Jul 31, 2016

Mr Khan

This guy is a giant-killer. God love him.


“He is a black soul, and this is totally unfit for the leadership of this country,” Khan said in an interview with CNN’s “State of the Union.” “The love and affection that we have received affirms that our grief ― that our experience in this country has been correct and positive. The world is receiving us like we have never seen. They have seen the blackness of his character, of his soul.”

Hillary's Big Deal

AlterNet:

1. Make economic and social justice issues 'front and center'.
Clinton made that pledge when praising Sanders and his campaign, saying that’s “where they belong… I want you to know I have heard you. Your cause is our cause. Our country needs your ideas, energy, and passion. That is the only way we can turn our progressive platform into real change for America.”

2. Comprehensive immigration reform—not Trump’s border wall. 
“We will not build a wall… When we have millions of hardworking immigrants contributing to our economy, it would be self-defeating and inhumane to try to kick them out. Comprehensive immigration reform will grow our economy and keep families together—and it’s the right thing to do… And we’ll build a path to citizenship for millions of immigrants who are already contributing to our economy.”

3. End targeting and racial profiling of Islamic Americans. 
Replying to Trump’s proposal to stop Muslims from visiting from overseas and increasing police surveillance at home, Clinton said, “We will not ban a religion. We will work with all Americans and our allies to fight and defeat terrorism.”

4. Believe in government public service and be competent. 
“So it’s true. I sweat the details of policy, whether we’re talking about the exact level of lead in the drinking water in Flint, Michigan, the number of mental health facilities in Iowa, or the cost of your prescription drugs. Because it’s not just a detail if it’s your kid, if it’s your family. It’s a big deal. And it should be a big deal to your president, too.”

5. Make it a top task to revive America’s economically stagnant regions. 
“My primary mission as president will be to create more opportunity and more good jobs with rising wages right here in the United States… Especially in places that for too long have been left out and left behind. From our inner cities to our small towns, from Indian country to coal country. From communities ravaged by addiction to regions hollowed out by plant closures.”

6. Reform campaign finance as the key to changing the economy. 
“I believe our economy isn’t working the way it should because our democracy isn’t working the way it should. That’s why we need to appoint Supreme Court justices who will get money out of politics and expand voting rights, not restrict them. And if necessary, we will pass a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United.”

7. Hold corporations accountable and have them pay a fair share of taxes. 
“I believe American corporations that have gotten so much from our country should be just as patriotic in return. Many of them are, but too many aren’t. It’s wrong to take tax breaks with one hand and give out pink slips with the other. And I believe Wall Street can never, ever be allowed to wreck Main Street again.”

8. Oppose trade agreements that privilege corporations above everyone else. 
“If you believe that we should say no to unfair trade deals; that we should stand up to China; that we should support our steelworkers and autoworkers and homegrown manufacturers, then join us.”

9. Climate change is real, and the solution is a new energy infrastructure. 
“I believe in science. I believe that climate change is real and that we can save our planet while creating millions of good-paying, clean energy jobs.”

10. Achieve a higher standard of living, starting with higher minimum wage. 
“If you believe that companies should share profits, not pad executive bonuses, join us. If you believe the minimum wage should be a living wage, and no one working full-time should have to raise their children in poverty, join us.”

11. Expand Obamacare and a health care safety net. 
“If you believe that every man, woman, and child in America has the right to affordable health care, join us!"

12. Raise Social Security benefits. 
“We should expand Social Security.”

13. Protect reproductive rights. 
We should “protect a woman’s right to make her own heath care decisions,” Clinton said.

14. Make sure women get equal pay for equal work. 
“If you believe that your working mother, wife, sister, or daughter deserves equal pay, join us. That’s how we’re going to make sure this economy works for everyone, not just those at the top.”

15. Make the biggest infrastructure investment in decades. 
“In my first 100 days, we will work with both parties to pass the biggest investment in new, good-paying jobs since World War II. Jobs in manufacturing, clean energy, technology and innovation, small business, and infrastructure. If we invest in infrastructure now, we’ll not only create jobs today, but lay the foundation for the jobs of the future.”

16. Make public universities tuition-free for most. 
“Bernie Sanders and I will work together to make college tuition-free for the middle class and debt-free for all.”

17. Cut and restructure student debt. 
“We will also liberate millions of people who already have student debt.”

18. Expand job and trade skill programs. 
“Sure, college is crucial, but a four-year degree should not be the only path to a good job. We will help more people learn a skill or practice a trade and make a good living doing it.”

19. Open up lending options for small businesses. 
“We will give small businesses, like my dad’s, a boost, make it easier to get credit. Way too many dreams die in the parking lots of banks. In America, if you can dream it, you should be able to build it.”

20. Tax the rich to pay for these public programs. 
“We’re going to pay for every single one of them. And here’s how. Wall Street, corporations and the super-rich are going to start paying their fair share of taxes. This is not because we resent success, but when more than 90 percent of the gains have gone to the top 1 percent, that’s where the money is.”

21. Track down tax evaders and make them pay. 
“We are going to follow the money. And if companies take tax breaks and then ship jobs overseas, we’ll make them pay us back. And we’ll put that money to work where it belongs: creating jobs here at home.”

22. Get military-style weapons off the street through new gun controls. 
“I’m not here to repeal the Second Amendment. I’m not here to take away your guns. I just don’t want you to be shot by someone who shouldn’t have a gun in the first place. We will work tirelessly with responsible gun owners to pass commonsense reforms and keep guns out of the hands of criminals, terrorists, and all others who would do us harm.”

23. Work to heal divides on race and bigotry. 
“That starts with listening—listening to each other, trying as best we can to walk in each other’s shoes. So let’s put ourselves in the shoes of young black and Latino men and women who face the effects of systemic racism and are made to feel like their lives are disposable. Let’s put ourselves in the shoes of police officers, kissing their kids and spouses goodbye every day and heading off to do a dangerous and necessary job.”

24. Enact criminal justice reform and address abusive policing. 
“We will reform our criminal justice system from end to end, and rebuild trust between law enforcement and the communities they serve.”

25. Protect civil rights and liberties, including LGBT rights. 
“We will defend all our rights: civil rights, human rights, and voting rights; women’s rights and workers’ rights; LGBT rights and the rights of people with disabilities. And we will stand up against mean and divisive rhetoric wherever it comes from.”

Today's PolToon

Today's Pix













Jul 29, 2016

Somebody Please



...this guy is an abscess that's been allowed to fester on the ass of humankind for way too long. Could we just get it drained and disinfected already?

Big Twitter thing today was the Voter ID crap got smooshed in North Carolina.
Federal appellate judges on Friday struck down a 2013 law limiting voting options and requiring voters to show photo ID at the polls, declaring in an unsparing opinion that the restrictions “target African Americans with almost surgical precision.”
The three-judge panel of the U.S. 4th Circuit Court of Appeals found that the law was adopted with “discriminatory intent” despite lawmakers’ claims that the ID provision and other changes were designed to prevent voter fraud.
The ruling – which could have implications for voting laws in other states and possibly for the outcome of close races in the swing state of North Carolina – sent the case back to U.S. District Judge Thomas Schroeder, who in April issued a 485-page decision dismissing all claims in the legal challenge.
“In holding that the legislature did not enact the challenged provisions with discriminatory intent, the court seems to have missed the forest in carefully surveying the many trees,” the ruling states. “This failure of perspective led the court to ignore critical facts bearing on legislative intent, including the inextricable link between race and politics in North Carolina.”




Read more here: http://www.newsobserver.com/news/politics-government/state-politics/article92593512.html#storylink=cpy

The God Bidness

Today's Tweet

Bill Maher

Jul 28, 2016

Tempting

The north Carolina GOP decided to pitch a bit of a hissy fit because of what they tho't was a horrible Democrat doing something horrible to "their" America".




That's the story, but it's not really the story.

I think it happens too often for it not to be a Dirty-Tricks thing.  You make a charge about some made-up bullshit, which is intended to reinforce the negative image of the Democrat Libtards because of all the other made-up bullshit that's been installed like firmware in "conservative" brains for 35 years - it's not true, and you know it's not true, and you know it doesn't matter. It only matters that you get it into the consciousness stream.  The rubes are already conditioned to take on whatever negative shit you feed 'em so you put it out there, and if you get slapped down, then you can issue the basic non-corrective corrective or whatever, knowing that the thing has already taken root and has passed into the body of GOP lore about rotten Democrats, and the rubes will never go back and look for any kind of retraction or rebuttal.

And the other point is that you don't see that shit - not anything rising anywhere near that level anyway - coming from the Dems.

Jul 27, 2016

Today's Quote

Vanity Fair Hive
“Democracy is a little bit messy sometimes,” he told reporters at a breakfast convened by Bloomberg News. “You know, I grew up in a family where I got yelled at a whole lot. It doesn’t make me nervous.”
Bernie Sanders is a mensch.

Jul 26, 2016

Today's Tweet

That Thing That Isn't Really

Wikileaks’s tweets conjured dark and menacing conspiracies, but these are not borne out by the emails themselves. Take the group’s claim that the “DNC knew of Hillary paid troll factory attacking Sanders online.” The highlighted email isn’t some secret communication laying out nefarious plots. It’s a summary of a panel discussion on Fox News Sunday.
But forget the emails for a second. The main problem with the notion that the DNC rigged the results for Clinton is that it requires one to assume the improbable. The DNC had no role or authority in primary contests, which are run by state governments. Clinton dominated the primaries. The DNC, through state parties, had a bit more influence over caucuses … where Sanders dominated Clinton.
None of the thousands of leaked emails and documents show the DNC significantly influencing the results of the nomination. Furthermore, if it is true that last fall Clinton campaign chair John Podesta tried but failed to have DNC Chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz sacked, the underlying premise of the entire WikiLeaks dump—that Wasserman Schultz machinated to deliver Clinton the nomination—is hard to believe.
So, yeah - bad news for the DNC Truthers, except that truthers usually believe the conspiracy no matter what.  Not that this one's anywhere near the weirdnesses of JFK or 9/11 - there is some little bit of substance to this - but then again, that's always the case, and it's also always the case that once it's in the bloodstream it prob'ly won't be going away any time soon.

The handful of (known) emails so far, indicate to me something along the lines of: tired staffers who hit the hotel a little late, and about halfway thru their 3rd mini-bar scotch are suddenly seized by the revelation that they possess the most amazing political chops, and they're having such a flood of genius ideas they just have to share them ASAP, so they fire off a few brainstorm emails etc etc etc.  You tell them to knock off the shit; you discipline them; you fire them; you force them out - kinda like what happened.

What I'm really not shocked about: Democrats "conspiring" to nominate a Democrat.  C'mon, guys.

Ted Talks Donald

Jul 25, 2016

Well That Explains A Lot

I've spent some time calling "the GOP base" a lotta names.  Sorry not sorry.

One of my favorites has always been "Whiny-Butt Pussies" because seriously, when you listen to what they say - and to what their candidates and media darlings have to say - they're afraid of practically everything.

Immigrants and POC and Trade Deals and not having 37 guns (and believing they'll need lotsa guns to protect themselves from the hippies? wtf?) etc etc etc.  

Anyway, you name it, they're scared of it.

So it shouldn't have come as any kinda shock to me when they picked Donald Trump as their POTUS nominee, but I was pretty shocked.  I guess maybe I figured I was just indulging in a little name-calling, thinking I'd be cute and clever, but that deep down they weren't really that bad and I was just having some fun tweaking them. 

Oops.

So I was right all along(?)  Cuz Trump is pretty obviously the epitome of the Whiny-Butt Pussy (at least he plays it that way) - why would they not  pick him?



Like Alice, I give myself plenty of good advice - and it seems I'm always kinda lost anyway.

Donald and Vlad

From Charlie Pierce:
In brief: In his business dealings, He, Trump seems increasingly dependent on money from Russia and from the former Soviet republics within its increasingly active sphere of influence. This is because most of the big banks on this side of the pond won't go near him without HazMat suits. (Gee, could it be that his sudden emergence as a Warren-esque crusader against the "rigged system" of the banksters is less of a principled opposition and simply pure animal vengeance? Unpossible!) As Marshall points out, this isn't exactly a deep corporate secret, as The Washington Post explained:
Trump has conveyed a different view, informed in part through his business ambitions. Since the 1980s, Trump and his family members have made numerous trips to Moscow in search of business opportunities, and they have relied on Russian investors to buy their properties around the world. "Russians make up a pretty disproportionate cross-section of a lot of our assets," Trump's son, Donald Jr., told a real estate conference in 2008, according to an account posted on the website of eTurboNews, a trade publication. "We see a lot of money pouring in from Russia."
So maybe now we have a slightly better idea of what's in those tax returns Trump doesn't want us to see?

Today's Chart

Which is actually another tweet, but anyway - be reassured, but don't be happy and don't get cocky.  GOTV and put as many Blues in office as possible.