Saturday, August 19, 2017

Hoods Off


Think of it this way: the Ku Klux Klan has the atom bomb. This week our new President came out in the open about supporting the Klan, the Nazis, and even the Confederacy. During the campaign there were signs of it, but now that Unite the Right has revealed itself -- without hoods -- in Charlottesville, the President has dropped his pretense, as well. He accused the liberals there of protesting without permits, claims they attacked the "nice people" of the racist right with clubs, and in general takes the racists' side of the matter. At his most conciliatory he admits there are "many sides" to the issue. Many sides. You have to say it twice.

We are happy that the rally in Boston today was a big flop, 20,000 [Edit] 40,000 protestors and less than fifty actual racists, but other events are scheduled for the upcoming days and weeks, and another Charlottesville is just a matter of time. It is not just a little group of weirdos any more, these people now have the Presidency and, it appears, Congress. Good people have to get their walking shoes on, need to hit the streets and show their faces and express their views, this is snowballing toward a state of chaos that we may not be able to recover from.

Obviously it is hard to have a government that gives rights and benefits to all kinds of people, including people who are different from us. I get it that everybody wants to be at the head of the line, and that the nasty old Constitution pretty much requires that everybody gets a fair place in the queue.

It can be frustrating, I guess, though it is hard to imagine that being white is too hard for some people.

I'm going out on a limb here: kindness and respect are the high road, in any place and at any time in history. There is nothing further to debate about this. We don't want the Ku Klux Klan in our society, or the Nazis who our fathers and grandfathers died to stop, and "alt right" is a fake label for marketing hate. It is a fundamental moral position to assert that people deserve respect unless they do something to lose it. You might even call it The Golden Rule. Guy a long time ago thought it up.

A year ago, in August 2016, Hillary Clinton gave a speech where she warned us about this. It is strange to look back now and see how it was received. She was "shrill," calling someone a racist was a low blow, it was a cheap shot, some kind of wimpy liberal name-calling. Imagine this: she had used an email system that was not run by the government. She couldn't be trusted.

Or rather, to put it another way, the vast rightwing conspiracy and fake news painted a picture of her that influenced almost all Americans. Most Americans felt she must have done something illegal, or sketchy, or dishonest; even though all Americans understood that her opponent in the election was a liar, a sexual predator, and a mobster, there were a lot of people who believed that she was worse. She had been slandered and criticized since Whitewater, at least, investigated and questioned and pursued. Google "Hillary" and "scandal" and you will get thirteen million, six hundred links. And yet every investigation has found nothing. Every minute of her life and the lives of everyone she knows has been dragged out into a courtroom or committee hearing room, stern Republicans have asked accusing questions, and in every case the result is ... nothing. But that much slime can't be scraped off, the effect on her reputation is there.

[ Edit: Here is a perfect example from yesterday, in Newsweek: HILLARY CLINTON’S LINK TO FORMER KKK LEADER ROBERT BYRD SURFACES AGAIN AFTER CHARLOTTESVILLE ]

[Another Edit: Here is an example from today: A Preemptive Review Of Hillary Clinton’s Shameless New Memoir “What Happened” This is a review where the reviewer has not even seen the book yet. This stuff is going on still, half a year after the election. ]

Here are a couple of minutes from her speech last year in Reno, Nevada.



"He is taking hate groups mainstream." You were told this a year ago. And what did we do as a country? We cringed, because it is shrill and liberal to say that about somebody. "Helping a radical fringe take over the Republican Party." Woo, she's gone too far now, saying those things. "This is not conservativsm as we've known it, this is not Republicanism as we've known it, these are racist ideas." You can't be surprised after Charlottesville when Trump proves that these words were absolutely correct. You knew this a year ago.

Hillary is not a gifted speaker but she had a clear vision and vast and detailed knowledge of the global political landscape. You can ask someone why they didn't vote for her and they almost surely won't have an answer. They just didn't "feel right" about her, after millions of dollars had been spent to destroy her reputation over several decades of time.

America chose, instead, an unhooded Klansman. You knew during the campaign what you were voting for. You knew there would be no "pivot," this guy would never be "Presidential." I am heartened today by the turnout in Boston. This is what we will need, good people have to stand up for what is right, and Nazis, the KKK, racists, haters need to be sent home. Their AK-47s and crashing cars into helpless crowds of people will not win them acceptance in this country. They have the right to their beliefs but when they have the codes to the atomic bomb, when they are running the United States of America, we have an actual emergency on our hands.

269 Comments:

Anonymous Good people standing up said...

http://www.care2.com/causes/its-up-to-us-to-stop-white-supremacist-rallies-throughout-america.html

You will find a list of upcoming white supremacist rallies in the United States

A note about free speech: Some argue that such rallies are defensible because of free speech rights, and that denying permits to meet on government land could be a violation of both the freedom to assemble and the freedom to speak your mind. Free speech is an important American value — but in fact, there’s a legal precedent here, known as the Brandenberg test. ( http://freespeechdebate.com/case/the-brandenburg-test-for-incitement-to-violence/ )

If speech includes a direct incitement to violence — as for example if a rally is expressly organized to promote violence against antifa or other counterprotesters — it may not be protected under the law. Unlike nations like France and Germany, where the display of Nazi symbols is outlawed and municipalities may exercise more discretion in event permitting, the U.S. theoretically must permit even vile racist hate speech, but only up to a point.

August 19, 2017 5:41 PM  
Anonymous Preemptive review said...

LMAO

Way to prove your point, Jimk!

Thanks for the Farron Cousin's review Hillary's newest book written preemptively, that is without reading the book.

August 21, 2017 8:22 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Moving from hate to love with God’s grace
By Fr. William Aitcheson
8/21/17

In the course of one’s life, there are seminal moments that humble us and, in some cases, even bring shame. For the past several decades, I have been blessed with the opportunity to serve as a Catholic priest. Originally ordained for the Diocese of Reno-Las Vegas, I transferred to my home area here in the Diocese of Arlington.

What most people do not know about me is that as an impressionable young man, I was a member of the Ku Klux Klan. It’s public information but it rarely comes up. My actions were despicable. When I think back on burning crosses, a threatening letter, and so on, I feel as though I am speaking of somebody else. It’s hard to believe that was me.

As a young adult I was Catholic, but in no way practicing my faith. The irony that I left an anti-Catholic hate group to rejoin the Catholic Church is not lost on me. It is a reminder of the radical transformation possible through Jesus Christ in his mercy.

While 40 years have passed, I must say this: I’m sorry. To anyone who has been subjected to racism or bigotry, I am sorry. I have no excuse, but I hope you will forgive me.

The images from Charlottesville brought back memories of a bleak period in my life that I would have preferred to forget. The reality is, we cannot forget, we should not forget. Our actions have consequences and while I firmly believe God forgave me — as he forgives anyone who repents and asks for forgiveness — forgetting what I did would be a mistake. Those mistakes have emboldened me in my journey to follow the God who yearns to give us his grace and redemption.

The images from Charlottesville are embarrassing. They embarrass us as a country, but for those who have repented from a damaging and destructive past, the images should bring us to our knees in prayer. Racists have polluted minds, twisted by an ideology that reinforces the false belief that they are superior to others.

Christ teaches something different. He teaches us that we are all his creations and wonderfully made — no matter our skin color or ethnicity. Realizing this truth is incredibly liberating. When I left my former life, I did a lot of soul-searching. God humbled me, because I needed to be humbled. But abandoning thoughts of racism and superiority gave me the liberation I needed.

We must condemn, at every opportunity, the hatred and vile beliefs of the KKK and other white supremacist organizations. What they believe directly contradicts what we believe as Americans and what we, as Catholics, hold dear.

If there are any white supremacists reading this, I have a message for you: you will find no fulfillment in this ideology. Your hate will never be satisfied and your anger will never subside. I encourage you to find peace and mercy in the only place where it is authentic and unending: Jesus Christ.

I ask that you pray for the victims of racism and bigotry. Pray that they would never feel like anything less than children of God, bestowed with dignity and love.

Pray also for those who perpetuate racist beliefs and wrongly believe they are superior to others. God forgives everyone who truly repents. Nobody is outside of his loving grasp. With conversion in Christ, they can find new life in the truth.

Diocesan Note:

Father William Aitcheson’s article was written with the intention of telling his story of transformation. He voluntarily asked to temporarily step away from public ministry, for the well being of the Church and parish community, and the request was approved.


http://catholicherald.com/News/Local_News/Moving_from_hate_to_love_with_God_s_grace/

August 22, 2017 3:00 PM  
Anonymous Did we say that? Yes, as a matter of fact, you did said...

RICHMOND — The Republican Party of Virginia said Wednesday that Lt. Gov. Ralph Northam, whose ancestors once owned slaves and fought in the Civil War, had “turned his back on his own family’s heritage” by calling for the removal of Confederate monuments.

The accusation drew swift condemnation from Democrats and some Republicans, who said it amounted to calling Northam a “race traitor.”

In a two-part tweet on its official account posted shortly after noon, the state party took aim at Northam, the Democratic nominee for governor, whose great-great-grandfather owned eight slaves in 1860 and nine slaves in 1850 on Virginia’s rural Eastern Shore.

“.@RalphNortham has turned his back on his own family’s heritage in demanding monument removal (1/2),” it read. “Shows @RalphNortham will do anything or say anything to try and be #VAGov - #Pathetic 2/2.”

The blowback was instant.

“I feel fine about turning my back on white supremacy. How does @EdWGillespie feel about the president’s position?” Northam tweeted in response, referring to his rival in the November election, former Republican National Committee chairman Ed Gillespie.

The Daily Beast ran a story under the headline: “Virginia GOP Calls Democratic Candidate a Race Traitor for Wanting Confederate Statues Removed.”

Even a conservative blog, the Reagan Battalion, jumped in, asking the Virginia Republican Party, “Was your account hacked?”

Former delegate David Ramadan, a Republican, tweeted: “Have you lost your minds — who is in control of your twitter act?”

After nearly four hours, the state party pulled down the tweet and replaced it with this: “Our previous tweets were interpreted in a way we never intended. We apologize and reiterate our denunciation of racism in all forms.”

Eric Boehlert, a writer, trolled the state Republican Party by tweeting, “It’s almost like yr trying to erase history when you deleted the tweets.....#monuments.”..."


https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/virginia-politics/va-gop-northam-turned-back-on-heritage-by-calling-for-confederate-monuments-to-come-down/2017/08/23/a5b3edf6-882d-11e7-a50f-e0d4e6ec070a_story.html

August 24, 2017 10:07 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

I Have No More Patience for Trump Supporters
by Charles P. Pierce

"...A guy basically went mad, right there on the stage in front of you, and you cheered and booed right on cue because you're sheep and because he directed his insanity at all the scapegoats that your favorite radio and TV personalities have been creating for you over the past three decades. Especially, I guess, people like me who practice the craft of journalism in a country that honors that craft in its most essential founding documents. The President of the United States came right up to the edge of inciting you to riot and you rode along with him. You're on his team, by god.

Are you good people? I keep hearing that you are, but let's go back to Tuesday night's transcripts and see what we find.

One vote away. One vote away. We were one vote away. Think of it, seven years the Republicans -- and again, you have some great senators, but we were one vote away from repealing it.

(CROWD CHANTING)

But, you know, they all said, Mr. President, your speech was so good last night, please, please, Mr. President don't mention any names. So I won't. I won't. No I won't vote -- one vote away, I will not mention any names. Very presidential, isn't' it? Very presidential. And nobody wants me to talk about your other senator, who's weak on borders, weak on crime, so I won't talk about him.


Right there, in the passive-aggressive fashion of the true moral coward, he made a bobo out of a former POW who currently is undergoing treatment for what is likely a terminal brain cancer. And you chanted and cheered. Do good people chant and cheer a rhetorical assault on a dying man of respect and honor?

I have no more patience, and I had very little to start with. I don't care why you're anxious. I don't care for anybody's interpretation of why you voted for this abomination of a politician, and why you cheer him now, because any explanation not rooted in the nastier bits of basic human spleen is worthless. I don't want any politicians who seek to appeal to the more benign manifestations of your condition because there's no way to separate those from all the rest of the hate and fear and stupidity. (And, for my colleagues in the Vance-Arnade-Zito school of Trump Whispering, here's a hint: They hate you, too.) I don't care why you sat out in a roasting pan since 5 a.m. Tuesday morning to whistle and cheer and stomp your feet for a scared, dangerous little man who tells you that your every bloody fantasy about your enemies is the height of patriotism. You are now the declared adversaries of what I do for a living, and your idol is a danger to the country and so are you. Own it. Deal with it. And, for the love of god, and for the sake of the rest of us who live in this country, do better at being citizens..."

http://www.esquire.com/news-politics/politics/news/a57164/trump-arizona-speech/

“The quickest way for him to get impeached is for Trump to knock off Jeff Flake and Dean Heller and be faced with a Democrat-led Senate.”

https://mobile.nytimes.com/2017/08/22/us/politics/mitch-mcconnell-trump.html

August 24, 2017 12:42 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

We, of the resistance who feel Trump is so odious that anything is justified to get rid of him, must coordinate of efforts at deception to be effective. We have been hyping a story about Russian collusion 24/7 until Charlottesville and now Americans may start to realize we completely dropped that story when we saw a chance to twist Trump's words to make him look like a friend of the KKK. Problem is, he really can't be both.

But, Jim, you're so right. The KKK now has the bomb and will probably drop it on Motown any day now. Thanks for that shrewd insight.

Meanwhile, can we all agree that this neo-Nazi should be forever banned from the public airwaves?:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C_ksYL26lZE

August 24, 2017 4:56 PM  
Anonymous Yes-Plorable said...

Anon if you're going to troll with music at least post the right version and not the sissified liberalized one:

The Band's version

BTW seems to me your sarcasm is getting you backed into a corner. If you think it's ok to have a president who thinks the nazis and kkk are "nice people," if you enjoy seeing swastikas in the streets, then go ahead an make your jokes.

If you're point is "none of this matters" then you have no standards and no morals and we have to wonder why you keep arguing here. If yu're point is "nazis and racists are nice people," then you might want to think that through and ask yourself, how did you get to this point.

August 24, 2017 5:46 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Good people have to get their walking shoes on, need to hit the streets and show their faces and express their views"

yes, somehow, someway, good people (you know, that didn't vote for Trump) have to find a way to express their views

oh sure, the entire media and entertainment complex of our society constantly day-in, day-out expresses the views of the good people but there are pockets of support for Trump that still exist and liberals need to hit the streets and smash windows and shoot at ball games until every last Trump voter recants

why?

because they're good people!!

that's why!!!!!!!!!!!

August 24, 2017 5:48 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Anon if you're going to troll with music at least post the right version and not the sissified liberalized one:

The Band's version"

Robbie Robertson is a freaking Canadian

his views are irrelevant

under the current liberal definition, Joan Baez is a neo-Nazi who popularized a song sympathetic to the Confederacy

"BTW seems to me your sarcasm is getting you backed into a corner"

you might want to get a second opinion before you post what "seems" to you

you'll avoid a lot of embarrassment that way

"If you think it's ok to have a president who thinks the nazis and kkk are "nice people,""

we don't have such a President and won't ever have one

what we have is a desperate liberal fringe that thinks lying about such things is OK

August 24, 2017 5:58 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

A pair of parallel events occurred last night that perfectly capture the surreal and troubling times in which we are living.

First, President Trump held a rally in Phoenix, in which he once again offered unto his base the reddest of red meat.

“They’re trying to take away our culture,” he said, of the exploding debate over Confederate statues and monuments.

“They’re trying to take away our history. And our weak leaders, they do it overnight. These things have been there for 150 years, for a hundred years. You go back to a university and it’s gone. Weak, weak people.”

Simultaneously, on the other side of the country, something else was happening. ESPN was scrambling to release a statement on a baffling assignment change that a sports website had caught wind of.

The decision to remove an Asian-American announcer named Robert Lee from calling University of Virginia’s home opener — “simply because of the coincidence of his name,” as ESPN inexplicably admits — unsurprisingly lit up the Internet with outrage, jokes and memes.

It also rendered inarguably true the assertion made by President Trump himself as well as many others that this debate will descend quickly and embarrassingly down a slippery slope. I’d argue the pre-emptive removal of an Asian-American sportscaster, who had nothing to do with the Civil War or slavery, from a college football game simply because his name sounds similar doesn’t represent a gradual slope, but a 1000-foot cliff.

In its mock-worthy statement, ESPN laments, “It’s a shame that this is even a topic of conversation and we regret that who calls play-by-play for a football game has become an issue.”

Of course, Robert Lee’s assignment change and “who calls play-by-play for a football game” is only an issue and topic of conversation because of ESPN’s dimwitted hyperventilating over fears that they would be mocked and embarrassed for having a guy named Robert Lee call their football game. But at a time when ESPN is facing heavy criticism for being an overtly liberal network, does anyone doubt what’s happening now is worse?

Whatever you think of the statue debate, one thing is now abundantly clear: President Trump has won it.

August 24, 2017 6:14 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The list of offensive iconography grows by the hundreds every day. From removing Lee statues all over the South to changing the name of Fenway Park’s Yawkey Way and Boston’s Faneuil Hall, even abolitionist strongholds aren’t spared the scrutiny of ravenous liberal activists on a mission to run as far as they can towards crazy with this argument.

And yet, it gets even crazier. A writer at Vice News, Wilbert L. Cooper, wants to blow up Mount Rushmore. Why? Because “demystifying the historical figures of the past, pulling them off the great mountain top back down to Earth where they sh-t, farted, spit, pissed, f-----d, raped, murdered, died and rotted seems like important business for this country.”

In New York City, Mayor de Blasio has created a panel to review and remove “symbols of hate,” with even some of the Broadway sidewalk text documenting actual parades through the Canyon of Heroes in his crosshairs, and Council Speaker Melissa Mark-Viverito railing against the statue of Christopher Columbus in Columbus Circle.

Over at the University of Southern California, activists are taking issue with the school’s mascot, a horse named Traveler. The mascot, according to his official bio, is “a symbol of ancient Troy. Its rider, with costume and sword, is a symbol of a Trojan warrior.”

So what’s the problem? Robert E. Lee’s horse was also named Traveller — spelled differently, but unacceptable nonetheless.

This is nonsense. What’s unnerving to conservatives like me, who are actually sympathetic to the fact that confederate flags, statues and monuments are painful reminders of one of our darkest moments as a nation — and have written so — is that this is exactly what Trump wants.

To distract from his indefensible moral equivalencies between neo-Nazis in Charlottesville and the activists who were there to protest them, Trump dared liberals to go down this kooky rabbit hole of political correctness. It’s fertile ground and he knew they’d take the bait.

And did they ever. So instead of talking about the growing scourge of white supremacy in this country, and what the President should do about it, we’re talking about blowing up Mount Rushmore and punishing Asian-American sports announcers for having the wrong name. Game, set, match: Trump.

Whatever seriousness this argument once had is gone. And I, for one, think that’s a real shame. But in the meantime, all the other Robert Lees out there should think about brushing up their resumes.

August 24, 2017 6:14 PM  
Anonymous He's a Rebel and He'll Never Ever Be Any Good said...

The Civil War was fought a hundred fifty years ago and the Confederacy lost. Now black people are people, white people can't buy and sell them, and we won't be going back to slavery or even Jim Crow.

Recently the racist assholes seem to have gotten it in their heads to pretend they won the war, and basically the United States of America does not have any real reason to tolerate their treason. Fascists, racists, white supremacists should be stomped out, along with their flags, their statues, their street names, and all the other things real Americans have generously put up with instead of acting like the conquerors we are. We could have rubbed their noses in it after we humiliated them on the battlefield, and probably should have. We still can.

You lost, racists. America is not a white country and never will be. It's a country for everybody. Step back so I can light some dynamite under the statue of that loser on the horse.

August 24, 2017 8:01 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

if jackasses like the last poster are not rejected by America, they will grow the the white supremacist movement from a handful of flakes to a more dangerously sized group of flakes

the real loser of the moment is the Dem party and their desperate attempt to resurrect racism as a means to regain relevance is threatening the unity of this country

to recap: racism had largely died out in America, indicated most strongly by a popularly elected black man to the highest office in the land

the Dems saw the writing on the wall and frantically tried everything they could to turn race into an issue: native American mascots and statues of Confederate generals has existed for years at the same time as great progress for diversity was made

America needs to dispense with the Dem party and start a new second party

for the sake of the nation

August 24, 2017 11:33 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

good point!

brushing up their resumes.

"He's a Rebel and He'll Never Ever Be Any Good" is clearly a jackass

August 24, 2017 11:36 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

WHO IS RICK DEARBORN? TRUMP AIDE RECEIVED EMAIL TO SET UP PUTIN MEETING WITH CAMPAIGN

Rick Dearborn, who currently serves as the deputy chief of staff to President Donald Trump, reportedly received an email in June 2016 from a person attempting to set up a meeting between Trump campaign officials and Russian President Vladimir Putin, CNN reported Wednesday night, citing unnamed sources.

The unverified report claims Congressional investigators obtained an email sent to Dearborn, who was also the executive director of Trump’s transition to the White House, by a person identified as “WV,” initials that reportedly were in reference to West Virginia.

But other details about the email sender remain unclear, like the purpose of the meeting they were hoping to set up or if Dearborn complied—though CNN’s report did indicate that Dearborn, a Republican, was “skeptical” about the request.

White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders declined CNN’s request for comment on the email received by Dearborn, saying the message could be part of an intelligence leak.

“We aren't going to comment on potentially leaked documents,” Sanders told the cable news network.

Before working on the Trump campaign as a policy aide, Dearborn served as chief of staff to former Alabama senator turned U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions. While there is no evidence Dearborn did anything nefarious, CNN’s report also states that investigators hope to establish whether Dearborn helped to arrange the two meetings Sessions had with former Russian ambassador to the U.S. Sergey Kislyak; meetings that Sessions did not at first disclose during his Senate confirmation hearing for the Department of Justice’s top job and that led to his recusal from the Trump-Russia investigation.

Sessions denied any collusion with Russian officials on Trump’s election campaign during Senate testimony earlier this year but has since faced the president’s wrath for removing himself from the investigations.

The revelation of the email comes after Donald Trump Jr. admitted to setting up a meeting with a Russian lawyer and several other Russians also in June 2016, a meeting that was also attended by the president’s son-in-law and senior adviser Jared Kushner and former Trump campaign manager Paul Manafort.

Trump Jr. at first said the meeting was related to adoption policy, but later released an email chain showing he hoped it would provide him with damaging information on his father’s former political campaign rival, Democrat Hillary Clinton.

Before that, former campaign foreign policy adviser George Papadopoulos had also sent around emails in March 2016 suggesting that Trump meet with Russian officials to discuss relations between the two superpowers, The Washington Post reported earlier this month.

August 25, 2017 10:05 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

New Details: Manafort raid

The FBI’s July raid on former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort’s Virginia home lasted 10 hours and involved a dozen federal agents, according to a source close to the investigation who described the raid as heavy-handed and designed to intimidate.

The source—whose account was backed up by a second individual not authorized to speak on the record—said both Manafort and his wife were asleep when armed FBI agents entered the Alexandria, VA condo, without warning at about 6 o’clock in the morning, concluding the search by late afternoon.

FOX News is told that agents copied his electronics through a process known in law enforcement circles as “mirroring” and agents collected records, including several documents marked “attorney-client” that included privileged material to prepare Manafort for congressional testimony.

The FBI raid came the same week Manafort appeared before two senate committees, providing documents on a voluntary basis. A spokesman for Special Counsel Robert Mueller declined to comment. A former Justice Department official pointed to the timing’s significance, saying: “The timing of all this is unusual because ordinarily if you are in the process of testifying before Congress and turning dogs over to Congress you would think the prosecutors might say, well this person is cooperating and there is no need for us to go in and get a search warrant. The fact that Mueller, nonetheless, went in, got a search warrant, and raided his home, suggests that there is something else going on here.”

In a separate development, congressional investigators are reviewing a campaign email sent bu Rick Dearborn, now the president’s deputy chief of staff. A source tells FOX that Dearborn got an offer to set up a meeting between top Trump campaign officials and the Russian President. Dearborn was skeptical, but still forwarded the email, ultimately refusing the offer.

And on this week’s closed door testimony about the unverified Trump dossier, at least one Senator, Democrat Richard Blumenthal, wants the transcript public.

August 25, 2017 10:13 AM  
Anonymous thanks for sharing said...

thanks for the two news reports about, basically, nothing new

you do know this is a blog not a branch of AP, right?

any thoughts on the reports you're willing to share or are you at least careful enough to not want to make yourself look stupid?

August 25, 2017 11:53 AM  
Anonymous analysis of why Dems are doomed said...

In his new book, Columbia University humanities professor Mark Lilla laments the phrase “speaking as an X.” Ubiquitous in academia for years, but now increasingly prevalent in general discourse, it is an introductory clause that
sets up a wall against questions, which by definition come from a non-X perspective. And it turns the encounter into a power relation: the winner of the argument will be whoever has invoked the morally superior identity and expressed the most outrage at being questioned. So classroom conversations that once might have begun, I think A, and here is my argument, now take the form, Speaking as an X, I am offended that you claim B. This makes perfect sense if you believe that identity determines everything. It means there is no impartial space for dialogue.
The passage makes plain what Lilla is up to—and up against. He wants the Democratic Party to abandon identity politics for the sake of its electoral viability. Effecting beneficial changes requires wielding power, he argues, and in democracies, securing power requires winning elections. In America—vast, diverse, and unruly—such victories can be secured only through “the hard and unglamorous task of persuading people very different from [oneself] to join a common effort.” Lilla thus finds it necessary to instruct fellow Democrats that elections are neither prayer meetings nor therapy sessions nor seminars nor “teaching moments.”
What is identity politics? As a chapter epigraph, Lilla cites a statement from the Combahee River Collective, a 1970s group whose raison d’etre—black lesbians’ issues and perspectives were getting short shrift from existing civil rights, gay rights, and feminist organizations—sounds like a parody of the problem Lilla describes. “This focusing upon our own oppression is embodied in the concept of identity politics,” the statement said. “We believe that the most profound and potentially most radical politics come directly out of our own identity, as opposed to working to end somebody else’s oppression.”
This rejection of the very idea of an impartial dialogue is, Lilla believes, how the noble legacy of “large classes of people—African-Americans, women—seeking to redress major historical wrongs by mobilizing and then working through our political institutions” gave way, by the 1980s, to “a pseudo-politics of self-regard and increasingly narrow and exclusionary self-definition.” Inherent in it is identitarians’ “disdain” for the “ordinary democratic politics” of “engaging with and persuading people unlike themselves” in favor of “delivering sermons to the unwashed from a raised pulpit.”
Rather than gratefully accept this enlightenment and path to redemption, however, the unwashed are likely to demand an identity politics of their own. “As soon as you cast an issue exclusively in terms of identity,” Lilla warns, “you invite your adversary to do the same.” Thus, Donald Trump’s victory and Lilla’s book, which grew out of a New York Times op-ed he wrote the week after the 2016 election. He was “sick and tired of noble defeats,” Lilla told interviewers then. Lilla’s article prompted many denunciations, the most venomous coming from a Columbia law professor who compared him, unfavorably, with David Duke.

August 25, 2017 12:04 PM  
Anonymous analysis of why Dems are doomed said...

Such reactions give strong reason to doubt that we will soon see a post- or anti-identity politics emerging the Democratic Party. And yet, an even stronger reason exists. The feasibility of Lilla’s project depends on the plausibility of his analysis. If identity politics is an affliction that happened to liberalism, as he sees it, then it’s realistic to activate Democratic antibodies to reject the pathogen. If, however, identity politics is a condition to which liberalism is inherently susceptible, or even disposed, then identity politics is not the Democrats’ problem but their destiny. Unfortunately for Lilla, the evidence points in this direction.
Something came between the New Deal Democratic Party, summoned to pride and patriotism by Franklin Roosevelt’s Four Freedoms, and today’s Democratic Party, micro-targeting so many distinct constituencies that, to Lilla, it seems better prepared to govern Lebanon than America. In between came McGovernism—not just George McGovern’s 1972 campaign but also the whole style and substance of 1960s and 1970s liberalism: from John F. Kennedy’s cool to Robert Kennedy’s zeal; from civil rights to Black Power; from the counterculture, New Left, and antiwar movements to feminism and environmentalism. The result, says Lilla, turned Joe Sixpack’s Democratic Party into Jessica Yogamat’s. Democrats uncritically embraced the constituencies and passions brought to the fore in the 1960s—often at the expense of common sense, political and governmental. In these years, Lilla writes, “liberals, fearful of ‘blaming the victim,’ refused to speak about the new culture of dependency, or about the tremendous rise in violent crime in the 1960s.”....

https://www.city-journal.org/html/liberals-shipwrecked-15410.html

August 25, 2017 12:06 PM  
Anonymous analysis of why TTFers and fellow Dems are losers said...

Just last month, Democrats were talking about how they needed to rebrand their party around a positive message. They wanted to move beyond simple anti-Trumpism and identity politics, and craft an economic appeal to the white working-class voters who deserted them in 2016.

Now here we are with Democrats going all in to refight the Civil War. Well done.

A glance at the electoral map shows how foolish this is. Donald Trump triumphed in 2016 by increasing Republican margins in a swath of northern counties stretching from western Pennsylvania across the Great Lakes, netting him Pennsylvania, Ohio, Michigan, Wisconsin and the presidency. Voters there are more likely to see this issue as a radical temper tantrum than anything affecting their daily lives.

Polling gives reason for skepticism. An NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist poll last week found that 62% of respondents thought statues honoring leaders of the Confederacy should “remain as a historical symbol.” Only 27% of those polled wanted the statues removed, and presumably they vote Democratic anyway. Perhaps party leaders see this issue as a way to motivate the minority base that failed to energize for Hillary Clinton, but even among African Americans, a 44% plurality said let the statues stay. So it’s just bad politics.

It gets worse. Once the issue was uncorked, it ballooned out of control. Last week, Trump wondered aloud where the iconoclastic movement would end, asking rhetorically, “Is it George Washington next week, and is it Thomas Jefferson the week after?” Right on cue, a Chicago pastor wants Washington’s name removed from a park, and Al Sharpton comes out against the Jefferson memorial.

This after protesters in New York City suggested last fall taking down a statue of Theodore Roosevelt. Last week, a bust of Abraham Lincoln — really? Lincoln? — was set ablaze. Demolish Mount Rushmore and radicals can smite all four of these presidents at once.

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe showed how difficult the climate has become for Democrats. During his statement condemning the neo-Nazi protesters in Charlottesville, he innocently invoked “patriots … Thomas Jefferson and George Washington, who brought our country together." This brought a stinging rebuke from CNN Vice President Johnita P. Due, who wrote that “our national healing cannot move forward if even well-meaning leaders don't recognize the role our Founding Fathers played in seeding white supremacy.”

Maybe Democrats can put that gem in their national platform. Clearly, the Democratic tradition of the Jefferson-Jackson dinner is a thing of the past.

The liberal heroes of the hour are not dead white slave-owning presidents but the angry young street activists. For example, the radicals who pulled down the Confederate statue in Durham, N.C., who are affiliated with the socialist revolutionary Workers World Party. Also the thuggish "antifa" (anti-facist) movement, which helped organize demonstrations in Boston last weekend.

Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., deputy chair of the Democratic National Committee, praised the Boston demonstrators in general, saying “the Democratic Party, like those protesters, needs to step up into the patriotic moment.” Ellison sees an advantage in making common cause with the activists and harnessing their energy.

Yet denouncing America’s Founders, defacing the Lincoln Memorial and taking a knee for the Star-Spangled Banner are not the kinds of behavior most Americans would consider patriotic. Democrats rush to embrace this movement at their political peril. All that soul searching about rebranding the party to bring back white working-class voters goes right out the window.

Meanwhile, Trump is free to talk about infrastructure programs, border control, tax cuts, the war on terrorism and other policy issues that voters care about. And if it looks like Democrats aren’t bursting with enough toxic anger, he can send radical left-wing mobs into the streets with a well-timed tweet.

And they say Trump is becoming irrelevant? Irrelevant like a fox.

August 25, 2017 12:18 PM  
Anonymous climate skeptic outsells Al Gore said...

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2017/aug/25/climate-skeptics-rebuttal-book-outselling-al-gores/?utm_source=onesignal&utm_campaign=pushnotify&utm_medium=push

August 25, 2017 12:20 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Yeah, there’s still a Russia probe — and it looks worse for Trump all the time

Trump has hissy-fits at GOP senators while Mueller interviews "Dossier Guy." Bipartisan consensus: Big trouble

It’s been another wild ride this week with President Trump holding one of his serious teleprompter speeches announcing that he has a secret plan to win in Afghanistan that he can’t tell us anything about, and then turning around to hold a raucous campaign rally in Phoenix reminding the world that he’s really an undisciplined narcissist. More than one pundit observed that Trump is more clever than he seems with his crazed behavior, because as long as he’s giving succor to Nazis and neo-Confederate racists nobody’s talking about the Russia investigation.

That’s giving Trump way too much credit. He is an impulsive person who has shown no sign that he’s that strategic about anything. And even if his frantic efforts this week were attempts at misdirection, it was to no avail. There have been quite a few developments in the Russia story, none of which are good news for the president.

The first big revelation was in the blockbuster New York Times story on Tuesday about Trump’s deteriorating relationship with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. Trump has been tweeting his disappointment with McConnell for some time, so it was no big secret that he is unhappy with him over the health care vote. But apparently the two men had an angry confrontation over the phone on Aug. 9, in which Trump cursed at the majority leader over his inability or unwillingness to “protect” Trump from being investigated over Russia.

Trump doesn’t seem to understand that the Congress is an equal branch of government, endowed with oversight responsibilities. But if there was ever any chance that congressional Republicans could provide cover it went out the window when Trump fired the FBI director and then reassured the Russian ambassador the next day in an unpublicized meeting in the Oval Office that he’d relieved the “pressure” by doing it. Everything in his behavior since then, including his incessant whining about Jeff Sessions’ recusal from the probe as a personal betrayal, has made it more impossible.

Perhaps we might excuse Trump’s argument with McConnell as a general temper tantrum; maybe he threw in the complaint about Russia as an afterthought. But Politico followed up the Times story with more reports of phone calls with Republican senators in which the president requested that they abandon their plans for Russia-related legislation. He reportedly tried to convince Sen. Bob Corker of Tennessee that the bipartisan bill sanctioning Russia was unconstitutional and damaging to his presidency. Corker didn’t listen and the bill passed with overwhelming bipartisan support, which is not something you see every day.

Trump also called up Sen. Thom Tillis of North Carolina to complain about the latter’s bill designed to protect special counsel Robert Mueller from a presidential firing. Unsurprisingly, Trump is not a fan of the legislation or of the legislative branch exercising its oversight responsibilities over his administration when it comes to Russia.

As one GOP aide told Politico, “It seems he is just always focused on Russia.”

Meanwhile, there was some intriguing news about the investigation this week. ABC News reported that Christopher Steele, the former MI6 operative who compiled the notorious “dossier” about Trump’s Russian ties has spoken to Mueller and turned over all his sources. Perhaps that shouldn’t be surprising, but Steele had reportedly gone underground for his own protection and was unreachable by investigators.

August 25, 2017 1:44 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

No thanks for your ALT-RIGHT bullshite book review and opinion pieces from sources like the Moonie Rag and FAUX News,

This isn't Stormfront.

If you are not happy with the comments here, go march in lock-goose-step with your fellow Trump supporter brothers who like to wave side by side Nazi and Confederate flags as they chant "JEWS WILL NOT REPLACE US"

August 25, 2017 1:59 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"...the thuggish "antifa" (anti-facist) movement, which helped organize demonstrations in Boston last weekend..."

They were relatively peaceful demonstrations in Boston.

There were no people carrying tiki torches and chanting Nazi slogans or "Go the fuck back to Africa."

There were no militia carrying weapons dressed in camouflage.

There were no cars murdering American citizens.

https://www.boston.com/news/local-news/2017/08/19/live-updates-free-speech-rally-counter-protests-boston-common

"...As of the press conference, police had made 27 arrests, mostly for disorderly conduct but also “a couple” for assault and battery on police officers and other charges, according to Evans. He said some officers were hit with bottles of urine, and police tweeted that rocks were being thrown at officers. No serious injuries or significant property damage occurred, Evans added.

Evans didn’t attribute the bad behavior to rally-goers or counter-protesters, but rather a third group.

“Obviously I wish the troublemakers stayed away,” he said. “ … They weren’t here for either side. They were here just to cause problems.”

Evans said, “99.9 percent of people here were for the right reasons, and that’s to fight bigotry and hate.”..."

Americans fight against bigotry and hate, Nazis fight for it.

August 25, 2017 5:24 PM  
Anonymous the fruits of victory said...

If only liberals had not been so stupid as to back the Clinton crime syndicate in 2016. Alas, they bitterly regret that now. They have no power anymore. Even their judges can simply have their decisions nullified by the victor, Donald J Trump.

President Donald Trump pardoned Joe Arpaio on Friday, sparing the courageous Arizona sheriff a jail sentence after he was convicted of criminal contempt related to liberal attacks on him for upholding the law by going after illegal immigrants.

Imagine that...a sheriff upholding the law...

During last year's presidential campaign, Arpaio was a vocal proponent for Trump's candidacy, and used his national esteem to advocate for Trump's stance on border security and deportations.

August 25, 2017 11:16 PM  
Anonymous Updating Passport said...

Anon, I do not believe any real human being can believe what you are saying. On the continuum from programmed bots to clear-thinking humans you have some autonomous bots and also some programmed humans, overlapping on the scale of ability to make a credible statement. I cannot tell what you are but clear thinking human has been eliminated.

Arpaio is a convicted criminal who has shown no remorse. This pardon is unparalleled. This also signals that Trump might pardon anybody who is caught up in the Mueller investigation. Then after his inevitable impeachment, Pense can pardon him and all go free. If he choose the route of dictatorship, and it appears he has, trump and his inner circle are above constitutional law. I look forward to your zany and lighthearted interpretation of the rightwing talking points as America descends into anarchy.

August 25, 2017 11:41 PM  
Anonymous Nepotism said...

Too bad Jared is only a Jew and not Hispanic too.

Then both Gorka and Arpaio would be gone.

August 26, 2017 6:47 AM  
Anonymous epistle to the deluded said...

"Anon, I do not believe any real human being can believe what you are saying"

I know. It's been clear for some time that TTFers don't believe people who disagree with them are human beings. Nazis always felt the same way.

"Arpaio is a convicted criminal who has shown no remorse. This pardon is unparalleled."

Have you ever heard of Bill Clinton? He used to be President. Little trivia: he was married to the big loser in the election of 2016.

There's a whole wikipedia page dedicated to his "disgraceful" pardons, as Jimmy Carter phrased it. James Comey once investigated whether the pardons issued by Clinton were illegal. He had to conclude they weren't because Presidents can pardon anyone they want.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bill_Clinton_pardon_controversy

You guys should have chosen a better candidate in 2016 because the Presidet has vast power. Anyone acceptable would have beaten the crass and vulgar reality show star that won. I assume you now realize how irresponsible you were and bitterly regret your error, from which your cause won't recover for decades.

"This also signals that Trump might pardon anybody who is caught up in the Mueller investigation. Then after his inevitable impeachment, Pense can pardon him and all go free. If he choose the route of dictatorship, and it appears he has, trump and his inner circle are above constitutional law."

The pardon power is constitutional. If Americans object to a President's use of pardons, they can vote him out. Problem you have is that Americans agree with the sheriff so they likely are happy with this pardon.

They will also be fine with pardons in connection with the Russian collusion hoax. No American outside the beltway really thinks DJT did anything illegal with Russia.

"I look forward to your zany and lighthearted interpretation of the rightwing talking points as America descends into anarchy."

Well, TTFers don't have a lot to look forward to, so hold on to your delusions.

They're all you have.

August 26, 2017 8:33 AM  
Anonymous Updating Passport said...

OK I will hold on to the delusion that the US is governed by adherence to a Constitution and that our leaders, even the Republican ones, will eventually come around to enforcing it.

The fact that ordinary people use a phrase like "the Clinton crime syndicate" shows how effective propaganda can be. This sheriff was not upholding the law, he was breaking the law. BTW, Clinton pardoned a normal number of people, about the same number as Reagan. None of them were government officials convicted for crimes committed while performing their job.

We'll see how far he takes this, but this pardon could mean a true crisis if the President pardons his political allies when they are convicted of crimes committed during the campaign and Trump's term in office. We knew he had been asking about it, in particular asking if he can pardon himself, and so when the Mueller investigation starts filing charges you might find the President sabotaging the Constitution just as fast as the legislative and judicial branches can implement it. The normal term for that is "dictatorship." You'll be laughing your head off, anon, happy as a clam. That's what we mean by "deplorable."

August 26, 2017 9:19 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

May the Grand Old Party of Lincoln long enjoy its association with Russian oligarchs, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, racists, and white nationalists.

August 26, 2017 9:48 AM  
Anonymous Welcome to Trumplandia said...

"A small group of neo-Nazis gathered outside an Arlington, Va., shopping center Friday to commemorate the 50th anniversary of an American Nazi leader’s assassination.

As one man held a large red flag emblazoned with a swastika, half a dozen others raised their right arms in a Nazi salute. Their ceremony came two weeks after neo-Nazis and white supremacists rallied in Charlottesville, where clashes with counterprotesters left one woman dead and many others injured.

The neo-Nazis who appeared in Arlington are members of New Order, a successor to the American Nazi Party, whose founder, George Lincoln Rockwell, was shot to death at the Dominion Hills shopping center on Aug. 25, 1967.

Martin Kerr, New Order’s chief of staff, said most of those who attended the commemoration live in the Washington area, although one came from Wisconsin to pay tribute to Rockwell.

“We laid a wreath, I said a few words and then we gave a nationalist socialist salute for 88 seconds,” Kerr said, explaining that the 88 seconds symbolized “Heil Hitler.”

Dozens of Arlington residents appalled by the display gathered outside the shopping center a few hours later, carrying signs that read “Love Trumps Nazis” and “No Hate Zone.”

Kerr described Rockwell, who called for shipping blacks to Africa and sending millions of “Communist Jews” to the gas chambers, as “an authentic American patriot.”

Matt Garcia was getting a haircut when he saw the neo-Nazis gathering outside Tom’s barber shop.

“I stood up in the chair to see what was going,” he said. “It was startling, obviously, to see right there.”

Garcia, who is Mexican American, lives in New York City but grew up around the corner from Dominion Hills. He was home visiting his parents and had gone to the barbershop with his mother and five-year-old son.

“I always thought of Arlington as a diverse and welcoming place,” he said. “Seeing a Nazi flag go up in your neighborhood is shocking and disturbing, especially after what happened in Charlottesville.”

Kerr, who attended the white supremacist rally in Charlottesville, said his group did not hesitate to pay tribute to Rockwell at such a fraught time and scoffed at any suggestion that it was inappropriate...."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/retropolis/wp/2017/08/25/shocking-neo-nazis-fly-swastika-salute-at-shopping-center-where-leader-was-killed/

August 26, 2017 11:38 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"OK I will hold on to the delusion that the US is governed by adherence to a Constitution and that our leaders, even the Republican ones, will eventually come around to enforcing it"

well, Trump, for all his faults, has so far nominated, and gotten confirmed, many key judges who invariably are committed to the Constitution

including, significantly, originalist Neil Gorsuch, who will enforce the Constitution rather than rewrite to advance the liberal and gay agendas

"The fact that ordinary people use a phrase like "the Clinton crime syndicate" shows how effective propaganda can be."

the Clintons were clearly guilty of influence peddling and taking bribes from hostile foreign governments

their "charitable" foundation had private inurement throughout its activities

additionally, Hillary clearly mishandled confidential, classified information she had access to as Secretary of State, an area where negligence is criminal

she also destroyed evidence

none of this is propaganda and players on all sides agree

"This sheriff was not upholding the law, he was breaking the law."

he was indeed upholding the law, a court ruled he had racially profiled while doing so, a nebulous charge

let us know the details and why you think his activity was criminal

what exactly, not abstractly, did the court order him not to do and how did he violate that order?

"BTW, Clinton pardoned a normal number of people,"

more than a third came after W Bush had beaten pompous windbag Al Gore, when there were no longer any political consequences
We'll see how far he takes this, but this pardon could mean a true crisis if the President pardons his political allies when they are convicted of crimes committed during the campaign and Trump's term
talk about abusing the Constitution

why do you think an investigation was done, headed by James Comey?

it was because it was clearly seen that his pardon of Marc Rich was a quid pro Quo payback to a financial backer

"None of them were government officials convicted for crimes committed while performing their job."

when officials are convicted for crimes committed while performing their jobs, that's called politics

the Presidential pardon power was specifically designed to ameliorate such a circumstance

"President sabotaging the Constitution just as fast as the legislative and judicial branches can implement it."

the balance of powers in the Constitution is not "sabotage", it was designed to thwart the excesses of politics, like the ruckus the Dems are now raising

"The normal term for that is "dictatorship.""

it would be a dictatorship if there was no way the people could end it

no one has suggested there won't be an election in 2018 or 2020

Trump, for all his faults, has challenged the dictatorship of the government bureaucrats and the deep state

this dictatorship is at war with the American voter and Trump represents democracy

"May the Grand Old Party of Lincoln long enjoy its association with Russian oligarchs, neo-Nazis, white supremacists, racists, and white nationalists."

the KKK was formed by the Dem party which is doing everything it can now to exacerbate racism

they feel they need a racist nation to survive

"A small group of neo-Nazis gathered"

nothing new

they've always been a small group

the Dems would like to change that to give themselves an issue

August 26, 2017 1:45 PM  
Anonymous Updating Passport said...

"the Clintons were clearly guilty of influence peddling and taking bribes from hostile foreign governments

their "charitable" foundation had private inurement throughout its activities

additionally, Hillary clearly mishandled confidential, classified information she had access to as Secretary of State, an area where negligence is criminal

she also destroyed evidence"


Actually, that is all propaganda. She has been investigated and questioned more than anybody by political enemies who would love to "lock her up," as Trump supporters like to say, echoing and amplifying the propaganda you so love. There are lots of powerful people who would love to catch her committing any kind of crime at all, and the actual fact is, they have not found anything to charge her with. Not even close. The media have propagated these beliefs for decades but there is no substance to them.

People like you willfully accept fiction as fact without examining it and spread it further, because it fits your preconceptions and supports your political agenda. None of these things, which you state as facts because you know you will find easy popular agreement among your peer group, are true. I bet it's a lot of fun destroying a person's life and reputation, great fun chanting "Lock her up! Lock her up!" Hate is more fun than a barrel of monkeys, isn't it, Anon? But we can't run a country that way.

August 26, 2017 3:08 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

actually, it's all true

rather than go through each crime, which you will simply deny, answer this simple question:

when the Clintons left the White House in 2001, they were so destitute that donors had to raise money to pay their legal bills

now, they are millionaires many times over

what service did they provide in exchange for all this money they "earned"?

I think you will realize it was influence, access, and a promise for future considerations once Hillary became President

nice work if you can hide it

because its mostly illegal

August 26, 2017 4:24 PM  
Anonymous Updating Passport said...

I would not "realize" any such thing. You may think it is terrible that a former President of the United States goes on to have a prosperous life and lots of influence, you may be as resentful as you wish, but it is not illegal. Obviously nobody has ever even tried to press charges against the Clintons for any crime beyond lying about a blow job.

None of it was illegal. You don't have to "go through each crime" because "each crime" has already been investigated, sometimes over and over again, and there are no crimes. You are simply believing and spreading propaganda.

I suppose the reason they don't get charged is that they have intimidated the Trump administration? You may believe what you are saying but it is so obviously false that this just makes you look gullible.

It's what we call the "rightwing bubble" and it is a well studied, well documented objective phenomenon. Just this week there was another study showing how the media biased news about the candidates during the campaign season, measured in minutes of airtime and what the topic was. You have heard so many propagandists saying that Hillary broke the law, or killed a bunch of people or runs a human trafficking ring, or sold uranium to the Russians, or whatever, and don't forget Benghazi and the horror of her non-government email server. You hear it over and over again and because thinking requires paying attention you take the low road and believe it all.

None of it is a crime, or even close.

August 26, 2017 4:51 PM  
Anonymous Updating Passport said...

Here is that new study by the Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society at Harvard University: Partisan Right-Wing Websites Shaped Mainstream Press Coverage Before 2016 Election, Berkman Klein Study Finds

The Washington Post yesterday had a nice summary of this and similar research: Studies agree: Media gorged on Hillary Clinton email coverage

August 26, 2017 6:28 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"why do you think an investigation was done, headed by James Comey?

it was because it was clearly seen that his pardon of Marc Rich was a quid pro Quo payback to a financial backer"


You mean it was clearly the Giuliani section of the FBI surprises again, shares files on Bill Clinton pardon of Marc Rich on November 1, 2016, "one week before the election and just days after Director James Comey's stunning announcement that the FBI was looking into newly discovered emails related to its investigation of Hillary Clinton."

Comey's investigation of pardons lead to no charges being filed against Clinton.

How soon they forget.

"the KKK was formed by the Dem party which is doing everything it can now to exacerbate racism

they feel they need a racist nation to survive"


What fake news!

Everyone can see Democrats are not the ones running around dressed like militia men carrying weapons while marching and waving Nazi and Confederate flags side by side.

The torch-bearing Nazi slogan chanters carrying Nazi and Confederate flags are you white nationalist racist GOPer types.

August 27, 2017 8:15 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

This is an updated version of an editorial originally published on Aug. 21.

Fresh from pouring gasoline on the fires of intolerance in Charlottesville, Va., President Trump on Friday pardoned a man who systematically persecuted people of color.

Invoking the presidential pardon power for this man — former Maricopa County (Ariz.) sheriff Joe Arpaio — further shreds whatever semblance of moral authority the president retains, not to mention Republican hopes of making inroads among Hispanic voters.

The pardon, announced Friday evening as a major hurricane bore down on the Texas coast, also has a potentially chilling effect on special counsel Robert Mueller's Russia investigation by signaling targets of that inquiry that the president might let them off the hook, even if they refuse to cooperate.

Arpaio was one of the first officials to endorse Donald Trump for president early last year. He spoke on Trump's behalf at the Republican convention last summer. Maybe that's all the character reference required to win the president's allegiance.

The pardon, which bypassed the normal process for executive clemency, wasn't unexpected. Trump told Fox News this month that Arpaio was "a great American patriot." He praised Arpaio's self-styled toughness on illegal immigration and said a pardon was under serious consideration. And the president hinted at the action at Tuesday night's rally in Phoenix.

Arpaio, 85, faced up to six months in jail for willfully violating a federal court order while sheriff by allowing racial-profiling roundups of suspected undocumented immigrants. Sentencing was set for Oct. 5.

The sentencing judge could have considered Arpaio's age and other factors. Given the history of "Sheriff Joe," presidential interference in the judicial system was premature and unwarranted.

As documented by federal investigators, Latinos living in Maricopa County during Arpaio's reign as sheriff from 1993 to 2016 suffered abuse and discrimination. They were four- to nine-times more likely to be pulled over in traffic stops, often for no good reason. One legal U.S. resident stopped in 2008 for not using his turn signal was jailed for 13 days before the case was dismissed.

The sheriff, who was finally voted out of office last year, was famous for housing inmates in a sweltering tent city. Spanish-speaking inmates picked up on immigration sweeps served harsh time in Arpaio's jails. Detention officers cursed at them in Spanish.

The federal investigators found that a "wall of distrust" between a harassed Latino community and the sheriff's department hampered police investigations. Hundreds of sexual assault and child molestation cases went unsolved where many of the victims appeared to be Latino.

Despite all this, Trump said of Arpaio: “He has protected people from crimes and saved lives. He doesn’t deserve to be treated this way.”

In fact, just the opposite is true. Latinos taken into custody were abused, and hundreds of crimes, many against children, were unsolved. This is the kind of person worthy of a pardon?

Arpaio's sentencing for contempt of court should have been allowed to go forward.

USA TODAY's editorial opinions are decided by its Editorial Board, separate from the news staff. Most editorials are coupled with an opposing view — a unique USA TODAY feature.

https://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2017/08/21/joe-arpaio-doesnt-deserve-pardon-editorials-debates/585386001/

August 27, 2017 8:37 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous sure is getting testy, lol!

If Hillary had done the slightest thing wrong decades of dozens of Republican partisan investigations would have find it by now. As good anonymous said, she's obviously squeaky clean.

Now let us praise God.

Oh Lord, oooh you are so big. So absolutely huge. Gosh, we’re all really impressed down here I can tell you. Forgive us, O Lord, for this dreadful toadying and barefaced flattery. But you are so strong and, well, just so super. Fantastic. Amen.

August 28, 2017 12:33 AM  
Anonymous Towson Patch said...

"TOWSON, MD - A Rosedale man who allegedly fired a weapon during the Aug. 12 riots in Charlottesville, Virginia, is being held at the Baltimore County Detention Center, according to reports.

Richard Wilson Preston, 52, of the 5800 block of Cedonia Avenue, was arrested Saturday on a warrant out of Virginia, court records show. He was detained as a fugitive from justice.

Preston was charged in Virginia with shooting a firearm within 1,000 feet of a school on Aug. 12, according to a statement from the Charlottesville Police Department published by the Charlottesville NBC affiliate.

Police filed the charge Thursday against Preston related to shots that were fired in the 100 block of West Market Street in Charlottesville, Virginia, on Aug. 12 after riots broke out as white nationalists protested the city's decision to take down a statue of General Robert E. Lee.

Preston is reportedly an imperial wizard with the Confederate White Knights in Rosedale, a chapter of the Ku Klux Klan.

The Virginia ACLU sent police a video that shows Preston shooting a gun at a counter-protester during the Charlottesville demonstration, according to a statement from the civil rights organization.

Warning: The video contains profanity and violence.

https://twitter.com/ACLUVA?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fpatch.com%2Fmaryland%2Ftowson%2Frosedale-kkk-wizard-charged-charlottesville-shooting-report

Three people lost their lives in relation to the Aug. 12 riots: Charlottesville resident Heather Heyer died after being run over by a driver believed to have Nazi sympathies, while dozens of others were injured. Hours later, two Virginia state troopers, Lt. H. Jay Cullen and Trooper-Pilot Berke M.M. Bates, were killed in a helicopter accident while monitoring the violent clashes.

The white nationalists' demonstration was targeted at the city's decision to remove the Lee statue, after the city council voted in February to take it from a public park and sell it in April. The removal is on hold since a judge issued a six-month injunction in May. A trial is expected on Sept. 1, court records show.

Similar rallies in support of keeping the Lee statue up included a Ku Klux Klan rally in July and a gathering of other groups of white nationalists in May.

Since the deaths on Aug. 12, Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe asked the General Assembly and local governments to consider taking Confederate statues down, while Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan has overseen the removal of a statue at the state house in Annapolis depicting the judge who upheld slavery in the Dred Scott case. Baltimore City also removed four statues with ties to the Confederacy, and Howard County removed a memorial honoring Confederate soldiers from its courthouse grounds.

Before the debate began in Charlottesville, Baltimore County changed the name of Robert E. Lee Park off Falls Road to Lake Roland. That occurred in 2016.

https://patch.com/maryland/towson/rosedale-kkk-wizard-charged-charlottesville-shooting-report

August 28, 2017 9:40 AM  
Anonymous You remember Rosedale, MD, don't you? said...

It's where transgender Chrissy Polis was beaten to the point of having a seizure for trying to use a public bathroom with individual stalls with locking doors.

http://baltimore.cbslocal.com/2011/09/13/woman-sentenced-to-5-years-in-rosedale-transgender-attack/

August 28, 2017 9:54 AM  
Anonymous the left uses Taliban tactic of destroying statues said...

when someone is arrested for shooting a gun or attacking someone, why does TTF think that is something worth a post on the blog?

it just shows that America works and the TTF hysteria is misplaced

Who's buried in Grant's Tomb?

That question used to be part of an old joke. But the answer might soon be "no one" if certain New York politicians get their way.

New York Mayor Bill DeBlasio has called for a review of the historic relevance of public monuments in the city. City Council Speaker Melissa Mark Viverito has said she wants Grant's Tomb to be on the review list. It seems that during the Civil War, Grant issued an order expelling Jews from Kentucky, Tennessee and Mississippi in an effort to crack down on black-market trading.

Christopher Columbus is on the list as well, of course, and Columbus Circle and its giant statue of the explorer are under review as well.

All of this is part of that national effort by the left to cleanse history of historical figures with checkered pasts.

That effort has been in the news ever since that fight in Charlottesville, Va., over the proposed removal of a statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee.

In the aftermath of the Charlottesville incident, the supposedly objective reporters of the mainstream media decided to manufacture the news rather than report the news

President Trump became the subject of an all-out assault by my fellow members of the media when he blamed the violence that day on people from "many sides." But as I noted in an earlier column on this, we soon saw a familiar pattern emerge.

The inside-the-Beltway crowd at first thought they finally had the Donald on the ropes. But before long he shifted attention from the so-called "alt-right" to the so-called "alt-left."

Before long the public was learning about the "Antifa" protesters who later showed up in Boston doing things like throwing bottles of urine at the cops separating them from some conservative protesters. News articles revealed that many in the Antifa crowd argue that violence is justified in protesting people they disagree with.

Soon we were seeing a repetition of that old saying about history repeating itself, first as tragedy and then as farce. That came when we learned that the ESPN network had removed a Korean-American sports commentator from covering the University of Virginia football game because his name is Robert Lee.

When this made its way around the internet, the typical preface was "This isn't from the Onion." It wasn't from that satirical site. The network really did replace Lee.

August 28, 2017 4:40 PM  
Anonymous the left uses Taliban tactic of destroying statues said...

Similarly, when I was discussing the New York situation with fellow conservative Jeff Bell, I remarked that I'd heard that some right-wing wag had suggested renaming the FDR Drive because Franklin Delano Roosevelt had ordered the internment of Japanese-Americans after World War II.

When I looked it up, it turned out I was wrong. That was not some witty right-winger. It was an actual tweet from a Queens Council Member by the name of Eric Ulrich.
(Note: Political consultant Rick Shaftan notes that Ulrich is a Republican, so this tweet may have been satirical. However, there is an online petition to rename Roosevelt Island.)

The Beltway types assumed that all right-thinking people supported the campaign to remove Confederate statues, he said. In fact, a recent PBS poll showed that 64 percent of Americans oppose it.

The Republican gubernatorial nominee in Virginia, Jersey-born Ed Gillespie, nearly lost the primary to an obscure and underfunded pro-Trump candidate named Corey Stewart who made retention of the statues his major issue, he said.

"What saved Gillespie was that in the final days he put up ads saying he was against taking down Confederate statues," Bell said. "This is not a niche issue in Virginia."

Like a lot of conservatives, Bell argues that the effort to remove historical artifacts has its roots in the Stalin methodology that George Orwell highlighted in "1984."

"Orwell satirized the idea of a 'memory hole' and now the left is starting to have a memory hole for anything they don't believe in," he said. "They don't want Americans to be proud of their country. They want to change the story into a triumph of evil."

That story might sell in New York City and in Washington, but most Americans don't want to hear it. The media went crazy when Trump tweeted that he wanted to preserve "beautiful" Confederate statues. But if the polls are any indication, most Americans agree with his tweet that it is "Sad to see the history and culture of our great country being ripped apart."

The Beltway crowd may be questioning Trump's sanity.

But at least he knows enough not to mess with the memory of the guy who's buried in Grant's Tomb

August 28, 2017 4:40 PM  
Anonymous bye-bye Dems said...

you may have heard that Trump's approval rating is just horrid

Dems think that's why they'll win big in 2018

but did you know that most world leaders right now are worse?

no you don't, because lyin' TTF and the rest of the media don't want you to know that:

French President Macron 36 percent

British Prime Minister Theresa May 34

Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe 34.2 percent

and the hopeful Democratic Party in the United States 38 percent

ouch!

August 29, 2017 12:19 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"and the hopeful Democratic Party in the United States 38 percent"

Still having problems with reading comprehension so you cherry pick and lie about the numbers.

RCP Average 8/3 - 8/22 -- 46.2 Dem 37.6 GOP Democrats +8.6

It's the GOP that's stuck in the UNDER 40% range, while Dems are above it.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/epolls/other/2018_generic_congressional_vote-6185.html

REALITY !

August 29, 2017 8:04 AM  
Anonymous Our Stupid President said...

Just 10 days before Hurricane Harvey descended upon Texas on Friday, wreaking havoc and submerging hundreds of miles of land under water, President Donald Trump signed an executive order revoking a set of regulations that would have made federally-funded infrastructure less vulnerable to flooding.

The Obama-era rules, which had not yet gone into effect, would have required the federal government to take into account the risk of flooding and sea-level rise as a result of climate change when constructing new infrastructure and rebuilding after disasters.

Experts are predicting Harvey — the most powerful storm to hit the US since 2004 — will cost Texas between $30 billion and $100 billion in damage.

And in the coming days, Congress will be called upon to send billions of federal dollars to help with the state's recovery and rebuilding efforts.

But because of Trump's rollback of Obama's Federal Flood Risk Management Standards, experts across the political spectrum say much of the federal money sent to Texas will likely be wasted on construction that will be insufficiently protected from the next storm.

"We will rebuild things that should not be rebuilt and ... in ways that are less safe and secure than they should be," Eli Lehrer, president of the DC free-market think tank R Street Institute, told Business Insider.

Shana Udvardy, a climate preparedness specialist at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said it would be a "grave mistake" to rebuild in Texas without taking into consideration the increasing occurrence and severity of major storms. She added that the federal government will lag behind some 600 towns and cities that have already implemented requirements to build between one and three feet above the 100-year flood level.

Lehrer called Trump's decision to revoke the standards "the biggest step backwards that has ever been taken in flood management policy" and said the move will waste untold amounts of taxpayer money, harm the environment, and cost lives.

He and others argue that Trump's decision was a politically motivated attempt to undo President Barack Obama's climate change legacy.

"If the Obama administration had simply described this as a sensible taxpayer protecting land-use measure, the regulations would still be in effect," Lehrer said.

Indeed, some Republican lawmakers have denounced the move.

"This executive order is not fiscally conservative," Rep. Carlos Curbelo, a Florida Republican, said in a statement. "It's irresponsible and it will lead to taxpayer dollars being wasted on projects that may not be built to endure the flooding we are already seeing and know is only going to get worse."

The Obama administration estimated that the regulations would increase building costs by 0.25% to 1.25%, but would save taxpayers significant costs in the future. Studies show that taxpayers will save $4 on post-disaster aid for every $1 spent on disaster mitigation.

SEE ALSO: NFL teams lead sports world in Houston aid after Hurricane Harvey

Joel Scata, an attorney with the Natural Resources Defense Council, told Business Insider that the regulations were in part spurred by the enormous costs of the disaster relief efforts following Hurricane Katrina in 2005 and Hurricane Sandy in 2012.

"This not only would have protected people and property from future flood events, but also was really meant to reduce the amount of disaster aid we spend on recovery," he said...

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/08/28/trump-reversed-regulations-protect-infrastructure-against-flooding-days-before-hurricane-harvey/23188610/

August 29, 2017 8:16 AM  
Anonymous Climate Change said...

Houston is experiencing its third ‘500-year’ flood in 3 years. How is that possible?

"Hurricane Harvey has brought “500-year” rainfall and flood conditions to the Houston area, according to officials at the Harris County Flood Control District.

But 500-year floods, as it turns out, happen more frequently than you might expect. The Houston area alone has seen no fewer than three such events in the past three years, according to local officials: Memorial Day floods in 2015 and 2016, followed by Hurricane Harvey's torrential rains this year.

So is Houston just on a historically unlucky run of flooding, to be followed by a return to normal soon? Or was there some miscalculation of how frequently these massive flooding events occur? Or, most alarmingly, is something else happening that suggests these catastrophic weather events are becoming much more common?...

The 1990s saw 30 percent more of these heavy rainmakers than the typical decade between 1900 and 1960 did. In the 2000s there were 40 percent more of these events...."

August 29, 2017 8:47 AM  
Anonymous Mueller-time said...

About two weeks ago, this rumor (http://www.rawstory.com/2017/08/longtime-trump-business-partner-told-family-he-knows-he-and-potus-are-going-to-prison-report/) from Paul Wood at The Spectator floated around the internet and no one knew what to make of it:

"...For several weeks there have been rumors that Sater is ready to rat again, agreeing to help Mueller. “He has told family and friends he knows he and POTUS are going to prison,” someone talking to Mueller’s investigators informed me.

Sater hinted in an interview earlier this month that he may be cooperating with both Mueller’s investigation and congressional probes of Trump.

“In about the next 30 to 35 days, I will be the most colourful character you have ever talked about,” Sater told New York Magazine. “Unfortunately, I can’t talk about it now, before it happens. And believe me, it ain’t anything as small as whether or not they’re gonna call me to the Senate committee.”..."

Maybe he’s as much of a BS artist as his friend in the White House. He certainly seems like the type. But if this is true it might mean we finally learn whether Trump was merely making corrupt deals with Russian oligarchs to line his own pockets or was actively colluding with the Russian government to become president of the United States. What a choice.

August 29, 2017 11:12 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"500-year floods, as it turns out, happen more frequently than you might expect."

oh OK, so they usually only happen every 500 years but they are now happening every year

sounds really bad

must be that evil global warmin' genie at it again!

"The Houston area alone has seen no fewer than three such events in the past three years, according to local officials: Memorial Day floods in 2015 and 2016, followed by Hurricane Harvey's torrential rains this year."

well, the Texas coast is second only to Florida, historically, for tropical storm hits

"So is Houston just on a historically unlucky run of flooding,"

not luck, just geography

familiarize yourself with a globe

"The 1990s saw 30 percent more of these heavy rainmakers than the typical decade between 1900 and 1960 did. In the 2000s there were 40 percent more of these events....""

hey, wait a minute here...

so, if there were enough of these events since the turn of the 20th century to base such percentages on, obviously the "500 year" characterization is completely false

can we find out who the idiot was that originally coined the phrase?

no doubt, a global alarmist

probably someone dependent on government grants that will only be made if there's an alarm over a potential disaster

an alarmist with a conflict of interest

shocker

August 29, 2017 11:16 AM  
Anonymous It's complicated said...

Science -- it's just too complicated for Trumpsters.

From the 500 year flood link above:

"...Let's start with what it means to be a "500-year” flood.

A 500-year flood isn't necessarily something that happens once every five hundred years. Rather, a 500-year flood is an event that has a 1 in 500 chance of occurring in any given year. “For a 500-year flood, there is a 0.2 percent chance of having a flood of that magnitude occurring” in any given year, according to the National Weather Service.

Think of it as more a statistical term than a meteorological one. The probability that any extreme storm will happen is completely independent of the probability of the next one. “If one of those events occurs, it has no effect on future events occurring,” according to the National Weather Service. “In other words, if a 100-year flood event occurs, that does NOT mean that people are 'safe' for 99 years. The risk of having the flood in any given year is the same," regardless of whether it occurred recently. Ditto for 500-year floods..."

And here's some more statistics for you:

"...anti-choicers like to argue that “crisis pregnancy centers” — facilities set up to resemble abortion clinics, in hopes of luring in poorly-informed pregnant women and pressure them not to have abortions — could step up and fill the holes left by defunding and shuttering the nation’s largest women’s health organization. In 2012, Texas Gov. Rick Perry (now Donald Trump’s energy secretary) attended the ribbon-cutting ceremony for one such center, touting it as a place low-income women could go for reproductive health care now that the state had cut Planned Parenthood funding from its family planning program.

This argument that crisis pregnancy centers (CPCs) could take Planned Parenthood’s money and effectively replace its family planning services, got put to the test in Texas. The Heidi Group was granted $5 million in family planning funds by the state to provide health care for 17,000 women in 2017, even though its leader, Carol Everett, is so ignorant about sexual health care that she once argued that abortion clinics could contaminate the water supply with sexually transmitted diseases.

To the surprise of nearly no one outside the Texas Republican Party, this plan appears to have been a massive failure. Texas Health and Human Services took back more than $4 million in grant money from the Heidi Group. The group had promised to get low-income women matched with doctors to provide family planning services, but was either unable or unwilling to actually do so. (The Heidi Group did not return Salon’s request for comment.)

... Rates of gonorrhea, syphilis and chlamydia are on the rise. Texas health officials report alarming “clusters” of HIV transmission popping up in 16 areas of the state. The rate of second-trimester abortions, which are more painful and expensive, is on the rise as women in the state have more difficulty getting contraception and early-term abortions. Texas now has the worst maternal mortality rate in the developed world, and has fallen behind the rest of the country when it comes to the decline in teen births. The state’s Medicaid system is straining as the number of births to low-income women rose, in part because they lack affordable or convenient access to contraception."

August 29, 2017 11:34 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"A 500-year flood isn't necessarily something that happens once every five hundred years. Rather, a 500-year flood is an event that has a 1 in 500 chance of occurring in any given year. “For a 500-year flood, there is a 0.2 percent chance of having a flood of that magnitude occurring” in any given year, according to the National Weather Service."

and how did they calculate that chance?

if not on actual historical data, then it would have to be based on the chance of certain phenomena occurring which leads to the flood

but climate science is really not that advanced to even understand the causes of weather, much less the probability of those cause occurring at certain times

"Science -- it's just too complicated"

it is for the National Weather Service, which can't even reliably tell what the weather will be for the next 48 hours

last week, I was following the forecasts for the band of totality and all the locations kept changing daily beginning with a week out

and where I went, they weren't right the day before

meteorology is not that really well developed or understood by science

it's actually too complicated

August 29, 2017 12:40 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "and the hopeful Democratic Party in the United States 38 percent [approval]"

Good anonymous posted "Still having problems with reading comprehension so you cherry pick and lie about the numbers.

RCP Average 8/3 - 8/22 -- 46.2 Dem 37.6 GOP Democrats +8.6

Wyatt/bad anonymous does this regularly - its no honest mistake on his part. When there's a poll comparing Democrat and Republican approval or who the public blames for a negative situation he often looks up a poll and swaps the Republican percentage for the Democrat percentage to create a false narrative that the Republicans are liked better than the Democrats.

He tries to justify his deception by saying that if he doesn't attribute a story he's changed the facts around in to the person/organization that wrote it he feels free to change it as he likes.

This is what you get from someone who says "there are many situations where its appropriate to lie."

August 29, 2017 5:52 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "can we find out who originally coined the phrase [once in a five hundred year flood]? no doubt, a global alarmist probably someone dependent on government grants that will only be made if there's an alarm over a potential disaster an alarmist with a conflict of interest shocker".

If it was true that climate scientists were only saying global warming is real to get grant money then they would be changing their position with changing administrations which they do not do.

Trump has appointed agency heads who are global warming deniers and are firing scientists left and right for holding to the position that global warming is real. Now the money is in denying global warming but you don't see American climate scientists changing positions to chase that money. That's because they're honest, contrary to your disproven assertion and they're maintaining the position that a vast array of evidence overwhelmingly supports.

August 29, 2017 6:10 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Great swathes of American climate scientists are being fired by the Trump administration rather than willingly lie and say global warming isn't happening.

These people can't be bought much to the chagrin of Trump and the global warming deniers he's appointed.

August 29, 2017 6:16 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Houston is drowning (in part) due to its "freedom" from regulations

August 29, 2017 6:25 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Good anonymous said "Science -- it's just too complicated [for Wyatt/bad anonymous]"

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "it is for the National Weather Service, which can't even reliably tell what the weather will be for the next 48 hour smeteorology is not that really well developed or understood by science it's actually too complicated".

LOL, Riiiiight. And yet somehow this flooding was predicted days in advance - I wonder how that happened?

Science - its true whether you believe it or not.

August 29, 2017 7:21 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

shut up, Priya

no one believes your lies

August 29, 2017 8:59 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Lame, troll.

August 29, 2017 9:41 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt, Good anonymous posted the link that proves you were lying about the Democrat approval poll results.

August 29, 2017 10:55 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous did the same thing during the October 2013 government shutdown, taking a poll on who the public blamed for the shutdown and assigning the Republican number to the Democrats and the Democrat number to the Republicans.

At the time I posted that I didn't believe him noting he hadn't posted a link to the poll and when I checked the poll his deception was laid bare.

August 29, 2017 11:03 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad Bad anonymous lies about polls on the government shutdown at October 12, 2013
in this thread

August 29, 2017 11:07 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

In this threadat September 12, 2016 11:06 PM Wyatt/bad anonymous said "there are many situations where lying is appropriate".

In this thread at October 14, 2013 1:41 PM Wyatt/bad anonymous says when he cuts and pastes a news article "unless I attribute a post to someone else, I'll feel free to change the wording as I like" (true or not).

He posted that to try to justify his swapping Democrat poll blame numbers for Republican ones on the government shutdown.

As anyone can see, I don't lie, Wyatt/bad anonymous does.

August 29, 2017 11:28 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Thank you Priya Lynn, for taking the time to dig for facts here on Vigilance.

You have clearly documented which commenter here at Vigilance feels "free" to lie.

No wonder the troll supports fellow liar Trump.

The Party of Lincoln is being Trumped by the Party of Liars.

August 30, 2017 8:20 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

https://www.militarytimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2017/08/30/transgender-military-service-unchanged-as-mattis-announces-panel-to-study-policy-implementation/

August 30, 2017 9:43 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

interesting. here's an article in Townhall with all the poll numbers that "bye-bye, Dems" cited

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/leahbarkoukis/2017/08/28/gingrich-what-the-medias-not-telling-you-about-trumps-approval-rating-n2374123

you should always be wary when someone tells you that a poll number is a "lie" and then cites another poll

there are myriad polls and they seldom agree

and most of them are wrong

if not, Hillary would have won Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Florida and would be President now

and if anyone thinks the Dems are popular, note that where it counts, elections, Dems have lost several special elections since Trump became President and won none

that's right zero victories in 2017 to go with their historic defeat in 2016

ouch!

btw, "bye-bye, Dems" threw in the comment about Dems as an aside but the main point was that many Western leaders, those on Britian, France and Japan have lower approval ratings than Trump but lyin' TTF and the press doesn't tell you that

by not responding, TTF has ceded this significant point

thay had no choice

August 30, 2017 12:38 PM  
Anonymous Cherry pits said...

" I was following the forecasts for the band of totality and all the locations kept changing daily beginning with a week out"

There goes the troll again, this time cherry picking some weather forecasts when trying to discuss climate change.

Climate scientists have long predicted an increase in the frequency of severe storms on Earth and now Houston has been flooded by severe "500-year" storms three years in a row.

That's a real head scratcher for you deplorable climate change deniers.

" Dems have lost several special elections since Trump became President and won none"

Once again the troll goes cherry picking only federal elections and skipping state elections where fivethirtyeight.com has reported:

Democrats Are Overperforming In Special Elections Almost Everywhere
That bodes well for them in 2018.




August 30, 2017 1:55 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "you should always be wary when someone tells you that a poll number is a "lie" and then cites another poll there are myriad polls and they seldom agree and most of them are wrong"

Your poll is from 2 & 1/2 months ago and was an outlier then. Democat favourability was 44% at the time and consistently above the Republican party. You tried to portray the situation as being the opposite, that Republicans were more favoured than Democats - that was a lie.

Its ironic that you should claim that most polls are wrong given that during elections you frequently take the one outlier of a poll that shows Republican doing well and ignore the majority of polls showing the Democrat doing well.

You're doing the same thing here, taking a single outlier poll from 2 & 1/2 months ago and ignoring the current RCP average of polls which shows Democratic party much more favoured than the Republican party.

Individual polls usually vary thats why an average of polls is usually more accurate than any single poll but being the dishonest person you are you like to ignore averages of polls and highlight a single outlying poll that shows your party doing better.

August 30, 2017 3:08 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous said " Dems have lost several special elections since Trump became President and won none"

Good anonymous said "Once again the troll goes cherry picking only federal elections and skipping state elections where fivethirtyeight.com has reported:".

And what Wyatt/bad anonymous isn't telling people is that all those federal special elections were in Republican strongholds historically won by huge margins and the Democrats overperformed in all of them by several percentage points making most of them pretty close when Republicans should have won by very large margins - in other words, even in those special elections Democrats did far better than they have in the past, the momentum is with the Democrats.

August 30, 2017 3:39 PM  
Anonymous the economy stupid, it really is - hoho heehee hohoho ! said...

Which party will win in 2018?

Could it be the party that makes America better off?

The Commerce Department said on Wednesday that the economy had expanded at an annual rate of 3 percent in the second quarter of the year, a substantial acceleration over the first quarter’s lackluster 1.2 percent pace, when America was still shaking off the drearily lackluster management of the Obama administration.

President Trump’s eventual goal of 4 percent growth appears much more doable, and this is the economy’s best quarterly showing in two full years.

Mr. Trump talked up the latest figures in a speech on Wednesday in Springfield, Mo., laying out his plans for tax overhaul. Despite nearly uniform skepticism from liberal economists, he insisted that much faster economic growth was within reach.

“I happen to be one who thinks we can go much higher than 3 percent,” the president said. “There is no reason why we should not.”

August 31, 2017 1:07 PM  
Anonymous lame duck duck now golden goose said...

Word!

America will never kill the goose that lays golden eggs!

Trump is a goose!

The economy is full of golden eggs now!

August 31, 2017 1:11 PM  
Anonymous a little trip down memory lane said...

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/elections/live_results/2016_general/president/map.html

August 31, 2017 1:22 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

You are tripping if you think trickle down AKA "voodoo" economics works.

You GOPers fuck up the economy every time with your greedy tax cuts and then leave it to the Dems to clean up your messes.

Clinton took us from the Reagan/Bush deficits to surpluses and Obama has pretty well cleaned up hemorrhaging of the Baby Bush recession.

What do we need surpluses for you repeatedly ask?

Our friends in east Texas and west Louisiana can tell you.

"Rainy day fund

A rainy day or rainy day fund is a reserved amount of money to be used in times when regular income is disrupted or decreased in order for typical operations to continue. In the United States, the term is usually used to apply to the funds maintained by most U.S. states to help deal with budget shortfalls in years where revenues do not match expenditures."

August 31, 2017 2:35 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Nice red map.

It looks like Russia.

August 31, 2017 2:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2017/08/31/harvey-is-a-1000-year-flood-event-unprecedented-in-scale

August 31, 2017 2:58 PM  
Anonymous Doing the same thing and expecting a different outcome yet again said...

TRUMP’S NEW TAX SCAM: SELLING PLUTOCRACY AS POPULISM
Trickle-down is back, baby.


"...the White House still has no plan of its own after holding a self-congratulatory press conference in April to unveil a one-page, double-spaced, bullet-point list of tax-reform goals...

IIt’s not clear how the G.O.P.’s tax proposals, like eliminating the estate tax, will improve access to the American dream. While the exact outlines of the plan have yet to be defined—it’s always easier to sell the idea than the specifics—It’s not clear how the G.O.P.’s tax proposals, like eliminating the estate tax, will improve access to the American dream. While the exact outlines of the plan have yet to be defined—it’s always easier to sell the idea than the specifics—the broad strokes of the Trump tax cuts appear aimed at rewarding the business class. His past proposals have included a historic slashing of the corporate tax rate, bringing the top individual rate down to 35 percent, and introducing a loophole that would allow people like hedge-fund managers and lawyers to reorganize their businesses as pass-through entities and pay the corporate rate on their income, which Trump wants to be 15 percent. “Those are not exactly populist, keep-rich-people-from-rigging-the-tax-system provisions,” Roosevelt Institute fellow Michael Linden told the Wall Street Journal. “Those are the opposite of those things.” A July analysis by the Tax Policy Center found that the cuts proposed by the Trump administration in April would be 23,500 times better for the ultra-rich than the poor, giving the former an average tax cut of $937,700 to the latter’s $40....

Accessibility appears to be the operative word: according to the White House’s reasoning, letting corporations keep more of their own money will redound to everyone’s benefit. “Every American worker will get a pay raise by getting to keep more of their paychecks,” the same official went on, promising that the money would trickle down while conspicuously avoiding that toxic phrase. “We’re going to win again by slashing the business tax rate and making our companies competitive again. They’ll be able to hire more workers, boost wages, and bring back trillions of dollars parked overseas. We’re going to make taxes simple and easy so people don’t have to spend a bunch of time and money on preparing their returns.”..."

August 31, 2017 3:16 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"You are tripping if you think trickle down AKA "voodoo" economics works"

what works is to reduce the size of government, which is inefficient and funnels assets toward political ends

our nation is much better off with the economy in private hands

"You GOPers fuck up the economy every time with your greedy tax cuts and then leave it to the Dems to clean up your messes"

you mean like when John Kennedy reduced taxes and the economy boomed?

or when Obama borrowed more money than any administration in history and kept interest rates are zero for eight years and could still only stimulate anemic growth?

Dems are full of crap

truth is America boomed and had low employment from 1982 to 2006, when Dems gained control of Congress

now, America is booming again

"Clinton took us from the Reagan/Bush deficits to surpluses and Obama has pretty well cleaned up hemorrhaging of the Baby Bush recession"

you ever hear of Newt Gingrich's contract with America

it promised to bring the budget into balance and Clinton was forced to submit to Gingrich by the voters

it was beautiful

"What do we need surpluses for you repeatedly ask?

Our friends in east Texas and west Louisiana can tell you.

Rainy day fund"

governmental surpluses aren't kept on a rainy day fund, you fool

have you ever had an IQ test?

here the Washington Post explains that at UVA, there weren't "good people" on both sides, there are "bad people" on both sides:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/yes-antifa-is-the-moral-equivalent-of-neo-nazis/2017/08/30/9a13b2f6-8d00-11e7-91d5-ab4e4bb76a3a_story.html?utm_term=.8b6150d95cac

August 31, 2017 11:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

in recent years, a post-modern line of reasoning has taken hold among the far left with the totalitarian concept that speech that doesn't support them is an act of violence and physical violence is justified to counter it

many TTFers here post comments revealing that they have gone down this dark ideological path

these are the Bernie supporters who invaded Trump rallies, punching people

these are the hoodlums that smashed windows and trashed cars on inauguration day

they rushed the racist rally in Charlottesville with clubs swinging

they vandalize statues of Robert E Lee, Chrsitopher Columbus, and Teddy Roosevelt

they want to dynamite Mount Rushmore

they are as bad as neo-Nazis and the Taliban

the antifa wants a civil war and heresy won't be tolerated:

http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/civil-rights/348389-opinion-antifa-threatens-to-turn-america-into-an

September 01, 2017 7:26 AM  
Anonymous ANGRY WHITE MAN RANTS ABOVE said...

*yawn*

September 01, 2017 7:57 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

the dim, the dull, the low IQ folks

they're always bored

at least they aren't as violent as their friends

after all, they've got nothing better to do

than sit around the house, get high and watch the tube

September 01, 2017 8:11 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

You have described the deplorable Trump voter to a T.

September 01, 2017 8:51 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

See how the opioid epidemic swept across the United States

URL for the fearfully paranoid:

https://www.statnews.com/2017/04/25/opioid-deaths-map/

Note how current opioid mortality maps mirror Trump's great Russian red rust belt 2016 election map.

September 01, 2017 9:07 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Fox News Poll: Americans Think Donald Trump Is An Unstable, Dishonest, Immoral Bully

Americans aren’t holding back when it comes to President Donald Trump.

A new poll from Fox News found that many Americans think the 45th president of the United States is an unstable bully.

Respondents were asked how well certain words described the president. For “bully,” 39 percent chose “extremely,” 14 percent chose “very” and 20 percent went with “somewhat.”

For the word “unstable,” 33 percent selected “extremely,” 11 percent chose “very” and 16 percent agreed with “somewhat.”

Just 27 percent said he was “not at all” a bully while 38 percent said he was “not at all” unstable.

The same poll showed that 56 percent of respondents said Trump was “not at all” presidential, 55 percent said he was “not at all” a moral leader, 53 percent said he was “not at all” compassionate or steady and 50 percent said he was “not at all” honest.

Despite these views, 58 percent of respondents believed Trump would finish his term.

The poll of 1,006 registered voters was conducted Aug. 27-29, and had a margin of error of 3 points.

Portions of the poll released earlier this week found a disapproval rating of 55 percent while 56 percent said Trump was “tearing the country apart.”

Full poll results: http://www.foxnews.com/politics/interactive/2017/08/31/fox-news-poll-august-31-2017.html

September 01, 2017 9:31 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Fox News Poll: Americans Think Donald Trump Is An Unstable, Dishonest, Immoral Bully"

of course he is

Unfortunately, no Republican could overcome his tactics in the primaries

and the Dems didn't even bother to offer an acceptable alternative

so far, it's not a complete disaster though

the economy is humming and originalists who will protect the Constitution are taking up judgeships

we can make it to 2020

September 01, 2017 1:13 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"We" who?

You must talking about angry white guys with enough money to gamble on the stock market.

Poor folks without flood insurance who used to live in Southeast Texas and Southwest Louisiana may not make it to 2020 regardless of the "economy humming along" and "originalists" who think the three-fifths compromise was a workable solution to slavery.

September 01, 2017 2:58 PM  
Anonymous Size matters said...

Trump Fires Longtime Event Organizer Over Sparse Crowd at Phoenix Rally

If you watched the TV broadcast of President Trump’s rally in Phoenix, Arizona, it might have looked like the event went exactly as planned. The “Blacks for Trump” guy was front and center, and other enthusiastic Trump supporters booed journalists and applauded the president’s racist dog whistles, right on cue. As soon as Trump took the stage he marveled, “What a crowd,” and claimed (falsely) that there weren’t many protesters outside.

“A lot of people in here, a lot of people pouring right now,” Trump said. “They can get them in. Whatever you can do, fire marshals, we’ll appreciate it.”

A short time after the event, Trump noted the crowd size again, tweeting: “Thank you Arizona. Beautiful turnout of 15,000 in Phoenix tonight!”

But according to Bloomberg, Trump was actually very upset by the “beautiful turnout” — so much so that he’s fired George Gigicos. Or rather, he had top security aide Keith Schiller tell Gigicos that he’ll never manage a Trump rally again, because Trump doesn’t actually like to fire people.

Gigicos organized Trump’s rallies during the campaign, and he served as White House director of scheduling and advance until last month, when he quit to return to his consulting business. He organized the Phoenix event as a contractor to the Republican National Committee.

Trump’s notorious sensitivity about crowd size makes it hard to pin down how many people were actually at the event. City of Phoenix spokeswoman Julie Watters tried to back up Trump’s claim of 15,000, though she said there weren’t that many people in the venue. “There were more than 10,000 inside and there were approximately between 4,500 to 5,000 outside who were turned away because the event was wrapping up,” she said. Jon Hotchkiss of Be Less Stupid, who attended the event, estimated that the number of people who saw Trump speak was more like 4,000.

[Check out Jon Hotchkiss' video of Trump's Aug. 2017 AZ campaign rally at YouTube.com
https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=143&v=IPL11keVyx8]

The Washington Post reported that as Trump’s 72-minute tirade dragged on, the crowd lost interest:

"Hundreds left early, while others plopped down on the ground, scrolled through their social media feeds or started up a conversation with their neighbors. After waiting for hours in 107-degree heat to get into the rally hall — where their water bottles were confiscated by security — people were tired and dehydrated and the president just wasn’t keeping their attention. Although Trump has long been the master of reading the mood of a room and quickly adjusting his message to satisfy as many of his fans as possible, his rage seemed to cloud his senses."

But Trump was upset even before he took the stage. TV and social media coverage showed the crowd was thin when Trump arrived at 6:30 p.m. The room filled in as several people introduced the president, but he still blamed the lackluster energy in the room on Gigicos’s staging:

"Gigicos had staged the event in a large multipurpose room. The main floor space was bisected by a dividing wall, leaving part of the space empty. There were some bleachers off to the side, but otherwise the audience was standing — and the scene appeared flat, lacking the energy and enthusiasm of other rallies."

Though Gigicos has been banished, it seems Trump is still fixated on the size of his adoring crowd in Phoenix. “You saw the massive crowd we had,” he said at a White House news conference on Monday. “The people went crazy when I said, ‘What do you think of Sheriff Joe?’ Or something to that effect.”

September 01, 2017 3:39 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

""We" who?

You must talking about angry white guys with enough money to gamble on the stock market."

I've heard of people like you

you're a racist, aren't you?

"Poor folks without flood insurance who used to live in Southeast Texas and Southwest Louisiana may not make it to 2020"

they'll make it

contributions are pouring in from throughout America, including a million from you=know=who

I can tell you church groups from across the country will pour in to rebuild

it's happened before

regardless of the "economy humming along" and "originalists" who think the three-fifths compromise was a workable solution to slavery.

September 01, 2017 9:53 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The Department of Homeland Security is classifying actions by the leftist group known as antifa -- or anti-fascist groups -- as "domestic terrorist violence."

Politico reported Friday that according to previously unreported documents, even before the deadly August 12th rally in Charlottesville, the DHS had issued warnings about the likelihood of lethal violence by leftists.

But it was "anarchist extremists" that were blamed for the violence at a public rally in April 2016. Since then, antifa has become increasingly confrontational and dangerous.

September 01, 2017 9:56 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

""originalists" who think the three-fifths compromise was a workable solution to slavery"

here's a real stupid ass comment

there are no originalists who think the three-fifths compromise was a workable solution to slavery

the Constitution provides for amendments

consider the Bill of Rights, after the drugs wear off

it doesn't provide for judges changing the Constitution to fit their whims or the latest fashion

and certainly not by antifa violence

September 01, 2017 11:23 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

when you're hot, you're hot

when you're not, you're not

and you get violent

Dems are not hot

September 02, 2017 9:23 AM  
Anonymous Blue Blooded American said...

Our fathers went to war to fight fascism. The fact that our own government, and people like Anon here, would feel comfortable calling them criminals and terrorists today is a perfect statement of what has gone wrong.

Fascism is bad, Violence is to be avoided but standing up for what is right is necessary. Fighting fascism was good when our fathers were young and it is good now.

You may argue about whether breaking a particular window was criminal, or whether a certain provocateur deserved to be kicked, but violence is a reasonable response to someone who is trying to take your rights away.

September 02, 2017 10:05 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Our fathers went to war to fight fascism"

you father did?

how old are you?

I'm pretty old and my GRANDFATHER received a medal because he was wounded in Normandy

I do have a cousin who received a medal his acts of bravery in fighting the totalitarians in Vietnam

the antifas are totalitarian, like the Vietnamese communists we fought against

they are also like the Korean communists who we are still technically at war with

and who are currently blatantly threatening to nuke us

totalitarians believe certain speech and thought is the moral equivalent of physical violence and justifies a physically violent response

NO SPEECH, regardless of how evil, justifies anarchy and physical violence

if neo-Nazis act violently, it is the government's job to bring them to justice

if they just speak evilly, they should be countered with truthful and righteous speech

this approach has resulted in steady progress in tolerance and increasing marginalization of racists

but now, Dems feel threatened because we've become so tolerant that they see the end of their wedge issue as being imminent

so, they do everything they can to inflame racial tension

that's evil

"The fact that our own government, and people like Anon here, would feel comfortable calling them criminals and terrorists today is a perfect statement of what has gone wrong."

people who counter speech with violence are criminals, by definition

"violence is a reasonable response to someone who is trying to take your rights away"

not if all they're doing is advocating taking your rights away

but what right are you referring to?

have a feeling that you aren't referring to rights at all

do let us know

September 02, 2017 12:47 PM  
Anonymous Blue Blooded American said...

That was lame, anon.

Yes my FATHER was able to walk, with a cane, for most of his life after being shot down over France by fascists. He was told he would never walk but he got off his crutches for his wedding and mostly got around without them after that, until his later years. I am that old and there are a lot of us whose fathers fought Hitler and Mussolini. Fighting fascism is not a silly thing that liberals do.

You don't even know what an "antifa" is so shut up about them. They oppose fascism. They aren't even an organized group, it can be anybody but they are not going to let the fascists take over this country without a fight. Tough question: it is morally right to punch a fascist? Hmm, the same question in reverse: is it morally right to let fascists rise in power and take over your country? Is that really a hard question for you, anon? It's not about logic, these are not people making an logical case for empowering the white race and sending other people back to where they came from, it's about power. And you fight it with power.

Also the government is not going to "bring fascists to justice," Smart Guy, because the government is fascist. That is why they have declared antifa "terrorists," and not the Klan or real fascists.

"people who counter speech with violence" are not criminals when that speech is taking their rights away. You want to make a distinction between "advocating taking your rights away" and "taking our rights away?" You are a nut. Has the DREAM Act been rescinded yet? Or are they just talking about it?

September 02, 2017 1:06 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Troll anon does not seem to realize that "baby boomers," who are defined as people 51-69 years old now, are called that because after World War II the soldiers came back and got married and started having kids all at once. The boomers are the children of the WWII generation. Their fathers came home with a lot of shrapnel in them and lot of dedication to fight fascism. That "greatest generation" is dying off now but it would break their hearts to see that their sacrifice failed in the long run.

September 03, 2017 11:41 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Haggard's law:

The likelihood of a person harbouring secret desires to engage in sexual and/or romantic activities with members of the same sex is directly proportional to the frequency and volume of said person's vocalized objections to gayness...Wyatt

September 04, 2017 5:20 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Haggard's law:

The likelihood of a person harbouring secret desires to engage in sexual and/or romantic activities with members of the same sex is directly proportional to the frequency and volume of said person's vocalized objections to gayness.."

Priya has a rich fantasy life. Of course, it all started with Priya began imagining that Priya is a different gender than Priya is. In Priya's world of unicorns and leprechauns, you are whatever gender you think you are. Let's just be glad this only extends to gender and not, say, species.

You will see that no one in the above stream of comments over a couple of weeks has mentioned homosexuality. There was one comment by a TTFer about a transgender but everyone ignored it.

Truth is, the theme of this blog is the liberal misuse of the gravitas of science to further the liberal political agenda.

here's a psychological principle:

The likelihood of a person harbouring a secret fear of God is directly proportional to the frequency and volume of said person's vocalized objections to religious belief

September 04, 2017 9:23 PM  
Anonymous yet another corrupt Hillary supporter said...

When Sen. Robert Menendez stands in a New Jersey courtroom Wednesday to face bribery charges, a lot more than his political future will be riding on the outcome.

The case, the first against a sitting U.S. senator in nearly a decade, also might affect the delicate balance of power in the Senate, where a thin Republican majority has made it difficult for the party to pass legislation.

If the jury convicts Menendez, Republicans will boot him from office immediately, allowing Gov. Chris Christie, a Republican, to appoint his replacement.

Menendez, 63, once the powerful chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, is accused of taking gifts for years from a wealthy South Florida eye doctor, Salomon Melgen, including plane rides, a stay in a five-star Paris hotel and visits to a resort in the Dominican Republic with three different girlfriends.

Menendez failed to report any of the gifts on disclosure forms until news reports in 2013 made the trips public.

September 05, 2017 11:26 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Wow, a supporter of Hillary Clinton's took free plane rides and stayed in a nice hotel that somebody else paid for.

Whew, it's good we didn't elect her!

September 05, 2017 12:33 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"That was lame, anon.

Yes my FATHER was able to walk, with a cane, for most of his life after being shot down over France by fascists. He was told he would never walk but he got off his crutches for his wedding and mostly got around without them after that, until his later years. I am that old and there are a lot of us whose fathers fought Hitler and Mussolini. Fighting fascism is not a silly thing that liberals do."

we fought militarily against Hitler and Mussolini and, for those of us not racist like you, Tojo

not because they espoused some ideas we disagreed with but because they attacked us, and attacked and invaded us our allies

saying that, I certainly do disagree with their ideas, but that's not what the war was over

the war was over their imperialistic attacks on us and our allies

indeed, there were Americans, most famously Charles Lindberg and the founder of Planned Parenthood, Margaret Sanger, who agreed with the ideas of the Nazis

prior to WWII, most of the status quo science community, the types who argue for global warming now, believed strongly in the eugenics philosophy of the Nazis

"You don't even know what an "antifa" is so shut up about them"

actually, they are a group that believes that anyone who speaks in favor of fascism, as they define it, deserves a violent response

"They oppose fascism. They aren't even an organized group, it can be anybody but they are not going to let the fascists take over this country without a fight."

right now, they are the best friend of the fascists

fascists have withered to a small group of nuts who occasionally hold rallies with a half dozen people, completely marginalized

now, Dems and liberals, afraid of losing their racism issue have inflamed tensions with trivial issues like statues and mascots, which harmlessly existed for years while fascists became increasingly marginalized

now there's a still unlikely, but slightly higher, chance they will get traction with those don't like change

"Tough question: it is morally right to punch a fascist?"

not tough at all, unless in self-defense, it's wrong to assault anyone

"Hmm, the same question in reverse: is it morally right to let fascists rise in power and take over your country?"

not going to happen if you don't assault them

there are decades of proof

"Is that really a hard question for you, anon? It's not about logic, these are not people making an logical case for empowering the white race and sending other people back to where they came from, it's about power. And you fight it with power."

the genius of Americans is that there is peaceful means to power

"Also the government is not going to "bring fascists to justice," Smart Guy, because the government is fascist."

actually, it isn't

"That is why they have declared antifa "terrorists," and not the Klan or real fascists."

everyone's familiar with the Klan and the neo-Nazis, antifa needed to be defined because Americans don't know as much about them

""people who counter speech with violence" are not criminals when that speech is taking their rights away"

none of the fascist rallies have taken anyone's rights away

"You want to make a distinction between "advocating taking your rights away" and "taking our rights away?" You are a nut."

if you don't see that distinction, you're a nut

and a dangerous one

"Has the DREAM Act been rescinded yet? Or are they just talking about it?"

while I personally favor compassion to these kids, this is not a matter of rights

I'd like to see Trump reverse this decision and Sessions retire, it doesn't warrant violent revolution

looks like Congress will overrule Trump anyway

conclusion of all this: you sound dangerous and if you commit acts of violence, you will belong in prison

September 05, 2017 12:47 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"here's a psychological principle:

The likelihood of a person harbouring a secret fear..."


Why don't you tell us the psychological principle of a person who harboring great need to come to Vigilance blog for years to insult other human beings who happen to be a little different than most of us.

September 05, 2017 1:29 PM  
Anonymous Blue Blooded American said...

1. WWII: they didn't attack us
2.Yes it was their ideas that we disagreed with
3. "fascists have withered to a small group of nuts" -- no, fascists now control the White House and apparently a significant part of congress, which is cooperating with the WH
4. "it's wrong to assault anyone" Not when they are trying to take your rights away so their race can control the country
5. "everyone's familiar with the Klan and the neo-Nazis" Everyone knows what a terrrorist is, and this government refuses to include rightwing terrorsts, who are responsible for the greatest proportion of terrorist attacks in the country, by far. But they include antifa, which isn't even a thing
6. "while I personally favor compassion to these kids" who cares what you think, talk leads to action, that is the point; advocating a position led to actually beginning the deportation of nearly a million honest Americans who had been promised a home here. That's how it works, fascist talk about the supremacy of white people and "making America great again" has led to deportations of nonwhite residents, breaking up nonwhite families, blocking travel to nonwhite/nonchristian countries. It starts with talk and that's where you have to stop it, by speaking out and by acting to stop it from spreading further because we are too polite to tell somebody to STFU
7. "if you commit acts of violence, you will belong in prison" -- you tell that to my father and the thousands of other Americans who gave their lives to stop fascism. War is violence. Punching a random nazi is much less violent than what happened, say, to Dresden, and we can prevent that sort of disaster in an American city of the future.

If you ever wondered what you would have done if you were a German citizen as Hitler rose to power, just look at what you're doing now.

September 05, 2017 1:46 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

A Pew Research Center survey conducted this year found that 52 percent of U.S. Muslims say gayness should be accepted by society. In contrast, only 34 percent of white evangelical Protestants believed in 2016 that gayness should be accepted by society.

The rate at which white evangelicals are shifting their views is slower than the rate for Muslims. White evangelicals shifted their views by 11 percentage points between 2006 and 2016. Muslims’ acceptance of gayness shot up by 25 percentage points between 2007 and 2017.

So much for Wyatt and Theresa absurdly claiming LGBT people should support anti-gay christians because Muslims are more anti-gay than christians are.

September 05, 2017 2:31 PM  
Anonymous Trump chump said...

"contributions are pouring in from throughout America, including a million from you=know=who"

A million dollars is chump change for a supposed you-know-what billionaire (https://www.moneytips.com/how-much-donald-trump-says-he-is-worth/507) whose regular weekend golfing and TV viewing vacations cost US taxpayers that much and more.

Here's what a real billionaire has pledged: $36,000,000 from Michael and Susan Dell who are starting a new charity that aims to raise $100,000,000.

Meanwhile, Trump costs US taxpayers a lot more than he has offered to give to help clean up after Hurricane Harvey.

"....Secret Service Director Randolph "Tex" Alles, in an interview with USA TODAY, said more than 1,000 agents have already hit the federally mandated caps for salary and overtime allowances that were meant to last the entire year.

The agency has faced a crushing workload since the height of the contentious election season, and it has not relented in the first seven months of the administration. Agents must protect Trump – who has traveled almost every weekend to his properties in Florida, New Jersey and Virginia – and his adult children whose business trips and vacations have taken them across the country and overseas.

"The president has a large family, and our responsibility is required in law,'' Alles said. "I can't change that. I have no flexibility.''

Alles said the service is grappling with an unprecedented number of White House protectees. Under Trump, 42 people have protection, a number that includes 18 members of his family. That's up from 31 during the Obama administration.

Overwork and constant travel have also been driving a recent exodus from the Secret Service ranks, yet without congressional intervention to provide additional funding, Alles will not even be able to pay agents for the work they have already done.

The compensation crunch is so serious that the director has begun discussions with key lawmakers to raise the combined salary and overtime cap for agents, from $160,000 per year to $187,000 for at least the duration of Trump's first term.

But even if such a proposal was approved, about 130 veteran agents would not be fully compensated for hundreds of hours already amassed, according to the agency...."

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/08/21/secret-service-cant-pay-agents-because-trumps-frequent-travel-large-family/529075001/

So Secret Service agents go without pay while our Grifter-in- Chief's DC’s emptiest hotel is the city’s most expensive
The presidency turns a profit.


"...Trump’s Washington hotel has raked in about $18 million in the four months following Trump’s inauguration. Out of the $18 million made in revenue, the hotel made a profit of nearly $2 million despite budgeting for a $2.1 million loss.

The hotel is profitable despite a “44.4% occupancy rate compared with 69.5% for comparative hotels.” This is because people pay more to stay at the Trump hotel than any other place in DC.

So far this year, guests have paid an average of $652.98 a night to stay there, significantly higher than the projected daily rate of $416. According to data provided to the Washington Post by Smith Travel Research, the politically inflated rates at the Trump International have even made it the most expensive hotel in Washington DC, with guests staying at comparable hotels like the Hay-Adams, Four Seasons, and Willard only paying an average of $495 a night. Even the food and beverage at the hotel has seen a hike in prices, with the cheapest cocktail at the bar priced at $24, up from $16. The bar’s signature cocktail, featuring caviar and a raw oyster, goes for an even $100..."

But there's no doubt the victims of Hurricane Harvey appreciate the $1,000,000 small change he's tossing their way.

September 05, 2017 3:19 PM  
Anonymous Welcome to Trumplandia said...

http://www.care2.com/causes/trump-reverses-obama-era-ban-on-military-equipment-for-police.html

https://www.thenation.com/article/the-houston-stadium-grift-comes-home-to-roost/

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2017/09/02/doj-confirms-no-evidence-supporting-trump-claim-obama-wiretapped-him/628758001/

September 05, 2017 3:48 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The popular vote losing pussy grabber may have promised to give $1 million but its highly questionable whether or not he'll ever follow through and cough up the money.

During the 2016 campaign he promised millions to veterans groups but when a journalist checked months after he claimed he had made the contribution no one had received anything. If I remember correctly he was eventually shamed into keeping his promise but he has a long history of pledging money to charities and not following through, or using the money others have given to his charity to give to a different charity and then falsely claim the money came from him.

Last I heard Trump was already verbally backing away from his pledge to give a million to victims of the flood.

He really is an incredibly cheap bastard for a supposed billionaire.

September 05, 2017 5:01 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Trump even used the money others had given to his charity to pay around a $17 bill for his son's dues to boy scouts.

September 05, 2017 5:04 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

yes, giving a million's just not enough

although it's about a million more than any TTF losers gave

September 05, 2017 11:19 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"survey conducted this year found that 52 percent of U.S. Muslims say gayness should be accepted by society"

brought to you by the same morons who think Jehovah Witnesses and Mormons are Christians

people who think homosexuality is just another fun way to look at things in the land of unicorns, are not Muslims

they were simply raised as Muslims

by that definition, Priya is a Christian

September 05, 2017 11:46 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

you mean Priya Lynn?

hhahahahahahahahahahahahahahahohohohohohohohohohohohohohoheeheeheeheeheeheeheeh0h0h0h0h0hardyharharhar

September 05, 2017 11:49 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "people who think gayness is just another fun way to look at things are not Muslims they were simply raised as Muslims by that definition Priya is a christian"

LOL, you're so afraid to admit the truth.

I don't identify as a christian. These people in this survey were all self-identied Muslims.

American Muslims are less bigoted than evangelical christians.

September 06, 2017 1:27 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

You're so gullible Wyatt/bad anonymous.

As a percentage of net worth Trump giving a million is the equivalent of me giving $2.

Just because Trump says he's going to give a million is no reason to believe he actually will - he's already been making noises that he's backing away from his promise. He talks big about giving to charity but virtually never comes through and actually does it.

September 06, 2017 1:41 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"As a percentage of net worth Trump giving a million is the equivalent of me giving $2."

no, it's like you earning a million and giving it

so when Trump provides services to customers and earns a million and donates it, that's more significant than someone who gives $2 dollars of the money they've collected from the government while making zero contribution to society

see the difference?

"Just because Trump says he's going to give a million is no reason to believe he actually will - he's already been making noises that he's backing away from his promise. He talks big about giving to charity but virtually never comes through and actually does it."

And how much did Obama contribute to victims of Sandy?

September 06, 2017 6:36 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"American Muslims are less bigoted than evangelical christians."

standards of sexual morality are not bigotry

one problem with polls is that they generalize

the 52% that are nonchalant about homosexuality are not true Muslims because homosexuality violates Islam

but those who believe in actual Islam are much more dangerous to gays than evangelical Christians

September 06, 2017 6:43 AM  
Anonymous Actually said...

it's about a million more than any TTF loser TROLLs gave

September 06, 2017 8:04 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Trump hasn't given anybody a million dollars. He only said he would.

September 06, 2017 8:12 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"so when Trump provides services to customers and earns a million and donates it

Q. And when was/is that?

A. Almost never!

The pussy grabber mostly gives other people's money to charity, not his own.

Apparently you missed David A. Farenthold's Pulizer Prize in Journalism for reporting on the truth of "the illusions Trump has created over his lifetime, that have made his philanthropy seem more impressive than it was."

Washington Post’s David Fahrenthold wins Pulitzer Prize for coverage of Trump’s charitable giving:
Post reporter David Fahrenthold won the 2017 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting for his pioneering work exposing the distance between image and reality in Donald Trump’s philanthropy.


https://www.washingtonpost.com/graphics/2017/david-fahrenthold-wins-pulitzer-prize-2017-winner-finalists/

Here's a sample of Fahrenthold's Pulizer Prize winning reporting:

Trump boasts about his philanthropy. But his giving falls short of his words.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-boasts-of-his-philanthropy-but-his-giving-falls-short-of-his-words/2016/10/29/b3c03106-9ac7-11e6-a0ed-ab0774c1eaa5_story.html

Here's another:

Trump recorded having extremely lewd conversation about women in 2005

https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/trump-recorded-having-extremely-lewd-conversation-about-women-in-2005/2016/10/07/3b9ce776-8cb4-11e6-bf8a-3d26847eeed4_story.html

September 06, 2017 8:23 AM  
Anonymous Short-sighted GOP appropriators said...

In addition to running out of money for Secret Service, our short-sighted GOP appropriators have left FEMA with insufficient funds to cover damages from Hurricane Harvey as well as approaching Hurricanes Irma and Jose:

https://www.aol.com/article/finance/2017/09/06/fema-is-expected-to-run-out-of-money-by-friday/23198750/

http://www.marketwatch.com/story/florida-declares-state-of-emergency-as-hurricane-irma-heads-for-region-2017-09-05

https://weather.com/storms/hurricane/news/tropical-storm-hurricane-jose-forecast-atlantic

September 06, 2017 10:26 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "standards of sexual morality are not bigotry".

When those standards are "Do whatever you want but harm no one" they are not bigotry.

When those standards are "Suppress the actions of innocent people who aren't hurting anyone" they are bigotry - case closed.

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "the 52% that are nonchalant about gayness are not true Muslims because homosexuality violates Islam"

That's the No True Scotsman logical fallacy.

Some christians claim that gayness violates christianity but that doesn't stop many (most?) christians from being accepting of gays.

You don't get to decide who is a Muslim and who isn't, Muslims do.

American Muslims are less bigoted than evangelical christians.

September 06, 2017 1:46 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

I said "As a percentage of net worth Trump giving a million is the equivalent of me giving $2."

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "no, it's like you earning a million and giving it".

The equivalent of me earning a million and giving it would be Trump giving his entire multi-billion dollar net worth.

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "so when Trump provides services to customers and earns a million and donates it, that's more significant than someone who gives $2 dollars of the money they've collected from the government while making zero contribution to society".

Wrong. I earned the money I have now by selling my property (much like Trump) and I didn't stiff the government and creditors for hundreds of millions in money owed like Trump did.

As a percentage of net worth Trump giving a million is the equivalent of me giving $2.

A million means no more to Trump than $2 means to me (and he probably still won't follow through and actually donate it). If he actually donated $100 million or $200 million that might be something to praise him for.

Don't hold your breath waiting for him to actually cough up the money - he rarely does.

September 06, 2017 2:01 PM  
Anonymous Drip, drip, drip. Here come the conspiracy theories..... said...

Rush Limbaugh Claims Hurricane Irma Is Part Of A Vast Conspiracy:
Conservative radio host says storms are used to sell bottled water and batteries.


[Ex-con] Jim Bakker: Hurricane Is God’s ‘Judgment’ So Hurry Up and Buy My Doomsday Food:
Televangelist turns tragedy into a marketing opportunity.

September 06, 2017 2:44 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

we're still waiting to hear how much money Brother Barack donated to the victims of Sandy while he was Prez

you know, the guy who spent summers at a lavish estate on Martha's Vineyard and winter vacay at a sprawling ocean-side complex in Hawaii and whose wife would jet around the world to exotic locations like India with 20 of her closest gal-pals and stay in luxury resorts taking up floors of rooms that cost thousands each a night

oh, and Bill Clinton, who writes off deductions of his used underwear, and who claims to be helping the world's poor by using money donated by others to his corrupt Foundation, how much did he personally contribute to any type of disaster relief?

September 06, 2017 2:56 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

We'll be sure to let you know how much money Obama gave as soon as you find a video of Obama claiming to be a billionaire and saying he can't show his tax returns because he's under IRS audit while the IRS says audit or not, it's legal to share it.

A funny thing about Trump's supposed pledge to give money to Hurricane Harvey victims was pointed out by Pulitzer Prize winner David Fahrenthold:

"David Fahrenthold ✔
@Fahrenthold

It's my understanding that @realdonaldtrump's Fdn can't make donations now, while it's under investigation by NY AG. https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/903704506977935360 …
9:15 PM - Sep 1, 2017


How convenient for Trump, who never has any intention of giving a penny to anyone but himself.

Fools like you keep falling for his promises.

Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome.

September 06, 2017 3:59 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Oh yeah, and be sure to let us know how many times the Secret Service and FEMA ran out of money under the Obama Administration.

Now that the GOP controls all three branches of government, everybody knows who to blame for our woes.

"...As Trump’s presidency goes forward, we’ll keep tally of how many times he plays golf and how that compares with Obama at the same point in his presidency on what we’re calling our Trump Golf Tracker.

The score so far?

As of August 1 in the first year of each man's presidency, the score is Trump 21, Obama 11.Obama’s first game as president was April 26, 2009. He went on to play 333 times total over his eight years, according to CBS White House Correspondent Mark Knoller, who tracked Obama’s games.

It’s not as easy to track Trump’s game as you might think.

His staff has on several occasions declined to confirm he played golf while spending the day at his golf club. So in some cases, we have to rely on reporters’ observations and those of private citizens who spotted Trump on the course and posted pictures on social media..."


So far, from inauguration through Aug. 1 of their first years in office, Trump has played nearly 2 golf games for every one of Obama's AND Trump tries to hide the fact he's playing, just like he hides his tax returns.

Trump and his supporters are pathetically SAD!

September 06, 2017 4:14 PM  
Anonymous You brought it up said...

http://www.businessinsider.com/how-often-trump-golfed-during-first-100-days-compared-to-obama-bush-and-clinton-2017-4

Trump 19
Clinton 7
Obama 1
Bush 0

http://www.businessinsider.com/trump-travel-spending-outspending-obama-millions-taxpayer-dollars-2017-4

April 12, 2017

"...While the cost of individual trips may vary, the news outlet estimated that the six weekends (21 days, in total) Trump has spent at his Mar-A-Lago estate in Florida since becoming president added up to roughly $21.6 million.

Back in December, conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch found that Obama spent almost $97 million on travel during his two terms as president — about $12 million a year...

With eight more months to go until the end of 2017, Trump could reach or surpass what Obama spent on travel in eight years by December."

September 06, 2017 4:37 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Barack Obama ✔
@BarackObama

To target hopeful young strivers who grew up here is wrong, because they’ve done nothing wrong. My statement: http://www.facebook.com/barackobama/

2:52 PM - Sep 5, 2017

Chris Evans‏ ✔
@ChrisEvans

Chris Evans Retweeted Barack Obama
https://twitter.com/barackobama/status/905141484386750469

Thank you. I was starting to forget what a president is supposed to sound like.

3:18 PM - 5 Sep 2017

September 06, 2017 4:45 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"We'll be sure to let you know how much money Obama gave as soon as you find a video of Obama claiming to be a billionaire and saying he can't show his tax returns because he's under IRS audit while the IRS says audit or not, it's legal to share it"

so, to the screwed-up TTF mind, one needn't give any of their excessive personal wealth, not one cent, to help victims of natural disasters unless they make a video saying they're a billionaire and refuse to make their personal tax returns public

and, with logic like that, you wonder why you keep losing elections and don't control any level or branch of government

"A funny thing about Trump's supposed pledge to give money to Hurricane Harvey victims was pointed out by Pulitzer Prize winner David Fahrenthold:

"David Fahrenthold ✔
@Fahrenthold

It's my understanding that @realdonaldtrump's Fdn can't make donations now, while it's under investigation by NY AG. https://twitter.com/kylegriffin1/status/903704506977935360 …
9:15 PM - Sep 1, 2017

How convenient for Trump, who never has any intention of giving a penny to anyone but himself."

don't want to shock you with the facts, but Trump's free to donate personally without going through his foundation

"Fools like you keep falling for his promises."

did he ever promise you could keep your doctor?

"Insanity is doing the same thing over and over and expecting a different outcome."

true, Barry Obama drove TTF insane

"Oh yeah, and be sure to let us know how many times the Secret Service and FEMA ran out of money under the Obama Administration."

happened at least twice

you remember the government shutdowns, right?

the ones that happened because Barry wouldn't compromise with the majority in Congress?

yeah, you remember, I know you do

"Now that the GOP controls all three branches of government, everybody knows who to blame for our woes."

have you looked at the latest economic data?

the GOP is making America great again

"So far, from inauguration through Aug. 1 of their first years in office, Trump has played nearly 2 golf games for every one of Obama's"

and?

I couldn't care less if he plays golf every day

getting outside and getting some exercise is preferable to sitting in the WH living quarters watching porn all day, like Barry did

"...While the cost of individual trips may vary, the news outlet estimated that the six weekends (21 days, in total) Trump has spent at his Mar-A-Lago estate in Florida since becoming president added up to roughly $21.6 million.

Back in December, conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch found that Obama spent almost $97 million on travel during his two terms as president — about $12 million a year...

With eight more months to go until the end of 2017, Trump could reach or surpass what Obama spent on travel in eight years by December."

Trump goes home for the weekend

Obama spent the taxpayer money on pleasure trips for his family

"To target hopeful young strivers who grew up here is wrong, because they’ve done nothing wrong."

no one has targeted them

Presidents don't make laws

Congress does

DACA was unconsitutional

Trump has made clear he supports it and will sign it into law if Congress passes it

Barack Obama broke the law

September 06, 2017 5:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"don't want to shock you with the facts, but Trump's free to donate personally without going through his foundation"

Sure, he's free to do it, he's just too greedy to do it.

Let's see you show Vigilance readers one instance when Trump personally donated one red cent.

I don't want to shock you with facts, but you won't find it ever happened.

""how many times the Secret Service and FEMA ran out of money under the Obama Administration."

happened at least twice

you remember the government shutdowns, right?"


The only government shutdown during the Obama administrations was in 2013 and was one of the numerous failed attempts by the GOP to end the Affordable Care Act no matter what the cost. The House and Senate could "not develop a compromise bill by the end of September 30, 2013, causing the federal government to shut down due to a lack of appropriated funds at the start of the new 2014 federal fiscal year." (Quote from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_federal_government_shutdown_of_2013)

Let's see your "twice."

"have you looked at the latest economic data?

the GOP is making America great again"


Some people equate money with greatness.

You might recognize this quote: "Again I tell you, it is easier for came to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."

"getting outside and getting some exercise is preferable to sitting in the WH living quarters watching porn all day, like Barry did"

There you go, bearing false witness again.

Let's see, who has the fat ass and belly, Trump ( https://twitter.com/cher/status/878469866121908224?lang=en ) or Obama ( https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/gallery/2017/feb/08/barack-obama-kitesurfing-in-pictures ) ?

It's quite clear looking at those photos who sits around watching TV stuffing his face with fast food all day and who gets out for fresh air and exercise often.

Fatso uses golf carts every time he plays golf.

The pussy grabber even rode a golf cart because he's too fat to take a stroll with world leaders at the G7.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/335424-trump-rode-golf-cart-while-g7-leaders-walked-through-siciliy

As far as who's more likely to watch porn goes, I'd think that'd be the thrice married guy who feels entitled to walk in on beauty contestants changing their clothes rather than the happily married, doting father of two young ladies.

Here are just a few of the six million google hits I got for "Trump went backstage during beauty contests:"

http://thehill.com/blogs/ballot-box/presidential-races/300093-trump-confirms-he-walked-backstage-when-beauty-queens

http://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/2016/10/12/former-teen-beauty-queens-donald-trump-barged-in-on-us-changing.html

http://www.thedailybeast.com/the-trump-rule-leaked-audio-of-trump-ogling-miss-usa-beauty-queens

"Trump has made clear he supports it and will sign it into law if Congress passes it

Barack Obama broke the law"


Yesterday the Trump administration staked out the position that DACA was constitutionally flawed as a circumvention of the legislative branch. However, that position was less than 10 hours old when Trump posted a tweet that directly contradicted the legal position of his own administration. Trump suggested that he might reissue DACA or a similar program if Congress does not act — effectively same position as Obama.

Donald J. Trump Verified account
@realDonaldTrump

Congress now has 6 months to legalize DACA (something the Obama Administration was unable to do). If they can't, I will revisit this issue!

5:38 PM - 5 Sep 2017


No doubt the TTF troll will sing Trump's praises for doing exactly the same thing Obama did the troll claims broke the law.

September 06, 2017 9:13 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Typo

"Again I tell you, it is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God."

September 06, 2017 9:52 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Sure, he's free to do it, he's just too greedy to do it."

according to you, but you have a bias

"Let's see your "twice.""

so, you've gone from arguing it didn't happen to arguing it only happened once

but we have established, beyond dispute, you were wrong

"Some people equate money with greatness."

in America, even in the ghetto, people have jobs, food, shelter

people in the lowest class live in paradise compared to most in the world today and throughout history

yeah, it's just material blessing, but that's greatness

and opportunity is expanding under Trump, the opposite of what happened under Obama

"You might recognize this quote: "Again I tell you, it is easier for came to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God.""

I do recognize that. We're all rich in America. btw, do you know what "eye of a needle" refers to

I don't think you do

camels can get through but it's tricky

it's just not impossible

"There you go, bearing false witness again."

yes, but it was so obvious that I assumed everyone got it

the point was really that even Presidents need free time and golf not a bad way to spend it

what do you do with yours, watch porn?

"Yesterday the Trump administration staked out the position that DACA was constitutionally flawed as a circumvention of the legislative branch."

that's right

"However, that position was less than 10 hours old when Trump posted a tweet that directly contradicted the legal position of his own administration. Trump suggested that he might reissue DACA or a similar program if Congress does not act — effectively same position as Obama."

actually he said if Congress doesn't pass it, he would "look at it"

that could mean a number of things

the point is several states were about to sue over the constitutionality and they would have won

because Obama broke the law

Congress now has 6 months to legalize DACA (something the Obama Administration was unable to do). If they can't, I will revisit this issue!

September 06, 2017 11:21 PM  
Anonymous Wow!! said...

TTF said: "Let's see you show Vigilance readers one instance when Trump personally donated one red cent. I don't want to shock you with facts, but you won't find it ever happened."

Remember when Sandy devastated the New Jersey coast?

Obama was President and didn't give a dime of his own personal wealth to the victims.

On Wednesday, President Trump gave $1 million of his own money to charities helping the Houston area recover from Hurricane Harvey, splitting the gift among 12 nonprofits.

In a statement, the White House said that Trump and first lady Melania Trump had witnessed some of these charities at work firsthand during their two visits to areas of Texas hit by the hurricane.

Other recipients were “recommended, at the invitation of the President, by members of the White House Press Corps,” the White House said.

The two biggest individual gifts were given to large charities with a history of effective relief to disaster areas: the American Red Cross and the Salvation Army would get $300,000 each, the White House said.

The White House said Trump would give $100,000 to Samaritan's Purse, an aid agency run by Franklin Graham, the son of famed evangelist Billy Graham. Vice President Pence met with Samaritan's Purse volunteers during his separate trip to hurricane-ravaged areas.

Trump also said he would also give $100,000 to Reach Out America, a Houston-based charity.

The remaining gifts were all for $25,000 each. The White House said they would go to:

—Operation Blessing International, a disaster-relief charity based in Virginia Beach

—Catholic Charities

— The Houston Humane Society

—The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals

—Team Rubicon, a charity that sends teams of military veterans to help in disaster zones.

—Portlight Inclusive Disaster Strategies, a nonprofit group that focuses on helping those with disabilities.

—Direct Relief, a medical-aid group which has shipped doses of medicines and vaccines — all of which must be kept cold — to flood-ravaged areas in Texas.

September 07, 2017 12:04 AM  
Anonymous put another log on the fire said...

the investigation into Obama's use of the FBI to do oppo research against Trump's campaign heats up:

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/house-committee-subpoenas-fbi-justice-over-trump-dossier/article/2633466

September 07, 2017 12:12 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Obamacare has put in hospice:

http://www.realclearhealth.com/articles/2017/09/05/the_inconvenient_truth_about_obamacares_premium_spiral_110721.html

September 07, 2017 12:15 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

White Christians are now a minority in the U.S. and “Nones” are the majority demographic in 20 states. Those are a couple of the highlights in a major new report by the Public Religion Research Institute. It was based on a bilingual survey of more than 100,000 Americans over the course of 2016.

PRRI found that white Christians, who represented about 80% of the population 40 years ago, now make up only 43% of the nation. The decline was fueled both by a rise in non-white Christians — who don’t necessarily have the same political/social views as white evangelicals — along with a rise in the percentage of Americans who no longer have any religious affiliation. (Golf claps all around!)


More importantly, perhaps, is the breakdown by age. When it comes to people under 30, the “Unaffiliated” make up an astonishing 38% of the population. And you can see how our numbers are growing. [click link to see charts]

Those two charts alone could inspire all sorts of think pieces.

We know that white evangelicals hold just about all the political power right now and drive much of our current policy decisions. But they’re hanging on for dear life. At least in terms of power. Their decisions over the past decade — notably their opposition to LGBTQ rights — have squandered away any goodwill they had among young people who might have given them a chance at one point.

September 07, 2017 12:17 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

White evangelicals have made themselves damn near synonymous with heartless bigots. On the whole, they don’t care about LGBTQ rights. They don’t care about women’s health. They don’t care about science (including climate change). They don’t want to legalize marijuana. They love “fake news.” They promote abstinence to the point of absurdity. And they include Joel Osteen.

Time after time, when they’ve had a chance to do the right thing, they’ve failed spectacularly. And their inability to disavow Donald Trump in any meaningful way is the most obvious example of that.

Why would any decent person want to be a part of that club?

The head of PRRI noted that white evangelicals once warned other Christians that a watering down of the faith would lead to a decline in numbers. Instead, it’s their beliefs that have taken the hit while more progressive forms of Christianity — and people who want out of organized religion altogether — are on the rise.

Just look at this beautiful trend line showing the rise of the Nones:

Non-religious numbers were rising in the 1990s, but the George W. Bush presidency — with the Christian-fueled policies he supported — accelerated everything. That didn’t slow down while President Obama was in office, and you can bet the symbiotic relationship between evangelicals and the current administration will only push more people away from organized religion.

Evangelical Christians have routinely shot themselves in the foot, pushing for awful policies in the name of God. Whenever you think it can’t get worse, white evangelicals find a way to screw it up even more.

Keep fighting, everyone. It’s working. It’ll take time for the demographics to catch up with our politics, but we’ll get there.

September 07, 2017 12:18 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "On Wednesday, President Trump gave $1 million of his own money to charities helping the Houston area recover from Hurricane Harvey, splitting the gift among 12 nonprofits.".

LOL, he only said he would give that money to 12 non-profits, he hasn't actually done so you liar. And he won't unless journalists hold his feet to the fire and shame him into doing so like they did with his promise during the 2016 campaign to give money to veterans groups.

As a percentage of net worth Trump giving a million is the equivalent of me giving $2.

A million means no more to Trump than $2 means to me. Its a pathetically cheap donation (if he even follows through on it) for someone who claims to be worth 5 billion.

September 07, 2017 12:26 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Obama donated $1 million to charities while he was president.

Given that Trump has 125 times as much money as Obama, Obama made a 125 times bigger personal sacrifice than Trump has only claimed he will.

Former President Obama makes 2 million dollar personal donation to a summer jobs program in Chicago

Obama made 250 times the sacrifice for charity that Trump has only claimed he'll do given their respective net worths.

Obama has given 7 & 1/2 percent of his net worth to charity. Trump is only claiming he'll give 1 million which is 2/100 of one percent of his net worth.

Trump might "sacrifice" the same percentage of his net worth that I would if I donated $2.

He won't follow through unless journalists shame him into doing so just like was the case with the money he said he was going to donate to veterans groups.

September 07, 2017 12:52 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

looks like Priya has done some research and confirmed it:

despite making 11 million dollars while he was President, most from writing books in his spare time while he was supposedly working for the American people, a job thinking people think is full-time, Barry didn't give anything, not one cent, to help victims of the largest natural disaster during his Presidency, Sandy

hopefully, Trump's largesse will be the example followed by future Presidents, not that of the stingy Obama

meanwhile, Priya has now added racism to the previously expressed hatred for religious belief

anyone with such a rabid hatred is likely masking a deep-seated fear that religious beliefs are true

the trouble with all the polls is that they can't discern between heresy and orthodox Christianity

basically anyone who says they are Christians are counted but even ISIS says it believes in Jesus

Priya says, for example, that Joel Osteen is an evangelical

he actually preaches something called the "prosperity gospel", which evangelicals consider heretical

truth is, authentic Christianity has always been a minority

scripture is written from that perspective and it is a correct perspective

"more progressive forms of Christianity — and people who want out of organized religion altogether — are on the rise"

"progressive Christianity" is not on the rise

September 07, 2017 7:14 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

So you are unable to show Vigilance readers of even one instance when Trump personally donated one red cent.

Sad for you!

You claimed:

"happened at least twice

you remember the government shutdownS [emphasis added], right?

the oneS [emphasis added] that happened because Barry wouldn't compromise with the majority in Congress?

yeah, you remember, I know you do"


No, I don't remember multiple government shutdowns during Obama's term because multiple government shutdowns during Obama's term did not happen no matter how many times you lie about it.

There was one government shutdown during Obama's term. It was in 2013 and it was yet another failed attempt by the GOP to repeal the Affordable Care Act and Priya Lynn and I both know and have reported that fact to you on this thread.

You're just another deplorable lying Trump supporter in his ever-shrinking-since-election-day base who clings to the idea of white privilege Trump represents to you.

SAD!

September 07, 2017 7:31 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

aside from the million Trump gave to veterans' groups and the current million to Harvey victims, here's an article from New Yorker that while obviously hostile to Trump and biased, still concedes 5 million in donations

https://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/trump-and-the-truth-his-charitable-giving

still, the truth stands: Trump contributes to Harvey, Obama didn't contribute to Sandy

"There was one government shutdown during Obama's term. It was in 2013 and it was yet another failed attempt by the GOP to repeal the Affordable Care Act"

the GOP made several offers to separate the Obamacare and budget votes

Obama chose to let the government shutdown

September 07, 2017 10:01 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Obama chose to let the government shutdown"

No he didn't.

Congress could not agree on any bill funding the government to send to Obama for his signature.

Here's more from wikipedia:

"From October 1 through 16, 2013, the United States federal government entered a shutdown and curtailed most routine operations because neither legislation appropriating funds for fiscal year 2014 nor a continuing resolution for the interim authorization of appropriations for fiscal year 2014 was enacted in time. Regular government operations resumed October 17 after an interim appropriations bill was signed into law...

A "funding-gap" was created when the two chambers of Congress failed to agree to an appropriations continuing resolution. The Republican-led House of Representatives, in part encouraged by conservative senators such as Ted Cruz[5] and conservative groups such as Heritage Action,[6][7][8] offered several continuing resolutions with language delaying or defunding the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (commonly known as "Obamacare"). The Democratic-led Senate passed several amended continuing resolutions for maintaining funding at then-current sequestration levels with no additional conditions...."


Now let's review our civics lessons.

Which of the three branches of government authorizes appropriation of funds?

The Legislative branch.

And which branch of government was Obama part of in 2013?

The Executive branch.

The failure to appropriate funds was the fault of the appropriators in Congress.

Our poor little ttf troll simply cannot keep himself from lying about Obama, not doubt due to his shared-with-him-love of white privilege.

"the investigation into Obama's use of the FBI to do oppo research against Trump's campaign heats up:

http://www.washingtonexaminer.com/house-committee-subpoenas-fbi-justice-over-trump-dossier/article/2633466"


Yeah, the GOP is trying to politicize the work of the FBI.

How deplorable will the GOP get?

Remember, this is the House committee with Nunes on it, the dope who went to the White House in an effort to blow up his own investigation into the Russian matter and then was forced to step aside.

House Intel chair was on the White House grounds the day before he dropped Trump surveillance bombshell

Calls grow for Nunes to step aside in Russia probe

House Intelligence Chairman Devin Nunes will temporarily step away from Russia probe

He's just another GOP House member trying to march in lock step with the Pussy Grabber who likes to associate himself with Russian oligarchs.

Meanwhile the drip, drip, dripping continues:

https://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/mueller-seeks-grand-jury-testimony-pr-execs-who-worked-manafort-n796066

http://www.reuters.com/article/us-facebook-propaganda/facebook-says-likely-russian-based-operation-funded-u-s-ads-with-political-message-idUSKCN1BH2VX

September 07, 2017 12:18 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Presidents are not expected to contribute their own money when there is a disaster. Presidents are expected to execute -- they are the government's CEO -- the laws of the country as they pertain to emergency responses.

For instance, the EPA that reports to the President should establish immediate presence at Superfund sites to ensure that toxins are confined and that if they escape they are documented. (That did not happen in Houston.) The President should be pressing Congress to pass legislation to slow climate change and to deal with its consequences, to prevent catastrophes like Harvey and now Irma or at least minimize their costs. (Not going to happen.) It's not the President's job to donate his own money to these things, he is in charge of the system-of-systems that is carefully designed to respond to emergencies and manage them.

Sadly, Trump has a long history of lying about donating to causes that he never gave a dime to. And so there is a public debate about whether he "really" donated this money. That would not have happened with any other President. They used to be taken at their word, even the bad ones. we have reached a new level of deplorable with this guy.

Or what would would really be cool is if Trump did like Al Gore did during Katrina. Naw, not gonna happen.

September 07, 2017 12:54 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Presidents are not expected to contribute their own money when there is a disaster."

so Obama met expectations and Trump exceeded them

sounds about right

"They are the government's CEO -- the laws of the country as they pertain to emergency responses."

more Americans believe Trump did this than don't, according to the latest polls

"The President should be pressing Congress to pass legislation to slow climate change and to deal with its consequences, to prevent catastrophes like Harvey and now Irma or at least minimize their costs."

The U.S. has already exceeded the targets of Kyoto and carbon output is going down

all without any government action

and despite the predictions of the Algarmists after Katrina, since then we have enjoyed the most placid weather conditions on the Atlantic seaboard in history

so no legislation will prevent hurricanes from hitting the gulf coast of Texas or south Florida

they have always had hurricanes

the U's football team is even called the Hurricanes

of course, not long ago, the Algarmists, disappointed by the lack of hurricanes, was claiming a drought in California was global warming

despite the fact that droughts are regular throughout history for California

it's pathetic, really

"Sadly, Trump has a long history of lying about donating to causes that he never gave a dime to"

because he claims credit for his foundation even though others contribute the money

doesn't Bill Clinton do the same

they consider themselves spokesmen for foundations they started

so what?

fact remains: Obama didn't give to help Sandy victims, Trump did

there's a differentiation

when it comes to disasters:

Obama C-

Trump A+

"And so there is a public debate about whether he "really" donated this money."

if by "public", you mean media talking heads

"That would not have happened with any other President."

the media hasn't had the same motivation to discredit any other President

no other President stood up to them

"They used to be taken at their word, even the bad ones. we have reached a new level of deplorable with this guy."

yes, the media deplores those who expose them

"Or what would would really be cool is if Trump did like Al Gore did during Katrina."

have you heard how big AlG' carbon footprint is?

no, you don't

the media hasn't told you

September 07, 2017 2:38 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Try to imagine Trump refusing to sit for an interview after having hired two private charters to airlift hurricane ravaged evacuees from danger to safety.

There'd be tweet dumps every morning for weeks!

September 07, 2017 2:47 PM  
Anonymous Time for Ryan to step up and do his job said...

USA TODAY:

Senate passes hurricane aid package that includes short-term measures to increase debt limit, fund government

WASHINGTON — The Senate on Thursday passed a $15.25 billion hurricane relief package that would also increase the nation’s debt limit and fund the government for the next three months.

The bill passed 80-17 and must pass the House before it heads to President Trump's desk for his signature.

The package is the result of a deal Trump struck with House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., and Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y., against the wishes of his own party leaders, who pushed for a longer-term increase of the debt limit.

It would provide initial emergency funding to respond to to disasters caused by Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, a Category 5 storm expected to hit Florida. The bill also maintains government operations at current levels through Dec. 8 and extends the debt ceiling and National Flood Insurance Program to that date.

The federal government is running out of borrowing authority, which officials say must be increased to pay for existing obligations, including hurricane relief efforts...."

September 07, 2017 3:08 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

imagine if Al Gore had been President during 9/11

September 07, 2017 3:12 PM  
Anonymous much adieu about no thing said...

President Donald Trump's son told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday that he agreed to meet with Russians who had promised his father's campaign information about Hillary Clinton because he wanted to assess Clinton's "fitness" and "qualifications" for office.

“To the extent they had information concerning the fitness, character or qualifications of a presidential candidate, I believed that I should at least hear them out,” Donald Trump Jr. said in a statement provided to the committee before his closed-doors interview.

“Depending on what, if any, information they had, I could then consult with counsel to make an informed decision as to whether to give it further consideration.”

"If it's what you say I love it especially later in the summer," Trump Jr. told music publicist Rob Goldstone, who pitched him on the meeting on behalf of his client Emin Agalarov.

Emin is the son of Aras Agalarov, a Russian-Azerbaijani developer who brought Trump's Miss Universe pageant to Moscow in 2013.

“As much as some have made of my using the phrase ‘I love it,’ it was simply a colloquial way of saying that I appreciated Rob’s gesture,” Trump Jr. said in his statement for the committee on Thursday.

Goldstone told Trump Jr. in the emails last year that "the crown prosecutor of Russia" had "some official documents and information that would incriminate Hillary and her dealings with Russia."

Trump Jr. said he "did not quite know what to make of his email," and had "no way to gauge the reliability, credibility or accuracy of any of the things he was saying."

“As it later turned out, my skepticism was justified. The meeting provided no meaningful information and turned out not to be about what had been represented.”

adieu, Russian hoax!!

September 07, 2017 4:01 PM  
Anonymous TTF must be so happy said...

CHINO, Calif. — Leslie Van Houten, the youngest of Charles Manson's murderous followers, was recommended for parole Wednesday by a state panel that concluded she is no longer a threat to society.

September 07, 2017 4:10 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Gore handling 9/11 would have maintained the peace and prosperity of the Clinton/Gore administration, which might have kept us from experiencing the George W. Bush Great Recession where too many Americans lost their jobs, homes and dignity.

"have you heard how big AlG' [sic] carbon footprint is?"

Yes, I have.

According to Al Gore's Inconvenient Reality "compiled from public records requests and information from the Nashville Electric Service, Gore’s 20-room, 10,070-square-foot, Colonial-style mansion consumed an average of 19,241 kilowatt-hours per month—more than 21.3 times that of the U.S. household average of 901 kilowatt-hours monthly."

If Al Gore's puny TN estate draws that much power, just imagine how much power the too numerous to count Trump estates draw.

And unlike Trump, President Gore would not have put us in the company of Nicaragua and Syria when it comes to climate.

In fact, with President Al Gore, it might have been the "Al Gore Climate Accord" all but those two nations would have signed onto in order to work together to save our planet.

September 07, 2017 4:31 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"President Donald Trump's son told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Thursday"

Just wait until they bring Junior back and place him under oath after they've interviewed the other conspirators at the June 2016 Trump Towers meeting with the Russians.

September 07, 2017 4:34 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Wyatt/bad anonymous said "looks like Priya has done some research and confirmed it: Barry didn't give anything, not one cent, to help victims of the largest natural disaster during his Presidency, Sandy".

No surprise that Wyatt/bad anonymous is lying again. I didn't confirm any such thing, I didn't find anything saying Obama never gave to victims of hurricane Sandy.

But then what do you expect from someone who says "there are many situations where its appropriate to lie."?

What I was able to confirm is that based on the percentage of their wealth that each gave to charity since the time Obama was president Obama gave 125 times as much of his wealth to charity as Trump did.

Trump is a cheap bastard. Him giving 1 million is literally the equivalent of me giving $2 in terms of percentage of our net worths.

Trump's saying he hasn't come up with the 1 million yet because he can't figure out how to convert rubles to dollars.

Obama has been hundreds of times more generous to charity than Trump.

September 07, 2017 7:37 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Lying Wyatt/bad anonymous keeps falsely claiming there were multiple government shutdowns during Obama's presidency when there was only one in 2013 forced by the Republicans as good anonymous has pointed out several times.

Polls at the time showed a far larger percentage of the public blamed the Republicans for the shutdown than the Democrats.

In this thread at October 12, 2013 6:19 PM Wyatt posted poll numbers of the percentage of each party the public blamed for the shutdown but swapped the Democrat numbers for the Republican ones to create the false impression that the public blamed the Democrats more. He had been repeatedly lying up until that point and claiming the public blamed Democrats more.

But of course he didn't post a link to the poll he was deceptively swapping around so at October 12, 2013 7:59 PM I proved he had swapped the Democrat blame numbers for the Republican ones and vice versa.

Later Wyatt tried to justify his lie by posting at October 14, 2013 1:41 PM that when he cuts and pastes a news article "unless I attribute a post to someone else, I'll feel free to change the wording as I like".

So its no surprise Wyatt/bad anonymous is still lying about this to this day.

September 07, 2017 7:52 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

So Trump's justice department is arguing before the Supreme Court that businesses have a right to discriminate against LGBT people.

But, Hey! He's the most gay friendly presidential candidate ever, right?

That's Wyatt/bad anonymous's cue to tell us that Trump is really doing gays a favour by allowing businesses to discriminate against them because "gays have many mental issues" (or something) - "anti-gay Hillary would have never been so nice to gays as to allow businesses to discriminate against them!" amirite Wyatt?

Hahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha!

September 07, 2017 7:58 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Hurricane Irma churns over the Bahamas on collision course with Florida

Sorry Rick Scott, but banning the use of the term ""climate change" or “global warming” in any official communications, emails, or reports...[a] policy goes beyond semantics and has affected reports, educational efforts and public policy in a department with about 3,200 employees and $1.4 billion budget," was a fatal error on your part.

Rick Scott's stunt of thinking he's smarter than scientists who study climate and failing to heed their warnings is completely deplorable.

Governor Rick Scott has failed in his duty to protect the citizens of Florida from a very real and imminent threat.

September 08, 2017 7:19 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The House today overwhelmingly approved a $15.25 billion disaster aid package despite strong objections from conservatives who oppose including an agreement struck by President Trump and congressional Democrats to raise the federal borrowing limit and keep the government open until Dec. 8.

The measure passed by a vote of 316-90.

The legislation easily passed the Senate by a vote of 80-17 yesterday.

September 08, 2017 11:18 AM  
Anonymous Rush pirouettes said...

https://thinkprogress.org/limbaugh-to-evacuate-south-florida-after-claiming-irma-was-a-hoax-cb3fb5fb35b8/

"Rush Limbaugh will be evacuating South Florida, just days after the popular conservative radio host claimed that Hurricane Irma would not hit the United States and that scientists and the liberal media were hyping up the hurricane as proof of their global warming "lie."..."

Rush seems to really fear the power of liberals!

He thinks we manufacturer hurricanes!

September 08, 2017 2:52 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"...Taking Irma and Jose together, this is the first time on record two storms in the tropical Atlantic Ocean have attained 150 mph winds at the same time.

Meanwhile, the peak winds of Hurricane Katia, centered over the southwest Gulf of Mexico, had reached 100 mph — making it a Category 2 hurricane. It is expected to make landfall along the west coast of Mexico Friday night.

“Atlantic currently has 3 Cat. 2+ hurricanes at same time — 2nd time on record this has occurred & first time since 1893,” tweeted Phil Klotzbach, hurricane expert from Colorado State University...

Three hurricanes at the same time is highly unusual

Incredibly, all three of the active hurricanes in the Atlantic basin could affect land at the same time on Saturday: Irma over the Bahamas (and approaching Florida), Jose over the northeastern Leewards, and Katia in Mexico.

It is quite rare to have three simultaneous hurricanes. The last time this occurred was in 2010 with Hurricanes Igor, Julia and Karl. In an unlikely coincidence, these storms are almost in the same order and position as Irma, Jose and Katia, and have the same first three letters (I, J, K)."

https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/capital-weather-gang/wp/2017/09/07/tropical-triple-threat-hurricanes-jose-and-katia-could-join-irma-in-striking-land-this-weekend/

September 08, 2017 4:03 PM  
Anonymous Too little too late said...

TAMPA — Florida Gov. Rick Scott (R) has been ubiquitous in recent days as Hurricane Irma bears down on the Sunshine State, warning of deadly winds and storm surges and imploring residents to heed evacuation orders.

“This is a catastrophic storm our state has never seen,” he cautioned at one of many news conferences.

By all accounts, Scott and other officials have aggressively tried to prepare the state and its residents for the destructive storm’s impact and immediate aftermath.

But for all of Scott’s vigor in readying Florida for Irma’s wrath, his administration has done little over the years to prepare for what scientists say are the inevitable effects of climate change that will wreak havoc in the years to come. With its far-reaching coastline and low elevation, Florida is one of the states at greatest risk from rising sea levels, extreme weather events — including more-powerful hurricanes — and other consequences of a warming planet.

Local officials, academics and even some political allies say Scott has scarcely acknowledged the problem and, along with the Republican-led legislature, has shown little interest in funding projects to help the state adapt and become more resilient in the face of storms such as Irma.

“The science has been brought on a silver platter to Governor Scott, and he’s chosen not to do anything,” said Kathy Baughman McLeod, a conservation expert who served on the Florida Energy and Climate Commission, which was effectively dismantled after Scott took office in 2011. “If there is climate action, it’s all coming from local and regional collaboration. There is no state leadership on climate change in Florida, period.”

Scott has often demurred when asked about climate change and the overwhelming scientific consensus that human activity is fueling it, saying, “I am not a scientist.”

But he faced a wave of criticism in 2015 after the Florida Center for Investigative Reporting revealed that state employees had been discouraged from using the terms “climate change” and “global warming.” One state official even refused to utter the words in a public hearing.

The governor’s office has repeatedly insisted that no such policy ever existed. Scott’s office did not respond to a request for comment for this article, perhaps understandably, as he prepared Floridians to face the historic and deadly storm barreling toward them.

Scott’s long-standing refusal to acknowledge an issue that many others view as among Florida’s biggest threats has had repercussions, his critics say.

“It’s more than an absence of leadership. There’s harm being done by denying the problem,” said Eric Buermann, former general counsel to the Republican Party of Florida and a former board chairman for the Southwest Florida Water Management District. “He’s chilled the discussion, so that those who would want to do something about it feel ostracized . . . I’m a Republican. He’s a Republican. He’s a nice guy. There’s nothing negative I have to say about the human being. It’s just that the policy is 180 degrees off course.”

Seas are rising faster than in the past, and low-lying Florida, with its tourist-attracting beaches and condo-crowded coastlines, could be among the hardest hit by the change.

“It’s important we don’t hide from reality,” said Harold Wanless, chairman of the University of Miami’s geological science department and an expert on sea-level rise. “We should be doing very serious planning, and it doesn’t help when you have a governor and a president who are dismissing” climate change....

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/health-science/florida-governor-has-ignored-climate-change-risks-critics-say/2017/09/08/04a8c60a-94a0-11e7-aace-04b862b2b3f3_story.html

September 09, 2017 9:01 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Local officials, academics and even some political allies say Scott has scarcely acknowledged the problem and, along with the Republican-led legislature, has shown little interest in funding projects to help the state adapt and become more resilient in the face of storms such as Irma."

What problem? This is the first hurricane to make landfall in Florida in a dozen years. A remarkable period of placidity in an area known for frequent hurricanes. Here's a dummy's guide to Florida hurricanes just perfect for a TTF dummy:

http://fcit.usf.edu/florida/lessons/hurricane/hurricane.htm

All that being said, Scott hasn't proposed reducing Florida's hurricane preparedness apparatus.

"“The science has been brought on a silver platter to Governor Scott, and he’s chosen not to do anything,” said Kathy Baughman McLeod, a conservation expert who served on the Florida Energy and Climate Commission, which was effectively dismantled after Scott took office in 2011. “If there is climate action, it’s all coming from local and regional collaboration. There is no state leadership on climate change in Florida, period.”"

What exactly are you proposing that he do?

"Scott has often demurred when asked about climate change and the overwhelming scientific consensus that human activity is fueling it, saying, “I am not a scientist.”"

Sounds like he understands science better than the average TTF dummy. Climates change over centuries. It's possible that the current rise in global temperatures was caused by the Industrial Revolution. But, as third world countries move in to the modern age and begin to enjoy the blessings the privileged liberals in the US take for granted, you can't expect them to go back. If you really want to reduce carbon output, push for more nuclear power, more fracking, and massive forestation projects.

And stop whining and pointing fingers.

September 09, 2017 11:19 AM  
Anonymous Look Out, Here Comes a Category Five Liberal Hoax said...

"What problem?"

Keep showing your ignorance.

The "problem" includes the effects of super storms like the massive and historic floods Houston has incurred the last three years in a row, which were incidentally three of the hottest years on record ("Five Warmest Years (Anomalies: 1st. 2016(+0.45°C), 2nd. 2015(+0.42°C), 3rd. 2014(+0.27°C), 4th. 1998(+0.22°C), 5th. 2013,2010(+0.20°C)" from: http://ds.data.jma.go.jp/tcc/tcc/products/gwp/temp/ann_wld.html) and also includes the impending effects of Hurricane Irma Rush Limbaugh has now decided to evacuate himself from.

"Scott hasn't proposed reducing Florida's hurricane preparedness apparatus.

Keep showing your ignorance coupled with your laziness to read the rest of the article quoted above with URL provided.

"...[Former Florida Governor] Crist convened a climate change summit in Miami, created a task force focused on the issue, and signed an executive order to reduce the state’s greenhouse gas emissions and mandate more energy-efficient building codes. He also signed a bill, championed by a state House Republican, that would push the state toward more renewable energy sources.

“I wanted to be upfront and on point when it comes to climate change,” Crist, now a Democratic U.S. House member, said in an interview. “It is real and it exists.”

But when Scott swept the governor’s race with support from the tea party and came to office in 2011, the issue all but vanished from the state’s agenda.

“Local governments kind of stepped into the vacuum and have led the conversation ever since,” said Steve Adams, a former climate and energy adviser to Crist, who oversees urban resilience for the Institute for Sustainable Communities.

Miami Beach has undertaken a roughly half-billion-dollar quest to raise roads, build storm-water pumps and gird itself against a slowly encroaching ocean...

...While some municipalities have tried to address problems caused by increased downpours, such as overwhelmed wastewater treatment facilities and flooded neighborhoods, Hastings and other scientists say Scott’s administration has done little to mitigate the destruction of storms like Irma, whose winds could drive rising waters inland, making a bad problem many times worse..."


"And stop whining and pointing fingers."

That's exactly what you non-scientific, purely political climate change deniers need to do.

September 09, 2017 3:08 PM  
Anonymous Learning the hard way said...

‘Never seen anything like it’: Governor issues new warning as Florida sees first signs of Hurricane Irma’s winds and rain

"...The National Weather Service said southwestern Florida could see storm surges up to 15 feet if peak surge happens during high tide. A storm surge warning is in effect for much of the Florida peninsula.

“This is a deadly storm and our state has never seen anything like it,” Scott said.

Counties including Broward on the east coast have imposed curfews and at least 70 more shelters were opening across the state Saturday. At least 50,000 people are staying in 260 state shelters, Scott said. He implored nurses to volunteer throughout Florida; the state desperately needs 1,000 nurses in its special needs shelters..."


Maybe you haven't seen anything like it, Gov. Scott, but it's not like you haven't been warned to expect storms would increase in severity.

Pay attention, Gov. Scott. If you're going to ignore 97% of climate scientists, the least you could do is pay nurses to work in your 260 state shelters instead of expecting nurses, who do study science, to volunteer to clean up after your "I"m not a scientist" stupidy.

September 10, 2017 9:21 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

brilliant anon:

"What problem?"

moronic anon:

"Keep showing your ignorance.

The "problem" includes the effects of super storms like the massive and historic floods Houston has incurred the last three years in a row"

Irma turned out to be not much of a problem and it was the worst to hit in a pretty long time

one guy was killed in the Keys when he ran his truck into a tree

a normal day would have seen more accidents just because more would have been on the road so Irma saved lives

this is not evidence of global warming problems but a fairly standard hurricane by historical Florida standards

bri;liant anon:

"Scott hasn't proposed reducing Florida's hurricane preparedness apparatus."

moronic anon:

"Keep showing your ignorance coupled with your laziness to read the rest of the article quoted above with URL provided.

"...[Former Florida Governor] Crist convened a climate change summit in Miami, created a task force focused on the issue, and signed an executive order to reduce the state’s greenhouse gas emissions and mandate more energy-efficient building codes. He also signed a bill, championed by a state House Republican, that would push the state toward more renewable energy sources.

“I wanted to be upfront and on point when it comes to climate change,” Crist, now a Democratic U.S. House member, said in an interview. “It is real and it exists.”

But when Scott swept the governor’s race with support from the tea party and came to office in 2011, the issue all but vanished from the state’s agenda.

“Local governments kind of stepped into the vacuum and have led the conversation ever since,” said Steve Adams, a former climate and energy adviser to Crist, who oversees urban resilience for the Institute for Sustainable Communities.

Miami Beach has undertaken a roughly half-billion-dollar quest to raise roads, build storm-water pumps and gird itself against a slowly encroaching ocean...

...While some municipalities have tried to address problems caused by increased downpours, such as overwhelmed wastewater treatment facilities and flooded neighborhoods, Hastings and other scientists say Scott’s administration has done little to mitigate the destruction of storms like Irma, whose winds could drive rising waters inland, making a bad problem many times worse..."

changing Florida's greenhouse emissions wouldn't have changed a thing and all sides agree Scott (and Trump) have performed greatly during this storm"

September 11, 2017 11:56 AM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Russia Investigating Canada’s Gay Underground Railroad

With thousands of gay men apparently tortured and murdered by the government in Chechnya and others fleeing to Russia, Canada has established what is essentially an underground railroad to get those men to safety. Russia is quite unhappy about that.

A Russian official has warned that if Canada violated Russian law by bringing gay Chechens to Canada as refugees, there will be consequences.

Kirill Kalinin, who is a spokesman for the Russian embassy in Ottawa, said of the Canadian underground railroad operating in his country: “Any legal irregularities, if proven true, shall be duly investigated.” He made the comment in an e-mail to The Globe and Mail, and declined to elaborate on what laws might have been violated…

Since June, the Canadian government has been identifying people at risk and secretly bringing them from the safe houses to Canada. Government officials said all those who qualified and were willing to come to Canada are now here or safely on the way.

Yes, that’s where your priorities should be Russia. Don’t bother investigating the anti-gay bigots who take delight in killing gay people. Don’t worry about the government in Chechnya, with which you are closely allied, and the fact that they have literally set up concentration camps for gay people and tortured and killed thousands of them. Investigate the people who are trying to protect the human rights of those people from religious fascists. That’s where the real problem is.

Of course, the Russian government is in favor of all of those things. They have made life hell for gay people under Putin, who seems to think his manhood, so often on display along with his metaphorical peacock feathers in so many shirtless photos, is threatened by the mere existence of gay people. He has passed laws to prevent them from even advocating for their own rights and his police enforce those laws with great zeal, busting heads in the process.

Hey Vlad, you don’t like gay people? Then why not just let them leave? If Canada is willing to take them in and protect their equal humanity, why not let them? Oh, right. Because you’re a brutal, vicious bigoted thug. Silly me.

September 11, 2017 12:28 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

You don't see Trump assisting persecuted Chechnyan gays in coming to the U.S.

So much for his election promise that he'd protect gays from "a hateful foreign ideology".

September 11, 2017 1:09 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Priya is for some reason mightily concerned about gays in Chechyna but wants to give an award for other Muslims regions that routinely do the same

you'll remember when a Muslim immigrant went down to Orlando and massacred gays in a night club

Priya was rushing to blame Americans

huh?

we don't have enough licensed psychiatrists to deal with Priya's issues

September 11, 2017 1:26 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Irma turned out to be not much of a problem and it was the worst to hit in a pretty long time

one guy was killed in the Keys when he ran his truck into a tree"


One death is "not much of a problem" to you?

So what would five deaths and counting be?

"ABC News has confirmed a fifth storm-related fatality early Monday morning after a person was found dead in a home in Shark Key on Sunday. Monroe County, which includes the Florida Keys, has reported two deaths. Hardee County has also reported two deaths so far and one person died in a single-vehicle crash in Orange County. At least 27 people were killed in the Caribbean."

The loss of life in the US is "not much of a problem" to the ttf troll.

Apparently the damage, destruction and loss of billions of dollars of property, is "not much of a problem" to the ttf troll either.

Hurricane Harvey Has Damaged at Least $23 Billion of Property in Just Two Texas Counties

Irma's winds knock down three cranes in South Florida

Hurricane Irma rips roofs from mobile homes

It's obvious who the "moronic" commenter here is.

Two collapsed construction cranes in Miami and billions of dollars in property damage across both Texas and Florida is "not much of a problem" to you?

And you call yourself a Christian?

Sad!

September 11, 2017 1:41 PM  
Anonymous Still finding and counting victims said...

Associated Press
Sep 06, 2017

(HOUSTON) — County and city officials now attribute at least 70 Texas deaths on Harvey, the storm that dumped several feet of rain on southeast Texas in a matter of days.
The latest deaths reported by county emergency officials include a lineman electrocuted while working to restore electricity outside of Bloomington, about 13 miles (21 kilometers) southeast of Victoria, and several people with medical conditions exacerbated by flooding or delayed from receiving treatment.

The Associated Press has confirmed the fatalities and causes of death by interviewing emergency personnel and county officials in the areas under state and federal disaster designation.

The death toll from Irma will continue to grow just as the death toll from Harvey.

Just now Gov. Scott is reporting there is no water, sewer or electric service in portions of the Keys and saying it's going to be a long time to get back to normal.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national/2017/live-updates/weather/hurricane-irma-a-monster-storms-devastating-path/the-keys-are-not-open-for-business/

Gov. Scott is also reporting historic flooding today in Jacksonville.

http://www.businessinsider.com/hurricane-irma-new-record-flooding-jacksonville-florida-hurricane-dora-2017-9

September 11, 2017 3:40 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Calls to punish global warming skepticism as a criminal offense have surged in the aftermath of Hurricanes Harvey and Irma, but it hasn’t discouraged climate scientists like Judith Curry.
A retired Georgia Tech professor, she argued on her Climate Etc. website that Irma, which hit Florida as a Category 4 hurricane on Saturday, was fueled in large part by “very weak” wind shear and that the hurricane intensified despite Atlantic Ocean temperatures that weren’t unusually warm.
That is the kind of talk that could get policymakers who heed her research hauled before the justice system, if some of those in the climate change movement have their way.
“Climate change denial should be a crime,” declared the Sept. 1 headline in the Outline. Mark Hertsgaard argued in a Sept. 7 article in the Nation, titled “Climate Denialism Is Literally Killing Us,” that “murder is murder” and “we should punish it as such.”
The suggestion that those who run afoul of the climate change consensus, in particular government officials, should face charges comes with temperatures flaring over the link between hurricanes and greenhouse gas emissions.
“In the wake of Harvey, it’s time to treat science denial as gross negligence — and hold those who do the denying accountable,” said the subhead in the Outline article, written by Brian Merchant.
Brad Johnson, executive director of Climate Hawks Vote, posted last week on Twitter a set of “climate disaster response rules,” the third of which was to “put officials who reject science in jail.”
Climate skeptics have taken note of the alarming trend. “Ever since Hurricane Harvey, the global warming-hurricane hysteria has ratcheted up to levels I haven’t seen since 2006,” said Ms. Curry.
Anthony Watts, who runs the Watts Up With That blog, listed some of the threats to criminalize skeptics under the headline, “Hate on Display — climate activists go bonkers over #Irma and nonexistent climate connection.”
Climate Depot’s Marc Morano said the heightened vitriol aimed at those who dispute the link between climate change and extreme weather events is a sign that the global warming narrative is losing steam with the public and policymakers.
“Activists have been frustrated with record number of polar bears, no acceleration of sea level, the Pause, no trends or declining trends in extreme weather and the public’s apathy,” said Mr. Morano, whose book “The Politically Incorrect Guide to Climate Change” is slated to be released in February.

September 11, 2017 11:59 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

“Trump has added to all of that, and we are now seeing them blow their gaskets in frustration,” he said.
Given the heated exchanges fueled by the two hurricanes, the climate change debate is clearly far from resolved.
President Trump has said he plans to pull out of the 2015 Paris climate agreement, drawing an outcry from those who argue that rising greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are driving higher temperatures and natural disasters such as drought, wildfires and hurricanes.
“The effects of climate change are no longer subtle. We are seeing them play out before us here and now. And they will only worsen if we fail to act,” said a Sept. 7 op-ed in The Washington Post co-authored by Penn State climatologist Michael E. Mann.
White House homeland security adviser Tom Bossert deflected questions at a Monday press briefing about whether Harvey and Irma were caused or made worse by human-driven climate change, saying that “causality is outside of my ability to analyze right now.”
“I will tell you that we continue to take seriously the climate change, not the cause of it, but the things that we observe,” Mr. Bossert said. “And so there’s rising floodwaters — I think 1 inch every 10 years in Tampa — things that would require prudent mitigation measures.”
Meanwhile, Pope Francis said the two Category 4 storms offer proof of catastrophic climate change, even though they are the first two major hurricanes to make landfall on the U.S. mainland in 12 years.
“You can see the effects of climate change with your own eyes, and scientists tell us clearly the way forward,” said the pontiff, adding that leaders have a “moral responsibility” to take action.
An analysis by Colorado State University meteorologist Philip Klotzbach found that the latest hurricanes weren’t unprecedented in terms of their power upon making landfall in the U.S.
His chart showed that Irma made landfall in Florida at 929 mb, or millibars, tying it for the seventh most powerful storm to hit the mainland since record-keeping began in the 1850s.
In Texas, Hurricane Harvey ranked 17th at 938 mb, placing it in a three-way tie with an 1898 Georgia hurricane and Hurricane Hazel in 1954.
The push to prosecute climate skeptics comes even though the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has concluded that it is “premature to conclude that human activities — and particularly greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming — have already had a detectable impact on Atlantic hurricane or tropical cyclone activity.”
“That said, human activities may have already caused changes that are not yet detectable,” said the Aug. 30 statement.
Mr. Watts said the air pressure graphic should prompt global warming activists to take a deep breath.
“With Irma ranked 7th, and Harvey ranked 18th, it’s going to be tough for climate alarmists to try connecting these two storms to being driven by CO2/global warming,” Mr. Watts said in a post. “But they’ll do it anyway.”

September 12, 2017 12:01 AM  
Anonymous It's not just US said...

Here's what's been going on while Hurricane Harvey drenched Texas and Hurricane Irma pounded Florida.

ROME – Torrential rain in Italy triggered flooding that killed at least five people Sunday in the Tuscan port town of Leghorn, including four family members trapped by rising water in their basement...

...Train service was interrupted in parts of the Tuscan coastal area along the Tyrrhenian Sea.

In Rome, which until recently had suffered through 3½ months of drought, the downpour quickly made streets resemble fast-moving streams and several subway stations were closed.

http://www.foxnews.com/world/2017/09/10/heavy-rain-floods-lash-italy-at-least-5-dead-in-tuscany.html

KATHMANDU/NEW YORK, 2 September 2017 – Weeks of torrential monsoon rains and catastrophic flooding in three countries of South Asia – Nepal, India, and Bangladesh – have devastated the lives of millions of children and families. UNICEF estimates that almost 16 million children and their families are in urgent need of life-saving support.

"Millions of children have seen their lives swept away by these devastating floods" said Jean Gough, UNICEF Regional Director for South Asia. "Children have lost their homes, schools and even friends and loved ones. There is a danger the worst could still be to come as rains continue and flood waters move south" she added.

Since mid-August, there have been at least 1,288 reported deaths, with over 45 million people estimated to be affected.

https://www.unicef.org/media/media_100719.html

Last month’s rain initially brought relief to drought-stricken parts of Africa but didn't stop as it inundated villages with flood water, which led to staggering death tolls reaching the hundreds. The August floods in Africa have killed about 25 times more people than Hurricane Harvey, which left 70 people dead.

Hurricane Harvey displaced tens of thousands of residents living in the Lone Star State. As the state begins rebuilding efforts, flood waters recede and businesses begin to open their doors once more, some African residents won't recognize some of the flood-ravished towns they called home.

Some of the devastation in Texas can be cleaned up. However, much of the flooding in Africa intensified due to years of inadequate drainage systems and poor infrastructure. While officials successfully rescued some Texas residents, those in Africa weren’t afforded the same relief as non-stop rain and mudslides claimed over 1,200 lives in August.

http://www.ibtimes.com/devastating-floods-africa-killed-25-times-more-people-hurricane-harvey-2587062

This wasn’t supposed to be a bad year for Western wildfires.

Last winter, a weak La Niña bloomed across the Pacific. It sent flume after flume of rain to North America and irrigated half the continent. Water penetrated deep into the soil of Western forests, and mammoth snowdrifts stacked up across the Sierra Nevadas. California’s drought ended in the washout.

Yet fires are now raging across the West. More than two dozen named fires currently burn across Washington and Oregon. More than one million acres have burned in Montana, an area larger than Rhode Island, in the Treasure State’s third-worst fire season on record. And the largest brushfire in the history of Los Angeles currently threatens hundreds of homes in Burbank.

Canada may be experiencing an even worse year for wildfires: 2.86 million acres have burned in British Columbia, the largest area ever recorded in the province.

So what happened? How did a wet Western winter lead to a sky-choking summer?

The answer lies in the summer’s record-breaking heat, say wildfire experts. Days of near-100-degree-Fahrenheit temperatures cooked the Mountain West in early July, and a scorching heat wave lingered over the Pacific Northwest in early August.

https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2017/09/why-is-2017-so-bad-for-wildfires-climate-change/539130/

September 12, 2017 6:46 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"President Trump has said he plans to pull out of the 2015 Paris climate agreement" said the Moonie-rag editorialist.

A typical factual error for the Moonie-rag.

< eye roll >

September 12, 2017 6:59 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration has concluded that it is “premature to conclude that human activities — and particularly greenhouse gas emissions that cause global warming — have already had a detectable impact on Atlantic hurricane or tropical cyclone activity.”

really, NOAA

could you alert TTF, the current location of America's fruits and nuts?

every time there is a flood somewhere, they say it's proof positive we need a worldwide socialist government to police carbon emissions

September 12, 2017 7:20 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

That's NOAA under Trump, AKA, pure bullsht.

September 12, 2017 7:34 AM  
Anonymous Dumbing down deliberately said...

Just a few weeks ago:

Trump administration dismisses climate change advisory panel

August 22, 2017

The Trump administration has fired another shot at the scientific community, this time dismantling a federal advisory committee on climate change.

Members on the 15-person committee tell CNN they learned the news by email Friday...

The experts who sat on the now-defunct committee warn that without their advice and guidance, the release of the federal climate report could be the equivalent of a large scientific data dump absent of useful context for a public that lacks scientific expertise.

"The job of this advisory committee was to help federal agencies, state and local governments and the private sector understand all the science and data behind climate change," said Riley Dunlap, a sociology professor at Oklahoma State University who was one of the experts on the committee.

Jessica Whitehead, a coastal communities hazards adaptation specialist in North Carolina, who also sat on the committee, told CNN, "We helped the science make sense."

"It's now going to be a big challenge for government entities to easily understand how to use the science when making decisions on things like land use and infrastructure." Whitehead added. "If states or towns, for example, need to install new storm-water pipes, those pipes won't be very effective if they make those decisions without a good understanding of the science of climate change and how it's impacting that community."..

Committee members said they did not receive explicit reasoning for why the federal advisory committee on climate science was disbanded. Many of them told CNN they were disappointed but not surprised about the White House's actions.

"Given what's happened over recent months, when you look at the things being said by key people in the administration like EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt about climate science, it's fair to say we were all a bit concerned," Dunlap said. "But I expected the committee's term to be renewed."

September 12, 2017 8:15 AM  
Anonymous Pope Francis said...

Pope Francis On Climate Change Denial: ‘Man Is Stupid’

“When you don’t want to see, you don’t see,” the pope says while flying over the hurricane-ravaged Caribbean.

WASHINGTON — Climate change denials amid catastrophic hurricanes are a reminder that humans are not a particularly smart species, Pope Francis said Sunday while flying over areas in the Caribbean decimated by Hurricane Irma.

“Man is stupid,” he said, referencing a passage in the Old Testament, according to the The New York Times and The Associated Press. “When you don’t want to see, you don’t see.”

A correspondent for Crux Now had a slightly different translation of the pontiff’s comments: “Man is a stupid and hard-headed being who doesn’t see.”

The pope — who has sparred with President Donald Trump on several issues, including climate change — also urged the climate skeptics of the world to consult with a scientist.

“Those who deny climate change need to go to scientists and ask them,” Francis said, according to Crux. He said the scientific community has been “clear and precise” in linking human activities to the ongoing crisis and that “each [person] has a moral responsibility, bigger or smaller.” Climate change is a “serious matter over which we cannot make jokes,” he said.

Pope Francis’ comments came during a flight from Colombia to Rome, which passed over areas of the Caribbean left devastated by Hurricane Irma. According to Crux, journalists asked the pope about the moral responsibility world political leaders have to fight against climate change.

Francis warned that “history will judge those decisions,” and that if humans fail to curb climate change we “will go down,” according to reports.

When Trump met with Francis in May, the pope gave the president a copy of his 2015 encyclical on climate change and the environment, “Laudato Si.” In the 184-page document, Francis argues that climate change is inherently a moral and spiritual issue and criticizes local and national governments that refuse to address it.

Since taking office, Trump, a longtime climate change skeptic who has dismissed it as “bullshit” and a Chinese hoax, has worked swiftly to derail America’s actions to combat the threat. In June, Trump announced he will pull the U.S. out of the historic Paris Agreement on climate change, in which nearly 200 countries committed to slashing carbon emissions.

Climate scientists say powerful back-to-back hurricanes Harvey and Irma — which battered the Gulf Coast, the Caribbean and the U.S. Southeast over the last two weeks — were made worse by climate change. The Trump administration, however, has said now is not the time to discuss the role climate change played in the extreme weather events.

September 12, 2017 8:48 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"Climate scientists say powerful back-to-back hurricanes Harvey and Irma — which battered the Gulf Coast, the Caribbean and the U.S. Southeast over the last two weeks — were made worse by climate change."

typical bait and switch from TTF

now, that they realize scientists don't support that AGW caused these storms, it's on to the more nebulous "made worse"

sounds like an unverifiable hypothesis, TTF's rhetorical specialty

this is how "global warming" became "climate change"

well, Irma was not all that extraordinary and since it was first hurricane to hit Florida in a dozen years, we're still way ahead of the game

the loss of life was minimal and likely less than if traffic had been a normal sunny day in the Sunshine State

the property damage was way less than expected (I know those shrubs can be expensive) because Florida building codes have strengthened since Andrew, which indicates that humans can adapt to weather events

one more point: both Rick Scott and Donald Trump performed admirably and capably, as agreed to by all sides

say hi to Nancy and Chuck!

more than anyone will ever say about Barack Obama

"After suffering from depressed approval ratings during the summer, President Donald Trump just saw one of his biggest poll bumps in recent months.

According to the latest Rasmussen daily tracking poll, Trump's approval rating currently hit 46 percent on Monday. That's the highest approval rating he's seen in that survey since early June, and up ten points from his low of 36 percent in early August when his approval dropped below former President Barack Obama's threshold."

September 12, 2017 11:18 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"it's on to the more nebulous "made worse""

MADE WORSE = INCREASE IN FREQUENCY AND INTENSITY

"Storms will become more frequent and more severe" is exactly what climate scientists have been saying for decades.

Now that is happening, some choose to ignore it. Like Pope Francis says, "Man is stupid. When you don't want to see, you don't see."

You've been burying your head in the dirt/sand for a decade now here on Vigilance yet Earth keeps getting hotter and storms keep getting more frequent and more intense.

But while you're head's above ground, pay attention, you won't want to miss this:

"(Reuters) - Republican lawmaker Devin Nunes’ investigation into whether Obama administration officials used classified intelligence reports to discredit Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign team could backfire on the congressman - and the president, sources familiar with the reports said.

The reports contain no evidence that any aides to former Democratic President Barack Obama acted improperly, the sources said, but they do indicate some Trump associates may have violated an obscure 1799 law, the Logan Act, which prohibits unauthorized U.S. citizens from negotiating with a foreign government that has a dispute with the United States.

The spying reports also are relevant to the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into conclusions by U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia worked to tilt last November’s election in Republican Trump’s favor, said the sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Mueller’s office declined to comment..."

https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-russia-investigations/republican-attempt-to-deflect-trump-russia-probes-could-backfire-sources-idUSKCN1BM25G

"Trump's approval rating currently hit 46 percent on Monday."

Well yeah, it's now five days after he gave up on the GOP and cut a deal with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi so no wonder his approval rating went up, even in the right-wing's favorite outlier poll, Rasmussen.

Apparently even some Republicans appreciate bipartisanship on Capitol Hill.

However, the RCP average of Trump's approval rating is still under 40%, the worst for any first year President since Harry Truman and Gallup shows Trump at 37% approval today..

http://www.gallup.com/interactives/185273/presidential-job-approval-center.aspx

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_States_presidential_approval_rating

September 12, 2017 12:32 PM  
Anonymous How deplorable! said...

ALEX JONES (HOST): Ladies and gentlemen, I was told this by high level sources and it was evident and especially after [Ronald] Reagan was shot in his first year in office when he was acting like Trump, and doing the right things, that he never really recovered. They gave him cold blood, and his transfusion that causes brain damage. They slowly gave him small amounts of sedatives. It’s known that most presidents end up getting drugged. Small dosages of sedatives till they build it up, Trump’s such a bull he hasn’t fully understood it yet.

But I’ve talked to people, multiple ones, and they believe that they are putting a slow sedative that they’re building up that’s also addictive in his Diet Cokes and in his iced tea and that the president by 6 or 7 at night is basically slurring his words and is drugged. Now first they had to isolate him to do that. But yes, ladies and gentleman, I’ve talked to people that talk to the president now at 9 at night, he is slurring his words. And I’m going to leave it at that. I’ve talked to folks that have talked to him directly.

So notice, “Oh, he’s mentally ill. Oh, he’s got Alzheimer’s.” They isolate him then you start slowly building up the dose, but instead of titrating it like poison, like venom of a cobra, or a rattlesnake, or a water moccasin where you build it up slowly so that you get a immunity to it, you’re building it slowly so the person doesn’t notice it. First it’s almost zero, just a tiny bit and then a little more and then your brain subconsciously becomes addicted to it and wants it and so as the dose gets bigger and bigger you get more comfortable in it. The president’s about two months into being covertly drugged. Now I’m risking my life, by the way, tell you all this. I was physically sick before I went on air. Because I’m smart. And I don’t mean that in a braggadocious way. I mean I’m not dumb. The information you’re going to get today is super dangerous. In fact, I’m tempted just to let it out now so they don’t cut the show off or something before this goes out. I mean this is the kind of thing that gets you killed.

[...]

JONES: They drug presidents because the power structure wants a puppet. The president needs his blood tested by an outside physician he trusts.

September 12, 2017 1:50 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"MADE WORSE = INCREASE IN FREQUENCY AND INTENSITY"

oh thanks

hurricanes have been less frequent in recent years

and Irma hit the mainland as a Cat 3

25 years ago, Andrew hit mainland at cat 5

so, intensity doesn't seem to be increasing either

are you stupid?

"Storms will become more frequent and more severe" is exactly what climate scientists have been saying for decades.

"Now that is happening, some choose to ignore it. Like Pope Francis says, "Man is stupid. When you don't want to see, you don't see.""

yeah well, the Pope isn't the brightest of bulbs

you ever see how he dresses?

moron-anon gets even stupider:

"But while you're head's above ground, pay attention, you won't want to miss this:

"(Reuters) - Republican lawmaker Devin Nunes’ investigation into whether Obama administration officials used classified intelligence reports to discredit Donald Trump’s 2016 campaign team could backfire on the congressman - and the president, sources familiar with the reports said.

The reports indicate some Trump associates may have violated an obscure 1799 law, the Logan Act, which prohibits unauthorized U.S. citizens from negotiating with a foreign government that has a dispute with the United States."

pay attention? this has been discussed here in detail many times, if Mueller's saying this, it's nothing new

that was a law passed for political reasons when a guy named Logan negotiated with France and the public strongly approved of his actions, which really ticked off the powers that be

there's a reason that law is obscure

no one has ever been prosecuted under it

why?

it's an unconstitutional violation of the right to free speech

even Logan himself blatantly violated it again, negotiating with England, prior to the War of 1812

the government did nothing

"The spying reports also are relevant to the investigation by special counsel Robert Mueller into conclusions by U.S. intelligence agencies that Russia worked to tilt last November’s election in Republican Trump’s favor, said the sources, who spoke on the condition of anonymity."

oh brilliant, Mueller

but no need for anonymity

everyone already knows that

it's what they do

the only thing is that they usually try to help the Dems and Hillary so failed at diplomacy as Secr of State that they were out to get her

they probably are why Bernie did so well against her

Bernie has ties in Russia and even honeymooned in Moscow in what he considered the perfect society

brilliant anon reported:

"Trump's approval rating currently hit 46 percent on Monday."

moron-anon made himself look stupid:

"Well yeah, it's now five days after he gave up on the GOP and cut a deal with Chuck Schumer and Nancy Pelosi so no wonder his approval rating went up"

that's strange...

because right before all that, Economist had Trump at 42 and Congress at 10

Trump is more likely benefiting from his masterful handling of the hurricane in Houston and he'll get more bump from Florida

could you imagine if this happened while Hillary was President?

she'd probably appoint some crony from the Clinton Foundation to run the whole thing as payback for his assistance cleaning up Comet Ping Pong



September 12, 2017 3:46 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"it's an unconstitutional violation of the right to free speech"

uh, TTF's position is that freedom of speech is not in the constitution, but, instead, a later amendment

there's a word for people who think like that:

traitor

September 12, 2017 4:03 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"hurricanes have been less frequent in recent years

and Irma hit the mainland as a Cat 3

25 years ago, Andrew hit mainland at cat 5

so, intensity doesn't seem to be increasing either

are you stupid?"


Andrew did not follow three years of historic flooding in Houston, nor was Andrew accompanied by two other active hurricanes at the same time like Irma was accompanied by Jose and Katia.

Ask yourself, are you stupid?

Insult the Pope all you want so Vigilance readers can clearly see what kind of christian you are.

And the venerable Gallup has Trump surging all the way up to 37% approval today while you cherry pick.



September 12, 2017 5:59 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"there's a word for people who think like that:

traitor"


And then there's thought police
noun
a group of people who aim or are seen as aiming to suppress ideas that deviate from the way of thinking that they believe to be correct.

September 12, 2017 6:06 PM  
Anonymous the real mccoy said...

"Andrew did not follow three years of historic flooding in Houston, nor was Andrew accompanied by two other active hurricanes at the same time like Irma was accompanied by Jose and Katia."

my Andrew comment was directed not at frequency but intensity

as a matter of fact, the 2005 hurricane season, which was the last time any hurricane made landfall in the US, had numerous hurricanes, one after the other

are you too stupid to do a search online?

hurricanes have become neither more frequent nor more intense

hey have been non-existent for a dozen years in contrast to the GW alarmists' predictions in 2005

are you too stupid to cut your losses and move on when you're clearly wrong?

"Insult the Pope all you want so Vigilance readers can clearly see what kind of christian you are."

thanks for the permission

as a matter of fact, Roman Catholic is a subset of Christianity, a large sect with a number of heresies present

"And the venerable Gallup has Trump surging all the way up to 37% approval today while you cherry pick."

I have three polls: Ramussen, Reuters, Economist/You Gov that contradict the ONE you cite

sounds like you're the one cherry picking

"And then there's thought police
noun
a group of people who aim or are seen as aiming to suppress ideas that deviate from the way of thinking that they believe to be correct."

I wouldn't dream of stopping you from attacking the Constitution

at the same time I will defend it and characterize the attack appropriately as un-American

is that policing thought?

sounds like free speech to me

and all other real Americans

September 12, 2017 6:34 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

"are you too stupid to do a search online?

hurricanes have become neither more frequent nor more intense

hey have been non-existent for a dozen years in contrast to the GW alarmists' predictions in 2005"


Why do you insist on cherry picking the Atlantic seaboard of the US?

The US is not the only place there are severe and historic flooding and hurricanes.

“Man is stupid. When you don’t want to see, you don’t see.”

"I have three polls: Ramussen, Reuters, Economist/You Gov that contradict the ONE you cite

sounds like you're the one cherry picking"


< eye roll >

I ended my comment at 12:32 PM today with"

"However, the RCP average of Trump's approval rating is still under 40%, the worst for any first year President since Harry Truman and Gallup shows Trump at 37% approval today"

I have nine polls.

You know what the RCP average is don't you?

It's the average of the polling from
1. Gallup
2. Rasmussen Reports
3. Economist/YouGov
4. Reuters/Ipsos
5. Fox News
6. IBD/TIPP
7. Quinnipiac
8. PPP (D)
9. ABC News/Wash Post

It shows 39.6% job approval.

“Man is stupid. When you don’t want to see, you don’t see.”

September 12, 2017 9:51 PM  
Anonymous same old, same old said...

this is getting surreal

Trump has been handling this better than his previous two predecessors and people recognize that

additionally, the economy is doing great, stupid

looks like it's the same old, same old for gay politicians

from Barney Frank's male prostitution ring in his townhouse to this gay mayor in Seattle who is accused of having sex with underage guys

gays have broken society's moral standards against same gender sex

why would they respect any other standards?

"SEATTLE, Sept 12 (Reuters) - Seattle Mayor Ed Murray, dogged since by mounting allegations of child sexual abuse, said he would resign as mayor effective Wednesday afternoon.

Murray's decision to resign effectively ends the decades-long political career of Seattle's first openly gay mayor.

In recent months, he has faced growing pressure to resign as more people came forward to accuse him of sexual assault.

"it is important that my personal issues do not affect the ability of our city government to conduct the public's business," Murray said in a statement announcing his resignation.

Heterosexual Seattle Council President Bruce Harrell will become Mayor upon Murray's resignation, which is effective Wednesday at 5 p.m.

Five men have come forward to accuse Murray of sexually abusing them as children.

In April, a 46-year-old man sued Murray, claiming the mayor paid the man for sex when he was a homeless, drug-addicted teenager in the 1980s.

The Seattle Times reported in July that a child welfare report filed with the state of Oregon said Murray sexually abused his teenage foster son in the 1980s.

Murray announced his decision to resign on Tuesday, after the Seattle Times reported that his younger cousin told the newspaper that the mayor repeatedly molested him as a teenager in the 1970s."

September 12, 2017 10:29 PM  
Anonymous it's a full term, stupid said...

Wash Post reports that middle class income is going through the roof under Trump

that'll get ya re-elected

looks like a big win for gays

the most gay-friendly President, like ever, will serve eight full years

by 2024, reparative therapy will be an entitlement

September 13, 2017 8:28 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Did he kill anyone?

Compare to this deplorable heterosexual:

Killer of 8 in Texas was the estranged husband of one of the victims, her parents say.

September 13, 2017 8:29 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

and we have Hillary to thank

thanks, Hill

September 13, 2017 8:30 AM  
Anonymous a day with TTF is like a day without sunshine said...

"Did he kill anyone?

Compare to this deplorable heterosexual:"

let me get this straight

you're defending a homosexual who abused young boys

looks like Anita Bryant was right all those years ago

let's all have an OJ in her honor!!

September 13, 2017 8:35 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

What The 2 Deadliest Mass Shootings This Year Have In Common
Both involved men allegedly targeting their estranged wives as the women attempted to move on.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/plano-texas-mass-shooting_us_59b7e02ce4b09be416581d2b?ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009

September 13, 2017 8:45 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

The Supreme Court agreed late Tuesday to lift restrictions on President Trump's travel ban until further notice, allowing the administration to continue barring most refugees under the ban.

September 13, 2017 8:57 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Lady Liberty's torch has gone dark.

September 13, 2017 10:02 AM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

millions come in legally every year

temporarily barring some from a handful of countries that the Obama administration deemed breeding grounds for terrorists doesn't change that

you are the type of extremist that is making rational conversation difficult and dividing the country

September 13, 2017 12:17 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

https://www.aol.com/article/news/2017/09/13/mike-flynns-son-is-subject-of-federal-russia-probe/23207764/

September 13, 2017 1:58 PM  
Anonymous der clinton said...

When Hillary Clinton, who was almost our president, riffed on President Trump and what she saw as his "authoritarianism" she displayed an odd definition of the idea. She said that at the "core" of authoritarianism is "to sow mistrust toward exact the people we need to rely on: our leaders, the press, experts who seek to guide public policy based on evidence…"

So, authoritarianism involves sowing distrust in the people in power?

Huh?

Clinton invoked Orwell in her perverse definition of authoritarianism. We could wave off her backwards understanding to sloppiness or partisanship. But this is a small shadow of something far bigger: Clinton has a fundamentally authoritarian mindset, and she had built around her a circle of sycophants who enabled that mindset.

Hillary had proven very adept at her efforts to amass power. She successfully made herself a multimillionaire by trading on government connections. She acquired the resumé for a presidential run, remarkably without ever attaching herself to any vision or principles. She successfully evaded federal transparency laws for years, managing to run the State Department outside the prying eye of federal authorities and FOIA requesters alike. And she had layers and layers of seasoned supporters backing her—believing her justified—in her disdain for and evasion of transparency.

In fact, the Washington Post and others have scolded journalists who asked too many questions about her evasion of public records laws.

This highlights the biggest reason Hillary was the greater threat on the authoritarianism score: She would have the elites on her side.

When Donald Trump imposed onerous visa standards, every academic, most journalists, every celebrity, and every lawyer in the country raised a furious cry. The judicial system struck down Trump on flimsy grounds, because of how unseemly and mean-spirited his order seemed.

A favorite canard about totalitarian Trump is the notion—repeated by Hillary in her new book—that Margaret Atwood's play about a theocracy in which poor women are made sex slaves and baby incubators, was "prescient." Somehow, Donald Trump has put the U.S. on the verge of a theocracy obsessed with fertility.

Look around at the culture war and ask yourself if that's where we are headed. The ACLU has sued to force Catholic hospitals to abort babies. State after state punishes small businesswomen and men who don't want to participate in gay marriages. California is entertaining speech codes about pronouns for men who identify as women, vice versa, and everything in between.

Freedom of Speech is under attack from the Left, on campus and in America's largest most powerful corporations.

Were Hillary President, she would have taken up some or all of these cultural crusades, and she would have had massive elite support—far more than Trump will ever have for his hoped-for trampling on civil liberties. Recall that Clinton literally campaigned on amending the Constitution to curb the First Amendment when it comes to criticizing politicians, and on suspending gun rights without due process. These are both matters where 90 percent of the news media agrees with her.

Google, the academy, the news media, all celebrities, Apple, K Street, the courts, the bureaucracy, and the legal establishment would be rallying behind her destruction of the Bill of Rights. But with Trump as president, all of those institutions, for better and for worse, are today part of the #resistance.

If authoritarianism was your concern, America dodged that bullet.

September 13, 2017 2:30 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

No, idiot, authoritarianism is not when you distrust authorities. In authoritarianism you distrust the knowledge of experts, for instance scientists, diplomats, experienced people. You put the ignorant in charge because they have power, not because they know what to do.

And yes, we have that now. She was absolutely right.

September 13, 2017 2:39 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Good anonymous posted "Why do you insist on cherry picking the Atlantic seaboard of the US?".

That's Wyatt/bad anonymous's modus operandi for denying the reality of global warming.

He picks isolated events/localized geography that support his lies and ignores the longer term and global trend that shows hurricanes are getting worse and the planet is warming.

If it weren't for dishonest cherry-picking and outright lies Waytt/bad anonymous would have nothing.

September 13, 2017 3:10 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

The Dying of White Christian America

There’s a landmark new report from the Public Religion Research Institute, a fine organization that I’ve often cited in the past. The report is based on data from the American Values Atlas, a survey of more than 100,000 Americans conducted in 2016. Its title is “America’s Changing Religious Identity“, but its conclusions are more dramatic than that anodyne title would indicate:

White Christians, once the dominant religious group in the U.S., now account for fewer than half of all adults living in the country. Today, fewer than half of all states are majority white Christian.

In 1976, a mere forty years ago, an 80% supermajority of Americans were white Christians, and a 55% majority were white Protestants. Today, those numbers are 43% and 30%.

This has never happened before in American history. Until the last few decades, our national mythology has painted us as a nation of, by, and for white Christians, especially Puritan-esque white Protestants. But that image no longer reflects reality. We’re an urban, a multicultural and, increasingly, a secular society, and these trends are strengthening with every rising generation. Meanwhile, white Christians are literally the America of yesteryear: they’re aging, graying, and dwindling. What happens when the mythology collides with the reality?

The decline of white Christianity is across the board, not limited to any specific faith or creed. When it started to become a trend, conservative white evangelicals believed they’d be immune, because they knew what they stood for and did so without apology, unlike those wishy-washy liberals. They were wrong:

White evangelicals managed to avoid the first wave of white Christian decline in the 1990s and into the early years of the 21st century. But between 2006 and 2016, the proportion of white evangelical Protestants has fallen six percentage points, from 23% to 17%. [NB: It sounds more dramatic when you say, truthfully, that white evangelicals have lost one-quarter of their strength in ten years.]

September 13, 2017 3:10 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

America is, in truth, becoming less religious. The number of people who are religiously unaffiliated – atheist, agnostic, or simply nothing in particular – now accounts for one-quarter of Americans. That number has tripled (!) since the 1990s. Among people under 30, the figure is even more pronounced: 38%, or nearly four in ten. And while some of the unaffiliated describe themselves as generically religious, the majority don’t:

Even as America becomes less religious, many of the unaffiliated shrink from the terms “atheist” and “agnostic”, which still have negative stereotypes attached to them. But a healthy majority identify as secular, i.e., possessing no religious belief. This refutes the gloomy prediction, seen in comments on this site and elsewhere, that the secular movement is destined to fail because humans are genetically programmed to be religious. Evolution doesn’t happen fast enough to account for a change like this. America’s transformation is a living demonstration that religiosity is driven by cultural factors, not DNA.

And what cultural factors could those be? One of the obvious ones is religious intolerance of gay rights, as noted by Patheos’ Hemant Mehta in a passage worth quoting:

We know that white evangelicals hold just about all the political power right now and drive much of our current policy decisions. But they’re hanging on for dear life. At least in terms of power. Their decisions over the past decade — notably their opposition to LGBTQ rights — have squandered away any goodwill they had among young people who might have given them a chance at one point.

Or as Amanda Marcotte puts it on Salon, quoting PRRI’s Robert Jones:

“It’s not just that conservative white Christians have lost this argument with a broader liberal culture,” he noted. “It’s that they’ve lost it with their own kids and grandchildren.”

The Nashville Statement was a reaction to this. So too, in a slightly different way, was Donald Trump and the Nazi march in Charlottesville. All of them stem from the same root; they represent eruptions of anxiety among conservative white Christians who realize the world is leaving them behind.

But they’ve made a devil’s bargain. In a last-ditch attempt to cling to power as long as possible, they’ve thrown in their lot with the worst elements of America. They’re anti-gay, anti-woman, anti-science, anti-equality, anti-refugee. They’ve reembraced the racism and white supremacism of their past. They’ve made Christianity synonymous with all these evils, and that’s something that young voters aren’t likely to forget. The compromises they’ve made to hang on to power will reverberate – and in the next forty years, we may see America changed even more rapidly and dramatically than in the forty before.

September 13, 2017 3:11 PM  
Anonymous Dems Flip State House Seats In 2 Districts That Trump Won By Double Digits said...

"Democrats won two GOP-held legislative seats in Oklahoma and New Hampshire on Tuesday, bringing the total number of state legislature seats the party has flipped since the November election to six.

The Democratic victory in Oklahoma was especially striking. Democrat Jacob Rosecrants, a schoolteacher, defeated Republican Darin Chambers, a businessman, by nearly 21 percentage points in a special election to represent District 46 in Oklahoma’s House of Representatives. The district encompasses part of the city of Norman, home of the University of Oklahoma.

Rosecrants had lost by a nearly identical margin in a previous race for the seat in November. The seat opened up, however, when Republican Scott Martin resigned to head the Norman Chamber of Commerce, prompting Tuesday’s special election.

The Democratic win was even more notable because President Donald Trump defeated Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton in the legislative district by over 10 percentage points.

Rosecrants campaigned on restoring school funding, reforming the state’s criminal justice system, resolving Oklahoma’s budget crisis and limiting corporate influence on state politics.

“Representative-elect Rosecrants fought hard to win this open Republican seat that Trump carried by 10 points in 2016. Progress, public education and long-term budget solutions resonated with Oklahoma voters, turning this once reliably-red seat blue,” said Jessica Post, executive director of the Democratic Legislative Campaign Committee, in a statement reacting to the victory.

Democrats also took control of the New Hampshire House of Representatives’ Belknap County District 9, which includes Belmont and parts of Laconia.

Democrat Charlie St. Clair, a retired teacher, defeated Republican Steven Whalley 1,267 votes to 1,009 votes. St. Clair, who runs the Laconia Motorcycle Week Association, emphasized his deep roots in the community. He campaigned on improving public safety, maintaining Laconia’s nursing home and upgrading transportation infrastructure.

Republican Robert Fisher had won the district handily in the previous election, but he resigned in May amid revelations that he had founded the misogynist Reddit forum “Red Pill.” Trump had also won the district in November by 16 percentage points.

Oklahoma and New Hampshire have proven especially fertile ground for Democrats looking to make gains in state legislatures. Counting Rosecrants, the party has picked up three previously GOP-held legislative seats in special elections since November. And St. Clair’s win is the second pickup for Democrats in New Hampshire.

Democrats remain in the minority in both the Oklahoma and New Hampshire Houses of Representatives. But the victories bolster the party’s attempt to regain nearly 1,000 legislative seats that Democrats have lost across the country since 2009, and suggest they could make more significant gains in normal state-level elections in Virginia and New Jersey this November."

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/democrats-flip-seats-oklahoma-new-hampshire_us_59b93e62e4b086432b035ea2

September 13, 2017 5:37 PM  
Anonymous True Blue Maryland said...


https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/md-politics/college-park-decides-to-allow-noncitizens-to-vote-in-local-elections/2017/09/13/2b7adb4a-987b-11e7-87fc-c3f7ee4035c9_story.html

September 13, 2017 5:49 PM  
Blogger Priya Lynn said...

Take away Donald Trump's money and he's the guy on the bus you avoid because he's screaming random sh*t with his penis in his hand.

September 14, 2017 12:42 AM  

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