REAL WORLD EVENT DISCUSSIONS

A thread for Democrats Only

POSTED BY: THGRRI
UPDATED: Wednesday, March 13, 2024 08:08
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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 8:15 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Yeah...

Kind of makes one wonder if the Civil War was about the "good guys" in the North trying to end slavery like we were taught in public school, huh?

There would still be Confederate States if President Jefferson Davis had been content with just controlling the Southern States. But Jeff Davis, overly proud of himself, got persuaded by his Confederate Generals that they could conquer the North. And it looked like Davis's Generals could, at least until Lincoln promoted Grant and Sherman to be his new Generals and fired the incompetent ones.

There were abolitionists in the North, but the North went to war with the Confederacy to save itself, not for love of the slaves. The Emancipation Proclamation came later, as an afterthought by Lincoln, and it did not free slaves in slave states that did not join the Confederacy (Delaware, Kentucky, Maryland, and Missouri). Northerners, except the few abolitionists, disliked blacks. That didn’t change with winning the Civil War and was on the mind of Martin Luther King Jr. when he was killed for being black.

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 8:21 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Yeah...

Kind of makes one wonder if the Civil War was about the "good guys" in the North trying to end slavery like we were taught in public school, huh?

There would still be Confederate States if President Jefferson Davis had been content with just controlling the Southern States. But Jeff Davis, overly proud of himself, got persuaded by his Confederate Generals that they could conquer the North. And it looked like Davis's Generals could, at least until Lincoln promoted Grant and Sherman to be his new Generals and fired the incompetent ones.

There were abolitionists in the North, but the North went to war with the Confederacy to save itself, not for love of the slaves. The Emancipation Proclamation came later, as an afterthought by Lincoln, and it did not free slaves in slave states that did not join the Confederacy. Northerners, except the few abolitionists, disliked blacks. That didn’t change with winning the Civil War and was on the mind of Martin Luther King Jr. when he was killed for being black.



You do surprise me on occasion Second. I think that might be 3 posts you've made in the last week that we're in agreement on either in large part or in full.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 8:34 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

You do surprise me on occasion Second. I think that might be 3 posts you've made in the last week that we're in agreement on either in large part or in full.

If you looked at that MLK article you'd see that MLK correctly identified what is wrong with America today. Martin Luther King’s Radical Anti-Capitalism www.theparisreview.org/blog/2018/01/15/remembering-martin-luther-kings
-radical-class-politics
/

I'm a big fan of Capitalism because it benefits me, but I receive those benefits only because I understand how it works in America, as did MLK Jr. who was aware of how American-style Capitalism did not benefit the poorer 50% of the population.

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 8:51 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

You do surprise me on occasion Second. I think that might be 3 posts you've made in the last week that we're in agreement on either in large part or in full.

If you looked at that MLK article you'd see that MLK correctly identified what is wrong with America today. Martin Luther King’s Radical Anti-Capitalism www.theparisreview.org/blog/2018/01/15/remembering-martin-luther-kings
-radical-class-politics
/

I'm a big fan of Capitalism because it benefits me, but I receive those benefits only because I understand how it works in America, as did MLK Jr. who was aware of how American-style Capitalism did not benefit the poorer 50% of the population.



I agree with capitalism on paper, but not in practice... at least how it is done in America.

I'm not anti-Capitalist at all. I'm anti-Predatory-Capitalism, which is what the current structure is. We're allowed to live with an illusion of a Capitalistic society, but only those with true wealth are allowed to thrive and continue to consolidate power.

I don't know what the fix for this is. Communism certainly isn't a viable option.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 9:40 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

I agree with capitalism on paper, but not in practice... at least how it is done in America.

I'm not anti-Capitalist at all. I'm anti-Predatory-Capitalism, which is what the current structure is. We're allowed to live with an illusion of a Capitalistic society, but only those with true wealth are allowed to thrive and continue to consolidate power.

I don't know what the fix for this is. Communism certainly isn't a viable option.

Capitalism rules until there is a Star Trek economy (replicators instantly manufacture food, clothing etc. & money is not the measure of all value). But until that economy arrives, along with starships, government can keep the wealthy from being too greedy and incompetent if government wants. In a few countries, I believe government does.
www.socialprogressindex.com/results

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 10:07 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


I'd like to see three things happen. One we've already talked about.

1. Eliminate the Social Security/Medicaid tax on anybody for the first $100,000 and force all companies to give the half they were paying to the employees. This would be an instant 15.30% pay increase to every single one of the working class that are in poverty all the way up to those making $100,000 per year. Make this $100,000 number tied completely to inflation, so it never decreases in real life.

2. Then, end the top half of this equation and remove the cap completely on income. Everyone making over $100,000 per year will have to pay it on every dime they make over $100,000.


3. Most importantly, make this a constitutional amendment that no person in political power can EVER change this or remove it.


This would not solve all of societies woes, but I think it would be an amazing start.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 11:24 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
I'd like to see three things happen. One we've already talked about.

1. Eliminate the Social Security/Medicaid tax on anybody for the first $100,000 and force all companies to give the half they were paying to the employees. This would be an instant 15.30% pay increase to every single one of the working class that are in poverty all the way up to those making $100,000 per year. Make this $100,000 number tied completely to inflation, so it never decreases in real life.

2. Then, end the top half of this equation and remove the cap completely on income. Everyone making over $100,000 per year will have to pay it on every dime they make over $100,000.


3. Most importantly, make this a constitutional amendment that no person in political power can EVER change this or remove it.


This would not solve all of societies woes, but I think it would be an amazing start.

I'll take you seriously. I think #2 could not get even one vote from the GOP in Congress, but if it did pass by a miracle I think #3 could not get approval from the state governments controlled by the GOP. That would kill the amendment because the legislatures of three-fourths (presently 38) of the states need to ratify. It takes only 13 states voting NO! to stop an amendment and the GOP controls 32 states. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_state_legislatures

But it's always a game won by numbers. For an unexpected example from today:

Democrats just picked up a Wisconsin state Senate seat. Though Donald Trump had won the rural district by about 17 points in the 2016 presidential election, Democratic nominee Patty Schachtner defeated her Republican opponent for the open seat by a comfortable margin of about 10 points.
www.jsonline.com/story/news/2018/01/16/wisconsin-voters-chose-legislat
ors-tuesdays-special-elections/1038687001
/

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 8:01 PM

THGRRI


A Democrat won a reliably GOP seat in Wisconsin, causing angst among some Republicans.

Democrats on Tuesday won a surprising victory in Wisconsin's Senate District 10, part of what's become a wave of wins nationwide in state legislative and federal races, stoking concerns among Republicans ahead of the midterm elections this fall.

"Senate District 10 special election win by a Democrat is a wake up call for Republicans in Wisconsin," tweeted Republican Gov. Scott Walker, who later Wednesday sent out several tweets that began with "WAKE UP CALL" and touted his party's achievements in the state.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-01-17/democrat-wins-seat-
in-traditionally-red-wisconsin-district



http://beta.latimes.com/nation/la-na-pol-wisconsin-senate-seat-2018011
7-story.html


Patty Schachtner's victory Tuesday over state Rep. Adam Jarchow marks the 34th legislative seat that has flipped from Republican to Democrat nationwide since President Donald Trump took office last year, according to the national Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, signaling backlash against Trump could fuel a Democratic wave in November.

T

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 8:32 PM

THGRRI

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Wednesday, January 17, 2018 10:09 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
I'd like to see three things happen. One we've already talked about.

1. Eliminate the Social Security/Medicaid tax on anybody for the first $100,000 and force all companies to give the half they were paying to the employees. This would be an instant 15.30% pay increase to every single one of the working class that are in poverty all the way up to those making $100,000 per year. Make this $100,000 number tied completely to inflation, so it never decreases in real life.

2. Then, end the top half of this equation and remove the cap completely on income. Everyone making over $100,000 per year will have to pay it on every dime they make over $100,000.


3. Most importantly, make this a constitutional amendment that no person in political power can EVER change this or remove it.


This would not solve all of societies woes, but I think it would be an amazing start.

I'll take you seriously. I think #2 could not get even one vote from the GOP in Congress, but if it did pass by a miracle I think #3 could not get approval from the state governments controlled by the GOP. That would kill the amendment because the legislatures of three-fourths (presently 38) of the states need to ratify. It takes only 13 states voting NO! to stop an amendment and the GOP controls 32 states. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_States_state_legislatures

But it's always a game won by numbers. For an unexpected example from today:

Democrats just picked up a Wisconsin state Senate seat. Though Donald Trump had won the rural district by about 17 points in the 2016 presidential election, Democratic nominee Patty Schachtner defeated her Republican opponent for the open seat by a comfortable margin of about 10 points.
www.jsonline.com/story/news/2018/01/16/wisconsin-voters-chose-legislat
ors-tuesdays-special-elections/1038687001
/



As you say, it's a game won by numbers. The People that would be positively effected by this outnumber those that don't by a very large margin. The problem is, nobody ever talks about it.

Sure, they bitch about Social Security for many different reasons, but never talk about what I'm talking about specifically. I never got this idea from anyone, because nobody ever talks about it. I just thought of it.

Most people are too stupid to realize that they're paying 15.3% of every penny they make to the Government because of this tax. Their paycheck says that it's only %7.65.


I like that you're not disagreeing with me about the merits of this idea anymore, only the probability that it could ever happen. I don't think that having the correct amount of Democratic seats would do it, because they never talk about it either. I think the first step in getting this to happen would be to raise awareness of it.


Just so nobody forgets, an additional benefit to this would be that this 15.3% pay increase for all workers making under $100,000 a year would not impact companies providing goods and services that minimum wage employees work. This would be a huge way of boosting the quality of life for the lowest earners while also not raising the burden of companies by forcing them to raise their minimum workers pay rates.


Although, I would like to add a 4th thing to my list right now. Immediately tie the minimum wage to inflation going forward as well. It's absolutely crazy that it isn't already.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Thursday, January 18, 2018 7:59 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

As you say, it's a game won by numbers. The People that would be positively effected by this outnumber those that don't by a very large margin. The problem is, nobody ever talks about it.

Sure, they bitch about Social Security for many different reasons, but never talk about what I'm talking about specifically. I never got this idea from anyone, because nobody ever talks about it. I just thought of it.
. . .

I like that you're not disagreeing with me about the merits of this idea anymore, only the probability that it could ever happen. I don't think that having the correct amount of Democratic seats would do it, because they never talk about it either. I think the first step in getting this to happen would be to raise awareness of it.

Texans talk about politics the same way they talk about sports: "My team's winning. Your team sucks." That's about as deep as it goes in politics for the masses, the lower 99%. There is no talk about political policy. Nothing about consequences. It's all feelings and gossip. Maybe that's why crappy political policies can exist?

But when the 1 percenters talk to each other or, and this is where things start getting effective, lobbyists for the 1% talk to politicians, they don't talk in vague generalities and emotion. They can make a politician squirm if he spouts inconsequential nonsense like a child who didn't prepare for a quiz. Save that bluster for TV and the newspaper reporters.

I just answered my own question about crappy political policy. Whatever policy is important to the 1% is pushed slowly and resolutely toward making sense by the 1%. Whatever the 99% want will be pushed hither and yon by the turbulent emotions of the 99% during election season. And that is where the number game comes in. What is the emotion that the majority are feeling on election day? That makes the voter King For A Day. But when election season is over, the 1% will be pushing whoever got elected, either D or R politician, for things to go their way on what they care about. Slow and steady wins for the 1%.

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, January 18, 2018 10:21 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Well... right.

Hence why nobody ever talks about this issue. I know I'm smart, but surely I can't be the first person to ever have this idea. Ain't nothing new under the sun.

That's why it's been kept under a boulder.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Friday, January 19, 2018 2:19 AM

JO753

rezident owtsidr


Soundz like a great idea, 6.

I'm starting to think YOU shoud rite the TAX paje on my site!

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

http://www.7532020.com

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Friday, January 19, 2018 4:10 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Thanks J0 :)

I'm down. I actually mentioned something about that a while back but you must not have seen it. (I'm not sure if you also didn't see the part I added in a later post about how this SS tax reform would not only give a %15.3 raise to all employees making under $100k, but would do so without raising the bottom line at all for companies providing goods and services that employ a majority of the people who would benefit from it... so a gallon of milk wouldn't cost 5 bucks a month later as it might if we just raised the minimum wage by 4 or 5 bucks. I also said that we should then immediately tie the minimum wage to inflation so that's never a problem again).


We can't forget the ideas about replacing homeowners insurance with mortgage insurance and helping offset any deficits this might create by using lottery earnings and making where that money goes completely visible to the public as well. ;)

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Friday, January 19, 2018 7:59 AM

SECOND

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


While 6ixStringJack is adjusting Social Security tax on wages: You wouldn't put all your 401K money into US Treasury bonds, would you? Doing that would lower your retirement income. But since the beginning of the Social Security program, all securities held by the trust funds have been issued by the Federal Government. Could you please fix that by investing in something that pays higher interest?
www.ssa.gov/oact/progdata/investheld.html

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Sunday, January 21, 2018 8:31 AM

SECOND

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


Unexceptionalism: A Primer
By E. L. Doctorow, April 28, 2012
www.nytimes.com/2012/04/29/opinion/sunday/unexceptionalism-a-primer.ht
ml


To achieve unexceptionalism, the political ideal that would render the United States indistinguishable from the impoverished, traditionally undemocratic, brutal or catatonic countries of the world, do the following:

PHASE ONE

If you’re a justice of the Supreme Court, ignore the first sacrament of a democracy and suspend the counting of ballots in a presidential election. Appoint the candidate of your choice as president.

If you’re the newly anointed president, react to a terrorist attack by invading a nonterrorist country. Despite the loss or disablement of untold numbers of lives, manage your war so that its results will be indeterminate.

Using the state of war as justification, order secret surveillance of American citizens, data mine their phone calls and e-mail, make business, medical and public library records available to government agencies, perform illegal warrantless searches of homes and offices.

Take to torturing terrorism suspects, here or abroad, in violation of the Eighth Amendment of the Constitution, which prohibits the infliction of cruel and unusual punishment. Unilaterally abrogate the Convention Against Torture as well as the Geneva Conventions regarding the treatment of prisoners of war. Commit to indeterminate detention without trial those you decide are enemies. For good measure, trust that legislative supporters will eventually apply this policy as well to American citizens.

Suspend progressive taxation so that the wealthiest pay less proportionately than the middle class. See to it that the wealth of the country accumulates to a small fraction of the population so that the gap between rich and poor widens exponentially.

By cutting taxes and raising wartime expenditures, deplete the national treasury so that Congress and state and municipal legislatures cut back on domestic services, ensuring that there will be less money for the education of the young, for government health programs, for the care of veterans, for the maintenance of roads and bridges, for free public libraries, and so forth.

Deregulate the banking industry so as to create a severe recession in which enormous numbers of people lose their homes and jobs.

Before you leave office add to the Supreme Court justices like the ones who awarded you the presidency.

PHASE TWO

If you’re one of the conservative majority of a refurbished Supreme Court, rule that corporations, no less than human beings, have the right under the First Amendment to express their political point of view. To come to this judgment, do not acknowledge that corporations lack the range of feelings or values that define what it is to be human. That humans can act against their own interest, whereas corporations cannot act otherwise than in their own interest. That the corporation’s only purpose is to produce wealth, regardless of social consequences.

This decision of the court will ensure tremendous infusions of corporate money into the political process and lead to the election in national and state legislatures of majorities of de facto corporate lobbyists.

PHASE THREE

Given corporate control of legislative bodies, enact laws to the benefit of corporate interests. For example, those laws sponsored by weapons manufacturers wherein people may carry concealed weapons and shoot and kill anyone by whom they feel threatened.

Give the running of state prisons over to private corporations whose profits increase with the increase in inmate populations. See to it that a majority of prisoners are African-American.

When possible, treat immigrants as criminals.

Deplete and underfinance a viable system of free public schools and give the education of children over to private for-profit corporations.

Make college education unaffordable.

Inject religious precepts into public policy so as to control women’s bodies.

Enact laws prohibiting collective bargaining. Portray trade unions as un-American.

Enact laws restricting the voting rights of possibly unruly constituencies.

Propagandize against scientific facts that would affect corporate profits. Portray global warming as a conspiracy of scientists.

Having subverted the Constitution and enervated the nation with these measures, portray the federal government as unwieldy, bumbling and shot through with elitist liberals. Create mental states of maladaptive populism among the citizenry to support this view.

PHASE FOUR

If you’re a justice of the Supreme Court, decide that the police of any and all cities and towns and villages have the absolute authority to strip-search any person whom they, for whatever reason, put under arrest.

With this ruling, the reduction of America to unexceptionalism is complete.

E. L. Doctorow is the author, most recently of the novel “Homer and Langley.”

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

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Sunday, January 21, 2018 2:36 PM

JO753

rezident owtsidr


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
While 6ixStringJack is adjusting Social Security tax on wages: You wouldn't put all your 401K money into US Treasury bonds, would you? Doing that would lower your retirement income. But since the beginning of the Social Security program, all securities held by the trust funds have been issued by the Federal Government. Could you please fix that by investing in something that pays higher interest?



Soundz risky. Wut woud hav happened in 08 with that plan?

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

http://www.7532020.com

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Sunday, January 21, 2018 2:43 PM

JO753

rezident owtsidr


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Unexceptionalism: A Primer...
PHASE ONE, TWO, THREE, FOUR



Well, thats wun way.

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

http://www.7532020.com

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Sunday, January 21, 2018 6:25 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:

Originally posted by second:
Unexceptionalism: A Primer
By E. L. Doctorow, April 28, 2012
www.nytimes.com/2012/04/29/opinion/sunday/unexceptionalism-a-primer.ht
ml



It's interesting that the 'primer on unexceptionalism' was written in 2012. In 2009, 2010, and 2011 democrats controlled both Congress and the White House. You'd almost think some of the diatribe was pointed at democrats, who twiddled their thumbs while shoveling money at the banks, failed to investigate and prosecute fraud, expanded the surveillance state, prosecuted more whistleblowers than previous administration COMBINED, 'intervened' in Libya, failed to close GITMO ...

"Starting January 2009, at the beginning of the 111th Congress, in the month that Barack Obama was inaugurated president, the House of Representatives was made up of 257 Democrats and 178 Republicans. There is no question that Democrats had total control in the House from 2009-2011."




HAS IT NOT OCCURRED TO YOU BY NOW THAT IF YOU HAVE TO RESORT TO LOGICAL FALLACIES AND TROLLING YOUR SO-CALLED ARGUMENTS ARE LIES?

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Monday, January 22, 2018 7:34 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 1kiki:

It's interesting that the 'primer on unexceptionalism' was written in 2012. In 2009, 2010, and 2011 democrats controlled both Congress and the White House. You'd almost think some of the diatribe was pointed at democrats, who twiddled their thumbs while shoveling money at the banks, failed to investigate and prosecute fraud, expanded the surveillance state, prosecuted more whistleblowers than previous administration COMBINED, 'intervened' in Libya, failed to close GITMO ...

"Starting January 2009, at the beginning of the 111th Congress, in the month that Barack Obama was inaugurated president, the House of Representatives was made up of 257 Democrats and 178 Republicans. There is no question that Democrats had total control in the House from 2009-2011."

And it is extremely NOT interesting that 1kiki claims Democrats are failures because the Republicans left them with failures to solve. There are no quick political cures in two years; there is only moving slowly away from a mess created by Republicans, a mess the GOP did NOT want fixed. Closing GITMO was one of your examples of failure. Don't you remember how the GOP fought 8 years the Democrats over that? The GOP loves and protects every mistake it every made and fights the Democrats to the death to keep the mistakes alive.

One of the examples of the contrast between Democratic politicians and GOP politicians was the item on unexceptionalism that goes like this: “If you’re the newly anointed president, react to a terrorist attack by invading a nonterrorist country. Despite the loss or disablement of untold numbers of lives, manage your war so that its results will be indeterminate.”

The contrast is exactly this: Bush goes into Afghanistan to kill Osama bin Laden, which turns into the longest war in American history. Obama goes into Pakistan to kill Osama bin Laden (note well it is the same goal, repeated) which does not turn into a war with Pakistan despite the CIA’s and the Pentagon’s unstoppable blundering.

The stupid Pentagon and Seal Team Six and the incompetent CIA did their very best to make Zero Dark Thirty into a flaming fiasco. They crashed a helicopter, murdered the most valuable terrorism intelligence asset (Osama bin Laden) rather than bringing him in for interrogation, Seal Team members were court-martialed and sued for writing books they shouldn’t have, a vaccination program in Pakistan was shutdown because the CIA used it as a cover, Pakistanis who helped the US were executed because of the CIA, etc. Obama had to use the same over-priced, less than competent military and CIA that Bush used, but Obama knew he couldn’t depend on them to not screw things up.

The Democratic politicians fight a war differently than GOP politicians: The Republican acts as if the field work is in the hands of the best people in the world. The Democrat knows the people carrying out his policy in the field will do a terrible job in many varied ways that neither Congress nor the White House could predict because the military and CIA are full of over-confident morons and under-achievers, but what can you do about that? Fire everybody and restart the US? No. A Democratic President can’t do that or even say it in public because the GOP would throw a running wormy rabid-dog fit.

www.cnn.com/2013/09/09/world/death-of-osama-bin-laden-fast-facts/index
.html

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Monday, January 22, 2018 8:14 AM

SECOND

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


Another difference between Democratic politicians and GOP: The Wall Street Journal reports that banks are getting tired of performing actual appraisals for high-volume home loans — the kind that get packaged into mortgage-based securities — and are turning instead to less rigorous broker price opinions:
Quote:

Now these perfunctory valuations abound, underpinning tens of billions of dollars of home deals. Sometimes the process is outsourced to India, where companies charge real-estate agents a few dollars to come up with U.S. home values by consulting Google Earth and real-estate websites. BPOs have been used to value collateral in the more than $20 billion of bonds sold by institutional landlords, such as Blackstone’s Invitation Homes Inc., and in the fast-growing business of lending to individual house flippers.
What could go wrong? “Their popularity,” says the Journal, “shows how Wall Street is finding ways to adapt to government efforts to crack down on some of the excesses that contributed to the housing crisis.”

It’s remarkable how fast we’ve decided to ignore the lessons of the great housing bubble and the subsequent crash. Republicans, of course, never wanted to learn any lessons from the very start, but Wall Street stayed cautious for at least a few years. Now even that’s receding into the rear view mirror, a mere decade after the second-worst recession of the past century. Republicans are naturally happy to help this process along, because the market is always right, even when the market is wrong. Plus the finance industry is generous to politicians who let them do whatever they want.

It took upwards of 50 years to unlearn the lessons of the Great Depression. The Great Recession took only ten.

www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/01/a-decade-after-the-great-recess
ion-were-outsourcing-home-appraisals-to-india
/

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Monday, January 22, 2018 8:20 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
There are no quick political cures in two years; there is only moving slowly away from a mess created by Republicans, a mess the GOP did NOT want fixed. Closing GITMO was one of your examples of failure. Don't you remember how the GOP fought 8 years the Democrats over that? The GOP loves and protects every mistake it every made and fights the Democrats to the death to keep the mistakes alive.



You're right. So what?

I think my only real problem with you at the end of the day Second is that you seem to think that the exact same thing can't be said about the Democratic party.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Monday, January 22, 2018 8:23 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Another difference between Democratic politicians and GOP: The Wall Street Journal reports that banks are getting tired of performing actual appraisals for high-volume home loans — the kind that get packaged into mortgage-based securities — and are turning instead to less rigorous broker price opinions:
Quote:

Now these perfunctory valuations abound, underpinning tens of billions of dollars of home deals. Sometimes the process is outsourced to India, where companies charge real-estate agents a few dollars to come up with U.S. home values by consulting Google Earth and real-estate websites. BPOs have been used to value collateral in the more than $20 billion of bonds sold by institutional landlords, such as Blackstone’s Invitation Homes Inc., and in the fast-growing business of lending to individual house flippers.
What could go wrong? “Their popularity,” says the Journal, “shows how Wall Street is finding ways to adapt to government efforts to crack down on some of the excesses that contributed to the housing crisis.”

It’s remarkable how fast we’ve decided to ignore the lessons of the great housing bubble and the subsequent crash. Republicans, of course, never wanted to learn any lessons from the very start, but Wall Street stayed cautious for at least a few years. Now even that’s receding into the rear view mirror, a mere decade after the second-worst recession of the past century. Republicans are naturally happy to help this process along, because the market is always right, even when the market is wrong. Plus the finance industry is generous to politicians who let them do whatever they want.

It took upwards of 50 years to unlearn the lessons of the Great Depression. The Great Recession took only ten.

www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/01/a-decade-after-the-great-recess
ion-were-outsourcing-home-appraisals-to-india/



You know where I stand on this particular issue.

In case you missed it, I am not a fan of where the DOW is headed, and I don't feel that it is going to end well. Furthermore, I don't feel that it is at all reflective of how the working class in general is "recovering" since this all happened.

Anybody saying there has been any recovery at all is full of shit. The Obama administration was full of shit for years about it, and now the Trump administration has been full of shit for over a year about it.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Monday, January 22, 2018 9:01 AM

THGRRI


Jared Kushner Is China’s Trump Card

How the President’s son-in-law, despite his inexperience in diplomacy, became Beijing’s primary point of interest. Since the election, Beijing intelligence has targeted Kushner as a key asset.

In Kushner, Cui found a confident, attentive, and inexperienced counterpart.


https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/01/29/jared-kushner-is-chinas-
trump-card



T

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Monday, January 22, 2018 9:08 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


lol...

Meanwhile, T is afraid of Communist ghosts.

Keep fighting the good fight.

Idiot.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Monday, January 22, 2018 9:35 AM

SECOND

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


“I wasn't ever taught not to trust anyone. It was a learned behavior.” - 6ixStringJack
http://fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?bid=18&tid=62170&mid=10450
61#1045061


Decide who you can trust. Or trust that people you know will fail in predictable ways. I trust that I know exactly how a Republican will fail. Democrats are trickier to predict because sometimes they do not fail. Sometimes there are improvements. Sometimes they do not mislead you and sometimes keep promises that are beneficial.

There is a spectrum between completely untrustworthy and worth-trusting-with-your-life. I know where all Texas Republicans are on that spectrum, while Democrats are spread across it from worst to best. With Democrats, you have to sort the rotten from the good.

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Monday, January 22, 2018 1:25 PM

THGRRI


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
“I wasn't ever taught not to trust anyone. It was a learned behavior.” - 6ixStringJack
http://fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?bid=18&tid=62170&mid=10450
61#1045061


Decide who you can trust. Or trust that people you know will fail in predictable ways. I trust that I know exactly how a Republican will fail. Democrats are trickier to predict because sometimes they do not fail. Sometimes there are improvements. Sometimes they do not mislead you and sometimes keep promises that are beneficial.

There is a spectrum between completely untrustworthy and worth-trusting-with-your-life. I know where all Texas Republicans are on that spectrum, while Democrats are spread across it from worst to best. With Democrats, you have to sort the rotten from the good.



Like


T

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Monday, January 22, 2018 2:26 PM

THGRRI


Donald Trump's Many, Many, Many, Many Ties to Russia

The most obvious example is Trump Soho, a complicated web of financial intrigue that has played out in court. A lawsuit claimed that the business group, Bayrock, underpinning Trump Soho was supported by criminal Russian financial interests. While its initial claim absolved Trump of knowledge of those activities, Trump himself later took on the group’s principal partner as a senior advisor in the Trump organization.

“Tax evasion and money-laundering are the core of Bayrock’s business model,” the lawsuit said of the financiers behind Trump Soho. The financing came from Russian-affiliated business interests that engaged in criminal activities, it said. “(But) there is no evidence Trump took any part in, or knew of, their racketeering.”

Journalists who’ve looked at the Bayrock lawsuit, and Trump Soho, wonder why Trump was involved at all. “What was Trump thinking entering into business with partners like these?” Franklin Foer wrote in Slate. “It’s a question he has tried to banish by downplaying his ties to Bayrock.”

But Bayrock wasn’t just involved with Trump Soho. It financed multiple Trump projects around the world, Foer wrote. “(Trump) didn’t just partner with Bayrock; the company embedded with him. Bayrock put together deals for mammoth Trump-named, Trump-managed projects—two in Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a resort in Phoenix, the Trump SoHo in New York.”

But, as The New York Times has reported, that was only the beginning of the Trump organization’s entanglement with Russian financiers. Trump was quite taken with Bayrock’s founder, Tevfik Arif, a former Soviet-era commerce official originally from Kazakhstan.

“Bayrock, which was developing commercial properties in Brooklyn, proposed that Mr. Trump license his name to hotel projects in Florida, Arizona and New York, including Trump SoHo,” the Times reported. “The other development partner for Trump SoHo was the Sapir Organization, whose founder, Tamir Sapir, was from the former Soviet republic of Georgia.”

Trump was eager to work with both financial groups on Trump projects all over the world. “Mr. Trump was particularly taken with Mr. Arif’s overseas connections,” the Times wrote. “In a deposition, Mr. Trump said that the two had discussed ‘numerous deals all over the world’ and that Mr. Arif had brought potential Russian investors to Mr. Trump’s office to meet him. ‘Bayrock knew the people, knew the investors, and in some cases I believe they were friends of Mr. Arif,’ Mr. Trump said. ‘And this was going to be Trump International Hotel and Tower Moscow, Kiev, Istanbul, etc., Poland, Warsaw.’”

http://time.com/4433880/donald-trump-ties-to-russia/


T

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Tuesday, January 23, 2018 8:04 AM

SECOND

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


In a dramatic moment on the Senate floor Monday afternoon, as the upper chamber rushed a spending bill through to end the government shutdown, the top Republican and Democrat on the Intelligence Committee warned that the bill contains language that would kneecap Congress’s ability to oversee secret covert actions and surveillance programs. Their effort to amend the language was rebuffed.

The intelligence community, in its latest grasp, has gone too far even for Richard Burr. The Republican chair of the Senate Intelligence committee has long been one of the Senate’s staunchest advocates for the intelligence agencies, leading the fight to reauthorize surveillance programs and fighting to bury the results of the Senate’s five-year investigation into CIA torture. But he took to the Senate floor Monday to warn that it would compromise Congress’s ability to oversee secret intelligence programs.

“This language could erode the powers of the authorizing committee,” Burr said. “Effectively, the intelligence community could expend funds as it sees fit without an authorization bill in place and with no statutory direction indicating that an authorization bill for 2018 is forthcoming.”

The provision, first reported by The Intercept, appeared in the House version of the spending bill last week and modified the 70–year-old-law that first chartered the CIA. It removed language that requiring intelligence agencies to spend money according to Congress’s instructions, and replaced it with a provision that allows the agencies to move money around freely and without Congress’s knowledge. Blackwater founder Erik Prince has recently pitched the administration on a private intelligence force that would report directly to President Donald Trump and CIA Director Mike Pompeo.

The move cuts off the Intelligence Committee’s most effective means of oversight, because it allows the intelligence community to repurpose funds in the event that the legislature eliminates funding for a certain program, the senators charged. “If this exemption is granted, you could potentially have an administration, any administration, go off and take on covert activities, for example, with no ability for our committee — which spends the time and has the oversight — to say time out, or to say we actually disagree with that policy,” said Mark Warner, the leading Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee.

https://theintercept.com/2018/01/22/the-top-republican-warns-under-new
-spending-bill-the-intelligence-community-could-expend-funds-as-it-sees-fit
/

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Tuesday, January 23, 2018 8:39 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
“I wasn't ever taught not to trust anyone. It was a learned behavior.” - 6ixStringJack
http://fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?bid=18&tid=62170&mid=10450
61#1045061


Decide who you can trust. Or trust that people you know will fail in predictable ways. I trust that I know exactly how a Republican will fail. Democrats are trickier to predict because sometimes they do not fail. Sometimes there are improvements. Sometimes they do not mislead you and sometimes keep promises that are beneficial.

There is a spectrum between completely untrustworthy and worth-trusting-with-your-life. I know where all Texas Republicans are on that spectrum, while Democrats are spread across it from worst to best. With Democrats, you have to sort the rotten from the good.



Once again, you're only half delusional. How can you believe that one side is ALL BAD? I don't believe that about Democrats. In fact, I agree with a lot of traditional Liberal beliefs. It's the fucking wack jobs and extremists that have co-opted the party and subsequently taken control of it that I'm very wary of. The ones who make no bones about it that I am part of the problem simply because of my color and my gender.

It really must be nice having so much money that you feel that you can vote against your own personal well being. Most of us don't have that luxury.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Tuesday, January 23, 2018 9:27 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Once again, you're only half delusional. How can you believe that one side is ALL BAD? I don't believe that about Democrats. In fact, I agree with a lot of traditional Liberal beliefs. It's the fucking wack jobs and extremists that have co-opted the party and subsequently taken control of it that I'm very wary of. The ones who make no bones about it that I am part of the problem simply because of my color and my gender.

It really must be nice having so much money that you feel that you can vote against your own personal well being. Most of us don't have that luxury.

I'll give you a real-life example (and some make-believe examples) about how NOT "voting against your own personal well being" can ruin a democracy.

In Houston, Hurricane Harvey only flooded 15% of the houses and businesses. Those 15% of local people want flood control, which will cost billions for nearly perfect control, but the cost for perfect control is only a third of the cost of damages from Harvey. It seems like a tremendous bargain! But on the other hand, the 85% who had no flood damage will get no direct benefit from perfect flood control. That 85% keep voting NO! to flood control bonds. This happens year after year. The only reason Houston has any flood control at all is Federal government money, which doesn't need popular approval.

Same thing with flood control happens with poverty. Locally 15% of the population live in poverty and that is no problem for 85% of Houstonians. The money for antipoverty comes from the Federal government because the local 85% will vote NO! to spending their money.

Or I could go on with the 50% at the top of incomes vote NO! to helping the 50% at the bottom of incomes.

With enough NO! votes a country can be wrecked. But the only thing the NO! voters are doing is voting against what doesn't benefit them.

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Tuesday, January 23, 2018 9:30 AM

SECOND

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


Populist Economic Policy: Does it exist in the GOP?

Taxing the rich? That’s out. Support for labor unions. Please. Higher taxes on capital income. Not gonna happen. Government regulation to rein in the cost of pharmaceuticals? Nah. Free college for everyone? Nope. A higher minimum wage? Not a chance. Wage subsidies (the “thinking man’s minimum wage”)? That costs money, so it’s out of the question.

It’s popular these days on the right to simply declare policies they like to be populist, but that doesn’t actually make them populist. Anything truly populist is almost by definition something that corporations and the rich oppose, and that means Republicans will never be economic populists. Donald Trump sure isn’t, no matter how much he blusters about his love for the common man.

www.motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2018/01/theres-no-such-thing-as-populis
t-conservative-economic-policy
/

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Tuesday, January 23, 2018 9:39 AM

THGRRI


Wray threatened to resign after Sessions pressured him to fire FBI deputy director

FBI Director Christopher Wray threatened to resign after Attorney General Jeff Sessions pressured him to remove FBI Deputy Director Andrew McCabe.

Wray reportedly told Sessions that he would resign if McCabe was removed from his post.

Sessions also reportedly told White House counsel Don McGahn about Wray's response to the pressure for him to fire McCabe. McGahn replied by telling Sessions that McCabe wasn't worth losing Wray, according to Axios.
If Wray had resigned, he would be the second FBI director to leave President Trump's administration, after Trump fired former FBI Director James Comey.

http://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/wray-threatened-to-resign-after
-sessions-pressured-him-to-fire-fbi-deputy-director-report/ar-AAv2Eq8?li=BBmkt5R&ocid=spartanntp



T

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Tuesday, January 23, 2018 10:14 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Once again, you're only half delusional. How can you believe that one side is ALL BAD? I don't believe that about Democrats. In fact, I agree with a lot of traditional Liberal beliefs. It's the fucking wack jobs and extremists that have co-opted the party and subsequently taken control of it that I'm very wary of. The ones who make no bones about it that I am part of the problem simply because of my color and my gender.

It really must be nice having so much money that you feel that you can vote against your own personal well being. Most of us don't have that luxury.

I'll give you a real-life example (and some make-believe examples) about how NOT "voting against your own personal well being" can ruin a democracy.

In Houston, Hurricane Harvey only flooded 15% of the houses and businesses. Those 15% of local people want flood control, which will cost billions for nearly perfect control, but the cost for perfect control is only a third of the cost of damages from Harvey. It seems like a tremendous bargain! But on the other hand, the 85% who had no flood damage will get no direct benefit from perfect flood control. That 85% keep voting NO! to flood control bonds. This happens year after year. The only reason Houston has any flood control at all is Federal government money, which doesn't need popular approval.

Same thing with flood control happens with poverty. Locally 15% of the population live in poverty and that is no problem for 85% of Houstonians. The money for antipoverty comes from the Federal government because the local 85% will vote NO! to spending their money.

Or I could go on with the 50% at the top of incomes vote NO! to helping the 50% at the bottom of incomes.

With enough NO! votes a country can be wrecked. But the only thing the NO! voters are doing is voting against what doesn't benefit them.



Well great. Until you fix the Democratic Party, my two options are to vote for the party that loudly villianizes me every chance they get, or the one that lies to me on a daily basis.

It's why I'm probably voting for J0 in 2020 if we can come to an understanding on the For The Record topic.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Tuesday, January 23, 2018 5:10 PM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Well great. Until you fix the Democratic Party, my two options are to vote for the party that loudly villianizes me every chance they get, or the one that lies to me on a daily basis.

It's why I'm probably voting for J0 in 2020 if we can come to an understanding on the For The Record topic.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

GOP versus Democratic Party. Cain versus Abel. Remember that Cain is the survivor and liar in the story, while Abel is the goody-goody who gets his brains bashed in with a rock. God does not protect Abel. (“Where is your brother Abel?” asks God. “I don’t know,” Cain replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”)

The account of Cain and Abel is remarkable for its unique combination of brevity and depth. In a few short sentences, it outlines two diametrically opposed modes of being -- both responses to the emergence of self-consciousness and the knowledge of good and evil detailed in story of Adam and Eve.

Cain's mode of being -- resentful, arrogant and murderous -- arises because his sacrifices are rejected by God. This means that his attempts to give up something valuable in the present to ensure prosperity in the future are insufficient. He fails, in consequence, to thrive, as he believes he should, and becomes bitter, resentful and murderous.

Abel's mode of being is characterized, by contrast, by proper sacrifice -- by the establishment of balance between present action and future benefit. This ensures his personal and social success, accruing over time. Unfortunately, it also makes him the target of Cain's malevolence.

This great short story is relevant personally, on the level of the family, and politically, all with equal force, all simultaneously.

www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+4&version=NIV

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Wednesday, January 24, 2018 6:08 AM

SECOND

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


The Art of the Broken Deal

“L’état, c’est moi,” declared Louis XIV: “I am the state.” Louis was an absolute monarch, whose word was law, and serving France meant being personally loyal to Louis himself.

There were obvious advantages to such a system: no ambiguity about where authority lay, no time wasted in legislative debates, no need to cobble coalitions together to get things done. Yet Louis’s France, Europe’s most powerful state, was fought to a standstill by England and the Netherlands — a constitutional monarchy (after the Glorious Revolution of 1688) and a republic, with a combined population only a fraction as large.

And in the Anglo-French wars that followed, France generally got the worst of it, while sliding ever deeper into fiscal crisis — a crisis that eventually helped precipitate the French Revolution.

Why was an absolute monarchy weaker, in practice, than quarrelsome republics? One reason was that the very absence of limits on the ruler undermined French credibility: Whatever the king might promise, he could always change his mind. Not incidentally, France repeatedly defaulted on its debt, while post-1688 England, its king effectively constrained by Parliament, never did. As a result, England was much more successful at wartime borrowing, and paid much lower interest rates.

Which brings us, as all things do these days, to Donald Trump — a man who has evident contempt for the rule of law and who, like Louis, sees no distinction between loyalty to the nation and loyalty to himself. The main difference is that Louis seems to have at least tried to understand the issues.

On Friday night, something unprecedented happened: The U.S. government shut down temporarily even though the same party controls both Congress and the White House. Why? Because when it comes to Trump, a deal isn’t a deal — it’s just words he feels free to ignore a few days later.

Chuck Schumer, the Senate Democratic leader, seemed to have at least a short-term agreement with Trump, only to see it pulled back a few hours later. Working with Trump is “like negotiating with Jell-O,” Schumer fumed.

But what did he expect? Trump’s whole business career has been a series of betrayals — failed business ventures from which he personally profited while others, whether they were Trump University students, vendors or creditors, ended up holding the bag. And he hasn’t grown a bit in office, unless you count that mysterious extra inch in height since 2016.

Think, for example, about the international consequences of a U.S. president whose word can’t be trusted. Who can we count on to be a reliable ally, when no country knows whether America will stand by it if it needs help?

During the 2016 campaign Trump openly talked about forcing the nation’s creditors — like creditors of some of his businesses — to accept less than they were owed. Does this government have any reserve of financial credibility if something should go wrong? Probably not.

In other words, Trump’s unreliability is a big problem, over and above the substance of his policies.

The result is that promises from the U.S. government are now as worthless as those from a tinpot dictator. We don’t yet know how high a price we’ll pay for that loss of credibility, but it probably won’t be small.

www.nytimes.com/2018/01/22/opinion/art-deal-trump-shutdown.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, January 24, 2018 7:26 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Well great. Until you fix the Democratic Party, my two options are to vote for the party that loudly villianizes me every chance they get, or the one that lies to me on a daily basis.

It's why I'm probably voting for J0 in 2020 if we can come to an understanding on the For The Record topic.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

GOP versus Democratic Party. Cain versus Abel. Remember that Cain is the survivor and liar in the story, while Abel is the goody-goody who gets his brains bashed in with a rock. God does not protect Abel. (“Where is your brother Abel?” asks God. “I don’t know,” Cain replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”)

The account of Cain and Abel is remarkable for its unique combination of brevity and depth. In a few short sentences, it outlines two diametrically opposed modes of being -- both responses to the emergence of self-consciousness and the knowledge of good and evil detailed in story of Adam and Eve.

Cain's mode of being -- resentful, arrogant and murderous -- arises because his sacrifices are rejected by God. This means that his attempts to give up something valuable in the present to ensure prosperity in the future are insufficient. He fails, in consequence, to thrive, as he believes he should, and becomes bitter, resentful and murderous.

Abel's mode of being is characterized, by contrast, by proper sacrifice -- by the establishment of balance between present action and future benefit. This ensures his personal and social success, accruing over time. Unfortunately, it also makes him the target of Cain's malevolence.

This great short story is relevant personally, on the level of the family, and politically, all with equal force, all simultaneously.

www.biblegateway.com/passage/?search=Genesis+4&version=NIV




So we're comparing the GOP to Cain and the Democrats to Abel now?

Wow.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Wednesday, January 24, 2018 9:31 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

So we're comparing the GOP to Cain and the Democrats to Abel now?

Wow.

Do you truly not see Republicans as resentful? Do they not dodge blame and personal responsibility when their lives go wrong? Instead, Republicans blame Washington DC. The tribe of Republicans descended from Cain, who lied to God right in his face. (“Where is your brother Abel?” asks God. “I don’t know,” Cain replied. “Am I my brother’s keeper?”)

The Adam and Eve myth shows the coming of self-consciousness – and therefore an awareness of mortality, vulnerability, the future, and good and evil. Everyone in the story immediately starts to lie and dodge the blame – Adam blames Eve, Eve blames the serpent. Then they give birth to Cain and Abel, and the first act of human history is for Cain to murder his own brother out of resentment against him and God alike, and then lie about it: “Am I my brother’s keeper?”

Resentment is powerful. We hate those who are better than us (God, Abel) and want to destroy them, then lie to hide from the consequences. Consult your resentment. It is revelatory. But cowering in your basement resenting everyone is the real pathway to darkness.

Cain is far from happy. He's working hard, or so he thinks, but God is not pleased. Meanwhile, Abel is dancing away in the daisies. His crops flourish. Women love him. Worst of all, he's a pretty good guy. Everyone knows it. He deserves his good fortune. All the more reason to hate him.

Cain broods on his misfortune, like a vulture on an egg. He enters the desert wilderness of his own mind. He obsesses over his ill-fortune and betrayal. He nourishes his resentment. He indulges in ever-more elaborate fantasies of revenge. His arrogance grows to Luciferian proportions. "I'm ill-used and oppressed," he thinks. "This is a stupid bloody planet. It can go to Hell." Not surprisingly, the GOP claims there is no greenhouse gas effect.

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Wednesday, January 24, 2018 5:49 PM

THGRRI


“Republicans approve of the American farmer, but they are willing to help him go broke. They stand four-square for the American home--but not for housing. They are strong for labor--but they are stronger for restricting labor's rights. They favor minimum wage--the smaller the minimum wage the better. They endorse educational opportunity for all--but they won't spend money for teachers or for schools. They think modern medical care and hospitals are fine--for people who can afford them. They consider electrical power a great blessing--but only when the private power companies get their rake-off. They think American standard of living is a fine thing--so long as it doesn't spread to all the people. And they admire of Government of the United States so much that they would like to buy it.”

Harry Truman


T

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Wednesday, January 24, 2018 6:56 PM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Quote:

Originally posted by THGRRI:
“Republicans approve of the American farmer, but they are willing to help him go broke. They stand four-square for the American home--but not for housing. They are strong for labor--but they are stronger for restricting labor's rights. They favor minimum wage--the smaller the minimum wage the better. They endorse educational opportunity for all--but they won't spend money for teachers or for schools. They think modern medical care and hospitals are fine--for people who can afford them. They consider electrical power a great blessing--but only when the private power companies get their rake-off. They think American standard of living is a fine thing--so long as it doesn't spread to all the people. And they admire of Government of the United States so much that they would like to buy it.”

Harry Truman


T



Huh....

Well, I'm for tying the minimum wage to inflation immediately, and removing the social security tax on anyone making under 100k. This means 1 of 2 things.

1. I'm not Republican.

or

2. #NotAllRepublicans

Pick one.


And while you're at it, T... Remind us why it is exactly that you are not a Democrat, since you always say that you're independent, but you denounce Republicans as much as you extol Democratic principals.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Thursday, January 25, 2018 5:51 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Huh....

Well, I'm for tying the minimum wage to inflation immediately, and removing the social security tax on anyone making under 100k. This means 1 of 2 things.

1. I'm not Republican.

or

2. #NotAllRepublicans

Pick one.

Your suggestions are exactly what an unthinking Republican legislator would suggest: Make some huge changes in the law that you are pretty sure will benefit yourself. Then do not work out the calculation on paper to see what the consequences are for the rest of the nation or business or the national debt or, really, anything because you have already done the mental calculation of "What's in it for me?" Republicans have contempt for experts that could do a real calculation because the sum total might be: "Don't Do It!" The recent tax overhaul, for example, did not wait for the experts to tell Congress how the National Debt would change if the law changed.

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, January 25, 2018 7:29 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


Bullshit I haven't thought about it. Don't make an accusation and then offer nothing to back it up. If you have a problem with my tax plan and my idea to tie the minimum wage to inflation, then specifically state what it is or shut the fuck up.

Quote:

Originally posted by second:
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

Huh....

Well, I'm for tying the minimum wage to inflation immediately, and removing the social security tax on anyone making under 100k. This means 1 of 2 things.

1. I'm not Republican.

or

2. #NotAllRepublicans

Pick one.

Your suggestions are exactly what an unthinking Republican legislator would suggest: Make some huge changes in the law that you are pretty sure will benefit yourself. Then do not work out the calculation on paper to see what the consequences are for the rest of the nation or business or the national debt or, really, anything because you have already done the mental calculation of "What's in it for me?" Republicans have contempt for experts that could do a real calculation because the sum total might be: "Don't Do It!" The recent tax overhaul, for example, did not wait for the experts to tell Congress how the National Debt would change if the law changed.

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



Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Thursday, January 25, 2018 8:05 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:
Bullshit I haven't thought about it. Don't make an accusation and then offer nothing to back it up. If you have a problem with my tax plan and my idea to tie the minimum wage to inflation, then specifically state what it is or shut the fuck up.

6ix, what you got is not what a real plan looks like, you know, a plan that will be a success. You have nothing: no calculations, no URL's to several experts and their calculations, no economist praising your idea. You've got nothing but a high opinion of yourself, which makes you perfect material for a GOP legislator. Admit it: you are a natural-born Republican, despite your strong protest that you are not.

And you ending your comment with "or shut the fuck up" is the GOP cherry on top. Those guys are ultra-sensitive babies when called out on their half-ass plans.

This is what a real minimum wage law should look like, if only Congressmen would take real responsibility and stop faking it for what they do: Every year, every Congressman submits his number for the minimum wage. He has to explain in writing to his voters about where his number came from. The final decision is the median, not the average, of all the numbers from all Congressmen. There should be no automatic change with inflation.

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Thursday, January 25, 2018 9:05 AM

SIGNYM

I believe in solving problems, not sharing them.


WOW, SECOND, you have outdone yourself!

Quote:

Bullshit I haven't thought about it. Don't make an accusation and then offer nothing to back it up. If you have a problem with my tax plan and my idea to tie the minimum wage to inflation, then specifically state what it is or shut the fuck up. - SIX

6ix, what you got is not what a real plan looks like, you know, a plan that will be a success. You have nothing: no calculations, no URL's to several experts and their calculations, no economist praising your idea.= SECOND

In other words: no access to things that ordinary people simply don't have. No influence-peddling. No complicit media. No tamed economists. Just an idea.

SECOND, dood, you have not debated SIX's idea, merely re-stated your preference that only WEALTHY people- such as yourself- should influence the conversation.

Quote:

You've got nothing but a high opinion of yourself, which makes you perfect material for a GOP legislator.- SECOND
Speaking of people with a high opinion of themselves ... tell me, SECOND, how high ARE you right now?? 'Cause YOUR high opinion of yourself? It's pretty characteristic of liberaloids who believe that they can threaten others without consequence because... well, they're just so PERFECT!

Quote:

Admit it: you are a natural-born Republican, despite your strong protest that you are not.
Admit that you're a natural-born asshole, which is typical of wealthy Texans.

Quote:

And you ending your comment with "or shut the fuck up" is the GOP cherry on top. Those guys are ultra-sensitive babies when called out on their half-ass plans.
Your whole post ... yes, THIS post ... is a giant "shut the fuck up". Instead of discussing SIX's PLAN, you ... like virtue-signallers everywhere ... attack SIX, personally. For not having "connections". For being "Republican" (YOUR insinuation). For having a high opinion of himself (YOUR opinion)!

I have to add an extra-crispy comment to that: One of the humblest people on the board is SIX. One of the biggest, most self-congratulatory turds here is you. And you have spent your entire post trying to shut SIX down because he had the temerity to bring AN IDEA to a discussion forum, which is exactly where ideas are supposed to be brought? Who the hell do you think you are? Oh, that's right: Just some tremendously rich guy who thinks he's better than everybody else.

Quote:

This is what a real minimum wage law should look like, if only Congressmen would take real responsibility and stop faking it for what they do: Every year, every Congressman submits his number for the minimum wage. He has to explain in writing to his voters about where his number came from. The final decision is the median, not the average, of all the numbers from all Congressmen. There should be no automatic change with inflation.
Oh look! A BASELESS IDEA from SECOND!

Tell me, where are your calculations? Where are the economists lining up behind your idea? CLEARLY your plan doesn't have what it takes to be a success!

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

America is an oligarchy
http://www.fireflyfans.net/mthread.aspx?tid=57876

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Thursday, January 25, 2018 10:13 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by SIGNYM:

SECOND, dood, you have not debated SIX's idea, merely re-stated your preference that only WEALTHY people- such as yourself- should influence the conversation.

6ixStringJack is like every Texas Republican I have ever known. They've got ideas haunting their heads and they believe that haunting is the same thing as thinking and planning. And then they start shouting and conniving when they don't get their way. And when they get the reality of what was once an idea that was haunting their brain, and reality sucks, they start telling lies about how good reality has become.

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, January 25, 2018 10:37 AM

6IXSTRINGJACK


I was going to have a much different reply, but Signy said everything very eloquently already.

Thank you for that wonderful reply Signy.



And despite all of J0's and my differences, Second, he seems to think that I'm on to something here. Unlike you, who would most definitely have something to lose if this plan were ever enacted, he sees the merits of it and is willing to not only discuss it here, but to bring it to other places he posts and presumably is running his platform on. Say what you will about me, but J0 is most certainly nothing like a Texas Republican.

Your original tactic was to cut me off at the knees on my idea by quoting what FDR had to say about it, to which I altered the plan to also call for an Amendment to the Constitution that would prohibit future politicians from reversing it or dismantling Social Security altogether. I assume that was a good idea because you completely changed tactics and are now baselessly attacking my character and comparing me to Texas Republicans, of not a single one have I ever met in my entire life.

I think you're afraid.

You probably should be.

I don't blame you for wanting this idea to never see the light of day.

Do Right, Be Right. :)

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Thursday, January 25, 2018 11:57 AM

SECOND

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


Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

And despite all of J0's and my differences, Second, he seems to think that I'm on to something here. Unlike you, who would most definitely have something to lose if this plan were ever enacted, he sees the merits of it and is willing to not only discuss it here, but to bring it to other places he posts and presumably is running his platform on. Say what you will about me, but J0 is most certainly nothing like a Texas Republican.

Your original tactic was to cut me off at the knees on my idea by quoting what FDR had to say about it, to which I altered the plan to also call for an Amendment to the Constitution that would prohibit future politicians from reversing it or dismantling Social Security altogether. I assume that was a good idea because you completely changed tactics and are now baselessly attacking my character and comparing me to Texas Republicans, of not a single one have I ever met in my entire life.

It took me hours to realize it, but in your scheme, you avoid paying FICA tax because your income is less than $100,000 per year. FICA taxes are the Social Security and Medicare taxes. So your scheme is exactly the same scheme as a Republican legislator trying to kill social security and medicare, which makes you a standard, run-of-the-mill, ordinary GOP operative. Your little side suggestion of a constitutional amendment to prohibit dismantling Social Security altogether will never get passed, which means you are fantasizing.

Florida Senator Marco Rubio admits that the Republican tax cut plan, which benefits corporations and the wealthy, will require cuts to Social Security and Medicare to pay for it.
www.newsweek.com/tax-plan-social-security-medicare-welfare-republicans
-rubio-729133


House Speaker Paul Ryan and other top Republican leaders are already sounding the alarm about an out-of-control deficit problem. Their targets for closing the gap include Social Security and Medicare.
www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/12/18/16741730/gop-agenda-medicar
e-social-security


It is a natural wonder that you can un-selfconsciously write "baselessly attacking my character and comparing me to Texas Republicans" when there is no substantial difference between you and Republican Congressmen, other than you have less money than them.
Quote:

Originally posted by 6IXSTRINGJACK:

I think you're afraid.

You probably should be.

I don't blame you for wanting this idea to never see the light of day.

When Walmart announced a wage increase in February 2015 and then another one in January 2016, it was just business. When Walmart increased wages in 2017, it was hailed by the GOP as only happening because of them. Walmart agreed because flattering Trump keeps him focused on his current embrace of hard-right economic policy rather than following through on the populist impulses he voiced on the campaign trail.
www.vox.com/explainers/2018/1/25/16904136/corporate-america-tax-cut-ce
lebrations-explained


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Thursday, January 25, 2018 7:38 PM

SECOND

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


Trump asked the Guggenheim Museum to loan an 1888 Vincent Van Gogh, “Landscape with Snow,” to install in the White House. The museum’s curator declined the request but came back with a counteroffer: How about a solid gold toilet? What about Trump's taste made the museum think gold?

www.vox.com/2018/1/25/16933970/trump-white-house-guggenheim-toilet-art

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Thursday, January 25, 2018 8:45 PM

JO753

rezident owtsidr


Quote:

Originally posted by second:
I just answered my own question about crappy political policy. Whatever policy is important to the 1% is pushed slowly and resolutely toward making sense by the 1%. Whatever the 99% want will be pushed hither and yon by the turbulent emotions of the 99% during election season. And that is where the number game comes in. What is the emotion that the majority are feeling on election day? That makes the voter King For A Day. But when election season is over, the 1% will be pushing whoever got elected, either D or R politician, for things to go their way on what they care about. Slow and steady wins for the 1%.



I dont hav a comment. Just rered this and think it dezervz more attention than it got.

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

http://www.7532020.com

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Friday, January 26, 2018 6:25 AM

SECOND

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


Q & A with Philip Roth, the novelist

Q: Your famous essay “Writing American Fiction” argues that American reality is so crazy that it almost outstrips the writer’s imagination. It was 1960 when you said that. What about now?

Philip Roth: No one I know of has foreseen an America like the one we live in today. No one (except perhaps the acidic H. L. Mencken, who famously described American democracy as “the worship of jackals by jackasses”) could have imagined that the 21st-century catastrophe to befall the U.S.A., the most debasing of disasters, would appear not, say, in the terrifying guise of an Orwellian Big Brother but in the ominously ridiculous commedia dell’arte figure of the boastful buffoon. How naive I was in 1960 to think that I was an American living in preposterous times! How quaint! But then what could I know in 1960 of 1963 or 1968 or 1974 or 2001 or 2016?

Q: Your 2004 novel, “The Plot Against America,” seems eerily prescient today. When that novel came out, some people saw it as a commentary on the Bush administration, but there were nowhere near as many parallels then as there seem to be now.

Philip Roth: However prescient “The Plot Against America” might seem to you, there is surely one enormous difference between the political circumstances I invent there for the U.S. in 1940 and the political calamity that dismays us so today. It’s the difference in stature between a President Lindbergh and a President Trump. Charles Lindbergh, in life as in my novel, may have been a genuine racist and an anti-Semite and a white supremacist sympathetic to Fascism, but he was also — because of the extraordinary feat of his solo trans-Atlantic flight at the age of 25 — an authentic American hero 13 years before I have him winning the presidency. Lindbergh, historically, was the courageous young pilot who in 1927, for the first time, flew nonstop across the Atlantic, from Long Island to Paris. He did it in 33.5 hours in a single-seat, single-engine monoplane, thus making him a kind of 20th-century Leif Ericson, an aeronautical Magellan, one of the earliest beacons of the age of aviation. Trump, by comparison, is a massive fraud, the evil sum of his deficiencies, devoid of everything but the hollow ideology of a megalomaniac.

www.nytimes.com/2018/01/16/books/review/philip-roth-interview.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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