Open Thread: The Scream

Norwegian artist Edvard Munch‘s most famous work, The Scream, seems most appropriate this week. If you can’t think of something that made you want to scream this week, count yourself a lucky person.

With Superbowl done, pro football season is over; that’s enough to make some folks scream with frustration if not boredom. Cheer up — there’s other sportsing to be had.

NHL regular season doesn’t end until April 9, 2017. (Ugh, Red Wings, in the basement? Come the fuck on.)

NBA regular season doesn’t end until April 12, 2017. (Pistons smack in the middle of the Eastern Conference. Meh.)

NCAA regular season ends March 5th, beginning March Madness. Start working on your bracket now. (I got nothing. Maybe next year if my kid transfers to a Big 10 school.)

PGA golf tour continues its plodding way with the Genesis Open this week at Riviera Country Club in Palisades, CA. (Yawn.)

I’m sure bmaz will fill us in on critical racing news if there’s any this week. I don’t think Formula One starts until the last week of March, though.

Me? I’ll be watching for Amy Suskind’s weekly list of Not Normal events measuring our republic’s drift away from sanity into a fascist one-party state. Last week’s list was grim and included for the first time items we have now normalized. I can hardly wait to see what’s on Week 14’s list.

This thread is open. Scream away.

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41 replies
  1. Don Bacon says:

    This is why the US has senators?
    McCain, at the Munich Security Conference:
    “I think that the Flynn issue obviously is something that shows that in many respects this administration is in disarray and they’ve got a lot of work to do.”
    One instance of a job candidate lying to the VP and then getting fired for it shows disarray in many respects? This is cause for a childish senatorial display as other more responsible US government representatives are in Europe attempting to bring a sensible message? This from the senator who has visited al-Qaeda anti-government forces in Syria, and in a recent visit to Ukraine urged an offensive against Ukrainian citizens?

    McCain, echoing the Washington Post, can’t accept that Trump upset the deep state applecart, so he goes overseas and grouses about an inconsequential personnel action. That’s not what he’s paid to do and it’s disrespectful of the U.S. McCain is acting like a spoiled child who didn’t get his way (Hillary). It’s yet another indication that the Dems and Repubs are simply branches of the same party. Or as Ralph Nader called them, teedledum and tweedledee.
    http://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-security-mccain-trump-idUSKBN15W210

    • John Casper says:

      Don,

      Who from the private sector’s on the “deep state apple cart?”

      Big Data, Amazon, Facebook, Apple, their supply chains, all the Telecoms….; all the for profit federal contractors controlled by private equity (Snowden worked for Booz Allen Hamilton–who got 99% of their income from federal government and siphoned their profits to their parent at the time, Carlyle Group, all the defense contractors in the military industrial complex, and their private equity owners.

      Who am I missing?

      WWII didn’t last four years, because the elites couldn’t rake profits from it.  GWOT will go on as long as we let elites profit from pretending to be patriotic.

    • Tom says:

      Any chance that unsubtainsiated leaks, like FBI vs Hillary or Inteligenve v Flynn outlined on NPR might maybe slightly be deliberate plants of fake news?

  2. person1597 says:

    Sooner or later we will be looking back at the Trump/Bannon/Sessions triumvirate. Will it be said…

    “He kept them busy, he kept them out of trouble. In those years we did not have to concern ourselves with the worry of youths taking drugs, getting involved in crime, and sexual permissiveness. We did not have burning of national flags and draft cards. We had a healthy youth with healthy minds, all pulling together to build a nation. That is what we need today. We need to get them back on the right track.”

    Discuss…

  3. person1597 says:

    Or maybe this furtive acknowledgement…

    What I do want to say really is that for the present this country is headed in directions which can only carry ruin to it and will create a situation here dangerous to world peace. With few exceptions, the men who are running this Government are of a mentality that you and I cannot understand. Some of them are psychopathic cases and would ordinarily be receiving treatment somewhere. Others are exalted and in a frame of mind that knows no reason. The majority are woefully ignorant and unprepared for the tasks which they have to carry through every day. Those men in the party and in responsible positions who are really worth-while, and there are quite a number of these, are powerless because they have to follow the orders of superiors who are suffering from the abnormal psychology prevailing in the country.

    • John Casper says:

      bloopie, nice catch.

      If White Sox and Cubs farm systems are included, they might have exposure, Bulls not so much.

      Agree, Bears probably have the most to gain.

    • SpaceLifeForm says:

      Rams are still based in STL While not playing there, they are still legally based there. Why? To save money. (taxes, unemployment comp)

    • Don Bacon says:

      It doesn’t make me scream. Currently the average person works until age 67, but the average pro athlete averages much less, 8-10 years. So why should the disabled athlete get a percentage of a very high compensation for so many years when he’s already made a bundle? Somebody has to pay for that.

      • John Casper says:

        Don, you’re a socialist, aren’t you.

        You don’t like the laws of supply and demand.

        How many pro athletes make a bundle?

        Where’d you get that 8-10 year average? Average NFL career is three-years.

        Search on opportunity costs, let us know what you learn.

  4. person1597 says:

    Here’s an update on the antediluvian sport of giant gladiators vs dinosaurs from the one and only TREX!!  Willing suspension of disbelief provided by the famous democratic populist, the one, the only William Jennings Bryan:

    Bryan actively lobbied for state laws banning public schools from teaching evolution. The legislatures of several Southern states proved more receptive to his anti-evolution message than the Presbyterian Church had been, and passed such laws after Bryan addressed them. A prominent example was the Butler Act of 1925, which made it unlawful in Tennessee to teach that mankind evolved from lower life forms.

    Bryan’s indictment of science post Scopes…

    “Science is a magnificent force, but it is not a teacher of morals. It can perfect machinery, but it adds no moral restraints to protect society from the misuse of the machine. It can also build gigantic intellectual ships, but it constructs no moral rudders for the control of storm-tossed human vessel. It not only fails to supply the spiritual element needed but some of its unproven hypotheses rob the ship of its compass and thus endanger its cargo. In war, science has proven itself an evil genius; it has made war more terrible than it ever was before. Man used to be content to slaughter his fellowmen on a single plane, the earth’s surface. Science has taught him to go down into the water and shoot up from below and to go up into the clouds and shoot down from above, thus making the battlefield three times as bloody as it was before; but science does not teach brotherly love. Science has made war so hellish that civilization was about to commit suicide; and now we are told that newly discovered instruments of destruction will make the cruelties of the late war seem trivial in comparison with the cruelties of wars that may come in the future. If civilization is to be saved from the wreckage threatened by intelligence not consecrated by love, it must be saved by the moral code of the meek and lowly Nazarene. His teachings, and His teachings alone, can solve the problems that vex the heart and perplex the world.”

    Therefore, science, ahem, is an augury of war! Hashtag #Neoantediluvian Aesthetic

     

  5. person1597 says:

    WJB posits that instead of Science and Invention, Consecrated Love is the answer.  Is that so?  What might be the peanut gallery’s response?

    I am not against the scientific method per se. What I am pointing out is the fact that there is no such thing as a “pure” search for knowledge, or knowledge for its own sake. It is not so innocent. Knowledge is sought, scientifically or otherwise, because it gives power. Love is an invention of the moment, used to replace power. Since you have failed in every other way, through every other channel, to acquire that all-powerful state of being, you have invented what you call love. 

    And the Reply?

     Qui audet adipiscitur

    • Don Bacon says:

      Evolution (quite naturally) is usually looked at in the animal world, but it also exists in the plant and mineral world as botanists and geologists can tell us.  The evolution of the land is very apparent in the western U.S., for example the Grand Canyon with its former innards now resting in California. Regarding knowledge, recall that Francis Bacon said “knowledge is power.”

  6. greengiant says:

    I scream because Trump is hiring 10,000 more ICE agents and planning massive deportations from the US interior never before seen.  And if incompetence did not describe it,  I scream because the Bannon-Miller MO seem to be to create crises.

    • wayoutwest says:

      So you’re a proponent of keeping or protecting criminal illegal aliens on our streets? It will take some time for this program to ramp up and it may never reach Obama’s levels of deportation but one can hope. 10,000 new jobs for working class Americans, how horrible.

      • Rayne says:

        So you’re a proponent of militarized fascism, treating humans as targets rather than opportunities for raising tax revenues? You’re all for increasing radicalization and reducing the labor pool at the same time? You’re there for driving people further underground rather than encouraging fully-documented “guest worker” status which pays taxes for infrastructure?

        At less than 5% unemployment, we don’t have enough qualified drug-free people to to employ as immigration shock troops as well as laborers to build a fucking wall. Nor do we have the money to hire them, pay for the fucking wall, and whatever other militarized neo-Nazi nonsense you support.

        The single upside to this presidency: the fascists masks are removed. Thanks for sharing.

        • nobody says:

          I want to scream both because of the ever-encroaching militarized fascism and the scale of support for it, AND because of the massive human suffering associated with the employment/underemployment crisis and scale of ignorance and evil indifference that helps undergird its perpetuation.

          Less than 5% unemployment? Good grief. There are millions and millions and millions of people who want and/or need work but can’t find it and have simply been defined out of the labor force. We are nowhere near full employment. Nowhere near it.

          And then there are the millions and millions more who would love (or desperately need) to have a full time job but are only able to find employment at one or two or maybe three crappy part-time jobs.

          “At less than 5% unemployment…” That right there is why we’ve got a President Trump. Show me somebody who believes and is out asserting that we’ve got “less than 5% unemployment” and I’ll show you somebody who did their little bit to make Donald J. Trump (at least nominally) the president of the United States.

          Anyone who believes that in real common sense terms unemployment is less than 5% has NO clue about the realities (and brutalities) of contemporary American society.

        • wayoutwest says:

          @Rayne

          You don’t seem to understand what this criminal element represents among the majority of law abiding illegal aliens. Many of them do crime and don’t pay taxes or fill needed jobs or they do both. I doubt your local illegal alien drug runner is going to work for low wages and he probably wouldn’t be paying any federal income tax either way.

          A neo-fascist regime might round up and expel an ethnic group of its citizens or legal immigrants but this ICE program is  a routine legal procedure to deport illegal aliens who have no right to reside here. Legal immigrants from Mexico and elsewhere do have some rights inside the country as the courts recently decided.

          Once people stop trying to protect these already identified criminal illegal aliens and most are apprehended and deported then a serious look at what can be done about the non-criminal illegal aliens, who Trump has referred to as the Good Mexicans, can take place. A different approach may be possible for this much larger group. They might be allowed to stay and help pay for the wall their border hopping made necessary.

        • greengiant says:

          Cognitive Dissonance there wayoutwest.   Your criminal is a drug pusher.   Trump’s criminal is anyone who used a fake ID for a job,  anyone who crossed the border, no matter how young they were,  outside of an entry point,  anyone who is “believed” to have committed a chargeable offense.  Trump thinks that is 2 to 3 million.  I think it is closer to 8 million workers and 3 million dependents.  Totally not counting green card holders who run afoul of the law.  Some talk about what Trump can and cannot do visa vi existing law.   I think anyone who gets out much does understand how much racism there is towards  people of color, people who don’t speak English, and the less well off.  That does not mean I am going to pander to it.  It is not in Trump’s game plan to offer clear concise empathetic changes.  The more disruption and pain Trump causes the more Bannon’s and Miller’s hate is fed.   Your “Good Mexican” theory, ( only 52 percent of illegals are Mexican),  is not in Trump’s mind,  nor in his executive order.   It could have been,  but it’s not.

        • wayoutwest says:

          No one is being targeted for deportation because of jay-walking they are all convicted felons and yes identity theft is a felony offense. Trump has used the 2 to 3 million number that could be accurate but even the supposedly verified documented number is about 800,000. and this doesn’t include people who commit crime and aren’t caught. Trump’s EO singles out illegal aliens with existing criminal records, no one else, no matter how creative your imagination may be.

          The discrepancy in these numbers could be because the larger numbers may include legal alien residents with criminal records another group that needs to be stripped of their residency privilege and deported but that will be a much more difficult task.

          Human beings are racist and classist always have been and will continue to be. An Apache/Maori acquaintance of mine told me about his tribe on the AZ/Mexico border hiring Mexican laborers to work their fields. They mounted horsed and were armed with rifles to police the workers shouting for them to try to get away so they could shoot them. It was probably a bluff but there was no love shown for their fellow NA’s.

           

        • greengiant says:

          No requirement to believe me,  just a messenger,  here are the sources.  Nothing you have written has changed my views.

          (a)  Have been convicted of any criminal offense;

          (b)  Have been charged with any criminal offense, where such charge has not been resolved;

          (c)  Have committed acts that constitute a chargeable criminal offense;

          (d)  Have engaged in fraud or willful misrepresentation in connection with any official matter or application before a governmental agency;

          http://www.cbsnews.com/news/president-elect-trump-says-how-many-immigrants-hell-deport/

          http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/is-donald-trump-deportation-plan-impossible-233041

          http://www.juancole.com/2017/01/mobilization-sanctuary-deportation.html

          https://www.ice.gov/removal-statistics/2016

          And from a “low” immigration viewpoint,  and breitbart.com for some reason carried an abcnews article.

          http://cis.org/mortensen/president-trumps-executive-order-puts-americans-first-least-75-illegal-aliens-eligible-deportation

          http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/01/26/abc-news-trumps-executive-order-mean-deportation-11-million-illegals/

           

        • wayoutwest says:

          @GG

          All of these charges require documentation and even if they are not yet convictions they soon could be so I erred by degree while your assertions were pure fabrications. Most people charged with these crimes are guilty but even if a few are not they are still illegally in the country and are subject to being deported, no more catch and release.

          I don’t know what the plans are for the ICE budget but that will decide how many people can be deported and there will be more than enough work for them to remove this criminal element in the next few years.

           

        • John Casper says:

          wayout,

          Your comments insulate the elites from accountability. That’s not an error “by degree.”

          Green Giant provided credible links.

          You’re allergic to any kind of documentation.

        • greengiant says:

          ICE  tried to Deport for varied from 3 to a single misdemeanor under Obama. Differences between state and Federal definitions of a felony versus misdemeanor is also an issue.

          https://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2014/12/immigration-obama-deportation-misdemeanor-felony/383920/

          Using a fake social security card for a job, pled to a felony, deported 7 years later, time already served 6 months.

          Mother of 2 US citizens deported. Previously served 6 months detention for using a fake SS card.

          Had pled to felony in 2009,  after picked up in one of Joe Arpario’s workplace raids that have been challenged on constitutional grounds.

          http://www.denverpost.com/2017/02/09/arizona-mother-deported-immigration/

          DACA still held on ICE detainer claiming he is a gang member because of his home town tattoo

          Alleged ICE falsified his statement. Hat tip to Emptywheel.

          http://www.thestranger.com/slog/2017/02/16/24878118/detained-dreamers-lawyers-say-government-doctored-legal-document-to-try-and-prove-false-gang-affiliation

          I think all 8 million illegal immigrant workers are at risk,  evidently some are good with that number leaving. Perhaps the plan is just have 8 million workers who will never complain about wages, safety, and violations there of. Does that violate the 13th amendment?  How Trumpian.

          These will be “interior” deportations for the most part,  compared to 133,551,  102,224, 69,000 and 65,000 in the last 4 years of the Obama administration.

          Trump’s executive order punishing local government for not cooperating will be adjudicated.  Already federal court rulings in some districts have mandated that local governments must have an ICE warrant to hold people instead of just an ICE detainer. Those holding on ICE detainers are a Federal lawsuit away from changing.

        • John Casper says:

          wayout,

          Did you admit at 6:43 that what you wrote earlier, 3:50, about “10,000 new jobs for working class Americans, how horrible,” was wrong?

          How does an undocumented worker, who gets a paycheck  avoid paying FICA–the payroll tax?

          Why can’t law enforcement catch you and other immigrants who you claim have committed crimes?

          Do you support the job killing government regulations against marijuana, because selling it is one of your crimes?

          Are there any undocumented CEO’s of Wall Street banks? Is Trump’s DOJ going to investigate any of them, regardless of citizenship?

          If labor isn’t free to move, why should capital be free to move?

  7. person1597 says:

    How’s this for controversy (I know, old news…) …  but anyway… ARRRRGH!

    DeVos said, “I would imagine that there’s probably a gun in the school (in Wapiti, Wyo.) to protect from potential grizzlies.”

    Was she referring to her brother, Erik Prince?

    Talk about grisly…

    Blaming leftists and some congressional Democrats for destroying his Blackwater empire, Prince clearly views Trump’s vow to bring back torture, CIA-sponsored kidnapping, and enhanced interrogations, as well as his commitment to fill Guantánamo with prisoners, as a golden opportunity to ascend to his rightful place as a covert private warrior for the U.S. national security state.

     

     

    • Tiger75 says:

      It’s reported today that Prince is exploring setting up training for Chinese law enforcement personnel.  The legality of that is currently questioned, but in the world of power not an insuperable barrier.

  8. SpaceLifeForm says:

    Cogent revisted.
    More digging reveals a story saying that Cogent is blaming it on a UK court order vs a Spain court order.
    As I noted earlier, I doubt there is a court order at all.

    If there is, it may really be a US court order.
    Still have doubts there is court order at all.
    May be an NSL.

    But Cogent has aways been a problem when it comes to SPAM. Over 14 years now.

    But while digging, I came across a coment that allegedly put the blame on Spamhaus, that Cogent was blocking the ip addys because of what Spamhaus recommended to blackhole.
    Whoops! I SCREAM – pure bullshit.

    First, Spamhaus has always been about blocking SPAM.

    But, the problem is that Cogent has always hosted Spammers!

    This does not compute!

    And blocking Cloudflare ip addys is not going to stop the spam.

    The comment I mentioned above, excusing the Cogent action as them relying on Spamhaus, is just that, an excuse.

    I suspect that the person that said that is part of DS (DarkSide/DeepState), and that Cogent is also part of DS.

    When you have a tool like Cogent to spam billions of unsuspecting users for over 14 years now, well, just think of the metadata that has been collected over that time.

    Some snippets from (a long usenet thread)

    http://www.dolphinwave.org/spam/Cogent.txt

    Cogent Communications – hosting all the worst and the biggest spammers of the
    Internet, ignoring all complaints about it for months! You just see these names
    yourself: IMG Direct / Steve Hardigree / Frank Bernal, Penn Media / Shagmail,
    Eddy Marin, Webfinity/Dynamic Pipe. Yes, they ALL are on Cogent right now, and
    some are there for as long as 6 months!

    Update: 12-Sep-2003: Add to it Alan Ralsky with djlhosting.com.

    You mean to tell me that Eddy Marin, Sam Al and Steve Hardigree, as
    well as iWay, Penn Media/Shagmail, emailfactory.com and Dynamic Pipe
    are all on Cogentco *at* *the* *same* *time*?!?!

    Yow!

    I guess I haven’t been paying close attention. For cryin’ out loud:
    I’m surprised anybody’s accepting *any* traffic from Cogentco!

    Even more annoying: Cogent has been passing me packets from RFC 1918
    addresses.
    [Ip addys to never be routed. more at that spot in thread, but clearly Cogent ‘rep’ lying]

    Do you have any better idea on how to make Cogent to kick their spammers?
    One that will not require “carpet bombardments”, yet will be effective
    enough for Cogent to kick them? We are all ears! Just keep in mind that
    listing only the spammers was already tried with Cogent, and it was not
    effective, at all (you can see it in the SPEWS evidence file, the first
    lines).

    I have tried to get Cogent to boot one of their spammers who is
    mailbombing one of my users. The spambags in question have the entire
    38.112.197.0/24 assigned to them (listed by Spamhaus as SBL13738) and
    both their spam spigots and websites are hosted on that network. I
    have sent some 20 Spamcop reports and an email with a 180+ kB
    colection of crap to Cogent’s abuse address. I have called Cogent’s
    abuse desk on the phone three times yesterday and today and the only
    answer I got is “we have got complaints on that customer and we are
    working on it”. They have also mentioned that they need at least 50
    complaints on a customer to take action, and that I was the only one
    who had complained so far.
    [LIARS]


    === Cogent’s policy is to warn, and warn, and warn spammers ===

    Cogent’s abuse department seems more intent on work avoidance and revenue
    continuation than actually reducing abuse. So what else is new?

    //

    [Bottom line: Cogent and NSA must be buds to create and allow all of that metadata collection.

    Maybe Cogent is really a darkop?

    Maybe best option is to blackhole Cogent by all other Tier1 providers? Yes, it will be painful for some. Another thought: if Cogent routers were DDOSed, would all other DDOS attacks magically stop? Suspect that would be the case.]

    [Also note: no big DDOS attacks recently]

    Cogent revisited

    Original story was court order in Spain.
    I doubted there was any court order at all.
    Another story said it was a UK court order.
    Now wondering if really a US court order.
    Still have doubts there is court order at all.
    May be an NSL.

    But Cogent has aways been a problem when it comes to SPAM. Over 14 years now.

    But while digging, I came across a coment that allegedly put the blame on Spamhaus, that Cogent was blocking the ip addys because of what Spamhaus recommended to blackhole.
    Whoops! I SCREAM – pure bullshit.

    First, Spamhaus has always been about blocking SPAM.

    But, the problem is that Cogent has always hosted Spammers!

    This does not compute!

    And blocking Cloudflare ip addys is not going to stop the spam.

    The comment I mentioned above, excusing the Cogent action as them relying on Spamhaus, is just that, an excuse.

    I suspect that the person that said that is part of DS (DarkSide/DeepState), and that Cogent is also part of DS.

    When you have a tool like Cogent to spam billions of unsuspecting users for over 14 years now, well, just think of the metadata that has been collected over that time.

    Some snippets from (a long usenet thread)

    http://www.dolphinwave.org/spam/Cogent.txt

    Cogent Communications – hosting all the worst and the biggest spammers of the
    Internet, ignoring all complaints about it for months! You just see these names
    yourself: IMG Direct / Steve Hardigree / Frank Bernal, Penn Media / Shagmail,
    Eddy Marin, Webfinity/Dynamic Pipe. Yes, they ALL are on Cogent right now, and
    some are there for as long as 6 months!

    Update: 12-Sep-2003: Add to it Alan Ralsky with djlhosting.com.

    You mean to tell me that Eddy Marin, Sam Al and Steve Hardigree, as
    well as iWay, Penn Media/Shagmail, emailfactory.com and Dynamic Pipe
    are all on Cogentco *at* *the* *same* *time*?!?!

    Yow!

    I guess I haven’t been paying close attention. For cryin’ out loud:
    I’m surprised anybody’s accepting *any* traffic from Cogentco!

    Even more annoying: Cogent has been passing me packets from RFC 1918
    addresses.
    [Ip addys to never be routed. more at that spot in thread, but clearly Cogent ‘rep’ lying]

    Do you have any better idea on how to make Cogent to kick their spammers?
    One that will not require “carpet bombardments”, yet will be effective
    enough for Cogent to kick them? We are all ears! Just keep in mind that
    listing only the spammers was already tried with Cogent, and it was not
    effective, at all (you can see it in the SPEWS evidence file, the first
    lines).

    I have tried to get Cogent to boot one of their spammers who is
    mailbombing one of my users. The spambags in question have the entire
    38.112.197.0/24 assigned to them (listed by Spamhaus as SBL13738) and
    both their spam spigots and websites are hosted on that network. I
    have sent some 20 Spamcop reports and an email with a 180+ kB
    colection of crap to Cogent’s abuse address. I have called Cogent’s
    abuse desk on the phone three times yesterday and today and the only
    answer I got is “we have got complaints on that customer and we are
    working on it”. They have also mentioned that they need at least 50
    complaints on a customer to take action, and that I was the only one
    who had complained so far.
    [LIARS]


    === Cogent’s policy is to warn, and warn, and warn spammers ===

    Cogent’s abuse department seems more intent on work avoidance and revenue
    continuation than actually reducing abuse. So what else is new?

    //

     

    [Bottom line: Cogent and NSA must be buds to create and allow all of that metadata collection.

    Maybe Cogent is really a darkop?

    Maybe best option is to blackhole Cogent by all other Tier1 providers? Yes, it will be painful for some. Another thought: if Cogent routers were DDOSed, would all other DDOS attacks magically stop? Suspect that would be the case.]

    [Also note: no big DDOS attacks recently]

  9. bevin says:

    “the famous democratic populist, the one, the only William Jennings Bryan:”
    The point about Bryan is that he was NOT a Populist.
    As to the idea that Unemployment in the US is less than 5%, Rayne, would that be true of the are in which you live? The real rate of unemployment-the proportion of the population who want to work but cannot find employment is likely to be at least 10%. If you take into account, as was traditionally done, until Clinton decided to go one better and end unemployment as previously known, the number of people working in part time positions it would be about 20%.
    When the Democratic Party gets to the post mortem stage- first it has to acknowledge that it lost the election- it is likely to find that one of the things about Obama that really pissed millions of traditional Democratic supporters off was his constant claim that the ‘economy had recovered’ and that unemployment was not a problem.

  10. pasha says:

    Regarding Trump’s Thursday performance art, one commentator on this site, in response to the 10 February 17 posting, was truly prescient:
    martin says:
    February 13, 2017 at 9:01 am

    I give it a week before President Queeg starts rolling his balls.  STRAWBERRYS!!!

     

  11. lefty665 says:

    Makes me want to scream that the NFL draft is over a month away.  It is so rewarding to hear Goodell booed every time he hits the stage. Maybe I can find last years on Utube to tide me over.

     

  12. Don Bacon says:

    @bevin
    –reply doesn’t work–
    Yes, the real unemployment rate is at least 10 percent. Gallup recommends using two simple metrics to track unemployment in the U.S.: Gallup Good Jobs (GGJ) and what Gallup calls the “Real Unemployment” metric (U-6) from the BLS — which combines those who are unemployed, underemployed and marginally attached to the workforce.
    Many Americans in the labor force have given up looking for work, or work “under the table.” The labor force participation rate continued to drop during Obama’s two terms, hitting 62.4 percent in September 2015, its lowest point in 38 years. It’s now 62.8. It was 66-67 percent under Bush-43.
    And yes, this more than anything is what got Trump elected. “It’s the economy, stupid.” Face it, the Democrat Party gave up on working people especially with “free trade” (exporting jobs) and Trump capitalized on it. So in the campaign Trump rallies were gangbusters, and Clinton’s anemic. Hillary had the Washington Post and CNN and little else (except in California).

    • lefty665 says:

      Yep you’ve got it, the labor participation rate is the telling number. The unemployment measures don’t mean much, even U-6 which includes more people than U-3 that we hear shouted from the rooftops monthly. The Dems are clueless and will not thrive until they get back to their New Deal roots that they abandoned in ’92 and represent people beyond the elites and fat cats.  We will find out on the 25th if they have a clue with the DNC chair selection. So far it looks like the Borg is regrouping. I am not optimistic, makes me want to scream.

      If “Yes California” succeeds, they secede, and the fault lines along the Nevada border open up I may scream for joy.

  13. John Casper says:

    @Don at 11:14

    Well said.

    Bernie Sanders’ infrastructure plan was superior to Trump’s, which GOP is stalling.

  14. Ol' Hippy says:

    It’s hard to see anything good coming out of the new administration anytime soon. More jobs? Federal hiring freeze, cuts to the EPA, medicaid, medicare, etc. Tax cuts to the 1%, business allowed, especially energy corps.,to have free rein without those pesky regulations, oh, also Wall Street and the banking industry. Increase the insane military budget at the expense of social programs needed by the lowest tier of income brackets e.g. Planned Parent hood. Failure to even acknowledge the global warming/poisoning crisis in slow motion; only increased profits seem to matter for the wealthiest of the rulers. I could go on, but to those that are truly alarmed I can empathize with your plight, especially those with young children. (I do not have children). Please someone wake up and hold the government accountable for fucking things up and hastening the demise of our Earth.

    • John Casper says:

      Yeah.

      Trump stopped TPP.

      He’s blocking GOP from repealing Obamacare without replacing it with something better.

      He told Zionists stealing Palestinian home/land isn’t right and further destabilizes the region.

      Can’t think of anything else positive.

      Meanwhile GOP controlled Congress is gutting the 99%.

      Need Bernie to lead Dems into midterms.

  15. martin says:

    @ pasha says:
    As Mr. Bacon says..reply doesn’t work.
    *scream*
    Irt… your hats off…that would be me. Thanks.
    Meanwhile..notwithstanding steelballs,
    Thursday:
    Breaking: @realDonaldTrump tweets it’s #HokeyPokeyTime @ShitSandwichHotel2 #LaLaLandLego Meanwhile King George lll sends porphyria sympathy
    Friday:
    Pres. McMurphy tweets from Cuukoo’s Nest..It’s HOKEYPOKEYTIME!! @NurseRatched says time for porphyria beta meds after lobotomy dressing change.
    Sat:
    After flying Cuukoo’s nest @realDonaldTrump last stage porphyria delights Florida Trumpette crowd! Joins #POTUS in #DoTheHokeyPokey. #thats_what_its_all_about….. #MAGA !!
    Sun:
    VP Bancini & Advisor Martini… psst @realPresMcMurphy..don’t rock the Cuukoo’s Nest. Won’t get afternoon IC cookies! Nurse Ratched : Alright McMurphy..nuff party. Back to the @Ovaloffice ward for
    daily reality check, intravenous EO, and Depends change. Pres. McMurphy tweets: “Press…STRAWBERRYS!! Tomorrow big day. Fake Press confer. Fools. Meanwhile..Sekrit ICE raid.. invade Kansas for deporting Toto & CRIMINAL TORNADOES!! Appointing @WickedWitch new NatSec advisor. wait..ut oh..toilet plugged again.. *scream* #softertowels!!
    Nurse Ratched: Now now Mr. President,..calm down or we’ll have to put your special jacket back on. You know..the one with all those strings and stuff. Now, be a good little boy and take your night meds. Nightty night.
    *screams*

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