that.
Did the manafort trial prove there was no collusion ?
No, you can not prove a negative.
It did provide that Paul Manafort had no knowledge or collusion.
The rest of all of this proves that Papadolis knew nothing of collusion, Flynn knew nothing, Cohen knew nothing.
Here is the New Republic – that hot bed of conservatism on Maria Butina the great russian spy that Mueller nabbed.
So we have another guns blazing raid, follwed by a year in jail without bail in solitary confinement, only to get a plea to almost nothing an deportation to Russia.
And what is Butina guilty of ? Being Russian in the US when Mueller needed a scapegoat.
You fixate on all Mueller’s convictions. For what ?
And BTW during the clinton administration the HEAD of the CIA was convicted of mishandling of classified information and pardoned by Bill Clinton.
https://newrepublic.com/article/153036/maria-butina-profile-wasnt-russian-spy
Trump Threatens To Build Mile High Net Across Mexican Border To Halt New Migration
http://www.chicoer.com/why-are-there-so-many-butterflies-in-southern-california-right-now
Yes, Jay, Trump should build that net, not only would it prevent those invading butterflies from taking . pollen from our U.S. butterflies (even the illegal foreign ones already here), but it would also stop the importation of drugs that are being thrown over fences and being fired over by giant air howitzers. (Drug smugglers can’t just depend on 3200 pound shipments through places like N.J.)
“Drug smugglers can’t just depend on 3200 pound shipments through places like N.J.”
Obviously they can not – they got caught.
Storm Ahead?
“Michael Cohen Has Email Showing Trump Obstructed Justice by Dangling Pardon”
“Even as staunch an advocate of presidential authority as William Barr agreed in his confirmation hearings that dangling pardons could be obstruction of justice. “Do you believe a president could lawfully issue a pardon in exchange for the recipient’s promise to not incriminate him?” asked Senator Pat Leahy. “No. That would be a crime,” replied Barr.”
http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2019/03/cohen-email-trump-dangled-pardon-obstruction-justice-mueller.html
I am highly dubious this email exists.
News stories have claimed to have “the smoking gun” innumerable times.
The evidence we have thus far is that Trump actually shunned contact with Cohen after he became president – infact having very limited contact with him during the campaign.
That Cohen was told he was PNG when he tried to get into the whitehouse.
So this claimed email seems dubious.
We also had myriads of claims that Cohen had tapes of Trump plotting crimes with him.
And that has proved “fake news”/
Finally do you really think That Cohen held this “ace in the hole” until aften he had become irrelevant ?
But lets address the actual claim and assume that there is some merit to it.
Trump can pardon all involved at anytime he wants. That is within his legitimate powers.
It might result in impeachment – that is political not legal. But it is not a crime.
Trump “dangling” a pardon, would be disturbing to me, and could be a corruption and a crime – but that would depend very heavily on the details.
As an example if Trump told Cohen “not to worry, when the investigation is over I am pardoning everyone” – that is not a crime, but it would be impeachable.
A quid pro quo offer of a pardon in return for something would be a crime.
That is pretty text book public corruption.
Most if not all criminal uses of the pardon power require ANOTHER crime.
i.e I will pardon you if you testify falsely – that is suborning perjury, the fact that it involves pardons is irrelevant.
As to Barr.
I thought at the time his appointment was a mistake.
He is another of those purportedly long term respected figures from washington that on closer inspection should not be respected.
Trump has been mistaken in just about every appointment he has made of a washington insidered.
Barr, never should have answered a question like that
and the senate should not have asked it.
In the example you cited the CRIME is Trump asking Cohen not to incriminate him.
The pardon is irrelevant.
“I will dance naked down pennsylvania avenue if you do not incriminate me”
Would be a crime.
Roby, Jay et al,
Did Trump say he would not cut medicare, Yes
Did Trump Lie, Yes
Is Trump the only politician that lies, No
Does Trump lie more than most. No sure, many lies are never discovered, but he lies a lot.
But think about this. You are having cows over Trump saying something and then doing something else that needs to be done.
Why don’t you have the outrage for the money that the government is wasting on issues like Medicaid where people that go on Medicaid are not re certified periodically as they should?
Why should we be paying for Medicaid for people who can work, but won’t?
Why should doctors that are employed by hospitals be paid differently( about 50% more) by Medicare than doctors that have private practices doing the same services?
Think about this guys, the issue is not one if Trump lied, it is your money, my money and every other taxpayers money that is being wasted because government is incompetent and does not know or is unwilling to make changes that need to be made that is not going to impact anyone.
America needs to direct its attention to what needs to be changed and stop being manipulated like you are by the media to complain about things that do not need to be complained about.
And if you want me to give you more examples of games the medical industry plays to waste your money, I have a boat load. I did it for years. But each one will be longer than a “Dave posting” to explain. I don’t think you want that.
Ron, Trump is a PATHOLOGICAL liar.
He lies about things large and small.
Not a day goes by when he doesn’t distort the truth.
Doesn’t that worry you?
Do you not see how deleterious to the collective character of the nation that is?
Doesn’t it embarrass you to have him as your president?
The fact that you don’t recognize/admit that, or worry how dangerous it is to have a US President like him, is worrisome – to me. I know in most things you’re a reasonable guy. Aside from political bickering, we’re much alike; we’d get along fine in a bar over drinks or at a restaurant discussing menu options; we could even be friends if you turned out to be a New England Patriots fan (though I definitely would not be buying you drinks if you were openly rooting for them). But your inability to recognize how detrimental Trump is to the nation, how divisive a disease he is to the body-politic, how cancerous he is to our national integrity, depresses me to the nth degree.
Jay, the difference between you and I is the fact that I know all politicians lie, but they just are much more polished in lying than Trump. They lie and don’t get caught for months or years later. Trump lies and gets caught while he is lying.
Yes, that is damaging to the country, but damn, can’t you see how much more damaging it is for the media to take a certain proposal by a politicians, nit pick the proposal and make it sound like the sky is falling if passed. Then if one does any itty bitty amount of research, one finds that the proposals are good changes.
The fact that Trump lied about not cutting Medicare is far far less damaging than allowing the waste, fraud, unfair reimbursement policies and idiotic government rules to stay in place and continue to run up debt.
As I said many many times, I supported Simpson-Bowles, not because it increased taxes, but because it finally would cause any administration to cut expenses.
I am so sorry that I can not empathize with your thoughts on how damaging Trump is, but wasteful spending is not.
But that’s the way it is. Trumps policies (not Trump himself) have been good for the country in my mind. Trump himself has not been, but weighing the two, I have to give more emphasis to the administration policies than personal behavior.
Trump has a different style than other politicians.
It is more blunt, but that is part of his appeal.
The difference in “catching” other politicians is not skill, it is more a function of the radically disproportionate dominance of the public discussion space by the left.
The media had to be drug kicking and screaming to recognize Obama’s lies.
While if Trump says the sun will rise tomorow, it is certain that politifact will likely rate that as mostly false.
I am not looking to blame the media – just explain the world we are in.
Further Trump is the consequence of that near total dominance of the public discussion space by the left.
The left is trying to hold the cork in a bottle of champaign.
When speech is so heavily skewed as it is now – whether by government or twitter, the pressure will build and the cork will pop.
Trump is not sufficient – there will be more.
26 of 27 people banned by twitter recently were on the right, the one who was not was a radical feminist who refused to call MTF Trans people women.
That is not sustainable.
You seem to have bought this Trump lied about SS and Medicare nonsense.
If you have not gathered – I can not say strongly enough how much nonsense and how evil I think that claim is. Maybe you are prepared to let it slide as unimportant.
I am not.
There is a giant gulf between accusations of imprecision, which are inappropriate in the context of campaign speechs, and accusations of moral failure – lying.
Do you beleive that Trump promised anyone that the budget for SS and medicare would continue to rise under his administration endlessly ?
Unless you beleive that was what he promised, then claiming that he lied is a lie on your part.
And if you beleive that – which I doubt, how do you explain that in the same or next sentence, Trump explicitly state he would cut fraud and waste.
While I absolutely agree with you that Trump’s budget is close to meaningless.
At the same time it is EXACTLY what he promised.
He is doing EXACTLY what he said – what his voters expected.
Nor as I have said repeatedly is this about Trump.
But this is about the immorality of those who make false accusations targeting others.
It is a backlash against that that elected Trump in the first place.
Ron,
If you beleive that Trump “lied” about cutting medicare,
then what meaning do his statements that he would reduce fraud and waste in medicare – often in the same or next sentence mean ?
Personally, I think those statements are superfluous.
“promising” not to cut medicare is NOT the same as promising to allow waste and fraud to continue.
As an example – when Obama promised that if you liked your doctor you could keep them,
did that mean he also promised not to prosecute your doctor if they were engaged in fraud, or that he agreed not to try to reduce waste even though that might mean a few doctors were driven out of business ?
No one would have tried to claim that Obama’s statement meant that everything would stay exactly the same. Only that PPACA would not effect your ability to choose your own doctor – with the UNSTATED assumption that you might be restricted in choosing wasteful and fraudulent doctors.
Obama lied because he affirmatively took from many people their choice of doctors and health insurance.
Roby and Jay are trying to impose a standard for what constitutes a lie that;
They do not hold themselves to,
and they do not hold democrats to,
and they did not hold Trump to.
In some instances they do not even hold other republicans to.
They are violating Kant’s catagorical imperative
“Act only according to that maxim whereby you can, at the same time, will that it should become a universal law.”
“Ron, Trump is a PATHOLOGICAL liar.”
Self Evidently false.
“He lies about things large and small.”
I will give you that he says an enormous amount and he does so in “soundbites” that are inherently oversimplifactions and exagerations.
But that is not that unusual. Nor it is inherently immoral.
When we simplify issues and the result is deceptive, communicates falsely that is bad.
When we simplify and the result clarifies, that is good.
As an example – a bad analogy distorts our thinking. While a good one clarifies.
Analogies are inherently simplifications.
By the defintion of lie that you and Robby are using – every analogy, every effort to explain anything without hundreds of pages of details is a lie.
“Not a day goes by when he doesn’t distort the truth.”
Likely true. That happens all the time.
You do that all the time.
“Doesn’t that worry you?”
Not particularly.
I think that all of us can listen to what Trump says – and I think it is pretty trivial for us to determine what we can trust and what is superfluous.
As Salena Zito noted in 2016.
Democrats take Trump literally, but not seriously
Trump supporters take Trump seriously, but not literally.
Candidate Trump promised to confront both legal and illegal immigration. President Trump is doing so in ways that are very consistent with his promises. Whether you think what he is doing is right or wrong, he is doing what he said he would.
Candidate Trump promised to confront Trade. President Trump is doing so in ways that are very consistent with his promises. Whether you think what he is doing is right or wrong, he is doing what he said he would.
Candidate Trump promised to confront the courts. President Trump is doing so in ways that are very consistent with his promises. Whether you think what he is doing is right or wrong, he is doing what he said he would.
Candidate Trump promised to confront the economy. President Trump is doing so in ways that are very consistent with his promises. Whether you think what he is doing is right or wrong, he is doing what he said he would.
Candidate Trump promised to confront foreign entanglements. President Trump is doing so in ways that are very consistent with his promises. Whether you think what he is doing is right or wrong, he is doing what he said he would.
Candidate Trump promised to confront government waste. President Trump is doing so in ways that are very consistent with his promises. Whether you think what he is doing is right or wrong, he is doing what he said he would.
Candidate Trump promised to confront government regulation. President Trump is doing so in ways that are very consistent with his promises. Whether you think what he is doing is right or wrong, he is doing what he said he would.
On and on and on. I do not think there is a single president in the entirety of US history has the track record of keeping campaign promises Trump has.
This is not about whether he is right or wrong.
What is self evident is that you can trust that he will do what he says.
If you like what he says – you should vote for him.
If you do not – you should vote for someone else.
But despite all the uproar – almost entirely driven by the media and the left,
Trump’s presidency has been highly predictable.
All the recent chaos, is not about Trump himself – the chaos is entirely the consequence of detractors.
“Do you not see how deleterious to the collective character of the nation that is?”
No. There is no collective character. Character is an attribute of individuals.
“Doesn’t it embarrass you to have him as your president?”
Less so than Bush, or Obama. Honestly less so than Clinton.
Though there is still an open question as to whether Trump will be as good or better a president.
“The fact that you don’t recognize/admit that, or worry how dangerous it is to have a US President like him, is worrisome – to me. ”
What are we not recognizing ? Whether we characterize Trump’s remarks or actions the same of not, they are not secret.
I worry about every president.
I worried more about Trump when elected than I do now.
I worried much more about Obama as president than Trump.
Obama, not Trump is the president who repeatedly did whatever he pleased without regard for the law or constitution.
Trump just says things that torque you.
“I know in most things you’re a reasonable guy. Aside from political bickering, we’re much alike; we’d get along fine in a bar over drinks or at a restaurant discussing menu options; we could even be friends if you turned out to be a New England Patriots fan (though I definitely would not be buying you drinks if you were openly rooting for them).”
Jay that could be said of everyone here – including those who are most caustic in their relations. My Musical skills suck. But I share Robby’s appreciation of fine music, even if I lack his skills. Each of us would have no problems finding some common ground.
You would be shocked to deal with me in person. It is not that I am different, it is that outside the issues we discuss here we have enormous common ground and though this may surprise you I am a very agreeable person. What I am not, is either a leader or a follower.
I am not an Alpha, or a Beta.
“But your inability to recognize how detrimental Trump is to the nation, ”
An unsubstantiated assertion.
“how divisive a disease he is to the body-politic”
Our divisions predate Trump, though there has always been some division, the gap widened dramatically under Obama. The data is clear on that.
Further the gap widened because of a hollowing out of the middle – mostly the destruction of the moderate left. The left has shifted further left AND destroyed their own moderates.
Trump had nothing to do with that.
Has Trump capitalized on it to get elected.
But the surfer does not create the wave.
And until you recognize the actual source of the divisions in this country blaming Trump will accomplish nothing. If you destroyed him, someone worse will be back – and likely elected all too soon.
“how cancerous he is to our national integrity, depresses me to the nth degree.”
Then you are easily depressed about odd things.
Jay, you are not only wrong about many of the facts, but you are wrong about their importance, the latter being more significant than the former.
While there are many things Trump is doing that I do not support – on net he is an improvement over Obama – according to standard of living data – a 50% improvement.
We could do better, but we are doing good.
We are certainly doing better than under Bush and Obama.
Further of every problem that I consider very serious, that Trump is not addressing – debt, deficits, entitlements, Trump is NOT making them worse, and Clinton would have.
Might we be moving towards crisis ? Possibly. But not a single issue I think is near crisis is something that is a significant part of the current public debate.
To the extent that Trump has actually had a negative impact on our public debate, that would be because when Obama was president Republicans (tepidly) raised the most serious issues facing us. Now no one does.
Regardless, all of your Trump hysteria is overwrought.
Thus far Trump is a mediocre president who stands a bit taller than he ought because he was preceded by pygmies.
Did Trump lie ? NO!
This is the central issue. And it is not about Trump.
I constantly criticism people for lack of precision in their remarks.
But I do not accuse them of lying because what they meant and what they said is not in perfect sync.
In the clips Jay linked to – even edited to get something like a dozen of trump’s remarks into a 2min clip – there are numerous explicit statements that his is going to reduce waste and fraud.
To understand that as meaning anything different from – I will reduce spending, but I will not reduce benefits is deliberately deception.
In the rest of the media, this claim has died, in fact, it really never gained traction.
Only people interested in deliberate deception have tried to sell it,
and you one is buying.
This is not about Trump, It is not about defending Trump, it is not about SS or HI, It is not about whether politicians lie. It is not about whether Trump lies or does not.
It is about whether accusing anyone of being a liar, for less than perfect precision where everyone knows what was meant, and where the immediately following statements make that clear.
Either you must say Trump was obviously contradicting himself when he said “I will not cut Social Security or medicare. I will cut fraud and waste”, or you know exactly what he said and you are deliberately trying to misrepresent it to portray it as a lie.
Robby and Jay constantly assert they are not on the left.
Maybe not, but this is exactly the kind of garbage that comes almost exclusively from the left, it is a significant part of what cost them the 2016 election, and it is immoral.
The right thinks the left is wrong,
The left thinks everyone else is immoral.
The largest moral problem is on the left.
Ignoring the ludicrously stupid claim that Trump is lying.
Waste and Fraud anywhere in government should be reduced.
Virtually all politicians promise to do so.
Maybe Trump will be the first to actually succeed.
I doubt it.
That is again why to the greatest extent possible things that government is not required to do, should not be done by government.
Private waste and fraud exist, but the need to make a profit and the requirement to deliver value to clients create an ever present incentive to reduce fraud and waste.
The incentives work toward greater waste and fraud in government not away.
It is not an accident that the worlds worst polluters are governments – even in the US.
Trump’s promise not to cut SS or HI is both truthful (thus far) and wrong. We need to cut both. We also need to cut rather than increase defense. We need to get out of destructive and wasteful foreign entanglements. that is both a good thing and a cost reduction.
We may need to take care as to how we do so. SS and HI are a decades long lie that we have told ourselves. But we need to figure out how to end them, while keeping as much as possible of the stupid promise that we made to people.
“And if you want me to give you more examples of games the medical industry plays to waste your money, I have a boat load. I did it for years. But each one will be longer than a “Dave posting” to explain. I don’t think you want that.”
Facts and arguments do not usually fit into sound bites.
I like Joe Rogan – but I prefer Dave Rubin, or Jordan Peterson or ….
But one of the points of this article is that as traditional media moves more sharply into the 15sec soundbite era, The Denizens of the new media are increasing moving to long detailed exploration of difficult and nuanced topics. 3 hr interviews.
Everything we purportedly know about the media tells us that is wrong and leads to failure.
Yet, it is exactly what the new media is very successfully doing.
real people have an appetite for thorough analysis over 15s sound bites that reinforce their biases.
The article further notes interestingly that the new media is dependent only on its audience.
Rogan screwed up his first twitter interview. His listeners took him to task and he wisely scheduled another interview and brought someone else in to make sure the tough questions were asked. Further Twitter obliged. They chose to sit for the initial 3 hr interview on Joe Rogan, and when asked, knowing that the re-interviewer was going to be tougher – they came back again.
Not only are these long detailed examaninations of issues desired by ordinary people, but they are suffficiently that if Rogan asks, Twitter feels they must comply.
That is huge.
That is one of many reasons I am happy with the media changes.
The new world of media is not perfect, there are many bad things about it.
But we have not journeyed to hell. We are in a better place, but still looking to find and fix the warts.
https://quillette.com/2019/03/12/joe-rogan-is-the-walter-cronkite-of-our-era/
“Roby, Jay et al,
Did Trump say he would not cut medicare, Yes
Did Trump Lie, Yes
Is Trump the only politician that lies, No
Does Trump lie more than most. No sure, many lies are never discovered, but he lies a lot.”
Ah, Sanity. Thanks for that! Its needed here.
I am not very excited by the new trump position on Medicare,SS, Medicaid. I calmly noted that this is legitimate political fodder. He said one thing, he has now proposed to do another. There will be some hyperbole about that and he and his side will have their chance to shoot it down if its wrong.
Like there will be hyperbole that the Dem party candidates are proposing Venezuelan Marxism, which criticism they have opened themselves up to by moving as far as they have towards pie in the sky free everything economics. Its wrong to mention Venezuela or stalin when criticizing the current dem candidates, its idiotic, but there are plenty of idiots, so… This is just how politics goes. Part of the game.
This particular lie of trumps about cuts is an ordinary political lie, not one of trumps trademark whoppers where he simply brazenly asserts something that is obviously not so, as if his saying so makes it so. And doing it many times on some days.
Politicians lie. We demand it. A non lying politician does not get elected, the people will choose the candidate who tells them what they want to believe. In this case trump told the kind of lie that politicians always tell, he said what had to be said if he wanted to not be shot down. I am not in any uproar about it. But I think he will pay for it, as I think the dems will pay for their progressive nonsense.
As I said above in a reply to your post above about the proposed cuts and what they are, I have an open mind about the measures, or some of them, that trump’s budget is proposing.
See, Ron, I am perfectly calm. Don’t fall into Dave’s nonsense of seeing every criticism of trump as rabid TDS.
“I am not very excited by the new trump position on Medicare,SS, Medicaid. ”
Roby, like I just commented, I could care less if he lied or not. I am more concerned about waste that is rampant in government spending.
So again, lets look at Medicaid.
Government stupidity allows for a look forward of 10 years. So lets say this extremely accurate crystal ball projects Medicaid spending will be $1 trillion over 10 years based on current conditions where those unable to obtain or hold a job paying a wage over a certain amount get medical coverage.
Now some one comes along and says, “we need to look at Medicaid rules”
Findings:
1. Year one the expense is $80 billion. Year two-ten are project to increase twice the increase of CPI.
2. Recommendtion is for the $80 billion to be distributed to states over the next 10 years plus a CPI inflator and let states distribute funds. Is that a cut? Its more than previous years. If your employer tells you that he is going to give you a 10% raise each year for 10 years and then says that is going to change to 5%, did your salary get cut?
3. If the government tells Suzie Q you need to get off your dead ass and get a job or you will lose Medicaid, is that a cut? Queen Nancy calls this “cruel”. Are we really cruel when people have to work?
4. If your state begins re -certifying eligibility every two years instead of never or every 5’years and they find 10% of the recipients are no longer eligible, is that a cut?
Please state your definition of “cuts”.
My definition is the act of making something smaller or less in size, volume or number. My definition of cut does not allow for an increase, then a reduction and the resulting number still being larger than the base number in amount or size.
Ron.
your argument that SS, medicare and medicaid are not actually being cut they are growing faster than inflation for every year in the budget, should not merely end this nonsense.
It should make it clear that the entire claim that Trump lied is a LIE.
I do not think it should have been necessary to go there.
I do not think that when Trump said this, that anyone said:
If trump seeks to reduce fraud or waste – then he is lying.
Or if he does not increase spending as fast as the most profligate person on the left – then he is lying.
The point I am trying to make is not about Trump.
While he did not lie, he did make a promise he should not have, and he should not keep it.
Your argument is picayune, but the claim that Trump lied is worse.
Your argument should not have been necescary – Trump’s statement would not in the view of rational people be a lie if the benefits to ordinary people remained unchanged.
Trump’s statement would be true if he magically found a way to deliver the benefits of SS and medicare while reducing the budget to zero.
If you accuse someone else of lying – you had better be able to prove it.
Otherwise you are the liar.
The worst possible hypocrisy is that of those who have no morals who pass erroneous moral judgement on others.
Did Trump at the same time say he would reduce fraud and waste ? Yes,
Is it LYING to claim that reducing fraud and waste is cutting medicare ? Yes.
In Roby world Trump would have to allow waste and fraud to continue to avoid lying.
Again – this is not about Trump. You play the same idiotic game all the time.
There is an enomous gulf between criticising other peoples errors and calling them evil.
I do ALOT of the former, and I often do so because people are not careful about what they say. I focus on errors in precision that gloss over significant conflicts or distort meaning.
You jump right for whoever you are after is evil. Often making up some basis after the fact.
Nor do you do this consistently – it is reserved only for those you do not like.
Your moral foundations are your feelings about who is good and who is evil.
They are not rooted in fact.
Your problems predate Trump – this is not about Trump, This is about you.
This is also about the serious problems with the left – you claim not to be part of the left,
yet your MO is the same. Lob moral grenades without bother to note that your attacks work just as well against you and yours.
You bemoan the polarization and divisiveness in the country – yet, you are the source.
Not Trump – it started long before him.
BTW – I do not care that you disagree with people over politics – or pretty much anything.
I do not expect everyone to agree. But everyone who disagrees is not evil.
Being wrong is not inherently evil.
Using force without justification IS inherently evil.
Falsely attacking the morality of others IS inherently evil.
Yet you do both easily – without thought.
And then you pretend that anyone who criticises – they too are evil, and they are someone using force against you, by trying to prevent you from imposing your will on others by force.
We disagree on some very fundamental things. On the foundations of society. On the very basics of morality. Disagreement is innaccurate, we do not disagree, you do not have moral foundations.
Damn, even the freaking computers are racist!!
https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/3/5/18251924/self-driving-car-racial-bias-study-autonomous-vehicle-dark-skin
😂😂😂😂😂!!!!
Wait!. We need congressional investigation!!!
Trump must own computer company used for programs in ADV’s
AI and machine learning are heuristic not algorithmic – and that is part of the problem.
Assertions of moral issues are nonsense.
Actual algorithms might have moral implications – because they reflect the RULES determined by the programmer.
AI systems – heuristics, machine learning are far less likely to have moral consequences.
They reflect the DATA they were trained with.
Using a real world human example – medicine is notoriously biased against minorities and sometimes women. Not because it is filled with racists, but because it is driven by data and most of the data collected is about white males.
That will automatically correct itself over time, and will do so more rapidly as we note and choose to provide more data.
Well, I was joking. I don’t really think self driving cars are racist. 😜
I was not attacking you.
I was attacking some of the nonsense in the article.
I understand you were linking to is as evidence that the rear world was mirroring the onion.
But I was attacking some of its premises as if they were serious.
I know they were laughable to you.
But even Tucker Carlson who generally is not prone to this kind of nonsense. has bought into the AI doom and gloom story.
The robots are coming (though slowly).
They will be disruptive.
People will lose their jobs.
And they will find other jobs.
Some will find better jobs, some worse.
We will still be much better off.
We are always better off when we produce more that humans value with less and less valuable human effort.
Tucker Carlson, and Andrew Yang and all the rest of the “AI is different” crowd are wrong.
I am glad for their voices, but there is no difference between AI truck drivers and 18th century spinning jennies.
Absolutely AI will be disruptive. Just as all the automation fo the industrial age was.
But at the same time as automation in the 18th century destroyed millions of jobs, it created more than it destroyed.
It is not predictable precisely how the free market will respond to the automation of 3.5M jobs. It is still without doubt that it will respond and it will find use for them and we will be better off – we will have cheaper transportation AND whatever new goods and services the displaced move to. Significant Long Term unemployment is solely the consequence of govenrment.
Yes, I agree with you about Andrew Yang, particularly now that he has revealed himself to be a fear-monger, telling Asians that white people are going to start killing them, in revenge for them taking jobs away from whites. Yang is a dangerous fear-monger. Although, I still like Tucker Carlson, and think that he is an important voice for populist conservatism. I’m guessing that he’ll back off of his admiration for Yang, after he hears this:
“And so what do you think the attitude is going to be over time for the shrinking insecure white majority that’s losing their jobs for let’s say Chinese Americans or Asian Americans? I’m like, I personally, I said to a group at Harvard I think we’re one generation away from falling into the same camps as the Jews who were attacked in the synagogue in Pittsburgh like just a couple months ago. Like we’re probably one generation away from Americans shooting up a bunch of Asians saying like, you know, “damn the Chinese because there’s a giant cold war even more with China.” ~ Andrew Yang
https://www.dailywire.com/news/44689/dem-candidate-andrew-yang-one-generation-away-ryan-saavedra
I had not heard about the Yang’s fear mongering.
Though it sounds extreme, I have two asian children and I can tell you that we treat asians differently. My daughter has conflicts with black friends who claim that she can not understand their experience of racism – while that is sort of true, they completely discount hers.
It is also an almost unmentioned subtext in the immigration debate.
The majority of legal us immigrants are Asians, From China, Philippines, India, …..
When the accusations fly that this is all about brown people vs. white people,
No, it is about brown people vs. yellow people.
Tucker is extremely smart. He is too smart to be buying into this ludite nonsense.
While he is correctly identifying a broad set of fears, the same fears that helped Trump get elected and that democrats are STILL clueless about. His solutions are wrong, and he should know that.
I can only speak from my families personal experience. But despite Trump’s sabre rattling over trade with china, the major threat to my children is not “white people”.
It is other minorities. In CA they ended race based prefernces in college admissions – odd for CA, and the result was a quadrupling of the number of asians in CA schools. The number of whites stayed the same. The numbers of other minorities tanked.
When my daughter is confronted with racism, it is usually from minorities, it is even quite often from friends.
Asians sterotypes do not portray them as a real threat to whites. Yes they compete for jobs as doctors and scientists. But that competition is not translating to racial conflict.
Asians are not a threat to young single jobless white high school educated men.
Central americans are.
Americans see China – the country as a threat of sorts. They do not mostly see asians in the US as a threat. It is only the chinese in china who take jobs from blue collar whites.
The US should be concerned about China – they are a huge superpower and their economy is 8 times that of Russia. They have alot of political weight to throw around and they make serious political missteps. Modern Chinese leadership seems to hold the same view that the japanese did in the 30’s and 40’s – that they are THE power in asia an THEY should dictate to the rest of asia.
At the same time, I do not think violent conflict with china is likely. Though we should never let our guard down, and we should assume that China will act agressively if we are careless.
BTW that is the same position we should have toward Russia.
And just like Russia we should also be looking to cooperate where we can.
Further China MUST allow political freedom – we do not need to try to force that.
it is going to happen. It is inevitable. Nations as affluent as China is moving towards do not exist without much greater freedom. China has kept conflict at bay by providing great economic freedom, but that only goes so far, and freedom is just not divisible in that way.
We have all this ranting here about Trump and NK.
But no one is paying attention. There is alot more going on. Trump is negotiating with China, and Vietnam, and in ways much of asia. Nor is this just about trade deals.
North Korea is not a great success yet, but it likely will be. We are likely looking at a transition that over a decade will be similar to that of East Germany. Though it is not going to occur in the same way. Everybody – including Kim Un wants North Korea to better integrate with the rest of Asia.
No prior president even attempted what Trump is doing.
Despite all the bumping and bruising – China is working with us on NK. As is vietnam.
And others that you would expect.
This is NOT just about NK, it is about a change int he relationship of the US to asia.
And it is not just about trade.
It’s nice to a story about money that does good things.
“Old Rape Kits Finally Got Tested. 64 Attackers Were Convicted.”
“Ms. Sudbeck’s case is one of thousands that have gotten a second look from investigators since the Manhattan district attorney, Cyrus R. Vance Jr., committed $38 million in forfeiture money to help other jurisdictions test rape kits. Since the grants began being distributed in 2015, the evidence kits have led to 165 prosecutions in cases that were all but forgotten. So far, 64 of those have resulted in convictions.”
Rarely have public dollars from a local prosecutor’s office been so directly tied to results with such national implications. The initiative has paid to get about 55,000 rape kits tested in 32 law enforcement agencies in 20 states, among them the police departments in Las Vegas, Philadelphia, Miami, Memphis, Austin, Tex., and Kansas City, Mo.”
If we are not going to bother to test rape kits, we should not both to force women through the degrading process of gathering evidence.
We should not be using asset forfeiture money to do this.
Prosecuting acts of violence is just about the most core function of government.
Our taxes MUST go towards that BEFORE anything else. Before SS, Before Medicare, before Highways. The collection of taxes in order to prosecute acts of violence is the single most justified role of government.
Asset Forfeiture is an entirely different issue.
And there is a serious ends do not justify the means problem in this story.
Absolutely government is compelled to test rape kits.
But the vast majority of asset forfeiture money is quite litterally stolen.
We are having an asset forfeiture scandal in my own country that has managed to gain a bit of national attention. Turns out the local DA – currently running for Judge, leased a car using asset forfeiture money, and then asked the county for mileage reimbursement for miles driven on a vehicle that the county was paying for.
There are indications this will get worse.
He might have used the vehicle provided with county funds for personal driving – including vacations. He might also have used it as part of a political campaign. We sent a superior court judge to jail for a relatively minor instance of using public resources in a political campaign.
Regardless, the vast majority of asset forfeiture money is little more than public theft.
I could care less if Trump lied or did not lie. If the rest of the country cant be concerned about the billions ($xx,xxx,xxx,xxx.xx) we waste on government programs because of COMPLETE GOVERNMENT INCOMPTETENCE why should I get me my underware in a wad over another lie by a politician?
My priorities are much diverent.
Ron;
Medicare, Medicaid, SS should be cut, and more than just waste reduction.
At some point we are going to have to confront the fact that we have LIED to ourselves, that the entire scheme actually is a ponzi scheme that is failing and that it is a mistake,
and we are going to have to figure out how to get out of the mess we made.
We have made promises. And we can not keep them without self destruction.
But as wrong as we were to make those promises and as wrong as it is to keep them,
we still are going to have to find a way to fix things with the least amount of harm.
Almost no one is talking about that. Idiotically the left is rushing to make new stupid promises, rather than try to fix the old ones.
Hopefully most of those here get that.
Assuming arguendo that Trump lied – which I not only do not accept but reject roundly as the claim is evidence of what is wrong today, but returning to the assumption that he lied.
We should be cheering.
Trump is atleast doing something to reduce waste and fraud.
Does any sane person think that he promises NOT to do something about waste and Fraud ?
Would anyone have voted for him had he claimed that he was going to increase waste and fraud ?
Continue with the false assumption – what kind of cretin tries to score political points and assert moral superiority because someone else is doing something good, something that we want them to.
Even if you are nuts enough to buy this “trump lied about Medicare” nonsense.
Who jumps up and down celebrating “liar, liar, your cutting waste and fraud!” ?
I am happy that Trump has kept many of his campaign promises in the least harmful way possible, because he has made many bad promises.
I keep returning to Trump – because he is the example du jour.
But my point has nothing to do with Trump.
I am exposing and opposing an immoral tactic, and those who engage in it.
“New York Attorney General Letitia James (D) said in a filing Thursday that President Trump misused his charitable foundation to assist his 2016 campaign, The Associated Press reported.
James is suing the Trump Foundation for $2.8 million in restitution and seeking an order banning the president and his three eldest children from running any charities in the state for 10 years.”
The lawsuit reportedly cites insider testimony and emails as part of its evidence.
The Trump Foundation shut down and distributed about $1.7 million in remaining funds to nonprofits in December in a court-supervised process.”
https://thehill.com/homenews/administration/434184-ny-attorney-general-evidence-shows-trump-misused-charity-for
DD;
The trump foundation is a private Trust – it is NOT the same as the Clinton foundation.
I am near certain all its money comes from the Trump family. Not third party donors.
I am not even certain that it is a charity in the normal sense. Trusts generally contain AFTER TAX money, and that money can be spent pretty much anyway the trustees wish – within the constraints of the trust document.
The only taxes a trust ever owes are taxes on PROFITS, and it owes those regardless of where funds are distributed.
While there are many different types of trusts, and there are some differences in the rules between different types, as a rule of thumb, a Trust is made of money that has already been taxed, and is subject to no further taxes (except on profits). The laws regarding trust are purely to protect the interests of the beneficiaries – not the state, not the general public.
It is nearly unheard of for AG’s to involve themselves in trust litigation.
There are two exceptions:
Where the trust documents explicitly direct distribution of funds to a charity, and that charity appears to be getting shortchanged.
Where the trust is being used to avoid taxes – which is actually quite rare because the money is already taxed and not subject to further taxes.
James is seeking restitution – to whom and for what ?
Assuming the claims in the Hill article are correct – the allegation is farcical nonsense.
As ALLEGED (according to the Hill) Trump asked people to donate to veterans charities.
He apparently (as alleged) offered to have them donate to the Trump foundation and then passed that money on to veterans foundations.
So what is it that James is wigged out about ?
DD, based on the information provided by “the hill” article you cited, the allegation is facially nonsense. James had better have a more substanitive claim.
The NY AG stated unequivocally, upon taking office, that her primary goal was to get Trump anyway she could. She campaigned on it.
Like Trump, she’s following thru on a campaign promise.
And ‘any way she could legally’ is the job she was thereby elected to accomplish.
Certainly you don’t object to democracy in action….
“Like Trump, she’s following thru on a campaign promise.
And ‘any way she could legally’ is the job she was thereby elected to accomplish.
Certainly you don’t object to democracy in action….”
Yes, I do.
To the extent there is some problem with Trump’s budget it is that he IS keeping campaign promises.
Here is a far better attack on Trump’s budget.
While I disagree with Solomon regarding raising taxes, he is correct on everything else.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2019/03/14/trumps_fantasy_budget_139748.html
With respect to James – if she wishes to waste the resources of the AG’s office on this nonsense to the harm of New York – fine.
Absolutely she is keeping a campaign promise.
I have criticised you for claiming that Trump was not keeping campaign promises when he was.
But that is an entirely independent question from whether those promises are wise.
Trump made promises like that of protecting SS and HI benefits. to get elected,.
Just as James made promises to go after Trump.
Both are keeping those promises.
Neither should.
In a perfect world neither would make stupid promises.
It is a bad idea to make promises you should not keep.
It is a worse thing to keep them.
BTW we are STILL not a democracy.
We have had a long history of stupid political NY AG’s – many of whom ended up in jail.
James is going to wage war to fine Trump 5 minutes worth of his income, and bar him from running a NY charity for a decade. Who cares ?
And why would anyone sane wish to preclude very wealthy people from participating in Charity ?
This move is about as stupid as NYC driving Amazon out.
What does James want – The Trump’s to take their money out of NY ?
That is what she is asking for.
Here’s a mercy post for the beleaguered righties:
“The damning proof of innocence that FBI likely withheld in Russian probe”
https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/434054-the-damning-proof-of-innocence-that-fbi-likely-withheld-in-russian-probe
John Solomon has been fairly thorough at digging into all of this.
But this article is odd.
First it inverts standards.
Carter Page has never been charged with anything, the presumption is that he is innocent.
No proof has ever been provided that Page was guilty of anything.
Solomon is blurring two different matters, and misreporting a 3rd.
1). Though most of the evidence is from Page and Strzoks texts, and purportedly there is much more evidence the House obtained that we do not have yet, the investigation into the Trump campaign began in December 2015 – not July 2016.
That is important because the DNC hack had not occured, Neither Page nor Papadoulos were affiliated with Trump until 3 months later, the steele dossier was not even a twinkle in Christopher Steels imagination. Put more simply in Dec. 2015 the administration had NOTHING AT ALL – not even rumours. Certainly nothing close to what would be required to open a criminal investigation. Especially of an opposing political candidate.
2). More evidence that the FBI was deceptive in the FISA application is just piling on.
Pretty much everyone hopefully grasps the FBI was deliberately misleading the FISA court.
What is less well understood is that is a crime. Warrant applications require an oath.
If papadoulis getting a date wrong in an FBI interview requires jail, then everyone who signed the Page Warrant application committed a more serious crime – a sworn falsification.
We rarely prosecute law enforcement for lying to courts.
We need to start. If we do not we can expect that all the time.
3). Though the FISA warrant application makes a big deal of Steele’s credibility. And even Solomon gets sucked into that. Steele’s credibility is irrelevant.
The Steele Dossier is not a first hand account. All the allegations in the Steele Dossier are hearsay. It is the credibility of the people who provided that information to Steele that matters, not steele’s credibility. And we do not know who those people are.
A police officer in a warrant application can swear to the past reliability of an informant.
That is where the informant directly gathered the information in the warrant.
Warrant applications do NOT get granted by swearing to the police officers credibility – unless he has directly observed whatever is in the warrant application.
Not is it proper for a police officier (or FBI agent) to swear to the credibilty of a hearsay informant or to the credibility of that informants sources.
It is not Steele;s credibility that matters. It is the credibility of Steele’s sources and no one has ever talked to them and we do not even know if they exist.
“New York appellate court allows Summer Zervos’s defamation suit against president to proceed”
“The ruling, which Trump’s lawyers plan to appeal, means that attorneys for Zervos may have the opportunity to question Trump under oath in the coming months. The current schedule sets a deadline of June 28 for depositions, with document and electronic discovery expected to be concluded by the end of July.”
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/new-york-appellate-court-allows-summer-zervos-defamation-suit-against-trump-to-proceed/2019/03/14/aee8b8c6-4671-11e9-90f0-0ccfeec87a61_story.html?utm_term=.65f2957b6104
This is a Gloria Allred case. That alone should give you pause.
Absent the court reversing the Clinton decision – which was bad law, but they are unlikely to do, Trump is not likely to win on a priviledge claim.
At the same time, this is a defamation suit. the facts seem to me very simple.
Zervos makes specific Claims of specific conduct by Trump at specific times and places.
Trump has denied those claims. The purported “defamation” is that he called them fake news. Aside from calling them fake news he does not appear to have otherwise defamed Zervos. Anything that one says that someone else takes offence to is NOT defamation.
I am surprised the court allowed this to proceed at all. That said – it is New York.
Regardless, it is likely the merits of the defamation claim will be challenged at some point.
It does not appear Trump’s statements meet the requirements for defamation.
It does not appear that there are any damages.
Further Zervos likely made herself a temporary public figure – by making public allegations against a public figure. That means the standard of proof for defamation is much higher and there is no chance she is meeting it.
And we have not yet gotten to the merits of the case.
If Trump establishes – which is likely that he was not present at the places and times Zervos alleges – this is over.
In the unlikely even Zervos is allowed discovery, it would probably be initially limited to trumps schedule and diary at the times she alleges he made advances.
It is highly unlikely that a sane court will grant broad discovery absent FIRST having credible evidence that Trump could have committed the harrassment alleged.
I would remind you that Zervos is making a defamation claim – not a sexual harrassment claim.
OK, I have gone back to the system of having a dedicated e-mail address to which TNM comments go. This will allow me to tune Dave’s world of NO! and all that goes with it out. If I read his nonsense I reflexively want to point out how absurd it is. So, this saves me that reflex, since he can always write something so over the top loonie that I want to respond yet again. I have done this before, it takes a day or so to get it to work right and my name may jump to something else.
I’d suggest this system to you dduck. Just create some e-mail account that you use only for receiving notices of posts from TNM. Then just delete the drekmasters posts, send them off to eternity unread.
I’ve been doing that e-mail prescreening for a year.
I briefly read only those from him responding to me, and mass delete the rest with a single click.
Ah, the mass delete, after reading the posts of interest. Excellent idea.
“If I read his nonsense I reflexively want to point out how absurd it is. ”
You have failed to do so.
I am hard pressed to think of a time ever when you have made an actually valid argument about anything. You do not even try.
Given what you has said about your own background, you should have the skills to grasp the complete absence of an argument.
More ad hominem
Ron, for balance I will again stick my personal experience into the discussion on healthcare costs. I am not against looking for waste and corruption and inefficiencies in government programs. Why should I be? Like almost everyone I believe that legitimate places for savings are out there. Unfortunately, along with the rational belief that we can fix waste adn corruption problems there is also the view the government is the problem period and the fix is flat out removing it. So, many people who have heard this bitterly anti-government rhetoric are defensive about what the motives might be of those who want inefficient government programs, regulations, etc. “fixed” The anti-government radicals are not making the goals of people like you who just want to find waste and corruption easier.
When I hear over and over how the government ruins all that it touches I start to compare my own experiences. I hear how badly mangled health care is in particular.
So, this year my wife and I both experienced the medical system in big important life saving ways. (I made a typo in an above post about our medical experience this year and I said “my first wife,” instead of what I meant, “First, my wife.” It is my present wife who had thyroid cancer and had her thyroid removed at UVM medical center).
The experience was above and beyond any expectations we had. The level of professionalism almost took the fear and pain and inconvenience away. In fact, I decided to make my own physician happy and have the colonoscopy she had been suggesting that I have after I saw how well run the UVM medical center is. That may have saved my life in the long run.
All of the system we encountered is just riddled with government influence, from the medical research to the education and training of the doctors and everyone else to the running and financing of the hospital. I am supposed to believe that it’s a ruinous governmental disaster. Well, it ain’t. If we are going to complain when the government screws up, fine. Lets also speak up when a system that the government is deeply involved in works well. UVM medical center is part of UVM, the state university, in Bernie Sanders lefty Burlington Vermont . So, the percentage of the system that is either state, local, or federal in its nature is high. UVM Medical Center is a fantastic success. Every interaction I have with it is good or great.
I am not buying the government ruins everything idea.
That does not mean that I don’t think you have something legitimate to talk about in the waste and inefficiency department. But the over the top endless running down of the system is a caricature, and the more over the top and bitter the criticism is (and I don’t mean you Ron) the less many people listen to it and the more they react against it and say “the system treated me personally pretty well, kindly leave it alone.”
I am sure that the anti-government wing can produce a litany of wrongs and screw ups in response to my words. My cars have all let me down at times, some more than others. I didn’t give up on cars. Nearly everyone is in wonder and occasional dismay at the faults of the opposite sex. Do we all just go gay? We don’t.
The full-hog anti government attitude and rhetoric that I often hear at TMN and other places are just as useless and fallacious as the government should be our mommy and daddy Marxist idea. There is a happy medium where the baby is not thrown out with the bathwater.
“I am not buying the government ruins everything idea.”
Sorry for the length of this, but it important, I think)
Roby, I also do not believe government ruins everything. I think you have seen this in my comments about government oversight of restaurants and other companies that can inflict harm if their products are a health or safety issue.
But I do believe government messes up a lot. And that is for two reasons.
1. The people in Washington offices have no earthly idea what is going on in Vermont, North Carolina or California.
2. Too many jobs in government are based on doing the same thing the same way, even when that is no longer needed or there are better ways of doing it.
Yes, healthcare in this country is excellent. In many instances, the reimbursement and coverage for those services are excellent. As you say, colonoscopies save lives and could save many more. Medicare pays 100% of that service when certain medical conditions exist, like previous detection of polyps.
But even with this service, the billing requirements are ridiculous. So I just recently had one performed. It was ordered by a Wake Forest Baptist Physician and I was sent to one of their smaller hospitals in the are. The previous procedure was performed at one of the physician offices outpatient locations. Why are the doctors now performing this procedure at the hospital and not their outpatient center (which was much more convenient)? Because Medicare pays for that same service at a higher rate done at the hospital than if performed in the doctors outpatient facility.
Why? Same doc, same staff, same machine, same drugs, etc etc. Just a different building.
Now I will get a bill from the doctor, the anesthesiologist, the pathologist and the hospital. And the hospital bill will have a preop room charge, a procedure room charge. a recovery room charge, anesthesia drug charge and maybe some supplies. Why when the same service performed in the doctors office had basically a one lice bill, “colonoscopy”/
Because CMS (Centers for Medicare/Medicaid Services) has thousands of people employed doing what ever they do on claims/cost and they require that billing. Other wise the hospital could send a bill for Colonoscopy $X,XXX.XX and then distribute the reimbursement in whatever way they wanted.
And that is how insurance and Medicare reimburses, not by charge. Again another reason to eliminate billing requirements.
And there are over 7000 codes for medical services like colonoscopies.
So now lets look at the FDA. recently a young black lady 25 years old (or so) went through an experimental treatment for sickle cell disease, an extremely painful and debilitating disease. Some commit suicide due to the pain being so great.
this treatment consisted of taking DNA,changing a DNA marker,injecting the DNA into HIV virus that had been changed to eliminate the transmission of AIDS, putting the patient though high dose chemo and then injecting the HIV virus with the new DNA that would then replace all the old DNA for that one marker. After a few months, she is cured of sickle cell and is now leading a normal life. The comment was “it will take years before this procedure is in use after all medical trials and results are known” WHY?
If people are in pain, they can not function (unless doped up on oxy for pain) and many think about suicide, why not give the patient the choice” This can cure you, it may do nothing or it may kill you at a later date. If the patient knows the circumstance, why is government blocking that service?
Last drugs. Why does government put patents on drugs for extended periods of time, then allow for a minor tweek in the formula and renew the patent for many more years, driving up cost all while allowing countries like Canada to sell those same drugs at a greatly reduced cost.
And don’t get me started on Medicare for all (Medicaid)
I can go on, but won’t.
“I also do not believe government ruins everything. I think you have seen this in my comments about government oversight of restaurants and other companies that can inflict harm if their products are a health or safety issue.”
Thank you Ron. I have seen your comments, its why I think that talking to you about this is worthwhile. You are not just going to give the question the reflexive government hating radical treatment.
I would put you in charge of a medical billing efficiency committee to reduce cost and waste in a heartbeat.
“this treatment consisted of taking DNA,changing a DNA marker,injecting the DNA into HIV virus that had been changed to eliminate the transmission of AIDS, putting the patient though high dose chemo and then injecting the HIV virus with the new DNA that would then replace all the old DNA for that one marker. After a few months, she is cured of sickle cell and is now leading a normal life. The comment was “it will take years before this procedure is in use after all medical trials and results are known” WHY?”
Wow, right up my alley. I will attempt an answer to your why? Because that treatment itself is a pretty profound monkeying with DNA. Changes to DNA are what causes cancer. I see your point, and if I had sickle cell and it was ruining my life I would probably say, damn the risk I want the treatment. But there is that “first do no harm’ part of the hippocratic oath. That treatment could well lead to serious or fatal consequences, so they will give it to some people and analyze the data. I understand that too. Imagine the headlines in a decade if it turns out that 50% of the people who get the treatment die of liver cancer. “Those idiots in the government didn’t even fully test this procedure before they approved it.” A rock and a hard place.
Having had a colonoscopy I would see the advantage to doing it in a hospital with all the resources. A quick google of colonoscopy fatality rate turned up this:
“…The authors found two deaths secondary to perforation (N = 20) from colonoscopy, corresponding to an overall mortality rate after a colonoscopy of 0.02% and an incidence of death after a perforation of 10%, which was higher than the incidence of death after a perforation from colonoscopy in our study (5.2%)… Results: There were 77 perforations after 39 286 colonoscopies (incidence = 1.96/1000 procedures) and 31 perforations after 35 298 sigmoidoscopies (incidence = 0.88/1000 procedures)…. ”
To sum up there is a one in a thousand chance of a perforation and a one in ten chance of dying from it if it happens. Its probably no picnik if you don’t die from it either.
https://academic.oup.com/jnci/article/95/3/230/2520585
Now that I found that I am even a believer in doing this procedure in a first class facility with resources. How they bill it may be subject to improvement. Those of us who do not do medical billing just go and have the stuff done and don’t think about the efficiency of billing.
Thank you Ron. I have seen your comments, its why I think that talking to you about this is worthwhile. You are not just going to give the question the reflexive government hating radical treatment.”
The reflexive answer is yours.
The burden when you want to use force to compel others to do things your way is YOURS,
There is NOT a presumption in favor of the use of force.
There is a strong presumption against it.
Your complain with me is that I do not roll over and assume you should be free to use force just because you want to.
I know you do not like the fact that I equate government with force.
Fine, I will agree to allow you to pass any law that you want – do anything that you want thought government – so long as each of us is free to decide on our own if we wish to abide by that law, or pay for it.
Government is force.
The default position regarding the use of force is always NO.
Reaching yes, requires persuading nearly everyone that your request to use force is necessary and justified.
That is difficult.
Pretending otherwise does not change that.
“I would put you in charge of a medical billing efficiency committee to reduce cost and waste in a heartbeat.”
You have the right and the power to put Ron or anyone else in charge of your own medical care. As do I, and I would seriously consider Ron.
But neither you nor I have the right to put anyone in charge of other people.
You constantly presume that you have the right to dictate how others live their lives.
It permeates everything you do and say. It is so deeply instilled that you do not notice.
Nor do you grasp that it is immoral. It is immoral – even if you are fortunate enough to produce a better outcome for others than they would for themselves.
roby, I know this was the first treatment and more needs to be done before it goes public, But right now I think we need a way for people with diseases such as this to access treatments if they can afford it and accept the ramification themselves before the final approval is given.
As for colonoscopies performed in hospitals, few were conducted in hospital settings between the early 80’s and mid 2000’s. The risk factor was so slight compared to other medical procedures that this was not an issue. Not until reimbursement was changed and that was identified was it moved into the hospitals.
And another issue with hospitals purchasing doctor offices. It has a tremendous impact on the local tax base. Every doctor office owned by a physician of leasing agency paid property taxes. Once that property was bought by the hospitals, which most are not-for-profit 501-C-3 classifications, all that property was taken off the property tax roles.
All that is necescary is to give back to people what is their right – the right to make their own choices about their own lives.
The hypocratic oath applies to doctors – not patients.
And it is actually a fallacy.
Unfortunately there is alot we do not know – and there always will be.
But lets address this example.
The effects of genetic therapies are completely confined to the patient.
Whatever the risks they are risks to the patient not the rest of us.
DNA is involved in almost every biological process. But that does not mean that a specific alteration to DNA could effect anything. I would be surprised if the actual risk of DNA treatments can not be much better understood than say drugs. DNA therapy targets specific genes – not all genes. It is far more likely that you can calculate the risks of other consequences better than you can with a drug as an example.
But lets pretend that is not so.
We are still ultimately dealing with odds – which is what is fallacious about the hypocratic oath.
Today we give people radiation and chemotherapy – we nuke and poison people in the hope of killing whatever ails them first.
Obviously that violates the hypocratic oath.
And yet without doing so people will die.
The cost of getting most anything through FDA approval today is $2B.
That is much like a minimum wage – any disease, or illness or medical problem that can not generate $2B worth of profits will not even be explored.
I read constantly stories about people with rare delibitating illness that have followed the research – in some instances they have helped to fund the research – because if their problem is uncommon enough no one else will.
But the FDA approval process guarantees they will never see a legal cure – even if one is ever found.
Further you are once again empowering 3rd parties to control the lives of others.
It is pretty much guaranteed that a healthy person will never bee willing to take the same risks in the treatment of another as a person with an otherwise fatal or debilitating disease.
Further the process you are imposing ensures that risks will always be weighted higher than benefits. No bureaucrat will ever get in trouble for moving slowing – even when that results in lots of suffering and death – so long as that suffering or death was inevitable absent the success of the treatment being tested.
but what is ultimately always the most important – is that these choices belong to individuals – not doctors, not bureaucrats.
No amount of rationalization alters the fact that you are taking not only hope – but over a large enough number of people real improvements away from people because you are substituting your judgement about the risks to them for their own.
“Now that I found that I am even a believer in doing this procedure in a first class facility with resources. How they bill it may be subject to improvement. Those of us who do not do medical billing just go and have the stuff done and don’t think about the efficiency of billing.”
Do you actually read and think about what you write ?
How about if I clarify
“I am magnanimously allowing people who are suffering to seek a specific cure, that I have deemed acceptable, but only under conditions I fund acceptable”
One of the reasons it is so critical that we respect the rights of people to kill themselves if they so choose, is because if you are free to actually kill yourself, then it should follow that you are also free to take risks that might kill you.
Ron, this seems to be the same sickle cell case, but about the NIH?
https://www.nih.gov/about-nih/who-we-are/nih-director/video-sound-gallery/cbs-60-minutes-dr-jon-lapook-speaks-dr-collins-about-new-advances-using-gene-therapy-potential-cure-sickle-cell-disease
Dduck, yes thats the case. But what was your question concerning the NIH?
“I am not buying the government ruins everything idea.”
Is that the standard ?
Should we allow absolutely anything that someone wishes to do through govenment – if it is not ruinous ?
I thought that we did not use force against others unless it was both necescary and justified.
I also thought that when there are many ways to do something, that we should not be required to prove that everyone else’s approach was ruinous to be free to follow our own.
“I am not buying the government ruins everything idea.”
“Is that the standard ?”
I never said that was a standard. That was a response to a statement by Roby concerning Libertarian positions on government.
Ron,
Though I responded to you.
The quote was Roby’s.
I am sorry if that was not clear.
I was asking for your oppinion,
Essentially my question was to you.
Robby proposed a standard – I have express my oppinion of that standard.
You commented on the issue – and I liked your comments.
But I wonder what you think of Robby’s standard.
Is government free to do whatever can be pushed into law – so long as everything it does is not ruinous ?
Is that our standard ? Is government that is only 50% ruinous OK ?
1% ?
Dave “Is government free to do whatever can be pushed into law – so long as everything it does is not ruinous ?
Is that our standard ? Is government that is only 50% ruinous OK ?
1% ?”
I think you know my answer before I write it, but I will comment again.
No, government should not be free to do anything that is ruinous, just as companies and individuals should not be free to do the same.
Unlike your more traditional libertarian position, I am more moderate in my beliefs in these standards.
I do not believe companies (big or small) will do the right thing 100% of the time, I think companies at times will find ways to circumvent standards that are harmful, to improve profits. Therefore, i believe that there are standards that need to be developed, communicated and monitored by someone. Right now, many of those standards have no one but the government to enforce since there are not groups willing to do what UL does with their certifications for electronics. And as companies grow larger, their risks as a percentage of company assets diminishes if their actions result in settlements, so the reward increases with the risk they may take. I believe privatization of standards is better than government standards, but that is not always an option.
As for government, I can not address each and every standard they set. I have no problems with the standards set for restaurants on a local level. The health checklist is normally short, there are few standards that have no positive impact and the requirement that companies post their grades visible to the public allows you and I the ability to freely choose if we want to eat there or not without getting sick before we make that choice..But when it comes to issues like the FDA, NIH or other government agencies making it difficult to access care that may save a life or improve drastically a life that one may feel is not worth living, then the government has gone too far. I can only remember one case that just recently occurred where drugs were found to have a profound impact on a deadly disease during trials and the FDA decided that they would circumvent their trial standards to save/improve many lives by releasing the drug early.
What has been lost over many years is government = people. Government is suppose to be “people” as in “we the people of the united states” What it has become government = government. Government run by the small elite few making rules for the masses. In this example, the elite decide from small rules like what size drinks you can buy all the way through to making rules were some people die if they have not ruled out that some treatment could cause death. What the “F” difference would it make if you die from not being treated or possibly dying from the treatment that was still experimental and you accept those risk? One you have a 100% chance of dying, the other an unknown risk fro 0% to 100%.
I think I would prefer the second choice if the elite allowed me to make that.
“I do not believe companies (big or small) will do the right thing 100% of the time,”
I do not beleive that PEOPLE will do the right thing 100% of the time.
They will not do so as individuals,
They will not do so as companies.
They will not do so as government.
Those engaged in profit are the LEAST likely to do things that are wrong.
Those seeking profits have the most to lose – their profits.
free exchange is exactly that – free, neither party is required to exchange.
If you beleive that some providers actions – sometimes even their private personal rather than business actions are wrong – where YOU get to define “wrong” however you please, then you are free to cease dealing with them.
That is by far the most powerful regulating force in existance.
There is nothing unique that government should regulate regarding those seeking profits.
It is wrong to murder to escape a marraige, it is wrong to murder to gain a business advantage. What conduct is their that a business can engage in that is wrong that is not already covered by ordinary laws ?
I am not free to poison you. That does not become legal if I do it for profit.
But inaddition to the normal constaints of our ordinary law, those seeking profits must also cater to the whim of people. Many many things that are not illegal can be ruinous to a business, because they offend customers.
Of the three groups I mentioned those seeking profits are the LEAST dangerous.
And Government is the MOST. Government is free to use force. Everything that government does is about force.
The number of murders in the US since the start of the 20th century (or any time before), is dwarfed by US military casualties. Add in those of the rest of the world and it should be obvious that the greatest threat of bloodshed is through government.
UL exists, and works.
The first building codes were those of insurance companies in the 1500’s.
Even today – I can not get my house insured affordably without complying with the requirements of my insurance company. “private” regulators, such as insurance companies and UL are constrained – in that they must compete.
I can look for other insurance if I do not like my insurance companies rules, or I can go without. Private regulators are constantly adapting and improving. When something works – they adopt it, when something fails they drop it. Experimentation outside of the “regulations” is still possible, So learning and improvement are possible, and the norm.
The risks to large companies is GREATER than small ones.
I ran a small business, 55 people, 4M in revenue. We got in trouble when we had over $1M in AR that went to 18months overdue post 9/11.
How long do you think Citi can survive if it is delayed in collecting 25% of revenue ?
Days. Not years.
Even a few percent shift in sales will bankrupt a big business in months.
Dave “How long do you think Citi can survive if it is delayed in collecting 25% of revenue ?
Days. Not years”
What does this have to do with a restaurant not storing meet in a cold enough environment leading to possible health problems, companies using chemicals in products shown to cause cancer and drugs that do more harm than good? That is what I am supporting governemnt regulation of because citizens have no way to verify health issues that may exist.
I could care less if CiTI does not collect their AR and goes bankrupt.
“What does this have to do with a restaurant not storing meet in a cold enough environment leading to possible health problems, companies using chemicals in products shown to cause cancer and drugs that do more harm than good? That is what I am supporting governemnt regulation of because citizens have no way to verify health issues that may exist.
I could care less if CiTI does not collect their AR and goes bankrupt.”
Fundimental to your argument is that big businesses have great power and need not respond to market forces – that they can more easily get away with bad conduct.
The OPPOSITE is true.
I come from a small business background.
The attitude of people in small business towards big business is worse than that of ordinary people. We assume they will throw their weight arround. We assume they will use influence to get their way. We assume that competing with them will never be fair.
And it isn’t – for every advantage they have small business has their own advantages. Small business is more flexible and more agile. Generally they are also more skilled. Small businesses are much more closely coupled to a small number of people who really know what they are doing.
Often the very aspects of big business that are its assets are also its liabilities.
Big businesses rarely take the risks small businesses do – and when they do they rarely survive long.
One of the reasons that you see the CEO’s of fortune 500 companies making such enormous salaries is that big businesses are so fragile. Small changes are devestating to their bottom line, Every stockholder wants the CEO to drive up profits AND to do so without taking any risks. Those things just do not go together.
I am sure Kodak wishes they had hired a CEO at twice the money – if that would have preserved the business – or Sears or Kmart.
“for balance”
Word matter, why should I accept that you bring balance?
I do not automatically agree with Ron, on Healthcare, but I grasp that he brings experience.
I have never seen you bring balance.
“I am not against looking for waste and corruption and inefficiencies in government programs. Why should I be? ”
To conclude that Trump is lying you MUST oppose reducing waste and corruption.
“Like almost everyone I believe that legitimate places for savings are out there. Unfortunately, along with the rational belief that we can fix waste adn corruption problems there is also the view the government is the problem period and the fix is flat out removing it. ”
Of course government is the problem.
Government is what all of us are fighting over – left, right, libertarian.
It is the center of everyone’s attention.
Everyday there are inumerable posts here ranting Trump this, Trump that – clearly you are not happy. Well guess what Trump is the government. Further you are never ever going to have circumstances where whatever your utopian view of government will exist.
Whatever you wish from government – you are never going to have long uninterrupted periods of that government. There will always be another Donald Trump if you are on the left or Barack Obama if you are not. It is near certain that at any given moment most of government federal state and local will be engaged in some nonsense you oppose,
That is not an accident, it is inherent in the nature of govenrment. The rare instances when it is not that way are near universally bad – whether the mousolini’s or Hitler’s or Chavez’s.
So cut this crap that those of us who see government as the problem are some lunatic extremists.
YOU see government as the problem – just as much as I do.
We are not fighting over how many daffodils you should plant this year, or when you should change the oil in your car.
Everything we fight about is regarding government.
Further though you are correct that those such as myself who want dramatically smaller govenrment are the minority, If we vanished tomorow the fighting would still continue.
We are not looking to throw the baby out with the bathwater, we are looking to get the baby out of the septic tank.
Is the solution to every problem to pound it to dust with a hammer ?
Government is a tool. Specifically it is a hammer – it is force.
It is a useful tool – for problems that require force.
Just as a hammer is not the right tool for driving screws, or cutting lumber, Government is not the right tool for all out problems.
The only unique attribute of government is its ability to legitimately (we hope) use force.
That is it. There is nothing that government does – that you can not do without government, except those things that require force.
We do not want private policemen roaming the streets and handcuffing us for some violation of laws made up by the guy across the street.
Government is for those things where the use of force is necessary and justifiable.
There is no wet dream of the left (or right) that can not be accomplished entirely without government, better or more efficiently – UNLESS that idea requires force.
I do not care about anything that you, the left or the right, wants to do – that does not require force.
You are completely free to do whatever it is that you wish – without using force.
The reason we are so bitterly divided about govenrment – and lets get past the nonsense that all the conflict is with a few “full hog anti-government” libertarians, is that it is incredibly difficult to get people to agree about using force.
It should be even harder.
Those “full hog anti-government” libertarians are the sane ones telling everyone,
to quit trying to use force against each other.
Go out and solve whatever problems you are fixated on – on your own, or with the help of anyone you can get to agree with you. But without using force against anyone.
If you can not solve a problem without using force, then the burden is on you to persuade everyone who disagrees that your problem can not be solved without force, and needs to be solved, It is not sufficient that you believe that. To use force you must get nearly everyone to agree.
It is not supposed to be easy to use force against others.
Your cars, your spouse, and every single other similar example you can think of is proof that we are capable of solving nearly all our problems without resorting to force or government.
Further, outside of government – we do not have to agree.
I can buy an audi, you can ride a bicycle, I can be straight, you can be gay.
We fight over government , because government is always some of us chosing for all of us.
I would hope it is obvious that that is rarely the best solution.
Ron, my first colonoscopy was at the NYU hospital in Manhattan, a couple after that also.
the last few have been done in my doctors office nearby, by the same doc that did them all.
Also, I’ve had a few other things done also at other facilities.
Thanks for the inside information on what’s behind the curtain.
Those damn lefty, libera Denver Post newspaper editorial writers are spewing false claims again, against a Republican who they obviously disliked in the first place:
“This is a bogus emergency that takes executive over-reach to an extreme not seen even under President Barack Obama. Trump’s declaration is an abuse of his power, a direct overturning of Congress’ deliberate decision to pass a federal budget without funding for a wall. Put simply this is a constitutional crisis and one of Colorado’s two senators has failed the test.”
Oh, wait: they had ENDORSED him for the office:
“We endorsed Sen. Cory Gardner in 2014 because we believed he’d be a statesman…We see now that was a mistake – consider this our resolution of disapproval. Gardner has been too busy walking a political tight rope to be a leader. He has become precisely what we said in our endorsement he would not be: “a political time-server interested only in professional security.”
Trump just said he liked his Veto,
Did he just misspell Beto?
The rhetoric is over the top. and ludicrously stupid.
When the NEA was passed they wrote it so that Congress could rescind a declaration of emergency. They could have and should have written it so that any such declaration was temporary and required positive affirmation by congress.
Regardless of the frothing there is zero doubt that the situation at the border is more of an emergency than the vast majority of prior or even current federal emergencies.
I beleive there are 28 currently in effect – aside from the border, can you name one ?
We can fight over what constitutes an emergency – or you can solve that by changing the law.
The fundimental problem with Trump’s action is not that this does not meet the defintion of emergency, or that it is unconstitutional, or significant overreach.
It is not, It is actually tame compared to all of what Obama did.
The fundimental problem is that because he has done so in such a high profile manner, he has essentially given the impramatur for future presidents to use a declaration of emergency to go arround congress on a high profile issue over which there is significant disagreement.
The solution to that remains “change the law”
Conversely the left nonsensically beleives that if there was no option to build the wall using a declaration of emergency, they would have thwarted the wall.
You can not presume to know how people will respond to changed circumstances.
No one as an example beleives that the well will end illegal immigration.
Immigrants will find other ways and we will have to thwart those.
But it will make it substantially more difficult and that will dramatically reduce numbers.
The same is true regarding Trump – take away the option of the declaration of emergency, and Trump would have done something else – likely veto’ing the budget deal, and returning to the shutdown.
Regardless, when you compare the extent to which Trump has acted imperially and Trump if you conclude that Trump is more imperial – you must have just finished off a joint of that recreational weed in CO.
test
“New Zealand mosque attacks suspect praised Trump in manifesto
Suspected gunman behind the Christchurch rampage dubbed the US president ‘a symbol of renewed white identity’.”
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2019/03/zealand-mosques-attack-suspect-praised-trump-manifesto-190315100143150.html
I think it was Rep. Omar or Rep Talib’s fault – I am sure the killer mentioned them.
If not he is just not up on his white nationalist bunkum.
trump opened pandora’s box of white nationalism-white chauvinism, in its various forms. Much of the base of the GOP has pretty much accepted the proud boys ethic, they are certainly not about to speak out against it, and many even have sympathy with it. I am not surprised that out and out racists and violent nut jobs, even worldwide, understand the fire that trump has been playing with and believe that he is one of them. Does trump intend this to go so far? Probably not. But he certainly has never been concerned or careful in his rhetoric and is not about to become more responsible, no matter what happens.
A POTUS is the American leader and a world leader as well. He should have certain standards in his rhetoric that trump clearly does not have. This is one of the reasons that trump is a terrible and even disastrous president and will be remembered as such in the future, in the history books, stock market notwithstanding. Its also a reason that he could actually lose to a progressive democrat, which would not even be a remote possibility otherwise.
“Trump opened”
Absolutely – there are Neo-Nazi’s parading down my streets every week.
The KKK meets just down the road!
NOT!
Are facts meaningless ?
30 years ago Neo-Nazi’s DID actually parade in my city every year, the KKK DID meet by the thousands at a farm within 10miles of my home. It was not difficult to find white supremecists.
Today they are rare.
Anti-fa is what is rising in response to Trump. Not “white supremecists”.
Milo Yanopolis is what the left is most fearful of. Really ?
You can find plenty of reasons to dislike him, but your greatest fear is an alt-right queen who talks about “black dick” at every oportunity, and whose connection to violence is repeatedly being the victim of left wing violence.
As for this “blame Trump” nonsense – I am seeing articles Blaming “chelsea clinton”.
I have no idea what she may have said, nor do I care, Chelsea is NOT to blame, Trump is NOT to blame, Rep. Omar is NOT to blame.
People who say stupid things are NOT to blame – even if they should not say stupid things.
No one wakes up and says I heard Trump last night, I am going to go kill 50 people.
Even those mass killers who are NOT nut jobs – of which there are few, are going to kill for some reason – usually one most of us do not understand, because that is who they are.
To the extent that “pandora’s box” has been opened – it is by the left.
I had a friend many years ago – a teacher, who was lesbian. She was also a christian fundimentalist. She deemed herself evil and unforgiveable. The result was, that instead of having relationships with adults, she had them with students, as young as 13.
When we are unable to make distinctions, when there is only black and white, there is no distinction between homosexualtiy and peodophilia.
When we make not supporting affirmative action or opposing illegal immigration, or wondering why nearly all terrorism is associated with islam into racism, and pretend it is the same as lynching, then we make lynching easier.
If YOU want a better world, you had better figure out how to LISTEN to the people you hate, rather than spray them with insults, and seek to crush them.
Attempting to supress things makes them stronger, and it makes the WORST of them stronger.
You can not control what people think. The most effective regulating force on bad thought is how stupid it sounds when openly expressed.
“A POTUS is the American leader and a world leader as well. He should have certain standards in his rhetoric that trump clearly does not have.”
The constitution enumates the powers and responsibilities of the president – nowhere does it specify world leader. There is no provision for moral leader either.
The president is the head of the administrative branch of govenrment, he is not the moral voice of the country.
We have often had presidents who have taken on that role, and we are free to value that or not as we please.
In nov. 2016 we chose Trump. When we did so, we knew what were getting.
Many of us DID NOT, choose Trump – and do not like what we got. Just as many of us did not choose Obama or Bush or … and did not like what we got.
We get the ability to change that in 2020. In the meantime, so long as the president conforms to the constitution – which he has. Those of us who are unhappy, must wait for the next election.
In the meantime, trying to PERSUADE those who voted for Trump would be a far better idea than continuing to call them all racist alt-right white supremecists, or calling them the stupid dupes of russians.
Regardless, it is not Trump that is driving violence on the right – it is YOU.
I would further note, that actual violence on the right it DECLINING and has been for decades. The right is ANGRY and it is rising – but not in violence.
They acted by voting.
BTW this also works in reverse. Though Trump is NOT to blame for left wing violence, the left clearly uses Trump as a justification for violence. The outrage and anger on the left is their reaction to Trump.
Those who engage in violence are ALONE responsible for their acts of violence.
But anger and outrage is driven by those you disagree with, not those you agree with.
Left wingnuts tend to get to write history – which is why the disasterous racist progressive Woodrow Wilson is highly regarded in history books while the quite effective Calvin Coolidge is not.
There is far more positive going on than the stock market.
Trump could lose to a progressive democrat – he also could win in a landslide.
In Nov. 2020 we will get to find out.
In 2016 democrats could have provided a better choice than Trump – they did not.
In 2020 democrats could provide a better choice than Trump – we will see if they can.
In my assessement that appears unlikely, and will likely assure Trump’s re-election.
Everyday I see more and more people marching in the streets over the superiority of the white race! NOT!
Here is the “proud boys” according to themselves.
You need not agree, but they are NOT the KKK
Nor are they representative of all or even most republicans.
Regardless, which portions of this do you disagree with ?
Maybe we can find some common ground ?
“The basic tenet of the group is that we are “Western chauvinists who refuse to apologize for creating the modern world.” Like Archie Bunker, we long for the days when “girls were girls and men were men.” This wasn’t controversial even twenty years ago, but being proud of Western culture today is like being a crippled, black, lesbian communist in 1953.
The Proud Boys confuse the media because the group is anti-SJW without being alt-right. “Western chauvinist” includes all races, religions, and sexual preferences.:
People are starving in Venezeula – a country that was first world not long ago.
In Europe they are killing people over gasonline.
In the mideast they execute people for homosexuality and in some places genitally mutilate women, and in others deny them an education.
I can go on and on about myriads of horrible things in the world.
Am I obligated to rise up against the great evil of “the proud boys” on a daily basis or be labeled an evil white supremecist nazi ?
At worst “the proud boys” seem to be a near alt-right group that hopes the left will get into a fight with them. They MIGHT be provocative, but thus far all violence involving them has been started by the left. They might not be the good guys, they certainly are not my image of this country but they are not even close to the threat of Antifa or even your ordinary campus SJW. They are not seeking to silence anyone.
This is your idea of the great evil that republicans are not ranting and raving about ?
We have FAR LEFT DEMOCRATIC congressmen Blaming the jews for everything – and YOU manage blame Trump for synagogue shootings ?
If we are going to blame someone for NZ – why not Omar, and Taliib ?
They are clearly a provocative threat that could drive someone off their meds to violence.
You say Trump is playing with Fire – do you listen to democrats and the media ?
The prior administration attempted a COUP against an elected president.
In case you have not been following the house testimony that Rep. Collins has been releasing slowly – though they used different words, that is the testimony of Ohr and Page so far. We also know that the White House directed this – as far back as 2015 – long BEFORE the Steele Dossier, or Carter Page or Papadoulis, or manafort.
We also now know that DOJ Told the FBI (over the objections of the FBI, including initially Comey and until the end Baker) that Clinton was not to be prosecuted.
You have declared war, and you blame those you attack for fighting back ?
It is crystal clear to all, that whatever you want, you feel free to get it “by any means necescary”
And you want us to be concerned about Trump ?
According to FBI director Comey – if you do not intend bad results – then everything is fine.
You can violate the letter and the spirit of the law. you can behave recklessly for your own benefit and in your won interest, yet absent a smoking gun email saying “I intentially brke the law” – you can not be convicted.
What does it take before you grasp there are two standards of conduct – one for the left that prohibits nothing, because everyone on the left is presumed to have good intentions, and one for the rest of us that criminalizes everything – because the rest of us are presumed to be bad so proof, acts, even now according to you intentions are not required.
New Zealand.
so I am going to avoid the Trump crap because we clearly know where everyone stands on Trump
I am going to address New Zealand and gun laws.
1. New Zealand has much tighter gun control laws than the United States.
Did their more restrictive laws stop this from happening or even making it more difficult?
It does not appear they had much impact at all.
2. So now what happens in New Zealand?
This week, I had a good friend visit for a few days. He is on the liberal spectrum somewhere around the same point as I am on the conservative/Libertarian spectrum. So we were talked about this and I avoided making any comment that might influence what he was saying until I knew his thoughts. His comment was “I fear that the people in New Zealand will say if this happened, I need to get a license and I need to protect myself and there will be too many gins available. What the New Zealand government needs to do is tighten their laws to make it harder to get the guns they own now”.
And as always, my comment was gun control laws don’t work unless you remove 100% of the guns and make the punishment for possessing a gun so strong one would never consider owning a gun. This was just a perfect example of how laws can be avoided.
So I am going to be very interested in what happens in New Zealand in the next few months.I doubt there will be many more people applying for a license. I suspect the reaction will be to make gun ownership much more difficult and possibly have laws something like Australia, were ownership is severely restricted.
A reasonable assessment below of Australia’s gun law change (they only banned semi-automatics and some shotguns), and why it was able to be passed there, but unlikely here.
Reducing the number of mass killing weapons available is reasonable.
No, it won’t stop all future mass murders, but will reduce them.
Yes, diabolically focussed killer’s willfigure out ways to circumnavigate the restrictions.
But it will make it more difficult for other violence obsessed idiots to guns that spray huge amounts of bullets into crowds of victims.
Are Australia’s gun laws the solution for the US? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-australia-35048251
“”why it was able to be passed there, but unlikely here.”
Ok, I have said it before, but it flies over everyone head. So here it is again.
1. The 2 nd amendment.
2. It would work as well as our drug laws.
3. The only way it would work is to ban 100% of all guns and anyone violating that ban would have a mandatory 10 year prison sentence if convicted.
Anything in between just opens this up to picking and choosing which laws to follow, just like the santuary gun law counties in Colorado and sanctuary immigration law states and local governments.
As my dearly loved grandmother would say, while trying to shake some sense into me, ‘Dein Gehirn ist furshlugginer.’
Rough translation: your brain is rattling on this Ron. Meaning your insistence that if law isn’t fully successful, cancel it.
I could offer a half dozen examples to confute that pov, but I have to make a quick walk to Trader Joes to pick up some necessary ingredients for tomorrow’s St Patrick’s Day meal at my local dive bar’s annual St Paddy’s feed.
Jay, there is a difference between a law not being fully effective like the drug laws and one like New Zealands gun law.
While no one reacts to drugs coming across the border, we could crack down on gun ownership and types of weapons, but if another mass school or church shooting occurred, those with your beliefs would then demand those guns be banned. Then the next shooting, those guns would be banned. Finally all guns banned.
I have said we lose our rights by a drip at a time. That is what would happen if the door is cracked.
And by the way all it would take is a president to pick two more Sotomayors for SCOTUS and a democrat senate and house. Then just start the process. Sounds easy to me.
Heinous acts occur where guns are banned and where they are not.
At best – and even this is dubious, gun bans mean that we find ways to kill people without guns.
84 dead in nice and the only guns are tbhose of police.
“Meaning your insistence that if law isn’t fully successful, cancel it.”
I have no idea what “fully successful” is – and I doubt you do.
The “success” of a law, seems to purely be the warm feeling its advocates get from passing it.
Stealing, assault, murder have been illegal form all of human history.
We do not need laws against stealing from the elderly, assaulting gays or murdering blacks, or any of the myriads of permutations. We need to enforce the laws we already have.
Outside of government – when something is not “fully successful”, we re-examine the problem and our solution and we “cancel” our solution and it possible come up with a better one based on what we have learned. Inside of government bad solutions are not canceled or fixed, they grow ever larger. Failure is rewarded.
It has not worked in australia.
Oh, and I forgot #4. In Australia, most all people trust their government until the government does something to prove otherwise.
Here, too many people think like I do. You cant trust government until it proves otherwise. And this has been around since the 1700’s. Unlike Australia, we split from the monarchy.
For two years this blog has been full of bazillions of posts that are little more than “do not trust the president”.
Though I do not usually agree with the assorted fake reasons regarding why, or that this moment is somehow unique,
I absolutely agree – we should not trust the president – any president.
“If men were angels, no government would be necessary. If angels were to govern men, neither external nor internal controls on government would be necessary. In framing a government which is to be administered by men over men, the great difficulty lies in this: you must first enable the government to control the governed; and in the next place oblige it to control itself. ”
We should ALWAYS be suspicious of those we give power over us.
Dave “We should ALWAYS be suspicious of those we give power over us.”
Well those on the right want power over us in our moral activities and want to take rights away to insure we follow moral (and christian) teachings.
Those on the left want power over us in our freedoms such as the 2nd amendment and other freedoms where the government finds anything one wants that may harm them, government need to ban.
There are far too few that believe in restrictions to what government can do.
“Well those on the right want power over us in our moral activities and want to take rights away to insure we follow moral (and christian) teachings.”
Have I ever claimed that the desire of some on the right to take control of our lives is a good thing ?
TODAY – the greatest threat is from the left, not the right.
The Right lost the culture wars. To the extent they are still fighting it is merely to preserve their own freedom to discriminate privately in limited circumstances. NOT to impose their position on all of us. Should that change – either broadly or narrowly, my opposition will shift to the right.
I would note that morality is the foundation of government and law.
The critical moral distinction regards negative and positive morality.
Government – left or right, should NOT be in the business of positive morality – either doing it or imposing it.
We are all called to feed the hungry, cloth the naked, shelter the homeless and visit the prisoner. That calling is individual and voluntary.
Contra the left, there is no moral merit in what we are forced to do.
Forcibly collectively caring for the less fortunate among us, does not make us any more moral than exterminating them.
Positive morality is individual. Free will is the right to choose to do good or evil. Absent choice there is no good or evil.
Negative morality, is the business of government. We surrender our freedom to use force to harm others as part of the social contract.
Morality is ABSOLUTELY the business of government.
I absolutely expect that government will punish those who CHOOSE to to use force to impose their will on me.
“There are far too few that believe in restrictions to what government can do.”
belief and disbeleif have little relationship with what works and what does not.
“If all mankind minus one were of one opinion, mankind would be no more justified in silencing that one person than he, if he had the power, would be justified in silencing mankind.”
John Stuart Mill
Something is not “reasonable” merely by saying so.
Reducing infinity by a fraction changes nothing – it is not “reasonable”.
Scottland has absolutely draconian gun laws – the rate of violence and murder is nearly as high as the US, the rate of violence for whites is HIGHER than the US.
In the UK london is now seeking to ban kitchen knives – because people still murder each other – at fairly high rates.
I posted the clip of a terrorist mowing people down in Nice with a rental truck.
84 dead.
After banning guns – are you going to ban gasoline – arson is one of the most comon means of killing large numbers of people.
After AU banned guns, the arson rate skyrocketed.
These laws do not work. They are solely “feel good measures”, they are not “reasonable”, they are proof of the inability of those selling them to reason.
No. it does NOT make things more difficult for the violence obsessed.
I can make a flame thrower with about $15 in parts from Autozone.
Here is a long list of different ways to do evil things without guns.
Click to access anarchistcookbook2000.pdf
Dave “Scottland has absolutely draconian gun laws – the rate of violence and murder is nearly as high as the US, the rate of violence for whites is HIGHER than the US.”
Please provide link or source. I could not find anything to support this.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk/2005/sep/26/ukcrime.scotland
I am having trouble finding the US homocide rate by race. There are plenty of places that note that the overall US rate is about 4/100K,
And that blacks are 17% of the population but commit over 50% of the murders (Trump used 81%, the actual number is very close to 50%).
That alone should lead to a white rate below 2%.
Mark Perry an economist and statistician did a comparison of the crime rates of the US and EU by racial groups and they are not different.
The Asian, Caucasian, Hispanic, black murder rates are near constant wherever in the world you go. With some variation based on development.
You can accurately approximate a nations overall violence rates using a demographically weighted sum or the overall global rates by race.
As usual, he bollocked it up.
They have more assaults than the US… but those are more often physical assaults, fisticuffs & headbutting are a national preoccupation. For ‘Serious Assaults’ the US commits 2-times as many.
They’re not close to the US in any other crime category, certainly not murders…
Here’s a link:
https://www.nationmaster.com/country-info/compare/Scotland/United-States/Crime
Please read what I wrote. I was pretty clear that I was comparing murder rates for white Scotts with murder rates for white americans.
The only one who got this wrong is you.
Your assertions about fisticuffs and headbutting are nonsense too.
I have no idea what the relative rates of bar fights are.
But whites in the US and whites in Scottland murder people – that is not headbutts or fisticuffs – atleast not usually. And frankly if it is, I think I would prefer to be shot to death than beaten to death, but you are free to choose differently.
Absolutely the rate of gun violence in scottland is far lower than the US.
Just as the rate of gun violence in AU is much lower.
But the rate of murder by race overall is nearly the same – Scottland.
I do not know why rates of violence and murder are nearly uniform accross the world for a given race – but they are.
Rather than pretend that guns have something to do with it – when there is absolutely no correletion between guns and violence of any kind – the CDC actually found that a gun in the home REDUCED the likelyhood of being a crime victim substantially.
Maybe we should look at the real world data.
Not false presumptions that fit our ideology and have nothing to do with facts.
Your link is ignores what was CENTRAL to my statement – the rates of violence by race.
And something i wrong with your data – the source I linked had the Scottish murder rate at 2.6/100K. 1.79/100K is below that of england – which is the 2nd highest country in the EU, and below that of the EU average.
Also the US murder rate is 4.6 not 5.
But slightly more than 50% of murders in the US are committed by blacks who make up only 11% of the population. Non-hispanic whites make up 62% of the population and commit less a bit more than 20% of the murders. A rate LOWER than whites in scottland.
You left wing nuts always forget that this nation is unequaled in diversity.
That diversity comes with benefits and at a cost.
One of those costs is higher crime rates as a consequence of larger minority populations.
Not because of guns.
Another reason to actually look at real data and NOT run away from the implications is that you can not learn until you ask the right questions.
Why are the rates of violence for asians – that is asians anywhere in the world about half that of caucasions ? Why are the rates of violence for blacks more than double that of caucasions.
I do not know the answers – but until you look honestly at the data, you can not ask the right questions.
The left rants about racism in the US – and we will never completely eliminate race as a factor in peoples choices. But TODAY, of all the predictors of future success race is among the weakest. When you do your statistical analysis correctly and regress out all other factors.
We KNOW that certain things strongly correlate to future success (or failure).
Intact families.
Completing high school
Some college,
waiting to marry
waiting to start a family
not committing crimes
getting and keeping a job – even a crappy one.
These factors all dwarf race – though they tend to be worse for some races than others.
So what should we be doing if we want to provide a better future for people in this country ?
Ranting about racism – or trying to address the things we can do something about that actually correlate to success for you and your children.
What happened in NZ is horrible.
The idea that almost any law can stop it is nonsense.
The overwhelming majority of people will not do bad things.
A small portion of people will – absent the threat of punishment, these are the people that our laws are written to address,
A smaller portion of people will do bad things no matter what.
More laws will not change that.
It is irrelevant what you substitute, the problem is still the same.
Laws will not stop those who do not care about the law.
Not only are there many horrible ways to kill people without guns – and frankly of all the ways you can kill large numbers of people, guns are among the LEAST horrible, and we do not want to motivate mass killers to explore others.
but gun laws do nothing to keep guns out of the hands of those who do not care about violating the law.
I also find it incredibly stupid that at a time when it is increasingly easy and will get easier all the time, to make your own guns in your garage, that we would continue to debate this nonsense.
https://ghostgunner.net/
Got my candidate!
Excellent!
“The World Doesn’t Need Trans Fats”
By The Editorial Board
The editorial board represents the opinions of the board, its editor and the publisher. It is separate from the newsroom and the Op-Ed section.”
May 14, 2018
If someone WANTS something, that does not directly harm others, they should be free to have that – to the limits of their own ability and desire.
Whether that is tranfats, Sugary drinks, or heroin.
Whether we NEED something is irrelevant, and our own business regardless.
The role of science is to inform not command.
Dave “If someone WANTS something, that does not directly harm others, they should be free to have that – to the limits of their own ability and desire.”
The restrictions on trans fats does not restrict anyone’s ability to buy whatever food they want to buy at a restaurant.
However, if you want your food cooked in trans fat you a free to stay home and cook it that way. Most anyone knows anything that is a liquid fat when warm that congeals when it cools does the same thing basically in your body and creates crap in your blood stream that blocks arteries and harms peoples health.
And too many studies have been conducted by research companies that are not connected to the “fat industry” and have shown that trans fats are directly related to increased heart disease risk.
This is not like me walking into a restaurant wanted a 32 ounce drink and having to buy 2 16 ounce drinks at a higher price to get that amount. I suspect very few people could care less if their fries are cooked in oils that don’t contain trans fats. They can still buy fries!
T”he restrictions on trans fats does not restrict anyone’s ability to buy whatever food they want to buy at a restaurant.”
Yes, it does – quite obviously.
It takes the choice from the buyer and the seller.
“However, if you want your food cooked in trans fat you a free to stay home and cook it that way.”
Today the resturaunt tomorow, your home.
Can I buy anti-biotics from home without the permission of government ? Heroin ?
Zocor ? Synthroid ? Hydrochlorothiazide ? Viagra ? RU486 ?
Nearly everything that goes in your mouth comes out your anus. Most of us would not eat that either, That something becomes disgusting as it goes through our bodies is a reason not to eat at all.
Regardless, I do not care if you want to eat DDT – which is edible, and not harmful to humans,
I am not looking to attack any specific studies, I do not have a dog in the Trans fat game, Though I would note that the “Fat Industry” is not the largest driver of distortion in research.
Far and away the worst distortions to science come from those who developed some thesis and then rose to prominence – in either government or academia.
For all the problems with studies done by commercial groups – what is forgotten by nearly all is that businesses are driven by consumer wants. It is usually easier to change a product than to change consumers values. No drug company wants a drug approved that is harmful and useless. You operate under the premise that it is hard for businesses to adapt to consumer wants and needs.
Why do you think a business is going to sell something that people do not want ?
If trans fats are so bad – if your research is compelling – persuade people. If you can not, let them make their own choices.
If you are only free to make choices that others beleive are good, you are not free at all.
BTW, the actually state of the art regarding heart disease is mostly “we do not know”.
Statins – which have risks of their own block YOUR bodies production of cholesterol.
We do know that the more you drink alcohol the lower your risk of heart disease is.
It might be the single most effective thing that you can do.
Everything that is good for us, is also bad. And most things that are bad are also good.
We may expect that doctors and academics will hopefully accurately determine how different things effect us – though that is not alot more than a hope. It would be quite wrong to expect certainty on EVERYTHING from research.
But the choice in the end SHOULD be ours,
not government.
Businesses should be free to decide what they will sell
consumers should be free to decide what they will buy.
To the extent govenrment has a role, it is to assure that violence and fraud are not involved, and that whatever a buyer and seller agree to – they keep their agreement.
If people do not care – then government should not either.
Pretty much the definition of a nanny is the person who cares about the things you do not.
Bad NYC government banned trans fats in 2006.
https://www.sciencenews.org/article/ban-artificial-trans-fats-nyc-restaurants-appears-be-working
I don’t view this any different than banning lead in paint. They did not ban customer choices or any foods one could buy. You can still buy french fries, cakes, cookies, candy, etc. Its just eliminating a product contained inside the product that causes harmful health issues. Nothing close to Bloomberg ban on large drinks.
We started to become aware of the dangers of lead – even in paint in the early 20th century.
By the time legislation banned lead in paint, few paints still had any lead in them.
This is typical. As I have stated over and over – the quality of peoples lives will automatically be improved by the free market once our standard of living is sufficient to afford those improvements. Unlike government – the market will prioritize improvements based on our actual values at any time dynamically.
Given that recent medical research suggests that most everything we think we know about heart diseases is WRONG, the premise of the article is crap.
Heart disease spiked dramatically after WWII. An enormous amount of effort was put into determining why. Just as Heart disease deaths had increased without explanation, they have subsequently declined without explanation.
All of the purported correlations with heart disease have diminished in statistical significance.
Much research is being redone.
This is just another reason we should be very careful about what we legislate.
The current half life of knowledge is about 15 years – half of what you believe to be true right now, will be proven false in the next 15 years.
Almost all of what is proven false will be NEW knowledge. It is highly unlikely the Pythagorean theorem will be disproven.
We should not be making decisions involving force – government based on knowledge without incredibly high statistical significance.
Oh, OK.
Budget Reminder:
Tomorrow (day following St Paddy’s Day) is the best day to buy Corned Beef at bargain prices (assuming you live near a supermarket that stocked up on them). They freeze good, pre-cooked or cooked.
Yum!
https://images.mentalfloss.com/sites/default/files/styles/mf_image_16x9/public/istock-470907200.jpg?itok=jH1kMIsh&resize=1100×1100
See we have somethings in common – corned beef! Yum!.
I am also scotch-irish on one side and irish on the other – except the smaller parts that are jewish and german.
Fox failed to run a story on Trump in 2016 – because they could not get on the record confirmation.
Reuters did not run a story on Beto O’Rourke because their sources requested they hold the story until after the election.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/reuters-held-story-about-beto-orourke-until-after-senate-race
Fox suspends a top rated Host for remarks that are LESS incendiary than those of Rep. Omar. The house can not manage to actual name Omar in condemning her remarks.
Just to be clear – To the extent there is a difference between asserting that a muslim who where’s a hijab and abides by sharia has dual loyalties, and asserting that a jew does – the benefit favors Pirro. Omar suggested that ALL jews have dual loyalties. Pirro only suggested that observant fundimentalist muslims might.
Nor am I aware of Pirro attacking Muslim’s more generally. While Omar has suggested that greedy rich jews control the world.
I find it odd that the left whigs out screaming antisemitism when Trump whose daughter converted to conservative judiasm criticises a rich person by name not race or religion who is at best nominally jewish.
While Omar specifically targets rich jews. Yet who do we blame for anti-semitism ?
This is only one stepp removed from the nonsense that the jews are responsible for anti-semitism.
The remarks quoted from Pirro are out of line. Though no more so than ones that those on the left make all the time. They are little different from Robby and Jay presuming that all white male trump supporters are racist members of the alt-right.
Beyond that – we need to figure out how to deal with islam. It is wrong to sterotype religions. But it is also wrong to enforce deliberate silence about the fact that the most homophobic, mysogynist people in the world share a single religion.
All muslims are not homophobic mysogynists, But far too large a portion are to be protected from criticism. We should not turn a blind eye to the sexual abuse within the catholic church – because catholicism is a religion. We should not tolerate the antics of Westboro Baptist Church because they are christian.
The left has given islam carte blanch to violate everything the left claims to hold sacred.
https://www.cnn.com/2019/03/16/media/jeanine-pirro-fox-news/index.html
Apparently merely opposing anti-semetism is sufficient to be blamed for the NZ shooting.
If Clinton criticised Rep. Omar – GOOD FOR HER. The right response to bad speech is more speech. Not enforced silence. The left wing nuts students wishing to silence Clinton should learn that.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2019/03/16/new-zealand-shooting-chelsea-clinton-blamed-attack/3184870002/
In the article, it states “Clinton, the daughter of former President Bill Clinton and former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, was one of many political leaders who denounced anti-Semitism after Democratic Rep. Ilhan Omar criticized Israel’s treatment of Palestinians and alleged money and lobbying were driving the United States to defend Israel and halt debate over the issue. ”
Who knew she was a political leader. When was she elected? When did she run for office? Just because your a daughter makes you a political leader? Guess Jenna and Barabara Bush missed that memo. And being on the board of the Clinton Foundation, does that make you a politician?
Interesting.
Mostly I think that Chelsea Clinton is a priviledged idiot who was never had to deal with the real world. She gave a speach on economics that was widely praised in 2015, that was the epidomy of economic idiocy – and people paid her to give it.
But if Chelsea and others spoke out against anti=semitism – they are to be applauded.
No one is wrong all the time about everything.
The fact that Chelsea is being attacked for opposing antisemitism should tell us who the modern left really is.
The recent Pirro mess is somewhat enlightening – except that Pirro’s remarks were better express and less hateful, what Pirro said is very nearly what Omar said – replacing jews with muslims. We can not censure Omar in the house, not even obliquely. Chelsea has almost certainly appologized already for being insensitive and hurtful – GROW UP!!! Sometimes the truth is insensitive and hurtful. And Pirro has been suspended from Fox.
That should tell you all you need to know about how screwed up our world is.
For those interested in weather and alternative scienctific information concerning climate change, this is an excellent site. Each Saturday Joe Bistardi posts a free weather update for the short term (left video) and long term ( right video). Those are available at the bottom of the home page. Anything else is a commercial site for his clients.
And if you access the video, at the bottom right on each slide is a volume icon, very small, you have to click to get the volume to work.
Following him each week gives a better idea of his positions on climate because he basis his thoughts on many years of patterns in the global weather. And he is not a climate denier as one finds in the political environment.
https://www.weatherbell.com
Many of the disagreements we have would either disappear or be much easier to resolve if we would cease mangling words.
Climate denier means someone who denies that climate exist (or maybe that it changes).
No one matches that. To the extent any do – it would be warmists – the warmist hypothesis, and the basis of the infamous “hockey stick” is that absent humans climate does not change.
This should already provide a clue why words and properly applying their meaning matters.
Warmists have inverted meaning. I do not think there are many intelligent people who think that but for humans climate would be static – unchanging. We have a billion years of history that tells us otherwise. Yet the warmist hypothesis – and the purported meaning of “the hockey stick” is that earths climate had not changed for 2000 years prior to the addition of substantial human CO2 emissions.
Most of us would laugh at that claim. Yet a climate “denier” is someone who accepts that climate changes naturally.
The term “denier” is also a deliberate perjorativ intended to equate minimizing the impact of humans on climate with rejecting the deaths of millions of jews during WWII.
Word mangling such as “climate denier” is particularly insidious as warmists are mangling NOUNS. That is straight out of Orwell and 1984 (and Animal Farm).
You can take most any sentence and strip all the adjectives out and while the emphasis might be lost, the dry meaning is not changed.
The stupid boy furiously chased the streaking blue car down the extremely steep hill,
is the same ad the boy chased the car down the hill.
adjectives and adverbs add color and nuance but the facts are unchanged.
But if you replace boy with girl, car with boat, and hill with lake,
the meaning changes completely.
The misuse of words like denier, or liberal alter meaning decepitively.
Liberal is supposed to be someone who prizes liberty.
We have two millenia of references to liberalism that explictly refers to those pushing greater individual liberty. Even in the 60’s liberal still held some of that connection to liberty.
The Berkeley Free Speech movement was liberal. We wanted to liberalism drug laws and attitudes towards sex and race. But today when we refer to “liberals” we mean those people seeking to censor others, looking to limit freedom.
Liberal is a word with several millenia of positive connotations.
You could take the “Proud Boys” credo and replace Chauvanism with “liberal” and have something hopefully all of us would except. Absolutely we should be proud of, celebrate and seek to advance actual liberalism. As I keep repeating we have two milenia of liberal history.
That liberalism is the history of overcoming tyranny and opperession. The history of liberalism traverses the world – but in the modern era, the flag of liberalism has been most advanced by the west.
Locke was a liberal, the scottish enlightenment was liberal, the american revolution was liberal, bastiat, Mill, Smith, were liberals. Thoreau was liberal.
Just as “denier” comes with significant negative baggage, “liberal” idenitifies with two millenia of the advance of humanity.
But the orwellian left has mangled liberal to mean exactly the opposite.
Todays “liberals” are elitists, statists, authoritarians, opposing liberty in most everything.
By slapping the noun denier on your opponent, you not merely misrepresent actual facts, but you label those you oppose as evil.
By owning the term liberal, the modern left distorts its own positions – the modern left is ANTI-liberal, takes ownership of two millenia of history that are not its own, and presumes itself to be “the good guys” while in fact being “the bad guys”.
Words matter. I have pummeled everyone with the undeniable assertion that government is force. Because that clarifies everything.
The only consequential distinction between government and churchs, civic groups, corporations, non-profits is that the latter are actually voluntary,
If you want to take care of the least fortunate among us – please do so, and I will join you.
Through a church or non-profit or civic group. Those are completely volunaray arrangemnts.
Anything you wish to do that does nto require force can be done through those – if it is possible at all.
If it is possible, but can not be done voluntarily – if you want to require government, you are requiring FORCE.
The moment that we grasp that when we are dealing with government we are talking about force – we more accurately understand the impact of our requests.
We do not have to agree on exactly when force is justified to understand that the default is to NOT use force. That we should be careful when we use force.
This guy is an uncouth despicable lump of shit.
Here’s what he was impelled to tweet today:
“So it was indeed (just proven in court papers) “last in his class” (Annapolis) John McCain that sent the Fake Dossier to the FBI and Media hoping to have it printed BEFORE the Election. He & the Dems, working together, failed (as usual). Even the Fake News refused this garbage!”
Really, this scuzzy phony ass is president of the US, and fools still defend allowing him to remain in office.
The lying scum sucking offal emitting despicable creep knows McCain didn’t forward the Steele report until AFTER the election.
What part of Trump’s statement is false ?
If you read McCain’s OWN book, he notes almost with pride how close he came to flunking out of Annapolis.
It is not only true that McCain provided the Dossier to DOJ, but that has been known since just after the election.
John McCain was a great man, and a hero – so was “Duke Cunningham” and he ended up going to jail for tax evasion. People are complex, they are both good and evil at the same time. We are well past McCains funeral, it is past time for eulogies.
We can open our eyes to his faults as well as his accomplishments.
And McCain had alot of faults.
Barry Goldwater did not like McCain. He though McCain’s integrity was weak.
I think Goldwater was right in a way.
McCain was an absolute hero of the highest order in vietnam – as were many others.
But he in particular. He was very badly injured, and very badly treated before going to the Hanoi Hilton. At anytime while he was there he could have said the word, and no strings attached the North Vietnamese would have put him on the next plane home.
They did not want anything except to send home the priviledge son of the CINPAC ahead of his own turn. I do not know that I could have done as he did. Under the circumstances I would have asked to go home, but McCain did not.
At the same time, Sen. McCain did ask the government agencies he had oversight of to look favorably on a constituent – McCain was one of the “keating five” – of course McCain was an ethical virgin compared to Sen. Menedez, or Obama, or Chenney, or AOC, or Waters, or Frank, or ….
Further McCain and Trump got into a tiff during the election that McCain took personally and sought to use his power as Senator to punish Trump.
That is WRONG – no matter how you feel about Trump.
One of the criticisms I have of the left is that for them “the ends justifies the means”.
In this, that was true of McCain. It is also the reverberating story of the Clinton and Trump investigations – the ends justifies the means.
It is possible that Trump has a similar tendency to seek revenge cold – this far I have not seen it.
Regardless, we should celebrate the good of John McCain without pretending he did not have clay feet.
You are correct that McCain (or his aides) were not the INITIAL source to DOJ of the Steele Dossier. Absolutely Comey had it before McCain provided it.
I am not so sure that was AFTER the election.
Nor does it matter.
One of the issues with this entire mess is that details like this do not matter.
Nunez is trying to get traction on the fact that the investigation of Trump STARTED in late 2015 – BEFORE the Steele Dossier was written.
The entire investigation is a disasterous mess.
So far FBI/DOJ have used 2 things to justify the investigation
The Steele Dossier and the meeting between Papadoulis and Downer.
There are so many problems with this.
First those things are NOT sufficient to justify an investigation.
Next BOTH did not occur until more than 6 months after the investigtion started.
Finally – TODAY. we STILL do not have the basis to start an investigation.
I have serious problems with Mueller as SC. But replacing him with someone better is NOT sufficient.
The big problem is the Trump investigation has NEVER even to this day met the standard necescary to open a criminal investigation.
The order of events does not matter.
It never ends with trump. Imagine what he thinks the news should be: a Hannity-Limbaugh-Ingram fawning daily tribute to the narcissist in chief. When there is dissent from that ass kissing he has a twitter snit in 6th grade vocabulary to reach his followers. No wonder he loves putin and lil kim, his envy of their power to stifle criticism must be enormous. History is going to fry his ego in oil. I hope he lives a long life and gets to see years of the post trump view of his idiot reign of narcissism and lies. Perhaps some of those years will be spent wearing stripes?
No, mentioning this, even often, is not TDS. TDS is the people who deny trumps ignorance, lies and narcissism and their effects on America. Its not the people who notice it. TDS is Dave and his millions of babbling words of useless denial.
https://thehill.com/homenews/media/434454-trump-criticizes-trio-of-fox-news-anchors-they-should-be-working-at-cnn
I have a great deal of respect for McCain – much more than Trump.
At the same time – Trump is still right. McCain’s conduct in this was excorable.
Being pissed over Trump’s disparaging campaign remarks is NOT justification for using his position as a senator to gain revenge.
The timing does not matter, the fact that the DOJ/FBI were already investigating does not matter. What McCain did was wrong.
Separately – I think Trump actually enjoys sparing with the media.
No I do not think he wants a Limbaugh love fest.
As someone said of the Scotts, Trump enjoys getting into the verbal fisticuffs.
Unlike Clinton and McCain, I have thus far seen no evidence that Trump takes things that personally. Hillary is infamous for serving up revenge cold.
Trump punches back and moves on – mostly. He has danced arround threats to do thing s that would be wrong as president – but he has not actually done any of them
McCain and Clinton have done things that are wrong.
McCain in particular is purportedly a better person – and probably he is.
But McCain’s actions are worse than Trump’s by far, even if his words have been more muted.
And sorry – while historians lean heavily to the left, Trump is not going to get excoriated by history. The thing you should really worry about is an actual recognition of the real magnitude of what occured during 2016.
The president of the United States used the CIA/DOJ/NSA/FBI as a political tool to attempt to influence an election.
If Trump had actually conspired with Russia to hack the DNC that would NOT be nearly as big a crime.
Sorry – but the “denial” is yours.
Trump’s rhetoric is sometimes offensive, he exagerates, on occasion – though not nearly as often as portrayed he lies.
But his actions are pretty ordinary as presidents go – except that he has tried valiantly to keep campaign promises.
In fact he actions are pretty impressive – if the prior two bozo’s are your standard of comparison.
The denial and derangement are yours.
Trump is what he is, and it is NOT who you paint him as or even close.
For all the accusations that he is a lying liar a great deal of what he purportedly has lied about is true.
It is pretty inarguable at this point that the FBI not merely BOTCHED the Clinton investigation but they did so in response to directions from AG Lynch and the President
Interestingly despite strong political bias FOR Clinton, many in the FBI actually resisted that pressure – even Comey for a time. But ultimately they gave in.
“Lock her up” is over the top – but she should have been indicted, and charged, and likely would have plead guilty.
At the same time, as the FBI was seeking to coverup the Clinton crime, they were looking to manufacture crimes by Trump.
Pretty much everything that Trump has said about this has been true.
Thus far Rep. Collins has only released a portion of the Testimony the house has collected.
He is trying to get DOJ/FBI to complete their reviews and allow the transcripts to be released.
There are atleast 80 more transcripts to be released.
Democrats thought they were being cute voting for the Mueller report to be released publicly.
They were surprised when house democrats offered a resolution consistent with the SC law that Trump and house republicans got on board.
Ultimately EVERYTHING is coming out.
If you are expecting a smoking gun regarding Trump – you are going to be disappointed.
If you are expecting any mitigation for what the Obama administration and DOJ/FBI did – your going to be disappointed.
Ron, somewhere in the middle of the overdose of one guys daily brain dump of his extreme ideas you wrote some very clear and believable libertarian words about wanting government not to be the whole show, letting people decide for themselves sometimes, such as deciding to take an experimental drug if they are in desperate shape. I can’t even find the comment now that you made. I should have replied then, I thought you said it very well. I could buy some of libertarian lite if it is put well by someone who isn’t a zealous nut.
There are decent sane liberals, libertarians, and conservatives who make sense when they speak. These people unfortunately all get pushed to the side by the loud, the certain, the zealous, the hyperactivated.
Its the people who have something reasonable and valuable to say who are all too modest and quiet about saying it. They keep it to themselves, or if they do say it they get run over by the zealots who take the reasonable moderate form of any idea and turn it into a caricature, a plague.
Oh yes “whatiwanta” (Roby), finding something on treads this long is impossible. Thank you for commenting, I try.
Now you said ” if they do say it they get run over by the zealots who take the reasonable moderate form of any idea and turn it into a caricature, a plague.” And that not only exist outside Washington, it is the culture of Washington. And I believe it trickles down into society.
“Ron, somewhere in the middle of the overdose of one guys daily brain dump of his extreme ideas you wrote some very clear and believable libertarian words about wanting government not to be the whole show, letting people decide for themselves sometimes, such as deciding to take an experimental drug if they are in desperate shape. I can’t even find the comment now that you made. I should have replied then, I thought you said it very well. I could buy some of libertarian lite if it is put well by someone who isn’t a zealous nut.”
Do you read what you write ?
How magnanimous of You!! People who are terminal, or who suffer from some horrible delibilitating disease – if Ron will wrap pleading for there liberty in sufficiently sachrine word, your majesty would be willing to consider that ?
Why isn’t the DEFAULT that people get to decide things for themselves ?
Why is it that YOU seem to think you are entitled to control of others lives ?
Read your own remarks – you not only ASSUME that the DEFAULT is that government gets to decide – except under extraordinary circumstances, But you also ASSUME that government should do what YOU think is best.
Government is not “the whole show”.
Absent justification – you may not use force against others.
That used to be called “liberal” not libertarian. We have spent 2000 years working towards that understanding.
The Magna Carte was almost 800 years ago.
Wow! it is an “extreme idea” that people should control their own lives ?
Patrick Henry did NOT say – give me “Obamacare or give me death”.
The “extreme” position is YOURS.
You STILL seem to think that absent a terminal or extremely debilitating illness it is OK for You and government to have absolute control of others lives – their heathcare as an example.
THAT is the extreme idea.
Your response is alot of what is wrong with the world.
While less crude than the “hog” ad hominem, it is never the less just slightly elevated ad hominem from end to end.
None of the arguments on this particular issue are all that complex.
It is trivial to “make sense” out of every argument by every person on all sides.
The question is not one of understanding them – the arguments are all simple
Are you free or not ? That simple.
In this particular example – do you own your own body ?
Am I free to have a doctor surgically remove a part of my body that I do not need or want, without the state stepping in ?
Rowe vs. Wade asserts yes.
If I am free to remove from my body, a fetus that I do not need or what, solely because I choose, and I am free to do so – according to Cuomo and Northam, right through and possibly after the birth of that fetus/body part, then why is government free to determine whether I may have some drug or other procedure than I think will save me life when I am dying ?
And why do I have to be dying or suffering greatly before I am entitled to my own free choice ?
How is this too complex for you ?
With PPACA we went from govenrment being able to tell us what we can not do, to government telling us what we must do.
Aside from the fact that you are personally more comfortable with PPACA – how is that different from Dr. Mengele experimenting on jews in death camps ?
Absolutely I am asking in the most extreme possible way.
It is a LEGITIMATE logical technique called reductio ad absurdem.
Unless you can distinction your position from that of the nazi’s on some basis besides that the one is more extreme, then there is no fundimental distinction.
If there is a “this far and no farther” line – then you should be able to explain – as you say “making sense” where that line is, and why it is there.
The problem with my arguments is NOT that they are extreme or do not make sense.
It is that I ask you to confront difficult questions. That I ask you to examine things you have pretended were resolved when they were just elided.
I would suggest that you do not respond with arguments – because you can’t.
Because you have none, and you know it.
Because none of this is difficult.
None of it is confusing.
Either you own yourself and control your own life – or you don’t.
My remarks do not make sense to you – because you do not want them to.
“the zealots who take the reasonable moderate form of any idea and turn it into a caricature, a plague.:
So lets clean this up without the hyperbole.
“Those who take an idea and ask what are its limits”
Same statement without all the obfuscation.
And yes, I do that all the time.
It is even a very standard logical technique, called “reductio ad absurdem”.
If you can not define the domain over which an idea is valid then the idea is nearly useless.
You seem to have magnanimously accepted that terminally ill people and those with lifelong chronic disease should be able to have broad choices regarding their own treatment.
Still we must define the domain.
Is that only men who can choose ?
Only whites ?
Only people diagnosed with less than 6 months to live ?
Only John Smith ?
…..
When are we free to make our own choices ? When are we not ?
What you call “extreme” “zealotry” “a plague” a “carciture”.
is asking you to explain why you beleive
that freedom is constrained,
what those constraints are
and what determined those constraints ?
The value of any idea is proportionate to the domain in which it is valid.
Those ideas that are work over very large domains with clear boundaries are called principles.
If we can not define the domain of an idea, or determine its boundaries – then what we have has no meaning.
I am glad that you found Ron’s argument “reasonable”.
But that is not even the beginning, it is at best the beginning of the beginning.
What you call carciture, plaugue and zealotry is the legitimate and normal process of determining the domain of an idea and the definition of its boundaries.
You completely elide that ideas have domains and boundaries.
Ron, I can add to my comment. I am sorry you have to listen to the war between Dave and myself (to the extent that you don’t just flush most or all of it it away, which would be sensible). I see this war not as a war between a libertarian and a liberal but as a war between a zealot and a moderate. Its the whole phenomenon of zealots taking control of the political process because they scream the loudest that made me come here to TNM 11 years ago. It would not matter whether Dave had taken up progressive. conservative or libertarian ideology, the war between Dave and I would take the same form. He is everything I oppose, not because of his particular ideology ,but because of his habits of thought, his certainty, his hyperactive extremism. He is AOC, he is Cruz, he is Limbaugh. He is the endless noise that believes it has the one true answer and is going to scream it in everyone’s face till they just go away or give up.
He is not helping you to communicate your form of libertarian views any more that AOC is helping moderate democrats.
Zealots are the plague, no matter what their ideology. The political conversation leaves the track of reasonable people talking about compromises for the good of all in the real world and enters the track of blind ideologues talking about their competing visions of utopia. Moderates are the opposing force, and we are losing a lot of the time, which just should not be. Moderates rarely fight hard, zealots never stop fighting, even long after their ideas have been disgraced. Well, not me, I am one moderate who is fighting. I am sorry for the noise it makes.
Roby, I have no proplem with your “debates” with Dave. As Dave will say ” I am free to read or discard it”. All I do is read the first couple sentences and I know if I want to read or not. And as I read, if it goes off target, I discard. But I also learn things from these discussions occasionally, so they are not totally useless. What I find more annoying is cut and pastes from twitter, but I hate twitter and think it is almost useless anyway. It only gives the “morons” a voice that no one can comment about where others can see and allows them a voice no one can question unlike Facebook where others can question their positions and everyone can see that debate.
I have found that twitter is the place people that I respect (even if I disagree) go to make fools of themselves.
While there are some rational and sane people posting on twitter, I am completely embarrased by the tweets of people, I have met, know and respect from other forums.
The war at this moment is not about ideology, it is not about libertarian or progressive or moderate. It is about morality or lack of it – yours.
Though I have noted patterns of immorality that follow ideologies,
I am fundimentally confronting yours.
At the same time addressing with you as a proxy that of others who engage in the same behavior.
When you step on the moral soap box, when you make moral pronouncements of others. When you accuse others of lying. You create a binary issue. Most things are not black and white. But a moral pronouncement about another is. Either you are correct or you are not merely wrong, you are immoral.
I am constantly asserting that others are wrong – in error.
I rarely make claims regarding the morality of others, and nearly always only when they are making moral judgements themselves.
You are constantly making moral judgements of others – even on issues that have little to do with morality.
You write of little aside from morality, and you are almost completely wrong about that.
Based on your writing here – I do not think you have any moral foundations, any principles.
That does not inherently make you a bad person. But it means you are completely unanchored. You think you know what is right and wrong – in fact you are pretty much absolutely certain your know. But you can not explain why.
You remind me alot of James Comey – preaching morality at others – yet in his own conduct there is no evidence of any morality.
I am not nearly the Trump fan all here accuse me of. But I do expect that when you make moral accusations of others – that you understand – that if you are not right, then you are more than just wrong, you are immoral.
This is a significant part of what is wrong with our dialog today – and it has nothing to do with Trump. Morality is not made up. It is not an oppinion. Everything is not fungible.
Accusations come with consequences – moral accusations come with high consequences.
“Zealots are the plague, no matter what their ideology. ”
What is a Zealot and why is it that you think you are not one ?
If you pretend that you can define that based on some mean of current views – then wouldn’t you have been a zealot in Nazi Germany or Mousolini’s italy ?
Would you not be a Zealot in Cuba or Venezeula ?
Rather than toss out meaningless labels or this idiotic pretence that some weighted sum of peoples oppinions someho defines both the truth and what constitutes extreme – or even that your own views are not inherently extreme.
Why is it not extreme to beleive government is entitled to control of your body ?
Why is it “moderate” to beleive that only people in EXTREME states are entitled to some degree of self determination ? Why is that not the extreme position ?
“The political conversation leaves the track of reasonable people”
A reasonable person is one who is able to reason. Thus far I have seen no evidence that you can.
“talking about compromises for the good of all in the real world and enters the track of blind ideologues talking about their competing visions of utopia.”
Compromise remains a tool not an end in and of itself.
And “the good of all” is a nonsensical utopian perspective.
Please tell me how we measure – “the good of all”.
And while your at it – why do you beleive government is particularly good at acheiving that ?
The human condition has improved dramatically over the past 500 years, the past 100, the past 50. It has done so throughout the world.
In the most agregate sense we have excellent evidence as to how to reach the greatest good for the greatest numbers. And that is NOT through government.
“the good of all” is soft soap marxism – and we know where that leads.
“Moderates are the opposing force”
You are not moderate.
“and we are losing a lot of the time, which just should not be. Moderates rarely fight hard,”
Whatever you are – you have successfully taken over. If you are unhappy with government as it is and its impact on the world – it is YOU tribe (whatever you wish to call them) that has brought us here.
“zealots never stop fighting, even long after their ideas have been disgraced.”
My “idea” is classical liberalism. That is the principles of Locke, Smith, Mill, Thoreau, Franklin Jefferson, Hume, or Coase, Friedman.
It would be hard to assert that your ideas have been disgraced as you have no real ideas.
If that is not so – tell me what your ideas are ? What your principles are ?
Who are the leading lights of your thought ? What non-disgraced thinkers speak for you.
“Well, not me, I am one moderate who is fighting. I am sorry for the noise it makes.”
But you are not fighting. you are just bitching and moaning.
In all your posts recently there are no ideas that are your own. In fact there are pretty much know ideas.
The closest you have come to an idea is a tepid agreement with Ron on the treatment of terminally ill people or people with serious debilities.
But even there – it is not really an idea. There is no principle, no rationale, just your gut feeling that it would be OK from them to have some personal automomy.
Why them ? Why not others ?
And actual idea, principles provides answers to those questions that we can test and evaluate. You offer NOTHING that can be tested – or nothing beyond this “everyone who does not go along with what I say – even though I am not really saying anything, is an evil zealot and a plague”.
Bitching about other people is not an idea, it is not an argument, it is not a principle, and it provides no guidance for life, or value to live by.
Folks..
Your tax dollars are being well spent, lining the pockets of golf rental cart companies.
Capitalism at its finest:
“https://golfweek.com/2018/12/06/secret-service-has-92k-golf-cart-deal-as-it-protects-president-trump-in-florida/
Did you read anything but the headline ?
If you had you would learn:
These decisions are made by SS, not Trump.
That the SS has determined that it can not rent GolfCarts from the course Trump golfs at – because he owns them and would profit personally, so even though it would be much cheaper to rent carts at the courses Trump plays on, the SS has contracted with third parties at much higher costs to avoid even the hint of impropriety.
Dear Dumb-Dumb, can’t you read and understand ANYTHING clearly?
“These decisions are made by SS, not Trump.”
No, you ding-dong, the decision to play golf AT Trump owned golf courses (and stay at Trump owned properties) is MADE BY TRUMP. Duh!
And where did you come up with your bull shit assessment that renting them from Trump would be cheaper? Before the SS worked out the deal with the cart rental company, Trump was charging the government three times higher golf cart rental fees – that was confirmed last year in public records, and initiated a slew of complaints about the cost of supporting Trump’s golf-hopping travel trips which “have cost more than $83 million in total for flights, security and other necessary rentals.”
I guess you didn’t read anything but the article headline, hypocrite.
I don’t read his comments any more, my screening system is up and working but I Do count his replies to my posts. When I post a comment I make a little bet to myself on how many posts he will need to get it all his objections and denials out of his system. Anything under 6 of his dissents is a disappointment to me.
Making the best use of a sense of humor is the only way to stay sane. That and perhaps drinking. I am Irish and Scottish and can drink with Russians adn hold up if needed but I have preserved my liver up until now pretty pristine. So, perhaps its time for a good binge.
Honoring your Irish side heritage, today I’m following this recipe (I was indeed able to get a great $1.99 per pound 3.3lb corned beef yesterday) and will be sipping Costco brand Irish Whiskey as it wends its way through the 4-hour simmer.
https://www.allrecipes.com/recipe/16310/corned-beef-and-cabbage-i/
“No, you ding-dong, the decision to play golf AT Trump owned golf courses (and stay at Trump owned properties) is MADE BY TRUMP. Duh!”
Are you actually saying that you are entitled to dictate where another person stays or plays golf or whether they play golf ?
You are making an extremely common left wing logical error.
It is very similar to “moral hazard”.
When YOU create the laws and rules than impose a cost on YOU based on another persons free choices – YOU have erred – not they.
I an insurance company sells you insurance with no deductible and as a consequence you go to the doctor 3 times as frequently because it costs you nothing. That is rational behavior on your part and there is nothing wrong with it. The error was that of the insurance company.
The law requires that SS protect the president. Your ignorant understanding of the constitution dictates that the president can not even accidentally benefit personally from being president, or that if the person who is president has choices they must always chose against their own interests – regardless of any other factors because of a benefit YOU chose to give them.
Grow up. Trump – just like everyone on medicare, is free to make choices in their own lives in the way they think is best for them. Those who create moral hazards are responsible to fix them.
Trump did not make the current law regarding Presidential protection details.
He is not making the decisions regarding how they do their job.
He is making the decisions regarding how he does his job – and that is what we elected him to do, and how he runs his life – which has always been his right.
That your choices regarding the laws that have been made, as well as your nonsensical interpretation of the constitution is increasing the cost of Trump’s secret service protection significantly is YOUR PROBLEM.
Neither Trump nor anyone else is required to live their lives in the way that is most beneficial to you, nor even in the way that reduces your costs for choices that YOU made.
BTW, I have ZERO problems changing the laws regarding protecting our president and their families and expresidents and ….
We did not used to beleive it was necescary for presidents to travel with an army of guards or to have lifetime protection details.
Further the SS does not (and can not) provide protection from anyone halfway smart who is dedicated to killing the president.
The longest sniper kill shot recorded was in 2017 in Iraq at 3,540m that is 2.2miles.
There are very few people that can do that. But as the distance decreases the numbers increase rapidly.
The president is safe because the people who own guns and know how to use them do not kill people on a whim or even because they disagree politically.
Nope, no voter fraud.
https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2019/03/18/why_ballot_fraud_is_as_big_texas_despite_local_enforcers.html
Dave, I have come around to your position on elections. Unless your military or work outside the USA for the government, there should be very limited adsentee ballots. There can be procedures in place that restrict someone from voting that allows for absentee, but under very strict supervision.
I used to think early voting was a good idea. I used it since it eliminated lines and I coulf vote within 15 minutes of parking and driving out of the parking lot. But like everything, it became politicized and claims of racism abounded this past election. We had 7 early voting sites in the county with 4 of them in the minority section of town. When they decided to move one site to a more central area to cover a section without a site, they moved one that was within 2 miles of another in the minority section. About 75 people used that site the past two elections. They claimed minority voting suppression in court, which they lost. Then they challenged another change allowing for more days, fewer hours per day, same total hours as minority suppression. They lost that one.
So even though I prefer fast voting compared to waiting 3 hours in line or getting up at 6 am to be at the polls a 1/2 hour before they open, I now favor voting on the Tuesday designated for voting to eliminate everyone and their kid brother claiming something unfair to the minority community.
The principles and mechanics of elections have nothing at all to do with ideology – despite the fact that we are ideologically divided.
Elections are the means by which government obtains power, legitimacy and authority.
They are essentially the “consent of the governed”.
It is not inherent that elections are the means by which government obtains “the consent of the governed” – but there are the means by which most governments today to.
Given that elections is going to be the mechanism we use – it is extremely important that “the people” have confidence in them.
It is NOT critical that voters beleive the best person won. The specific rules – such as our electoral college do not matter – that is not to say they do not have an effect on the makeup of government, but what I am trying to address is the legitimacy of the government elected.
It is important that we have rules. It is important that whether we like those rules or not, that we have confidence that they are being followed, It is important that we BELIEVE that the outcome of the election reflects “the will of the voters” as determined by “the rules”.
What we do not want is large numbers of people to believe the election was gamed.
When elections are won by large margins – none of this matters much.
Large scale fraud is incredibly difficult and near certain to be detected.
But a significant and I think increasing proportion of US elections are narrowly decided.
I would note that over the long run so long as we have a two party system natural forces are going to drive the parties to near balance. We have seen republicans and democrats shift positions on numerous issues over the years – while this is not centrally planned, over the long run the minority party will inevitably shift positions to swing voters to it.
The point is that close elections are NOT accidents. That does not meant that we will not have red and blue states, or that specific districts will not be dominated for decades by one party. But nationally over the long run natural forces will drive the parties towards equilibrium, and that will assure a large number of close elections.
And that is a big problem. That is where our confidence can be eroded.
And if we do not trust the election results – we do not have legitimate government.
There is no particular system of mechanics for conducting elections that is inherently the right way.
As I said there is no ideology to this at all.
But there are means of running elections that we can have higher degrees of confidence in than others.
Republicans have fixated on in person voter fraud – hence voter ID laws.
My sense is that in person fraud is less common that republicans beleive and more common than democrats do.
But I would qualify that by saying that the completely over the top response of democrats to voter ID laws and to asking about citizenship on the Census causes me to seriously question whether there may well be very large amounts of in person voter fraud.
Otherwise the holy war over those two issues makes zero sense.
I would note that I am strongly suspicious that the democrats beyond beleif opposition to “the wall” is similar.
Democrats are behaving like Voter ID laws, Census citizenship questions and restricting illegal immigration from south and central america are an existential threat to the democratic party. The only way that can be true is if democrats beleive that in person voter fraud in one form or another is very large.
With every aspect of voting – the goal is NOT to make it easy.
It is not even to get it perfect.
But it is to assure confidence in the results.
All large complex systems have a margin of error.
I think it is more important to determine how to deal with elections inside the margin of error than anything else.
Recounts are a horrible idea – if we have not learned that over the past couple of decades we are brain dead.
Bush’s 2000 victory in FL was substantially inside the margin of error.
That means it was statisically a tie. You can not pretend that a result with a difference smaller than the margin of error is meaningful.
And it does nto matter how many times you count the vote – you can not do so better than the margin of error.
It is my view that we should have automatic runoffs for close elections.
Several states do this and it works quite well. There are no fights over how the ballots are counted. Because no one is going to win by a small percentage of the vote.
The rules prevent that.
This alone might be the most significant anti-fraud measure.
Automatic runoffs when there is not a clear winner mean that fraud must be massive to change the outcome, and massive fraud is hard to hide.
While I would do other things to ensure trusted election results.
I think that requiring atleast 51% of the vote AND a margin of victory of more than 3% are so significant that the incentive for fraud nearly goes away.
But addressing other means of assuring trust – and the goal is NOT to do things perfect, it is to do things in a way that is trusted.
I have made many suggestions regarding improving our confidence in out elections in the past.
The details are only important in one way – and that is understanding that voting is a process, if can be understood as a type of engineering problem. If you define the critical criteria as transparency and confidence in the results – there are few problems that we have with our elections that can not be solved. But we have to remember that the goal is confidence and transparency – not low error rates, or efficiency.
One of the things I proposed was establishing vote counting much like jury duty.
For each election the local government pulls a bunch of names at random as vote counters.
These then MANUALLY count paper ballots by hand in teams of 3 in public – like in an HS cafeteria or a firehouse.
To be clear that is not efficient – it is not intended to be. There are many other ways to count votes, but that has the advantage of being very transparent. And fairly difficult to engage in significant counting fraud. BTW it is only the raw counts that needs to be kept secure – so long as everything is done in public. Preventing fraud above the raw counts is unnecescary so long as the raw counts are available and the counting is done publicly.
Anyone cheating at a higher level will get caught.
That is another things we should think about – the goal is not always to prevent fraud, but to assure that it will be detected and punished. You can allow fraud to be easy – if it is also certain to be caught and have serious negative consequences.
I would also suggest that one of the reasons we do not want vote by mail is because making voting easy makes people like the elderly, the poor and the disabled TARGETS.
What we are learning about ballot harvesting – is that the targets are the very people it is the easiest to take advantage of. Shutins, people with disabilities, the elederly.
In many instances it is people who do not really have the capacity to vote.
We do not have an official competency test for voting.
But in person voting imposes an unofficial one – that you are sufficiently competent to get to a poll, and get through the proccess.
What is self evident is that ballot harvesting goes arround that test, and it is highly likely that as an example elderly people who either do not know who they are voting for, or do not even know they are voting are the targets.
Another thing that we must do is federalize the funding and process of national elections.
There should be no variation in resources etc. between a wealthy district and a poor one.
You talk about long lines – those are far more common in cities than elsewhere.
Voting should be easier in cities.
There are the same number of people in every congressional district.
In a city you should not have to travel far to get to the polls.
Each poll should have approx the same number of people to vote.
It should take almost the same amount of time everywhere in the US.
Idiots. I give up. Both parties are totally nuts. All three if you count libertarians.
https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/434630-court-packing-becomes-new-litmus-test-on-left
Ron and I have tried repeatedly to get you or Jay or dd to address this.
We have said what we want out of a justice or judge.
While there is some minor bickering over details on the right, most on the right are close to agreed on what they want out of a justice or judge.
What is it that you want ?
Should judges – go with their guts ? With what they think is right ? How are they to know what is right ? Do they read tea leaves ?
How should a judge/justice determine what a law means ?
What the constitution means ?
Why is this ideological ?
Why should how the law and constitution is read be ideological.
We need not share the same views on what the law and constitution SHOULD be to atleast agree that if what the law and constitution DOES say varies from person to person we are lawless.
What is being called “originalism” or “textualism” is really just a form of what the law has evolved over the course of many centuries.
Those are approximately as follows.
The law and constitution is to be read narrowly with respect to the power of government and broadly with respect to the freedom of individuals.
As hard as it is to amend the constitution of change the law, it is near impossible to correct improper expansions of the power of government or limits on the liberty of individuals,
The law and the constitution particularly should be read first and foremost relying on the words that are written. Again – it is easier to change the law or the constitution of the text does not mean what we want than to correct when the meaning comes from somewhere aside from the words.
When the meaning of the text is not clear or has changed over time, the courts should rely on the meaning that applied to those the law or constitution applied to at the time it was passed. The constitution and laws that apply to ordinary people, should be read as ordinary people at the time they were passed would have understood them.
In a few instance in the US states have actually written rules similar to those above into their constitutions.
If you have some different approach – provide it ?
I think the criteria are pretty clear.
Whatever the rules for reading constitution and law – those rules need to be simple – so that everyone can understand them.
They need to be clear – so that judges as well as ordinary people to the largest possible extent – not just a majority, not even a super majority, but nearly unanimously agree on what the law and constitution ACTUALLY say.
The meaning should be the same over time. If our understanding of what the law and constitution SHOULD be changes – we should change the law or the constitution, not how we interpret it.
It is odd that your nom de plume is “do what I wanta” and your arguments are constantly – “you can not do what you want”.
Do you find it revelatory that a non de plume you regularly use here (John Say) is a double entendre for Toilet Talk?
I only use that “nom de plume” when WP will not let me logon.
Regardless the ndp is JBSay – for Jean Baptiste Say.
I have also rarely posted as Adam Smith – presumably know who he is.
JB Say is a famous economist – though I would not expect that you would know that.
He formulated “Says Law” which you likely know as “The law of supply and demand”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean-Baptiste_Say
Regardless, your assertion though humorous is attenuated.
vermontadowhatiwanna is directly at odds with the content of the posts.
You have to go jean -> john -> a euphamistic name for a toilet.
Still creative.
Sigh. You can’t even take a snide put-down without an over-elaborative reply.
& John Say (that was the log-on name you used) was an English MP and Speaker of the House of Commons in the 1400s.
“Sigh. You can’t even take a snide put-down without an over-elaborative reply.”
Sigh. You can dish it, but you can not take it
“John Say (that was the log-on name you used) was an English MP and Speaker of the House of Commons in the 1400s.”
Does not change anything.
The “log-on” name I used was jbsay and is of a FB account in the name of JBSay at thebrokenwindow dot net.
You can email me there is you wish.
Sir John Say is NOT JBsay.
That is Jean-Baptiste Say.
Thebrokenwindow.net is a domain that I control and a reference to Frédéric Bastiat and the broken window fallacy.
But if it makes you happy to beleive that jbsay is “Sir John Say” that does not really change anything.
The point is “vermontadowhatawanna” does not require any creative interpretation and is a hypocritical identifier for someone telling others how to live their lives.
It does not require myriads of levels of indirection or euphamism to get there.
And you accuse me of being pedantic ?
And then there is this crap:
“Some of the remarks — such as O’Rourke’s statement to Vanity Fair, referring to the presidential race, that he was “just born to be in it” — have fanned complaints that the Texan is blinded by “white privilege.”
https://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/434625-orourke-faces-sharp-backlash-from-left
I seriously seriously give up. Fuck politics and goodbye. Both sets of loonies are equally bad.
And on the other hand, he is being attacked by the #metoo group for two reasons. One, his wife ” standing by her man” at his announcement to run and not saying a word ( subservient female) and his comment about his wife raising the kids with his “help sometimes” (subservient female mother) which he has had to opolgize for.
Boo hoo! Get a damn life! I am sick of these people that blame everything on someone else.
A short explanation of ONE of the many problems with post modernism, intersectionality and the modern left.
The result you are seeing is INHERENT in the post modern ideological underpinnings of the modern left.
I know that you have no interest in things like philosophy – and I understand that most of us do not think of Kant or Aristotle or Marx, or Nozik or Rawls or Dworking or Plato.
But even though few know much of what they have written, it has still had enormous consequences.
Post modernism rests on a philosophical foundation that is nihilist and a value system that is guaranteed to produce conflict. Exactly this kind of conflict.
Whether you understand post modernism or not. Whether those who are acting driven by it do or not, its consequences are relatively predictable.
There are no words to describe how much I loathe detest and hate progressive politics. I hate this utter PC bullshit worse that Dave hates it.
And yet you are a mime of it.
Follow the shrinking money trail. LMAO
“President Trump Has Some Stories to Tell About Deutsche Bank
Why a German banking giant is in the news, and why the White House might worry.”
“In 2006, Donald Trump sued me for libel, claiming that a biography I wrote, “TrumpNation,” lowballed his wealth and misrepresented his track record as a businessman. Trump lost the suit in 2011. He had sought $5 billion in damages, which was, more or less, the difference between what he claimed he was worth at the time — about $6 billion — and what my sources believed him to be worth: $150 million to $250 million. ($5 billion was also substantially more than the advance my publisher paid me to write the book.)
During the course of the litigation, my lawyers got their hands on an assessment of Trump’s wealth that German banking giant Deutsche Bank AG had pulled together in 2004. Deutsche figured Trump had a net worth of about $788 million, even though he told them he was worth $3 billion.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-03-19/trump-has-some-stories-to-tell-about-deutsche-bank
So ?
I think the likelyhood of a journalist understanding networth is about zero.
I had to produce a networth statement to adopt my daughter from China.
I calculated it exactly as the Chinese required and the results were impressive.
My purported networth was about 4 times what it would be according to FASB standards.
I have no idea what DB uses to establish net worth – nor do you. Nor likely does the journalist. I would be very surprised if there measure is not extremely conservative.
Also is what is being reported Donald Trump’s personal net worth. Or Trump enterprises net worth ? I doubt you know. I certainly do not.
I know that Jared Kushner has an 80% share of a building in Manhattan that is worth atleast $3.8B and that he has about 800m in loans against it.
Finally does this matter in anyway?
I would be happy to be worth 1000 times less than DB thinks Trump is worth.
DB’s assessment still ranks Trump about 6 times more wealthy than Romney,
It still makes him the richest person that has ever been president – though MAYBE at 788M John Adam’s might have surpassed him in real dollars.
Of course Trump lost the libel lawsuit – he likely was considered a public figure, it is near impossible to win libel as a public figure. further it is highly unlikely the court would consider an erroneous assessment of Trump’s networth libel.
Nor is it likely that Trump was suing to win. Most likely the suit was a variation of a SLAP suite – a message to the journalist and others that they could end up wasting a fortune in legal fees if Trump did not like their reporting.
If you want to piss over Trump for that kind of conduct – I will be happy to agree.
But it is legal. So change the law.
Yea, Trump wins a court case for a change:
” Supreme Court rules for Trump on detaining immigrants
By TED HESSON
03/19/2019 12:41 PM EDT
Updated 03/19/2019 10:25 PM EDT
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The Supreme Court on Tuesday ruled that the federal government can detain immigrants convicted of crimes without a bond hearing, even if they have been previously released and committed the crime years earlier.
In a 5-4 decision that fell along ideological lines,……… “
Well piss on the constitution. Its just a worthless piece of paper anyway.
Just rule the way your f’in party wants you to vote. And try pulling some little something out of your ass to justify how you rule.
If you are a criminal, your illegal, YOU HAVE NO RIGHTS!
As reported:
“The court ruled 5-4 along ideological lines, with its conservative justices in the majority and its liberal justices dissenting, that federal authorities could place such immigrants into indefinite detention anytime without the possibility of bail, not just immediately after they finish prison sentences.”
It did not cover anyone other than CRIMINALS and not just the ones only breaking immigration laws.
What the F is wrong with people that cant get that they have no rights through their f’in mind if they are illegal. They should be packed up at the prison gates and dumped on the other side of the border. Why the hearing?
This country is going into the crapper!
Ron,
Immigrants do have rights, and our laws must protect them.
But they do not have all the rights of citizenship.
These detentions without bond are while awating deportation.
The immigrants in all cases can withdrawl their challenge to deportation and be released to their home country immediately.
They are not actually being “detained” or “held without bond” they are being prevented from roaming the US at will. They are perfectly free to go home immediately.
I am not entirely happy with the law – though 5 justices did follow the actual law and constitution.
I am not happy with it because I have seen how it is applied – and long before Trump.
Sometimes ICE deports seriously bad dudes – and we want to see that happen.
But quite often people are deported for very very minor charges – often charges we do not typically prosecute, after they have been here for decades.
Again, we need to change the law.
The most offensive case I am aware of is of an Iraq Veteran, with a purple heart.
He was convicted of possession of pot and deported.
That was after he had been in the US legally for 30 years, and had served out country with honor.
That just completely offended me.
We are talking about giving the dreamers a path to citizenship NO!!!!
There is a difference between permanent legal residence status and citizenship.
Some want to give citizenship to immigrants who complete college.
I have no problem with looking favorably at the citizenship applications of people who graduate from college. But not providing an automatic grant.
HOWEVER, if you serve in the US military and are discharged honorably, particularly if you are in combat and are wounded – THAT I can see granting citizenship for automatically.
Frankly, I am offended that we do NOT grant citizenship to immigrants who serve in out military.
But those are problems with our LAWS,
Our courts are supposed to take the laws as they are.
It is not their job to decide what they should be.
That is congresses and ours.
Dave I understand immigrants have rights. But they do not have the same rights as you and I. In my way of thinking, if you have come into this country illegally, committed a crime, then you have less rights than someone here illegally waiting for an immigration hearling. Thye should be deported immediately!. Once in prison, that should preclude you having any right to a hearing to stay here.
Now you say “We are talking about giving the dreamers a path to citizenship NO!!!!”
BZZT Wrong! If we can have a man born in Hawaii, taken overseas as an infant, raised in the far east and then come back as a teenager elected president, then kids brought to this country AND RAISED AN AMERICAN, EDUCATED AN AMERICAN AND MORE AMERICAN THAN OBAMA other than a piece of paper filled out by the hospital, then they are more citizen than Obama!
Just because you are born here does not make you American! And just because you were born in a foreign country does not make you “not American”. If you are brought here young, and been here all your life, then there needs to be a way to become a citizen much quicker than the current way now.
Ron,
To the extent we are at odds – it is only over details.
First the SCOTUS decision was specific to the LAW as written.
The issue of the rights of immigrants was NOT considered – because the plaintiffs did not raise that issue.
This is another of those differences regarding the courts.
Another rule of courts is that they decide the issues in front of them – not issues that are not raised.
If all 9 members of SCOTUS beleived that the deportation of illegal immigrants was unconstitutional – the decision STILL should have been 9-0 AGAINST the plaintiffs because the court was not asked to rule on the constitutionality of deportation.
The ONLY issue they were being asked to rule on was whether the existing law that allowed immediate deportation of immigrants charged with a crime required them to be provided with bail and a hearing if the state and local governments failed to honor and ICE detainer and released them thereby requiring ICE to find them and arrest them again.
And SCOTUS said that nowhere in the law was their a requirement to provide a hearing and bail if an immigrant with pending criminal charges was released despite an ICE detainer.
That is ALL this case was about.
It is evidence that those on the left will go to absurd lengths to interfere with existing laws that they do not like rather than actually challenging or changing the law.
This is much like DACA – an overwhelming majority of americans – myself included and even Trump OPPOSE the automatic deportation of the “dreamers”.
But our current law requires that.
Pres. Obama rather than working to change the law – at a time when a bipartisan consensus was in reach decided to act improperly illegally and unconstitutionally.
DACA has already been declared unconstitutional by several courts.
I do not beleive it has reached SCOTUS, and may never reach SCOTUS as I suspect President Trump refused to challenge the lower court decisions.
So Trump is elected and he enforces the law as it is and some idiot federal judge says NO DACA which has been determined to be unconstitutional, is still the policy of a prior administration and can not be revoked by the current one because “Argh! Trump”.
One of the other idiotic things we are dealing with current left wing nut courts is this nonsensical concept that something is constitutional or not based on “intent”.
This is absolute legal GARBAGE. But several federal courts have used this to determine that Trump can NOT do things that Any other president could have done.
Even if we can actually know “intent”, intentions do not make an otherwise legal action illegal. Lack of bad intentions USUALLY absolve one of guilt for an actual CRIMINAL act.
Either those in government have the power to do something, or they do not.
The courts should not be free to inquire into the “intentions” of lawmakers, or the executive.
Not for Trump, not for Obama. It is they ACTIONS that matter.
Those are either constitutional or not.
Ron;
I am a huge proponent of birth right citizenship.
It is not perfect, but those countries that do not have it have WORSE problems than we do.
I am not opposed to Dreamers becoming citizens – in the exact same way as legal immigrants. NOT automatically. Just about the only automatic route I would provide to citizenship would be for people who serve in our armed forces.
Again I am NOT opposed to Dreamers becoming citizens.
But they can go through the naturalization process like any other immigrant.
Or they can choose not to and remain a legal permanent resident.
Dave I am going to do that word you dislike😀 Compromise! 😖
Yes, I have no problem with going through the haturalization process. However, if they have paid attention in school, then they should be abke to take the naturalization test and be given citizenship without waiting years likevsome who apply.
Its not jumping the line, going to the front of the line or anything to do witn a line. There should be no line, they should be no part of the immigration counts nor anything else that someone entering has to go through.
No one can ever convince me these people are less “citizen” than Obama that was raised in anthing but a questionable American supporting environment. To me, they are way more American than Obama ever will be. You can not change your upbringing.
I do not “dislike” compromise. I oppose the stupid pretence that it is a principle that is often sold here.
There are few instances one should compromise principles.
But many conflicts do not involve principle.
Democrats were unable to make an argument that oposition to the wall was a matter of principle. As such they should have compromised. Ultimately they actually did.
Trump still ended up getting what he wanted – more than the compromise.
And he will ultimately succeed – because democrats were not taking a principled stand and they waged a political war over something that they were never able to make the case was consequential to them. Trump did successfully make the case that the wall was important to him. You need not agree with him. But that does not alter the fact that either a principle or atleast a significant value was at the root of his position.
That was not true of democrats, they came off as just seeking to thwart Trump.
That is not a principled stand.
Ron.
There is not a principle involved here. So absolutely you can compromise or I can.
I am reluctant to do so for a(several) practical rather than principled reason.
The US immigration system today is rooted in family.
Once someone is a US citizen they can easily bring an ever expanding array of relatives into the country. The longer naturalization takes the less granting citizenship to one person becomes a ticket to the legal immigration of dozens of others.
Next, obviously we do not consider the dreamers to be culpable for the choices of their parents. Even though they are technically “illegal” immigrants, they are NOT the same as their parents.
At the same time, they are also NOT the same as the people who have immigrated legally.
Our law should reflect that – however difficult it is for someone who immigrated legally to become a citizen, it should be more difficult for a dreamer.
While they should not be kicked out – we ABSOLUTELY should protect them from easy deportation, at the same time, they should not jump to the head of the line.
Absolutely if they payed attention is school they should pass any citizenship test easily.
That still should not allow them to “jump the line”.
Last, if you make it too easy for “dreamers” to become citizens you will create a moral hazard – and you will increase the efforts of illegal immigrants to bring their families.
We should not make law that foreseably creates consequences we do not intend.
The recent influx of unaccompanied children as well as the shift to family crossings, are a reflection of efforts to game our laws, regulations and protocols.
You can not blame people for doing so. But you can avoid writing laws that make it easy.
I understand your “Obama was born here, but not really american” argument.
It is part of the reason that “birtherism” was popular.
Alot of people grasp that Obama’s ties to America were oportunistic not ingrained.
And this is a part of why Trump was elected. MAGA is essentially anti-obama.
The fact that birthright citizenship has flaws, does not make the alternative better.
BTW GENERALLY – the legitimate children of diplomats – are NOT automatic citizens.
Birth right citizenship does NOT mean everyone born here is a citizen.
I would personally be reluctant to narrow who born here is NOT a citizen.
We certainly want the children of legal immigrants to be citizens.
Whether we want the children of illegal immigrants or people on tourist visa’s to be citizens is a different question. We can resolve that by changing the law.
“Just because you are born here does not make you American! And just because you were born in a foreign country does not make you “not American”.”
There is no perfect way of assigning automatic citizenship.
The constitution currently has TWO ways to “automatically” become a citizen.
If you lived in the US in 1787 (and were no black or indian) you were automatically a citizen.
If you were born in the US after 1787 you are automatically a citizen.
Anyone else who wishes to become a citizen must go through a naturalization process.
That arrangement is not perfect – nothing will be perfect.
But it is pretty close to the best we can do.
In 2000 a republican congress and President Clinton added a 3rd “automatic” grant of citizenship as a right to the adopted children of US citizens.
I would add that those who serve with honor in our military should automatically become citizens.
Al the “automatic” processes are essentially “rights” – you do not have to earn them, they can not be denied to you.
The naturalization process is set by LAW, not the constitution.
I am not sure that I agree with expediting citizenship for “dreamers”
But that is a choice we can make in the way we write the law.
I do not think that “dreamers” should be treated by law the same as illegal immigrants.
But they should not be treated the same as legal immigrants either.
Separately there is a large moral hazard associated with being overly kind to dreamers.
We absolutely know that “illegal immigrants” are not merely aware of our law, but even our regulations and protocols. If we make something too easy will will near immediately face a tidal wave of illegal immigrants who have found a way to meet whatever those new conditions are. The sudden explosion of unaccompanied minors, or family units are not from changes in things in south and central america, they are responses to changes in our laws, and polices and even our politics.
“If you are brought here young, and been here all your life, then there needs to be a way to become a citizen much quicker than the current way now.”
Whether I agree or not, that is accomplished by changing the law.
Dave, I need to specify my definition of dreamer. Someone brought to this country at a very young age, lived with a parent, completed their education in America and their first language is English.
Unaccompanied minor does not qualify in my definition.
DACA’s definition of “dreamer” was anyone brought to the US under 18.
One of the problems with that is once we are talking about people in their late teens without birth certificates establishing age is difficult to impossible.
There are instances of people as old as 37 at the time they were brought to the US claiming to be under 18 and qualifying as dreamers.
Conversely there are about 500K people in the US who would have qualified as “Dreamers” who did not register for DACA as required – are you going to cover them ?
“Yea, Trump wins a court case for a change:”
Too my knowledge todate Trump (as president) has only lost one case in the supreme court.
That was a case originally filed by president Obama that was a loser to begin with, that Trump continued. I am not sure that the Trump DOJ did not continue the case specifically because they WANTED to lose – setting a precedent.
The only other “losses” Trump has had at the supreme court have been denials of direct appeals – i.e. where Trump has requested that SCOTUS hear an appeal from a lower court BEFORE it has gone through all lower court appeals first. It is rare for SCOTUS to grant those.
Trump loses fairly regularly in lower courts where the plantiffs cherry pick the jurisdiction to get the judges that will rule in their favor.
As offended as you are by Trump – his actions as president have been well inside the law and the constitution as the courts currently apply it.
While I beleive the courts have given government and the president too much power,
Trump has still used that power far more conservatively than any recent prior president.
I beleive most of the Time Trump’s SCOTUS wins are either unanimous or close to it.
What is disturbing is that when the law is clear and Trump is following it, some lower courts are so far off. That is a problem with those courts, not Trump.
BTW Obama not only has the worst record with the supreme court of any prior president he has actually lost at SCOTUS 9-0 more times than ALL other presidents combined.
If you are concerned about presidential lawlessness and overreach – Obama was the epitomy of that – so says SCOTUS.
Jackson was on far shakier ground denying Manafort bond.
But then the courts have given way to much power to judges and ignored the constitution.
The eighth amendment makes bail a right.
With respect to the case you addressed – the constitutional rights of non-citizens are not the same as citizens.
A quick review of the case suggests the majority is correct – the lower court erred.
Trump’s detentions followed the law. There was not a constitutional challenge to the law itself. so the challengers conceded from the start that the convictions in question permitted detention without bond.
The only question the court was asked was whether government was required to detain from the moment the person with prior convictions or outstanding charges was released by state or local authorities.
Essentially this was a sanctuary case and the left set themselves up to lose.
The majority on the court saw this as a question of whether states can protect immigrants from federal detention by not informing the federal government of their release so they could be taken into federal custody immediately. The plantiffs had already conceded that the law allowed them to be detained indefinitely by the federal government.
That honestly left no meaningful question for SCOTUS
And another one, yippee:
“Judges lean toward Trump in hotel ’emoluments’ case
Jan Wolfe
(Reuters) – A three-judge U.S. appeals court panel signaled sympathy toward President Donald Trump on Tuesday in his appeal in a Democratic-backed lawsuit that accuses him of violating anti-corruption provisions of the U.S. Constitution with his Washington hotel.”
Well they will blame that on the judge being a conservative appointment also.
They will say “What difference does the law make” even if its the right ruling!
Trump has certainly found disfavor (I’m being kind) with judges and courts. A lot;
https://www.brennancenter.org/analysis/his-own-words-presidents-attacks-courts
In that article it states “This threatens our entire system of government. The courts are bulwarks of our Constitution and laws, and they depend on the public to respect their judgments and on officials to obey and enforce their decisions.”
The public, due to the media and politicians, no longer respect our courts. Some for good reason and others just because the media does not agree with decisions.
California and the 9 th district court is a good example. In one term in the mid 90’s, 27 of its 28 decisions that made it to SCOTUS were overturned and that was before the court really became politicized. Its rulings were based more on political positions and not the constitution. And that continues today. Any liberal position taken to court is filed in a court in the 9th district even though the 6th overtook the 9th in overturned decisions.
We most likely will see a shift in courts as right now about 60% of the court appointments were made by Obama and Clinton. However, there are now 140 openings and 60 have nominees pending by Trump. He will surpass Obama in appointments once the other 70 are filled and then the court systems will be close to 50-50 by both party representation.
But that will not fix the problem that comes from any decision being questioned based on political positions instead of constitutional rulings. And that comes from jurist finding some obsure words that allow for decisions contrary to the obvious words that should be used. It is much easier to blame political positions than to question legalese by the media and questioning decisions based on a weak legal basis.
Respect and Obey are NOT the same thing.
We are obligated to obey – until we can change.
We are not obligated to respect.
Respect is something that must be earned.
The government, the president, the DOJ, the FBI, the courts are entitled to our obediance – within the confines of the law.
They are not entitled to our respect.
Despite the “trumpanzee” nonsense – I do not have alot of respect for Trump, or Clinton, or Obama, or government.
I find this “the courts and government must be trusted and respected” argument complete lunacy.
Should we have respected the court that produced Dred Scott ? Plessey V. Fergussen ?
It is clear many here have zero respect for Trump.
There is no duty of Trust or respect to either the courts or the president or the government.
If there was – then the very people arguing here against Trump would be hypocrits.
Dave “Respect is something that must be earned.”
And once it has been earned it can be lost. That is what has happened over the past 20 years.
Also, earning it back will take many more years than it took to lose.
Trump is far from the first president to “attack” the courts – Wilson, FDR, Truman, all come immediately to mind. Though there were many presidents who attacked the courts in the 19th century too.
No this is not some crisis.
Nor are the courts or government entitle to our respect.
We are obligated to obey them – atleast until we change the law, the courts or the constitution.
We are not obligated to respect them or agree with them.
Trump specifically attacked “Obama Judges”, and Robert pushed back strongly.
But there was then huge pushback against Roberts.
There is a clear problem with the lower courts.
It is actually quite rare than SCOTUS resolves a contentious issue 5-4 on “ideological lines”
But it is eqtremely common for lower courts to be radically at odds with each other on ideological basis.
Both conservatives and progressives have “shopped” for favorable federal courts to challenge laws or actions they do not like. ‘
But there has been one signficant difference. Those challenges to Obama’s actions were overwhelmingly upheld by SCOTUS often 9-0. While the challenges to Trump’s actions are failing with SCOTUS – often 9-0.
It is clear which courts in the country have gone off the rails.
When you can not even get the left leaning justices to back you, the problem is with you.
The Brennan Center thinks voter fraud is a myth.
This is not a question of sympathy.
The constitution has NEVER been applied this way before.
No court has ever accepted this ludicrous interpretarion of the emoluments clause.
Washington would have been guilty of violating it.
These emoluments cases have been getting whittled away slowly because they are overreach.
Specifically in the case of the washington Hotel.
Trump receives nothing.
The hotel is owned by a company – not trump personally. He is a shareholder, but no longer has any management role in the business. Further the Washington hotel has voluntarily separated out the profits from any of their guests that are representatives of foreign governments and has voluntarily contributed those profits to the IRS.
Trump is about as far as you can get from a violation.
More Peterson on the intellectual problems with the modern left.
This is for the progressives that support Medicare for all. (MFA). I just received my EOB for the colonoscopy in January. 3 doctors, one Nurse Anesthetist and hospital total charges $14,100. Total reimbursement for all five, $523.00. Hospital $350, doctors and nurse about $40.00 each.
If anyone thinks providers can survive on getting paid 3.5% of charges for everyone, they are nuts.
And the total cost is $14,100 due to cost shifting. Because government pays 3.5% of government charges and everyone else covers the portion of the 97% discounts that are actual cost for providers.
Now some will say individuals are free to choose medicine as a profession. True. They can make more owning a Jiffy Lube than looking up somesone butt hole and they will do that if everyone pays them $40.00 like Mecicare.
And most hospitals will go bankrupt with 3.5% reimbursement rates given 24/365 care and most all professional level salaries.
But MFA makes good promises because voters are ignorant and dont know what the impact would be.
Glenn Greenwald makes an interesting and compelling argument.
If Mueller, Pelosi and democrats actually beleive what they say about Trump, then they should be acting.
The claims against Trump are incredibly serious. and if true not merely require his removal, but require doing so QUICKLY.
If Trump is a Putin plant – then the danger to the country is so great that he can not be allowed to remain as president for one second longer.
Yet, neither Mueller nor Pelosi nor democrats are acting as if that is the case.
Quiet simply they do not beleive their own hype.
In otherwords THEY – not Trump are lying hypocrits.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/03/19/glenn_greenwald_2020_dem_candidates_see_wheels_are_falling_off_the_cart_of_mueller_investigation.html
When you have lost Ted Koppel – your in trouble.
I doubt Koppel is a friend of Trump, but even he can see that the press has become unmoored.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2019/03/19/ted_koppel_establishment_press_decided_that_trump_is_bad_for_the_united_states_out_to_get_him.html
“GOP Sen. Johnny Isakson calls Trump attack on McCain ‘deplorable’
“I want to do what I said that day on the floor of the Senate,” he said. “I just want to lay it on the line, that the country deserves better, the McCain family deserves better, I don’t care if he’s president of United States, owns all the real estate in New York, or is building the greatest immigration system in the world. Nothing is more important than the integrity of the country and those who fought and risked their lives for all of us,” the Republican chairman of the Senate Veterans’ Affairs Committee said in an exclusive interview published Wednesday with conservative outlet, The Bulwark.”
https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/gop-senator-mccain-family-deserves/story?id=61808896
When you are in the position this individual is in, one should be careful who you criticize. For years the vets fought for benefits for agent orange. How many years did congress set on its dead ass on that one? For years we have heard about the piss poor healthcare at VA health facilities. Its still piss poor! How long before congress gets off its dead ass and changes civil service employment regulations so VA directors at these facilities can get fired, not transferred to take their incompetent leadership somewhere else. Now we hear about years of piss poor housing the military has allowed to happen. We hear now about years of complaints from military families that were ignored.
So I would tell this asshole to get off his dead ass and propose some positive changes to improve the identified poor situations our vets and military are in now. Once those are fixed and the lives of 1000’s has improved, then you have demonstrated you really care and then grandstand and say what you want about Trump and McCain. McCain was only one man.
Trump has done something for Vets – he has significantly expanded the ability of vets to get care OUTSIDE the VA.
Can Trump fix the civil service or the VA ? Not a chance.
If you have not figured it out – the SWAMP fights back.
Why does it surprise you that most of those in government service – even the few republicans hate Trump ? He made it clear during the election that he is coming to get them.
And they have been fighting back.
That is to be expected. What is disturbing is that the democrats have bought into this and are praising those leaking (usually fake leaks) and absolutely resisting any effort to change the federal government to do its job.
I do not know what the Tiff between Tillerson and Trump was about.
Whatever their friction foreign policy worked well then.
Further Tillerson was intent on reducing the state department by 25%.
Pompeo has Trump’s ear and they get along better.
But Pompeo has reveresed Tillersons cuts, and that was a mistake.
The McCain Funeral is long over.
McCain is absolutely an american hero. At the same time – like Washington and Jefferson and Madison and … he has alot of flaws too.
McCain Feingold was an unconstitutional disasterous mess.
Trump’s initial attack’s on McCain were unwarranted, and should have ended Trump’s presidential bid. But he survived them. McCain sought revenge. McCain’s attempts at revenge against Trump were likely legal. But they are also despicable.
John McCain like many american hero’s has clay feet.
It is best we see him that way.
Trump’s current attacks on McCain are not merely justified – they are accurate.
And as the editorial by VDH I just posted note – they are not even unusual.
Truman was famous for publicly insulting his political opposition as president.
Truman was also re-elected.
You really have to be an obtuse idiot to equate Truman’s remarks about others to Trump’s. Let’s make that a fucking idiot to compare them.
Here’s what just a few of the dozens of outraged Americans have to say about President Goof Ball:
“The cognitive and emotional/psychological decline of the president is clearly accelerating. He is breaking apart before our eyes. It is a remarkable thing to witness; and it’s only going to get worse. We’re in uncharted waters.”
-Peter Wehner
“This is not the behavior we expect from a leader of our country.”
-Lt. General Mark Hertling
“America deserves better, the people deserve better, and nobody—regardless of their position—is above common decency and respect for people that risk their life for your life.”
-Georgia Senator Johnny Isakson
“Nixon at his worst was never as loathsome and twisted as this man, who is simply a terrible human-being.”
-John Dean
“There’s a mean streak that runs through Donald Trump’s heart,” says Jack O’Donnell, former President and COO of Trump Plaza Hotel and Casino. “There is a piece of this that is almost sociopathic, that he likes to hurt people. … It’s who he is.”
But not to worry, Dave… people like you and Lou Dobbs are there to defend Trump no matte what he says: ““There’s a reason for those nasty remarks!” Dobbs said. “There’s a history between those two men. And the people who are attacking––including Mitch McConnell––attacking the president for his views on John McCain is asinine.”
“You really have to be an obtuse idiot to equate Truman’s remarks about others to Trump’s.
Let’s make that a fucking idiot to compare them.”
If the standards is speach our founders and other president were notorious for some of the things they said about each other.
Jefferson said that Washington was a Harlot.
Madison was accused of whoring Dolly Madison arround to get votes,
Burr said Munroe was so dumb that as a lawyer he never won a case that paid more than $5.
Grant said Garfield lacked the backbone of an angleworm.
Roosevelt called Taft a Puzzlewit and a fathead. Wilson called Harding “a fool of a president”.
Harry Truman predicted Dwight Eisenhower would make Ulysses S. Grant’s scandal-scarred administration look like “a model of perfection.” Truman had an even harsher opinion of Lyndon Johnson: “No guts.”
Inside the white house Truman was infamous for incredibly foul language.
John F. Kennedy called Richard Nixon “a filthy lying son of a bitch and a very dangerous man.” Lyndon Johnson was even more harsh — and prophetic. “He’s like a Spanish horse, who runs faster than anyone for the first nine lengths, and then turns around and runs backwards.” Johnson was equally merciless to Nixon’s successor, Gerald Ford. “Jerry spent too much time playing football without a helmet.”
In 1936, President Franklin D. Roosevelt promoted putting “dangerous or undesirable aliens or citizens” in “concentration camps.” And he did it.
In 1954, President Dwight D. Eisenhower told Supreme Court Chief Justice Earl Warren white Southerners “are not bad people. All they are concerned about is to see that their sweet little girls are not required to sit in school alongside some big overgrown Negroes”
President Lyndon B. Johnson would routinely use the “N” word and called civil rights legislation “n***er” bills.
Johnson also reportedly defended appointing Thurgood Marshall to the Supreme Court––the court’s first black justice in U.S. history––by stating, “Son, when I appoint a n***er to the court, I want everyone to know he’s a n***er.”
Nixon added, “I have the greatest affection for [blacks], but I know they’re not going to make it for 500 years. They aren’t. You know it, too. The Mexicans are a different cup of tea. They have a heritage. At the present time they steal, they’re dishonest, but they do have some concept of family life. They don’t live like a bunch of dogs, which the Negroes do live like.”
My remarks are not defenses of Trump.
I am merely pointing out that you are wrong and have little knowledge of history.
Trump’s public remarks that offend you greatly are TAME in comparison to those of past presidents.
And Trump’s less public remarks are far MORE tame in comparison to past presidents.
We do not have audio and video of most of them, and the news of through most of our history has not printed the viulgarity of many presidents – even on the campaign trail – though that has NOT always been true and some very offensive remarks made the press and political handouts during the first 50 years of our history.
There is little unusual about Trump. As I have noted repeatedly – he is a mediocre president.
But he looks good because he was preceded by two disasters and a rapist.
Because he has taken a poor economy that Obama and bush had nearly convinced everyone was the new normal and manage to return it to average.
What is unusual is the incredible outrage. While that of the left is extremely disturbing. Yours is even more so. You pretend to be moderate – and yet you respond to Trump as if he was the devil incarnate.
You are offended because Trump insulted McCain – I have been offended by SOME of the things Trump has said about McCain. It is inappropriate for someone who avoided vietnam to attack the war record of someone who was an actual hero there.
But Trump’s attack’s on McCain’s involvement in the Steele Dossier are justified, and true.
McCain was a true american hero, and sometimes he was an asshole.
Read his books, I think you will find McCain would agree.
And if Criticizing War Hero’s is out of bounds for presidents – Truman said some very bad things about BOTH MacArthur and Eisenhower. Both of whom were also genuine war heroes AND sometimes flawed humans.
The only thing especially unusual about Trump is the degree to which you and the press defame him. to be clear – you and the press are free to criticise Trump,
But the Trump Derangement Syndrome is wearing thin.
Absolutely – you are not alone – there are lots of people suffering from TDS,.
Quoting them does not make you look any more rational.
My guess is that Trump is more of a narcissist than a sociopath.
But it does not matter much – both are Cluster B personality types – they are closely related.
The vast majority of sociopaths are not criminals, and a large portion of successful people are sociopaths. Further they are particularly common is certain professions.
CEO’s Ministers, Teachers, Government employees, and at the top of the list – politicians.
Saying Trump may be a sociopath is like saying he may be a politician.
Absolutely we should be concerned about sociopaths as president – but we have had lots of them before. Power attracts sociopaths.
Again you make a purportedly terrifying claim about Trump – that he is a sociopath. and are pretty ignorant about sociopaths.
Estimate are about 1 in 30 people are sociopaths. they are pretty common.
While they make up about 30% of all criminals, the vast majority of sociopaths are not criminals.
I would prefer that we never elected sociopaths to positions in govenrment – but that ship sailed long ago.
Pointing out that you are both hysterical and wrong is not “defending Trump”
I pay little attention to Lou Dobb’s.
Trump’s attack’s on McCain’s military service were very wrong, and he should have apologized.
Trump’s attack’s on McCain’s involvement in the Steele Dossier were justified.
Much the same as Truman’s remarks about MacArthur and Eisenhower.
BTW Truman was elected but left office with an approval rating of 32%.
Isn’t it extremely hypocritical for you to be criticising Trump for attacking other peoples character.
Do you make any posts that are not attack’s on character ?
You are particularly prone to attack the character of people who disagree with you.
Sounds alot like Trump to me.
Though Trump’s remarks are not as offensive as yours.
“Was under the impression that the darkest, lowest place on Earth was the bottom of the Mariana Trench. Turns out, it’s Donald Trump’s soul.”
-Bret Stephens
“This *president* is the pettiest tyrant in living memory. Every day he heaps shame upon us in the eyes of the world.”
-Bette Midler
So now we have evidence – from his own mouth that McCabe was NOT merely investigating Trump but also Sessions.
What is succificent evidence for government to open an investigation ?
Can government investigate anyone for any reason ?
There are actually guidlines for this – as well as law, the use of the power of government for purposes that are NOT legitimate government purposes is both a tort and a crime.
https://www.realclearinvestigations.com/articles/2019/03/04/mccabe_probed_not_just_trump_but_own_boss_sessions_too.html
The facts here are hillarious – and scary.
So the school schedules a day of spirit and civic pride and AFTER hours, two students take pictures of themselves in MAGA sweatshirts with a MAGA banner, and the schools suspends one of them for 10 days ?
https://pjmedia.com/trending/high-school-student-suspended-for-posing-with-pro-trump-maga-flag-and-sweatshirt/
BTW, this issue was decided more than 40 years ago in Tinker v. Des Moines
non-disruptive political speach at school is protected by the first amendement.
If you can wear anti-war armbands to class, you can certainly wear MAGA shirts and hold a MAGA banner AFTER class.
I have said this before. Of all the rights gaurenteed by the constitution, non is more important than freedom of speech. It took years for the ” hippie generation” to get speech a right in schools.
But I guess its not as much a right as one would think or the ACLU would be front and center. I suspect liberals believe they own that right since they e arnec it in the 60’s-70’s and they can take it away whenever they please.
How unusual is President Trump ?
BTW Victor David Hanson IS an actual historian. He is currently considered on of the greatest living experts on WWII
https://nypost.com/2019/03/09/democratic-presidents-behaved-a-lot-worse-than-trump-in-the-white-house/
It is likely that Trump is just trying to buy time – run out the clock on North Korea.
There are 3 fundimental means to intercept ICBM’s.
At launch, in space and during re-entry.
The easiest is “at launch, But systems like AEGIS and THAD have the problem that they must be close to the launch point and they are always in a tail chase, and the window of time for success is very small. Conversely targeting ICBM’s from high altitude Drones eliminates all of those.
We do not and likely never will have an ABM system that con protect the US against Russia or China. But we already have about 50:50 odds of stopping anything from elsewhere with improvements over time.
https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/03/north-korea-nuclear-talks-missile-intercept-technology/
I can just see old Fred chortling away:
“Trump Has Now Shifted $1.3 Million Of Campaign-Donor Money Into His Business”
One example:
“In addition, the campaign has paid $54,000 to Trump Plaza LLC, which controls a property that includes two brownstone apartment buildings in New York City. The reason for those payments, which are listed as “rent,” remains unclear. Forbes staked out the property for 14 hours on a November day but still could not pin down what exactly the campaign was renting. A person working behind the front desk couldn’t make sense of it either. “If there was any kind of office rented out for campaigning or whatever, I would know about it.” Six residents also said they had never seen any indication of the campaign in the buildings. A 2016 campaign staffer, however, said people sometimes crashed at an apartment there when they were in town.”
https://www.forbes.com/sites/danalexander/2019/03/20/trump-has-now-shifted-13m-of-campaign-donor-money-into-his-business/#47538f3c7aaf
Wow! Trump – who contributes millions to his own campaigns and is running for president in a campaign likely to run close to $1B dollars, uses 1.3M to pay for services from businesses that he owns and trusts. AOC who ran for a house of representatives seat – funnelled 800K into businesses she or her paramour or her friends controlled and you are silent.
Atleast you know where Trump’s money went – we still do not know where AOC’s went.
Your government at work.
Guys, what are you expecting? To reach him? To finally hear some kind of ordinary decency or common sense? Its not in the program. Don’t bang your heads against a wall that history is going to demolish anyhow in due time.
“Guys, what are you expecting? To reach him?”
Facts, logic, reason.
“To finally hear some kind of ordinary decency or common sense? ”
You speak of decency ?
When you accuse others of lying, when you step onto the moral soapbox,
Either you can prove your claims, or the moral failure is yours.
You do not have a clue what morality is.
“Its not in the program. Don’t bang your heads against a wall that history is going to demolish anyhow in due time.”
Wishful thinking is not history.
We are well past the point where your beleifs and the conduct of those you chose to support can be vindicated.
Even if by some impossible miracle Mueller uncovered actual proof of criminal collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia – what is self evident is that the entire conduct of DOJ/FBI/CIA/NSA during the Obama administration and into the Trump administration was criminally politically corrupt.
The odds of Mueller pulling off that miracle – are zero.
But if you call Trump and anyone else who you disagree with a liar and otherwise malign them sufficiently – you can feel vindicated.
No! Full Stop!
If I am going to condemn Trump for his false attacks on McCain’s war record, I must hold YOU and others equally culpable for your false attacks – whether they are of Trump, or anyone else.
The only vindication for moral judgments of others is truth.
We can disagree over opinions, we can be honestly wrong about facts, without moral consequences.
When you make false moral claims about others, the moral consequences are yours.
On Anderson Cooper AOC openly stated that Facts do not matter if you are morally right.
You can not be morally right if you are factually wrong.
And you are morally wrong, if you are factually wrong about a moral claim about someone else.
It comes down simply to character. McCain had his, trump has his. Like attracts like, where there is a trump there will be a lou dobbs and that lot of cult like supporters of the trump way, the trump character. Bad character has power, there is no doubt, a lot of history has been made by people of bad character.
Its easy to get caught in totally unproductive ways of dealing with people of bad character and their tricks and their stink, to fall to the jerry springer level of reaction. The trick is not getting caught in that dead end, not playing life-sucking pissing games with skunks, and instead finding the way to beat them.
“It comes down simply to character. McCain had his, trump has his. ”
McCain’s life is a perfect example of the complexity of human character.
McCain’s conduct as a POW is a reflection of what is best in us under the worst of circumstances. McCain’s involvements with Charles Keating were sufficiently sketchy to earn censure from the Senate and were distinguishable from Those of Sen. Menendez only in scale. McCain’s involvement with the Steele Dossier was wrong.
Just like many of our Founders John McCain is a reflection of what is best in us, and what is worst.
“Like attracts like, where there is a trump there will be a lou dobbs and that lot of cult like supporters of the trump way, the trump character. Bad character has power, there is no doubt, a lot of history has been made by people of bad character.”
Here you are back casting vague moral aspersions.
There is specific conduct of Trump’s – such as his personal attack’s on McCain as a POW that are reprehensible.
But you are doing exactly what you are accusing Trump (and others) of.
Only worse. Trump tends to be specific when he makes moral allegations.
You are completely skipping any claim of actual moral misconduct and jumping straight to broad conclusions about large numbers of people.
Trump is immoral – why ? Because he lies. Yet all too often what you call lies, AREN’T.
That is on you.
Lou Dobbs is immoral. I do not even know “Lou Dobbs”, maybe he is immoral. But you offer no proof, no specific claim. Dobbs is immoral – because you disagree with him.
That is not sufficient.
Then according to you all Trump supporters are an immoral cult.
And a “Trump supporter” according to you is anyone who does not roll over and accept your unsupported allegations that Trump is the worst thing that has ever happened to the country.
Either we join you in TDS or we are immoral.
Even Trump does not cast the broad moral aspersions that you do.
“Its easy to get caught in totally unproductive ways of dealing with people of bad character and their tricks and their stink, to fall to the jerry springer level of reaction. The trick is not getting caught in that dead end, not playing life-sucking pissing games with skunks, and instead finding the way to beat them.”
The trick is not to make false allegations. If you have any doubts regarding bad character – that is bad character.
It is also wise – particularly in an era where getting facts right is pretty easy, not to be wrong about your facts. Because contrary to AOC you can not be factually wrong and morally correct.
Support them or not, I dont care. But I think leadership in this country has the common sense of a Japanese Beatle grub.
Hasn’t it been said one of the reasons Clinton lost close runs in a handful of states was her “deplorable” comment. Some have even embraced the “deplorabke” label andcwear deplorabke t-shirts. So good ol’ Joe now calls these same people the “Dregs of society”. Another t-shirt sale coming up!
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/sep/17/joe-biden-dregs-society-have-ally-donald-trump/
This just shows how out of touch Washington politicians are today. What they do not understand there are many millions of people who place personal freedoms and economic security above all other issues that face this country. When a choice is between these two issues and an very imperfect person promoting those positions or more social programs, more force (ie PPACA fine…tax) by government, identity politics and someone less imperfect, those “Dregs” will vote for personal freedoms and economic security.
I know I am out of touch myself. I would think keeping your mouth shut when a brain fart like this occurs would be wise. Finding common ground on issues would be wise. Not further dividing the country would be wise. Not forcing middle America to vote for fringe assholes would be wise. Make American Whole Again would be wise.
Can anyone show me a wise “man” in Washington today. ( “Man” in the context of homosapien, not sex)
Republicans think democrats are wrong.
Democrats think Republicans are evil.
The later is what is wrong with our politics.
Anything can be justified if you can paint the other party evil.
And that is the point – justifying your own misconduct.
Robby wants to rant about character and morality – without any understanding of either.
Robert Mueller lead the 2 year long investigation into Richard Jewel that publicly besmirched an innocent man as a terrorist. I can not think of much that better demonstrates bad character than that.
Then Mueller blamed Steven Hatfill for the 2001 Anthrax attacks – hounding him for several years. After That failed Mueller hounded Bruce Ivins until he committed suicide.
This is their hero ?
This is someone of good character who is going to set history straight ?
I have plenty of problems with Trump’s conduct.
But I am capable of seeing the world as it is.
I would prefer a world where our presidents were clearly of good character,
Where they did not own slaves or worse sleep with them.
Where they did not lie under oath.
Where they did not sic the IRS on political enemies,
Or have the CIA spy on Senators,
Or the FBI spy on journalists,
Or use the FBI to whitewash political cronies,
Or use the FBI to go after political enemies.
In the light of actual past presidents even recent past presidents Trump’s character like his economy is average.
First, let me stipulate that I see little upside to Trump bashing McCain right now, and considerable downside. It’s ugly behavior, and I don’t like it. Trump may have some strategic purpose, but I don’t know what it might be. It’s not as if McCain didn’t spend the two years of his life exacting his revenge on Trump, for succeeding where he failed, and for saying nasty things about him.
Second, I believe that McCain was a war hero. But I have never been of the mindset that war heroes (or heroes in general) are automatically good people for the rest of their lives. McCain proved himself to be a liar and a cheater on many occasions (the Keating 5, dumping his newly crippled first wife, after cheating on her with the much younger and richer Cindy, and, of course, pledging to the voters of Arizona that he would support a wall/fence and would repeal Obamacare, when he had no intention of ever doing so).
McCain loved the press, and the press loved him, but only when he was being the Maverick. When he ran against Obama, they called him an unstable, dangerous old warmonger. They destroyed Sarah Palin (who had a lot more going for her than Stacey Abrams, who is rumored to be Biden’s early pick for veep). So, after he lost in 2008, he became the full-time Maverick, even publicly disinviting Trump and Palin to his funeral, purely out of spite (although what Palin ever did to deserve that, I don’t know).
Trump has known for 2 years that McCain participated in the plot to overthrow him. So,now that that is public, he’s getting it out there in his own crass way. I think it’s a mistake, but I suppose that remains to be seen.
“Trump may have some strategic purpose…”
No. This is just his typical childish narcissistic ego-damaged mode of pettiness.
Same as his petty response to Conway’s criticisms. This my favorite toon about that whole ludicrous situation:
George Conway is a ridiculous attention-seeker, who has been baiting Trump for months on end, and Trump has ignored him, for the sake of Kellyanne. In a reversal of his usual role, Trump has behaved in a restrained way, and has been respectful of the woman who helped get him elected, and serves as one of his top advisors.
It seems that the little troll has finally gone too far, and Trump has likely made it clear that, unless Kellyanne can control her spouse, she will need to move on. HIs reference to Conway as “Mr. Kellyanne Conway” hit the nail on the head…the man is clearly jealous of his wife’s success, and doesn’t care how his public behavior affects her job and/or their kids.
I figure there are three possible outcomes to this: 1) George shuts his pie hole and Kellyanne remains Trump’s advisor. 2) The Conways divorce and Kellyanne remains Trump’s advisor 3) George continues to behave like an annoying gadfly, Kellyanne is forced to leave the WH, and the Conways get a reality show.
No one would care about George Conway if he was not married to Kelleyanne.
You would think that the left and women would celebrate a women who accomplished something that everyone though was impossible, despite having a husband who rather than applaud his wife, appears intent on stabbing her in the back.
Their relationship is their business. But even Carville/Maitlin did not engage in this kind of personal backstabbing.
I think Trump should stay out of it. This is Kelleyanne’s problem – and that of the idiots who think George is consequential because of who he is married to.
Dear Dumb-Dumb –
Show me any comment or remark where Conway mentioned his wife in relation to her work with Trump.
“Dear Dumb-Dumb –
Show me any comment or remark where Conway mentioned his wife in relation to her work with Trump.”
I did not realize George was posting anonymously ? NOT!.
George initially sought a job in the Trump administration.
He has kept silent for 2 years, Suddenly he starts this nonsense ?
Sorry Jay, George better how he has a brain tumor to explain his conduct.
Really Priscilla, your metamorphosis into a Trumpanzee clone is complete.
Conway, in addition to an A.B. degree magna cum laude in Biochemistry from Harvard and a law Degree from Yale where he was an editor of the Law Journal and president of the school’s Federalist Society, has had a long successful history as a conservative Republican lawyer, advisor and insider.
Go read his bio on Wikipedia.
Then read KellyAnne’s, with emphasis on the number of lies, distortions, inanities, ethical violations listed there. She’s the one who has sold her self-respect for notoriety, and betrayed her marriage vows to honor her husband: her ‘boss’ publicly insulted George’s character on national media, and in return she publicly defended Trump’s right to do that. If Trump said her three children were defective because George fathered them, she’d undoubtedly agree as well and tell her kids, ‘yes, Daddy’s DNA has effected you negatively, but the President still loves you anyway.’
She “betrayed her marriage vows”?! That is absurd. I mean totally, completely absurd.
I have read Conway’s bio. He’s a highly educated man, and a successful attorney. So what? He’s been obsessively tweeting anti-Trump slander for months, even as his wife served as a top advisor to the president. I know that, as an avid Twitter follower yourself, you must know this, and know that Trump, a prolific user of Twitter has not responded to the little jerk until this week.
Kellyanne Conway has handled this about as well as anyone could, under the circumstances. Her pathetic and disloyal husband is the one who has put her into an untenable situation. Trump, her boss and the President of the US, has been more loyal to her than her own husband.
Democrat, Republican, Socialist, whatever, if you are married to a campaign manager, you do not publicly shit on their candidate. If you do so, you are ending your marraige.
Kelleyanne is far more tolerant than either I or my wife would be.
And Trump has been unbeleivably tolerant too.
Do you think a degree makes you intelligent ?
I can find a long list of people with advanced degrees to tell you that everything you think is idiocy.
For every issue there is someone with multiple doctorates on either side.
In the end you are going to have to figure it out on your own.
As to Kelleyanne – why do I need a wikipedia bio ?
Kelleyanne Conway is the most successfull female campaign manager in history.
And her husband is shitting on her accomplishments.
If David Plouffe’s wife was shitting on him in public, there would be no Mrs. Plouffe.
If George had a problem with Kelleyanne working for Trump – he should have spoken up years ago.
Today it is treason – not against Trump, but against his wife.
Aparently he does not really want to be married.
If my wife had a shot a her dream job – even one working for someone or in a field I did not like, I would back her and bite my tongue. Any disagreements between us belong in private.
“She’s the one who has sold her self-respect for notoriety,”
She won an election no one thought was winnable.
That is an accomplishment.
Are we shitting on James Carville for getting Clinton elected ?
Are you accusing him of “selling out” ?
What about David Plouffe ?
“and betrayed her marriage vows”
That would be George.
“to honor her husband”
I was married in 1983 – my vows to my wife were the same as hers to me.
“her ‘boss’ publicly insulted George’s character on national media”
George not merely publicly shat on her boss, but publicly shat on her accomplishment.
“and in return she publicly defended Trump’s right to do that.”
And he should have expected that.
George is not merely shitting on Trump, He is shitting on his wife.
Wow! Full Bull Goose Looney!
Why not go the whole way and just say if Trump sent her kids to the ovens, she would have latched the doors.
Trump has not insulted her kids. I can not think of any instance – including McCain in which Trump has ever gone after a person FIRST.
Nor has Trump said anything about anyone like what you claim.
Your hatred of Trump has you hearing things. But that has been clear for some time.
If all you get is narcissism from a politician – you are lucky.
Regardless, McCain is coming up again as a result of the slow release of house transcripts.
You should expect more – there are about 75 more transcripts to come.
If McCain did not want to give Trump periodic oportunities to criticise him – he should not have pushed the Steele Dossier on the DOJ/FBI.
They already had it. He likely knew that. He also had good reason to beleive it was garbage – and if not then he was politicaly snookered – regardless, his own involvement and actions make McCain look petty and stupid.
The cartoon was pretty good.
I would note the Conways are not the only political odd couple.
Carville/Maitlin
The upside to bashing McCain is keeping the story of political corruption in the news.
I would further note that the story drove Trump not the other way around.
Rep. Collins slow release of transcripts is allowing the story of political corruption to be replayed again. Though I will note there is a difference.
The Trump collusion stories hit the press as rumors from unnamed sources and they sometimes get repeated, but eventually they die. There is pretty much nothing left of the Russian collusion narrative. No corroboration of any kind has been found, while many elements have been outright refuted.
The political corruptions stories hit the press as rumors – often ones they try to run from,
but the press can not hide from stories. With those over time we add substance – actual sources, and then testimony and texts, and emails – EVIDENCE.
Yes we have known this for sometime – but now we have EVIDENCE – testimony, emails.
I would further note that – whether the source is Clinton, HFA, McCain or Simpson, all these parties are free to try to persuade the FBI to investigate Trump and the Trump campaign.
The PROBLEM is at DOJ/FBI.
DOJ/FBI took allegations that the KNEW were politically sourced by Trump’s enemies.
They did NOTHING to verify them, they knew they were garbage and they sold them to FISA as actual evidence.
We were told – by Brenanan and by the purported Intelligence community that there was real evidence from credible sources. THERE WAS NOT.
We have confirmed that NOTHING came in from FiveEyes, That to the extent that CIA and FBI participated in this, they too were driven by the Steele Dossier or by manipluated political sources, or by their own political biases.
The point of attacking McCain is to stress over and over and over again, that all sources of Russia Collusion narratives were political, preposterous and unvetted.
As late as May 2017 Comey testified to congress that the Steele Dossier was completely unverified – that is AFTER Mueller was appointed.
From start to finish todate there is not a single credible allegation. There is nothing that was sufficient to start an investigation in December 2015, not in March 2016, not in July 2016, not in October 2017, not in March 2017.
Not only were the warrant applications to the FISA court criminally politically corrupt – Warrants must be sworn. But Mueller’s apointment was politically corrupt.
As McCabe said on 60minutes – they were driven my their fear. Fear is NOT evidence.
We had a DOJ/FBI/CIA/NSA that prejudged Trump – based on fear not evidence, has spent nearly 3 years trying to come up with evidence and not only found nothing, but NEVER has had enough to start an investigation.
The newly exposed evidence that AG Lynch tole the FBI there would be no prosecution of Clinton based on 18cf793(f) – reckless or negligent, despite the fact that Comey and Baker – like most of the rest of us grasped that was a slam dunk from the start.
Further the AG’s claim that only military prosecutions were based on reckless standards is FALSE, Deutsche – Bill Clinton’s CIA director and Petreus were both convicted on the basis of recklessness for incidents involving LESS material, and for instances that did NOT result in foreign powers gaining access to the material.
A recommendation from the FBI that sufficient evidence existed to prosecute 18cfr793(f) would have ended Clinton’s candidacy – and that SHOULD HAVE HAPPENED in 2015 – in plenty of time for democrats to field a better candidate.
The corruption of the DOJ/FBI regarding Clinton only makes that of the Trump/Russia nonsense worse.
In fact, Trump was correct in that he did give McCain what he wanted: a funeral WITHOUT Trump attending.
Yup. A funeral without Trump.
Rest in peace, John, flaws and all.
Dduck
John McCain NEVER let go of his bitterness towards Trump.
You are correct that Trump gave McCain what he wanted – a funeral without Trump.
Trump did that. Trump let go. Trump did not speak of McCain for months.
Trump is only speaking ill of him now months later – because the release of House Transcripts is bringing McCain’s involvement in the Steele Dossier to the surface again.
Trump’s remarks about McCain during the campaign were way out of line. I thought they tanked his candidacy at the time. They are a major factor in my choice not to vote for Trump.
I do not have a problem with Trump attacking McCain – that is politics, McCain should have stayed out of the 2016 election. But Trump should not have attacked McCain over his military service. that was just plain stupid.
This is where you are digging to try to find a “lie” ?
Absolutely the National Cathederal is a church and it can do whatever it pleases.
At the same time – your own article notes that McCain lay at state in the capitol.
I can not establish whether the McCain service at the National Cathederal was a State Funeral. Though from the list of dignataries – it sure looks like it.
My Guess is that it was not. And my guess is the only reason it was not was NOT because they needed Trump’s permission – which they likely asked for and got, but because if they chose to make it a state funeral – Trump could not be prohibited from participating.
Regardless, for Trump’s remarks to be a “lie” as you claim – YOU would have to prove that Trump was NOT asked, or that he Rejected a state funeral.
The fact that the NC does not require Trump’s permission for a funeral that is NOT a state funeral proves nothing. Even if McCain’s funeral was NOT a state funeral – which we do not know, That does not make Trump’s remarks a lie.
You seem intent on proving your own moral failures.
If you accuse someone of lying – or any other moral failure – the burden of proof is on you.
And if you can not meet it the moral failure is yours.
It is possible Trump is lying here, what is more likely is that he is not. That he was asked, that he agreed, and that the McCain family decided NOT to have a state funeral if that risked Trump’s presence. But I do not know that. Nor is that the only scenario is which Trump is not lying. Pretty much any scenario in which Trump was asked – even if only by his own staff, means Trump is not lying.
If McCain’s funeral was not a state funeral – it should have been. But the McCain family is entitled to do what they want.
Once again you are using deadbeat dad to make a claim that Trump lied – without sufficient evidence.
Look at the people who become very defensive when trump, a man of truly and obviously bad character judging by so many criteria, is criticized and twist themselves energetically into pretzels explaining away his faults. (the old make a silk purse out of a sows ear PR routine.) When the same people, by way of defending trump, try to explain that a man of McCains character is no saint and is perfectly open to criticism and that there is no reason to get excited by trump attacking him…. Of course McCain is open to criticism for his faults and mistakes and of course trump is open to criticism for his, both in proportion to the level of the flaws in their character. As well, into the character equation goes the part of their character that is admirable or even heroic. In my world trump and McCain fall out in very different parts of the character spectrum when one talks about the sum of their good and bad sides. Those who have the view that trump is in a fine position to relentlessly and repeatedly ream on McCain are not living in the same universe I live in. This is the stuff that chasms are made of.
Roby, one can do more to promote unity in the country by avoiding divisive comments. This all really got started with the Gingrich congress and Clinton impeachment. Then the democrats never got over the Bush election. Following, the GOP took another step when they could not accept Obama and the final huge step was the Trump election. With every election, the rhetoric ratcheted up, Trump describing those that suffered unimaginable things in POW camps unacceptible names and characterizations. But the more unacceptible comments are not what one politician calls another politician. That has happened since the revoolution, or before.
The most unacceptable of all comments is when politicians identify a complete voting block of citizens and characterize them as “Deplorables” and “Dregs of Society”.
When I make a decision to vote for someone based on the people or the country…….
1. Being free to say what they wnat, when and where they want,
2. Not being forced to buy a product or service by a private company (PPACA)
3. Not being subjected to higher energy prices due to agreements detrimental to America, while allowing China to continue to polute at a higher rate for yewrs to come,
4. Not being subjected to higher taxes to pay for boondoggles like the California bullet train that has wasted billions
5. Living in a country where the border is considered a border and individuals who do not have permission to be in the country are considered illegal
6. an economic policy the supports business and investments using fair tax policies where companies have an equal tax liability here and abroard,
7. trade policies that are equal at both ends of the trade in and out, while insuring copy right of artificial intelligence is protected.
8. social programs applied equally, without using identity politics to promote one position or another
9. A judicial system rulings based on the constitution on not political party positions or special interest positions
10 and…
…..! find it completely unacceptable for anyone in any leadership position in any party calling me a deplorable or a dreg!!!!
Just because I may not agree with someone elses political position and I decide to vote for a candidate because both parties are providing some of the most unacceptable candidates to fill the office of the president, I am making my decision on what I believe is in the best interest of this country for years to come.
When I make that decision along with 45%-55% of the voters, those representing the voters on the other side should be asking how to change some of their positions to make them more acceptable to the greatest number of Americans, not further dividing this country by calling us deplorables and dregs.
Outstanding comment, Ron.
Trump and McCain, two rich and immensely powerful men, who clearly hated each other, are carrying on a personal and political vendetta that has extended even beyond the grave. History is full of stories like that. Interesting, but ultimately unimportant in the scheme of things.
But, intentional hate-mongering directed at decent citizens by supposed leaders, based solely on the fact that these citizens support and vote for the opposition party, has become a threat to the continuation of this country, at least as we know it.
When Joe Biden says that Trump and his supporters are the “dregs of society,” he’s saying that 65 million Americans don’t deserve freedom, success, or safety, because they voted for someone else. Someone whose policies they preferred, but who is not Biden.
I guess he thinks that insulting half of the voters, and referring to them contemptuously as somewhat less than human is a good way to get elected?
Sort of the way Romney blew off the 47% of people who wouldn’t vote for him? Because that worked out so well for President Romney…
McCain is dead. He is carrying on no vendetta. He is gone. trump remains, the so called POTUS.
Reading what Biden actually said, no he did not blanket call all trumps supporters the dregs. But if you need to believe he did to work yourself up, well, its inevitable that trump supporters are going to do that. The dem party is not looking for your vote.
I have my own juicy private phrases to describe the trump supporters who have exonerated trump for his sexual predation, sympathized with the proud boys, dumped all over survivors of school massacres if they dared to become political about the experience. One does not have to live in a trailer to be in the category that I am thinking of.
I am pretty sure that the people who refer to accurate criticism of trump as TDS are going to find scant sympathy outside their own ranks when they work up their grievances with things dems say. trump has set a standard that no dem will be able to surpass, unless it is heard through the ears of someone who never was going to vote dem anyhow. So, its a bit fat, “Cry Me a River, over the alleged Biden remark and trump supporters are going to be hearing a lot more of Cry me a River over the next years, which they have brought on themselves by ignoring trumps unprecedented behaviors.
I don’t “need” to believe anything, Roby. I understand that Biden gave himself a bit of “plausible deniability,” as did Hillary, when she said only half of Trump supporters were deplorable racists. These are things that you believe,as well, and because you hold those beliefs, you can’t see clearly that the leaders who believe them and promote them are dangerous. There is no reason to call anyone deplorable or a dreg, unless they have actually behaved in a hateful way…voting is not hateful, nor is debate.
Ron has made clear, on any number of occasions, that he has well-thought out policy preferences. He has also made clear that he would prefer leaders who make policy the centerpiece of their platforms, and I was agreeing with that. The problem with people who have allowed their dislike of Trump to become a form of TDS is that those people can no longer see that he has pursued a platform of policy positions that have, on balance, been very positive for the country. He is far from perfect, and his marital history is …well, he is a product of the rich celebrity lifestyle from which he came. On the other hand, he appears to have left that lifestyle behind.
John McCain behaved admirably as a POW, but less so at other points in his life. That is simply fact. You didn’t vote for him, so you must have had some reason to prefer a first term senator who had not served in the armed forces, and had no clear policy positions, other than a preference for government health care, and a belief that he could “fundamentally transform” the country in some way. So, you clearly rejected someone who you now revere as a hero and a man of impeccable character, for someone who was largely a mystery. And he turned out to be a failure as president, setting the stage for a populist voter revolt.
This “dreggs of society” and deplorables nonsense, is stupid.
Plausible deniability is irrelevant.
The question is of intelligence. Pretend whatever you want – those who voted for Trump know Clinton meant THEM, and they know Biden means THEM.
Further from the context of the speach we know that Biden means:
People who think homosexuality is a sin.
People who think MTF Trans teens should not shower with their daughters,
People who think the army should not pay for sex change operations.
People who think that the government should not pay for abortions.
People who think you should not have to be forced to violate your religious beliefs in order to be in business.
That is an enormous number of “the dreggs of society”.
Wrong. I never said McCain was a man of impeccable character. Straw man. Reread what I wrote in various places about McCain and you will likely understand that. I did not vote for McCain because I did not vote for Anyone for POTUS in that election in 2012, I wanted to vote for McCain but there was that name Palin on the ballot next to him and he was not a young man. So….
The Man of mystery, Obama? Not only did I Not vote for Obama in 2012, by 2014 I was writing him a letter and stating that he did not have the character to be president, remember? I posted it here. You thought it was a very good letter. I was also strongly disagreeing with his go it alone policy here. I had no trouble characterizing his “you can keep your insurance statement” as either a lie or proof that he was clueless about the details of his eponymous legislation . Remember?
Your letter to trump stating that he does not have the character to be POTUS? We can expect that letter when? We can expect that letter Never, no matter what trump says of does. That is not who you are. Once you are in your are in full tilt till the end and damn the torpedoes.
If due to events trump should sink to only the hardest core trump supporters you and Dave will not bat an eye and your posts on trump will not change, no matter what he does or gets caught doing. The two of you will say, So What? in unison to everything. So, don’t be surprised , I say So What to you and Dave, I don’t care about your outrages. So What to them all.
Priscilla, You and Dave both drive me nuts with your predictable programmed blindness. That would not change if you both were flaming liberals or progressives, you would approach it the same way you both approach your conservative spinning. I would still have exactly the same relationship and the same opinion of both of you. Its the approach, the habits of thought, not the ideology.
er, the election of 2008, not 2012.
Ah, you have a better memory than I, Roby. I do remember that letter.
But I also do recall that McCain ran against Obama in 2008 and, in 2012, you did vote for Obama, perhaps later regretting it.
In any case, leaving aside your personal insults, I will say that you have missed my entire point, which is this:
McCain’s war hero status did not confer upon him any lifelong dispensation from criticism, any more than Trump’s promiscuity and marital infidelity conferred upon him lifelong condemnation. It’s pretty apparent to most students of history that many war heroes have also been flawed, sometimes seriously flawed, men, and that many promiscuous philanderers have been great leaders,
So, my point is not that McCain was bad and Trump is good. My point is that we all have the personal right and freedom to use our best judgement in voting for and supporting a presidential candidate. I understand that you and Jay and duck are repulsed by Trump. Fine…you didn’t vote for him, and you don’t have to like him. But millions of people DID vote for him, and they did not do so because they are deplorable racists, homophobes, or drooling dregs of society. The vast majority did so in spite of his marital history and because they thought he would be a better president than Hillary Clinton.
It may hearten you to believe that I am a “Trumpanzee”, or whatever else you want to believe, and I encourage you to go right ahead and do what heartens you and makes you feel smart and superior. .
But when presidential candidates call millions of people deplorable and the “lowest of the low,” (that is the definition of “dregs” no?) that is unacceptable and dangerous. And those are the leaders who are truly unfit.
trumpanzee not in my vocabulary.
trump, the actual POTUS repeatedly calling the MSM the enemy of the people? Doubling down on that after one of his supporters started sending bombs to the press? Fit?
No not fit.
which has never bothered you enough to change your opinion.
“trumpanzee not in my vocabulary.”
Taking a page out of your book – have you condemned those calling people Trumpanzee today ? Or “the Dreggs of society” ?
If we are going to go after everyone who has not condemned whatever the pet offense of the moment is – why not that ?
You expect everyone here who is not a Trump denier to condemn Trump for far less offensive remarks.
Our are you a hypocrit ?
So let me help you out with the answer.
We are not each obligated to call out and criticism ever offensive thing anyone anywhere in the world ever does that is offensive.
We each get to decide what offends us personally, and how much.
You are free to decide that calling others “trumpanzee” is not some unforgiveably great sin that requires you to speak out, just as the rest of us need not agree that everything Trump says rises to the level of frothing outrage.
“Trump, the actual POTUS repeatedly calling the MSM the enemy of the people?”
Got no problems with that.
“Doubling down on that after one of his supporters started sending bombs to the press?”
So Rep. Omar attacking Jews is OK after some wing nut shoots up a Synagogue ?
Grow Up, there are plenty of nutcases out their. They are going to do nutjob things – whether Trump or Omar say something or not.
Are you saying every candidate is personally responsible for everything anyone who identifies as a supporter does ? Really ?
“which has never bothered you enough to change your opinion.”
My opinion is based primarily on Trump’s actions.
Christ shares the same criteria, a does the law.
McCain was a pretty serious philanderer after he returned from Vietnam. We give people who have been POW’s a great deal of lattitude, at the same time, they should not be impugning those who engage in the same misconduct they do.
The tribulations of being a POW and its after effects are not a justification for hypocracy.
“But millions of people DID vote for him, and they did not do so because they are deplorable racists, homophobes, or drooling dregs of society. The vast majority did so in spite of his marital history and because they thought he would be a better president than Hillary Clinton.”
Calling them “Trumpanzees”, Deplorables, the Dreggs of societiey,
Is your right.
It is also incredibly stupid.
Maybe you, or Clinton or Biden only mean a few people – but the vast majority of us – often even people who did not vote for Trump think you mean US.
And I am pretty sure we are right.
But whether we are or not – the error is yours.
You have labeled 10’s of millions of people revolting, because they have political views different from yours.
I was alive for the summer of rage in the 60’s. I bumped into people who used phrases, like coon, jigaboo, darkie, and more offensive ones all the time. Even David Dukes does not talk or act like that today.
Before I was born – blacks were murdered if they were accused of looking at a white person funny.
This is the least racist moment in US history. We are the least racist, homophobic, misogynist country in the world.
Jay, and Robby, and Bidden and Clinton and the left generally spend all their time trying to foment race hatred.
Today, statistically race does not rate as a factor in peoples success.
Yes, Black people tend to do poorly at many things.
But if you are white, and you do not graduate from HS, and you do not get a job, and you get knocked up or knock someone up and you do drugs, and you commit crimes, you are as likely to fail as a black person with the same circumstances.
Racism still exists – but of all our problems it is among the least.
Is Trump racist ? Who here is ready to raise their hand and claim they have absolutely no racial bias of anykind ?
Is Trump different from his voters ? Nope.
So when the left and the press call Trump racist or … there are a huge number of people who hear “You are racists or …”
No one is telling those on the left to stop talking about the deplorables, and the dreggs of society – PLEASE keep it up. Little would do more to guarantee Trump another term.
“Wrong. I never said McCain was a man of impeccable character.”
That is correct
“Straw man.”
That is not correct.
You have attacked Trump for going after McCain for providing the Steele Dossier to the DOJ/FBI.
While Trump’s attacks on McCain’s military service are wrong and immoral.
And one of the reason’s I did not vote for him.
Trump’s attack’s on McCain’s role in what is essentially a soft coup – are perfectly appropriate.
You do not grasp that.
Some of us are capable of criticizing Trump AND McCain when they are wrong.
And not attacking them when they are not wrong.
That is not true of you.
“I wanted to vote for McCain but there was that name Palin on the ballot next to him and he was not a young man. So….”
You are free to vote for whoever you please.
I am personally glad McCain was not president. I do not think he would have been a much better president than Obama.
Instead of 4 or 8 crappy years of a McCain presidency that Republicans get the blame for,
We have had 8 crappy years of Obama which democrats get the blame for.
Aside from the fact that McCain would not have passed PPACA, and McCain would not have acted as lawlessly, I doubt there is much overall difference, between a McCain presidency and an Obama presidency.
As to Palin – McCain live through to the end of the Obama presidency.
And he was able the entire time.
Further – I think Palin would have been a better VP than Pence or Biden.
But VP’s are mostly non-entities.
But you get to make your own choices.
We have not had a good choice for President in decades.
I think Bush was a poor president – but Gore or Kerry would have been worse.
I think Obama was a bad president – but I do not think McCain would have been a good one.
Thus far Trump is a mediocre president – who looks good because we have had two decades of bad ones. Clinton would have been as bad as Obama and even more corrupt.
I do not care about your criticism of Trump – there is much to criticise, and we might agree on some of it.
I do care that you make everything a question of good and evil – and to the extent that any of the issues that you raise are issues of good and evil – you are on the wrong side.
You are quite litterally mimic’ing AOC – “facts do not matter is you are morally right”
Nonsense – you can not be morally right if your are not factually right.
If you accuse someone of lying – and you are not factually PERFECTLY correct – the moral failure is your.
If you advocate for the use of force – and all government action is force – then you had better be right about your facts. What you advocate for must not only sound good, it must actually bee good – and it must work. There is no good intentions exception to bearing responsibility for the use of force against others.
You choose to shift every argument to the moral domain.
“Your letter to trump stating that he does not have the character to be POTUS?”
Jimmy Carter, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan – those are the only two presidents in my lifetime that had the character to be POTUS.
I sent my “letter” to Trump on election day – I voted for the only candidate I think had the character to be President – Gary Johnson.
I voted for a president with character – if you voted for either Trump or Clinton – you should step down off your moral high horse about character – because you are a hypocrit.
The most that can be said of the two of them is that Trump was the lessor evil – and thuse far that has proven true. He is also proving to be the lessor evil compared to Obama and Bush.
The new testament tells us how the christian god will judge man Matthew 25:31-46
Or elsewhere Matthew 7:16
I am interested in actions not words.
“If due to events trump should sink to only the hardest core trump supporters you and Dave will not bat an eye and your posts on trump will not change, no matter what he does or gets caught doing. The two of you will say, So What? in unison to everything. So, don’t be surprised , I say So What to you and Dave, I don’t care about your outrages. So What to them all.”
What a mess!!!!
Ron, Priscilla, and I have been critical of Trump in a number of areas.
The three of us do not perfectly agree – but neither of us has problems criticizing Trump over policies that we think are wrong, or conduct we think is wrong or statements of consequence that are seriously false.
As to future events – you presume that there is something demanding great condemnation in the future.
I have no doubt that everyday will bring another bout of Trump lied about this, or that, Most of the time mischaracterizing what constitutes a lie and nearly always about a matter of no consequence.
I have personally criticised Trump over far more than either Priscilla or Ron – because I post more. Yet I am the one you and DD and Jay level this “trumpanzee” nonsense at the most.
But let me address “future events” – anything is possible, but the odds strongly favor your NEVER getting the smoking gun you hope for. That has always been the case.
I have told you repeatedly that the standard of integrity required to be successful in business is much higher than the rest of life. You beleive the opposite – but this is not really an issue for debate. No one must buy from you or sell to you. Free exchange only occurs where there is trust. It does not require that you beleive the other party is a good person or shares you values. But you will never exchange with another person unless you TRUST that you are getting more than you are giving.
This is why Trump is doing as he is with respect to his campaign promises – he is not a politician, he is a business person. He knows he is being judged by HIS voters based on what he delivers. They are his customers and they are the ones he must make happy – not you or I. Regardless, the integrity required in business dwarfs that of politics.
Nearly every claim of potential misconduct regarding Trump makes ZERO SENSE.
Trump colluded with Russia ? Why ? Why would Trump go to enormous efforts to do something he must keep perfectly secret and can’t because too many people would be involved. Do you think Trump would not have fired Mueller and pardoned Cohen in a heartbeat, if Cohen actually had the goods on him ? Or Manafort ? Or anyone else ?
Unless you beleive that people like Stone, Cohen, Manafort, Papadoulis, Flynn, …. all think Trump is the new messiah and would sacrifice themselves and their families for Trump – then if they actually know anything – if there ever was some substance to this, then atleast one of them would either be playing lets make a deal with Mueller or blackmailing Trump for a pardon or both.
And what is it that Trump gets out of this Russia deal ? a couple of million dollars of really bad social media adds almost half of which were for Hillary ?
Why is it so hard for you to understand that Trump is not going to throw massive resources in to getting Russia to do something he can do himself.
You have been chasing snipes from the begining. It has never required an investigation to grasp the entire Trump/Russia claim MADE NO SENSE.
Did trump try to get dirt on clinton from russian sources – absolutely. He failed, but he tried.
So did Clinton, and she succeeded – but the dirt she got was lies.
BTW she also worked with the Ukrainians. That has been in the news several times before, but it is coming up again as aparently both the FBI and the Ukrainians are investigating.
Regardless – if you ever come up with something of real substance regarding Trump – I will have no problem demanding his impeachment. In fact you can do that now. But if you actually try to impeach – you really better have something.
The future will be much like the past – daily “faux and insubstantial gothca’s” from now until inauguration day 2025.
“Priscilla, You and Dave both drive me nuts with your predictable programmed blindness. That would not change if you both were flaming liberals or progressives, you would approach it the same way you both approach your conservative spinning. I would still have exactly the same relationship and the same opinion of both of you. Its the approach, the habits of thought, not the ideology.”
No a conservative – not even close. The blindness is yours.
Predictable ? Yes, I will follow “facts, logic, reason” that can be very predictable and boring.
So long as we are discussing government – the use of force against others – facts, logic, and reason are absolutely required. That is not “ideology”.
BTW you are actually more predictable than most anyone else here.
Facts, logic, reason are not “spinning”, they just are.
“Despite losing in the courts and in the court of public opinion, these forces of intolerance remain determined to undermine and roll back the progress you all have made,” the Democrat said. “This time they — not you — have an ally in the White House.”
Biden added that “they’re a small percentage of the American people, virulent people. Some of them the dregs of society.”
Those are Biden’s actual remarks.
If you think homosexuality is a sin – you are intolerant, virulent and the dreggs of society.
if you do not want your teenage daughter being forced to shower in HS with a trans boy – you are intolerant, virulent and the dreggs of society.
if you think that christian(or muslims) bakers should not be forced to make wedding cakes for celebrating things they consider sins – you are intolerant, virulent and the dreggs of society.
if you think that the military should not have to pay for sex change operations for trans soldiers – you are intolerant, virulent and the dreggs of society.
if you think that government should not pay for abortions – you are intolerant, virulent and the dreggs of society.
I do not think that is a “tiny percentage” of the people. I do think it is a substantial portion of Trump’s base.
The most intolerant people in the US are white highly educated urban people living in a left wing bubble.
Pretty much Biden’s audience.
https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2019/03/21/the_most_politically_intolerant_americans_139810.amp.html
You should strike the words, “defend”, “sympathize”, and “rationalize” – and probably alot of others from your vocabulary – as you do not know how to use them.
Defending someone’s rights – even something you do not like, is something to be proud of,
I am MOST proud of being able to defend the rights of people I do not like.
Bill Clinton is a sexual preditor – of the first order.
Biden has publicly and repeatedly engaged in unwanted sexual conduct of the same nature as Franken, except eve with teenage girls.
What we can PROVE regarding Trump is that he is a mysoginist, that he is unfaithful. Stormy Daniels account of Trump’s sexuality is TAME, it was consensual and vanilla. Trump appears to be more fixated on the symbolism of being the male flaunting the attractive woman, than sexual conduct or misconduct. He is a braggart.
No one has “exhonerated” Trump. But frankly Trump’s actual documented treatment of women is less offensive than Hillaries.
Allegations do not constitute facts, – and most of the allegations are of leering – subjective, and still not the same as the long history of Biden or Franken.
Regardless, if Democrats run Biden, they surrender significant portions of any credibility on issues of sexual misconduct.
Still focused on this proud boys nonsense. What are there 50 “proud boys” in the US ?
Their Oath according to wikipedia is “I’m a proud Western chauvinist, I refuse to apologize for creating the modern world”; Childish – but a threat to the world ?
If we judge people by what they oppose – your great world threat is pretty tame.
And just to be clear – Proud Boys, Antifa, whoever, whatever is said, if you throw the first punch – you are the aggressor, and you are wrong. Proud Boys appears to deliberately seek confrontations with antifa. That is troubling. Antifa complies – that is WRONG. The Boys usually get in the last punch. One wonders at the intelligence of the whimps in Antifa who allow themselves to get suckered into initiating violence in a conflict they are going to lose.
“I am pretty sure that the people who refer to accurate criticism of trump as TDS”
If you were accurate, it would not be TDS.
But you are not – you constantly make accusations when you do not have sufficient facts to support them. That conduct is most commonly directed at Trump today – but he is merely your favorite target of the moment. That behavior is your MO. Trump, others, it does not matter. It is what you do all the time.
If you disagree with someone – do not bother to address the facts, logic, or reason. Attack the other person, attack their character, engage in name calling, call thin liars.
You can not distinguish between wrong and evil, and do not understand that the standards for factual disagreement are much lower than moral accusations.
That is the core of TDS. Hillary did not attack the “deplorables” because they were Trump supporters, Nor is Biden ranting about virulent intolerant dreggs of society because they are Trump supporters.
Both and YOU are converting political disagreement into moral failure – and it is not about Trump, he is just the current lightning rod. Though more Tame this has been the core of the left forever.
Romney – who is now a hero to you was attacked in he same way as Trump – as well as his supporters. As was McCain, and particularly Palin.
You are not interested in actually debating facts or policies. You jump immediately to character assassination. A major part of Trump’s success has been that he provokes you so greatly that you are unable to pretend to be in control. Your attacks become small, credulous, petty. You hate Trump – because he causes you to expose yourselves.
The grevance is with YOU.
It is with YOUR politics of personal destruction.
It is with YOUR unwillingness to debate facts, issues, logic, reason, actual policies and their real effects,
It is that debate with you is entirely about character assassination.
Look over all the posts on TNM – Priscilla, Ron, and I actually address issues of fact, or policy. The rest of you do not. You are unwilling to make your own arguments about facts or policies. To the extent that you address those at all – all you care about is some bizare appeal to authority. Wow! It is always possible to find some person – even an important person to agree with you on anything. But even appeals to authority are rare in your posts.
Mostly you just engage in ad hominem and character assassination.
Further you are obviously confused over the importance of Biden’s remarks.
I would only be crying – if I wanted Biden to beat Trump. The remark is the same self destructive left wing nut nonsense that cost Clinton the election.
If you paint political differences as evil – you can expect to lose.
“Trump has set a standard that no dem will be able to surpass,”
Trump did not start this, the avoidance of issues, and equating political differences with evil is over 200 years old and is almost the exclusive domain of the left.
And a great deal of why I identify you as on the left.
Words, are STILL not conduct. Any offense at Trump’s words can not in a rational person ever reach the degree of offense at actual conduct.
We have real examples of actual conduct regarding Biden – not merely allegations.
With respect to policies – we have to poor results of Obama and Bush to contrast with the medocre results of Trump – while democrats are selling a return to poor.
Mediocre beats poor all the time.
It is called Trump Derangement Syndrome – not because Trump is some paragon of virtue, but because you equate Trump to Hiltler or Stalin. Because despite the fact that he is a better president that Obama or Bush – and could be a better president than Clinton, and unlikely Clinton has not obstructed justice or lied under oath repeatedly, you want him gone so bad that you will do or tolerate anything to accomplsh that.
That you are so fulled with hatred that you will make these absolutely insane and unsupportable moral claims,
“If you like your doctor, you can keep them” – that is a LIE, a clear one, there is no debate over what was said, or what was done, there is no confusion over what people expected, or what they got, you do not have to twist Obama’s words, there is no doubt over what he meant or what those he spoke to thought he meant. It is a significant lie, there was real harm to large numbers of people as a result.
“Benghazi was a spontaneous protest against an internet video” – that is a LIE, a clear one, there is no debate over what was said, or what actually occurred, there is no confusion that she knew when she said it the statement was false. You do not have to twist Clinton’s words, there is no doubt over what she meant or what those he spoke to thought she meant.
It is a lie of consequence. It is a lie to cover-up failure.
When The Beruit Marine Baracks was attacked – Reagan to responsibility. There was an investigation that was relatively short for the purpose of figuring out how to do better, as well as to address the individual responsiblity of subordinates. But Reagan made no effort to duck responsibilty. You want to talk about character – THAT is character.
Clinton and Obama in the midst of an election not merely tried to duck responsiblity – but the lied and worse blamed others. Nothing makes me want to put Clinton in Jail more than the fact that she hounded authorities into prosecuting some nobody that produced a video that pretty much no one had ever seen, in order to scapegoat him. That is BAD CHARACTER.
The 4 years of investigation into Benghazi were the direct result of the lying and coverup.
The facts are that a US ambassador and several others will killed and a CIA outpost overrun in a planned terrorist attack on a date that was forseable, and worse this took place over 13hrs. during which no one even tried to help. Was help possible ? We will never know, no one tried. Why was there no help ? Because in the midst of a close election Obama was more worried about the bad press of a failed rescue effort that the possible death of a handful of americans. That is BAD CHARACTER.
Those are just two of the man scandals of Clinton and Obama.
So what is it about Trump that rises to a level far above those ?
NOTHING – and that is why it is called Trump Derangement Syndrome.
When you say that other people are evil – you are saying that you no longer have to afford them their rights, that you no longer have to follow the law, or civility.
This is a vile tactic that dates atleast to the french revolution.
It is what Hitler did to the jews. It is what is wrong with Rep. Omar’s remarks.
It – not Trump, is the cause for the murders at christchurch – and for acts of islamic terrorism throughout the world.
When you jump from wrong, to repugnant, you can justify saying anything, and doing anything.
Ron, you like 90% of trumps policies. I like maybe 10% So while you uhave clearly seen what is wrong with trump’s character and said so repeatedly, you are in his corner policywise. Imagine what this administration is like for people like me who have no silver lining?
So, unfortunately taking a broad look at your ucomment what it says is that the Really bad stuff is not trump its what someone on the dems side said. And I am going to answer that, right now and for the next 2 or 6 years the issue is not Obama, not Clinton, its trump.
If you feel like you are the actual intended target of the deplorables or dregs of society comments then take them to heart. Personally I think those comments have an appropriate target, today a good example is tiffany nicole. Its the proud boys and their sympathizers. etc. I will have no problem if conservative politicians use all sorts of juicy descriptions of the worst elements of the left side, the AOCs, the bernie bros, call them what they are. I won’t take it to heart because I am not one of those nuts. Calling a left wing nut a nut is acceptable to me. Calling a war hero a loser and lil kim my new love is not acceptable for a POTUS in my universe and so there we are. trump got the real raving white nationalists on his side, somehow, mysteriously. Those people are the dregs of society , yes. the dems don’t want their votes and are not trying to make them happy.
This long ago ceased to be a debate over policies.
Ron probably does like more of Trump’s policies than I do.
The most I can say for Trump’s policies is they are less bad than Obama’s.
And that is an important point. I opposed Obama’s policies. I supported efforts to use the political process and the law to thwart them – even some that I support – such as Dreamers were imposed unconstitutionally, and I opposed that.
What I did not do was thoroughly whigg out and support removing Trump by any means necescary.
Those of you supporting TDS – would be happy if he had a stroke, was assassinated, if the cabinet really did involve the 25th amendment, if he were impeached, and you would support anyone doing anything – including breaking the law, to get Trump impeached.
You are well past lawful opposition. You want to destroy Trump by any means necescary.
You do not even pretend otherwise. You are not angry that Comey, Rosenstein, Strzok, Page and a plethora of others engaged in a politically corrupt attempted coup. You just wish they had succeeded.
The ends justifies the means.
I do not care that you oppose Trump’s policies – we have more common ground than you think there.
To the extent we are different on issues of policy – I am not foaming an frothing because I disagree with 50% of what Trump does. Getting 50% right is better than I have seen from any president in 20 years.
If Tiffany Nichole and the Proud boys are the worst we have to worry about – this country is in great shape. If that is who you and Biden mean by the dreggs of society – no comment was even needed.
No one cares about Tiffany Nichole – except those who think that all offensive speach should be silenced by force. Most of us paid ZERO attention to her.
WOW, there is one right wing idiot on twitter who said something nasty to Cindy McCain!
In a nation of 330M only one ? That is pretty amazing.
We have members of the house of representatives saying vile things – and you do not care.
But this “tiffany nichole” that no one would have heard of had Cindy McCain deleted her tweet like any reasonable person does with that kind of garbage.
But no. You are so desparate to find justification for your outsized offence your are giving national prominence to a nobody. Because that is the little you have.
I am not a big fan of the “proud boys” – but clearly you are clueless about them.
If they are the face of “white supremecism” today – we are doing pretty damn well.
The most vile group you can come up with is a bunch of guys whose manefesto is Western Chauvanism ? And who will is just itching for some Antifa whimps to take a swing at them so they can justify pummelling them ?
Are the “proud boys” heros ? Not a chance. Are they are serious threat to anything ? Not a chance ?
No one “sympathises” with them – more garbage. Defending peoples actual rights – even people who are not “really fine people”, even actual thugs, that is NOT sympathizing.
I defended the right of the KKK and Nazi’s to march in my town in the past.
I would defend the right of the proud boys or Antifa to do so today.
I would also protest both, and demand that any acts of violence by either be prosecuted.
Defending someones rights – even the rights of actually bad people, is not sympathizing with them.
I do not like Paul Manafort at all. I do not like him or his ilk – of either party.
But I think has rights have been violated all over the place.
I think that Mueller and the courts have confused being unlikeable with being criminal.
As have many here.
I would like to see the Podesta’s in the jail cell next to him.
But just like Manafort – doing things I do not like is not the same as being criminal.
And if the standard is dark ties to russia – The Podesta’s are far more guilty of anything than Manafort.
That is what people who actually care about civil liberties and rights do. They defend the rights of those the rest of us hate.
I am extremely disappointed in Lawrence Tribe – one of the leading lions of the legal left, for going batshit crazy over Trump and shifting from trying to use the constitution to defending peoples rights to trying to warp it into a blue print for going after those he hates.
I am extremely proud of Alan Derschowitz, Derschowitz is NOT a trump fan, but he is not allowing his dislike of Trump to cloud his views of civil rights and the law.
I do not think that defending the rights of people who are hated is “sympathizing”.
I would be happy to see us clean house accross both parties and jail lots of people in politics.
But lets follow the law and constitution to do so.
–
What attack’s on AOC or Bernie bros are equivalent to YOUR attacks on Trump ?
We can debate policies, We can disagree, we can argue facts, logic, reason – even if you duck that completely.
Regardless, the attacks on those on the right – even by YOU are of a completely different character than those on the left.
Absolutely, there are occasional attacks on the character of those on the left.
AOC appears to be engaging in brazen hypocracy over campaign finance issues. Attacking dark money while wading in neck deep.
Fauxchantas has spent decades claiming to have indian heritage. More importantly she has sought to benefit from false claims. She has sought preferential treatment because of a heritgage of oppression that she does not have.
That kind of conduct earns moral condemnation.
Is there some fact I have wrong ? IF so please enlighten me.
If any one is making unsupportable allegations of moral misconduct against those on the left – please raise that.
You specifically cite some of Trump’s remark’s regarding McCain.
Absolutely I am offended by some of those. They are as you assert – a sign of bad character.
Just as claiming that something is a lie when it is not clear that it is.
I would further note that Trump rarely if ever starts the spitball contests.
McCain went after Trump first. That is not an excuse for Trump’s specific false comments.
If calling war hero’s losers is out of line for POTUS – that pretty much fries Truman and even Lincoln.
Wow Trump has the real raving white nationalists on his side – all two of them in the entire US ? That is going to win the election !!!
Antifa in Portland alone has more members than all white supremacists in the US.
Did they vote for Trump in 2016 ?
I do not here ANYTHING from the left regarding Antifa.
In myriads of instances democrats in government – from Portland to Charlottesville have ordered the police to STAND DOWN to allow antifa to engage in violence and lawlessness.
Antifa sure has the left on their side.
Who is trying to make David Dukes Happy ?
Not only can’t you distinguish between being wrong and being evil.
but you are so deluded that you see the same conduct differently depending on who engages in it.
The governor of Virginia ordered the police to stand down at Charlottesville.
Pretty much guaranteeing the violence that resulted. He did not do so to favor white supremecists. He did so because he knew that the press would spin antifa attacking white supremecists as somehow proof of the evil of the white supremecists.
How is it that Trump has similarly fawned on the extreme right ?
Oh, yes, he does not knee jerk condemn white supremecy at your beck and call, and he will not do as Biden and Clinton did and slime his own bases as “deplorables” and “dregs”
So where are the notable examples of those on the left condemning antifa ?
Rather than empowering an emboldening them ?
You claim not to be on the left – but you parrot the left all the time.
You see everything in those you do not like as moral failures,
and you are blind to the failures moral or otherwise of others.
I am proud to defend the rights of the most hated people – even if I share your hatred of them. I am not “sympathising” with them.
I understand that neither you, nor I, nor anyone else can expect more rights or better treatment than we give those we hate the most.
I am not apologizing for that even a little.
Roby, you say if I think the dregs remark is directed toward me, then take it to heart. This headline leaves no doubt who its directed toward.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/sep/17/joe-biden-dregs-society-have-ally-donald-trump/
It says the dregs support Trump, just like Clinton defined supporters as deplorables.
You can disagree with his policies and himself. I can disagree with the liberal agenda. I dont call Queen Nancy’s supporters “the cesspool of society”.
I can dislike the progressive agenda as much ad you dislike Trumps agenda and not call those that support those policies bad names. And I do not put “socialist” in the bad name category as that is what I believe a Berney/AOC type agenda is and is a political movement, not a personal attack on voters like dregs.
If YOU think it was directed at YOU – then Biden has a problem.
The point – just like Clinton’s deplorables remark – is that this is how Clinton, Biden, the left think.
If this was directed at the “proud boys” – then we really have licked racism and intolerance.
If the proud boys are the “dreggs of society” – we are in pretty good shape.
But you know and I know – and Robby knows, Biden is not talking about the Proud Boys.
He is talking about those voters who will vote for Trump, in the hope that the next SCOTUS appointment overturns Rowe.
He is talking about Those voters who want to make sure that SCOTUS does not force Hobby Lobby or Little Sisters of the Poor to pay for abortions.
He is talking about those voters who do not want government to force them to have to chose between being put out of business or violating their religious beleifs.
He is talking about a majority of american voters.
And those he is talking about KNOW who he means.
And he has just assured they are not voting for Biden.
The left has taken ownership of the term “socialist”
giving the lie to their prior claim they were being misrepresented.
Being a socialist today is the equivalent of being blind to history and stupid.
It is an insult in the way being called a murderer is an insult – if you are a murderer.
It is not the same as calling people racist, hateful, hating haters, the dreggs of society, virulent, deplorable.
Particularly without sufficient evidence.
Debating issues – even labeling a postion as stupid – particularly one as obviously stupid is socialism is NOT catagorically the same a calling people “the dreggs of society”.
The problem with Clinton, Obama, Biden and Robby
is that they beleive that.
They beleive that political disagreement is more than stupid. That those who disagree with them are immoral.
The “deplorables”, the virulent, the dreggs of society, are those who would use force to impose their will on others without justification.
Bad character is rooted in bad acts. the worst of which are using force unjustifiably against others.
Another part of Biden’s error is that the 2020 election will hinge on “moderates”.
Not necescarily the “moderates” at TNM,
But people who do not think this country is a hotbed for intolerance.
Though I do get a kick out of Biden commiserating with some of the most intolerant people in the country about the intolerance of others.
The “Proud Boys” are less intolerant than the typical progressive.
Ron you have your opinions and values, I respect that. In my world, in my values I am fine with calling people what they are, bluntly. For example, AOC is an economically illiterate braying jackass of a woman, and her supporters are likewise, obnoxious, stupid, and spoiled left wing nuts. Now, did it hurt you to hear me say that? Really? I loathe them. Conservatives are welcome to say what I have said about AOC and Co., even trump is welcome to say it. You and I have a different point of view on this.
Not all trump supporters are the dregs of society. But there are plenty of people who I am totally comfortable calling the dregs of society (or worse) who have in fact found a hero, a voice in trump. I am with Biden 100% on his comment. If you wish to interpret my words as meaning that I support trump calling You the dregs of society, well, it is not my meaning but I cannot stop you if you wish to take it wrongly, personally.
There was by the way a fantastic Southern rock band called the Dixie Dregs, I saw them, mind-blowing talent.
What separates you from AOC is just a matter of degree.
Certainly she is more extreme than you.
But she has the same passion for nonsense that you do – even if her nonsense is slightly more obvious.
She has the same tendency to eschew facts, logic, and reason and to make every policy difference a moral issue in which here opponents are wrong.
She has the same tendency to call everyone she disagrees with or does not like a liar.
She has the same tendency to think that her feelings define morality, rather than facts.
“even trump is welcome to say it.”
But that is not true – you will not allow Trump to say things – even ones you agree with.
Trump’s attack’s on McCain’s millitary service were ALWAYS wrong.
But his attack’s an McCain’s conduct in the 2016 election have always been right.
You hear “Trump attack’s McCain” – and you never bother to find out why, and go into
full bull goose looney”.
You micro-parse everything Trump says try to find proof that he is a racist sexist homophobic liar. And you find it ALWAYS – even in statements that if Obama made, you would agree with.
Sometimes Trump is right sometimes wrong. but he is not particularly unusual.
The most unusual thing about him is that he has consistently used twitter to bypass the media.
“Not all trump supporters are the dregs of society.”
What ? Are there two that you can find that are not ?
Regardless, it is stupid statements like that from you and Biden that are why Trump will likely be president through 2024. They cost you the election in 2016 and they will do so again in 2020.
You presume that people you have never met are morally inferior – just because you beleive they support Trump. you do not know them , you do not know what each ones actual values are – yet you have condemned them.
I am not a Trump supporter, I did not vote for him and I find many things he does that I disagree with.
But you have had no problem casting all kinds of insults at me. You are not merely condemning “all Trump supporters” you condemn anyone who ever does not think Trump is evil incarnate.
“But there are plenty of people who I am totally comfortable calling the dregs of society (or worse) ”
We know that – you rush to make moral judgements of people you do not know.
“who have in fact found a hero, a voice in trump.”
You honestly think that is wrong ?
So the unemployed rust belt factory workers who think Trump has their back – atleast more so that other politicians – these are the “dreggs of society”.
Or the “MAGA” people who are weary of the Obama appology tour – these are the dreggs of society ?
Or those tired of being called racist for pointing out that most terrorism in the US involves muslims – these are the dreggs of society ?
Or those who think that Trade with China is loppsided and unfair – these are the dreggs of society ?
I can go on and on.
I do not agree with all Trump’s positions, but I do not presume that those who agree with any of Trump’s positions are “the dreggs of society”.
You Do.
“I am with Biden 100% on his comment.”
We know you are – you would far prefer insulting other people morally than defending facts.
“This all really got started with the Gingrich congress and Clinton impeachment.”
That is not the start. While there is some political nastiness there that was beyond reasonable. Alot of what occurred was grounded in fact.
One of the differences between Trump and Clinton is that the Clinton’s fought EVERYTHING – all the way to SCOTUS if necescary, and they hid and destroyed evidence.
Trump has fumed and foamed, but he has NOT fought Mueller on anything – not even things that he should have such as the records from the transition.
But the “start” of this rests in a very fundimental difference in character between the left and the rest of us.
Those of us not on the left think the left is WRONG.
Those on the left think everyone else is EVIL.
That is at the core of our bitter divisive conflict.
It is a flaw of the left – that dates back atleast to the French Revolution.
It was true of those on the left then, of communists, and socialists, of turn of the 20th century progressives, even to some extent of 60’s liberals. and it was absolutely true of Obama and his alcolytes. it is the core problem to the Clinton whitewash and to the corruption in FBI/DOJ over Trump, it is at the core of IRSGATE and Benghazi. It was a major force in Trump’s election. And it is at the core of the bitternes here at TNM.
When you shift from beleiving that those you disagree with are wrong, to jumping to their being evil – morality goes out the window, civility goes out the window.
It becomes possible to do anything,. say anything, beleive anything. about those you disagree with.
McCabe was compelling on 60minutes – he clearly BELEIVED Trump was a threat to the nation, as did all the rest of those in this soft coup attempt, as do all of those posting this Trump Derangement syndrome nonsense here.
Belief is NOT sufficient. You can not ACT based solely on belief.
There is little doubt that those even here who Beleive Trump is evil – would at this moment if they had the power to do so, act on that beleif. They are no different from McCabe. They do not even recognize that his ACTIONS were wrong.
I keep reminding everyone that Mueller persecuted Richard Jewel, and Steve Hatfill and Bruce Ivens (and numerous others)
The point is that acting on the mere beleif that someone else is evil is itself evil – immoral.
I am not sure how we come back from that divide.
Even the debate here has shifted – and I am part of that shift, because I am fed up with the extremely stupid faux moral superiority that those suffering from TDS put on.
Half the posters here sound like AOC – “the facts are irrelevant if you are morally correct”.
BZZT WRONG!!!! If you are not right about the facts, you have no basis for moral claims.
You can not accuse someone of lying – based on incomplete and often false facts.
It is NOT sufficient that you MIGHT be right.
In the debate over what is true and what is not – betting your facts wrong is not usually a moral failure.
In a debate over good and evil, falling short on your facts IS am moral failure.
This is what is dividing the country.
“Look at the people who become very defensive when trump, a man of truly and obviously bad character judging by so many criteria, is criticized and twist themselves energetically into pretzels explaining away his faults.”
Aparently you can not read – I am not interested in this bogus stream of Garbage.
This is not about Trump. This is about morality and about YOU.
When you accuse someone – anyone, of lying, you had better be right.
if YOU are not – then the Moral stigma is YOURS,
Trump’s character is irrelevant. If you accuse the grand dragon of the KKK of lying – you had better be right. There is no free pass to make false accusations because your target is unappealing.
The only “Trump” part of the debate – is this ludicrous nonense that Trump is somehow different. Different that Jefferson ? Washington ? Adam’s ? Lincoln ? Jackson ? FDR ? Truman ? Kennedy ? Johnson ? Nixon ? Clinton ? Obama ?
Some of our best and worst presidents have behaved worse than Trump.
I wish it were otherwise. But it is not.
Regardless, if you wanted a president of better character – you should not have run Clinton in 2016, and you should find someone with actually good character to run against Trump in 2020. Not seeing that so far.
You can weight McCain’s and Trump’s character however you wish. I have no problem with the conclusion that McCain had better character than Trump. Only with the conclusion that McCain is flawless, or entitled to protection from criticism for the flaws he did have.
What you can not do is accuse ANYONE of lying, without being RIGHT. Not Trump, not the grand dragon of the KKK.
Making an error regarding facts, is not usually a moral failure – it is also not a lie – something you should figure out as YOU make factual errors far greater than Trump all the time.
Making a false moral accusation is a MORAL FAILURE.
If you accuse someone of lying 10 times and are wrong only once – that is still a serious moral failure on your part. But your accusations rarely are credible. They nearly always require concluding that minor factual errors are deliberate lies, or that casting something in a favorable light is a lie, or on many occasions that the actual truth is a lie.
Trump WAS spied on.
Trump WAS wiretapped,
Trump WAS the victim of a witchhunt.
Trump did NOT collude with Russia.
McCain DID forward the Steele Dossier to DOJ.
and I can go on and on.
Even minor details – Trump did NOT call Trump Jr. before and after the Natalia meeting.
Claim after claim FAILS.
There is alot of lying going on, but the big problem is NOT Trump.
And you have not gotten that yet.
You choose to make the discussion about morality – you have chosen the domain. The consequences are YOURS.
McCain came up again because his contact with DOJ/FBI was part of the house transcripts just released.
I expect that Trump will be asked to comment on just about everything in every transcript.
And that if he is not asked, he will on his own tweet everything he thinks is favorable.
Obama was not as involved in Social Media – he did not need to be. He had a fawning press corp that would repeat anything he wanted without criticism. His people even bragged about that.
Trump has found that Social Media – twitter in particular provides him the means to speak to people with out the press as a filter.
That is no different from say FDR’s fireside chats.
“Marine Corps commandant says deploying troops to the border poses ‘unacceptable risk’”
https://www.latimes.com/politics/la-na-pol-marine-corps-border-national-emergency-20190321-story.html
Then the marine corp commander needs to resign.
The role of soldiers is to risk their lives for the benefit of the nation.
My read of the article you linked is Neller saying that I would rather engage in war games accross the world than do things to protect the country against a real threat at the moment.
Absolutely we can not expect the Marines to fight the Russian’s the Chinese, and protect the southern border concurrently.
There will always be a theoretical threat greater than the current real one.
THE MEMO:
https://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/la-marine-corps-commandant-memos-20190321-story.htmlhttps://www.latimes.com/nation/politics/la-marine-corps-commandant-memos-20190321-story.html
Absolutely – lets allow another 1M illegal immigrants into the country so that we can fix up so barracks and play war games in asia.
Neller has an oppinion reqarding that priorities are most important for marines.
But in our system the final decision on those priorities is mode by civilians not the military.
All you are doing we these posts is reinforcing that:
Alot of members of the govenrment need to resign.
That you are extremely desparate and looking for the least significant nonsensical reasons to loath Trump.
That Trump really does no more than “the generals”.
Do you really think some guy who thinks he is losing his job to illegal immigrants gives a damn whether some marine corp 4 star got to play war games in Asia last year ?
No need to thank anyone, Pinnochio or Punnochio:
“President Trump said that he “had to approve” the funeral for Sen. John McCain — but the cathedral where the service was held said Thursday that no presidential OK was needed, sought or granted.
“Only a state funeral for a former president involves consultation with government officials. No funeral at the cathedral requires the approval of the president or any other government official,” the Washington National Cathedral said in a statement, CNN reported.
Still pushing this.
Do you know that Trump was not asked to “approve the use of the national cathederal for a state funeral” ?
If you do not – then you are making an accusation that Trump is lying when you do not have the facts.
The fact that Trump’s approval was not needed for one type of approval does not mean no one asked for his approval.
I have not even been able to confirm that McCain’s funeral was NOT a state funeral.
Though I suspect it was not.
My Guess – but only a guess, is that the McCain’s wanted a state funeral, but chose not to have one, because that MIGHT have allowed Trump to be present.
I am not sure – but I think there were news stories to that effect at the time.
Regardless, the choices of the McCain family can not convert Trump’s remarks into a lie.
You plain flat out do not know whether Trump was asked by ANYONE to approve a state funeral. You do not know whether he approved. Finally, though we can probably confirm that, you do not know that McCain did not have a state funeral. He certainly had something hard to distinguish from one.
If you are going to accuse others of lying – you had better have ALL the facts and be right.
Otherwise the moral failure is yours.
You don’t know what th hell youre talking about as usual.
Your just a reflexive Trump apologist, You can’t help yourself anymore than Trump can help being an asshole.
This would be a good time to remind you to GFY.
“You don’t know what th hell youre talking about as usual.”
No Jay – that would be you.
The only thing this story and your rant proves – which anyone could know without the story, is that you can have a funeral in a church without the permission of the president.
Wow! News at 11!!
Your just reflexively Trump Derangement Syndrome, You can’t help yourself
You will assume whatever you do not know to concoct the result you want.
Trump may be lying. It might even be possible to know. But it probably is not.
Regardless, you do not have sufficient facts to conclude that.
This is about YOU – not Trump.
When you accuse someone else of lying – you bet your integrity against theirs, and the burden of proof is on you.
Adding more insults only makes it worse.
When I look up bidens dregs remark the first thing that comes up is a RT (Russian times) story.
Well that means it must not be true!
Or if it is true, well, it is still somehow a part of Trump Russia Collusion.
How is it that Putin managed to get Biden to say something stupid ?
Those dastardly Russian’s
Still influencing our elections.
I mean if the only media that reports something is RT then clearly it is somehow an example of Russia trying to influence US elections by ….. Reporting the truth ?
Ding Dong Donnie is at it again, undermining protocols of presidential behavior.
“WASHINGTON — President Trump undercut his own Treasury Department on Friday by announcing that he was rolling back North Korea sanctions that it imposed just a day ago.
The move, announced on Twitter, was a remarkable display of dissension within the Trump administration and represented a striking case of a White House intervening to reverse a major national security decision made only hours earlier by the president’s own officials.“
-NY Times.
Trump’s people immediately provided explanation:
“NEW @PressSec statement on this: “President Trump likes Chairman Kim and he doesn’t think these sanctions will be necessary.”
“This is Trump overruling the Treasury Department—but it’s more importantly Trump overruling and publicly almost humiliating his national security adviser, John Bolton.”
B Kristol
The policy of the United States is decided by the president – there is no constitutional executive authority beyond the president.
Final decisions are all his.
This is true whether it is Trump or anyone else.
There is nothing special here.
You are free to disagree with Trump’s choices – but acting contrary to his advises is not
“undermining protocols of presidential behavior.”
There is no such thing.
I am glad Trump acted contrary to the advice of his military advisors in Syria and Afghanistan. As are many other americans.
With respect to sanctions and negotiating with NK. I will leave that up to Trump.
He has done pretty well thus far.
NK’s nuclear program has at worst been stalled for the past 2 years – that is an accomplishment no other president has managed.
Dave Your comment
“Not necessarily the “moderates” at TNM,”
There are no moderates here at TNM
If you divide the spectrum into three sections of equal distance. the best anyone can do is fall in the middle of the left side or in the middle of the right side. The whole 1/2 of the spectrum from the left to the right is empty.
Now everyone can say they might be center left or center right, but when they comment, including myself, we are no where near center left or center right.
Ha! Isn’t that the truth!
I do think that Rick is very much a centrist, and it’s too bad that he doesn’t participate more often. But I think that true centrists like him have become very disheartened by the hatred and division that has taken over both sides of the political spectrum, not to mention the fact that many centrist politicians have been drummed out of their respective parties.
I’ve often said that I don’t think that moderates and centrists are necessarily the same. But if we’re going to consider a “moderate” as someone close to the center, I don’t really see any of us all that close…
Priscilla you are correct, centrist and moderates are not the same. If one looks at the definition of a centrist, one will find a centrist to hold many libertarian positions.
> You want an efficient government.
> You see right thru the current charade of “corrupt political hypocrits” and “grandstanding” for no other reason than furthering of selfish ego and personal gain.
> You want fiscal responsibility and restraint.
> You want freedom of choice on personal issues.
> You want strong diplomacy and national defense.
On the other hand, a moderate is one who can be a liberal or conservative, but is willing to use a process to achieve some of their desired outcome without giving up most of their principles. They will “moderate” a position to get something instead of standing firm in many circumstances, this moderating of positions results in a more centrist government.
So saying that, I still see just a few who will moderate a position or two, but nothing to get us to a centrist position.. I dont see anyone willing to move that far from their beliefs, including me when it comes to the constitution and personal freedoms. Unlike those on the left, these are non negotiable.
I do not want an “efficient government” I want a SMALL government.
I oppose Trump’s efforts to make Medicare more efficient – they will fail.
The solution is to find a way of ending it.
Dave, I may not know many things that happen in government but one thing I am is a realist. And making comments like ending Medicare is like saying we need to find a way to end federal taxes. NEVER HAPPEN!
So my being a realist suggest finding ways to improve Medicare and make the system more efficient. And that could be as simple as increasing the number of subscribers on a Medicare Advantage policy which is more cost efficient for the government, is less expensive for the retiree and a better product than traditional Medicare with a part B and D supplemental plan.
Making comments like ending Medicare is just blowing smoke up someones butt.
There is political realism – ending medicare is politically impossible.
And there is ordinary realism – fixing medicare is impossible.
We have spent 6 decades F’ing with healthcare.
Nothing we have ever done has improved it.
Is what Trump is seeking to do an admirable goal ? Maybe.
Is it going to work – not a chance.
Worse the small possibility that it might is actually scarry too.
The most efficient govenrments we have ever had were fascists.
It is unwise to seek efficiency in govenrment.
I want to disempower government.
I want it to be inefficient in those few areas left to it.
The inefficient use of force is far less dangerous than the efficient use of force.
Regardless – you say you are a realist – do you really think Trump will reduce waste and fraud in medicare ? Be Honest ?
I am not asking whether he is sincere. I have no doubt he is.
I am asking given history if you have ever seen efforts to make government work better (not efforts to make government smaller) actually work ?
In Healthcare ? In anything ?
What you are asking for is just as unrealistic as what I want.
But actual reductions are not only possible they are inevitable.
The only question is whether they happen sooner when tbhe pain will be less or later when it is greater.
The thing is, there is nothing wrong with having some non-negotiable positions, particularly ones that involve personal liberty, as long as one is willing to listen to those who have opposing viewpoints…understanding, of course, that “listening,” doesn’t mean “agreeing.” But it can often open up an avenue of compromise.
As you have often said ,the current refusal of many of our so-called leaders to even consider compromise on issues like immigration is one of the main things, if the THE main thing, contributing to the crack-up of the American system of government.
As cynical as I have become, even I was somewhat shocked that the Democrats refused to do the DACA-for-Wall deal that Trump proposed. It was such a win-win. But I guess that any compromise that Trump proposes is automatically bad.
At least here on TNM, you have often “reached across the aisle,” to suggest potential areas of agreement with almost everyone. And others have as well, maybe not quite so often. But it never seems to result in any real consensus. So, I guess we’re sort of a microcosm of today’s politics….
We should never do what is morally wrong. NEVER.
It is rarely if ever acceptable to do what is factually wrong.
But we should never get cocky about what we beleive to be morally and/or factually correct.
I am far more likely to listen to NPR than to watch Fox, even here I WANT those of you who disagree to make your best arguments. My surety of my own positions is the result of CONSTANTLY testing them – and when actual flaws are exposed revising them. I have done that my entire life. It is much more rare for me to change positions significantly at 60 – but that is because my current positions have been vigorously tested throughout my life. The odds of someone exposing a flaw decrease the more they are tested.
I would further note that outside of TNM I am about as likely to go after someone on the right as the left.
Ron and I are at significant odds on several issues – I do not know that he is farther to the right than I am – as I do not consider protectionism to be a right wing value. Historically it has been atleast as prevalent on the left.
But we are civil and have actual discussions.
Recently I eviscerated a prominent blogger on a conservative site for the nonsensical assertion that there are no enumerated rights.
This is a leading conservative legal light – who aparently has read Bork, but not the 9th amendment, or the federalist papers, or the debates surrounding the ratification of the constitution.
“In like manner, I say, the future Congress can have no right to exercise any power but what is contained in that paper. Negative words, in my opinion, could make the matter no plainer than it was before. The gentleman says that unalienable rights ought not to be given up. Those rights which are unalienable are not alienated. They still remain with the great body of the people. If any right be given up that ought not to be, let it be shewn. Say it is a thing which affects your country, and that it ought not to be surrendered–this would be reasonable. But when it is evident that the exercise of any power not given up would be an usurpation, it would be not only useless but dangerous to enumerate a number of rights which are not intended to be given up; because it would be implying in the strongest manner, that every right not included in the exception might be impaired by the government without usurpation, and it would be impossible to enumerate every one. Let any one make what collection or enumeration of rights he pleases, I will immediately mention twenty or thirty more rights not contained in it.”
James Iredell 1788 SC ratifying convention.
Ron. I don’t see any middle of the right folks here. Name names. I admit leaning to middle of the left (because of Trump, my excuse) and I can’t speak for the others commenting here, I’m sure they have some sort of label for themselves, that if proffered will generate thousands of words of rebuttal by dhlii (not oblique) consisting of the usual mind twisted intelligent sounding but ultimately a tiny pony of intelligent sounding comments in a immense pile of b—-..
So there are six of us that comment regularily here. Jay, Roby, dduck, Dave, Priscilla and myself.
So , since you ask for names, here is how I would classify each based on comments they make concerning government. NOT WHO IS PRESIDENT.
From left to right.
Jay is the most liberal based on his views followed by you (dduck) then Roby.
I find myself probably the most conservative based on my positions about government based on the constitution, individual freedoms and government regulations, with Priscilla close by. Dave is our resident Libertarian that is about 100% against any government involvement in our lives ( such as food safety, FAA safety, etc) and accepts risks followed by civil action when those risk turn harmful. He will also argue black is white if there is a shred of evidence supporting that position. Dave just loves a good debate no matter the subject. If I am right from previous post, Dave voted as I did for Johnson, but thats just my assumption based on his comnents.
Jay is almost incapable of accepting any position that does not include government involvement. He is against most immigration controls, he is in favor of forced insurance coverage, he favors agreements enforced by executive orders that should require congressional approval, he approves of increased taxes to support government programs and I cant get a reading on much more because his whole life at the site is finding twits from Twits to post here about Trump.
Roby is left of center, but not a Pelosi liberal like Jay. I look at him more like a JFK liberal which today is almost centrist liberal. You(dduck) seems to fall in between Jay and Roby, but slightly closer to Jay.
Priscilla is very close to my positions, but there are differences, but not many. If I remember right, she did not support Trump at the beginning, we supported different primary individuals, but I dont think she went as far as I did in voting for Johnson in the general election. I would describe us as being Ronald Reagan conservatives, meaning that conservative is more centrist than what is now the far right Ted Cruz conservative. Reagan would compromise where the Cruz conservative find compromise almost impossible. RR conservatives today are like the JFK liberals today.
And this is all based on Trump not being in the discussion. Now if we had a gun to our heads and our choices were only two, no Green party, no Libertarian party or any other alternative and our chouces were Trump and Sanders, I beleave the vote would be 3-3. Because 3 would be to get rid of Trump under any circumstance and 3 would be to promote economic growth and individual freedoms regardless of personal behaviors.
As for Trump, Trump is not anything but a populist. If you want, I can define my idea of a populist in another comment. But there is little in common between Ted Cruz and Donald Trump other than lower taxes. And even then, there are many differences.
Ron, Thank you! I especially like how you placed me. A JFK liberal, that IS the era that formed me, its the era my parents most correspond to, its a description that I’m proud to own. What would JFK have thought of bernie or AOC, BLM, or campus PC (or trump?)? I think he would have the reaction I do, blehhhh.
I agree with all your judgements except about Jay. (Jay I am sure will give his opinion.) I don’t think Jay is nearly as liberal as you believe. He is so energetically against trump that the loudness and agitation of his rhetoric leads you see him as very liberal. I think that Jay is even to the right of me on some issues; for example, when it comes to race, especially regarding black citizens, I am the biggest “bleeding heart liberal” here, maybe more like RFJ or MLK, than JFK when it comes to civil rights. Civil rights is an issue that my parents were deeply involved in, I have not much changed from my ideas that I held in my teens. I am sure I will take those ideals to the grave.
Bravo! You have, all in all, done the most accurate job I have seen of describing our views. Its nice being understood for what I actually believe.
So Roby, join me over on racial profiling and lets open a discussion on race relations. There are over 1000 comments here. I will post something to start the discussion and you can follow up. Not that it will stay on race once “Trump” becomes the topic, but its a clean slate where hand held devices will interface with much quicker.
Agreed. Tomorrow. And I have dave quarantined so that will help.
Very adult of you
https://proxy.duckduckgo.com/iu/?u=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.lovethispic.com%2Fuploaded_images%2F233056-I-Can-t-Hear-You.jpg&f=1
Sorry robby – you are not a “jfk” liberal.
You are prepared to use force to reduce the liberty of others.
You are prepared to do so without first justifying it.
Not even McGovern was that progressive.
McGovern had alot of mistaken beliefs, but he actually thought he was going to bring about a smaller government.
What would JFK have thought about Trump ?
Though not perfect the parallels are strong.
Both came from Wealthy families – though Trump expanded on his fathers wealth before getting into politics.
Both seemed to have an overabundance of testosterone and were not particularly faithful.
Both cut taxes.
Both faced down their own missle crisis.
Why this fixation on labels ?
I have labeled you and Jay and DD lefties – it would be more accurate to call you statists.
Though I will accept that to varrying extents for each of you – “its all about Trump”.
Which is part of the problem. While there is this undercurrent of socilaism wafting about the democratic party – the real ideology of democrats at the moment is trump nihilism.
I think you are actually further left than DD and Jay. But they are more foaming and frothing over Trump and will knee jerk favor anything that opposes Trump.
But again why the labels ?
Why the fixation on personalities ?
Why not issues ?
None of you have any real interest in issues.
To the extent there is meaningful discussion on TNM today, it is mostly Ron, and I and Priscilla debating minor differences.
Whatever your actual views they are unrepresented unargued.
You assert them – rarely.,
And then quickly degenerate into fallacy, ad hominem or debates over style whenever you are challenged.
You run from any serious discussion of issues or merit.
You claim that is somehow because of me – but you are going to end up dealing with me much the same regardless,
All I can gather is that you are more comfortable debating personalities and sytle than issues.
Ron.
Politics has many axis’s not just one.
It is sometimes convenient to talk of “left” and “right”,
But few of us fit that well. Though those on the left are closer to homogenity than the rest of us.
Nor would I agree with your assessments of Jay, DD and Robby.
Jay in particular is so chock full of TDS that he would likely vote for AOC to get rid of Trump,
Trump has taken total ownership of his brain and all choices are based on opposing Trump.
If Trump favored ending racism, Jay would knee jerk oppose it.
But I do not think when not suffering from TDS that Jay is an actual creature of the left.
DD is similar but his TDS is far less severe and I do not think he is really a creature of the left.
I do not think Roby’s TDS is nearly as severe as Jay’s or DD’s. I think his real positions lean more left, and that his opposition to Trump is more strongly rooted in policy.
At the same time like many leftists – Roby’s positions are not internally consistent, so he holds positions from the extreme left, moderate left and sometimes even conservative positions.
I am not opposed 100% to government involvement in our lives.
I am 100% opposed to UNJUSTIFIED government involvement in our lives.
Government is FORCE. If you beleive that some task requires force – that it can not be done any other way, any you can persuade me of that – then that is a task for government.
Food Safety is NOT. Punishing people who poison others IS.
“accepts risks followed by civil action when those risk turn harmful.”
NO!!! No such rule.
Most acts of force (violence) are criminal not civil.
The part you have RIGHT, is that Government gets to act WHEN THERE IS ACTUAL HARM.
Murder someone – go to prison – crime.
Break a contract – get sued – Civil.
Harm another in a way that you are clearly responsible but that harm was not either forseable (crime) or seriously reckless or negligent (crime) and that is a tort. You will again be held responsible.
But in ALL cases, the ONLY preventive role for government is the certainty of consequences, for actual harm.
If as an example you use massive amounts of lead and mercury in the production of some food, and you use some process that extracts it before shipping and you never harm a customer – then that is not government’s business.
It is not Governments job to dictate HOW you do anything.
It is government’s job to punish you for actually harming people.
“intelligent sounding”
If it sounds intellegent you might want to consider more seriously the possibility that it is.
“but ultimately a tiny pony”
If my remarks have errors of fact, logic or reason – then you should be able to point those out.
That is errors of fact, or logic. Not emotional reaction.
If an arguments premises are valid – the facts,
and its arguments are valid – the logic.
Then its conclusions are valid.
There is not a third choice.
An argument is not “intelligent sounding but ultimately a tin pony”.
The facts are true or false,
the arguments or valid or not.
I do not think that politics is defined by a single axis, nor that the “center” is inherently either right or moderate.
The Mueller Investigation is completed.
He forwarded the report to Barr today.
We should get to see it in a week or so, after Hannity and Carlson and Dobbs and others at Fox vet it for Trump.
And when aside from speculation and vituperation it has nothing ?
Are you going to finally be done ?
I have zero doubt that Mueller will write it in some way that vindicates himself.
But they will be nothing of substance.
You continue to hope for a pot of shit at the end of the rainbow.
It is not going to be there.
The Trumpsitas will be lining to buy the new message hat, NNI, No New Indictments.
This will be Trump’s and their’s mantra and ringb his campaign cash register.
I will wait for the actual end of this – I do not particularly trust Mueller.
As to your assertion – absolutely – and they should.
If democrats, the left, the press, the DOJ/FBI/NSA/CIA conspirators have wasted two years of this nation on this garbage – there SHOULD be consequences – pretty severe ones.
Raking in money being the LEAST of those.
There are (or should be) severe moral consequences for false accusations.
Ron, thanks for your mostly accurate (in my opinion) assessment, but i can’t go along with excluding the president. When Obama was president (I voted for McCain btw), I criticized his actions, but not his demeanor, I was then considered a rightie; I called out those that defended him 99% of the time.
Now, when confronted with Trump I wish Obama were back; there is an amazing contrast. Besides doing all kinds of things I don’t like policy wise, Trump has the demeanor of a crude, rude gang boss.
Once he is out, I will return to the Rep party assuming it picks up some of its older values..
So, including Trump as president in the equation, I consider you, Priscilla and especially dhlli as on the extreme right, not middle right.
duck, I am curious as to why you characterize anyone who supports Trump’s policies as “extreme.” Or, maybe more accurately, what policies you see as extreme? I’m not defending Trump’s demeanor here. I can agree that his personality and his strategy of always being on the offensive ~ “offensive” in all senses of the word~ is a primary reason why many people, including former Republicans, refuse to support him.
But, I am pro-choice ~ excluding post viability, partial birth and after birth abortions~ I am in favor of a robust safety net, and I would even include UBI, if it could be funded without further taxing the middle class. I believe that government regulation is necessary in a mixed market economy. I voted for Democrats for most of my life, and only stopped when the Democrat Party became too far left. I am 100% opposed to authoritarian rule.
So,it’s a stretch to call me extreme right, I think. And, Dave and Ron are certainly not…I don’t want to characterize their positions, but libertarians have often been accused of being far left, particularly in their social positions. Dave has often expressed his preference for open borders, for example. Neither of them even voted for Trump.
So, in summary, I think that you are incorrect in using Trump agenda support as the sole criterion of what it means to be “extreme.”
The idea that Dave does not support trump is long dead. Vote-shmote, he is working overtime to deflect absolutely every criticism of trump no matter how reasonable. Dave is strongly pro wall. He is for open borders only if a set of impossible things that never will happen should occur, till that utopian day he is right with the trump position. All the things that trump does that are against daves previous positions, such as free trade, get a pass from dave, he ‘ll tell there is no trade war, etc. Dave is in awe of trump, loves his presidency, would vote for him if actually mattered I am sure. And Dave’s positions on both many social (gun control) and all spending issues are far far right. Plus there is is over the top equating even slightly liberal people with Stalin. He is far far out on the right in nearly every way.
As to Ron, I don’t think he is far right, no, I think he is a relatively moderate libertarian with very conservative ideas abut spending. Ron is totally willing to fully criticize trumps behavior, does not defend it at all, is obviously disgusted by it, unlike you and Dave.
As to you Priscilla, I am glad that you still have some moderate position,s though in your partisan way, you rarely talk about them, The positions that you DO talk about make you sound far right.
“The idea that Dave does not support trump is long dead. ”
Again a reason you are a creature of the left.
You equate defending rights – event he rights of offensive people, with supporting their positions.
You equate attacking misrepresentations and false claims as supporting those who are targeted.
And you make “support” into some idiotic binary.
Trump is sometimes right, and sometimes wrong – like every president before him.
He has been right more often that Obama and Bush and lawless less often than either.
He is not my choice.
We have a massive debate over character here – Absolutely I think Character is important.
As I said I did not vote for Trump – nor did I vote for GHWB, and that was over issues of character. As much as I might not like to say it Clinton was a good president. But he had absolutely horrible character – much worse than Trump.
I can not vote for someone with bad character – but if character is the justification for the outrage regarding Trump – then why not the same outrage at Bill Clinton ? or Barack Obama ? Or Hillary Clinton ?
I have been consistent throughout my life regarding character. I have occasionally misjudged the character of a candidate, but I have never voted for a candidate despite beleiving they had poor character.
Can the rest of you claim the same ?
I do not consider making unproven moral accusations of others to be good character – something that is done here all the time.
I do not consider attacking those who make unproven moral accusations to be “supporting” those they are attacking.
I do not consider defending what is true or accurate to be supporting the person who in this instance is correct.
As president thus far Trump gets a C+, but we have had almost 20 years of D’s before.
A C+ is not good, but it is much better than we have had in the recent past.
Ron and Priscilla are more likely to support more of Trump’s policies than I do.
I am just much less tolerant of the half baked attacks and the frothing and foaming.
I do not consider attacking that “supporting Trump” – I consider it attacking stupidity and immorality.
I have done this at other times with other people, and other issues.
In some recent posts I have attacked attacks on “the proud boys”.
Am I a supporter of the proud boys – absolutely not.
But the enemy of my enemy is not inherently my friend.
And if the Proud Boys are the face of the extreme right, or white supremecy – then WOW we have come along way since I was young.
You can not make these ludicrously stupid binary claims about supporting a person, particularly when I do not support people, I support positions.
On rare occasions I have found myself defending Obama or Hillary Clinton – not because I agree with them, but because SOME attacks on them are spurious.
I have no problem with Trump attacking Clinton or McCain regarding the Steele Dossier, but their conduct is morally no different from Trump trying to get dirt on Clinton from Natalia.
And regardless of the morality, Trump, Clinton and McCains actions were LEGAL.
It is the actions of those in DOJ/FBI/CIA/State that are an abuse of power – and illegal.
I noted that Jackson’s revocation of Manafort’s bail was legally correct. I think it was morally wrong – though the real moral failure was with Mueller. Manafort’s actions were not “witness tampering” Mueller’s indictment for them was an abuse of power and an infringement on the rights of the accused to attempt to defend themselves.
I am on the far right on Gun Control ?
You mean the same positions as SCOTUS ?
Or our founders, or our constitution ?
If you think my position is so far to the right – it should be trivial to change the constitution.
In recent polls a majority of people support greater gun control – when asked that means universal background checks and mandatory waiting periods.
I can support the latter, and the former depending on exactly what that means.
That puts me with the majority of americans.
Are you saying the country is a far right country ?
You say I am strongly pro wall ?
No I am strongly anti-stupidity.
You are right, what is necescary for open borders is politically impossible.
But without those things the harm of open borders will substantially dwarf the benefits.
I do not favor destroying the country
I STRONGLY want “open borders” – I want the end to our stupid drug laws.
I am not going to get that – though maybe Marijuana will be fully legal in my lifetime.
Further, I am not “strongly pro-wall”.
The wall is just one part of many things that are necescary if we are not going to do what it takes to have open borders.
If ‘illegal immigration” doubled or trippled – which it would easily if we had defacto open borders – would you support or oppose it ?
You say I have impossed impossible conditions.
You have absolutely refused to discuss in anyway, any arrangement regarding the border.
What you want is the laws we currently have – but you do not want to enforce them.
That is just insane – far more off the wall than my support for open borders under conditions that would work but are politically unacheivable.
We should not deliberately make things worse, because we do not have the political will to do them right.
Do you favor unlimited immigration – regardless of whether it is “called” legal or illegal.
If you do – then what changes do YOU propose to preclude that limitless immigration destroying the country ?
If you do not – then stick YOUR but on the line – what are the limits of immigration and are you going to enforce them ?
I do want a wall – unless we are going to fix all the other problems that preclude open boarders. And I want other measures to secure out borders.
I also want those caught crossing illegally to be deported immediately.
If you want asylum – go to an embassy or cross at a checkpoint.
And if you do, expect that you and your family will be detained until your request has been approved and deported immediately if it is not.
BUT I would also TRIPPLE current legal immigration – that is about 3M legal immigrants/year.
I have preferences for how that should be done. but I do not expect to get my preferences.
But I do expect our congress – and particularly DEMOCRATS to sit down and make the HARD CHOICES regarding who gets to immigrate legally.
If they want to favor “shit hole countries” – fine BUT DO SO OPENLY.
Own your own choices.
What I think is extreme is the position of nearly the entire democratic party, which is “wink wink nodd nodd, we do not want open borders, but we also do not want any immigration laws enforced”
No one here – and certainly none of those on the left has been more honest about immigration than I have.
I think those of you who oppose Trump on immigration are COWARDS,
You are unwilling to own tough decisions. I do not completely agree with Trump on immigration, but I respect him because he HAS taken a position.
Being opposed to walls is just stupidly ducking the issue.
Walls are nothing more than a means of enforcing whatever immigration laws we actually have. Nothing more.
YOU need to take an actual position on what those laws SHOULD be.
And you need to take a position that you intend to ENFORCE.
If you have some magical way that works better than walls – DO IT.
But the opposition to the wall is not about the wall, it is about enforcing the laws we have,
If you do not like the laws we have – and quite often I do not, then work to change them.
Do not call people who have had the courage to actually have and defend positions extremists when you are unwilling to do anything but snipe yourself, and your real bottom line is advocating lawlessness.
Dave there are a couple here that read what you say and understand your positions. But even then, much of what you write goes unread if its not in the first couple paragraphs. Just make sure your point is made within the first 100 words of your point may be ignored and only what is said in the first 100 is read and remembered.
I read more than most. But I also have to skim and find pertinent points to read as I also don’t have the time to read everything you write.
Yes, I oppose the Utopian position of open borders, absent the Utopian conditions necessary to make it work.
“Plus there is is over the top equating even slightly liberal people with Stalin.”
What you are ranting about is called logic.
“In logic, reductio ad absurdum (Latin for “reduction to absurdity”), also known as argumentum ad absurdum (Latin for “argument to absurdity”), apagogical arguments or the appeal to extremes, is a form of argument that attempts either to disprove a statement by showing it inevitably leads to a ridiculous, absurd, or impractical conclusion, or to prove one by showing that if it were not true, the result would be absurd or impossible.[1][2] Traced back to classical Greek philosophy in Aristotle’s Prior Analytics[2] (Greek: ἡ εἰς τὸ ἀδύνατον ἀπόδειξις, lit. ‘demonstration to the impossible’, 62b), this technique has been used throughout history in both formal mathematical and philosophical reasoning, as well as in debate.
The “absurd” conclusion of a reductio ad absurdum argument can take a range of forms, as these examples show:
The Earth cannot be flat; otherwise, we would find people falling off the edge.
There is no smallest positive rational number because, if there were, then it could be divided by two to get a smaller one.”
The most common means to defeat a reductio ad absurdem is to demonstrate some actual limiting principle.
As an example you constantly accuse me of being an anarchist.
But there are a number of limiting principles between my limited government and anarchy.
Government infringement on individual liberty is acceptable if it can be justified.
Some of the elements necescary to justify the infringment of liberty by force are:
Necescity – there is no means besides force to resolve an issue.
self defense – force can be used to defende against force.
effectiveness – the use of force MUST work.
Minimizations – the use of force must be the least necescary to accomplish the purpose.
So what are the principles that are barriers between your ideology and Stalin ? Or any other totalitarian ?
Why should I trust that over time you are not going to take more an more liberty until you reach Stalin ?
You have never bothered to answer that.
Trust in you or your intentions is NOT enough.
Stalin, Hitler, Mao, Castro, Chavez, Pol Pot, …. these are real world examples of totalitarianism. They have occured in impoverished countries and despotic countries, but they have also occured in afluent advanced western democracies.
If you want more power for govenrment – YOU are obligated to tell us what the limits of govenrment power are. Why we are not going to creep slowly towards Stalin
If you can not or do not do so – then your moaning about being compared to stalin is crocodile tears.
I would suggest that your definition of “far right” really means will not let you get away with bullshit.
Priscilla and Ron are closer to Trump on most issues.
Where we differ is that I do not let your bullshit slide.
And that predates Trump
Priscilla, the thing that I find in this political environment is anyone agreeing with anything that Trump does is categorized as an extreme right “Trumpanzee” by the left.
You could hate the ground that Trump walks on and if you said “That was a really great looking over coat trump was wearing when he got off Marine 1” you would immediately be identified as a far right “Trumpanzee”.
And that just shows how uninformed those that are taking this position are. Many of Trumps positions are not right wing, they are populist.
Amen;
BTW you are also a Trumpanzee if you do not tolerate bullshit.
If you expect people to make arguments and back them up with facts, logic, reason, rather than emotion.
The current defintion of extreme right is anyone who does not want Trump impeached yesterday.
Dduck ” So, including Trump as president in the equation, I consider you, Priscilla and especially dhlli as on the extreme right, not middle right.”
So, if voting for Johnson is extreme right, I am guilty
…If voting for a libertarian instead of a far left Democrat next election, guilty
…If believing the laws in this country should be enforced, all laws, just not the ones you want to follow, guilty
…If not accepting force on those who do not want or need something as a way to get entitlement programs funded for others that do, guilty
…If not accepting abortion up to the date of expected delivery, guilty
…If not accepting that America’s political parties enter into trade agreements that have decimated our manufacturing due to unfair trade practices for years by other countries, guilty
…If not accepting that America enters into climate agreements that place burdens on our country, while giving the worlds worst CO2 polluter free reign for years to come, guilty
…If supporting programs that help those unable to work, but requiring those that can to work to receive proportional help, guilty
…If supporting the words in the constitution and not what is interpreted based on a political position, guilty
…If not accepting federal control, but recognizing states rights, guilty
…If not accepting that Medicare for all is the answer to the rising health care problems in this country, guilty
…If not accepting that the federal government should be paying off student debt, guilty
…If not accepting that the federal government should be funding college cost for all, guilty
…If not accepting the federal government paying for brain farts like the bullet train in California, guilty
…And I could add more, but my fingers are getting tired.
You go on to say
“Once he is out, I will return to the Rep party assuming it picks up some of its older values.”
Once the new crop of democrats (possibly led Sanders) gets in office, with the help of Queen Nancy and Chuck Shumer and they pass their new Democratic party entitlements, energy controls, trade agreements, social programs and gun control measures, your worries might be more on making ends meet than voting for a Republican in 2024.
I don’t view myself as a strong conservative, but if you do, that’s fine. I can live with that much more than someone identifing me as a democratic socialist. But I know I am far from a christian conservative Ted Cruz conservative and much closer to Libertarian when it comes to those values.
Ron, I don’t care if you voted for Johnson. I voted for Perot, and in hindsight consider myself to an utter jerk. So what?
Trump is president now, regardless that I voted for HC in NY. I felt like I was trying to decide between two ultra sleazes. Following Trump, and his empire, starting with papa Don Fred, and then Don’s antics in the bigger real estate arena in the NY media for decades and the NY Clinton escapades made for a weird non-choice. Trump trumped Hillary with his total lack of governmental experience, so I voted for her. Past is past.
Now is now, so what I see is more chaos ahead under Trump and that is why I will support the Dems until the Reps straighten out.
Incidentally, If she had won, I would have criticized HC/Dems strongly as I am still a Rep at heart.
So you have followed the Trumps ?
Have they used force against anyone ?
The worst things I can think Trump has done privately is his use of eminent domain – and that is a private plea for government to use force to benefit a private actor.
Everything else ? Voluntary.
The Trumps have built things, that people wanted and pay to make use of.
No one has to do so. If this is “empire” please sir can I have more.
Trump’s lack of government experience is an asset.
Anyone who favors term limits grasps that consciously or otherwise.
Power is corrupting. Government experience is a school in corruption.
Chaos and order are a yin/yang. We can not exist without both.
That does not inherently mean they must be balanced.
Chaos and freedom are inseparable. But complete chaos is disaster,
At the same time more than the minimal order necescary to control violence is increasingly harmful.
Trump’s promise to drain the swamp to shrink government are inherently chaotic.
If you are bothered by that you are not a republican at heart.
Or atleast you do not understand what smaller government means.
It absolutely means more chaos.
Though I would note that the highly elevated chaos we have now is primarily the outrage of the left. They thought they had power permanently, and that proved untrue and now they are throwing a hissy fit.
They need to figure out why they lost and adapt. But they are not doing that.
I disagree with Trump – much more than Priscilla and Ron.
Yet you think I am farther to the right ?
What distinguishes me from Ron and Priscilla is that I do not let you, Jay or Ron get away with False attacks on Trump. There like of response does not mean Ron and Priscilla agree, just that they are less willing to tear apart every single stupid attack.
I would also note – as part of what is wrong with this one dimensional scale is that Trump is NOT all that far to the right. His most controversial positions – Trade and immigration were for much of my lifetime positions of the LEFT.
Trump is most closely alligned with both the good and the bad of the Tea Party ideologically.
And as I have noted many times before the TP was a shift LEFT for the GOP.
It was an abandonment of Social conservatism.
To the extent we view this on one axis – the country has moved LEFT significantly in my lifetime, but not on all issues, and different groups not at the same rate.
But again politics is not a single axis.
I support EQUAL rights for all – gay, female, trans, black, …..
Justice is supposed to be BLIND, it is not supposed to see those attributes.
It is certainly not supposed to favor one group over another – not even oppressed minorities.
With few exceptions. the evidence I see is that is Trump’s position.
I doubt he is the same as I am, and I can call him a hypocrite with respect to women – except that according to recent data the Trump administration has the largest proportion of women in all roles – both important ones and others. I read an article in RCP or somewhere like that in the past week asserting Trump’s historic levels of women in power – but google is not finding that article – but then we know Google has weighed their search rankings to bury pro trump stories.
We have a big row here over KelleyAnne Conway – the first woman running a winning presidential campaign ever. I am not sure that Sanders is the first female Press Secretary – but I can not think of another.
“So, including Trump as president in the equation”
And that is actually what is the most wrong with you and Jay.
You are so offended by Trump that you beleive everything negative uncritically, and you fixate on words – and mostly the words of others about Trump, not actions.
I do not think anyone here Thinks Trump is a saint. I am pretty sure my view of him is more negative than Priscilla’s or Ron’s.
But you include criticising you for false character assassination with being a “trumpanzee”.
and you think anyone whose view of Trump is not worse than that of Bush, Clinton or Obama is on the hard right.
Trump is not even on the hard right.
So, the Mueller report is complete. There will be an absolute hurricane of partisan spin and BS starting yesterday and going on indefinitely. Getting an objective description of the true finding and conclusions of the report is going to be difficult verging on almost impossible. Both sides will claim total vindication, no matter what. The noise will shout out the data.
Does anyone who has invested their emotional energy in prejudging the finding really want to know the objective truth? Are any party partisans anywhere ready to handle a conclusion that does not support their side? The reaction to the OJ verdict is going to be a pimple compared to the reactions of people to the Mueller report who are totally certain that they know the truth, to wit, my side wins.
I hope that I will be able to restrain myself from saying anything about the substance of the report until a good long time has passed to let the spin and BS storm subside.
Well Roby, you are going to be waiting for many years to come before you know the truth and the whole truth. Just yesterday I read where Judicial Watch finally received over 30,000 e-mails that the DOJ had from Clinton’s private server that proves she lied to the FBI and the congress during their hearings. They provided any number of e-mail conversations that showed classified information being discussed. Who cares about that now?
So this has been over 3 years and they just received those through the Freedom of Information request.
That means the Muller investigation may not be fully disclosed until 2022 or 2023. Will anyone care then?
A Google search now doesn’t reveal any new Clinton emails from Judicial Watch, Ron. The last release of ‘new’ email info from them was NOVEMBER 16, 2017.
if you have a link to your ‘just received’ emails, please post it.
Jay, I misspoke. Dont know where I get the 30,000 from. Its 756. But if it were you ir I, 756 would get us convicted.
https://www.judicialwatch.org/press-room/press-releases/judicial-watch-uncovers-more-classified-emails-in-hillary-clintons-unsecure-email-system/
According to JW, TODATE only 5000 of 33,000 Clinton emails have been produced.
And aparently no more will be. Either the FBI does not have the other 28,000 or they are “classified”.
One of the problems that Comey had by claiming that only a few (thousand) of Clinton emails were classified, was that made ALL the rest subject to FOIA requests without redaction.
JW should have about 29,000 emails. They have only received 5000,
Why not the other 24000 ?
google “judicial watch email clinton” last month
Third link
https://rightwingtribune.com/2019/03/24/clinton-email-server/
Separately you can go to JW’s web site and they have a cronology.
Lots of things have happened since November.
In december a new discovery order was issued allowing JW to make further email relatred discovery requests of clinton.
Sorry Ron, another search via Bing just brought up the newer Judicial Watch story…
And, so what?
She was “extremely careless” in handling classified information – none of which proved to have any detrimental impact on anything.
So I guess because she was “connected” and part of the political elite, then this is another case of picking which law one wants to ignore.
I guess that is why juries can justiy finding officers like Pittsburg police officer Michael Rosfeld not guilty after shooting an unarmed black youth in the back. Just
pick and choose which laws to enforce!
“She was “extremely careless” in handling classified information – none of which proved to have any detrimental impact on anything.”
Talk about blinders.
We KNOW that two foreign powers had access to her emails – we know that from Strzoks texts.
We KNOW that China had REAL TIME access to her emails.
We KNOW that she sent and received emails to POTUS – those are automatically classified.
We KNOW that she provided Sydney Blumenthal with classified information and that he used that information to profit in his dealings with foreign government clients.
We KNOW that she was not merely careless, that she used the private email server Deliberately to circumvent federal record keeping laws and to evade FOIA requests.
ALL of this is DETRIMENTAL.
The most important Clinton communications are NOT the classified ones.
We already know that she sent classifed information.
The important ones are those that address her onw knowledge of what she was doing – and we have some of that already.
She discussed handling her communications with Colin Powell – specifically about trying to thwart freedom of information requests.
That is a violation of the federal record keeping acts. That probably is not a crime. But it is wrong. And the requirement of criminal intent are NOT the intent to commit a crime,
they are the intent to do something you know you may not and the RESULT being a crime.
Clinton is guilty of violating 18cfr793(e) – which is the crime of INTENTION Comey said could not be proved. But it could EVEN when Comey exhonerated her.
But there will be more of that. Any communications that show that she KNEW that some of what she was sending was classified – proves intention.
It is not the classified emails that are going to be most damning.
It may not even be her own. It may be staff emails saying that they need to stop sending classified messages.
Roby “Does anyone who has invested their emotional energy in prejudging the finding really want to know the objective truth? ”
If anyone was interested in the truth, Clinton would be under indictment for lying to the FBI and congress. There, the courts would decide what the truth was based on evidence presented.
No one in any position other than “voter” wants the truth. They just want a political issue to use in the next election.
Yes , in my PERSONAL opinion, anyone that 100% defends/agrees with Trump is far right. Admitting that he is wrong a fair percentage of the time makes me say. Not extreme.
“Yes , in my PERSONAL opinion, anyone that 100% defends/agrees with Trump is far right. Admitting that he is wrong a fair percentage of the time makes me say. Not extreme.”
1).
Trump is not “far right”. Trump is at most Tea Party – which is a blend of fiscal conservatism and trade and immigration positions that were common among democrats in the recent past.
Trump sounds like the Steel Workers of America on Trade – is that far right.
2).
No one agrees with Trump 100%.
3).
No one defends Trump 100%
BTW those are quite different.
I do not aggree with the KKK or Nazi’s but I have defended their rights.
4).
What is a fair percentage of the time ?
Trump is quite obviously “right” far more than Obama – the evidence is in rising standard of living. When you get things closer to right – we do better, closer to wrong we do worse.
Also what about Scale ?
PPACA was a Trillion dollar error over a decade. That is the equivalent to 4 times the 10 year cost of the wall each year.
Trump is wrong about Trade. But to this point only hystrics think the impact has been significant. He has been playing a brinksmanship game with China that is dangerous and scarry, but so far he has not tipped over an edge.
So again – how important is this ?
Trump’s handling of NK has been far from perfect.
But unlike 40 years of president he HAS done something.
So what is a wrong a fair percentage of the time.
I think Trump is wrong alot.
I think he exagerates alot.
I think he makes overly broad statements alot.
Arguably they are all errors.
But though annoying they are not consequential.
Obama on the other hand was far less anoying, but his errors were more consequential.
Why are you surprised there will be lots of spin ?
Eventually I expect to get the actual report.
I do not expect a single fact we do not already know.
And I expect massive amounts of spin from Mueller.
The report has to justify his existance. Of course he is going to make it sound momentous and important.
The actual truth is it should not exist.
Absent a credible allegation of a real crime their should not have been ANY investigation.
I am not particularly interested in a long report about an investigation that never should have happened.
I have not been keeping up with this for sometime now. But I believe I heard this morning that Mueller has not recommended any further indictments.So now we are hearing the left saying, “but wait, lets see what the house investigation turns up, or what the NY district attorney files”.
This is going to go on for sometime and it is following my game plan to perfection. Investigate, Investigate, Investigate until 2019. Turn over the report. Then the House gets the report, they begin investigation based on the report, They debate and talk of impeachment until early in the election cycle, using that as their basis for getting Sanders or Warren elected president. (Or one like Sanders/Warren)
(Go back over months of discussions and you will find me saying this is a liberal witch hunt and Mueller is the democrat pawn. Now I was unaware until just recently that Mueller was the investigator on the Richard Jewel investigation, but the same things that happened then are being used now.)
It is my understanding that the DOJ has FORMALLY announced that there will BE NO FURTHER INDICTMENTS by Mueller or based on his report.
Yes, there is alot of confusion and ranting by democrats as well as regrouping
I have always said the house is free to do as it pleases.
But Mueller had a patina of legitimacy, a pretense of being apolitical.
The house – whether controlled by republicans or democrats DOES NOT.
The BIG QUESTION right now is how do people respond to this.
Mostly the words in the report do not matter – though we will fight over them.
Mostly the report does not matter. The Big announcement is
“I am Done” – what you have seen in prosecutions in court – that is what I have found.
And that is nothing.
You are correct the left wants this to continue to the election.
But the question is NOT what the left wants but what ordinary people want.
We keep talking about TDS – but it is actually important.
I am surprised that democrats have maintained their virulence and energy as long as they have. But this is NOT the same as the Tea Party. This is not slow burn long term committed activism. It is the red hot fire of uncontrolled outrage. Eventually that passes, and it is normally followed by BACKLASH.
I do not know what will happen, but this is a very complex and tricky moment and things could go many directions.
If the conclusion(the conclusion of the people, not Mueller) of the Mueller investigation is accepted as proof this was a witchhunt – there will be a high price to pay.
If democrats continue to investigate after the Mueller investigation and the people really are tired of this – they will make things WORSE for themselves not better.
I have no idea what we will see.
Democrats are demanding everything.
Many Many republicans are demanding everything.
But Rod Rosenstein as an example has written a letter stating that ALOT of this can not be made public BY LAW. That even the house can not subpeona it BY LAW.
Anyway there is going to be enormous fights over that, and it is not really clear what the sides are.
Regardless, it is of critical importance to democrats right now to find someway of continuing to fire the flames of outrage – because when they die – democrats face backlash.
Republicans were massacred for impeaching Clinton – which I did not understand – there was a legitimate basis for that.
At the same time ordinary people felt they were promised more than lying about a blow job in the oval office. And they were angry and took that out on Republicans.
None of us can predict how voters will respond to this. But it could easily dwarf 1998.
The democratic party has been in disarray since before 2016. The fixation on socialism at the moment I think is a reflection of the fact that they have no real message.
I think that many democrats understand that Bernie and AOC are the road to disaster.
But there is no other democratic message.
Trump stole the democrats best modern message when he coopted immigration and trade.
He took blue collar workers from democrats – and they are doing nothing to get them back.
So you ave a democratic party whose only real message is “Argh! Trump!”, and that message is dying, and a public who is losing interest. Recent polls have 53% of voters beleiving that this has all been a witch hunt.
I do not KNOW what will happen moving forward from this point. My predictions of great disaster for democrats may not come to pass – and they are NOT wishful thinking.
The democratic party needs to come together, figure out what it is doing wrong and refocus.
I think that it is inevitable that will result in a HUGE shift of democrats towards the center.
But that is in the future – it is NOT happening yet. But it is inevitable, and it can not happen until democrats start to understand their own failure.
They need to get from being the “anti-Trump” party, to being pro something that actually appeals to the center. They need to do so without doubling down on the extreme left, or disallusioning their own base – which is extremely left.
Alot is made of the energy of democrats – and it was a major factor in 2018.
That energy can be sustained in the face of major setbacks.
It CAN NOT be sustained in the face of being WRONG.
It is unlikely that the virulent TDS’er will ever change their beleifs.
There will be an all too large segment of the population that will always beleive absolute nonsense.
But lots of people who beleived the TDS garbage, but did not get mentally owned by it, are going to let go.
I do not think the fizzle of the Mueller investigation is going to be a watershed in most ways.
But I do think it is likely to be in the political/emotional sense.
And that is the problem facing democrats right now.
This likely will not end. The die hards will never give up.
But if large numbers of people go “Where’s the beef” ?
Democrats are F’d.
BTW all the fights that will come over releasing things or whatever what is released might say are not all that important. At the most they are a fighting retreat.
Mueller has anounced he is done. What speaks for him is his results.
Trey Gowdy said it best regarding Comey and the July non-exhoneration exhoneration.
FBI/DOJ investigate. Where their is a basis – they indict and prosecute.
The prosecution speaks through the court – not press conferences.
It was enormously wrong for James Comey to stand up and spend 15 minutes telling us all the reasons that Clinton Should be prosecuted and then announce he was not going to prosecute.
A large part of my problems with Mueller’s overall conduct is that if you do not have an underlying case – you do not prosecute this other nonsense.
You do not criminally prosecute other innocent people – because they spoke out against you, or they did not coopoerate with you to your satisfaction.
Flynn was fired because his statements to VP Pence regarding his phone call with Kislyak was not completely accurate. That should have been the end of that.
Mueller ultimately found that Papadoulis was not involved in anything.
That should have been the end of that.
Pissing on Papadoulis because he got the dates of some emails wrong is EVIL.
The entire manafort investigation was a farce – Manafort was only part of the campaign for 6 weeks. It was self evident from the start that he could know little or nothing of the actual focus of the Mueller investigation – anything regarding Manafort should have been handed off to other US ADA’s Just as everything related to Cohen was.
I still have some lack of clarity regarding Stone. The “lying to congress” claim is ludicrous, Stone failed to remember exculpatory information. That NEVER should be prosecuted.
There are other claims against Stone – essentially for witness tampering.
Stone who dates all the way back to Nixon, claims – and I think quite credibly, that what is alleged to be “threats” are actually ironic and satirical nixon references.
I am not sure. As serious as “witness tampering” might be. We do not want to make all communications of any kind in the US like dealing with the TSA – where if you make a joke you end up in jail because no one has a sense of humor.
Further Judge Jackson’s responses to Stone have been WRONG.
Stone is constitutionally free to conduct his defense in the press. He can insult the prosecutor, and the judge and the entire system.
You do not lose your constitutional right to free speach – even offensive speach, because you have been indicted.
The court does not gain much in the way of power over rights of ordinary people UNTIL they are convicted.
Regardless the point is the convictions Mueller has gotten are nearly all process crimes.
Even Butrina’s “guilty plea” – was really a revalation of the weakness of Mueller’s case.
Butrina plead guilty to something that prevented Mueller from looking like a fool, and was immediately released on time served and returned to Russia.
It it was OK to take a plea that gave you nothing and released her immediately – then why the hell were you holding her int he first place ?
Mueller told the courts she was a great danger, that she would flea, that she not only had to be held on what were minor charges, but that she had to be isolated.
Yet when push came to shove he accepted a plea to a FARA violation and released her.
I jeep trying to tell you all that Mueller and his team are part of the PROBLEM, not the solution. They are what is wrong with out justice system.
I do not as an example beleive that Mueller is “partisan”. I do not beleive that he is “corrupt” in the sent that he is bought. I beleive he is corrupt in the sense that he beleives the ends justify the means and that he will pummel innocent people to “get to the truth” – even if the truth which was evident from the start – is there is nothing here. Further Mueller acts as if he has no doubt that anyone he investigates is guilty – guilty of serious offenses. He pursues everyone as if they are pablo escobar. As if his job is to make it impossible for them to defend themselves. As if this is a gladitorial contest to the death not a search for truth.
Ron, I have been ranting about the connection between Mueller and Richard Jewel since about 6 months after he was appointed.
Nor is Jewel the only such mess Mueller is connected to.
Mueller was an active participant in nearly every disaster at DOJ/FBI for the past 30+ years,
While he is only CENTRAL in about 50% of those. He shows up negatively in all of them.
Whether it is the FBI lab scandal, or Ruby Ridge or Waco, or OKC or Hells Angels or Whitey Bulgar or Hatfill and Ivens. or at the very end the FBI U1 coverup.
Mueller is their. Mueller and Comey were the lead players in the “Ashcroft Hospital confrontation” that is the huge notch on Comey’s belt – that Gonzales and others who were there claim that Comey is lying about.
“The objective truth” – if there is something more in it of substance than we already know I would be shocked. If you are expecting more – the odds are you will be disappointed.
The report will be Mueller’s spin on what we already know – and we can expect him to spin it favorably to Mueller. He has to justify his own existance.
No I do not expect this will fall like the OJ verdict.
I do not expect anything of consequence that will surprise anyone.
Nothing will change immediately.
As you say – both sides will spend months spinning the spin.
It will take a long time to digest – not the report itself but its meaning.
In the long run the left should expect to be let down.
There is nothing there – and there never was.
The good news for Trump is that Mueller has stuck his nose into everything – even deep into places he did not belong. Absent a highly unexpected finding of consequence backed up by facts, no matter how Mueller spins this Mueller the pit bull ultimately exhonerates Trump and condemns his enemies – even if he does not say that.
But it may take months for the impact of that to take hold.
“The good news for Trump is that Mueller has stuck his nose into everything – even deep into places he did not belong. Absent a highly unexpected finding of consequence backed up by facts, no matter how Mueller spins this Mueller the pit bull ultimately exhonerates Trump and condemns his enemies – even if he does not say that.”
What difference does it make when the dem’s stretch this out and the final outcome is not known until after the election and the democrats have won?
The ability of dems to stretch this out depends on the interest of the people as a whole – not just their base.
Before the report was released to the AG 53% of americans decided this was a “witch hunt”
If there is not something NEW to come from Mueller, Democrats are likely DEAD.
This will take the wind out of the sails of even their unrelated investigations.
It will also reinforce the need for a quiet but thorough investigation of what went wrong at DOJ/FBI – hopefully resulting in prosecutions.
I really do not care if democrats and republicans in congress go at each other with machettes. The problem here is the use of DOJ/FBI.
We need to be able to trust that DOJ/FBI(or IRS/CIA/NSA/State) are not being used as a political weapon – not by democrats, not by republicans.
I heard one former US ADA assert that Rosensteins appointment of Mueller was actually a deliberate coverup of his own involvment in the corrupt DOJ/FBI investigation of Trump.
That he grasped that signing the FISA warrants and participating in the “wear a wire” and 25th amendment discussions were a very very serious problem for him if they came out.
That by appointing Mueller he was able to use the “ongoing investigation” as a firewall to prevent access to the evidence of his own misconduct.
I do not think Rosensteins actions were quite that overtly corrupt.
But they were wrong.
We have to be certain that in the future when the power of the executive branch is targeted at political enemies, that there is a real foundation for what is being done. That the driver is the law, not politics.
DducK has also flown to the “Racial Profiling” thread.
The process worked. It was a necessary process. I am satisfied with the result. I never believed, and my comments history here will back this up, that trump or his team directly communicated with putin or his people. That was not necessary.
The report also apparently finds that the putin’s people hacked the dem party and used wikileaks among others to distribute the leaks to help trump. I hope that the details of that affair will be fully revealed. This is something trump denied happened. The Mueller report apparently documents the evidence that this Russian hacking of the dem party did in fact occur. Will trump still deny it? trump publicly took putin’s word over the opinion of all of the American intelligence agencies on this matter. That was and is extraordinary, which is the source of my opinion that trump behaved in a manner that was traitorous and that republicans and conservatives would have found traitorous had a democrat been the one who behaved that way.
That extraordinary behavior made the Mueller probe completely necessary. It should be obvious from its result that it was not a “witch hunt. “
“The process worked. It was a necessary process. I am satisfied with the result. I never believed, and my comments history here will back this up, that trump or his team directly communicated with putin or his people. That was not necessary.”
No Robby, the process did not work.
What happened was that political operatives from one party were able to collude with DOJ/FBI/CIA/State to cause the investigation of a political opponent using manufacturered evidence that should have taken 10 minutes to ferret out as garbage but instead consumed us for 3 years.
That is NOT what we expect from government.
If I make false accusations regarding you – with crap for evidence – I should be the one under scrutiny – not you. This has nothing to do with Trump, and everything to do with corruption.
Most of us are not going to have alot of sympathy for Manafort or Cohen – though I am still deeply disturbed at the way their prosecutions were handled – certainly they did not receive the Hillary Clinton version of “justice”.
But what was done to Flynn and Papadoulis is DESPICABLE.
Even Page has been defamed even though he managed to avoid been prosecuted by a DOJ/FBI/SC more focused on jailing the innocent.
What MUST happen next is holding those who inflicted this mess on us responsible.
To the extent possible it should be done quietly without fan fare.
But I doubt that can occur.
I would note that Mueller “exhoneration” is particularly damning.
We sicced a lawless pit bull on innocent people – and he found nothing.
We have been subjected to these leaks and lies for 3 years – and in the end NOTHING!
Unless you are going to prosecute the washington Post for the Pentagon Papers – Wikileaks is no different from any of the rest of the press.
The left was happy with them when they were embarrassing Bush.
As to Russia:
Mueller is the same person who concluded that the Anthrax in 2001 came from Fort Dietrich.
After his investigation destroyed two innocent people, the NSF concluded the Anthrax likely came from the Mideast and near certain did NOT come from fort dietrich.
I do not think Mueller and his people are competent to deal with technical evidence.
VPS – those are former members of the NSA concludes that there was more than a 50% chance this was an inside job, that there was near zero chance that if it was a hack that the hack originated in europe. Most people involved in hacking will tell you that everyone has everyone else’s hacking tools. The US made Stuxnet look like the Israel’s did it.
Unless you are clairvoyant like Cloudstrike and Mueller, you can not determine the origin of a hack without inside information. We know as an example that several similar high profile hacks of the french at near the same time using the same tools originated in Pakistan.
Further – what are you going for ?
If hackers in Ohio had gotten the DNC emails and given them to the washington post, should they not have published them ?
While Hacking is a crime.
The behavior of the DNC was offensive.. The harm to clinton was that her own dirty laundry was exposed.
BTW there is plenty of evidence that the DNC continues with the same bad conduct as before. They are currently trying to make it even harder for other democrats to primary incumbents
The DNC is free to do as it pleases – and the rest of us are free to vote accordingly.
I am not all that happy at times with the behavior of Republicans.
All kinds of games were played to keep Ron Paul from having any consequential role in the 2012 republican convention. He was stripped of nearly half his delegates by GOP shenanigans prior to the convention.
As to revealing the details – they are ALREADY fully revealed.
The SC has no evidence that was not in the Crowdstrike report – no one does.
The DNC stopped any investigation by the FBI or NSA.
Your not going to get more than we have had for years – because there isn’t any more.
Wikipedia continues to insist the DNC emails were from a hack not a leak – and frankly I think Assange know better than Mueller or Crowdstrike.
Past that – So long as Wikileaks is not involved in actual hacking,
Which there is no evidence they are, it is irrelevant where they got their information.
It is also interesting when Wikileaks was publishing things that made Bush look bad – they were getting donations by the ton. They received money from credit cards and by the ton.
When they published things that embarrassed democrats – suddenly their credit card processors dropped them and the only means they have of receiving donations is bitcoin.
And of Course we have the idiots in the DOJ trying to go after assange for espionage.
But that is par for the course for the Obama DOJ.
Is it possible that Russia hacked the DNC ? Certainly. Russia is one of myriads of groups that might engage in such actions.
Would the Russians do things to disrupt our elections ? Absolutely!
We did not need a $30M investigation to know that we should assume that all kinds of people might want to hack our elections.
And no that is NOT extrodinary. The same bogus commission that Obama concocted that concluded that Russia had tried to influence the 2016 election ALSO concluded that their actions were NOT unusual, that they have been doing so with every US election.
Do you understand the US spies on Russia, and the US even spies on our Allies.
We should always be trying to thwart those spying on us.
We should also be trying to ferret out what other countries are doing.
Mueller has said nothing about Russia that was not obvious from the start.
If you want to start looking at what we need to better secure our elections – so long as you are not going to use that as a means of having government censor speach or compell others so censor speach – I am fully with you.
Trump tried to do something about that after the election. Democrats refused to participate.
We should look at how to secure voter registration databases – from Russians and anyone else. We should also look at developing unifromly accepted standards for purging those databases – People should not have to be dead for over a century before they lose the right to vote. I would be happy to completely eliminate computer voting machines. Anyway there are many other facets of securing the integrity of our elections that we should address.
Russian hackers being only one of those.
Nor is any of that new, nor is any of ti something we needed a Special Counsel to find out.
As to Mueller’s conclusions regarding Russia.
Thus far he has gotten a plea from Maria Butina.
To get that he had to put a millstone on her neck pretending she was the greatest russian spy since the Rosenburgs, lock her in solitary without bail for charges that he was never going to be able to make stick, and he eventually got her to plead to a FARA violation – time served and immediate deportation. So much for Butina being a great spy. She was no different from US college students in Russia who remained proud of their home country.
But hey you are OK with that.
Mueller’s investigation is going to wreak havoc on our foreign relations.
Mueller has legitimized every other nations criminalization of the political conduct of americans in foreign elections. Next thing you know some country is going to indict Jimmy Carter.
What are you going to do it Russia starts indicting US social media groups that express oppinions in US elections ? Are you going to extradite them ?
Neither the left nor Mueller seem to the capable of understanding that whatever the rules are – those that the US tries to impose on other countries – we can expect to have imposed on us by them.
The US has spent most of our history defending the free expression of americans even in the politics of other countries.
We have just wiped that out entirely.
This entire left wing nut nonsensical need to blame russia for 2016 means that human rights activists, aides activists, gay rights activists, religious rights activists throughout the world are much less safe today.
There is no such thing as “free speach for me, but not for thee”.
The entire Russian Social media nonsense should have died DAY ONE.
Even If putin personally directed a successful 100B social media campaign to influence US elections. Our response should have been MORE speech. Not this insanity.
From the very moment that any allegation is every made, as little as most of us know of the truth – the guilty know they are guilty, and the innocent know they are innocent.
If you wish to hold the innocent culpable for ranting and raving that they are innocent YOU are the problem.
What you call Trump’s “Traitorous” behavior – is the behavior of someone who is INNOCENT.
I have no doubt that over the past 2 years Trump’s advisors probably had to practically arm wrestle him to the ground to keep him from firing the entire DOJ and Mueller.
Wanting to do so is not “traitorous” it is what innocent people do.
It is unfortunately also what some guilty people do.
As to American Intelligence agencies – Mueller found two specific facets of Russian efforts to interfere in US elections. I think he is wrong about one of those and there is nothing we can nor should do about the other – besides engage in our OWN speech.
But even if he is right – Mueller’s scope was the entirety of Russian interferance in the US election – and all he found was what was in the press BEFORE the election.
He DID NOT found all the interferance that the American Intelligence community claimed.
Put simply in this instance the ABSENCE of other finding REFUTES the US IC claims of widespread efforts.
While Mueller’s findings do not entirely vindicate Trump’s assertions, they actuall come damn close.
Mueller was suposed to find EVERYTHING – this is all there is.
And it is NOT MUCH.
When Comey declined to recommend prosecuting hillary over e-mail gate I was satisfied and relieved. Many conservatives were totally ripped and a throw her in jail themed GOP convention was one result.
Now Barr and Rosenstein have said almost exactly the same thing about trump, prosection is not clearly indicated in spite of evidence for and against obstruction charges. I am satisfied, probably relieved too. I think its a terrible idea to prosecute either the POTUS or a party nominee during their political careers, the evidence should be utterly overwhelming to do so. That does not mean that I don’t think that both trump and clinton did not act in ways that could conceivably be prosecuted. If we start habitually putting presidential nominees or POTUSes in jail while in office or during campaigns, satisfying as that might be to some, the result is going to be chaos. I am not at all opposed to prosecuting them when they are out of office if the offense is clear enough and grave enough to warrant it. They are not above the law.
“Oh, Mama, can this really be the end
To be stuck inside of Mobile with the
Memphis blues again”
Roby “I am satisfied, probably relieved too. I think its a terrible idea to prosecute either the POTUS or a party nominee during their political careers, the evidence should be utterly overwhelming to do so. ”
Are you in the “Jay camp” of picking and choosing which law you want to follow, or do you believe everyone should be subjected to the same enforcement regardless. Would you favor those in the office or running for president to face legal action after the election or leaving office?
I am a hard ass on this issue. I think Clinton should have been indicted. If there is enough evidence he obstructed justice to bring charges, then he should face the music after leaving office.
If there is a law, everyone should follow it, not just the common folk.
In Russia, if you are an anti-putin politician and you get any traction it is soon discovered that you are an embezzler. I don’t think we need to go that route. Find me a politician who has not broken some law. Find me a grown person at all who has not broken some law. I am practical, we can indict every one of them. That won’t work.
Personally I see plenty of evidence that trump obstructed justice or attempted to. But, there are subtleties and loopholes in the law and it is not a cut and dried thing. Prosecuting trump or hillary would smack of the russian method of dealing with the other side. Now, we know, being not so young anymore, that Spiro Agnew got indicted for crimes he committed prior to being the VP. The VP, or AKA his irrelevancy, which is hardly a game changer politically. I think that going after the POTUS or a nominee is going down a very dangerous slope. But I am repeating myself.
The thing I most wanted from Mueller was an investigation into the Russian hacking-Assange connection. I hope we get the real info on that as a result of Mueller.
We are talking about the US – not Russia. Purportedly a country with “the rule of law”.
I expect the DOJ/FBI or the appropriate law enforcement to investigate all credible allegations of actual crimes – even by politicians.
DOJ actually has rules for this – they are driving by the constitution.
Any allegation is sufficient to start an investigation – BUT the first step – the first level begins with critical examination of the ALLEGATION – basically an investigation of sorts into the accuser. Is the allegation credible.
A credible allegation gets you to the next step. That allows you to start investigating the accused. But just getting to that level does NOT permit you to get warrants of use confidential informants of spies. Each step up the in terms of the intrusiveness of the investigation requires meeting a higher standard of credibility.
That is “the rule of law”.
If someone who does not like you accuses you of being a pedophile – that does not allow the government to search your house or bank records.
The Russia Collusion nonsense rests entirely on the Steele Dossier, and that fails at step one. In otherwords in July of 2016 when it first raised its ugly head – there was not enough basis to investigate – yet this investigation started in December 2015 – with even less basis.
Further by July – investigators had already used spy’s – again without sufficient basis.
You need to get past the fact that this involves Trump – who you do not like.
Our process is to protect peoples rights – whatever we think is sufficient for those we support and wish to protect – those we loath are entitled to the same protection.
There was no criminal investigation of Clinton until JW FOIA requests turned up NO emails of any kind from Clinton’s tenure at state. A judge granted JW discovery and JW found out about the Clinton email server.
The Clinton investigation STARTED with the following FACTS:
The State department could not comply with FOIA requests – because they did not have her emails.
That is a violation of federal records keeping laws.
Not usually a crime, but sufficient alone to justify an investigation.
JW had determined through discovery that ALL Clinton’s emails were kept on a private server.
All of this was KNOWN at the begining.
While JW can be presumed to be partisan – they are not the actual source. the source of the evidence was tesimony and documents provided by CLINTONS staff all under the supervision of the courts.
Not JW aligned groups.
Nothing exists to this day that reaches the same level regarding Russian Collusion.
By all means – get something legitimate on Trump, investigate and prosecute.
We have way too many laws, and that is a separate problem.
But so long as we do they should be enforced – even against Trump.
But more importantly against EVERYONE who we have a credible allegation has violated them.
If all politicians are criminals – give me a credible allegation, investigate, prosecute and convict.
Republican, democrat, I do not care.
The objective is not to preclude prosecution of politicians.
It is to thwart POLITICAL prosecutions.
The Steele Dossier needed to be scrutinized thoroughly.
But if any of the allegations in it were sufficiently credible – they should have been investigated. But especially given the source, the allegations must be viewed with suspicion until they are verified.
McCains and Clinton’s conduct regarding the Steele Dossier was NOT criminal.
Investigating without first verifiying ESPECIALLY given the political nature of the source of the allegations WAS a crime – it was a color of law crime – which is all misuse of the power of government for purposes beyond those of government. And it is a crime that can only be committed by those IN government.
“Personally I see plenty of evidence that trump obstructed justice or attempted to. But, there are subtleties and loopholes in the law and it is not a cut and dried thing.”
Actually the law is “cut and dried” – and in fact all law MUST be “cut and dried”,.
That is what the rule of law means.
We are lawless is we can not know that is an is not a crime – if it is a matter of oppinion what is and is not a crime.
We can disagree over what SHOULD be a crime, but there should be no doubt of what IS a crime.
Barr’s letter was brilliantly succinct.
Obstruction is a defined crime. It has several required elements. BTW this is true of ALL crimes. that is how the criminal code works.
Even in a jury trial, no judge is supposed to allow a charge to go to the jury unless evidence of all the required elements are present.
The elements of a crime are not OPTIONAL.
Barr noted 3 separate required elements for obstruction that were not present in ANY of Mueller’s claims. Only finding one missing element is sufficient to bar prosecution.
Even an indictment requires asserting that there is evidence to support ALL required elements.
This is not about “loopholes”.
The absence of presence of the required elements of a crime are the difference between innocence and guilt.
We do not prosecute people for the murder of others we know are alive – that is not a “loophole”.
“Prosecuting trump or hillary would smack of the russian method of dealing with the other side.”
Nope, there is no parity, no moral equivalence, no tit for tat.
The entire point – the FAILURE of both the Trump investigation and the Clinton investigation is that POLITICS not LAW drove both.
The problem with the Trump investigation was not that we can not investigate politicians.
It is that the LAW was not followed.
The decision not to prosecute Trump is not because of some moral equivalence.
It is because the evidence necescary to charge a crime does not exist.
In Clinton’s case it does.
In both cases the investigation should have been BLIND to the nature of the target.
BUT NOT blind to the source of the allegation.
I do not beleive that Manafort’s counduct meets the required elements of the crimes alleged.
But the courts did and the jury convicted.
If that is our law – then every other person who there is a credible allegation should be charged and convicted. If all those people turn out to be republicans – so be it.
But whether the charges are legitimate or not – if we are only investigating allegations against republicans and are seeking to avoid allegations against democrats – we have a serious problem with our justice system.
The accused is not immune from investigation because of WHO they are.
But the credibiulity of accusers DOES vary based on who they are.
There is one point I would likely agree with you on.
SCOTUS allowing the Paula Jones Lawsuit to proceed was a mistake.
I have zero problems with DOJ persuing credible allegations against any politician or sitting president. But private lawsuits should be tolled until the end of the presidency.
I do not like that – but it provides a vehicle for private disruption of the presidency.
I felt that way at the time – I continue to do so now.
Any connection between Russia and Assange is both mythical and irrelevant.
If Putin delivered the pentagon papers to the Washington Post – they should still publish them.
There is only one way in which Wikileaks is not completely protected.
That is if they were apriori involved in criminal conduct to acquire the DNC emails.
It is completely irrelevant whether a publishers source is a criminal, or a foreign government or revolting.
It is also completely irrlevant what the publishers source o income is, what their political views are, what their motives are.
One of the reasons I keep identifying you with the left – is your fixation on motives.
Conduct that is not criminal does not become criminal bercause of suspected motives.
Ron, reread my post. I answered your question, in the affirmative. I specifically said that they are not above the law. After office if warranted indictment is OK by me.
A person who can not be indicted, who has arguably committed a crime should be impeached, removed and then indicted.
If you can not impeach and remove – you are done.
I can add one more thing: I am not the grand poobah of America. I am just a guy who vents on TNM in between doing his paid work, which happen to occur on his computer. I’ve got the definitive answer to nothing. I have no well developed legal and moral theory that takes all issues into consideration and then outputs a foolproof answer to fixes everything. I’ve got my opinions and my fears, that is all. I fear using criminal law as a political tool on the president, other than under extreme circumstances. It may all the same be warranted, if it is warranted it is not going to be because the country consulted me and I in my position as the expert on everything gave my decision. Its a blog, fer gods sake, and I am a blovulator, as are all of us. So, anybody taking me too seriously is taking me more seriously than I take myself. We all know what it looks like when someone takes themself too seriously.
“I have no well developed legal and moral theory”
If you make a moral claim – then you had BETTER be able to argue the moral basis for that claim. If you can not – you have no business at all making a moral claim.
My wife does criminal defense appeals. It is incredibly rare that an appeal is on the basis of failure to demonstrate the required elements of a crime.
Prosecutions do not occur without evidence for EVERY required element of a crime.
The primary basis for appeals is procedural – the defendant did not get a fair trial.
We use juries to determine whether the evidence of each element meets the “beyond a reasonable doubt” standard. That is a bad arrangement, but we do not have a better one.
But some evidence MUST exist for each element.
That is about as close as we get to absolute in law – and it is pretty close to absolute – “foolproof” as you say.
BTW, this is NOT my theory of the law – this is out law developed over many centuries as it is. We do not just make it up as we go along. You need not personally know every nuance of it. But the rule of law requires that it is not arbitrary or capricious, or random or biased.
The law – particularly criminal law, must be as concrete as we can make it.
It also must be as intuitive as we can make it – we must KNOW that we are committing a crime, even if we do not litterally know the elements.
“I fear using criminal law as a political tool on the president, other than under extreme circumstances.”
The issue is NOT extreme circumstances.
The issue is that the use of criminal law should ALWAYS be done carefully,
and we should ALWAYS be suspicous that those making allegations are trying to use the law as a tool to get their enemies.
Allegations must be credible to trigger and investigation – whether of the president or a homeless person – they are also supposed to be allegations of a CRIME.
A higher standard than that must be met to prosecute.
All the standards must be BLIND to the target.
When we discuss serious things – like criminal prosecutions – we should do so seriously.
If you are just bullshitting – you should not be talking about criminal prosecutions.
Clinton should have been told she was likely going to be indicted in 2015.
The house can impeach Trump for “obstruction” even now.
They can impeach for anything.
But actual “obstruction” has real legal requirements.
I think Barr’s letter to congress UNDERSTATES the bar to an obstruction charge.
I have overstated that actual innocence is an absolute bar to prosecuting obstruction.
But it IS a nearly insurmountable defense.
If you can find a jury that will convict an innocent person for railing about their own innocence during an investigation of them, and or for doing anything in their legitimate power to thwart a “witch hunt”, then there is something seriously wrong with that jury.
Mueller has done something unusual for prosecutors.
The norm is to say nothing. Prosecutors speak by prosecuting.
Prosecutors almost never say that something DID NOT happen.
Mueller has said THERE WAS NO COLLUSION,
He has said so unequivocally.
In doing so he completely undermines any charges he has ever filed for obstruction or thwarting the investigation in any other way.
I hope and expect that Trump will take time before acting.
But after the appropriate wait:
Flynn should be pardoned.
Van Der Zandt should be pardoned.
Papadoulis should be pardoned,
Stone should be pardoned.
Manaforts sentences should be commuted.
Cohen can rot.
Dave, you comment about a jury convicting obstruction charges.
The House is not a jury. A jury has to make a decision based on evidence. The house, although they should not, can jury rig most information and with the help of the media, convince people that a president is guilty of most anything they investigate. And I suspect that is the game plan now that Mueller has finished.
T o me, this report has done nothing to change the dynamics in Washington. Mueller left enough doubt in the report that will allow the house to continue investigating and the press and prime time political shows to continue as they have for over two years.
Ron,
It is my sense that the dynamics have ALREADY changed.
They have changed HERE.
We will see if in a week or two they remain changed, but I think this is a bigger deal than I expected.
Yes there are still some demanding that house democrats agressively move forward.
And maybe they will.
But I am strongly suspicious we will see a fairly radical scaling back of the “get Trump” agenda over the next couple of months.
Mueller has just raised the stakes radically for the left.
Mueller has said “Trump is a pig who insulted me from day one. But as much as I loathe him, there was no evidence of collusion”.
Starting that instant the political price for continuing to assert otherwise is MUCH higher.
The very fact that Mueller is a dogged pit bull so willing to beat the shit out of people and break their arms to get what he wants, makes the results MORE damning.
Trump has been exhonerated by somebody who thinks everyone but him is a crook.
I would not be surprised to see the entire house Trump investigative agenda scaled back radically.
I would also not be surprised if the calls for “transparency” do not die.
I am all for transparency – but it is actually going to be quite difficult.
Grand Jury material is involved, and anything involving unindicted parties – with the exception of Trump is not supposed to be released.
But more importantly – there is not good reason for Democrats to beleive that there is some secret Thread hiding to be discovered.
Some possibilities – would be to allow Mueller to testify. That would probably have to be a closed session, but Mueller could determine what he was permitted to disclose.
Another alternative would be for Barr to ask Mueller to prepare a report that does NOT include material that can not be disclosed.
I expect there will be a few clamours for transparency.
But I think Trump and his people politically gamed the D’s by calling for Transparency themselves.
Now we have Rosenstein saying – WAIT A MINUTE!!!.
We will see. The left may back off “getting Trump”. I dont see the left changing much. Maybe a few will scale back, but already the story has shifted from collusion to obstruction. They will take that and run with that.
When you have prime time actors like Rachel Maddow on MSNBC almost crying (voice cracking, facial expression tightens, no tears but close) when she discusses the Mueller report and announces ” no further indictments,” you have to believe the left is more invested now more than ever in getting Trump than when they thought Mueller was going to do it for them.
Trump SHOULD still be gotten, the hell out of office, ASAP.
What in his idiotic creepy stupid behavior are you interpreting differently now, that Mueller wasn’t able to directly connect the Trump-Russia dots to indict him? He’s still the same erratic unprincipled lying lump of crap today he’s been for the last two years.
And the far left, middle left, moderate left, centrist independents, as well as a coterie of Never Trump neocons, Reagan Republican Rinos, and other sensible citizens want Trump GONE.
If Barr’s synopsis of Mueller’s investigation has so throughly cleansed Trump of perfidy, why are Republicans trying so hard today to keep the full report from being released? If there was nothing detrimental to Trump & pals for Mueller to find, why did he try so hard to obstruct the investigation?
The ties & lies between Trump & Russians aren’t going to be buried.
They will continue to be revealed as the state and House investigations continue.
Jay “Trump SHOULD still be gotten, the hell out of office, ASAP.”
I think if the democrats can find the evidence to remove him, they will vote to do that starting in the house “ASAP”
You:
“If Barr’s synopsis of Mueller’s investigation has so throughly cleansed Trump of perfidy, why are Republicans trying so hard today to keep the full report from being released? ”
I did a Bing search, a Google search and DuckDuckGo search on “GOP trying to keep Mueller report secret” I could not find anything for that information. Please provide a link to the information you have to support this question. The only thing that I have heard is the report is being reviewed and Grand Jury testimony as well as undercover informant information is being scrubbed since any grand jury info is scrubbed from any officially released information almost always and any undercover informant info is scrubbed for obvious reasons,
Now if your info comes from MSNBC, CNN, talk show info then forget it. That is not reporting. That is just 180 degree opposite Hannity crap.
You:
” If there was nothing detrimental to Trump & pals for Mueller to find, why did he try so hard to obstruct the investigation?”
Again, please provide the documented statements within the report that indicate where Trump obstructed justice. Yes Barr states there is not enough info to bring charges for that. but you seem to have information that I can’t find that provides sufficient proof that obstruction did occur. I would like to read that so I can decide myself.
Thanks
I suspect that Republicans are going to delay – but not for the reasons Jay thinks.
They are going to attempt to tie release of Mueller material with the release of the unpublished material on the FISA Warrant, on the unmasking, on the pre-Mueller Trump Collusion investigation.
AND they are going to want this all to come out in drips and drabs between now and the election.
Republicans want all of this to do as much damage as possible to democrats and the press between now in 2020.
Barr did NOT say there was insufficient evidence of Obstruction.
What he said was Trump’s conduct as reported by Mueller is not BY LAW obstruction.
It is not a question of evidence, it is a question of law.
Ron, eventually it will all come out,
When it does I would bet heavily that there is NOTHING, about Trump that is in Mueller’s report that you do not already know, including all the evidence.
Not about obstruction, not about anything else.
“Trump SHOULD still be gotten, the hell out of office, ASAP.”
Because what ?
Regardless, you can do that in 2020,
But you have just lost a huge number of votes.
“What in his idiotic creepy stupid behavior are you interpreting differently now,”
When an accusation is made ONE person – the accused knows absolutely for certain, whether they are innocent or guilty. The behavior of someone who we beleive MIGHT be guilty, might look idiotic creepy and stupid if you do not know whether the are guilty.
But it looks far more rational, when you grasp it is the behavior of an innocent person falsely accused.
“that Mueller wasn’t able to directly connect the Trump-Russia dots to indict him?”
Cut the idiotic Spin – not merely rapid foaming pit bull Mueller – but practically every reporter on the planet dug under every rock. THERE IS NO CONNECTION TO RUSSIA!!
There is no space left to play not guilty is not the same as innocent, or the absence of direct evidence is not the same as innocence. When something is a vigorously investigated by so many people as this – the absence of evidence IS proof of absolute innocence.
Though anyone who was not brain dead would have realized that from the start.
Only the most stupid person would “collude” with Russia for $10M in bad internet adds.
The cost of trying to keep contacts with Russia hidden would dwarf the cost of just buying more adds directly. You do not take an enormous risk of paying a infinitely high price for something of negligable value.
And lets say that Papadoulis, Cage, Cohen, Manafort, … helped Trump “collude” with Russia.
Wouldn’t Trump have risked impeachment to kill Mueller to prevent that from coming out ?
Wouldn’t Trump have paid nearly any price to avoid the risk of any of them being grilled – and jjailed by Mueller ?
Cohen is headed to jail for 4 years with near zero hope of a pardon.
Yet in the house he STILL testified “there was no Russian Collusion”
If there was collusion that Cohen knew about – wouldn;t Trump have given him that whitehouse job that Cohen coveted ?
“He’s still the same erratic unprincipled lying lump of crap today he’s been for the last two years.”
We have listened to YOU and myriads of others telling us Trump and others are “eratic unprincipled lying lumps of crap” for two years.
When you call someone a liar – and you fail to prove it you have destroyed YOUR integrity – not theirs. This failure is spectacular.
Your sour grapes do not work.
“And the far left, middle left, moderate left, centrist independents, as well as a coterie of Never Trump neocons, Reagan Republican Rinos, and other sensible citizens want Trump GONE.”
The future is not mine to see, but my bet – and it is already happening, is an awful lot of people who were not violently anti-Trump and many who were, will be rewriting their history.
Whatever they were saying about Trump 6 months ago, Today they will claim that they just wanted to give the system a chance to work, or something like that.
Regardless an awful large number of people are pretending they have always been 2 steps closer to Trump than they actually were.
“If Barr’s synopsis of Mueller’s investigation has so throughly cleansed Trump of perfidy,:”
It is not “Barr’s synopsis” that matters, Absent demonstrating that Barr is blatantly lying – and if that were the case Mueller would be investigating Barr for obstruction right now, Mueller is wrapping up and has found nothing.
The most important words Barr has spoken are NOT “Mueller found nothing” they are “there will be no further indictments”. The latter says the former as clear as a bell.
“why are Republicans trying so hard today to keep the full report from being released?”
What republicans are those ? All the republicans I heard in the past few days want as much as humanly possible released.
There are some serious legal problems that have to be addressed.
It is actually a crime to provide information from a grand jury.
It is also a crime to provide investigative material about someone who was not indicted.
That would NOT likely apply to Trump’s conduct as president. But it would apply to myriads of others who were investigated, but not charged.
It is possible that material can be released with their permission.
Grand Jury material can be released by court order.
I expect that it is likely that we will see pretty much everything – as soon as that can be done, and long before the 2020 election. But that will not happen tomorow.
Barr is likely to testify shortly – probably publicly and privately.
Mueller will probably follow – though his testimony will likely be private.
Right now it is Graham demanding Barr’s testimony – not democrats.
I am not so sure that after thinking about it, democrats will.
For all their carping about Transparency – at this moment a lack of Transparency serves them. It is easier to pretend there was a coverup, or Mueller found something but could not prove it WITHOUT his report, than with it.
“If there was nothing detrimental to Trump & pals for Mueller to find, why did he try so hard to obstruct the investigation?”
Obstruct how ? By firing a corrupt FBI head ?
BTW that claim works in the exact opposite direction too ?
Wouldn’t an actually innocent person behave much as Trump did over a cheap shot political snipe hunt started by the politically corrupt in the prior administration that refused to die, despite the absence of ANY evidence ?
What is surprising is that Trump allowed this to go on this long.
It is nearly impossible to convict an innocent person of “obstruction of justice” – even if they actually did.
Further it is NOW quite obvious to everyone that there NEVER was a basis for the investigation. Ranting and railing about a witch hunt is NOT obstruction.
The one part of Barr’s letter than he got right and Mueller got wrong, is that Trump’s conduct was NEVER obstruction.
Being angry as a hornet about a politically corrupt investigation when you know you are innocent is not obstruction. Defending yourself from a witch-hunt is not obstruction.
Aside from the fact that it is not obstruction legally, it is also not politically.
Absent evidence of collusiuon – you will never get most people to buy obstruction.
And that is how it should be. Always and for everyone.
“The ties & lies between Trump & Russians aren’t going to be buried.
They will continue to be revealed as the state and House investigations continue.”
There are no secret ties and nothing a fraction as consequential as those of Clinton, and her cronies.
It will likely take time – but my bet is that house is going to lose its appetite for further investigtions of Trump personally.
If they want to lose the house in 2020 – they should keep those investigation going.
I suspect their efforts will shift appropriately to administration oversight.
Whatever you or I say – what is going to happen will happen.
It is my oppinion that the post 2016 outrage of the left was a huge mistake – and unsustainable. Outrage must burn out without fuel, and as much as the far left might wish otherwise Trump’s actions are just not that outrageous.
But thus far I have been wrong – the outrage has been sustained for more than 2 years.
That scares me because I think that it MUST burn out eventually, and the longer it burns without real fuel the more destruction will be exposed when it finally goes out.
I am strongly suspicious this is that moment.
But only time will tell.
I beleive that Trump’s election was a watershed political event.
I beleive this moment is the marker for the collapse of the resistance.
But we will see.
Of course the extreme left is invested. But it is not the extreme (or right) that determines events,
I have been carping about the cost of being wrong about moral accusations.
The least possible cost for a false accusation, is to no longer be believed.
Large numbers of people (though not everyone) are trying to rewrite their past.,
It is not the extremists that matter – it is the middle 50% of the country.
People who have been lied to,
People who bought that lie,
can rewrite their own past to mitigate the extent to which they bought the lie.
and turn on those who lied to them.
I beleive that Mueller recently remarked that the absence of evidence of guilt is not the same as innocence. Often that is true. But when you have unleashed a rabid pit bull like Mueller and he can find nothing, that is called total exhoneration.
People really do not like having been duped into beleiving lies.
I listened to Comey’s statement live has he read it. As he went through the version that we now know was watered downsignificantly I remember thinking “Oh, My God, he is about to recomend indicting Hillary Clinton!” – Until just about the last sentence.
We now know that DOJ had told Comey and the FBI month’s early that there was to be no recomendation of prosecution for 18cfr793(f). That effectively took the teeth out of the investigation.
I would further note that from the START of the investigation, from DAY ONE, there was sufficient evidence for an 18CFR793(f) prosecution.
DOJ should have told Clinton to drop out of the race in 2015, and spared us all this nonsense.
That you think there is some kind of moral equivalence here is absolutely insane.
Clinton’s email conduct while potentially resulting in a 10year sentence would not likely have.
Contra DOJ – many others have been prosecuted for the same thing.
Sentences for those in the military tend to be higher,
but even other public servants have been convicted for much less egregious conduct.
Sandy Berger was convicted merely for violations of govenrment records requirements.
In his instance he stole a small number of records from the national archives.
Clinton kept atleast 30,000 government records from ever entering the national archives – and BTW we have email on that and we KNOW that was INTENTIONAL.
But outside of Berger I am not aware of prosecuting a record keeping violation as a crime.
But Gen Petreus and John Deutch were both convicted for merely bringing small amounts of classified information to their home.
Their conduct was SMALLER scale and LESS reckless than that of Clinton.
Petreus was convicted and received a probation sentence.
Deutch was convicted and headed for Jail when Bill Clinton pardoned him.
It is unlikely that Clinton would have faced jail. But it is near certain that she would have plead guilty and never been able to get a security clearance again.
It also would have ended here candidacy. That should have happened in 2015.
Further there are several on Clinton’s staff who are guilty of actual obstruction of justice or actual lying to federal agents – and they would have faced jail.
This is a real crime, and a real coverup, and one in which DOJ/FBI were complicit.
If you were satisfied – then you have bizarre standards of conduct.
Is it OK with you that the Secretary of State provides friends with Classified information that they use to profit in foreign countries ? Really ?
BTW that was “intentional”
It is not just “conservatives” that were “outraged”.
It was highly unlikely that Clinton was headed for jail. But had justice been done – she would have plead or been convicted.
She committed a crime.
I have no idea what Rosenstein has said – except that Rosenstein continues as he has from the start to resist allowing anything to be made public.
There is a real legal issue regarding grand jury material – as well as anything involving the investigation of anyone not charged. Investigators speak through indictments.
AS to this “obstruction nonsense”. Mueller refused to charge, and Barr CORRECTLY reviewed has “pro’s and cons” and said what has been said from the very begining.
You can not obstruct by protesting your innocence.
You can not obstruct by insulting the investigators.
You can not obstruct by excercising powers you are legitimately entitled to.
You can not obstruct where there is no crime – because you can not have criminal intent if you are innocent of what is being investigated.
YOU are continuing to harp on this lunatic proposition that even if there is no crime that you can obstruct justice by protesting your innocence.
Trump can not obstruct justice in the Mueller investigation – even if he had fired Mueller, unless there was actual collusion with Russia.
Papadoulis can not violate 18cfr1001 unless he knowing lies to investigators about something they do not already know that is substantative in a way that results misleading the investigation.
Manafort can not “tamper with a witness” by contacting someone NOT identified as a witness and essentially asking them if they would be willing to testify for him.
Seeking to establish your own innocence can not ever be a crime.
Stone can not commit perjury by failing to recall in his testimony exculpatory evidence and then being denied the oportunity to review his own testimony and correct it.
Each of the items about are THE LAW – as it actually is. Not as you wish it was.
We all know that the Mueller team was a bunch of zealots,
Their inability to actually assert a prosecutable claim of obstruction is damning – to them.
While Mueller was not man enough to admit that Trump’s criticism of him and his investigation was RIGHT, he was atleast unwilling to go completely over the top and claim a sitting president could be prosecuted for the non-crime of pissing off Mueller.
Something Mueller should have grasped regarding Manafort, Stone, Flynn and Papadoulis.
No POTUS is not above the law.
But that has NEVER been the question.
The only issue which Mueller answered was:
Was there ever any substance to this farce.
Mueller answered CORRECTLY NO!
In doing so he actually undermined his own investigation.
Today what evidence exists that justifies STARTING this investigation ?
Today there is NOTHING beyond the Steele Dossier.
Given that it is entirely hearsay once removed, and given that it is sourced from a political opponent, the DOJ/FBI (and SC) was OBLIGATED to verify it FIRST, and failing to do so come to a FULL STOP.
Mueller has PROVEN that the FISA Court was LIED to.
What you do not get is there never was a basis for this investigation.
You Trumpsters will no doubt defend this:
“Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell blocks a move by his Democratic counterpart to pass a resolution calling for the Mueller report to be made public cnn.it/2JE1gcf”
What’s in the report he want’s suppressed?
Trump’s money laundering?
Thanks for that info. I don’t know what the resolution states. If it is an immediate release of the report, then I understand McConnells reluctance to let it be approved. That releases confidential info from Grand Jury testimony and those involved as well as unidentifed undercover informants identites.
In many circumstances if an indictment is returned from the GJ, then that testimony is released. If there are no indictments, then many, if not most cases, that is held confidential.
So if Shumer is not grand standing and asking for something he knows can not be released anyway, then when the information can be released, I support his position. If, however, he wants everything released as is now, then he knows that can’t be done legally or otherwise. If that is what he is doing, its another play to the democrat base they know only fires up the TDS crowd.
Remember, Adam Schiff sent all the money laundering information as well as other information his committee dug up that they had to Mueller to use against Trump the first week in February. Even Mueller, who I said was out to get Trump under any circumstances, could not find anything in the house investigation material.
From the February 6th Washington Post…………..
“The committee heard testimony from more than 50 witnesses, including the president’s son Donald Trump Jr. and son-in-law, Jared Kushner, and others close to the president and deeply knowledgeable about his campaign and business dealings.
Schiff told reporters that the transcripts, which would be sent to Mueller immediately, include material that the special counsel’s office has not seen previously. Mueller “will now have access to those transcripts for any purpose that will facilitate justice,” Schiff said.
The panel has previously released select transcripts to the special counsel, including those from interviews with Trump’s longtime friend Roger Stone and Trump’s former attorney and fixer Michael Cohen. Cohen, who is expected to begin a three-year prison sentence next month for lying to Congress and committing financial crimes, was due to appear before the Intelligence Committee for a closed-door interview Friday. But that session has been postponed until Feb. 28, Schiff said Wednesday.”
By God, if Mueller could not find a shred of evidence in Schiff’s documented information, then I would bet a large amount that there is not evidence against Trump. Mueller is not going to let his investigation ignore anything that would indict Trump. He is not another Comey making a decision to not indict for the good of the country.
“By God, if Mueller could not find a shred of evidence in Schiff’s documented information, then I would bet a large amount that there is not evidence against Trump. ”
What orifice did you pull that statement from? More precisely, what part of Barr’s letter don’t you understand?
Barr noted that although the report “does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.”
In other words, there was LOTS of evidence, but it didn’t reach federal criminal indictment threshold, according to Barr. That doesn’t mean it doesn’t reach impeachment threshold. Which is likely the reason Republicans are trying to squelch it’s release.
You’re already in doublexstandard party-mode on this, Ron. Just the other day you were bitching about the FBI letting Hillary off too leniently on the email server. That investigation documentation was released to the public. But now you’re willing to dismiss all the charges leveled at Trump on the basis of a synopsis assembled by Barr, Trump’s appointee, who had expressed reservations about the investigation before he was jammed through the confirmation process by Senate Republicans.
You don’t know what’s in the Mueller report, or even how many pages it is, and you’ve already embraced it in a GOP hug.
Jay, you and I live in two different worlds.
“Here are highlights of what Comey said about Clinton
1. “Although we did not find clear evidence that Secretary Clinton or her colleagues intended to violate laws governing the handling of classified information, there is evidence that they were extremely careless in their handling of very sensitive, highly classified information.”
2. “Clinton’s emails included seven message chains with information classified as top secret”.
3. “None of these emails should have been on any kind of unclassified system.”
4. “The security culture of the State Department …was generally lacking in the kind of care for classified information found elsewhere in the government.”
5. Comey acknowledged that the FBI did not normally make public its recommendations to prosecutors as to whether to bring criminal charges. He added: “In this case, given the importance of the matter, I think unusual transparency is in order.”
6. “Although there is evidence of potential violations of the statutes regarding the handling of classified information, our judgment is that no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.”
7. “I know there will be intense public debate in the wake of this recommendation, as there was throughout this investigation.”
So please note the wording in #1, #2 and #6.
Each of these shows clear evidence that a crime was committed and there should have been further action taken. At least a prosecutor should have reviewed the information and made the decision, not Comey. At most, the courts, not Comey should have decided through a grand Jury to indict or not.. Thats why there are courts.
Now we have one day of a report from Mueller. In it, it clearly states he found no evidence of collusion. So in my world if there is no evidence then you are not guilty. But maybe in yours you are guilty until you are found innocent.
In the second issue, Obstruction. To quote the New Yorker article concerning the day one findings. “Barr stated “Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein and I have concluded that the evidence developed during the Special Counsel’s investigation is not sufficient to establish that the President committed an obstruction-of-justice offense.” These sentences prompt a number of questions. Why and when did Mueller decide that he wasn’t in a position to resolve the obstruction issue? Which actions by Trump did he investigate? (Barr wrote only that “most” had been reported in the media—but not all.) What did Trump and his attorneys tell Mueller about these actions in response to the special counsel’s written questions to the President? And what did Mueller make of those answers?
So what is considered sufficient and what is not when it comes to obstruction. Could just not testifying before his investigators be considered obstruction? Obstruction is defined as “the crime or act of willfully interfering with the process of justice and law especially by influencing, threatening, harming, or impeding a witness, potential witness, juror, or judicial or legal officer or by furnishing false information in or otherwise impeding an investigation or legal process.
So which one did Trump do? Did he influence a witness, threaten a witness, harm a witness or impede a witness? Did he do any of this to a juror, judge or other judicial official or did he provide false information to an investigator. If he did any one of those, he would be guilty of obstruction. So why the hell is there not enough evidence to prove it? I ask you (Jay) since you seem to have the answer already.
So right now in my world the citizens do not have the same information that the citizens had when the information came out about Clinton. Maybe in a day or two more information will leak out. Maybe Schiff will release information from his committee that he is keeping secret for some reason that he said indicates Trump is guilty of money laundering. Maybe the complete report will be released so you and I can make a decision that clearly shows obstruction.
But I dont have TDS and I am not going to indict someone in my mind without sufficient evidence. Comey gave sufficient evidence to indict. But because she is of your party, you dont believe she should be charged. Fine, that’s your world.
When the facts are released about Trump, then I will make a decision based on those facts. I was not part of the investigation, I don’t have a copy of the report, I was not on the grand jury, I was not in a committee investigation and therefore i can not make a decision now. All I have right now is someone taking Barr’s words and reporting them in their words based on their political bias. On the Left “GUILTY OF OBSTRUCTION”. On the right ” NOT GUILTY OF ANYTHING, TOTAL WASTE OF TIME”
So just because I said there must not be a shred of evidence in the Schiff information and Mueller did not use anything does not mean I am not open to something further about Trump if it comes up.
I don’t have a f’in crystal ball like you do so I have to wait..
Ron,
Though I absolutely agree that Comey’s remarks were damning.
I recall hearing them live and until the last few sentences thinking “Oh, My God, he is going to prosecute”.
But to clarify – just as with Trump – the “evidence” is not what is in Comey’s remarks or Mueller’s report. The evidence is the facts, Comey and Mueller merely put them in writing in one place conveniently.
You can look up the statutes on obstruction and you can look up 18cfr793(f) the statute on reckless or negligent espionage.
You can check of all of the elements in 18 cfr 793(f) – this is not a question of oppinion.
There is no disagreement of substance on the facts.
Clinton handled classified information recklessly.
That is the requirements of the law.
Comey is half correct – there have been plenty of other prosecutions of conduct indistinguishable from Clinton’s – Petreus and Deutch immediately come to mind.
All resulted in prosecutions and pleas, at the same time it is unlikely that Clinton would have gone to jail – atleast not for 18cfr793(f). But she would have been permanently labeled as a criminal, Her risk of jail would have been based on destruction of evidence, lying under oath, and obstruction. All of which the FBI fell over themselves to hide from.
While investigating Trump – Mueller went far beyond what the law allows in using the law as a weapon to try to get anyone purportedly involved to turn – an impossible task – because as even cohen demonstrated, you can put the screws to somebody to the point of making them your pupet, but you can not change the truth. And if the facts do not support the allegations you are hoping for, using the law as a weapon accomplishes nothing.
Conversely, in clinton’s case – we KNOW that evidence was destroyed AFTER notice was provided to preserve it. We do not always know WHO lied, but we know that among several parties atleast one is lying. We know that sworn pleadings to the court were false. We know that testimony to congress was false. We know that significant numbers of Clinton aides were complicit with Clinton in her crime – it would have been trivial to threaten half Clinton’s staff with 18cfr793(f) violations and gotten their cooperation.
We have none of that with Trump.
The facts we know do not come close to the crime Jay wants to charge.
Worse still the claim is obstruction of a criminally corrupt investigation.
You can not criminally obstruct a crime.
Dave, et al………….”All resulted in prosecutions and pleas, at the same time it is unlikely that Clinton would have gone to jail – atleast not for 18cfr793(f). ”
So hear me out. And understand my words. Don’t add or subtract anything from these words.
1. Comey presented information that INDICATED Clinton MAY have committed a crime.
2. It is the responsibility of a PROSECUTOR to determine if charges should be filed. They can do that themselves, go to a preliminary hearing before a judge or to the grand jury.
3. I could CARE LESS if Clinton was convicted of said criimes.
4. However, if there is evidence of a crime, THEN FILE CHARGES.
So now Trump.
1. No evidence of Collusion. No charges to file.
2. Not enough evidence for Mueller to make that decision, leave it up to the AG.
3. If there is any evidence that the AG can use that Trump may have obstructed justice, THEN PROCEED With whatever legal action one can take!
MOVE ON! This Benghazi, email and collusion environment in congress is not what we elect individuals to do. Make the damn decision, shit and get off the pot!
If he did it, impeach!
If not, Move ON.
1) Read Comey’s statement
There was no “may”
2). NO!! The law determines what constitutes a crime. The Prosecutor determines if the facts correspond to the laws requirements.
Whether they can do that themselves or use a GJ depends on local law.
…
2). Derschowitz got that right. There is no obstruction, Mueller is just no man enough to admit it. As Barr noted – BECAUSE MUELLER ABDICATED, the evidence does not meet the requirements of the law.
Benghazi took forever because the Obama Administration was hiding the evidence.
Prosecution is DOJ’s job – congresses is oversight. Figuring our what went wrong at benghazi was congresses job, investigating expionage is DOJ/FBI’s
I am not sure what “collusion” is, but investigating a conspiracy to commit crimes is the responsibility of the DOJ.
Quite often “no evidence” is not the same as innocence.
Few prosecutors have $30M to go after their prey.
Few have the entire world press as deputies.
Even in far lessor cases it is sometimes possible to say the investigation turned over every rock and stone, and not only did not find anything, but there is nothing, because there is nowhere left to look.
That is definitely true of this case.
There is no evidence because the alleged collusion not only never happened, but because those alleging it KNEW that from the start, and the DOJ/FBI knew they were being fed a political mess, and never bothered to verify or if they did, put blinders to the fact that the failed.
No one is ducking real evidence of real crimes. Bring it on if you have it.
Yes, I want as much as possible of Mueller’s work made public – AND as much as possible of the Republican investigations of DOJ/FBI.
I have zero expectation to find any crimes in that. That would require beleiving Mueller and his team were incompetent to a huge degree, When someone who sees crime in every word, finds no crime. When someone who stops inches short of stress positions and waterboarding finds no crime – you can take it to the bank there is no crime.
But I want to go further. This investigation NEVER should have happened. Nor should anything like it EVER happen to anyone else.
The standard necescary to open a criminal investigation is low. But it is far higher than an unverified set of allegations sourced from people who hate you.
I am NOT open to more which hunts – not by the FBI or DOJ or CIA or NSA or the House of Trump or anyone else based of unverified allegations by those with an axe to grind – not of Trump, not of anyone, based purely on hatred or fear.
If the FBI can find nothing better to do – then we do not need the FBI.
The most appropriate and important consequence of this is for those who pushed this,
“Not to be believed in the future.”
We have heard many here – piss over Trump for calling the press – the enemy of the people.
He was right.
The press is not the enemy of the people – because it investigated the crap out of these allegations – the standard for the press to investigate something is zero – whatever they think people car about. The press is the enemy of the people because they LIED to the people.
Because they breathlessly sold as gossip and rumours from anonymous biased sources as truth.
The price for lying – including false allegations of lying is
not to be believed in the future.
Jay;
“Barr noted that although the report “does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.””
FALSE
“The Special Counsel states that “while this report does not conclude that the President committed a crime, it also does not exonerate him.””
Correct.
These DO NOT mean the same thing. Your “fake” quote has Barr presenting a conclusion.
Barr’s actual quote has Mueller stating an oppion.
Further the Quote is a part of Barr’s discussion of the 2nd part of the report – it is SPECIFIC to “obstruction of Justice”.
and is followed by
“The Special Counsel’s decision to describe the facts of his obstruction investigation without reaching any legal conclusions leaves it to the Attorney General to determine whether the conduct described in the report constitutes a crime. ”
“In making this determination, we noted that the Special Counsel recognized that “the evidence does not establish that the President was involved in an underlying crime related to Russian election interference,” and that, while not determinative, the absence of such evidence bears upon the President’s intent with respect to obstruction. Generally speaking, to obtain and sustain an obstruction conviction, the government would need to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that a person, acting with corrupt intent, engaged in obstructive conduct with a sufficient nexus to a pending or contemplated proceeding. In cataloguing the President’s actions, many of which took place in public view, the report identifies no actions that, in our judgment, constitute obstructive conduct, had a nexus to a pending or contemplated proceeding, and were done with corrupt intent, each of which, under the Department’s principles of federal prosecution guiding charging decisions, would need to be proven beyond a reasonable doubt to establish an obstruction-of-justice offense.”
Mueller made no legal conclusion regarding obstruction.
Barr did. Frankly, Barr accepted a defintion of obstruction that is OVERLY BROAD, and STILL found Mueller’s evidence of obstruction did not meet the laws definition of obstruction.
Barr listed three legal requirments for obstruction”
acting with corrupt intent,
engaged in obstructive conduct
with a sufficient nexus to a pending or contemplated proceeding.
Barr found ALL 3 missing from ALL the possible instances of obstruction that Mueller identified but was unwilling to come to a conclusion on.
There is little doubt why Mueller could not reach a conclusion.
Absolutely Trump intentionally disparaged, insulted, pissed over and otherwise defamed Mueller from the begining to the end of the investigation. I have little doubt that Mueller is pissed as hell at Trump. And Mueller has a reputation for allowing his own faux moral certainty – like Comey, to cloud his legal judgement. But even Mueller was not sufficiently bold to make the formal legal claim that pissing on the SC is the same as obstruction.
Barr further notes – that while not absolute in the law.
It is near impossible to find PUBLIC actions obstruction.
It is near impossible to find Obstruction without an underlying crime.
You are still spinning. Barr’s remarks are clearly NOT the same as you quoted.
Barr is NOT equivocal.
Barr asserting that none of the actions Mueller cited constitute obstruction as a matter of law is NOT the same as “does not exonerate”.
Dave “There is little doubt why Mueller could not reach a conclusion.
Absolutely Trump intentionally disparaged, insulted, pissed over and otherwise defamed Mueller from the begining to the end of the investigation. I have little doubt that Mueller is pissed as hell at Trump. And Mueller has a reputation for allowing his own faux moral certainty – like Comey, to cloud his legal judgement. But even Mueller was not sufficiently bold to make the formal legal claim that pissing on the SC is the same as obstruction.”
So here is a conspiracy theory. And remember who this comes from, so you can take it with a grain of salt since you known my thought on Mueller for months
If you are like Jay and one of your highest priorities in life is to insure Trump is not reelected in 2020, what do you include in your report.
1. A complete vindication of both collusion and obstruction, stating there is nothing there to file any charges, or
2. You report there is no collusion, but you indicate your not completely sure about obstruction and your are going to let the AG make that call.
Barr has made some comments about Mueller and obstruction in the past that has been noticed by the left. So taking the action that Mueller has taken leaves the door open for the democrats to continue their search and destroy mission. They can leave the impression that Barr made this decision based on politics and being part of the administration.
So now we will have months of Obstruction hearings. The democrats are using the Benghazi republican playbook used against Clinton. They may find something or not. But the final out is their desire. Trump.
How those who pushed this garbage respond is a reflection of THEIR character.
What you beleive might occur is possible.
My “instincts” are that it will not.
My “sense” is this moment is as big or bigger than the election itself. That although the house cleaning of the government that I want will not likely occur, that efforts by the left to continue this will fizzle soon – on their own.
I am just guessing. And it is hard for me to appreciate the significance of this – as I never had any doubt there was no collusion. The claim was just preposterously stupid.
The big problem with all of this is not JUST that it required beleiving Trump was incredibly corrupt, but that he was incredibly stupid, and incredibly powerful, and that lost of people who were not close associates of Trump not merely did bad things but were willing to fall on their swords for Trump.
But that does not matter now.
A large portion of the press has an enormous credibility problem today.
Political biases aside – their survival depends on addressing it.
People who have been duped tend to get angry – I am not talking about Trump and the “right”. I am talking about moderates. Those who still want to beleive will get demoralized.
The psychological effects of this are likely to be enormous.
The left and the media have conspired to hype this to keep the outrage burning white hot, long past when reasonable skepticism should have kicked in.
By not backing down earlier, by doubling down in the past, they have inflated expectations unrealistically and those have been suddenly dashed.
Recent polls suggested that a majority of americans beleived there was collusion.
Some of them will never let go. But those that do are going to look for someone to blame.
I am just guessing, but I do not think that democrats and the left can just shift directions here.
I think obstruction is DOA and trying to push it is dangerous. Doing so only HIGHLIGHTS that the very people pushing Obstruction are the same ones who LIED to us about collusion.
Derschowitz is correct that you can be otherwise innocent and still obstruct. But you just can not sell people that righteous anger is a crime. That trying to thwart injustice is a crime.
We shall see what happens and I think it is going to take a while to get the full sense of the impact of this.
And even my speculation above is from the outside.
It does not matter how people who never beleived react.
There are two groups now that matter – the complete die hards – who are likely severely demoralized, and the followers who are coming to realize they have been duped.
It is their reaction that determines where this goes.
There is no “impeachment threshold”.
If you wish to impeach – go ahead.
But I suggest you let go Jay – most democrats and most of the media are trying to run away from their role in all of this, not double down.
But double down if you want.
It is what little remains of your integrity that you sacrifice.
No double standard.
Many in the FBI – including Comey – until Lynch told him “Not a snowballs chance in hell”,
understood that Clinton’s conduct met all the elements of the crime of espionage – in 18cfr793(f)
Mueller tried to pull a “reverse comey” and say – well the required elements for obstruction are not present – but Trump’s behavior so offended me that it must be criminal.
BTW meeting the elements is NOT some legal technicality.
You can not convict someone of murder, for calling you a shithead.
The crime of murder has elements.
One of those is a person must die.
calling someone names, is no more obstruction, than it is murder.
Nor would you want it to be.
If Trump’s ranting about Mueller might be obstruction, then Obama’s remarks about Clinton’s email server in 2015 were absolutely obstruction, as were Lynch’s directions to Comey.
So that you are clear – Obama’s statements – like Trump’s were improper, and ill advised.
They were not obstruction.
Lynch’s directions to Comey were highly improper, and dance extremely close to obstruction.
The only reason they might not be is because it was inside Lynch’s delegated power to direct Comey not to recommend prosecution.
Just as it was inside Trump’s CONSTITUTIONAL power to suggest to Comey that he not prosecute Flynn.
“You don’t know what’s in the Mueller report”
We know ALOT about Mueller’s report.
We know ABSOLUTELTY that Mueller found nothing else that warrented further investigation, and that he found nothing else that warrented indictment, AND that he thinks the probability of finding anything new in the little that he has left to prosecute to close this, is near zero.
Further we know that foaming pittbull Mueller prosecuted people for the tiniest inconsequential errors. So we know there is no evidence of even further tiny errors, otherwise Mueller would have indicted.
You are not very good at logic. You seem to beleive that if we can not see inside of a box, we can not have any idea what is in it.
We can know based on the rules of the system and what is Outside the box, what can not be inside the box.
“We know ABSOLUTELTY that Mueller found nothing else that warrented further investigation, and that he found nothing else that warrented indictment, AND that he thinks the probability of finding anything new in the little that he has left to prosecute to close this, is near zero.”
Near Zero is not Muellers desired outcome. And it never was! He wants Trump out and he is giving the democrats every scrap of procedural material to make that happen.
Not finding enough info to indict and leaving that up to the AG provides that doubt and material for the democrats to use as election issues.
Derschowitz has already appropriately shamed Mueller on this.
The call on Obstruction was his to make. Passing the buck to Barr was cowardice.
Barr made the correct judgement. Mueller should have been man enough to do so himself.
Mueller has a very long reputation of NEVER being able to admit he was wrong.
This is just another example.
Muellers efforts to leave open questions regarding obstruction was petty and pointless.
Mueller could have ranted and fumed all he wanted that Trump’s conduct was offensive, and unpresidential and whatever other adjectives he wanted.
It was still legal – and Mueller should have had the balls to admit that.
More importantly it was the conduct of an innocent person falsely accused.
Without the underlying Russian Collusion the vascilation on obstruction looks like what it is PETTY.
If Barr is misrepresenting Mueller’s report – that would at the minimum be a disbarrable ethical violation, and near certainly a crime.
Further Mueller has on occasion taken the rare step of publicly disclaiming remarks that were at odds with the SC’s office positions.
There are things Mueller can not disclose. But Mueller can absolutely publicly dispute the AG’s claims about his report if they are incorrect.
What you claim to be Barr’s bias’s are irrelevant.
I am not happy with Barr. I was not when he was appointed. If you are familiar with him – he is far too close to Mueller historically, and his past activities offend me.
He is a very unlibertarian AG. I think he was a mistake. Though not likely as bad as unrepentant drug warrior Sessions – who I think is more wrong, but more honorable.
I think Barr’s letter regarding the absence of obstruction should have been much stronger.
I think Barr’s interpretation of the law generally is too broad.
But he has still reported that Mueller found ZERO collusion,
that Mueller was unwilling to claim obstruction, and that based on the facts as Mueller presented them – those facts do not meet the legal requirements for obstruction.
If as you hint – he is wrong, that will ultimately – and likely soon, come out.
You radically over estimate the ability of participants in large (fantasy) conspiracies to hide the (your) truth.
The Obama DOJ/FBI/CIA/NSA/State conspirators were unable to hide the truth.
“That investigation documentation was released to the public.”
Nope, only a tiny portion of that has been provided to congress much less the public, and nearly all of that required lawsuits by Judical Watch.
I am for releasing everything. I beleive that will occur in time – and not all that much – but months rather than days.
But I am also for following the law.
Get the court orders necescary to release GJ material. I do not care if you get an Obama Judge to sign the order. But dot your i’s and cross your t’s.
Get any classified material declassified.
Get the permission of unindicted parties to release any material about them.
Wait for final disposition of the cases of those indicted – I would expect a bunch of pardon’s in a month or two – that would be final dispostion, as is a completed guilty plea.
Regardless, follow the rules and the law.
I do not think there is anything that can not be made public – even soon – if soon is months.
But not tomorow.
Neither Trump, nor the Senate, nor the house can release grandjury material or material regarding a party that was not charged, or a party charged, who has not exhausted all appeals.
We will get everything – soon enough.
Barr cited a specific Rule regarding grand jury material.
violating that rule is a crime.
This must be done carefully and properly.
Wrong, Jay. Or BZZT, WRONG! as Dave would say.
The Barr summary states:
“The Special Counsel did not find that the Trump campaign, or anyone associated with it, conspired or coordinated with the Russian government in these efforts, despite multiple offers from Russian-affiliated individuals to assist the Trump campaign,”
In other words, no evidence.
I suppose Mueller wanted to give the Dems an opportunity to pursue impeachment on charges of asking Comey to go easy on Flynn, which MAY have suggested obstruction in someone’s mind? Good luck with that.
Still hoping that there is some smoking gun ?
Barr has already committed to providing the house, the Senate and ultimately the public everything that can be made public without violating the law.
It will take a(multiple) court order(2) to make Grand Jury material public.
I suspect that will occur, but it will take time.
Material about people who were not indicted can not be legally disclosed without their permission. Material about those who are under indictment, but have not either plead or exhausted their appeals can not be made public without the courts permission,
and has a severe risk to resulting an an appeal that results in a declaration of a mistrial with jeophary attached. Do you want Cohen and Manafort to walk ?
Most everyone I know on the right wants EVERYTHING made public – including the FISA warrants and applications, an the internal communications of the DOJ/FBI/SC.
Again – in the long run they are going to get that.
To launder money, the money must be the profits of a crime.
All the money laundering charges against Manafort went away. I do not beleive they made it to the jury. Because none of you – including Mueller understand what money laundering is .
Nothing in the Mueller synopsis has improved my view of trump in any way.
No one owes him any apology. He brought this on himself with his words and behaviors.
He will probably outdo himself in the next period of time. Yeeech.
Roby, I will not say 100% because I don’t know everything that Trump has said in the passed. That is way to much to include in my old brain that has little space left for little known and useless BS to store, but I will say I agree with this statement 99%.
For clarification. I think Trump is a very immoral person. I would not invite him to dinner, I would refuse an invite to site down with him in the White House or meet with him if I were part of a team winning a championship, etc. I view Trump as one of those rich people that will create harmful products if unregulated and then say “sue me” if you die.
But I support most of his policies, unlike most commenting at this site. I have tried to stay out of the “hate Trump comments” and in doing so, I am now considered a “Tumpanzee”. So I guess I wear that label. What I have tried to do is comment on his policies and have experienced push back from most everyone, from Jay, you and dduck about taxes, spending immigration, etc policies to Dave on trade and regulation. But with the TDS that exist here, it is difficult to get into any meaty discussion about policies because it always flips to “Trump the Person”.
trampanzee is not in my vocabulary. That would be Jay’s word, but I have my doubts that Jay has applied it to you, since you have no admiration for trump the person and are quite quick to criticize him.. I have no idea why you want to wear that title or deplorable or any of the other words that have been flung. Perhaps back in school when the teacher yelled at some little ^&%$s that were causing mayhem in her classroom you also felt guilty and that she was yelling at you too, even if you were sitting quietly ?
Anyhow that is a tangent to my own point of view, which is that words are actions. trump is of course now doubling down on his “MSM is the enemy of the people” rhetoric post Mueller. When the next trump loving loonie is more successful than the last one at doing bodily harm to a journalist or bombing or setting fire to CNN or the NYTimes will he take notice? Change? Accept Blame? Where are all the basically decent GOP voters who need to speak with one voice to say that his enemy of the people rhetoric is unacceptable demagoguery and has a real danger of inciting someoneto action? Here is where character turns into something more than just disliking trump the person, it turns into a real issue. Words are actions, especially the words of leaders with a following.
The guy who shot up the synagogue was spouting the Fox line about the invasion at the border. I thought that after that and the mail bomber incidents trump and Fox might be more responsible in their rhetoric. If and when another right-wing loon influenced by such rhetoric kills the members of the groups that the rhetoric has pointed him to are the people who used the rhetoric going to take responsibility? They are not. They will say the person was simply crazy and that it had nothing to do with them, even if the loon quotes their words and ideas directly and is a supporter.
If calling trump a liar and a narcissist and observing that he is not at all interested in facts much of the time and does many things by impulse is “TDS” then what is calling the MSM the “enemy of the people” Do trump and many of his followers have MSMDS? Does it matter if they do? There are plenty of people, right and left who use rhetorical excess, even dangerous rhetorical excess. But, there is only one POTUS and when he is wildly irresponsible in his rhetoric, and doubles down repeatedly and incessantly that is something new and something really destructive. Do I have TDS for saying this? I don’t think I do.
Roby, no i did not feel guilty when the teacher called out another kid. But many times I comment about Trump policies and included in the respinse is Trumpanzee.
In addition, I read whatcDave posts most of the time. Most of it unless its a 500 word term paper, then I scan for key words. zregardless, I see Dave much closer to my position about Trump. Not liking the person, but defending some of his policies.
I also see Dave defending constitutional processes. I see him defending Libertarian positions, much of the time with documentation. In many cases, the response is a Trumpanzee label.
No, I dont label myself a deplorable. I did not vote for Trump just like dave did not. But if supporting Trump policies makes one a Panzee, then I guess I am one.
Now for the media. Although years ago we had what some call a liberal press, the media then brought us individuals.like Tim Russert on Meet the Press. He may have been liberal, but he put the screws to both liberals and conservatives if they were not telling true facts. He asked hard questions to all in a civil manner. His replacement was David Gregory, an obnoxious, leftist that never put the screws to a liberal, but took huge bites out of conservatives, chewed them up and spit them out.
Now we have Hannity, Mathews, Limbaugh, Maddow and others. They dont report news, they look for bits and pieces of news they can use to define an issue and then try to form listeners positions based on incomplete facts. That is not far from socialist and communist propagada that they use to manipulate the thinking of their citizens.The difference being one is the government and one is a organization with protected free speech rights posing as media.
So I dont think Trump should be calling MSNBC the enemy of the people any more than the Obama administration should have said ” We’re going to treat them (Fox) the way we would treat an opponent,” We don’t need to pretend that this is the way that legitimate news organizations behave.
Fox and MSNC, two peas in the some pod.
Well, I kind of could guessed that there would be an Obama reference in the reply to me about trumps “enemy of the people” rhetoric. I am sorry Ron, can you Really seriously claim that what obama said was anything like “enemy of the people,” let alone enemy of the people repeated over and over, including many times After one of trump’s supporters sent his bombs or fake bombs out to CNN? Other presidents have disliked the media or particular people in it (Nixon and Johnson come to mind) but calling the MSM the enemy of the people in public over and over goes Way beyond that. (by the way does the MSM include Fox? Does it include Hannity? or are they somehow not part of the MSM? Because, to answer my own question, they sure as heck Are part of the MSM and have been for decades now.)
So, this is where even I, who do not see you as a trump guy and who understand that you simply like many of his policies, which is fine, even I am going to ask you, why minimize the harm in what trump has said by comparing it to obama’s words? trump is the POTUS today. The whataboutism thing does not work for me at all, especially when the examples are in no way of nearly the same magnitude.
To be repetitive, we can all just hope and pray that no one in the media gets killed by someone who takes trump as his idol and his words about them being the enemy of the people as an inspiration. If that should happen my guess is that most of the conservative world is going to do what they have done thus far and claim that the person was just a nut and there is no connection to trump. Which, in my opinion, is BS and is completely irresponsible. I’ll go so far as despicable. Demonizing words by the POTUS Are actions. Our POTUS tells us he is in love with lil Kim and that he hates the American media. This is really disgusting and wrong. Yes, I am ranting at this point, I’ve gone all TDS.
You know what drives many people to what conservatives call TDS? It isn’t trump himself, its having to deal with people who think that trump’s behaviors can somehow be justified or minimized, so watted or whatabouted. That TDS, trump denial syndrome, is the cause of a lot of, maybe most, of the anti-trump TDS.
Again, to be redundant, this is where disliking trump the person turns into something much more important, disliking the consequences of trumps behaviors, and acceptance of them by his supporters and the GOP to our society. I know I am rambling and being repetitive.
Now, you are Not a member of the GOP and you are Not a trump supporter, that is totally clear, So I am going to be explicit: you are not an good example of what I am ranting about.
Robby,
What is it that you would call it when more than half the press reports lies, inuendo, as fact and accuses people who are telling the truth of lying ?
I have zero problem with the “enemy of the people” remark.
If the shoe fits.
I keep telling you that trust, credibility, and integrity are EARNED, they are not RIGHTS.
BTW the converse is true – distrust, enmity are earned too.
Much of the press has EARNED the insults Trump has heaped on them.
Trump’s remarks would only be wrong if FALSE.
It is the job of the press to re-earn our trust.
No Obama was not saying “enemy of the people” he was saying MY CHOSEN ENEMY
Distinction with little difference.
Regardless, it is not Trump’s words or Obama’s that are inherently wrong.
The words are unacceptable or acceptable based on their TRUTH.
“(by the way does the MSM include Fox? Does it include Hannity? or are they somehow not part of the MSM? Because, to answer my own question, they sure as heck Are part of the MSM and have been for decades now.)”
Is this that difficult for you ?
This is the same as your nonsensical claims regarding waste and fraud in SS and HI.
The purpose of words is to COMMUNICATE. The problem with mangling the meaning of words is that it is often an effort to MIScommunicate.
Trumps “words” lack perfect clarity – but NO ONE right or left has any doubt of what he meant – not about SS/HI not about the MSM
I have a formulaic way of expressing some of my principles. Every single word adds meaning, but sometimes that is long and pendantic. Usually I opt for long and pendantic and precise. But on occasions I skip a few words to shorten things, sometimes deliberately sometimes just because I am writing fast.
If that causes real problems communicating – the problem is mine.
But if everyone knows what I meant even though conditions limits and qualifiers are not present – then nonsense like Does Trump mean Hannity is just pedantic garbage.
Nearly everyone knew what Trump meant. Voters knew, Hannity and Fox knew and because they knew took no offense. You know – or you are much less smart than I credit.
When I say “words are not actions” and you want to fight over that you are playing the same game.
Commands, where you have to power to command are actions.
That is an exception to “words are not actions”
Is it necescary for EVERYONE who makes a blanket statement – one that is true and that everyone understands, to list every qualifier or limit every time they make it ?
There is no actual harm to either Trump’s or Obama’s words – though I would note Obama’s ARE a call to action. Trump’s are not. Neither are actual commands.
If I complain that the local DA is corrupt, and someone decides to assassinate him – using my words as justification – I am NOT culpable. I bear no responsibility. Not even if I am president. It is MY actions that I am responsible for – not someone elses.
You are jumping from reading other peoples minds to now blaming third parties for the state of mind from their the actions of evildoers. That is moral garbage.
Each of us are SOLELY responsible for our own ACTS – regardless of what bumper sticker we might have.
“disliking the consequences of trumps behavior”
behavior: observable activity in a human or animal.
i.e ACTS.
Identify Trumps ACTS that you wish me to judge harshly.
Even Christ judges our acts, not our thoughts or words.
Are you better than god ?
You want me to say sometimes Trump’s words are offensive and troubling – fine.
Though looking back many of the offensive and troubling words seem justified today.
But whatever degree of significance you attach to words ACTS dwarf words by several orders of magnitude.
As you said – I do not like Trump – I would not invite him to dinner.
His personality rubs me the wrong way.
I did not, but I am free to vote based on that.
My dislike of him is NOT a moral judgement.
Not wanting to hear him, or be arround him or like him is NOT a moral judgement – though it is a judgement of my own preferences.
With respect to actual assertions of fact, or moral judgements of Trump (or anyone else).
I try to be more careful.
You can like or not like whoever you please.
Being wrong about facts, comes at a price to your credibility.
And as I have said being wrong about moral judgements comes at the cost of your own integrity.
I have had to stand up – even in Court, Alone, facing erroneous factual and moral claims by others, and Making true claims myself.
I was then and am very conscious now, that I do not get to be wrong – not without paying a very high price.
I lost a significant amount of money by doing the “right thing”. I walked away poorer. I walked away battered and exhausted. I walked away depressed.
But I walked away with my integrity. Which is not something that anyone else in the conflict can say – not even the judge.
I have told Robby repeatedly how dangerous stepping up onto a moral soap box is.
I faced down false moral claims about myself. I VERY CAREFULLY made claims about others. I was absolutely terrified that some claim I made could not be proved 10 eays from Sunday.
I knew that anything less than perfection in my own claims about the failures of others and I was TOAST, My reputation would be shot. Every false accusation against me would be beleived, if I made a single mistake in accusing someone else.
I do not like Trump. On some issues I disagree with him.
On a few specific issues of moral conduct – like his past remarks about women – I judge him negatively.
At the same time I try HARD not to make claims about him that are not backed up by solid FACTS.
I can dislike him as much as I want.
I can disagree about policies.
I can condemn him in those few instances where the evidence is damning, and irrefutable.
But I have also told everyone repeatedly that free exchange is about integrity.
I am extremely reluctant to presume – even as you do, the bad conduct – even in business that is bandied about just like the russia allegations.
Absolutely Trump ran the private Trump Foundation Trust like …. a private family Trust.
That is not at all like a public foundation or Trust.
The absolute worst anyone has shown me regarding Trump’s fiscal conduct is disagrements over what is permitted and what is not. Errors that generally result in fines.
To those pondering digging into all Trump’s business affairs – even Derschowitz’s off hand remarks that if you dig into any business deep enough you will find misconduct.
I would warn you that there is a very strong probability that you will find nothing.
That the worst you will come up with is more minor technical errors. Some fines and the like.
No crimes.
More of Trump behaving in ways that are legal – but that you do not like.
I could be wrong – but the odds actually favor me.
The rest of you have such a distorted view of business that you do not grasp that.
Profit motives – self interest absolutely encourage people in business to get as close tot he line as possible. To go into grey areas.
But it is extremely rare that the people who run businesses, successful business people committ actual crimes. They do not need to, the risk is too great and the reward too small.
Further integrity is the most important thing they sell.
And no one here seems to understand that.
The results of digging deeply into Trump’s businesses, could be worse than this Russia collusion nonsense.
And if you do so now, you do so from a position of weakness.
So by all means doubt down.
Bet even more of your integrity against someone you have already LOST to big time.
Maybe the next time will go different.
Trump has a very very long reputation for winning bets – not 100% of the time, but far more than most. He also has a reputation for getting those he is playing against to make bad bets against him.
I am not betting against him.
But you can do as you wish.
“Now for the media”.
I beleive in a free press. I am happy with the press we have – I really would not change things. I do not care that there is massive bias in the press – whether it is Fox or MSNBC.
I have criticised the press – I have supported Trump labeling them the enemy of the people – that is all fine too.
The press is not a problem WE have to solve. They are their OWN problem.
Whether it is Fox or MSNBC – they get to decide who they want to be and how they do their job.
And WE get to decide whether to beleive them or patronize them.
This is exactly how the rest of the free market works.
The press has pissed away their credibility in a collosal way in this Trump/Russia Collusion story.
They have tanked their own credibility – and that is how it should be.
They have to figure out how and whether to fix their problem – and WE get to decide whether to trust them again
BTW the same is true for everyone else involved in this.
Despite the claims of “Liar, Liar” Trump has been not merely vindicated but proven to have been telling the truth most of the time he was purportedly lying.
That does not make him a saint. But it should mean those of you buying the liar, liar stuff might want to rethink future claims.
Today Trump’s credibility has shot up, and his detractors has tanked.
Because of the scale and duration of the conflict and the extent to which detractors doubled down, the consequences may be very very large.
Freedom – the right of people to make their own choices, does not mean they will have the choices they want, or they will make good choices.
But it does mean that if they make good choices – THEY benefit, and if they make poor Choices – they pay the consequences.
Government is not there to compel us to make good choices.
It is their to make sure that we do not use force, that our interactions are FREE, and that when we make mutual commitments freely – we honor them.
“Now we have Hannity, Mathews, Limbaugh, Maddow and others. They dont report news,”
Whatever they do – they are responsible for it.
I pay very little attention to any of them.
But at this moment – and probably for some time to come – and LEGITIMATELY,
Hannity and Limbaugh have more credibility than Mathews and Madow.
And that is how it should be.
Each made their bed, each made their bets.
Now they deserve the consequences.
That does not mean I would likely fine Mathews more personable than Limbaugh.
But it means I would TRUST Hannity more – though that is not saying much.
What is the difference between someone who says everything that Trump does is good, and one who says everything Trump says is bad?
The first is naive, but the second has failed morally. With few exceptions you can err on the side of seeing others as good without harm to your own morality or integrity.
But false or even uncertain claims about the character of another – come at the expense of your character, your integrity your morality.
I do not know anyone who defends Trump in everything.
Why would anyone wear the label “deplorable” proudly ? Because YOUR failure makes it a badge of honor.
When you misuse words you create a mess. When you try to make deplorable mean something it does not, you can expect that others will embrace your error in a way to make it positive.
Words are not actions. Where one has the actual power to direct the actions of others, COMMANDS are actions. Otherwise words are words. Even commands absent the power to compell are not actions.
Words may be offensive, but that is all. Like it or not, being offensive does NOT justify the use of force.
Again you are engaged in word mangling to confuse meaning.
The reason it matters whether you label words as actions is because the use of force in response to bad acts is justified,. it is NOT justified in response to bad words.
If you change the defintion of action to include word – that DOES NOT change the FACT that offensive words DO NOT justify the use of force – regardless of whether you call them acts or not.
Mangling meaning is important – not because it matters much whether the definition of action includes words, but because bad acts justify the use of force. Pretending words are acts allows pretending that words justify violence.
They do not.
Roby;
Large parts of the media have FAILED at their primary job – seeking out and reporting the TRUTH. Not rumors, not acting as the propaganda arm for some ideology.
I have told you repeatedly that when you make accusations you bet YOUR integrity.
Of course lots of the MSM have been found to be “the enemies of the people”,
That would be no different from concluding Goebels or Pravda were enemies of the people.
When your job is TRUTH and your present lies as truth – you are the enemy.
There is an expectation that those on the left (or right) will stretch the truth or even lie for their own benefit.
The media is one of the checks against that.
When they fail – it is WORSE than the failure of partisans.
No one is going to jail the media.
But they have enormous work to do to restore their credibility.
The deserve the negative attention they get.
If there is no cost for this mess – it will get repeated.
“If calling trump a liar and a narcissist and observing that he is not at all interested in facts much of the time and does many things by impulse is “TDS” then what is calling the MSM the “enemy of the people” Do trump and many of his followers have MSMDS? ”
Calling a narcissist a narcissist is not TDS,
Calling a liar a liar is not TDS.
Being WRONG is.
You are making a false moral equivalence.
There is a reason that Trump and his followers do not have MSMDS,
Their accusations have proven to be TRUE.
This is not about rhetorical excesses – which is the real point.
Perfection in speach is not possible. This is not about errors.
This is not about SPIN. This is about REAL LIES, and FALSE ACCUSATIONS,
There is a difference between:
You are WRONG,
and
You are STUPID
and
You are a LIAR.
Each is an order of magnitude more serious a claim.
Being wrong, or being wrong about someone else’s error, costs you your credibility not your character or integrity.
Error in character judgements comes at the expense of YOUR character.
Error in moral accusations comes at the expense of YOUR Morality.
There is nothing wrong with asserting that another person is wrong, or that they are stupid, or that they are a liar.
But there is a price for being WRONG about those claims.
“there is only one POTUS and when he is wildly irresponsible in his rhetoric, and doubles down repeatedly and incessantly that is something new and something really destructive.”
You make all these claims. what supports them ?
Is the economy better or worse ?
Are more or less american soldiers getting killed int he mideast ?
Is the threat of NK greater or less than it was when he took office ?
If you want to argue that Trump is not as great as he claims – you can credibly do that.
But to the extent he is different on net than Bush or Obama he is better.
He is less lawless than Obama. We are getting out of not into foreign conflicts.
I can go one and on. The point is NOT to prove how great Trump is – he isn’t.
But to demonstrate that “wildly irresponsible” is just words – like his, without much substance.
Destruction is something real – and the actual evidence is things are improving not declining.
Not as much as Trump claims, but still improvement.
“Do I have TDS for saying this?”
When you do not see the world as it is – yes.
it always flips to “Trump the Person”.
There is no magical “it”.
Some people want to debate issues.
Some want to assassinate character.
“we can all just hope and pray that no one in the media gets killed by someone who takes trump as his idol and his words about them being the enemy of the people as an inspiration.”
Trump called the “fake news media” the enemy of the people. And they are. Not the true journalists, who try to hunt down the facts, and report them straight.
Trump was accused of treason repeatedly for 2 years. CNN and MSNBC convinced millions of people that the President of the United States was either a Russian spy, or so compromised by the Russians that he was being blackmailed. And it was a lie, backed up by zero evidence
If there are people upset and angry about the Mueller report, it’s because they were lied to, and whipped into a frenzy of fear and hatred , only to be told “Oh, never mind.”
Whose fault is that?
If we must speak as if some lunatic will take our words as inspiration for Henous acts – then speach will be impossible.
Omar is not responsible for acts of Terrorism against Jews (neither is Trump)
Priscilla, if you haven’t yet done so perhaps its time to tell all the people in your life about your actual political opinions, no holds barred. Hogg is a punk, the proud boys are an innocent chauvinist group, trump isn’t a sexual predator, he is merely a (heroic) celebrity, the media is the enemy of the people, etc. Perhaps these ideas won’t sound as attractive if you try to explain them to flesh and blood people. Dave was born hard wired to take everything to an extreme, I don’t think you were.
Absolutely Robby – lets ALL do that.
Are you prepared to condemn Biden as a kiddie grouper ?
Warren as fraud, a white person who lied about being an indian to get special priviledges for discrimination she never experienced.
2/3 of the Press are LIARS – they have defamed – not merely Trump but a small army of people arround him, as well as half the country.
How about Jessie Smollet ? How despicable is it to stage a fake hate crime against yourself ? And why is he getting off ?
What about the army of those in the media whose ACTUAL treatment of women makes Trump look like a saint. Most of them are back in their jobs.
Grow up Robby, there is plenty out there to be upset about.
The fact that I or Priscilla choose to focus on different problems or people than you do does not make us evil or you somehow morally superior ?
You keep fixating on the proud boys. Are they actual Nazi’s ?
No one claims they are saints. But if you want me to condemn them then tell me what is it that they DO that is worse than a vice president who has groped many teens at the whitehouse ? What is it they DO that is worse than a lily WHITE women who lied about her race to get preferential treatment ? What is it that they DO that is worse than half the Media hosts who have sexually harrassed their employees ? What is it they they do that is worse than faking a hate crime against themselves, to foment a race war and to earn a bigger pay check ?
From what I can tell the proud boys great crime is being proud of western culture, and itching for some nut from Antifa to swing first so that they can beat the crap out of them.
“very fine people” – not a chance. A threat to society – not a chance.
As to Trump – based on actual EVIDENCE – no he is NOT a sexual preditory.
It is questionable whether he is a sexual harrassor, he is certainly not on the scale of Biden or Franken, or Charlie Rose, or Matt Lauer. He is a serial adulterer. He is a powerful man who has sought out the sexual attention of women who seek out powerful men.
He is certainly not a Biden or Clinton. No I am not happy with Trump’s conduct. Nor am I happy with the way he has TALKED about women and sex. But there is a giant gulf between Hugh Hefner and Jack the Ripper.
As to the media – their job is to report the TRUTH. Their job is to speak TRUTH to power.
I absolutely want them trying to find whatever dirt their might be on everyone in government – particularly the president. But I do not view the New York Times or the Washington Post as tabloids – or I did not until recently. If they want to be respected, if they want to be perceived as having integrity, if they want to be for the people rather than an “enemy of the people” then it is their job to report TRUTH not gossip.
Much of the media is fully complicit in selling the american people a LIE.
Much of the media has been the propaganda arm of the extreme left.
I think “enemy of the people” is an appropriate label.
Regardless, they “have sinned through their own fault, in their thoughts and in their words, in what they have done, and in what they have failed to do”
They need to do some soul searching and figure out how to earn back our respect.
Something you still have not figured out – respect is earned – it is not a right.
You do not respect Trump, or the proud boys – that is fine. No one has demanded that you do. Nor are you required to not respect, Biden, or Warren, or Franken, or assorted media talking heads, or Jessie Smollet.
But just as you are free to pick who you call attention to – for either respect or disrepect – so are we. We are not required to shift our attention – because you are foaming over Trump, just as you are not required to be upset about those who have attracted our ire.
When you insinuate that Ron, or I or Priscilla are less moral than you are because our attention is focused on different sinners than yours – YOU diminish your own moral stature.
You are free to persuade, just as we are. But you are not somehow more moral because your moral focus is on different people than ours. And in fact you are LESS moral by implying otherwise.
I would further suggest – this is NOT the time to be defending the press, this is NOT the time to continue your own claims of moral outrage.
You have been duped, and your judgement is legitimately suspect.
Like those in the press maybe you should try to figure out WHY it was so easy to dupe you ?
And what you might to earn respect and credibility back.
Finally – I REALLY do not enjoy, criticizing ANYONE’s morality. As I have noted repeatedly in the very criticism’s that I do not wish to level, Challenging another person’s character or morality particularly directly is very dangerous – there is no room for “innocent error”.
Being wrong about facts is not nearly so consequential as wrongly accusing another.
But YOU drive the discussion into this.
You equate criticism of your facts, logic, and reason, with criticism of your character or morality. When you argue morality you do not argue WHAT is moral, but WHO is moral.
If you want me to rank the proud boys, Trump etc onto a moral spectrum – along with Biden, and Franken, and Lauer, and Weinstein, and Rose, and Warren, and …..
then I would want to know what are YOUR moral principles, what are the actual criteria that YOU use to establish which conduct is better and which is worse.
I wear my principles on my sleeve – anyone who can not tell what my principles are can not read.
I have no clue what yours are. On rare occasions that I have managed to get you to write about them, all I got was an amorphous collection of conflicting feelings.
Principles, values, even feelings fit into a hierarchy – and that hierarchy is actually important.
If our principles conflict with each other – that is a very serious problem. It is not possible to have morality with conflicting principles. Values are subordinate to – and not the same as principles. Principles are what allow us to resolve conflicts between values – and values always conflict. They also allow us to give weight to different values to determine which are more important, or even which are more important at this moment. Feelings are reasons to question values and principles – but they do not provide answers. They are unreliable sources of information. They are not useless, but they are not determinative.
Without the hierachical relationship between your principles, values and feelings, what you have is chaos. Personal anarchy.
“Dave was born hard wired to take everything to an extreme, I don’t think you were.”
Nope, I was born hard wired for logic. Just as you are far far better at making music than I am, and that both you and others are far far better than others at other things – like cooking or gardeing, or sports, or emotional sensitivity, I am blessed with superior skills in some areas and inferior ones in many others.
As to the extremism – your assertion is full of flaws.
3 centuried ago the assertion that whites and blacks were equal – in almost any way, would be “extreme”, Today, atleast in this country it is the norm.
The deviation of a person from your perception of what is the “norm”, says nothing about whether they are right or wrong. Galleleo was right, Socrates was right, Einstein was right.
They were all also extreme for their times.
The only information that an assertion of “extremism” carries, is that ones positions deviate from the norms. I am not a big fan of “normal” and I do not see a single poster here who can call themselves “normal” without making us laugh.
I follow facts, logic and reason to their conclusions – where ever that goes.
I have frequently criticised “compromise” which is often offered as a principle that defines “moderate”. Compromise is a tool not a principle. there are times to compromise and times not to. For the most part we compromise in what we DO, not in what we SAY.
I am not going to get what I want – not the president I want, not the government I want.
Yet, I must still make choices, I am not going to get open borders and the prequisites necescary to have those without self destruction. So I must look to what is possible and figure out what is the “lessor evil”. That does not require changing my principles.
I think in numerous ways that Trump is an abysmal president – he is nearly always acting at odds with my principles. I could easily rage about him as you or Jay or DD.
At the same time I am not blind to the world as it is. As bad as Trump is, he is still less bad than Hillary Clinton, less bad than Obama, Less bad than Bush. MAYBE less bad than Bill Clinton – we will have to see.
I did not vote for him. But I can figure out how to live with him.
And that is EASIER than living with each of his two predecessors.
That is how compromise ACTUALLY works.
It does not require sacrificing your principles.
Next, you conflate a very common logical technique – reduction ad absurdem, with extremism.
The entire POINT of that technique is to get YOU to determine what distinguishes YOUR position from the extreme version of your own position. It is NOT about my extremism, it is about whether you recognize any limiting principle to your own values.
What is YOUR principle that allows me to tell when you favor government intervention and when you do not. Absent a principle, the fact that YOUR view or value can be taken to an extreme is YOUR problem, not mine.
“Nothing in the Mueller synopsis has improved my view of trump in any way.”
It is difficult to admit that you are wrong
“No one owes him any apology. He brought this on himself with his words and behaviors.”
Nope. When you make accusations YOU are responsible to be sure you are right.
“He will probably outdo himself in the next period of time. Yeeech.”
You can continue this self delusion forever.
Nothing is different today that it was a week of a month or a year ago.
Trump is the same, the media is the same, the left is the same, you are the same.
What is different is we know who the actual liars are.
trump campaign slogan for 2020: I’m the man to drain the swamp and I can prove it! Not All of the key members of my last campaign are in jail and not every member of my cabinet has resigned due to corruption or disgust.
LMAO, Roby.
And for a second time the progressive Dems will help him win.
You do not seem to grasp that Mueller went so far over the lines to get Trump that all of what you think are liabilities are assets.
Mueller was a bully. He found nothing, He persecuted anyone who did not kowtow.
That does not help you.
There are near certain to be pardons and commutations, and rational people will have no problem.
Derschowitz as ever is excellent on this. I disagree with him only on one point.
We MUST investigate the investigation. We must NOT allow this to have happened without consequence. I do not care about Clinton and democrats. But what happened in DOJ/FBI/CIA/NSA/State must have consequences.
It is increasingly apparent that otherwise mild Obama ran the most vengeful administration EVER. This was not personal corruption, but the worst political corruption we have seen. This was worse than Nixon. It is what Nixon dreamed of.
And it can not happen again. Not to republicans, not to democrats.
There must be a price for misconduct inside government, and a higher one for misconduct inside law enforcement.
Many going after Trump have repeatedly said “no one is above the law” and they are correct – especially not those enforcing the law.
Derschowitz say that Barr is restoring the integrity of the DOJ/FBI.
This goes far beyond the DOJ/FBI and it can not be swept under the rug.
Derschowitz is probably correct that the IG should be allowed to finish. And MAYBE that is enough.
Mueller set the standard for punishment. Anyone in government who is guilty of the same or similar conduct to Papadoulis, Flynn, Manafort, Stone, Cohen, …. should face MORE severe consequences. Let the IG gather the facts – but the standards for prosecution must be the same and the consequences must be worse.
The consequences for Schiff and other politicians are up to the electorate – absent actual criminal conduct.
I would further note that AFTER the election – I called for Obama and if not Obama Trump to pardon Clinton and her staff.
I think Trump should STILL do that – and when he pardon’s Flynn, Stone, Papadoulis, that would be the right time.
But the political corruption inside the FBI/DOJ/….. can not go unpunished or it will happen again.
We need to clean house – even more thoroughly than we have.
We need to publicly air the dirty laundry.
No one – not Trump, not Obama should have the ability to use our government as a political weapon again.
Posting this on “Racial Profiling issue.
Can’t navigate on this bloated/looooog thread.
“With Override Vote Coming, Congress Examines Military Cuts That Will Fund Wall”
Is this fake news? Is Andrew Napolitano the “enemy of the people”?
I think the POTUS, the GOP, and trump nation may be celebrating prematurely.
The entire idea of having a 4 page summary written by a Barr, man who held a year back that no obstruction of justice was possible is beginning to smell bad. I really did not want to think that.
Anyhow, “For Balance”:
“Fox News senior judicial analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano defended embattled House Intelligence Committee chairman Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) Thursday, stating the Democratic lawmaker is likely correct to insist there will be evidence of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia in the still-unseen Mueller report.
A day after Napolitano caused a stir by declaring both that the Mueller report will show “something” on conspiracy and that the special counsel’s summary is 700 pages long, the Fox analyst appeared on Fox Business Network’s Cavuto Coast to Coast to further speculate on what the report will show when made public.
After Fox Business host Neil Cavuto noted it was now reported the full Mueller report is 300-plus pages, the two men discussed Attorney General William Barr’s four-page letter summarizing the special counsel’s findings. Napolitano said it was “not binding interpretation” before pointing out Democrats are looking to “second-guess” both Mueller and Barr once the full report is made public.
“When this comes out, when Adam Schiff was making the statement he is still convinced of collusion, paraphrasing here, that prompted Republicans on the panel to say you have to go, you got to resign, he is not resigning,” Cavuto stated. “Just taking him at his word, would he be aware of something that Mueller wasn’t?”
Napolitano said he doesn’t know the answer to that question but he does believe Schiff is right that there will be something about collusion in the special counsel’s report.
“I think that Congressman Schiff is correct, in that report will be evidence of the existence of a conspiracy, not enough evidence to prove the existence beyond a reasonable doubt,” the judge declared. “In that report will be evidence of obstruction of justice, interfering with an FBI investigation for a personal gain but not enough evidence to prove it beyond a reasonable doubt.”
Napolitano added the California Democrat needs to decide whether or not to reveal other sources that will bolster his claims that there’s more evidence of collusion between Trumpworld and Russia.
“So on the collusion part, we do know that the Russians were very interested in mucking around with our election?” Cavuto asked. “They had a number of meetings with Trump personnel back in the day but that the—the quid pro quo part—where Trump people had to work with them to get what they wanted to do, that did not evidence itself, right?”
Napolitano concluded: “We have seen no evidence of that. What’s in the report, what’s in the raw evidence, remains to be revealed.”
Napolatano should know better.
As should you.
Do you really beleive that Barr is lying ?
Do you really beleive that If Barr lied about this report that Mueller or one of his lieutenants would not leak that Barr was lying ?
Under ordinary circumstances this would be the END.
Prosecutors DO NOT put out reports. They indict, or they do not,
They do not make public any embarrassing information they might have encountered about anyone. They Proscecute or they do not.
Mueller is NOT prosecuting anything else.
If this were normal – even the house and senate would never see Mueller’s report.
But this is NOT normal. YOU and others like you have made sure of that.
YOU have made clear that you have TWO standards with regard to the law.
One for YOURSELF and those on the left that whitewashes actual crimes, like those of Clinton, Her staff, The crooks at FBI and DOJ, Brennan, Clapper, and guys like Jussie Smollet, and then one for anyone you do not like – like Trump.
Proving absolute guilt of those you like is not sufficient to prosecute.
Proving absolute innocence is not enough for those you do not like.
Ultimately the Mueller report as well as Supporting information will be made available to congress, and then to the public.
I have zero doubt – I never did, that Mueller will have filled it end to end with negative references and innuendo.
I highly doubt there will be a single FACT that we have not already heard.
The best we can hope for in that regard is establishing to a moderate degree od certainty that many of the “FACTS” we have heard so far, are false.
I have no doubt that people who are blind to reality and unwilling to let go of this FARCE will be able to delude themselves into beleiving that they were NOT WRONG, and that somehow Trump has managed to conspire with the Russians and not get caught.
I find that a revealing delusion. You do not need Mueller to grasp how ludicrously unlikely that is. You have to beleive that Trump is so stupid as to do something that has ZERO upside for him, that is dangerous and provides him with NO benefit, and yet so smart than he has done this – involved many other people, and STILL not managed to leave even bread crumbs. You are betting on unicorns.
But that should not surprise me.
For several days now, you have been claiming to NOT be one of the left extremist TDS conspiracy theorists.
Yet here you are – joining the small coterie of die hard never give up TDS conspiracy nuts doubling down that the MUST be something.
To be clear – you beleive that Barr is lying ?
You beleive that Cohen is lying ?
Given that Schiff has no access to anything that Nunes and Gowdy have not seen, you must beleive they entire rest of the gang of 8 are lying.
You beleive that there is evidence that the press after 3 years has NOT ferreted out ?
You beleive that Mueller has secret evidence that has NOT leaked tot he press ?
At this time if you beleive ANY of these things – I think saying you suffer from TDS is a very fair assessment.
So please can we drop the pretense that you are not on the far left fringe of this nonsense ?
Lets make this CLEAR, You bet your integrity that despite no actual evidence and despite NUMEROUS accusations that have been investigated – but an alphabet soup of government agencies and the entire world press, that you still beleive that it is reasonable to presume Trump is a criminal who conspired with Russia and we just have not yet caught him ?