The Fix Is In

1. Create conditions that make people dependent on government largesse
2. Gradually eliminate the means to effect change in the government
3. Be sure to give people "cover" - ie: Scapegoats - so they can continue to "vote" against the "unworthy other" and in favor of those who hand out the goodies to the "real Americans".

Many of the rubes are convinced they're being patriotic, and making noble sacrifices in keeping with the traditions of service to their country.

This is the treachery and the insidiousness of creeping authoritarianism. It gradually poisons democracy while preaching to the mob that they're drinking a magic elixir, guaranteed to cure all their ills.

Let's Review

(former) Sheriff David Clarke is a douchenozzle extraordinaire - actually, he's not all that extraordinary considering all the other douchenozzles 45* keeps huddled around him.

The good news being, of course, that John Kelly is whittling away at that huddle, with Clarke being the latest wood chip to hit the floor without even becoming part of the stick (how's that for stretching the metaphor beyond its tensile strength?).

But anyway, with his book and all, the guy's convinced he's hit the big time, so now he's headed out onto the Wingnut Welfare Circuit to become the new Sarah Palin.

I think we can expect some very small things from this fuckwad.

As a reminder, here's a tour of all that weird shit he puts on his uniform trying to make us think he's impressive.

BTW - this is about half-a-hair short of Stolen Valor. Which would be plenty of reason for a General Kelly to stomp this clown into a greasy carpet stain.

WaPo gave us a rundown a while back:

1. Clarke’s four-star epaulets are standard for a chief of police or sheriff.

2. This is a pin that reads “Sheriff” made and branded by the Harley-Davidson motorcycle company. (Thanks to Charlie Deck for spotting it.)

4. A U.S. flag lapel pin.

5. A “thin blue line” pin. The expression “thin blue line” is meant to evoke the role of police in society: a thin blue line of people willing to stand between us and them. This pin mirrors similar others that are popular in the United Kingdom.

6. This is a pin for the Israeli civil guard, a branch of the Israeli police that serves as a sort of neighborhood watch since terrorist attacks in the mid-1970s. (You can see a more clear version of it here.) At other times, Clarke has worn a badge for the Israeli traffic police. (Much thanks to Naomi Fry, Jacob Kornbluh and Noga Tarnopolsky for their help tracking down this badge.)

7. Clarke’s actual sheriff’s badge.

8. A 9/11 memorial pin, presumably of the sort Clarke mentioned in the interview above.

9. This appears to be a small lapel pin that says “WTC” (like this one), a reference to attacks at the World Trade Center. (Thanks to Ryan Shyffer for helping identify this.) Pins similar to this were given out to New York Police Department officers who helped in the aftermath of the attacks.

10. Almost certainly a badge for the General Mitchell International Airport division of the Milwaukee County Sheriffs Department. A source who wished to remain anonymous sent a photo of a similar badge, depicting a five-pointed star on a background of extended wings.

11. A pin from the National Rifle Association. Clarke has been a proponent of the organization for some time, including starring in an ad for the NRA.

12. A U.S. flag bar pin.

13. A small replica of a 19th-century U.S. Secret Service badge (like this one). (Steve Hager identified it as being a souvenir given out to those who help out with a presidential visit. Thanks to Johanna Farkas for finding the original.)

14. A 75th anniversary FBI National Academy pin. The academy provides professional training on intelligence, terrorism, management and forensic science. You can see a more clear version of this pin here. (Thanks to Kyle McAllister-Grum, who identified this.)

15. Clarke’s name tag.

16. A “thin blue line” ribbon from Concerns of Police Survivors, an organization for the family members of law enforcement officials killed in the line of duty.

17. An FBI National Executive Institute pin. The institute trains law enforcement executives in leadership.

18. A pin labeled “NSI,” perhaps for the Nationwide Suspicious Activity Reporting (SAR) Initiative of which Milwaukee is a part.

19. An FBI National Academy completion pin. Clarke’s relationship with the FBI over the years means that one can stumble across politically interesting photos like this one.

20. Pin for the CeaseFire crime reduction program of which he was once a liaison for the Milwaukee Police Department.

21. A pin depicting a baby’s feet (“the precious feet”), signifying support for the antiabortion movement.

22. Blue Knights law enforcement motorcycle club pin.

You Don't Get One Without The Other

Zeeshan Aleem at Vox:

Democrats, not Donald Trump, are the real populists on trade in Washington. 

That’s the major takeaway from the Democrats’ bold new trade platform that they unveiled on Wednesday morning, the second rollout of their “Better Deal” messaging agenda in the runup to midterm elections in 2018. 

It's a collection of proposals aimed at protecting American workers from foreign competition — and it’s designed to edge out Trump's own messaging on how he's going to transform US trade to help bring back jobs to America.
The first 34 items on the 2016 Democratic Party Platform are all about helping everyday American Workin' Folk get a better chance to participate (to a slightly greater degree) in a system that actually fucking depends on their participation.

Don't gimme no shit about how the Dems fucked up by not addressing the problems of middle America.

If people missed it, then they weren't listening, cuz Hillary and Bernie and Tim all hit it plenty hard every time they stepped into the box last fall.

And maybe this had something to do with how we've been missing the point for 30 years:

The idea of evaluating foreign investment to ensure it doesn’t pose a threat to American jobs is bound to be incredibly controversial in Washington.

-snip-

That kind of scrutiny and interference with foreign investment would be unprecedented for the United States, says Edward Alden, a trade expert and senior fellow at the nonpartisan Council on Foreign Relations. “The US has had a very open stance on foreign investment — it’s only restricted if it’s considered a national security threat,” he told me. (*)
'Scuse me, Mr Alden - the health of our economy kinda depends on Americans having jobs that pay them enough to live on, so it seems pretty important to ask, "When did you decide a fucked up US Economy was somehow disconnected from a threat to US National Security?"

Today's Quote

Nothing is so hard for those who abound in riches as to conceive how others can be in want. — Jonathan Swift

And just to move things along, we need to be able to think about these issues beyond the sentiments of the quotes and the bumper stickers and the memes.

We can fill our heads with righteous indignation when "conservatives" spout the usual blaming bullshit about the "Professionally Poor", and we should be pissed about that, but we should be pissed about that because it's a tactic of deflection - it puts us in a position that makes us look like we're defending "waste fraud and abuse", which legitimizes an almost-totally illegitimate argument.

Waste Fraud and Abuse accounts for about .001% of total expenditure (not that we know with any precision cuz - you know, people need to hide that shit).  Anyway, it goes up some - sometimes getting as high as 1 whole percent on individual programs - but it's nothing near what "conservatives" love to fantasize about.  But that still means you're defending against a phantom threat.  Stop doing that. 

And don't get bogged down when they shift to The Tyranny Of Large Numbers crap either.  Yes, 1 or 2 percent of a humungous number is still a very large number - until you divide that very large number by that other very large number - poor people who just need a little fucking help, asshole. You're gonna get all bent outa shape because some guy scraped an extra 82 bucks out of the system's gutter just so his kids had a decent breakfast once in a while? Well ain't you just chock full of the spirit of Christian love and charity.

But that's not the point either.  The point is that when we're on the defensive like that, we miss the opportunity to point out that Waste Fraud and Abuse is what the big guys have built into the system to benefit themselves; and what the small-to-medium sized guys can take advantage of as well (so they can feel smart too), while they're all soaking up the tax dollars intended to help people who actually need the help. And here's the kicker on that part: these jokers are happy to throw a few crumbs at the poor because they can use that tiny bit of tax money to fuel the judgmental hypocrisy of Wingnut Autocrats and their army of Orcs rubes. 

Waste Fraud and Abuse is what happens when Archer Daniels Midland puts half-a-billion tax dollars in its pocket, and then hides behind a human shield that Coin-Operated Congress Critters get paid handsomely to refer to as Moochers or Welfare Queens.

These people have no soul and no honor. Stop helping them.

Mrs Davis Goes To Washington

At this point, Kim Davis has managed to cut thru the information clutter, and she stands at center stage. Which is exactly where she wants to be; which is where all the hypocrites Jeebus warned against want to be.

She's becoming very famous - fame being considered by Display Window Christians to be a preferable substitute for the less-than-satisfying private exaltation promised by their deity. 

And since, by now, she's gotten much helpful advice from the bigger TheoCon Franchisers about the best ways to monetize her faith, she's about to take a nice ride on the Wingnut Welfare Train and become a comfortably wealthy woman.

Is anybody willing to bet she hasn't been spending time with a whole squad of Associate Producers from DumFux News, who're either frantically trying to get her ready for her debut with Sean and Greta, or just as frantically trying to push her off towards Bryan Fischer or Pat Robertson?

And BTW, should we not take a minute and talk about Mrs Davis Goes To Washington?

Welfare Cowboy

Cliven Bundy is a deadbeat who can either pay us what he owes us for the use of our land, or he can get off our land.  There are no free rides here.  Pay up or get out.


Some truly amazing things:
--The absolute certainty that Bundy's the victim of a ruthless tyrannical government, and not just some dipwad running a scam at the expense of taxpayers - which includes every last one of his "supporters".

--The cool disregard for the lives of the women and children who they expect to die first.

--The simple fact that they're convinced Da Gubmint will kill women and children no matter what.  Because if it happens, then they can crow about how they were right all along.  It's not much of a stretch for me to think they don't just expect it, and they're not just hoping for it; they're doing what it takes to make it happen.

So if you're trying to get people killed because it'll make you look good on TV; how the fuck does that make you the good guys?

These people have no soul and no honor.

Today's Quote

...and also Today's Wingnut; and also Today's Too Self-Absorbed To Be Self-Aware; as well as a good followup on What About Bob:

I was put off by the way the president closed the meeting. To his very closest advisers, he said, “For the record, and for those of you writing your memoirs, I am not making any decisions about Israel or Iran. Joe, you be my witness.” I was offended by his suspicion that any of us would ever write about such sensitive matters.

That's a quick little excerpt from the memoirs written by the obviously irony-challenged Bob Gates.

hat tips = Balloon Juice and Dave Weigel

What About Bob?

Juan Cole is not given to the kind of exaggeration necessary for political slagging.  One of the redeeming qualities of "The Academy" is that generally they understand how important it is to maintain their good standing in the company of their peers; so it's pretty rare for any high-profile academician to stray widely from the fold when it comes to speaking out too strongly about much of anything unless he's very confident of his position.  They're really a pretty conservative bunch - which seems odd, doesn't it? - since all we ever hear is that they're exactly the opposite?  I wonder what that's all about.

Anyhoo - Bob Gates has left our employ, and it's time for him to suck around for his place on the Wingnut Welfare Circuit; but first he has to re-establish his worthiness with the Repub faithful (after all, he went to work for "those people") so he's taken a giant shit on Obama's head no, that ain't it.

He's written a book nope sorry, missed again

Wait, I got it: He's offering a good-n-greasy literary handjob to any "conservative" who needs to get his rocks off by hearing another privileged Washington insider calling The Prez a lazy shiftless no-good dirty infantile pickaninny - all in polite-sounding coded language of course.

But perhaps I go too far - and perhaps that's why I'm a low-rent blogger while Juan Cole gets paid pretty good to do this kinda thing a lot better:

Former Secretary of Defense Robert Gates in his new memoir is said to have slammed Vice President Joe Biden for having been consistently “wrong” on foreign policy matters over the past four decades.

Gates’s petty gossip about his former colleagues should put an end to the pusillanimous Democratic Party tradition of appointing Republicans as secretaries of defense in Democratic administrations.

There is a lot to like about Gates. He over time became something like a defensive realist. He appears to have helped prevent Dick Cheney and the Neocons from attacking Iran. He warns against the seductive character of drone warfare, and wants a court to sign off on drone strikes. He said he thought any military commander who wanted to take US troops into another big ground war should have his head examined. He is scathing on the grandstanding and sadism of congressmen during hearings.

But lest it be forgotten, Gates’s career has been checkered and he has been consistently wrong about foreign policy himself. To wit:

1. Gates as a high official at the CIA was involved in the 1970s and 1980s invastly exaggerating the economic and military power of the Soviet Union...

2. When he was a high official at the CIA in the mid to late 1980s, Gates was involved in selling Pentagon weaponry to the Ayatollah Khomeini. ...

3. Not only did the Reagan administration in which Gates served as a loyal capo illegally steal weaponry from Pentagon warehouses...

4. Gates was, further, involved in further covert provision of weaponry, including chemicals and biological precursors to Saddam Hussein of Iraq. ...

5. Gates was among the architects of the US policy of giving billions to far right Muslim jihadis (Mujahideen) such as Gulbadin Hikmatyar in northern Pakistan...

6. The Afghanistan jihad waged by Gates and others at the CIA involved pressuring Saudi intelligence also to raise funds for it. The Saudis asked Osama Bin Laden to help as a fundraiser. ...

7. Gates and others in the Reagan administration appear to have downplayed Pakistan’s nuclear program...

8. Gates thinks that the 2007 Bush troop escalation or “surge” was effective. ...

9. Gates was confident in 2008 that a troop escalation in Afghanistan could allow for free and fair elections and actually said that the Taliban held no territory and the security problems in that country were exaggerated.

10. Gates asserts that he believes that once the US winds down its military role in Afghanistan, that country will be on a fairly good track to success. ...

Today's Welfare Cheat

Chris Hayes may be the smartest guy on the TV box right now.

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy

The Amazing Charlie Pierce

Copied in it's entirety from Esquire - picture and all:

Jesus god, Ed fking Meese?

Shortly after President Obama started his second term, a loose-knit coalition of conservative activists led by former Attorney General Edwin Meese III gathered in the capital to plot strategy. Their push to repeal Mr. Obama's health care law was going nowhere, and they desperately needed a new plan.

I didn't know that there was an Old Timer's Game for Authoritarian Yahoos.

Will the sad detritus of the Saint Ronnie administration ever stop fouling American public life? We have Our Lady Of The Magic Dolphins on the teevee almost every weekend. We had a whole clutch of the foreign-policy fantasts rehabilitated during the late reign of C-Plus Augustus. And now, this guy, who once advocated concentration camps for student demonstrators, who personally oversaw the most embarrassing "investigation" into the porn industry ever conducted, and who functioned as lookout and getaway driver for the Iran-Contra crooks, up to and including the increasingly dim president himself, comes back to help screw up the nation again. Nobody listens to Gary Hart, but Edwin Meese III still has a place in public life. Wingnut welfare is forever.

At least part of the blame has to be shared by those nominal Democrats who, either through their silence on the crimes of that era, or in their admiration for Reagan's "style" and toothy obliviousness. (The latest of these, alas, is Chris Matthews, who has written a book about how Tip O'Neill and Ronnie made politics "work," and who, between 1980 and 1982, probably sold out truly progressive politics for at least two decades.) A number of truly horrible things were set in motion in our political life in the 1980's. The people responsible never have really been called to account for it. Now, one of the worst of them is back, doing further damage. I am, frankly, stunned.

Scammin' The Rubes

Visit NBCNews.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy