Sunday
Feb072016
The Commentariat -- February 8, 2016
Afternoon Update:
Could you let go of my breast, please? -- WCBS reporter Marcia Kramer, to a Secret Service agent protecting Donald Trump, at a Manchester, New Hampshire, hotel
Ashley Parker & Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: Oooh! Marco Rubio & MSNBC host Joe Scarborough are having a feud! "In an election season marked by animosity, egos and insults, this feud ... follows two men from the swamps of Florida politics to a presidential cycle in which Mr. Rubio, 44, has emerged as a leading candidate, and Mr. Scarborough, 52, as one of his fiercest critics.... In an interview Saturday, Mr. Scarborough could not hide his disapproval of Mr. Rubio, describing him as 'programmed' and 'risk averse.' And after Mr. Rubio's debate performance on Saturday appeared to validate his critique, Mr. Scarborough took something of a victory lap. 'I've been criticized for saying Marco looks too robotic, too prepackaged, and too young,' he wrote in a text message. 'But everything I've said alone for months is now being repeated this morning by everyone else in the political world. My critiques weren't personal: they were right.'"
*****
Presidential Race
Jonathan Martin of the New York Times: "Bill Clinton =uncorked an extended attack on Senator Bernie Sanders on Sunday, harshly criticizing Mr. Sanders and his supporters for what he described as inaccurate and 'sexist' attacks on Hillary Clinton.... What began as a testimonial to Mrs. Clinton's leadership and a statesmanlike lecture on her approach to issues evolved into an angrier recitation of grievances against Mr. Sanders and his fervent supporters." ...
... Annie Karni of Politico has more on Bill Clinton's attack on Sanders. ...
... Greg Sargent: "... one has to hope this latest episode is not a harbinger of more to come along the lines of what we saw in 2008. Hillary and her campaign have worked hard to avoid being tagged as the establishment candidate who believes she's entitled to a coronation.... But if the goal is to dispel that narrative, it won't be helpful to have an ex-president who also happens to be your husband angrily ridiculing and belittling the appeal of a spirited challenger who has engaged millions of young voters into the political process in a way you haven't." ...
... Steve Friess of the Washington Post: "... Hillary Clinton made a quick detour Sunday afternoon from the campaign trail in New Hampshire to express her outrage directly to the residents of ... [Flint, Michigan,] over the scandal that poisoned their municipal water supply.... She takes credit for goading the Republican governor to accept federal help...." ...
... Chas Danner of New York: "The Democratic National Committee and host CNN announced on Sunday that the March 6 Democratic debate between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders will be held in Flint, Michigan. The choice is meant to draw attention to the plight of the city...."
... Alan Yuhas of the Guardian: "The feminist writer Gloria Steinem apologized on Sunday for remarks about young women who support Bernie Sanders, not long after Hillary Clinton defended Madeleine Albright over her comment that there is 'a special place in hell' for women who do not support Clinton. Steinem posted her apology to Facebook, writing that she 'misspoke' on Friday when ... [she] said women 'get more activist as they grow older. And when you're younger, you think: "Where are the boys? The boys are with Bernie."'... 'Madeline has been saying this for many, many years,' Clinton said [on "Meet the Press" Sunday]. 'She believes it firmly, in part because she knows what a struggle it has been, and she understands the struggle is not over.'" ...
... Greg Grandin of the Nation on Hillary Clinton's long, friendly relationship with Henry Kissinger, the architect of policies that led to "3, maybe 4 million deaths." One thing to bear in mind is that diplomats, including secretaries of state, are obliged to say nice thing about people they hold in contempt. Look at Grandin's piece for evidence of a continuation of Kissinger's policies & philosophy, not for the nice things Clinton & Kissinger have said to & about one another.
Andy Borowitz: "Scandal rocked Bernie Sanders's Presidential campaign on Friday as the candidate was forced to admit that he received free checking from several big banks."
Bradford Richardson of the Hill: "The Iowa Democratic Party on Sunday updated the results of the Iowa caucuses after discovering discrepancies in the tallies at five precincts, but the final outcome remains unchanged.... Hillary Clinton still places first in the caucuses with 700.47 state delegate equivalents, or 49.84 percent, the party said in a statement. Primary rival Bernie Sanders comes in second with 696.92 state delegate equivalents, or 49.59 percent. The total net change gives Sanders an additional 0.1053 state delegate equivalents and strips Clinton of 0.122 state delegate equivalents. Former Maryland Gov. Martin O'Malley, who dropped out of the race after the caucuses, also received an additional 0.0167 state equivalent delegates."
CW: Somewhere in this great land, possibly in New Hampshire corner of it, the Marco puppetmaster, whoever he may be, is kicking himself for telling Marco, "Whatever happens in the debate, stay on message." ...
... Philip Rucker & Robert Costa of the Washington Post: Marco Rubio's "GOP rivals argued Sunday that the debate undercut the central case for Rubio's candidacy -- that his political agility and youthful, charismatic persona make him best positioned to challenge the Democratic nominee. And they claimed a renewed -- and seemingly justifiable -- rationale to soldier on past New Hampshire, which would mean that the mainstream Republican vote would probably continue to splinter among several candidates."
Sabrina Siddiqui of the Guardian: "Marco Rubio on Sunday defended his performance in Saturday night's Republican presidential debate, in which he was widely panned for coming off as scripted in a tense exchange with Chris Christie.... 'Actually, I would pay them to keep running that clip, because that's what I believe passionately,' Rubio said, reiterating once more his point about Obama deliberately harming the country." (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... There's No There There There. CW: Here's what Marco Marco Marco doesn't get or is pretending he doesn't get): if your schtick is to accuse the POTUS of subversive activity or whatever, then you have to find more than one way to say it; you have do say he did this & he wants to do that. You have to have some facts or at least some made-up crap to back up your assertion. All MMM has is a couple of canned applause lines asserting that President Obama is a malevolent force. A not-too-bright child can handle that (and be just as cute spouting his lines). There's no evidence that Marco even knows, beyond his prepared material, what awful things Obama is supposed to have done. ...
... "Software Glitch." Paul Krugman: "While Mr. Rubio did indeed make a fool of himself on Saturday, he wasn't the only person on that stage spouting canned talking points that are divorced from reality. They all were, even if the other candidates managed to avoid repeating themselves word for word.... The truth is that the whole G.O.P. seems stuck in a time loop, saying and doing the same things over and over. And unlike Bill Murray's character in the movie 'Groundhog Day,' Republicans show no sign of learning anything from experience.... The whole G.O.P. seems stuck in a time loop, saying and doing the same things over and over. And unlike Bill Murray's character in the movie 'Groundhog Day,' Republicans show no sign of learning anything from experience." ...
... CW: While he's at it, Krugman manages to praise Hillary & get in a dig at Bernie. ...
... Kevin Drum thinks Marco Marco Marco's debate performance may have ended his career. CW: He sure got a long way on platitudes & attacking absent opponents. ...
... "... Maybe His Ventriloquist Was Stuttering." Charles Pierce: "The general hilarity has tended to obscure what Rubio actually was saying. (And saying, and saying, and saying...) He was accusing the president of monumental and deliberate acts of subversion in office. This is a stunning charge, especially from a one-term pipsqueak whose memory banks jam whenever he steps an inch beyond his actual depth." CW: Haven't read that point elsewhere, & it is well-taken. (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... CW: One thing Marco Marco Marco reminds us of is, if not the low intelligence quotient of our billionaire class, then the low IQ that class of greedy bastards is willing to put into the White House to endanger all Americans & everybody else who gets in our way. This isn't the first time we've been provided a stark reminder that many a billionaire is a numbskull or worse -- for some reason the 2000 election comes to mind -- but when the billionaire who has been leading the GOP presidential race has been exposed as a featherweight fascist, the favored candidate of the uber-rich has proved to be a Doofus! & big money geniuses' second runner-up is poor Johnny Johnny Johnny One-Note, it's impossible not to notice that many of those billionaires & multi-millionaires need assistants to help them put their pants on one leg at a time. ...
... AND, Once Again, the GOP Establishment Bets on a Lame Horse. Brian Beutler of the New Republic: "At Saturday night's debate, Republicans wanted Marco Rubio to soar and Donald Trump to stumble. The opposite happened."
The Apogee of the Bully. Ryan Lizza of the New Yorker: Chris "Christie was gleeful on Sunday. In the morning, he appeared on CNN's 'State of the Union' from Manchester, New Hampshire. He bumped into Hillary Clinton in the green room. They shook hands and she congratulated him on his debate performance. 'I'll see you in the fall,' Christie told her as she departed.... During a swing around [New Hampshire], Christie was throwing punches in every direction. During his ninety-minute event in Hampton, he ridiculed Donald Trump, John Kasich, Jeb Bush, Ted Cruz, and Marco Rubio." ...
I think that the anointment [of Rubio] is now over, so that changes the entire race.... I am ready to roll right into South Carolina. -- Chris Christie, yesterday ...
... Chrisco Made the Snowplows Run on Time. Steve M.: "But what was Christie saying here? He was saying that being required to deal with strictly domestic problems makes him more qualified to be president that a U.S. senator, even though senators deal with foreign as well as domestic policy. He was saying that getting the streets plowed is all the job experience a potential president needs." CW: Read the whole post. I haven't seen this point made elsewhere, either. But I do think Steve is right to compare Christie's "qualification" for POTUS with Scott Walker's (remember him?) well-covered gaffe in which he claimed he could handle ISIS terrorists because he had "taken on 100,000 protesters" (mostly schoolteachers!). (Also linked yesterday afternoon.) ...
... E. J. Dionne has quite a different take: "It's not clear what Christie did for his own candidacy, but he performed a service by reminding his party that running a government is serious work and ought to be respected. That this was revelatory shows how far contemporary conservatism has strayed from the essential tasks of politics."
Bradford Richardson: "Following attacks from primary rival Jeb Bush about his past use of eminent domain..., Donald Trump on Sunday accused the Bush family of using the practice to build a baseball stadium in Texas. 'Eminent domain is a very important thing,' Trump said on ABC's 'This Week.' 'Jeb Bush doesn't understand what it means, and if you look into the Bush family -- I found this five minutes ago -- they used eminent domain for the stadium in Texas, where they own, I guess, a piece of the Texas Rangers.'" ...
... CW: Here's a little history on that, from Dan McGraw of Reason (May 2005): "
One of the most famous eminent domain cases involved ... baseball's Texas Rangers, at the time owned by George W. Bush. [The Rangers] convinced local voters to approve a 1991 tax increase that helped build a new $191 million stadium. The city of Arlington used eminent domain to acquire the property from hundreds of private owners, claiming that the stadium was a 'public use.'.... Several property owners were lowballed, and court decisions increased their take. (The city, not the team, was responsible for the larger payments. The compensation for one 13-acre plot was increased from $877,000 to $5 million, for example.)
The stadium clearly benefited the Rangers' owners more than anyone else: Bush turned his initial $600,000 investment into $15 million when the team was sold in 1999. But it has produced little of the promised economic benefit to Arlington, and there has never been a real 'public use' factor aside from baseball fans' paying their money to see games.
Katie Glueck of Politico: "Ted Cruz on Sunday said he opposes requiring women to register for a potential draft, breaking with Marco Rubio, Jeb Bush and Chris Christie, all of whom indicated support for opening up the Selective Service to women during Saturday night's debate." ...
... the idea that their government would forcibly put them in a foxhole with a 220-pound psychopath trying to kill them doesn't make any sense at all. -- Ted Cruz, on forcing women, specifically his daughters, to register for a draft
CW Translation: U.S. soldiers are fat psychopaths who routinely kill American women.
CW: If you suspect a racist subtext here, I'm with you.
Other News & Opinion
AP: "President Barack Obama is asking Congress for more than $1.8 billion in emergency funding to help fight the Zika virus. In an announcement Monday, the White House said the money would be used to expand mosquito control programs, speed development of a vaccine, develop diagnostic tests and improve support for low-income pregnant women."
Michael Wines & John Schwartz of the New York Times: "The crisis in Flint, Mich., where as many as 8,000 children under age 6 were exposed to unsafe levels of lead after a budget-cutting decision to switch drinking-water sources, may be the most serious contamination threat facing the country's water supplies. But it is hardly the only one. Unsafe levels of lead have turned up in tap water in city after city -- in Durham and Greenville, N.C., in 2006; in Columbia, S.C., in 2005; and last July in Jackson, Miss., where officials waited six months to disclose the contamination -- as well as in scores of other places in recent years."
Beyond the Beltway
Sarah Kaplan of the Washington Post: "Five top officials in Crystal City, Tex., were arrested Thursday under a federal indictment accusing them of taking tens of thousands of dollars in bribes and helping the operator of an illegal gambling operation.... The indictment swept up the city's mayor, mayor pro tempore (who both have city council votes) and a council member, as well as the city manager, a former city council member and the alleged gambling operator, Ngoc Tri Nguyen.... A fourth person on the city council, Marco Rodriguez, was arrested last month on human smuggling charges."
Mitch Smith of the New York Times: "The Chicago police officer who fatally shot a black 19-year-old and an unarmed bystander in December has filed a lawsuit seeking more than $10 million in damages from the teenager's estate, an unusual legal approach based on a claim that the young man's actions leading up to the gunfire were 'atrocious' and have caused the officer 'extreme emotional trauma.'"
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Reader Comments (26)
After seven years of a Presidency marked by a rare intelligence and genuinely humane spirit, perhaps I needed to be reminded that mean-minded bombast also has its uses in the political area.
I'm speaking of course of the Big Bully Christie's evisceration of the Lil Marco whose presentation of self had become as plausible in the eyes of too many as white teeth, practiced gestures and boyish good looks could make him.
Of course, that should not make a Bully President, but if the Bully made it less likely a good looking, spit-polished up-to-date boy with nineteenth century values won't become one either, bully for the Bully I say.
I have seen, up close and personal, what happens when a board of directors installs a puppet to run a complex institution, akin to Marie's comment about Marco Marco Marco and his billionaire backers above. In our case, it was a branch university of a Midwestern state system. The puppet destroyed functioning systems and fired a vast majority of the institutional administrative memory.
The final straw for us was when a board member said he would seek to fire any faculty members who were disloyal to the institution. In follow-up questioning, it became clear that being "disloyal" meant, for example, if your student was accepted for graduate studies at both the local institution and at the state's flagship institution, you were disloyal if you suggested your student might be better off at the flagship school.
We got out of Dodge, despite my wife's tenured position. The puppet was removed after about 18 months, but it took years to repair the damage. To see this happening on a national scale is horrifying, and there isn't a realistic escape route this time.
It is good to know that Chris Christie is now "ready to roll into South Carolina" (and if anyone could do it, he could). But he might find a speedbump along the way, if his performance in NH is weak. The latest UMass/7News tracking poll shows Christie at a whopping 5%.
Regarding Ms. Steinem's gaffe on the Bill Maher show: I watched the show and thought from the beginning of the interview that she seemed off her game. The media seems happy to pounce, but I think she deserves - at 81 - a little slack. Everyone has an off night.
I'd like to go back to that cake: Am I to understand that the whole thing is eatable? It looked to me as though the actual packages, boxes, necklace and purse were real and were placed atop an actual cake. Whatever the case, this kind of display from someone who actually implemented the "let them eat cake" scenario is beyond belief. And the money spent on it at this time makes me wonder whether there is any sanity left in Michigan's governor.
My fury knows no bounds––Snyder and Flint's former emergency manager, Darnell Earley, along with all the regulatory officials who lied need to sit their asses in jail while waiting for their trials. These technocrats are numb to the most basic of human emotions and devoid of empathy beyond their own tiny inner circle. I read that Michigan state officials, for example, provided bottled water to their employees in Flint for nearly a year while city residents drank the contaminated water, and authorities spent $440,000 to pipe clean water to the local GM plant after factory officials complained that the Flint water was corroding their car parts. That mediocre human beings make such systems function is what makes them dangerous. To wrap your mind around this scandal is pretty terrifying. A state deliberately poisoned children––not, whoops! let's correct this straightaway once they discovered what they had done, but hid it––lied, covered up, delivering evil in the form of polluted water.
Once upon a time we had important hearings like the Army/ McCarthy, the Estes Kefauver (re: organized crime), Watergate, et al. The Flint trials need to be one of these front and center ones soon––meanwhile it might be a good idea if all states check on their water supply.
In the book of Jonah the description of the inner hollow of a boat used the Hebrew term "yarech" which refers to the inner curve of the thigh where it folds into the scrotum in men and the vulva in women. In Genesis, Abraham asks his servant to swear an oath by touching him in the hollow of the thigh––a reference to the ancient custom of swearing by the testes––hence==we get TESTIFY. Which is what these Michigan ratfuckers are gonna have to do––the balls are no longer in their court!
@Victoria D. I agree, whatever Steinem's age. She is passionate to see a woman president, & that passion caused her to say a stupid thing. Do-overs for passionate, stupid things is one of the raisons d'etre of the women's movement: if women & men never made passionate mistakes, reproductive rights would be less important (tho of course abortions are often necessary when nobody errs).
AND, as MAG pointed out in yesterday's thread, Steinem wasn't completely wrong. I recall reading in 2008 that many young people went to Obama rallies to hook up. There's no reason to think they don't have the same motives in going to Sanders events now. Hell, if I thought Mr. Right were waiting for me at a Sanders rally, I'd be standing in front of Manchester's Palace Theater right now, scanning the crowd. (Instead, I'm contemplating going out among the snowflakes & moving some furniture from my trailer to the house, with no illusions a handsome fellow will happen by to do the heavy lifting.)
Marie
@PD Pepe: Thanks for the heads-up on GM water. I had read that GM switched off the Flint water system, but I hadn't read the details. Here's the indispensable Michael Moore (undated):
"A few months after Governor Snyder removed Flint from the clean fresh water we had been drinking for decades, the brass from General Motors went to him and complained that the Flint River water was causing their car parts to corrode when being washed on the assembly line. The Governor was appalled to hear that GM property was being damaged, so he jumped through a number of hoops and quietly spent $440,000 to hook GM back up to the Lake Huron water, while keeping the rest of Flint on the Flint River water. Which means that while the children in Flint were drinking lead-filled water, there was one — and only one — address in Flint that got clean water: the GM factory."
The whole page is well worth reading.
Marie
I don't think Ted meant a 220-lb psychopath to be racist (as in a blah psychopath). I think he meant being in a foxhole with a Muslin because that's where all the fightin' goes on and that's who our little ladies would be a-fightin' That's how it happens in wars, or at least the war movies that run in Ted's head. Everybody gets in foxholes and kills each other. Little mini-wars. Finish one foxhole, move on to the next -- making it much easier to carpet bomb the Muslins. Or maybe carpet bomb first, thus creating said foxholes for our little ladies to be a-fightin' in. Freedom. 'Murica.
Re: Marco, Marco, Marco.
I am entirely happy to accede to any suggestions of clairvoyance on my part for foreseeing the actions of the Marco Doll ™ whose voicebox got stuck on repeat. But the origin of this nom de butt is a tad more mundane. First some history. I may have mentioned in a story about a certain nun who taught my sixth grade class, that pretty much all the nuns had nicknames. They weren't the only ones.
Nicknames were also a big part of my family growing up, owing mostly to my brother's vivid imagination. The guys who lived on either side of us both had appropriate nicknames as did all our parents' friends and their kids. The house on the right was occupied by a guy who rose before the birds and began galumphing around in the dead of night getting ready to depart for god knows where dressed like he was ready to battle bears for deer carcasses in the wilderness (even though we lived in the city). His nickname? Danny Boone. The guy on the house to the left seemed to drive a new car every month, as if he were testing them out. His nickname, appropriately, even though he was never to my knowledge partially responsible for any illegal wars, was Ralph Nader.
My brother's knack for this sort of thing was so indelible that one summer, visiting my uncle who owned a cottage near the seashore, we, along with the local kids, were playing in the dunes off the beach. Suddenly, we noticed a new kid following us, trying, without much luck, to keep out of sight. My brother spied him leaning up over the top of a dune and declared "I see a lump on the horizon". The kid was welcomed into the group but for years after was known only as "Lump". I can't even tell you his real name. Even my mother called him Lump! I'm betting his own mother probably called him Lump.
Anyway, just to show you I come to this sort of thing naturally.
But the Marco, Marco, Marco sobriquet is more the result of the association of his name with a line from a 60's TV show that reeks of insipidus adolescentia, The Brady Bunch. The line? "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia." I never watched the show but it has always struck me as the height of insipidity. But hey, I never saw it so for all I know it could have been a sitcom version of "Long Day's Journey Into Night".
Still and all, my sense of The Brady Bunch is that it was a benign and rather mindless way to waste half and hour. Marco, Marco, Marco, unfortunately, although probably just as mindless, is far from benign and a Marco Reign of Error for four years--as opposed to half an hour--could be, as NiskyGuy relates, a true horror.
PD Pepe: What you said and thank you for saying it.
Good Morning, One & All.
To PD Pepe -
I've no knowledge of this particular "cake", however it is quite amazing what pastry chefs/stylists can create: They are, truly, artists. (And those whom I've known from work in The Food Industry - both male & female - have happened to be gay. Wonder if Snyder's selection of venue mandated, first, proof of "clean" hands.)
Also -
Thank you for the most enlightening origins of "testify" . . . and your following expansion regarding "balls". :)
To PD Pepe, Victoria D. & Marie RE Ms. Steinem -
While I've had more than a few "bones to pick" with Gloria (who, btw, looks fantastic . . .and at 81!) over the years, I'm struck that only she (unless I've been out-of-the-news-loop, which is entirely possible) - rather than Madam Albright - is being pilloried. To my way of thinking, 'where the boys are' (big laugh from the Connie Francis cover!) amounts to mere fluff when comparing that to 'a special place in hell'. Doncha think?
@Akhilleus: I never saw "The Brady Bunch" either, but I would guess that "Marcia, Marcia, Marcia" is a play on "Judy, Judy, Judy," a line usually attributed to Cary Grant from some movie but which actually comes, according to Grant's best guess, from a Grant impersonator. If that's the case, Marco Marco Marco has no Cary Grant antecedent but rather comes to us via a fake Cary Grant. Seems appropriate.
Marie
May be too early to slip into the stages of grief, but as the remaining days of the Obama Presidency ebb, I already feel the heavy load of bereavement.
The FDR tome I just finished and the presidential comparisons it invited only add to the burden.
Here I am, experiencing the last year of the only Presidency in my adult lifetime occupied by someone who had the capacity to recognize the challenges our world presents, the courage to describe them accurately and in the face of an increasingly hateful opposition to attempt to do something about them.
It's not that my adulation knows no bounds. Trade pacts like the TPP hand over even more control to the corporate interests that have caused so many of the other problems Obama inherited, like climate issues and the rampant inequality that is tearing the nation further apart.
But in contrast, each Republican debate reminds me of how deluded the opposition has been and how insistent they are on becoming more so. Tough talkers, yes, but not an ounce of realism--not scientific, not economic-- in the bunch.
So my admiration for Obama is not love for a perfection I only imagine, but I'm also not as pleased with the last seven years as I am merely because it could have been so much worse.
I just can't picture any of the candidates, even the two D's, holding a candle to the few great ones we've had, and though the circumstances that faced them and us were certainly different in 2008 and 1932, I am already missing the most remarkable man to hold the Presidency since FDR.
@PD Pepe & @Ophelia M.: The story of the etymology of the word "testify" is amusing, but it ain't necessarily accurate. See also this discussion.
Marie
@AK: What's in a name: One of the guys in the group of guys I had the pleasure of hanging out with in High School was the son of the owner of the Ballhorn Funeral Home––where most of Sheboygan's dead ended up (both my parents graced their halls). This lad, and for the life of me I can't recall his real name, was known as "Digger" Ballhorn––and Digger, true to his name, took over the family business so when it was time to put my mother to rest, it was my old pal Digger who paved the way.
The latest Ted Thing.
Christ, there are so many of them. But I thought the line was "There are no atheists in foxholes". I guess Ted wants it to be "There are no atheists and women in foxholes". Or something.
I wanna say something a little later about the simply amazing general lack of--everything, by all the Jolly Confederates on Parade in this campaign, but first let me say that trying to figure out exactly what goes on inside the Cruz Dome is like trying to read braille with your toes while stuck in an ice bath. Good luck with that shit.
So what's going on in this statement? Cruz, like all of these jamokes (I think Ben Carson retired the heavyweight crown in this category, but the rest are close behind), crams so many whacko theories and incorrect, insupportable and easily assailable assumptions into a few syllables, that several thousand words are often necessary to deconstruct his febrile thought process.
So here we have women being "forced into foxholes" by the gummint. But as far as I know, and as Amber Smith, former U.S. Army Kiowa Warrior helicopter pilot-in-command, Air Mission Commander, and a combat veteran of Iraq and Afghanistan relates in an article on the Federalist site (even the Federalist is in favor of having women register), military personnel have to apply for certain combat jobs so the idea of being forced is unclear. Details, shmetails, right?
The 220 lb. thing. What the fuck does this even mean? Someone in the foxhole is a big guy? A big black guy? Oh horror! Someone attacking the foxhole is a big guy? A big Moozlim guy? Ewww. So what? Women can shoot as well as anyone else. We routinely see stories about toddlers killing older siblings with firearms left lying around the family room (something Cruz DOES support), la-di-da. Oh shit! Baby Jen just shot her brother in the head. Oh well...Freeeeedom. (Sorry, side issue). So I'm guessing it doesn't matter if the enemy in or out of this supposed foxhole is 100 lbs or 300 lbs. Bullets still work. I thought Ted, avid hunter and marksman that he pretends to be, would get this.
Then there's this: foxholes? In Iraq? I'm not saying there are none at all, but it seems that Cruz, not a military veteran himself, is perhaps basing his imagery on too many WWII movies. Fantasy is no replacement for actual knowledge, Teddy boy.
Finally, who is Ted Cruz to say what women should and shouldn't be doing and who is he to call anyone who thinks they should decide for themselves "nuts"? My sense is that his daughters (as seen in a recent viral video) would rather sign up to fight Genghis Khan and the fucking Mongol Hordes in the Gobi Desert rather than kiss their creepoid dad.
Ted's bottom line: Women are inferior and need to be protected by big strong men like him. Big guys are scary and deadly, especially black Americans or brown Muslims, and foxholes are everywhere in the Middle East.
The guy is a fucking loon. But then you knew that.
@PDPepe: I think the whole cake is edible and uses something called rolled fondant to get the effect. Pretty amazing, whatever the politics.
I went on the bakery's website and they had some other impressive examples ( I think under Corporate section). But one weird one featured a newborn baby and a bunch of forceps!
It's a good thing the NH primary isn't today, since we've got some serious snow coming down. But it should have cleared out by dawn tomorrow morning and we'll just have to deal with the shoveling before heading out to vote. And then we will happily wave good-bye to the candidates and the media and turn our phones back on. I think most people maxed out on their tolerance a month or two ago. For those who would prefer their own states get to be "first in the nation," be careful what you wish for.
I know a few moderate Republicans who look at the candidates and say "None of the above." The people I've heard who are all excited about Trump seem to feel he will somehow cure all that (presumably) ails the country. But if square inches worth of yard signs are an indicator, Carly Fiorina will win big in my town--two huge signs for her, one in town and one in a neighborhood of expensive homes. Someone stumping for her stopped by while I was out on Saturday and dropped off not only a four-page flyer but also a 50-minute DVD entitled "Citizen Carly: The True Story of Carly Fiorina." I am not going to watch it. But deep pockets there.
The Democratic women I know are voting for Hillary; the men are voting for Bernie. I keep wondering if women are voting for Hillary as a "first woman president" thing, or because we've got strong practical streaks.
I'm inclined to agree with Charlie Pierce's take on Marco, Marco, Marco, linked above, when he calls to mind the truly outrageous accusations Little Rubio has been making about the president, calling him, effectively, a traitor, someone who has been working to destroy the country, destroy the country, destroy the country. And, to make it worse, Obama knows what he's doing, what he's doing, what he's doing.
If that's the case, why doesn't Rubio the Savior begin impeachment proceedings and saviorize all of us? He's a senator, he claims to be a leader who can do great things and fix stuff. Let him handle this as a demonstration of his efficacy as a great fixer savior guy. If Bill Clinton was brought up on impeachment charges for lying about a blow job, don't Rubio's much more serious accusations rate immediate action?
No? Okay then, more lies, right?
Yeah. Thought so.
In today's column, Paul Krugman mentions Capital Gains taxes in passing, but last week he had a remarkable blog post that I still find hard to believe:
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/02/04/rubio-for-the-rich/
The post includes a pie chart showing that 50% of the capital gains taxes are paid by the top 0.1%, over a quarter are paid by the rest of the top 1%, leaving 21% to be paid by everyone else.
But it doesn't stop there. If you go to his source at the Tax Policy Center you see the information for each quintile of income and further parsing of the top quintile showing just how much capital gain and dividend income goes to the very very top and how fast it falls off:
http://www.taxpolicycenter.org/numbers/displayatab.cfm?DocID=4007
If these data are correct, the whole argument about lowering capital gains tax rates to save ordinary folks money on their pension investments is pure nonsense. 80% of the people, those with incomes below $134,266, pay all of 2.6% of all capital gains taxes. I for one would be happy to pay twenty bucks more in capital gains tax if that meant it was leveraged into thousands or even millions (I still can't quite wrap my head around the magnitude we are talking about) from the top quintile. It would help make America Great again.
@NiskyGuy - excellent post re the capital gains tax and I completely concur. But for Marco, Marco, Marco the issue isn't raising the taxes to encourage the wealthy to shoulder more of the tax burden. Oh, no - he wants to do away with taxes on capital gains and interest income all together. You can just see the puppet masters at work!
@Ken Winkes - I agree with both of your thoughtful posts and am also entering a stage of melancholy realizing that whoever is elected next November won't measure up to Obama. You mention the deluded, ideological bent that the Republicans have assumed. On that note, it is interesting to consider that the relevant committees in Congress are not deigning to even give the President's proposed budget a hearing. Unbelievable.
@Victoria D. - Yes, thank you. No matter how much I write, I still forget that the reader can only read what is on the "page" and not what I am thinking. Krugman and Josh Barro, whose post Krugman refers to, are both talking about Rubio's proposal to eliminate the capital gains tax.
I was remembering debates in the past where the case for lowering the tax rate seemed to have a level of plausibility, but the data show how unbelievably skewed capital gains are for the rich.
Your discussion of Raphael's lack of familiarity with foxholes reminded me of one of the closing lines of a December 1999 review of "Catch 22" by Jim Webb:
"For while there may be few atheists in a foxhole, there are even fewer politicians."
http://www.jameswebb.com/books/book-reviews-by-jim/catch-22
Islander,
Great quote, dude. And Webb should know. How it must irk guys like that when forced to listen to chest thumping chicken hawks prattling on about war and combat and the need to "stay the course" or "bomb the shit out of 'em".
What Liberal Media?
The stories about the Flint Disaster almost all, except for those originating on explicitly liberal web sites (no MSM sites, if you please), nearly all play down or entirely exclude the culpability, not to say complete fault, of the current Republican administration under Governor Rick Snyder that cut out democratically elected officials in order to institute rigid, right-wing ideologically deterministic rules to save money at the expense of the health, welfare and lives of the residents of Flint, MI, especially the babies and young children who will have to suffer the consequences of months of ingesting and bathing in poison while Snyder and his goons made fun of reports of high lead content in the water they forced on this community.
I listened to a story on NPR just a short while ago that focused on the human toll of Snyder's decree. There was not a SINGLE mention that Snyder or his administration had anything to do with this human tragedy. It was all blamed on "the government", which is like blaming union members for every employment problem in the country (which Republicans do all the time).
But the thing that really irks the shit out of me is this. I heard (and I can't prove this until the audio version comes out tomorrow morning, or at least so they say) that Rick Snyder's only involvement was in detailing the Michigan National Guard to distribute water. So, really, according to the story I heard, he's a hero.
I checked the NPR website and found that this reference has been deleted from the printed story.
I am not wrong here, kids. I heard the reporter Ari Shapiro, mention Rick Snyder's name but there is no mention of him in the transcript.
How in the FUCK can Rick Snyder be touted as some kind of man of the people, helping the people he has poisoned??????? How can there be no mention of his direct, anti-democratic, originating role in this disaster?
Now I could have been hallucinating (and George W. Bush could have been on base at the Texas Air National Guard all those months he wasn't) when I heard that, but I don't think so.
Maybe the transcript will be "updated" later, but....
Shapiro promises that NPR will continue to follow the trepidation and sorrows of this Flint family which has suffered greatly under forced Confederate policies, but they will not, apparently, point a finger at those responsible other than to agree with wingnut cocksucking, asshole bastards that it's all the fault of "the government".
This is some sickening shit. This is like reporting that Abraham Lincoln was assassinated without ever mentioning John Wilkes Booth. Some guy with a pistol did it. Must have been a gummint worker.
There IS no fucking liberal media.
Sorry, here's the link to the NPR story to which I referred in my rant (above). There is no mention of Rick Snyder anywhere which is a travesty even if I didn't hear anything different on their newscast.
It's like talking about Watergate but never mentioning Nixon.
Oh yeah, must have been that Segretti asshole. Oh, and don't forget Margaret Mitchell, she's insane.
@Victoria: thanks for helping with that cake business and thanks for spelling edible–––my "eatable" was another example of my spelling going out the window.