Help
y66, on 2019-July-03, 06:23, said:
From Jeffrey Toobin at the New Yorker:
I have to admit to a degree of ambivalence toward stare decisis as there have been some truly horrible SCOTUS decisions in its past.
Has U.S. Democracy Been Trumped? Bernie Sanders wants to know who owns America?
#13061
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 17,284
- Joined: 2005-January-08
- Gender:Male
- Location:Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Interests:Art, music
Posted 2019-July-03, 09:53
I have to admit to a degree of ambivalence toward stare decisis as there have been some truly horrible SCOTUS decisions in its past.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
#13062
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 8,375
- Joined: 2005-February-09
- Gender:Male
- Location:Zurich, Switzerland
Posted 2019-July-03, 10:29
kenberg, on 2019-July-03, 09:37, said:
In this case I was criticizing the report, any criticism of Krugman was (mostly) incidental. It seems to me that with such a report more or less anyone can cite the report in support of more or less any view. Take Connecticut. I don't really know, but my guess is that there are a lot of rich people living in Connecticut, successful wallstreeters close to Manhattan. So they pay a lot of taxes, and so a lot of money flows to the Feds. But it flows from rich people, the fact that they are living in Connecticut is of little importance. Which was really Krugman's point I think, and there I agree with him. Data can be useful, but it can also be irrelevant or misleading. There are times I read data presentations and think "yeah, and so?"
The interesting point is that the US government transfers quite a bit of money from wealthy people to poor people, and from wealthy states to poorer states. Virginia is somewhat of an exceptional case because of its proximity to Washington DC -- most of the government money spent in Virginia is paying people (and companies) who work for the government. For the most part on this list though, you will see the more affluent states contributing more money than they get in return, and the poorer states receiving more than they contribute.
You'd think that if some people/states were opposed to this transfer of money and wanted to reduce the magnitude of such transfers, these people/states would be the ones that are net negative. The interesting point is that exactly the opposite is true! Most of the "red states" are net receivers of federal money whereas most "blue states" are net donors (there are some exceptions, Virginia being very notable; another exception is states which are relatively wealthy primarily because of oil and gas such as North Dakota and Texas, which tend nonetheless to vote Republican).
Adam W. Meyerson
a.k.a. Appeal Without Merit
a.k.a. Appeal Without Merit
#13063
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 11,224
- Joined: 2004-September-22
- Location:Northern Maryland
Posted 2019-July-03, 18:46
awm, on 2019-July-03, 10:29, said:
The interesting point is that the US government transfers quite a bit of money from wealthy people to poor people, and from wealthy states to poorer states. Virginia is somewhat of an exceptional case because of its proximity to Washington DC -- most of the government money spent in Virginia is paying people (and companies) who work for the government. For the most part on this list though, you will see the more affluent states contributing more money than they get in return, and the poorer states receiving more than they contribute.
You'd think that if some people/states were opposed to this transfer of money and wanted to reduce the magnitude of such transfers, these people/states would be the ones that are net negative. The interesting point is that exactly the opposite is true! Most of the "red states" are net receivers of federal money whereas most "blue states" are net donors (there are some exceptions, Virginia being very notable; another exception is states which are relatively wealthy primarily because of oil and gas such as North Dakota and Texas, which tend nonetheless to vote Republican).
You'd think that if some people/states were opposed to this transfer of money and wanted to reduce the magnitude of such transfers, these people/states would be the ones that are net negative. The interesting point is that exactly the opposite is true! Most of the "red states" are net receivers of federal money whereas most "blue states" are net donors (there are some exceptions, Virginia being very notable; another exception is states which are relatively wealthy primarily because of oil and gas such as North Dakota and Texas, which tend nonetheless to vote Republican).
My thinking was that the study suggested a crazy match-up of the transfer of money from the rich to the poor and the transfer of money from one state to another, but I have given it a l bit more thought.
I imagine a rich person in Montgomery County Maryland paying his federal taxes and saying "I don't mind if this goes to Baltimore but I surely object to it going to someone in Kentucky". This seemed unimaginable to me, we are all in the same country, but perhaps I was wrong. Maybe some people really do think this way. It's the only way that the cited study, with its emphasis on the unfairness to New York, makes sense to me. I was thinking that if a rich guy in Manhattan pays taxes and some of that money goes to food stamps he would not care if the person receiving the help was in Brooklyn or Louisville. I guess the authors of the study care a great deal. I don't get it. I grew up in the middle of the last century and I had a broader view than that.
Ken
#13064
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 17,284
- Joined: 2005-January-08
- Gender:Male
- Location:Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Interests:Art, music
Posted 2019-July-03, 21:32
kenberg, on 2019-July-03, 18:46, said:
I was thinking that if a rich guy in Manhattan pays taxes and some of that money goes to food stamps he would not care if the person receiving the help was in Brooklyn or Louisville.
It is much worse than that. Many of these people who object do so because their taxes may go to non-whites, regardless of state.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
#13065
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 6,496
- Joined: 2006-February-24
Posted 2019-July-04, 02:52
From America the Beautiful by the NYT Editorial Board:
It feels like we're summoning the spirit to address these contradictions in Virginia where Dems picked up 15 seats in the Virginia House of Delegates in 2017 when picking up 5 seats was considered optimistic and flipped 3 U.S. congressional seats in hard fought races. Dems have their work cut out for them as they try to take control of the Virginia House and Senate this fall. If they pull that off, it would be something.
Quote
America in 2019 is a nation that locks up migrant children after separating them from their families. And yet it is also a nation that gives sanctuary and charity to tired, poor people as they seek to join this community, built by immigrants.
It’s a nation that walked out on its commitment to help preserve a livable planet for future generations. And a nation whose engines of ingenuity are working to make the planet healthier and safer.
Its underpaid women’s World Cup soccer team competes wearing the national colors, even as the nation’s symbols and traditions are fiercely contested back home.
The country has always been stronger for its capacity to peacefully manage contradictions, like these, that can seem untenable.
Along the southern border, an archipelago of detainment centers is filled beyond capacity with desperate people seeking a better life or fleeing places so deadly that they risk swimming the Rio Grande with toddlers.
Dolly Lucio Sevier, a pediatrician, treated one girl who she noted was an “underweight, fearful child in no acute distress.” The problem was “severe trauma being suffered from being removed from primary caregiver.”
After the exam, as reported in agonizing detail by The Atlantic, “the child lingered, and Sevier offered to hold her. She climbed into the doctor’s lap and fell asleep in less than a minute.”
Adults are faring little better. “At one facility, some single adults were held in standing-room-only conditions for a week and at another, some single adults were held more than a month in overcrowded cells,” the Department of Homeland Security’s independent watchdog wrote in a report released this week.
Ordered to administer this harsh system, an alarming number of the men and women who patrol the nation’s international frontier, it was learned this week, belonged to a closed Facebook group that guffawed over anti-immigrant, misogynistic and racist filth. While the group discussed throwing burritos at Latino members of Congress visiting the detainment centers, the offline civilian hecklers of Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the rest of the delegation instead hurled curses and racial slurs.
Anyone curious about the effects of anti-immigration policies of the Trump administration needs look no further than the sad faces on the pictures of jailed children drawn by jailed children. For the strong of stomach, photos from the government’s own inspectors are even more disturbing.
Yet there are also stories from the border that showcase this country’s virtues.
After reading about the conditions inside detention facilities, Austin Savage and a group of friends walked into a store in Texas. They walked out, having spent hundreds of dollars on diapers, wipes, soaps and toys. When they arrived at a Border Patrol station that was holding children in Clint their donation was refused. While at the station, they also found a bag in the lobby holding soap, toothpaste and a note: “I heard y’all need soap + toothpaste for kids. Maybe more will be on its way soon.”
(There has been such a deluge of donations for detained families that aid groups have asked for financial gifts instead of material goods.)
Last year, the government filed felony charges against Scott Warren, a geography teacher who helped a pair of migrants in the desert who were hungry, dehydrated and with blistered feet.
Last month, jurors refused to return a guilty verdict. (On Tuesday, federal prosecutors said they would drop some charges, but plan to retry him for “harboring illegal aliens.”)
Meanwhile, the democratic mechanism to fix the situation at the border, along with other vexing national problems, is instead grinding its gears.
The Supreme Court last month made democracy of the people, for the people, harder for the people to repair, ruling in a 5-to-4 decision that political gerrymanders — fueled by big data and designed by partisan operatives — are allowable under the Constitution.
Along with the court’s decision, the country’s long-term political and demographic trends forecast continued worsening of the problem of entrenched minority rule.
But even as its decision made the country’s democracy less fair, the court did rise to the demands of justice, and it showed due concern for the rights of the least powerful.
Last month, the court overturned the conviction of Curtis Flowers in the 1996 murders of four people inside a Mississippi furniture store, finding that blacks had been illegally excluded from the juries that eventually convicted him. “Equal justice under law requires a criminal trial free of racial discrimination in the jury selection process,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote for the majority.
The justices also laughed out of court (or as close to it as the law allows) the Trump administration’s specious argument that sticking a citizenship question on the census had nothing to do with intentionally undercounting individuals in immigrant communities.
On Tuesday, the Trump administration said that it would print the census without the question. But President Trump tweeted Wednesday that the effort — whose larger goal is to improve the political fortunes of “Republicans and non-Hispanic whites,” as one architect of the question put it — would continue.
In other courtrooms, justice continues to be meted out, in fits and starts.
Prosecutors in Alabama this week, for instance, announced that they would drop charges against Marshae Jones, whom a grand jury indicted last month on manslaughter charges, after she was shot in the stomach and lost her pregnancy.
It may seem odd that a country so prosperous, so powerful and so free would at the same time be so anxious and angry, so riven by factionalism. It’s even more puzzling — and not unrelated — that this same country, with such resources to draw upon, would nevertheless tolerate such high levels of poverty and homelessness, of addiction to pharmaceutical drugs, of inequality in wealth and application of justice and quality of education.
Versions of these American contradictions have persisted for a very long time, but they seem particularly acute on this national birthday. The question to Americans, as ever, is whether they can summon the spirit to address them. So far, eventually, they’ve found a way.
It’s a nation that walked out on its commitment to help preserve a livable planet for future generations. And a nation whose engines of ingenuity are working to make the planet healthier and safer.
Its underpaid women’s World Cup soccer team competes wearing the national colors, even as the nation’s symbols and traditions are fiercely contested back home.
The country has always been stronger for its capacity to peacefully manage contradictions, like these, that can seem untenable.
Along the southern border, an archipelago of detainment centers is filled beyond capacity with desperate people seeking a better life or fleeing places so deadly that they risk swimming the Rio Grande with toddlers.
Dolly Lucio Sevier, a pediatrician, treated one girl who she noted was an “underweight, fearful child in no acute distress.” The problem was “severe trauma being suffered from being removed from primary caregiver.”
After the exam, as reported in agonizing detail by The Atlantic, “the child lingered, and Sevier offered to hold her. She climbed into the doctor’s lap and fell asleep in less than a minute.”
Adults are faring little better. “At one facility, some single adults were held in standing-room-only conditions for a week and at another, some single adults were held more than a month in overcrowded cells,” the Department of Homeland Security’s independent watchdog wrote in a report released this week.
Ordered to administer this harsh system, an alarming number of the men and women who patrol the nation’s international frontier, it was learned this week, belonged to a closed Facebook group that guffawed over anti-immigrant, misogynistic and racist filth. While the group discussed throwing burritos at Latino members of Congress visiting the detainment centers, the offline civilian hecklers of Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and the rest of the delegation instead hurled curses and racial slurs.
Anyone curious about the effects of anti-immigration policies of the Trump administration needs look no further than the sad faces on the pictures of jailed children drawn by jailed children. For the strong of stomach, photos from the government’s own inspectors are even more disturbing.
Yet there are also stories from the border that showcase this country’s virtues.
After reading about the conditions inside detention facilities, Austin Savage and a group of friends walked into a store in Texas. They walked out, having spent hundreds of dollars on diapers, wipes, soaps and toys. When they arrived at a Border Patrol station that was holding children in Clint their donation was refused. While at the station, they also found a bag in the lobby holding soap, toothpaste and a note: “I heard y’all need soap + toothpaste for kids. Maybe more will be on its way soon.”
(There has been such a deluge of donations for detained families that aid groups have asked for financial gifts instead of material goods.)
Last year, the government filed felony charges against Scott Warren, a geography teacher who helped a pair of migrants in the desert who were hungry, dehydrated and with blistered feet.
Last month, jurors refused to return a guilty verdict. (On Tuesday, federal prosecutors said they would drop some charges, but plan to retry him for “harboring illegal aliens.”)
Meanwhile, the democratic mechanism to fix the situation at the border, along with other vexing national problems, is instead grinding its gears.
The Supreme Court last month made democracy of the people, for the people, harder for the people to repair, ruling in a 5-to-4 decision that political gerrymanders — fueled by big data and designed by partisan operatives — are allowable under the Constitution.
Along with the court’s decision, the country’s long-term political and demographic trends forecast continued worsening of the problem of entrenched minority rule.
But even as its decision made the country’s democracy less fair, the court did rise to the demands of justice, and it showed due concern for the rights of the least powerful.
Last month, the court overturned the conviction of Curtis Flowers in the 1996 murders of four people inside a Mississippi furniture store, finding that blacks had been illegally excluded from the juries that eventually convicted him. “Equal justice under law requires a criminal trial free of racial discrimination in the jury selection process,” Justice Brett Kavanaugh wrote for the majority.
The justices also laughed out of court (or as close to it as the law allows) the Trump administration’s specious argument that sticking a citizenship question on the census had nothing to do with intentionally undercounting individuals in immigrant communities.
On Tuesday, the Trump administration said that it would print the census without the question. But President Trump tweeted Wednesday that the effort — whose larger goal is to improve the political fortunes of “Republicans and non-Hispanic whites,” as one architect of the question put it — would continue.
In other courtrooms, justice continues to be meted out, in fits and starts.
Prosecutors in Alabama this week, for instance, announced that they would drop charges against Marshae Jones, whom a grand jury indicted last month on manslaughter charges, after she was shot in the stomach and lost her pregnancy.
It may seem odd that a country so prosperous, so powerful and so free would at the same time be so anxious and angry, so riven by factionalism. It’s even more puzzling — and not unrelated — that this same country, with such resources to draw upon, would nevertheless tolerate such high levels of poverty and homelessness, of addiction to pharmaceutical drugs, of inequality in wealth and application of justice and quality of education.
Versions of these American contradictions have persisted for a very long time, but they seem particularly acute on this national birthday. The question to Americans, as ever, is whether they can summon the spirit to address them. So far, eventually, they’ve found a way.
It feels like we're summoning the spirit to address these contradictions in Virginia where Dems picked up 15 seats in the Virginia House of Delegates in 2017 when picking up 5 seats was considered optimistic and flipped 3 U.S. congressional seats in hard fought races. Dems have their work cut out for them as they try to take control of the Virginia House and Senate this fall. If they pull that off, it would be something.
If you lose all hope, you can always find it again -- Richard Ford in The Sportswriter
#13066
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 5,034
- Joined: 2008-September-10
- Gender:Male
Posted 2019-July-04, 04:17
Dennison wants to be the president of everybody in the world.
The Real Americans In Trump’s New Ads Are Foreign Stock Models
In Dennison's defense, at least all the fake people were white. Faking testimonials from non-white Americans is a bridge too far
The Real Americans In Trump’s New Ads Are Foreign Stock Models
Quote
President Donald Trump’s latest online ads for his reelection campaign feature what’s supposed to look like testimonials from real Americans. But it turns out the people in the ads are stock footage models from overseas.
In Dennison's defense, at least all the fake people were white. Faking testimonials from non-white Americans is a bridge too far
#13067
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 17,284
- Joined: 2005-January-08
- Gender:Male
- Location:Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Interests:Art, music
Posted 2019-July-04, 09:12
Today is July 4th. I can't wait to see the Space Force flyby over the capitol building. 
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
#13068
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 17,284
- Joined: 2005-January-08
- Gender:Male
- Location:Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Interests:Art, music
Posted 2019-July-04, 09:31
This is rather chilling seeing that some states don't use paper backup ballots:
The count of paper ballots turned an 1100 vote loss into a 20 vote win.
This is from a February 2018 Axios article - I hope by now it is obsolete but I am pretty sure Georgia remains at risk. About the others I am unsure.
Here is an article with 2019 updates.
Quote
July 3, 2019
The Democratic primary for district attorney in Queens, a race that drew nationwide attention, was thrown deep into uncertainty on Wednesday after a count of paper ballots flipped the primary-night result.
The Democratic primary for district attorney in Queens, a race that drew nationwide attention, was thrown deep into uncertainty on Wednesday after a count of paper ballots flipped the primary-night result.
The count of paper ballots turned an 1100 vote loss into a 20 vote win.
Quote
Five states in the U.S. — Louisiana, Georgia, South Carolina, New Jersey, and Delaware — run their elections using direct recording electronic machines (DREs), which provide no paper trail of the votes. That means if there’s a contested election or a suspected breach or tampering attempt in those states, there is no way to verify the election result.
This is from a February 2018 Axios article - I hope by now it is obsolete but I am pretty sure Georgia remains at risk. About the others I am unsure.
Here is an article with 2019 updates.
Quote
Voting Machines at Risk: Where We Stand Today
While significant progress has been made in shoring up this country’s electoral infrastructure in recent years, local election officials maintain that much still needs to be done ahead of the 2020 election.
While significant progress has been made in shoring up this country’s electoral infrastructure in recent years, local election officials maintain that much still needs to be done ahead of the 2020 election.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
#13069
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 17,284
- Joined: 2005-January-08
- Gender:Male
- Location:Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Interests:Art, music
Posted 2019-July-04, 09:56
Happy Fourth.
Quote
“This is how elected autocrats subvert democracy—packing and “weaponizing” the courts and other neutral agencies, buying off the media and the private sector (or bullying them into silence), and rewriting the rules of politics to tilt the playing field against opponents. The tragic paradox of the electoral route to authoritarianism is that democracy’s assassins use the very institutions of democracy—gradually, subtly, and even legally—to kill it.”
― Steven Levitsky, How Democracies Die
― Steven Levitsky, How Democracies Die
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
#13070
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 10,703
- Joined: 2006-May-18
- Gender:Not Telling
Posted 2019-July-04, 10:00
Winstonm, on 2019-July-04, 09:31, said:
This is rather chilling seeing that some states don't use paper backup ballots:
What is chilling here is that the Democratic Party are once again in the middle of vote-fixing allegations. Particularly given the current national climate, once would think they would be bending over backwards to avoid such a situation. For those not in the know, Katz is strongly favoured by the local party, who were in tun responsible for allocating the commissioner and even did the vote monitoring for Katz's campaign. Let's see if the 2300 spoiled ballots hold up when checked by truly neutral arbiters. If not, well I think the national level of the party needs to come in and take some responsibility here. Given all of the vote-rigging going on on he other side of the aisle, it is just a terrible look for the Democrats to portray themselves as the party not to be trusted on elections.
(-: Zel :-)
#13071
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 17,284
- Joined: 2005-January-08
- Gender:Male
- Location:Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Interests:Art, music
Posted 2019-July-04, 12:12
Zelandakh, on 2019-July-04, 10:00, said:
What is chilling here is that the Democratic Party are once again in the middle of vote-fixing allegations.
Two questions:
1) To which other vote-fixing allegations do you refer?
2) Why did you take a non-partisan post and make it about partisanship?
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
#13072
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 5,034
- Joined: 2008-September-10
- Gender:Male
Posted 2019-July-05, 01:35
Dennison's 4th of July political rally is a huge failure
President Whose ‘Bone Spurs’ Kept Him Out Of War Finally Gets His Tank-Adorned Celebration
I guess the 4th of July is now going to be Dennison fundraising and rally event going forward
Of course, all this is costing the park service millions of dollars that were supposed to go for park maintenance, even though the the park service is short on money.
National Park Service to use park improvement funds to pay for Trump July 4th event: Report
President Whose ‘Bone Spurs’ Kept Him Out Of War Finally Gets His Tank-Adorned Celebration
Quote
Thursday morning, he had bragged on Twitter: “People are coming from far and wide to join us today and tonight for what is turning out to be one of the biggest celebrations in the history of our Country.”
That claim, however, wound up being clearly untrue. The crowd in the portion of the National Mall close enough to see the massive television screens set up for the event numbered possibly as little as the high tens of thousands ― in large measure because of the White House’s failure to give away enough tickets to people who would be certain not to boo or protest his speech.
That claim, however, wound up being clearly untrue. The crowd in the portion of the National Mall close enough to see the massive television screens set up for the event numbered possibly as little as the high tens of thousands ― in large measure because of the White House’s failure to give away enough tickets to people who would be certain not to boo or protest his speech.
Quote
In contrast, the concert and fireworks show that has been a staple of Washington, D.C., July Fourth celebrations for decades routinely draws hundreds of thousands of people to the Mall.
Trump supporters arriving without a “VIP” ticket were turned away at the entrance gates. Some were told ― falsely ― that entrance tickets had been awarded by lottery.
In fact, the White House gave away tickets last week to political appointees in executive branch agencies and Republican donors through the Republican National Committee and Trump’s reelection campaign ― even though Trump’s “Salute to America” was described as a nonpolitical event.
Trump supporters arriving without a “VIP” ticket were turned away at the entrance gates. Some were told ― falsely ― that entrance tickets had been awarded by lottery.
In fact, the White House gave away tickets last week to political appointees in executive branch agencies and Republican donors through the Republican National Committee and Trump’s reelection campaign ― even though Trump’s “Salute to America” was described as a nonpolitical event.
I guess the 4th of July is now going to be Dennison fundraising and rally event going forward
Of course, all this is costing the park service millions of dollars that were supposed to go for park maintenance, even though the the park service is short on money.
National Park Service to use park improvement funds to pay for Trump July 4th event: Report
Quote
The Washington Post reported on Tuesday night that the National Park Service will divert $2.5 million in money from entrance fees intended for maintenance to pay for the Salute to America events on Thursday.
#13073
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 5,034
- Joined: 2008-September-10
- Gender:Male
Posted 2019-July-05, 07:53
Speaking of the 4th of July,
Donald Trump trips up on history in 4th of July speech, mentions airports during Revolutionary War
Ah yes, the Revolutionary War precursor to the space force. Why is this an error about history? I'm sure the Fox Propaganda Channel has cell phone pictures and video from some of the actual participants in the war. How can you argue with facts?
The full part of the quote
Of course, victory at For McHenry wouldn't have been possible without a surprise paratrooper drop behind enemy lines which was led by General Eisenhower, and the return to the battle by Gen MacArthur who kept his promise to return.
Donald Trump trips up on history in 4th of July speech, mentions airports during Revolutionary War
Quote
President Donald Trump read most of his Independence Day speech from a prepared text, but stumbled on his history at one point: He talked about airports during the American Revolution.
"Our Army manned the air, it rammed the ramparts, it took over airports," Trump said of the fighting force created by the Continental Congress in 1775.
"Our Army manned the air, it rammed the ramparts, it took over airports," Trump said of the fighting force created by the Continental Congress in 1775.
Ah yes, the Revolutionary War precursor to the space force. Why is this an error about history? I'm sure the Fox Propaganda Channel has cell phone pictures and video from some of the actual participants in the war. How can you argue with facts?
The full part of the quote
Quote
"In June of 1775, the Continental Congress created a unified Army out of the Revolutionary Forces encamped around Boston and New York, and named after the great George Washington, commander in chief. The Continental Army suffered a bitter winter of Valley Forge, found glory across the waters of the Delaware and seized victory from Cornwallis of Yorktown.
"Our Army manned the air, it rammed the ramparts, it took over the airports, it did everything it had to do, and at Fort McHenry, under the rocket’s red glare it had nothing but victory. And when dawn came, their star-spangled banner waved defiant."
"Our Army manned the air, it rammed the ramparts, it took over the airports, it did everything it had to do, and at Fort McHenry, under the rocket’s red glare it had nothing but victory. And when dawn came, their star-spangled banner waved defiant."
Of course, victory at For McHenry wouldn't have been possible without a surprise paratrooper drop behind enemy lines which was led by General Eisenhower, and the return to the battle by Gen MacArthur who kept his promise to return.
#13074
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 5,034
- Joined: 2008-September-10
- Gender:Male
Posted 2019-July-05, 07:59
DOJ Lawyer Told Judge He’s Doing ‘Absolute Best To Figure Out’ Trump Census Mess
As the DOJ reverses course again and plans to fight to get a citizenship question into the next Census, George Conway has a legal argument that the DOJ can use to explain to the judge why they are changing their minds again.
As the DOJ reverses course again and plans to fight to get a citizenship question into the next Census, George Conway has a legal argument that the DOJ can use to explain to the judge why they are changing their minds again.
Quote
“Your Honor, as best as we have been able to determine, the executive power is vested in a unstable, dimwitted, subliterate reality television host who didn’t like what he saw on Fox News Channel this morning. That seems to be what’s going on, Your Honor.”
#13075
- Group: Admin
- Posts: 21,594
- Joined: 2004-August-21
- Gender:Male
Posted 2019-July-05, 08:49
#13076
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 3,678
- Joined: 2006-February-21
- Location:Upper Michigan
- Interests:Music, films, computer programming, politics, bridge
Posted 2019-July-05, 08:49
johnu, on 2019-July-05, 07:53, said:
Speaking of the 4th of July,
Donald Trump trips up on history in 4th of July speech, mentions airports during Revolutionary War
Ah yes, the Revolutionary War precursor to the space force. Why is this an error about history? I'm sure the Fox Propaganda Channel has cell phone pictures and video from some of the actual participants in the war. How can you argue with facts?
The full part of the quote
Of course, victory at For McHenry wouldn't have been possible without a surprise paratrooper drop behind enemy lines which was led by General Eisenhower, and the return to the battle by Gen MacArthur who kept his promise to return.
Donald Trump trips up on history in 4th of July speech, mentions airports during Revolutionary War
Ah yes, the Revolutionary War precursor to the space force. Why is this an error about history? I'm sure the Fox Propaganda Channel has cell phone pictures and video from some of the actual participants in the war. How can you argue with facts?
The full part of the quote
Of course, victory at For McHenry wouldn't have been possible without a surprise paratrooper drop behind enemy lines which was led by General Eisenhower, and the return to the battle by Gen MacArthur who kept his promise to return.
As a conservative myself, I don't like this rebranding: conservatism = stupidity. Trump and his supporters are plainly stupid and glory in their stupidity. That's why wrecking schools and universities has such a high priority with them. There have always been stupid people, but in the past parents wanted their kids to do better than that. I would hope that some still do.
The growth of wisdom may be gauged exactly by the diminution of ill temper. — Friedrich Nietzsche
The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists — that is why they invented hell. — Bertrand Russell
The infliction of cruelty with a good conscience is a delight to moralists — that is why they invented hell. — Bertrand Russell
#13077
- Group: Admin
- Posts: 21,594
- Joined: 2004-August-21
- Gender:Male
Posted 2019-July-05, 08:49
#13078
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 17,284
- Joined: 2005-January-08
- Gender:Male
- Location:Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Interests:Art, music
Posted 2019-July-05, 09:23
barmar, on 2019-July-05, 08:49, said:
Better than diverting it to the border wall, though...
Personally, I see no fundamental difference. In each case an ego-driven decision is made to appropriate monies earmarked for better uses.
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
#13079
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 17,284
- Joined: 2005-January-08
- Gender:Male
- Location:Tulsa, Oklahoma
- Interests:Art, music
Posted 2019-July-05, 09:29
PassedOut, on 2019-July-05, 08:49, said:
As a conservative myself, I don't like this rebranding: conservatism = stupidity. Trump and his supporters are plainly stupid and glory in their stupidity. That's why wrecking schools and universities has such a high priority with them. There have always been stupid people, but in the past parents wanted their kids to do better than that. I would hope that some still do.
The most chilling aspect, to me, of the support for this president is explained in this article. How a huge segment of the population has been browbeaten into a position where they sincerely think that anyone who thinks differently than them is an enemy is more than puzzling - it is discouraging. It does not bode well for the continuation of our species, frankly.
Quote
Part of the answer is their belief that they are engaged in an existential struggle against a wicked enemy—not Russia, not North Korea, not Iran, but rather American liberals and the left. If you listen to Trump supporters who are evangelical (and non-evangelicals, like the radio talk-show host Mark Levin), you will hear adjectives applied to those on the left that could easily be used to describe a Stalinist regime. (Ask yourself how many evangelicals have publicly criticized Trump for his lavish praise of Kim Jong Un, the leader of perhaps the most savage regime in the world and the worst persecutor of Christians in the world.)
Many white evangelical Christians, then, are deeply fearful of what a Trump loss would mean for America, American culture, and American Christianity. If a Democrat is elected president, they believe, it might all come crashing down around us. During the 2016 election, for example, the influential evangelical author and radio talk-show host Eric Metaxas said, “In all of our years, we faced all kinds of struggles. The only time we faced an existential struggle like this was in the Civil War and in the Revolution when the nation began … We are on the verge of losing it as we could have lost it in the Civil War.” A friend of mine described that outlook to me this way: “It’s the Flight 93 election. FOREVER.”
Many white evangelical Christians, then, are deeply fearful of what a Trump loss would mean for America, American culture, and American Christianity. If a Democrat is elected president, they believe, it might all come crashing down around us. During the 2016 election, for example, the influential evangelical author and radio talk-show host Eric Metaxas said, “In all of our years, we faced all kinds of struggles. The only time we faced an existential struggle like this was in the Civil War and in the Revolution when the nation began … We are on the verge of losing it as we could have lost it in the Civil War.” A friend of mine described that outlook to me this way: “It’s the Flight 93 election. FOREVER.”
"Injustice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere."
#13080
- Group: Advanced Members
- Posts: 1,513
- Joined: 2008-September-03
- Gender:Male
- Location:Gainesville, GA USA
Posted 2019-July-05, 19:41
johnu, on 2019-July-05, 01:35, said:
Dennison's 4th of July political rally is a huge failure
President Whose ‘Bone Spurs’ Kept Him Out Of War Finally Gets His Tank-Adorned Celebration
I guess the 4th of July is now going to be Dennison fundraising and rally event going forward
Of course, all this is costing the park service millions of dollars that were supposed to go for park maintenance, even though the the park service is short on money.
National Park Service to use park improvement funds to pay for Trump July 4th event: Report
President Whose ‘Bone Spurs’ Kept Him Out Of War Finally Gets His Tank-Adorned Celebration
I guess the 4th of July is now going to be Dennison fundraising and rally event going forward
Of course, all this is costing the park service millions of dollars that were supposed to go for park maintenance, even though the the park service is short on money.
National Park Service to use park improvement funds to pay for Trump July 4th event: Report
Not only that, but The First Lady was dressed inappropriately! I'm infuriated! You people really are laughable.