A thread for Democrats Only by THGRRI

REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

A thread for Democrats Only

POSTED BY: THGRRI
UPDATED: Monday, October 21, 2024 20:59
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Tuesday, November 26, 2019 4:53 PM

What's your point? That it's within the so-called margin of error now?

Before the impeachment proceedings began the gap in favor of support was 10.4.

It's all bullshit.

And it doesn't matter anyhow.

I can't wait until this goes nowhere, just like I told you it would in the first place.

Dems lose. You lose. Go kill yourself.

Go share that Uplifting Tweet with your friends on Facebook.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Tuesday, November 26, 2019 6:05 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
What's your point? That it's within the so-called margin of error now?

Before the impeachment proceedings began the gap in favor of support was 10.4.

It's all bullshit.

And it doesn't matter anyhow.

I can't wait until this goes nowhere, just like I told you it would in the first place.

Dems lose. You lose. Go kill yourself.

Go share that Uplifting Tweet with your friends on Facebook.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

I take William Barr at his word. I believe he looks out at the landscape of contemporary America and sees a country changing into something he doesn’t recognize, that he believes Christianity is under an assault from which it may not recover and Trump, whatever his faults, is their last, best hope. And it’s the support of Republicans like Barr that ensures Trump’s survival.

This form of Flight 93ism is more widespread on the right than liberals recognize, and it both authentically motivates some establishment Republicans to enthusiastically embrace Trump, and creates coalitional dynamics by which other Republicans feel they have no choice but to defend Trump against the left. Some protect Trump on the merits, others protect Trump as a form of anti-anti-Trumpism, and others protect Trump as a way of protecting their future careers. But all of them protect Trump as a way of protecting themselves, and a future they feel slipping away.

From "The post-Christian culture wars"
www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/11/26/20978613/donald-trump-chris
tians-william-barr-impeachment

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Tuesday, November 26, 2019 7:07 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK

Fuck you and fuck Vox.

Vox won't even exist 5 years from now.

They should be doing whatever they can to protect their future.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, November 27, 2019 6:33 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Fuck you and fuck Vox.

Vox won't even exist 5 years from now.

They should be doing whatever they can to protect their future.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

I am sure that it is Trump lying to you about the future in order for him to gain votes in 2020:

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, November 27, 2019 7:34 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Texas Republican Party plans to build phony campaign websites loaded with negative information about Democrats

AUSTIN — Texas Republicans plan to use a disinformation campaign to help them win back a dozen state House races in 2020, buying up website domains that look like they belong to Democratic candidates and loading the sites with negative information, according to a leaked document from the party.

“Not sure why it’s news that we’re aggressively working to earn the support of all Texas voters for all our candidates,” said Texas Republican Party Chairman James Dickey, who confirmed the authenticity of the document. “This draft discusses just some of the many ways in which we are going to turn out not only our dedicated base, but we’re going to expand that base and attract independent voters as well.”

More at www.houstonchronicle.com/news/politics/texas/article/Texas-Republican-
Party-plans-to-build-phony-14863988.php

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, November 27, 2019 9:03 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Earlier this month, the federal government issued a solicitation for bids from contractors to refurbish a so-called “lethal/non-lethal” fence around a federal correctional facility in Tucson, Arizona. Three bids have so far been submitted, ranging from $3.3 million to about $3.8 million.

A lethal/non-lethal fence is an electrified fence running around the perimeter of a prison. Upon first contact, these fences deliver a non-lethal electric shock, but a second one triggers a lethal high-voltage discharge, typically several times more powerful than a standard electric chair. This is meant to kill the potential escapee on the spot.

Justin Long, a spokesperson for the US Bureau of Prisons, declined to provide the precise number of federal facilities now equipped with lethal electric fences, but said it’s “more than seven.”

The use of firearms or other means of deadly force in a particular situation, by its nature, calls for the application of human judgment or discretion. Fences, unlike humans, cannot think, assess circumstances, or exercise judgment. The fences mean less need for tower guards, who earn up to $70,000 per year at some prisons, with overtime, and generous pensions after they retire. Fences don’t.

Inmates could use the fences against each other or use them to commit suicide. It turns out that inmates aren’t the only ones under threat from these lethal fences. It’s other species that suffer the most. Mostly they kill birds and small animals by the thousands.

More at https://qz.com/1754413/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, November 27, 2019 9:46 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

Yeah....

I'm not comfortable with automatic death fences.

I'd imagine that a few larger animals such as deer have been roasted on these fences already as well.

Although it is possible that in my lifetime we'll see 80% of current jobs available replaced with automation, there's still a ton of bugs to work out of the systems.

I've told my brother that his family needs to be saving money to pay off their debts, because even though his wife makes a great deal of money today, there is a good chance that her job (or at least a significant portion of it) will be replaced in our lifetimes.

Though she has the benefit of being in the position where mixing medications or providing the incorrect dosages could lead to many deaths so there would be a lot of pushback for a long time with steps taken to automate pharmacist jobs, you know that being able to replace pharmacists worldwide is a wet dream of the board members of Big Pharma.

I mean, think about it...

The last two jobs I worked, the highest paid people in the building weren't the store managers. They were the pharmacists.

And there is a LOT of human error already in the entire process of distributing drugs to the people, much of which is before the prescriptions even hit the desks of the pharmacists. It is the biggest reason they get paid as well as they do and why they had to go to specialty schools to learn all about the drugs and how they could interact with each other, or with known allergies of the clients. It's also necessary they keep up with all the new drugs that come out as well. Most people probably don't give it much thought, but pharmacists save lives everyday because of mistakes doctors make by prescribing medication that would be a death cocktail when combined with medications they're already taking.

That being said, there is no reason that this couldn't all be programmed into a system that would automatically make these decisions and dole out the drugs correctly. But they are going to take their time to make sure they're doing it right before they roll anything out. To do otherwise would be a catastrophic mistake. All you would need was a single death due to a computer error for people to become scared and enraged, and you'd have to wait another decade before even proposing it again.

Scary stuff...

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Friday, November 29, 2019 8:48 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

House Democrats have passed nearly 400 bills. Trump and Republican Senators throw the bills into the trashcan without reading beyond the title.

There’s a pervasive sense of legislative paralysis gripping Capitol Hill. And it’s been there long before the impeachment inquiry began.

For months, President Donald Trump has fired off tweet missives accusing House Democrats of “getting nothing done in Congress,” and being consumed with impeachment.

Trump may want to look to the Republican-controlled Senate instead. Democrats in the House have been passing bills at a rapid clip; as of November 15, the House has passed nearly 400 bills, not including resolutions. But the House Democratic Policy and Communications Committee estimates 80 percent of those bill have hit a snag in the Senate, where Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY) is prioritizing confirming judges over passing bills.

Congress has passed just 70 bills into law this year. Granted, it still has one more year in its term, but the number pales in comparison to recent past sessions of Congress, which typically see anywhere from 300-500 bills passed in two years (and that is even a diminished number from the 700-800 bills passed in the 1970s and 1980s).

Ten of those 70 bills this year have been renaming federal post offices or Veterans Affairs facilities, and many others are related to appropriations or extending programs like the National Flood Insurance or the 9/11 victim compensation fund.

This has led to House Democrats decrying McConnell’s so-called “legislative graveyard,” a moniker the Senate majority leader has proudly adopted. McConnell calls himself the “grim reaper” of Democratic legislation he derides as socialist, but many of the bills that never see the Senate floor are bipartisan issues, like a universal background check bill, net neutrality, and reauthorizing the Violence Against Women Act.

“From raising the minimum wage to ensuring equal pay, we have passed legislation to raise wages. And we have passed legislation to protect and expand health coverage and bring down prescription drug prices,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said in a statement to Vox. “We continue to urge Senator McConnell to take up our bills, many of which are bipartisan.”

More at www.vox.com/2019/11/29/20977735/how-many-bills-passed-house-democrats-
trump

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Friday, November 29, 2019 10:21 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

lol Vox

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Friday, November 29, 2019 10:40 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
lol Vox

Do Right, Be Right. :)

You either do care about raising your own wages or you must have misunderstood: “From raising the minimum wage to ensuring equal pay, we have passed legislation to raise wages. And we have passed legislation to protect and expand health coverage and bring down prescription drug prices,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said in a statement to Vox. “We continue to urge Senator McConnell to take up our bills, many of which are bipartisan.”

The minimum wage bill has a very straight forward title: "Raise the Wage Act"

It is a bill that the Senate is stalling.

There will be an annual increase in the minimum wage, which rises to $15/hour and then keeps on rising at the same rate as the wages for rich/wealthy professionals rise. (I'm pretty sure the Senate Republicans hate this part, but those Senators are keeping their intentions a secret):

“(B) increased from such amount by the annual percentage increase, if any, in the median hourly wage of all employees as determined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics;

“(2) In calculating the annual percentage increase in the median hourly wage of all employees for purposes of paragraph (1)(B), the Secretary, through the Bureau of Labor Statistics, shall compile data on the hourly wages of all employees to determine such a median hourly wage and compare such median hourly wage for the most recent year for which data are available with the median hourly wage determined for the preceding year.”

More at www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/582/text

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Friday, November 29, 2019 11:07 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
lol Vox

Do Right, Be Right. :)
You either do care about raising your own wages or you must have misunderstood: “From raising the minimum wage to ensuring equal pay, we have passed legislation to raise wages. And we have passed legislation to protect and expand health coverage and bring down prescription drug prices,” House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-MD) said in a statement to Vox. “We continue to urge Senator McConnell to take up our bills, many of which are bipartisan.”

The minimum wage bill has a very straight forward title: "Raise the Wage Act"

It is a bill that the Senate is stalling.

There will be an annual increase in the minimum wage, which rises to $15/hour and then keeps on rising at the same rate as the wages for rich/wealthy professionals rise. (I'm pretty sure the Senate Republicans hate this part, but those Senators are keeping their intentions a secret):

“(B) increased from such amount by the annual percentage increase, if any, in the median hourly wage of all employees as determined by the Bureau of Labor Statistics;

“(2) In calculating the annual percentage increase in the median hourly wage of all employees for purposes of paragraph (1)(B), the Secretary, through the Bureau of Labor Statistics, shall compile data on the hourly wages of all employees to determine such a median hourly wage and compare such median hourly wage for the most recent year for which data are available with the median hourly wage determined for the preceding year.”

More at www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/house-bill/582/text

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

There already is equal pay. Anyone stating otherwise is peddling myths.

I don't really care if they raise the minimum wage or not, and I'm generally at the bottom these days. If it goes to $15/hr. that doubles what minimum wage is in my state. All that will happen then is that the poverty threshold will rise along with it. Wowie!

And explain to me how we're going to pay for expanded health care and lower prescription prices.

If your answer isn't that we're going to force drug companies and hospitals to charge legitimate prices, then there wasn't a bill proposed that will actually do anything to solve the problem.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Friday, November 29, 2019 12:37 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

There already is equal pay. Anyone stating otherwise is peddling myths.

I don't really care if they raise the minimum wage or not, and I'm generally at the bottom these days. If it goes to $15/hr. that doubles what minimum wage is in my state. All that will happen then is that the poverty threshold will rise along with it. Wowie!

And explain to me how we're going to pay for expanded health care and lower prescription prices.

If your answer isn't that we're going to force drug companies and hospitals to charge legitimate prices, then there wasn't a bill proposed that will actually do anything to solve the problem.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

If you want to be paid less than minimum wage, I know numerous companies controlled by Republican owners who will pay you in secret and in cash a wage less than minimum, but I don't think that underground/under-the-table/backstreet system solves any poor people's problems. But it sure does help to make business owners richer, so there is that advantage, if you are a poor person wanting to give charity to the wealthy this Xmas season.

There are bills to lower drug prices and healthcare prices, but the GOP will not vote for them. If you don't want those bills to pass, that's good for the GOP. The rich will thank you for your help making them richer by your willingness to pay higher prices and accept fewer medicines and less healthcare in exchange for your voting for a GOP Senator.

"Prescription Drug Price Relief Act of 2019" sponsored by Bernie Sanders, who is NOT a Republican. This bill won't pass the Senate:
www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/102/text

There is also the "Lower Health Care Costs Act". It ain't gonna pass either, but the committee controlled by Republicans is crossing out most of the words in the bill just in case it comes to another vote. You should look at the text:
www.congress.gov/bill/116th-congress/senate-bill/1895/text

Bernie voted against it. One easy to understand reason why he is against: it would cut funding for federally qualified health centers and the National Health Service Corps, a spokesman said. “This bill includes an absolute cut of nearly 20 percent in both programs,” the spokesman said. “At a time when people are already struggling to afford their health care and access providers in their communities, this was a real missed opportunity to help the most vulnerable people in our country.”
www.rollcall.com/news/congress/health-costs-bill-senate

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Tuesday, December 3, 2019 5:56 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Life Expectancy is 4 Years lower in Red States than Blue States

Democratic-leaning areas used to look similar to Republican-leaning areas in terms of productivity, income and education. But they have been rapidly diverging, with blue areas getting more productive, richer and better educated. In the close presidential election of 2000, counties that supported Al Gore over George W. Bush accounted for only a little over half the nation’s economic output. In the close election of 2016, counties that supported Hillary Clinton accounted for 64 percent of output, almost twice the share of Trump country.
www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2016/11/29/another-clinton-trump-div
ide-high-output-america-vs-low-output-america/

The thing is, the red-blue divide isn’t just about money. It’s also, increasingly, a matter of life and death.

In 1990, today’s red and blue states had almost the same life expectancy. Since then, however, life expectancy in Clinton states has risen more or less in line with other advanced countries, compared with almost no gain in Trump country. At this point, blue-state residents can expect to live more than four years longer than their red-state counterparts.

Is this all about deaths of despair in the eastern heartland? No. Consider our four most populous states. In 1990, Texas and Florida had higher life expectancy than New York and almost matched California; today, they’re far behind.

What explains the divergence? Public policy certainly plays some role, especially in recent years, as blue states expanded Medicaid and drastically reduced the number of uninsured, while most red states didn’t. The growing gap in educational levels has also surely played a role: Better-educated people tend to be healthier than the less educated.

Beyond that, there has been a striking divergence in behavior and lifestyle that must be affecting mortality. For example, the prevalence of obesity has soared all across America since 1990, but obesity rates are significantly higher in red states.

One thing that’s clear, however, is that the facts are utterly inconsistent with the conservative diagnosis of what ails America. Conservative figures like William Barr, the attorney general, look at rising mortality in America and attribute it to the collapse of traditional values — a collapse they attribute, in turn, to the evil machinations of “militant secularists.” The secularist assault on traditional values, Barr claims, lies behind “soaring suicide rates,” rising violence and “a deadly drug epidemic.”

But European nations, which are far more secularist than we are, haven’t seen a comparable rise in deaths of despair and an American-style decline in life expectancy. And even within America these evils are concentrated in states that voted for Trump, and have largely bypassed the more secular blue states.

More at www.nytimes.com/2019/12/02/opinion/life-expectancy-united-states.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Tuesday, December 3, 2019 6:36 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

And birthrates among Democrats have plummeted.

Nature always finds a balance.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Tuesday, December 3, 2019 8:32 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
And birthrates among Democrats have plummeted.

Nature always finds a balance.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

As a candidate, Trump was vocally skeptical of climate change regulations but specifically vowed “to promote clean air and water,” which are overwhelmingly popular causes. But Trump has moved to roll back dozens of rules on these subjects without the changes ever becoming a focus of sustained public debate.

Most of these rollbacks’ impacts will be felt primarily in the long term, but already, particulate pollution is getting worse, reversing years of progress. A team of researchers at Carnegie Mellon estimates that 9,700 more Americans died due to air pollution in 2018 than in 2016, in part due to regulatory changes.

www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/12/2/20970521/trump-administratio
n-achievements

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Tuesday, December 3, 2019 9:00 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

I smoke.

Do you honestly think I give a shit?

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Tuesday, December 3, 2019 9:43 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
I smoke.

Do you honestly think I give a shit?

Do Right, Be Right. :)

I have heard that Red-state smokers have lowered the life expectancy in their states by four years. I heard they voted for Trump. I heard they use the same brain to smoke and vote.

"America’s Red State Death Trip: Why does falling life expectancy track political orientation?"
www.nytimes.com/2019/12/02/opinion/life-expectancy-united-states.html

I am a Never-Smoker and a Never-Trumper.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Tuesday, December 3, 2019 11:50 AM

THG

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

I smoke.

Do you honestly think I give a shit?

In Tense Exchange, Trump and Macron Put Forth Dueling Visions for NATO

A once-cordial relationship between President Trump and President Emmanuel Macron of France devolved in a dramatic fashion on Tuesday, as the two leaders publicly sparred over their approach to containing the threat of terrorism and a shared vision for the future of NATO, a 70-year-old alliance facing existential threats on multiple fronts.

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/in-tense-exchange-trump-and-macro
n-put-forth-dueling-visions-for-nato/ar-BBXGDbc?ocid=spartandhp

T

Deep state describes dedicated, educated professionals.

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 7:07 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by THG:

A once-cordial relationship between President Trump and President Emmanuel Macron of France devolved in a dramatic fashion on Tuesday, as the two leaders publicly sparred over their approach to containing the threat of terrorism . . .

From the article you mentioned: “Would you like some nice ISIS fighters?” Mr. Trump said, crouching forward and claiming that “many” fighters had come from France. “I can give them to you.”

President Macron of France should have rudely said, “France will not take your prisoners from Guantanamo, or Syria. May I suggest you have SEAL team 6 guard your prisoners?” Trump has made himself infamous by pardoning soldiers who kill prisoners, then he fired the Secretary of the Navy for objecting to the pardon of a Navy SEAL.

“Trump grants clemency to 2 Army officers accused of war crimes, restores rank to Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher”
www.foxnews.com/politics/trump-clemency-army-officers-accused-of-war-c
rimes-navy-seal-eddie-gallagher

“Timeline: How Trump intervened in the Navy SEAL Eddie Gallagher's war crimes case”
www.usatoday.com/in-depth/news/politics/2019/11/27/timeline-gallahers-
war-crimes-trump-intervention/4305986002/
Interestingly, Trump defended Gallagher using the same lawyers defending himself.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 7:26 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

lol

Macron's idea of dealing with terrorism is watching the Muslims invade his country with open arms all while the people who live there can't afford gas to get to work.

Nancy Pelosi regularly polls with a higher approval rating than Macron does.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 7:59 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
lol

Macron's idea of dealing with terrorism is watching the Muslims invade his country with open arms all while the people who live there can't afford gas to get to work.

Nancy Pelosi regularly polls with a higher approval rating than Macron does.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

Half of the French have always been a bunch of whiny babies, much like half of Americans. During WWII, half of the French were cooperative with the Nazis. But the other half, Free France, continued to fight. Just because that war is over does not mean that France is no longer half full of whiny babies who feel kindly toward Nazis. Inside of France they argue about which side is the whiny baby side. Inside America they argue about which side, Democrat or Republican, is the whiny baby side. I know it is the Republicans because they shit their diapers and cry for Trump to protect them from the Democrats.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vichy_France

Pétain and Vichy France sound like Trump and the GOP: Pétain blamed la décadence on "political and economic liberalism, with its divisive, individualistic and hedonistic values—locked in sterile rivalry with its antithetical outgrowths, Socialism and Communism". Pétain argued that rescuing the French people from la décadence required a period of authoritarian government which would restore national unity and the traditionalist morality which Pétain claimed the French had forgotten. Pétain argued that la France profonde ("deep France", denoting profoundly French aspects of French culture) still existed, and that the French people needed to return to what Pétain insisted was their true identity. Alongside this claim for a moral revolution was Pétain's call for France to turn inwards, to withdraw from the world, which Pétain always portrayed as a hostile and threatening place full of endless dangers for the French.

It is easy to see why Trump and the children of the Vichy French would dislike Macron.
www.smithsonianmag.com/history/vichy-government-france-world-war-ii-wi
llingly-collaborated-nazis-180967160/
French president Emmanuel Macron gave a speech on France’s role in the genocide, denouncing his political opponents on the far right who dismiss the Vichy government. “It is convenient to see the Vichy regime as born of nothingness, returned to nothingness. Yes, it’s convenient, but it is false. We cannot build pride upon a lie,” Macron said in July.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 9:01 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

I don't need trump to protect me from a bunch of unarmed vegan pussies.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 9:49 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
I don't need trump to protect me from a bunch of unarmed vegan pussies.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

The vegans will vote for the Green Party, as they did in 2016, which places them on Trump's side:

Twice, in 2000 and 2016, the Green Party bears responsibility for changing the outcome of a presidential election. Green Party votes were indeed the difference in three Rust Belt states. In Michigan, Wisconsin and Pennsylvania, President-elect Donald Trump’s margin of victory was less than Green Party presidential candidate Jill Stein’s vote count. A difference of about 80,000 votes determined the outcome in these three states.

Ms. Stein’s Green Party voters have been almost exclusively former Democratic voters. The difference in 2016 dwarfs the 537-vote deficit that cost then-Vice President Al Gore Florida and the presidency in 2000, but it is still real.

www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/green-party-votes-made-the-difference-
in-the-presidential-election/2016/12/05/68899908-ba38-11e6-ae79-bec72d34f8c9_story.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 10:33 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Even if a Democrat is President, Medicare-for-all will not pass the House and it will not pass the Senate. “I’m not a big fan of Medicare for All,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said. None of the key Senate Democrats who will write the next health reform bill support Medicare-for-all or believe it could pass.

The primary itself has been evidence of Medicare-for-all’s long odds: A number of the co-sponsors on Sanders’s bill, like Sen. Kamala Harris and Sen. Cory Booker, have made clear they don’t actually support it as written. And a number of other senators the bill would need, like Amy Klobuchar and Michael Bennet, have come out in direct opposition to the legislation. Medicare-for-all would be a difficult lift even if the Democratic Party was united; it’s not going to pass with the party divided.

Democrats are setting themselves up for disillusionment, and possibly disaster. Either they will nominate a candidate who cannot deliver on their central policy promise or they will nominate a candidate whose victory will be a betrayal of liberal activists’ top policy priority.

Medicare has become a which-side-are-you-on test. So what’s the way out? Are you with Sanders and the left, and against insurance companies, squishy moderates, commodified health care, and a politics of preemptive compromise? Or are you afraid that Sanders and the left are going to scare the country into reelecting Donald Trump and set health care reform back for a generation?

The attacks on Medicare-for-all in the Democratic primary are a shadow of what would come in a general election, when the entire Republican Party, the entire health industry, and much of corporate America will devote billions of dollars to a 24/7 campaign of fearmongering and disinformation that dwarfs the genteel debates among the Democrats.

It’d be awful if the Democratic fight between Medicare-for-all and Medicare-for-more ended up empowering the Republican agenda of Obamacare for none and Medicaid for fewer.

More at www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/12/4/20994485/democrats-primary-2
020-medicare-sanders-warren-kamala-harris

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 11:16 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Are you with Sanders and the left, and against insurance companies, squishy moderates, commodified health care, and a politics of preemptive compromise? Or are you afraid that Sanders and the left are going to scare the country into reelecting Donald Trump and set health care reform back for a generation?

I wouldn't worry about it. Either way, Trump wins.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 11:59 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Are you with Sanders and the left, and against insurance companies, squishy moderates, commodified health care, and a politics of preemptive compromise? Or are you afraid that Sanders and the left are going to scare the country into reelecting Donald Trump and set health care reform back for a generation?

I wouldn't worry about it. Either way, Trump wins.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

I know people who won't quit smoking. All I needed to keep me from smoking was to be told what can happen, but most people wait until it happens to them. The thing that would strongly motivate them to change their behavior is cancer. The thing that will change some Trump voters from voting Republican is if they get cancer from Trump. These are the same dumbasses that won't believe cigarettes are deadly because smoking hasn't killed them, yet. These dumbasses need a few more years with Trump, maybe followed by 8 years of Pence, before they understand what is wrong. Maybe they never will, but their personal problems are no problem for me. And while they are learning about Trump/Pence, I'll have the next 5 to 13 years paying extremely low taxes under a Republican controlled system. It is no problem for me when dumbasses, smokers, and Trump lovers kill themselves slow or fast. Nobody I care about is stupid enough to smoke or believe Trump, especially the rich Republicans I know. They understand Trump the same as I do -- he is an incompetent old fool, but he makes them richer.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 12:07 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK

Oh. So you mean, nothing new. Just the same mindless bragging that you've been doing about how great you are the last three years.

Nobody gives a shit about you, your money or your opinions buddy.

Have a nice day.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 12:10 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK

This one goes out to Second, and all of the rich, virtue signalling fools out there.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, December 4, 2019 2:41 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.

1. My 600 lb life. (TV show)
2. Donald Trump
3. Texas Republicans
4. Ruining people's lives because of their political beliefs
5. Talking about how much money he has
6. Republicans in general
7. Conservatives
8. Russia

Quote:

2. Donald Trump
6. Republicans in general
6. Republicans in general
6. Republicans in general
6. Republicans in general
2. Donald Trump
6. Republicans in general
6. Republicans in general
5. Talking about how much money he has
6. Republicans in general
2. Donald Trump
2. Donald Trump
2. Donald Trump
5. Talking about how much money he has

FIFY
'Incognito', I've helpfully summarized your post so other people can get the gist without having to do any tedious reading.

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Thursday, December 5, 2019 10:07 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Oh. So you mean, nothing new. Just the same mindless bragging that you've been doing about how great you are the last three years.

Nobody gives a shit about you, your money or your opinions buddy.

Have a nice day.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

I care about you. I care that you are a sad, newly sober, rotten-toothed smoker. Don't tell me that is all behind you, just because you are not drunk, smoking, and Jacking off at this moment, 6ixJack. Like most Trump voters, except the rich ones, you've got terrible problems that you fear are unsolvable, but you hope having $100,000 in the bank, owning a house, and Trump are gonna protect you. You know your kind of people are in big trouble that you caused for yourself, just like the Confederates knew in 1863 the South might collapse in the war they started, but you are gonna fight until you decisively win or lose. I will be watching your struggles, but I'm placing my bets on the other side. In the meantime, I will enjoy the Red vs Blue death-match for control of the White House. Go Team Blue!

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, December 5, 2019 12:22 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK

There's no death match.

Democrats are going to lose huge. Maybe we should give them a participation trophy?

Why so mean, buddy? Resorting to personal attacks again because things aren't going your way and I'm right as usual?

Nothing personal when I insult you about your "wealth", buddy. We all know that you don't actually have any money.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Friday, December 6, 2019 7:28 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
There's no death match.

Democrats are going to lose huge. Maybe we should give them a participation trophy?

Why so mean, buddy? Resorting to personal attacks again because things aren't going your way and I'm right as usual?

Nothing personal when I insult you about your "wealth", buddy. We all know that you don't actually have any money.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

Remember Ebenezer Scrooge in a Christmas Carol? He did not get rich by treating Jim Cratchit to a high salary. Ebenezer saved his philanthropy until the very end of life, when the Ghost of Christmas Future was threatening him. Or Bill Gates. He was a slippery conniving businessman, plotting and planning a monopoly, until he retired and switched to be a philanthropist. John Rockefeller? Who only mellowed when he was old. It was his children who were nice. Henry Ford? Shooting strikers and antisemitic. That guy was not nice. It was his grandchildren and the Ford Foundation who were nice.

If I ever get around to writing "River Tam and the Problem of Evil" I'll show you how that works in sci-fi. In the comic books, River is passive, only kicking and shooting as a plot twist to save the day at the very last second. Firefly -- The Sting (2019) is a good example of that, but "River Tam and the Problem of Evil" would be one where River is plotting against the whole Alliance . . . and she wins without Malcolm Reynolds even knowing what was going on underneath his nose. He will wonder why the Alliance leaves Serenity in peace. He will never know what River and Kaylee did to make that happen. River and Kaylee didn't kill anybody to do it, either, although they came very close, but the Operative backed down first. River made a deal, but she also planned how to cheat the Alliance. There is no point in River being honest with her enemies, but she has to be subtle about it so they don't know she cheated them.

Free Comics Download | Image Format : JPG | Year : 2019 | Size : 50 MB | 132 Pages

https://getcomics.info/other-comics/firefly-the-sting-2019/

www.boom-studios.com/archives/firefly-the-sting-original-graphic-novel
-first-look/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Friday, December 6, 2019 7:35 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

U.S. trade law offers Trump more freedom of action — more ability to do whatever he wants — than any other policy area.

The basic story is that long ago — in fact, in the aftermath of the disastrous Smoot-Hawley tariff of 1930 — Congress deliberately limited its own role in trade policy. Instead, it gave the president the power to negotiate trade deals with other countries, which would then face up-or-down votes without amendments.

It was always clear, however, that this system needed some flexibility to respond to events. So the executive branch was given the power to impose temporary tariffs under certain conditions: import surges, threats to national security, unfair practices by foreign governments. The idea was that nonpartisan experts would determine whether and when these conditions existed, and the president would then decide whether to act.

This system worked well for many years. It turned out, however, to be extremely vulnerable to someone like Trump, for whom everything is partisan and expertise is a four-letter word. Trump’s tariff justifications have often been self-evidently absurd — seriously, who imagines that imports of Canadian steel threaten U.S. national security? But there’s no obvious way to stop him from imposing tariffs whenever he feels like it.

And there’s also no obvious way to stop his officials from granting individual businesses tariff exemptions, supposedly based on economic criteria but in fact as a reward for political support. Tariff policy isn’t the only arena in which Trump can practice crony capitalism — federal contracting is looking increasingly scandalous — but tariffs are especially ripe for exploitation.

So that’s why Trump is a Tariff Man: Tariffs let him exercise unconstrained power, rewarding his friends and punishing his enemies. Anyone imagining that he’s going to change his ways and start behaving responsibly is living in a fantasy world.

www.nytimes.com/2019/12/05/opinion/trump-trade-tariffs.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Saturday, December 7, 2019 6:46 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

The Russification of the Republican Party

Just how far will Republicans go in following President Donald Trump’s embrace of Russia? An answer may be crystallizing as the GOP mobilizes its defense of the president against impeachment.

Both congressional Republicans and conservative commentators are defending Trump from impeachment partly by accusing Ukraine of intervening against him in the 2016 presidential election—despite repeated warnings from national-security and intelligence officials that those claims are not only baseless, but advance Vladimir Putin’s goal of discrediting Ukraine.

Earlier in Trump’s presidency, many Republicans sought to distance themselves from his warm tone toward Putin. But just this week alone, a number of Republican lawmakers, the official House Republican report rebutting impeachment, and the Fox News host Tucker Carlson have repeated Kremlin lines on Ukraine.

This flurry of GOP rhetoric comes as Democrats are raising alarm about the Republican-controlled Senate’s refusal to take action on the DETER Act, a bipartisan bill that would impose sanctions on Russia if it interferes again in 2020.

Senator Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, the act’s sponsor, has been unsuccessfully pressing Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell to attach the bill to a defense-authorization bill now in conference between the House and Senate, which would ensure its passage.

“Nobody has provided any substantive justification for opposing this measure,” Van Hollen told me in an interview. “All the testimony has been supportive of the DETER Act. And yet when you get behind closed doors, it’s not that anyone says they are opposed to it; they just won’t engage. McConnell would like to see this defeated without any of his fingerprints on it, but his fingerprints are there because he has refused to engage.”

Representative Devin Nunes of California, the top Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, repeatedly insisted during last month’s impeachment hearings that Ukraine had meddled in the 2016 election against Trump. That drew a stern rebuke from one witness asked to testify, the former Trump National Security Council adviser Fiona Hill, who warned that congressional Republicans were spreading “a fictional narrative that has been perpetrated and propagated by the Russian security services themselves.”

But Hill’s words have not stopped Republicans from reprising those arguments. In late November, Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana claimed during a television interview that Ukraine, not Russia, might have hacked the Democratic National Committee’s computers in 2016. After retreating from that claim, he went on Meet the Press on Sunday and equated public criticism of Trump by some Ukrainian officials with Russia’s systematic interference campaign in 2016.

The Senate Intelligence Committee, during its investigation of 2016 election meddling, found no evidence of Ukrainian interference. But when asked about Kennedy’s comments this week, Senator Richard Burr of North Carolina, the committee’s chairman, came closer to endorsing rather than repudiating them.

More at www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2019/12/impeachment-republican-pa
rty-russia/603088/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Saturday, December 7, 2019 8:27 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

Quote:
The Russification of the Republican Party

Fuck you.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Sunday, December 8, 2019 4:36 PM

JO753

rezident owtsidr

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Quote:
The Russification of the Republican Party

Fuck you.

Thats your reply. And you gripe wen we say youre a Russian ajent. (ad eyeroll emoji here)

----------------------------
DUZ XaT SEM RiT TQ YQ? - Jubal Early

http://www.7532020.com .

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Sunday, December 8, 2019 4:38 PM

JO753

rezident owtsidr

Watch the Leonardo Da Vinci uv GoP propaganda paint a picture:

It really iz like a specialized kind uv performans art. He just gets on and riffs. Well worth hiz 30M$ salary to the peepl that pay him.

----------------------------
DUZ XaT SEM RiT TQ YQ? - Jubal Early

http://www.7532020.com .

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Sunday, December 8, 2019 4:48 PM

1KIKI

Goodbye, kind world (George Monbiot) - In common with all those generations which have contemplated catastrophe, we appear to be incapable of understanding what confronts us.

Quote:
The Russification of the Republican Party

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Fuck you.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

Quote:
Originally posted by JO753:
Thats your reply. And you gripe wen we say youre a Russian ajent. (ad eyeroll emoji here)

----------------------------
DUZ XaT SEM RiT TQ YQ? - Jubal Early

http://www.7532020.com .

Yoor lodjik iz rong, JO. U (awl) djust ahdehd Republicans to yoor lihst uv Russians. Yoor dooing hwaht yoov alwaaez bin dooing. Kawling peepl Russians.

Jack wuz obdjekting. :eyeroll:

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Sunday, December 8, 2019 9:10 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK

Yup.

Somebody brings up Russia, I tell them to fuck off with their red baiting.

Fucking idiots.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Monday, December 9, 2019 8:44 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

When Democrats last controlled the Senate, one especially important Democrat — Judiciary Chair Patrick Leahy (VT) — took an unusually expansive view of the rights of the minority party.

An informal tradition known as the “blue slip” sometimes gives home-state senators an exaggerated influence over who gets confirmed to federal judgeships within their states (the tradition gets its name from blue pieces of paper that home-state senators use to indicate whether they approve of a particular nominee).

Traditionally, the Senate Judiciary Committee showed some level of deference to senators who disapprove of their home-state nominees, although the level of deference given to these senators varied wildly depending on who chaired the committee and whether that committee chair was politically aligned with the incumbent president.

Leahy, who chaired the Committee for most of the Obama presidency, gave home-state senators a simply extraordinary power to block judicial nominees. Under Leahy, a single senator of either party could veto any nominee to a federal judgeship in their state (although federal appeals courts typically oversee multiple states, each individual seat on these courts is traditionally assigned to a particular state).

Leahy says that he did so to protect the “rights of the minority.” And protect Republicans he did. Red-state Republicans used the power Leahy gave them to keep many judicial seats empty until Obama left office. Sen. Ron Johnson (R-WI) effectively held a seat on the United States Court of Appeals for the Seventh Circuit open for eight years until Trump could fill it.

The blue slip allowed Republicans to drag out negotiations over vacancies until McConnell took over the Senate in 2015 and imposed a blockade on nearly all of Obama’s appellate nominees.

The blue slip also weakened Obama’s hand in negotiations with Senate Republicans, and sometimes forced him to name relatively conservative judges in order to placate senators who could veto judicial nominees. Sens. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) and Johnny Isakson (R-GA), for example, effectively held one of Obama’s Eleventh Circuit nominees hostage until Obama agreed to also name Judge Julie Carnes — a George H.W. Bush district court appointee — to a second vacancy on that same court.

Republicans did not reciprocate when they came to power.

More at www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2019/12/9/20962980/trump-supreme-court
-federal-judges

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Monday, December 9, 2019 3:38 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

The Afghanistan Papers show that lots of people knew we were failing in Afghanistan but lied about it in public:

A confidential trove of government documents obtained by The Washington Post reveals that senior U.S. officials failed to tell the truth about the war in Afghanistan throughout the 18-year campaign, making rosy pronouncements they knew to be false and hiding unmistakable evidence the war had become unwinnable.

….Several of those interviewed described explicit and sustained efforts by the U.S. government to deliberately mislead the public. They said it was common at military headquarters in Kabul — and at the White House — to distort statistics to make it appear the United States was winning the war when that was not the case.

“Every data point was altered to present the best picture possible,” Bob Crowley, an Army colonel who served as a senior counterinsurgency adviser to U.S. military commanders in 2013 and 2014, told government interviewers. “Surveys, for instance, were totally unreliable but reinforced that everything we were doing was right and we became a self-licking ice cream cone.”

John Sopko, the head of the federal agency that conducted the interviews, acknowledged to The Post that the documents show “the American people have constantly been lied to.”

It’s unbelievable that we’re still in Afghanistan a full generation after we first invaded. Unfortunately, no one has the guts to simply pull out and accept the fact that they will then become the president that lost Afghanistan. So they keep on pretending to fight. And that’s the biggest lie of all.

www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2019/12/afghanistan-papers-reveal-an-18
-year-lie/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Tuesday, December 10, 2019 8:44 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

The two major political parties in the U.S. really are very different in their policies toward the rich. President Barack Obama was hardly a radical, but when he left office the average federal tax rate on the top 1 percent was 5 percentage points higher than it had been under George W. Bush.
www.cbo.gov/publication/55413

In 2016 Trump claimed that he wouldn’t do the usual Republican thing and cut taxes on the rich while trying to destroy the safety net. But he was lying.

And despite what right-wing pundits like to claim, high-income Americans are in general much more likely than others to support the Republican Party. In last year’s midterms, 52 percent of voters with incomes over $200,000 voted Republican, compared with only 38 percent of voters with incomes under $50,000.
www.cnn.com/election/2018/exit-polls

The rightward tilt is especially strong at the very top; although there are a few high-profile liberal billionaires, most of the extremely wealthy are also extremely right-wing.
www.theguardian.com/us-news/2018/oct/30/billionaire-stealth-politics-a
merica-100-richest-what-they-want

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Wednesday, December 11, 2019 5:56 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Congress to Vote on $22 Billion Defense Increase One Week After Trump Slashed Food Stamps

In June 2017, former Defense Secretary James Mattis and former chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Joseph Dunford testified that the Pentagon needed a 3 to 5 percent annual increase in its budget each year until 2023, amounting to tens of billions of dollars a year. Dunford said the increases were necessary to “maintain the competitive level” of the armed forces, but such massive hikes would place U.S. military spending in peacetime at historic levels not seen since the World War II.

More at https://theintercept.com/2019/12/10/ndaa-congress-defense-bill/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, December 12, 2019 7:33 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Three years ago, 3.9 million Americans received a plain-looking envelope from the Internal Revenue Service. Inside was a letter stating that they had recently paid a fine for not carrying health insurance and suggesting possible ways to enroll in coverage.

New research concludes that the bureaucratic mailing saved lives.

Three Treasury Department economists have published a working paper finding that these notices increased health insurance sign-ups. Obtaining insurance, they say, reduced premature deaths by an amount that exceeded any of their expectations. Americans between 45 and 64 benefited the most: For every 1,648 who received a letter, one fewer death occurred than among those who hadn’t received a letter.

In all, the researchers estimated that the letters may have wound up saving 700 lives.

The experiment, made possible by an accident of budgeting, is the first rigorous experiment to find that health coverage leads to fewer deaths, a claim that politicians and economists have fiercely debated in recent years as they assess the effects of the Affordable Care Act’s coverage expansion. The results also provide belated vindication for the much-despised individual mandate that was part of Obamacare until December 2017, when Congress did away with the fine for people who don’t carry health insurance.

“There has been a lot of skepticism, especially in economics, that health insurance has a mortality impact,” said Sarah Miller, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan who researches the topic and was not involved with the Treasury research. “It’s really important that this is a randomized controlled trial. It’s a really high standard of evidence that you can’t just dismiss.”

www.nytimes.com/2019/12/10/upshot/irs-letter-health-insurance-fine-stu
dy.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, December 12, 2019 8:59 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK

Quote:
Originally posted by second:
Three years ago, 3.9 million Americans received a plain-looking envelope from the Internal Revenue Service. Inside was a letter stating that they had recently paid a fine for not carrying health insurance and suggesting possible ways to enroll in coverage.

New research concludes that the bureaucratic mailing saved lives.

Three Treasury Department economists have published a working paper finding that these notices increased health insurance sign-ups. Obtaining insurance, they say, reduced premature deaths by an amount that exceeded any of their expectations. Americans between 45 and 64 benefited the most: For every 1,648 who received a letter, one fewer death occurred than among those who hadn’t received a letter.

In all, the researchers estimated that the letters may have wound up saving 700 lives.

The experiment, made possible by an accident of budgeting, is the first rigorous experiment to find that health coverage leads to fewer deaths, a claim that politicians and economists have fiercely debated in recent years as they assess the effects of the Affordable Care Act’s coverage expansion. The results also provide belated vindication for the much-despised individual mandate that was part of Obamacare until December 2017, when Congress did away with the fine for people who don’t carry health insurance.

“There has been a lot of skepticism, especially in economics, that health insurance has a mortality impact,” said Sarah Miller, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan who researches the topic and was not involved with the Treasury research. “It’s really important that this is a randomized controlled trial. It’s a really high standard of evidence that you can’t just dismiss.”

www.nytimes.com/2019/12/10/upshot/irs-letter-health-insurance-fine-stu
dy.html

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

Yup. Now if they could only manage to make it affordable and keep the premiums from raising 30% year over year while also increasing the deductible.

WTF. Do you really think that anybody legitimately believes for a second that having affordable healthcare doesn't save lives?

What a stupid article.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Thursday, December 12, 2019 10:27 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

WTF. Do you really think that anybody legitimately believes for a second that having affordable healthcare doesn't save lives?

What a stupid article.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

Idaho Republican Labrador Booed Over 'Nobody Dies' Comment on Health Care
www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/idaho-republican-labrador-booed-over-nobo
dy-dies-comment-health-care-n755976

I have heard the same a million times from Texas Republicans. Nobody dies because the ER is available to the uninsured, according to those Texans.

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, December 12, 2019 12:44 PM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.

This generally went unnoticed but I think it's an excellent idea and should be extended. Not only should ALL healthcare providers be required to post standard charges, but ALL healthcare providers should charge ONLY standard charges ... no special rates for Humana v Anthem v BC/BS. The only deviation I would allow would be Medicare rates.

Quote:
TheHill.com
New Trump administration rule will require hospitals post prices online
By Jessie Hellmann - 08/03/18 01:13 PM EDT

New Trump administration rule will require hospitals post prices online
© Victoria Sarno Jordan

Hospitals will be required to post online a list of their standard charges under a rule finalized Thursday by the Trump administration.

While hospitals are already required to make this information public on request, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) said the new rule would require the info be posted online to "encourage price transparency" and improve "public accessibility."

Starting Jan. 1, hospitals will be required to update the information annually.

The CMS said it is also considering how to "allow consumers to more easily access relevant healthcare data and compare providers."

Increasing price transparency has been a priority for the administration as a way to drive down health-care costs.

"This is a small step towards providing our beneficiaries with price transparency, but our work in this area is only just beginning," CMS Administrator Seema Verma said in a speech last month. "Price transparency is core to patient empowerment and making sure American patients have the tools they need so they can make the best decisions for them and their families."

-----------
Pity would be no more,
If we did not MAKE men poor - William Blake

I'd nuke a BILLION PEOPLE if it would save the other 7 billion from living under Putin. Hell, I might go all the way to the last 100 people on Earth to keep this planet from being under fascist rule.- WISHIMAY

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Thursday, December 12, 2019 1:12 PM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

This generally went unnoticed but I think it's an excellent idea and should be extended. Not only should ALL healthcare providers be required to post standard charges, but ALL healthcare providers should charge ONLY standard charges ... no special rates for Humana v Anthem v BC/BS. The only deviation I would allow would be Medicare rates.

I'm sure it ain't gonna happen because the Health Industry will fight it:

WASHINGTON, D.C. (November 15, 2019) - The American Hospital Association (AHA), Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC), Children’s Hospital Association (CHA) and Federation of American Hospitals (FAH) issued the following joint statement on today’s final rule from CMS:

Today’s rule mandating the public disclosure of privately negotiated rates between commercial health insurance companies and hospitals is a setback in efforts to provide patients with the most relevant information they need to make informed decisions about their care. Instead of helping patients know their out-of-pocket costs, this rule will introduce widespread confusion, accelerate anticompetitive behavior among health insurers, and stymie innovations in value-based care delivery. America’s hospitals and health systems have repeatedly urged CMS to work with hospitals, doctors, insurers, patients, and other stakeholders to identify solutions to provide patients with the information they need to make informed health care decisions and know what their expected out-of-pocket costs will be. We continue to stand ready to work with CMS to achieve this goal.

Because the final rule does not achieve the goal of providing patients with out-of-pocket cost information, and instead threatens to confuse patients, our four organizations will soon join with member hospitals to file a legal challenge to the rule on grounds including that it exceeds the Administration’s authority.

www.aha.org/press-releases/2019-11-15-joint-statement-national-hospita
l-and-health-system-groups-public

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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Thursday, December 12, 2019 1:38 PM

CAPTAINCRUNCH

... stay crunchy...

Quote:
Originally posted by SIGNYM:

This generally went unnoticed but I think it's an excellent idea and should be extended. Not only should ALL healthcare providers be required to post standard charges, but ALL healthcare providers should charge ONLY standard charges ... no special rates for Humana v Anthem v BC/BS. The only deviation I would allow would be Medicare rates.

Quote:
TheHill.com
New Trump administration rule will require hospitals post prices online
By Jessie Hellmann - 08/03/18 01:13 PM EDT

New Trump administration rule will require hospitals post prices online
© Victoria Sarno Jordan

Hospitals will be required to post online a list of their standard charges under a rule finalized Thursday by the Trump administration.

While hospitals are already required to make this information public on request, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) said the new rule would require the info be posted online to "encourage price transparency" and improve "public accessibility."

Starting Jan. 1, hospitals will be required to update the information annually.

The CMS said it is also considering how to "allow consumers to more easily access relevant healthcare data and compare providers."

Increasing price transparency has been a priority for the administration as a way to drive down health-care costs.

"This is a small step towards providing our beneficiaries with price transparency, but our work in this area is only just beginning," CMS Administrator Seema Verma said in a speech last month. "Price transparency is core to patient empowerment and making sure American patients have the tools they need so they can make the best decisions for them and their families."

Meh. How many people would check those prices? And what do you do if you see another provider with better rates? When you're in the ER are you going to review rates while you're bleeding? Are you going to have to apply for arbitration if your splenectomy was too costly in your opinion? How would you know?
I don't need to do MORE work for my health care. Try taking care of a senior - that sh*t is the height of stupidity, "You have now entered the doughnut hole. Your plan will cover 33.5% of the following items on Tuesday." Total BS, complete insult in fact to people paying in. They make us work for them. Dig a hole and throw them in - let's start over.
I'd rather have a watch dog / accountability group that aggressively monitors all health care pricing and applies gov pressure to conform to pricing guidelines on our behalf with penalties for non-compliance. It's not hard - it's math.
Look around your community. Look at all the shiny new HC facilities - they have sh*t tons of money.

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Friday, December 13, 2019 6:13 AM

SECOND

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at https://www.mediafire.com/two

What does it mean for US Democratic Presidential candidates that UK Labor candidate Jeremy Corbyn led Labor to its biggest defeat in decades? For those of you who haven’t been following closely, Corbyn is no neoliberal shill. He is an unabashed lefty socialist who campaigned on an unabashed lefty socialist platform. No triangulating or “Tory lite” for him. He was out to prove that Labor could win by promising the voters a soaring lefty agenda filled with taxing the rich, taking back control of privatized industries, free college, huge infrastructure spending, more money for health care, and so forth.

The result was a mind-boggling defeat. So what does this tell us about American presidential candidates like Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders? Corbyn lost because he was a hard left candidate, and the same thing will happen if Democrats nominate one of their own.

The American and British electorates have voted quite similarly for the past several decades, putting in office Reagan-Clinton-Bush-Obama-Trump as against Thatcher-Blair-Cameron-Boris Johnson. Given the similarities between Boris Johnson and Trump, as well as the obvious salience of immigration politics in both countries, I’d be reluctant to blow off the British results as nothing much for US Democrats to worry about.

More at www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2019/12/too-bad-about-the-brits-but-wha
t-does-it-mean-for-us/

The Joss Whedon script for Serenity, where Wash lives, is Serenity-190pages.pdf at www.mediafire.com/folder/1uwh75oa407q8/Firefly

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