Yves here. Even though the number of comments in moderation every day does not strike Lambert and me as being disproportionated to the number of overall comments (which has gone up due to the vigor of conversation about the election), readers seem to be getting increasingly frustrated (and we know it is frustrating to compose a comment, and have it not show up and not know when it will appear). I’ve looked at the theorizing in the comments thread as to what is triggering moderation. I have to tell you that your guesses are incorrect.
However, since Lambert and I have been adding moderation and blacklist rules over a long period of time and we haven’t whittled them down in quite a while, it could be that the false positives are due to the software choking a bit on the size of the rule set. So we plan to do some pruning in the next few days. Thanks for your patience.
Drug-sniffing rabbit, cannon-firing kittens mark U.S. April Fools’ Reuters (EM). Wow, violence and surveillance are the lead themes, while in the UK, it appeared Brexit hysteria was the biggest target.
Lifting the veil on sex: Can males be less expensive? PhysOrg (Chuck L)
Herculaneum scrolls reveals papyri ink contained METAL centuries earlier than thought Daily Mail (martha r)
Ancient DNA shows European wipe-out of early Americans PhysOrg (Chuck L)
An ancient American civilization may have been wiped out by climate change Business Insider (David L)
Stanford University report finds fracking CAN pollute underground drinking water, conflicting with previous studies Cleveland Plain Dealer
The Mainstream Still Doesn’t Know Strength Training Beats Running. Why? PJ. Although this does not have to be “either/or,” unless you have very well aligned joints and good feet and ankles, running will eventually give you knee problems, while weight training (being much shorter duration and vastly less repetitive, particularly since you need to change your routine frequently) will cause you less joint wear and tear if you work in good form.
Research Shows That Spicy Foods May Help You Live Longer Good (Chuck L)
China?
China Turns to Face Its Aging Population Fiscal Times
The Secret Money Behind ‘The Wolf of Wall Street’ Wall Street Journal. Whocoulddanode?
Dilma Rousseff’s fight against impeachment Financial Times
Refugee Crisis
Circular Shuffle: EU Prepares Forced Return of Refugees to Turkey; Turkey Prepares Forced Return to EU and Syria Michael Shedlock
Europe Refugee Crisis: Belgians Want Refugees To Sign ‘Newcomer’s Statement’ Promising To Report Terrorist Acts International Business Times
Syraqistan
Russia claims Turkish NGOs are ‘main supplier’ of extremists in Syria DW
In Syria, Airstrikes Test a Fragile Truce Wall Street Journal
Imperial Collapse Watch
Work: Great-Power Competition Aims for Deterrence, Not War Department of Defense. Guurst: “Read the whole article, it is crazy.”‘
Obama warns of terrorist nuclear attack BBC
Obama’s Nuclear Security Summit Neglects 98 Percent of the World’s Bomb-Ready Uranium Intercept
Clinton E-mail Hairball
State Dept suspends review into ‘top secret’ Clinton emails Associated Press. EM: “Not sure if much of anything should be read into this … sounds like DOJ simply taking a hands-off approach so as to let FBI do their investigatory work. Note also the trotting out of the by-now-standard ‘None of the emails was marked classified at the time it was sent’ BS-meme.”
2016
How the G.O.P. Elite Lost Its Voters to Donald Trump New York Times (furzy)
When Commercialism Trumps Democracy Huffington Post (furzy)
All the numbers spell disaster for Trump: Latest projections portend electoral doom for both the billionaire and Republicans in November Salon (martha r)
G.O.P. Fears Trump as Zombie: Damaged but Unstoppable New York Times
Obama attacks Trump over nuclear remarks Financial Times
Clinton Supporters are Scaremongering about Donald Trump to Silence the Concerns of the Young and the Poor Benjamin Studebaker (furzy)
How Hillary Clinton Bought the Loyalty of 33 State Democratic Parties Counterpunch
Hillary Clinton’s Support Among Nonwhite Voters Has Collapsed Huffington Post
A close Wisconsin primary could spell future trouble for Clinton Washington Post
Rhetoric turns bitter as Sanders hurts Clinton in Wisconsin and New York Financial Times. Media is waking up to the subhead: “Some Sanders supporters say they will not vote for Clinton.”
Massachusetts Volunteers for Bernie Sanders Report Internal State Level Campaign Sabotage YouTube (Catherine)
Bernie Sanders Demands Apology From Hillary Clinton for Accusing Him of Lying ABC. Martha r: “ABC reports Sanders’s claims, backing them up. Not bad for a change!”
Bernie Sanders As Democratic Capitalist Forbes. Qyrs: “Anti-monopolist’ is probably clearer, but the headline does its job of grabbing attention.”
Bernie Sanders Will Make the Economy Great Again Nation (Sid D)
Walker to sign bill ending Wisconsin’s nuclear moratorium THonline (martha r)
Periods for Pence: Indiana women fight new anti-abortion law Fusion. Martha r: “The tweets are the main text really. Very funny. We need more of this kind of activism.”
Kentucky Attorney General Andy Beshear: Matt Bevin can’t make budget cuts now Courier-Journal (martha r)
Why didn’t Flint treat its water? An answer, at last Detroit Free Press (martha r)
Black Injustice Tipping Point
Video shows white cops performing roadside cavity search of black man Washington Post (guurst). You need to read this.
Minneapolis Fed’s new president is making waves with plan to scrutinize the power of the nation’s biggest banks MinnPost. Chuck L is on the waiting list to attend in person.
Labor Market Is Strong, but Fed Is Focused Elsewhere WSJ MoneyBeat
Could an Economic Collapse be in Our Near Future? Counterpunch (Chuck L)
Class Warfare
What’s Next For Global Capitalism When Things Fall Apart? Social Europe (Sid S)
The 1996 Welfare reform bill hits again Angry Bear
Chicago Teachers Aim to Shut Down City With One-Day Strike Real News Network
The Lies of Neoliberal Economics (or How America Became a Nation of Sharecroppers) Counterpunch
Antidote du jour. Robert H: “Lap bull.”
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
239 comments
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Didn’t see this in yesterday or today’s links section, but I think it’s worth posting just because I think it shows progress in the Clinton camp’s advancement through the stages of grief known as DABDA: Krugman (not to mention Clinton in that clip about the Sanders camp lying) has now entered the anger phase. If Sanders manages to take Wisconsin (seems probable) and NY (entirely possible depending on the exact scope of the victory in WI), expect the bargaining phase to begin.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2016/04/01/feel-the-math/
I saw that last night; incredibly shrill and tone deaf. The comments were pretty brutal as well.
He seems to be on a personal crusade to render himself irrelevant. Oh how the mighty have fallen.
It seems he also needs a vacation.
“Take 3 months off. You will feel better. Don’t worry, Hillary will win. You have done your job.”
Time for a Snickers, Paul.
Thanks for that link.
“But with influence comes responsibility, and it’s time to lay out some guidelines for good and bad behavior.”
Paul Krugman: one of the Very Serious People. Now also acting as Hall Monitor.
I don’t know if he’s angry enough to throw that Noble medallion against the wall…
“Now also acting as Hall Monitor.”
A brilliant description. Congrats.
Krugman accuses the Sanders campaign of not fundraising for down ticket races. Is Krugman not aware that Sanders uses ActBlue to channel contributions to candidates?
Whenever I read one of his columns these days (which I try to avoid), I feel like Krugman is shouting at his readers, ‘I’M STILL RELEVANT!’
I believe that Bernie will be cheated in New York.
me too, and it very likely is decisive. stuff like this makes me consider the strategy of voting for trump more seriously (not that it matters in my state, but just evaluating it as a strategy).
Are we talking primary or general? IMO its not worth voting for him in the primary, better to vote for Sanders.
Now, if Clinton wins, and Trump also wins (Im actually expecting Cruz to win now), voting for Trump is a possibility we sadly have to keep open… Something to at least think about.
I will probably just vote green in the general though,,,
i was talking general. my state’s going trump so i’ll vote bernie or stein. but in the swing states, in the general, voting trump (assuming he is the nominee) might be the best strategy to break the duopoly–not that i have any illusions about trump, but he’s certainly disrupting the republican party.
Trump has already performed one major service for this country . . . driving the Bush dynasty out of politics for a while. If the election is Trump v. Clinton, perhaps Trump can perform another major service for the country . . . driving the Clinton dynasty out of politics for a while. Actually, that is a service the voters of the country could do for themselves and their future if it is Trump v. Clinton.
please elaborate.
His column is titled “The Conscience of a Liberal.”
Paul, I don’t think either of those words mean what you think they mean.
Google’s April Fools “Mic Drop” Prank Goes Horribly Awry: http://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2016/04/google-gmail-april-fools-mic-drop-problems/.
“The “send and mic drop” button replaced the often-used “send and archive” button, which lets users close a conversation and file the thread away. Many users typing with muscle memory, unaware that the functionality had been changed…”
You’d think Google has a “user experience” designer, or just a UI developer with common sense, who would think twice about replacing an oft-used button like that. You’d think wrong.
Oh, and thanks for pointing out the entirely slippery and vapid line from the Clinton camp about emails not being marked classified at the time they were sent. Email by its very nature is throwaway and fast. People barely take the time to spell correctly, let alone consider whether and at what level to classify each one. Just like with attorney/client correspondence, it doesn’t have to be marked “privileged” (or “classified”) to in fact be so. Just more Clinton slime and lies to obfuscate their fundamental corruption and “Clinton exceptionalism”.
The idea that so many Dems still cannot see that Hillary will be an utter disaster as president boggles the mind.
Documents being created become classified the moment they contain classified information, as any clearance holder knows. These comments also seem to forget that Clinton is on record as ordering an aide to copy a classified message’s contents and paste it into a new message then forward it as unclassified. Wrong, wrong, wrong.
And that is where the profound level of incompetent negligence would be a warning to a saner electorate.
Historically CIA and pentagon have been competitive agencies but it is hard to imagine those guys wanting more of this.
Speaking of negligence, someone mentioned yesterday that, for days, the CIA left some explosives on a school bus.
“We are already there, living in a world of incompetent people.”
Sorry, Hillary, you’re not the Eve of Incompetence…not the First of that Class.
During the decennial census, I was briefly a supervisor.
Almost didn’t get the job because I lived with others and didn’t have a paper-shredder. It took some convincing for them to be comfortable with my mom (actually a full time Census Bureau employee) being in the building with the stuff locked up and using a fireplace instead of a shredder.
Mind you, this is for “sensitive” information, not even classified. I was actually proud that it was such a huge deal, as we clearly highly valued the information of our citizens and treated it with care. (That said, this was before the revelation that the Bureau had been passing around all kinds of information to pretty much anyone who asked, especially law enforcement, which is a complete violation of regulations and laws. Not proud anymore.)
I find it amazing, with this and many similar anecdotes (most of one side of my family was military or government,) that anyone could possibly even suggest that what she did was legal, let alone okay morally.
If I read this correctly, the problem is bigger than one person.
The FBI should do a thorough investigation of all the government agencies.
Just so we don’t under-estimate the other side, but we want to be prepared for any possible counter-moves, can we hear this already “Selective Prosecution?”
Because she’s a woman?
More victimhood?
I think this tendency to go around the rules, mostly to save time, is the main reason for the requirement for the separate computer attached to the agency’s network which has pretty go security in my experience, at least for top secret documents. Don’t ask me about my personnel records at OPM because that makes me weep.
Of course I don’t think for a moment that HRC set up her own server to “save time”. That was totally to control what went into the govt. archives.
The good news is that James Comey was the prosecutor in the Marc Rich case, you know the one where Slippery Bill gave him an 11th hour Presidential pardon.
As an aside, I didn’t know this – Guess who recommended to Bill that Marc Rich be pardoned… tada..the then-deputy AG, Eric Holder!!
You almost need an Independent or a Republican (anyone but a Democrat) to come in and investigate.
Well, that has always been the theory…get someone not from the same party.
Sanders as an Independent…that sounds pretty good.
The entirety of Obama’s cabinet picks were Clinton/Bush retreads. “Change you can believe in”
That historical tidbit regarding Comey bodes well for justice lovers.
Could you give us a link for this? Some supporting information? Thanks.
It appears Holder had a strong hand in getting this pardon approved:
“Holder had advised that standard procedures be bypassed and the pardon petition be submitted directly to the White House.”
“Nearly all of the White house staff advising the president on the pardon request had urged Clinton to not grant Rich a pardon.”
from https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marc_Rich
Federal Prosecutor Mary Jo White was appointed to investigate Clinton’s last-minute pardon of Rich. She stepped down before the investigation was finished and was replaced by James Comey, who was critical of Clinton’s pardons and of then-Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder’s pardon recommendation. Rich’s lawyer, Jack Quinn, had previously been Clinton’s White House Counsel and chief of staff to Clinton’s Vice President, Al Gore, and had had a close relationship with Holder. According to Quinn, Holder had advised that standard procedures be bypassed and the pardon petition be submitted directly to the White House.Congressional investigations were also launched. Clinton’s top advisors, Chief of Staff John Podesta, White House Counsel Beth Nolan, and advisor Bruce Lindsey, testified that nearly all of the White House staff advising the president on the pardon request had urged Clinton to not grant Rich a pardon. Federal investigators ultimately found no evidence of criminal activity.
I think it was Susan, Marc’s wife, and big donor and Friend of Bill (and Hill) who pushed for the pardon. .
Unclassified emails used to come marked [U] in the subject line. Anyone know if they still do?
Yes, they do. At least when they come from DoD sites (I don’t deal with State).
I have some old State emails labeled ‘SBU This email is unclassified’ in the signature line. (SBU = Sensitive but Unclassified) which makes me wonder if there was an auto-signature added to emails passing through the Clinton server.
Do you think a President Clinton would be a self-evidently smelly and sewage-y disaster to the point of self-destructing the Clinton dynasty from politics for the next few decades? Can we count on a President Clinton having that effect?
What about switching to Disqus or similar? They have pretty strong moderation/antispam controls in place, and it might be a better overall strategy than burning hours and hours fighting what amounts to a massive wave of international bots and trolls. It is of course another 3rd party integration with whatever privacy and TOS terms they have, but the pros might outweigh the cons, esp as regards us commenters who can review our comments in threads, etc…
I know you mean well, but no way.
1. Readers despise Disqus. Sites that have converted to Disqus have lost commnentors. We’ve spent time and money coding to make our comments (like the nesting) to make our comments section more reader friendly. And I believe it requires registration or logging in. I won’t comment on sites that require that. Too much of a nuisance.
Moving to Disqus would wreck the comments section in short order. And none of the other third party systems are any better.
2. If we move comments on someone else’s server, they are their property. We no longer control them. We regard the comments section as part of NC’s intellectual property and we aren’t about to cede control of that.
3. If for some reason, someone threatened to sue a commentor over what they said at NC, a third party comments site would turn over the info on them immediately. We would fight them.
Agreed, Discus=evil, can’t understand why Chris Hedges (and others) allow it on their sites.
NC’s comment software is great by in large. The new edit functionality is particularly nice and less clunky than the previous iteration (which wasn’t that bad itfp).
Comment nesting, or tree, is nifty; very intuitive and helpful.
And all the points you raise, particularly the fact that the software (and data) is yours!
Thanks Yves for spelling this out so patiently. Quite a feat to explain the horrendousness of Disqus in anything other than a screaming tirade.
I’ve commented before to the effect that the odd moderation glitch seems a non-issue when NC has by far the best comments section I’ve ever seen: civil, erudite and witty, fostering thoughtful conversation that just doesn’t happen elsewhere across such huge social, political, geographical and age distances.
But until now I forgot to add that the very first wonderful surprise was the lack of a registration/login system. (And yes, the lack of third-party ‘providers’ and their high-handed platform/profile requirements. Worst of all are those that only allow comments through F*cebook, Googoyle or similar, but Disqus and its wretched peers aren’t far behind.)
So I hope I’m not the only person who would say: sure, list the criteria if a lot of readers would like that (although ‘common courtesy + awareness that things sometimes go wrong’ seems to work fine for many), but please don’t change the format! And please (all editors!) accept riotous applause for the editorial efforts behind it as it is.
thanks for your tireless work on this site. i don’t think i’ve ever had a problem, perhaps because my posts are short and usually don’t contain links. but i wouldn’t mind really if i did, because the site is worth it.
more schools showing Lead…AR is working on their lead levels now, and the info showed up in a few local papers round the US http://www.nebraska.tv/story/31619553/more-lead-found-in-newark-schools-drinking-water (heads-up?)
There are signs up all over my area to “have your children tested for lead.” They all appear to be government sponsored (though I usually see them in traffic and can’t really get an up-close look of the fine print.) That alone indicates a pretty major problem just beneath the surface.
After much research over many years, I suspect that we are just now seeing the first cracks in the dam. Unfortunately, it was just a matter of time before all the old lead pipes started to degrade. Some of us have been screaming from the rooftops about our collapsing infrastructure for over a decade.
Unfortunate that no politician bothered to listen. The time has now arrived…
(I’m really, really not looking forward to the bridge issue. THAT one will be ugly soon.)
What I don’t understand is we had a stimulus less than a decade ago. Where did all the money earmarked for shovel ready jobs? It clearly didn’t go into infrastructure.
Would love to see a breakdown on what it WAS spent on(I’d guess in my state it went into education.)
Hi cwaltz, from NYx 2015: “The original plan called for putting “shovels in the ground” within 90 days. But when the rules were written, states ended up with 120 days to have their road projects “approved.” It often took six more months to a year before most of the projects were under construction.”
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/12/opinion/sunday/how-the-stimulus-fell-short.html?pagewanted=all&_r=0
and then there’s one lingering PROBLEM with NYx OPINIONS & FED LIES: “Shovel-ready isn’t as important as it was in early 2009 because we’re not scrambling to stanch economic bleeding.” bahahahahahahaaaaaaaaa
while the money was idling the frackers were hot n heavy…just say’n. also, many cities are continuing to build houses & condos…here in Atlanta we inundated with half million dollar homes. people always ask me how we could be in a bad economy if houses and sports arena’s are still going up…i usually suggest they look up Tools like ZIRP.
Didn’t most of the “money” go for pro-UpperClass tax cuts? I believe that was the way Obama wanted it and the Ladies from Maine offered the cover he wanted. ( “They made me do it. It was the price of bipartisan-shipfulness.”)
re: Massachusetts Volunteers for Bernie Sanders Report Internal State Level Campaign Sabotage
So the DNC (I assume that’s who did the hiring) hires Clinton Crime Family shills to run Bernie’s campaign at state and regional levels and they totally Sabotage all efforts by campaign staffers to organize and GOTV.
With all the reports from other states, this can’t be anything other than a DNC Consp1racy. Hellery is one Dirty F__king B__ch.
I would have thought the Sanders campaign did that hiring. You could make that mistake if you made foolish assumptions like “We’re really all on the same side and have the same goals.”
This Western MA report is very similar to the one from the NC Bernie organizer a couple weeks ago. If Bernie’s team did all the high level hiring, they seem to be making consistently bad decisions. Figuring out that the regional director for MA-CT-RI is a Clinton Insider could have been done in 5 mins with a Google search. If it is not DNC, then Bernie has traitors on his staff.
They may have figured that out. I think NY will prove that out. Recent results would indicate that either local supporters are getting the word out to other local supporters to not just coordinate with the head but with each other. OR the hiring is no longer being done by the person(s) who did it in MA and NC. Since the latter would be better and benefit the campaign more, I’m hoping for it.
Oh, and if that has happened it would be contributing to the higher level of anger from the Clinton camp, as well. Well that and the fact that people are beginning to ‘do the math’ as Krugman demands and realize that she is now losing to the grumpy old man AND he really could and very well might win the nomination. (And that the only reason she is not entering the general with historically high negatives for a Presidential candidate is because of Trump is still NOT good.)
I’m so leery after that I didn’t go to the opening of his office in Hartford today. I spoke w a local man this week who said the Hartford area person seems on the up and up but New Haven locals were complaining about the parachuted-in manager. (like NC and western MA). No more details than that.
I can phone bank from home. Was thinking of canvassing (they need that) to register voters, but I’m suspiciousenough that unless I take them to the office in Hartford myself, they’ll be deep-sixed. Very leery now.
Crap. I’m wondering if there is anyway to go around the person who hired the New Haven person and give the Sanders campaign a head’s up – they need to possibly replace the New Haven person and perhaps their boss as well.
Crap indeed. Serious Hillarrhea in fact. All over everything.
Very good one.
It will be interesting to see if this Clinton hack, Joe Causso (spelling?) regional director for MA-CT-RI, is still in charge. That video is 4 days old, so if he is gone now, then that was fast. But I’m skeptical.
Joe Caiazzo
Thanks Gareth. Apparently he was unable to sink Warren’s campaign. But practice makes perfect.
From boston.com
https://voterregistration.ct.gov/OLVR/prefix.do — Register voters online if they have a DL or a state-ID (if you have a smartphone or tablet or whatnot).
Get some physical VR cards (from the post office or the your county election board/ sec. of state office) and turn them in yourself if you don’t trust others. Make sure you have an audit process to make sure people fill out their cards correctly. And you should make a list of the voters you register. Name, phone number, address — I would share this list with the campaign or a group like People for Bernie or the SandersForPresident subreddit, if anything.
“We’re really all on the same side and have the same goals.”
C’mon, Bernie’s been in politics for 30years. He’s no Pollyanna. Hahaha.
I have grave doubts about these accusations. Nico House is a troll, many allegations, no evidence. One way to sabotage the Sanders campaign is to have all of us distrusting each other and making allegations. Sanders came from 3% to challenging Hillary and is on track to win, his campaign knows what it is doing.
These videos have many allegations but NO evidence. This video is a great take down of Nico House from someone who lives in Michigan.
TRUTH – About The Sanders Campaign in Michigan from IURL
So… she asked the Sanders campaign HQ if they were screwing Bernie, and HQ said no. OKaaaay. Totally cleared that up. ;-)
I heard that the Sanders campaign had abandoned the GOTV thing by the time they got to Arizona because it had been compromised/hacked.
If Sanders people didn’t understand that the “Democratic” Party is really the “Nixocratic” Party, then Sanders people would think that members of the Nixocratic Party nomenklatura would give unbiased fair advice about which Nixocratic nomenklaturians would be legitimate trustworthy Democrats trustworthy to help Sanders run a campaign.
If the Sanders group didn’t know it before, they are learning it the hard way. And something learned the hard way stays learned. And this is what will stay learned: the DLC Clintonite Obamazoids are all Nixocrats. They are indeed The Enemy. But the Sanders group will have to pretend in public to not even know it, while secretly acting from a thorough understanding of that knowledge every waking, sleeping and dreaming second of every day from now till the Election is over.
Actually, it says a hell of a lot more about the Sanders campaign than the Clinton people. If the Sanders people are hiring the wrong people now, imagine what they’ll do if they ever have to hire after the November election?
better than they do when being sabotaged by clinton agents.
But pragmatically speaking, this has to be regarded as a Darwin Exam that the Sanders campaign is taking. If the Sanders group wants to pass this Darwin Exam, they will have to purge, burn and “exterminate” every Clintonite from within every corner of the Sanders operation in which such Clintonite tapeworms and dogticks have taken hold.
If Sanders can’t understand this in time to correct it in time, then Sanders is indeed unfit in a Darwinian Survival sense to be President. I hope Sanders can pass this Darwin Exam by purging and burning every last Clintonite out of the Sanders operation within the next week or so.
And of course all the Sanders volunteers may have to consider every superior they report to as guilty until proven innocent. In other words, Clintonite until proven human. And they will have to regard their superiors as damage to be worked and routed around. Practicing this discipline could help the Sanders workers to become a broadly and multiply crosslinkedly organized movement enduring after the nomination and election. They might also want to develop their own Private Eye skills and root out every Clintonite in the Sanders operation and give them all the Alinsky Treatment.
So lets see, instead we should pick the person who has been running for president for twelve years, hired people whose strategy lost them the 2008 nomination and then rehired them for this campaign (admittedly they were working with an incredibly bad campaigner, but the strategies in both campaigns have been, well not good). Think about it the group who threw together a campaign in less then a year and got a hack or a mole in a couple of positions is still in a position to win the nomination. Hmmm, I wonder whose judgment and hiring policies this really brings into question.
You are so right! So you know you have a mole in your Massachusetts campaign that you lost when you should have won, so the “good judgment” would be to keep that same person in charge of the CT and RI primaries that are coming up in the next few weeks? Maybe they should just hand out “I’m with her” buttons at Sanders HQ.
Hey, we don’t know it is the same person from the Massachusetts campaign, I mean if I were behind this kind of sabotage I would have a whole lot of people lined up to do it. But whether it is or isn’t, now that you know it has happened it might behoove the Sanders campaign to find a means of implementing an internal check system so that locals can check/report questionable choices or information up the ladder.
Oh, and speaking of judgment and choices I’m betting you can get a good deal on a used server which has now been vetted by the FBI…
Just watch as it goes on the block at Sothebys and sells for a fortune to some billionaire who then donates it to the Smithsonian for a tax deduction. Extra points if Hillary is there for the unveiling to a grateful public…..
Wonder if Sander’s national campaign manager Jeff Weaver has been contacted about this. Hiring from the general DNC machine pool of experienced people isn’t a good idea. Better vetting needed.
Bernie was not a Democrat until recently.
To be safe, he should treat the D party as Hillary’s home court.
(And maybe jettisoning the party after the election – it’s not carpetbagging like Hillary moving to New York).
Maybe they expect people to be professional or have to use the Party structure. Ever since SC they have known about crap going on. I have heard that election theft is considered a nuclear waste topic and never discussed publicly while it is going on, even though it has been going on forever. I am glad there is so much fuss from the grassroots this time. I don’t know what the strategy is, look into it and do damage control and forge ahead on the high road?
Ohio and Florida. They just keep getting more and more creative about it.
I don’t see how you could you get any more blatant that Arizona’s certification of the fraudulent Maricopa county election results.
that was pretty clumsy–they need a Rove seminar
Ohio and Florida delivered huge margins without much fuss happening about it. They have been honing their technique for a long time.
There are only so many professional political consultants out there – it’s pretty much impossible to hire a professional “Democratic strategist” who doesn’t have the kind of affiliations Knox Cannon does. These guys are hired guns and their only allegiance is to their bank account. Whether they’re competent or not is another matter.
As for the order from the campaign to not open a “free” office in Pittsfield (which seems to have so outraged the folks on the video): providing “free rent” for an office is an “in-kind” contribution under Federal election law and is subject to normal contribution limits, restrictions and reporting requirements (for example, it would be *illegal* altogether if the office were owned by a corporation, union, or foreign national and would be subject to individual donation limits ($2700, I believe) if it were owned by an individual or partnership). Who owned the office? What would the fair rental of the space be? The law doesn’t distinguish between accepting a free jet from Lockheed-Martin and accepting a free office from Joe Blow Realty, Inc. – they’re both illegal (which is as it should be).
+100 Great comment. The “free” office thing did not occur to me. Thanks.
Sorry, but I’m just not buying what they’re selling.
Anybody who’s been around Dem campaigns over recent years knows that many if not most are run by careerist incompetents. It’s been the case for many, many years. Dem staffers and operatives don’t know how to run campaigns because the Dems don’t believe in campaigns. They want as few voters involved as possible. Because they think that’s smart. No matter whose campaign they’re running. This all may seem scandalous to the newcomer, but this has been Dem party SOP for decades. Why do you think the Dems have lost so many Congressional and Governors’ seats?
I mean, I’m a top-notch Clinton hater from forever but this is just full of holes. I’m not saying they’re lying. I believe that everything they’re describing happened. But sabotage by Clinton people? Maybe. But you REALLY gotta want it to make the case from this.
Plus the info in the description is factually incorrect and the links are wrong. It all comes across as pretty self-satisfied and sloppy. Very discouraging, really.
Your description of careerist opportunists unfortunately matches my limited experience with political machines.
More on the CIA leaving C 4 explosive in the engine compartment of a school bus. When this story appeared yesterday suspicions that it might be an April Fool’s joke.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/education/how-the-cia-managed-to-leave-explosives-on-a-special-needs-school-bus–without-noticing/2016/04/01/65b25f34-f810-11e5-9804-537defcc3cf6_story.html
Well, ever so slightly In their favor, c- 4 is very safe without the detonator, ie a blasting cap.
Of course blasting caps are easy to come by.
I’m sure the very best intelligence agencies misplace C-4 around public schools every now and then. Well, maybe not but Langley can’t be considered among the best anyway. I can only imagine the mirth this is bringing to other US intelligence agencies and their foreign counterparts.
probably not so much the pentagon, iirc they’ve lost atomic bombs. whoopsie.
The antidote du jour today was wonderful. And with the unrelenting awfulness of the news much needed.
The Counterpunch article is pretty depressing. And I was wondering why she needs all those fundraisers.
B/c no one will volunteer for her. I got a call yesterday from Hillary’s Victory Fund. Right off the bat I asked if the caller was a volunteer or was being paid.
Yes, he said. He’s paid up front for each call. (Interesting). Then he asked me for money, $100 to be exact to give to her. I said, “she doesn’t need my money if she’s giving fundraisers for $353,000.00/plate”. He says she needs a lot of money to beat Drumpf.
So I say, “what? the primary isn’t over yet, is it?”. he agrees it’s not. Then asks if I am supporting her. I say “no.” Then he asks if I’m going to support her in the GE.
I say “I’ve never voted for a republican in my life.” Then he says again she’s going to need money for the General Election. I say, “too bad.”
Well ffs, if you have to pay every phone banker b/c no one believes in you enuf to do it for free, then there’s no amount of money that’s enuf.
It is also another reason she is considered untrustworthy and sleazy. Think about it. Someone had to look at that ruling and see a way to manipulate it so that you could rake in money and Clinton or one of her top people did. And instead of going this is corrupt, they went ahead and did it.
Makes you want to throw up it does that many of her supporters will read about this and willingly fail to recognize what that says about her, her ethics and her interest in the public good.
Like Bob Herbert said 15 years ago
I’m just tired of the same people who have decried the corruption and actions of Republicans and bemoaned that their voters shrug it off because IOKIYAR, do the same thing over and over with the Clintons. Seriously, change that to the RNC and say Bush and they would be in an uproar, but some will twist themselves into pretzels to say this is just smart because…
It is really frustrating to see all of the people who had fits over Bush’s foreign policy, say, that are now completely O.K. with our so-called “Democratic” drone-a-bombers. It really does make me sick to my stomach to see all of the things we voted in majorities in Congress to change normalized by the very people we sought change from.
But then, I guess that is why the Dems no longer have their majorities. Silver lining to every cloud…
“Indefinite detention” which was Obama’s baby. Even ol’ Darth Cheney didn’t go that far.
Michelle Alexander on Chris Hayes (MSNBC). She is so articulate with plenty of intellectual firepower that Hayes doesn’t do much to temper her stinging indictment of the Clintons and race, Worth watching the whole 14 minutes.
msnbc.com/all-in/watch/extended-interview-with-michelle-alexander-657082435530
I bet Hillary isn’t coming through on promises to make it rain for down ballot races and state parties. TerryMac made this promise in Virginia and proceeded to blame gerrymandering done by the Democrats for failure to retake the state senate.
The strategy of appealing to Republican women to cross over on the top line Is bound to irritate Democrats who expected party building efforts.
No, what the Hillary campaign is doing is making me absolutely vote out all incumbents. I don’t care about crossing party lines to do so. F*ck the DNC.
There is only one War Party (with D and R branches). By definition, it is a status quo party whose purpose is to defend entrenched interests at all costs.
For instance, the out-of-control military intelligence complex, which keeps on expanding its global dominance strategy and its internal surveillance, without any apparent restraint.
Friends don’t let friends vote Depublicrat.
That leaves only the Green party or go independent (or some other less known parties).
Voting for someone who isnt in a third party is (usually) voting for the establishment
In a post on Reddit titled, If you perceive verifiable facts about your record to be attacks, you are admitting your actions are indefensible.
there is a link to Goldwater’s old campaign logo. It seems Hillary has copied it.
https://daylightsavingstime.files.wordpress.com/2015/04/clinton-logo.jpg
And I was wondering why she needs all those fundraisers.
B/c no one will volunteer for her
Well, she also needs to hang onto superdelegates, many of whom are officeholders. The best way to do that is both to make campaign contributions (which she’s done) as well as demonstrate a capacity to raise money for the general. The various Obama organizations were very heavy donors to the campaigns of superdelegates in the run-up to 2008, and that’s one of the major reasons they broke for him at the convention. She’s learned her lesson.
Yes, the Counterpunch article was by my neighbor and friend Margot Kidder. Great actress, , best Lois Lane, and a career activist. And an excellent writer. I believe she was marching for Bernie at a big rally in Bozeman, MT today. This was well researched and very sad. I used to be part of the whole Democratic scene in Montana for about 5 years. The shenanigans were too much for me.
Wow someone else who’s been around long enough to know who Margot Kidder is.
And Hillary is obsessed with money because she knows perfectly well that she lacks the political talent to win without tipping the scales. If anything she seems to be more shrill lately.
Re: Strength Training
You really shouldn’t be changing up your weight training routine much at all. Rather, incrementally increasing the weight lifted on a set of the same few, key movements (e.g. squat, deadlift, bench and overhead press) over time will lead to the largest and longest-lasting increases in muscle mass, bone density, and strengthened of connective tissue.
As an avid fitness buff who has also worked professionally with Olympic and pro athletes, ranging from pro football to the women’s national volleyball team, I dispute your contention. For one thing, everyone eventually hits their ceiling on any specific exercise. In the end you can only lift or press so much weight. Even the Olympic champ has a limit (although his or hers is more than that of the competition).
Second, at a certain point, adding weight results in drastically reduced reps. If you want to build pure power and massive muscle size, then by all means, go heavy with limited reps. But if you want balanced muscle mass and endurance (good all-around fitness) you have to synchronize your ratio of weight-reps-sets.
Third, changing exercises for the same muscle group gives greater development over the full range of motion and increases muscle elasticity, not to mention making that muscle or muscle group more effective for performing tasks other than just that specific exercise. Different exercises place different demands on muscle groups, such as the anterior, medial, and posterior deltoid cluster. Same with different exercises for the biceps, triceps, quads-hammy-glutes, and lats.
Olympic and Pro athletes have incredible genetic gifts and they can do basically any non-stupid training regimen and still excel. Inferences drawn from performance of those folks are less than useless for us normals. Don’t picture the needs of some medaled Iranian Cleaner and Jerker, but rather someone who isn’t a fitness buff and starting on the wrong side of middle-aged.
Every person hits a ceiling with regard to any activity they take up. What does that have to do with anything?
I’m not sure what “balanced muscle mass” means. If you lift more weight, you get stronger, and are able to lift sub-maximal weight a greater number of times than otherwise. You also gain increased benefits with respect to bone density. Similarly, “all around fitness” is another meaningless term. If you want to run or swim, train for those activities.
Your third point is useful for advanced trainees but not for most people. The exercises I mentioned above work the whole range of motion that anyone will ever need to use. Again, if flexibility is a goal, try yoga.
As I say below, you are just wrong. Exercise physiology is exercise physiology whether you are working at the elite level or for health reasons. If you want to get the benefits of strength training, you need to change your routine regularly. I once made the mistake of having a trainer (in the days when worked out regularly with a trainer) who did a technique called “super slow”. It’s fine for a change in routine but not as a steady diet. As you’d expect, I saw gains in the first month, then nothing thereafter.
Plus its worse for your joints to do the same thing, and you get less in the way of grey matter benefits (doing new exercises makes your work the coordination parts of your brain more).
Jess, is spot-on for the more athletic among the population. However, many everyday folks aren’t likely to engage with a fitness trainer and perform the variety of training exercises expected of serious athletes.
The reason Yves likely placed the weight training link is she has read the literature on the supreme value of challenging the body (appropriately) with activity that loads muscle groups with beyond normal loading. Learning to do weight training properly takes some learning and practice. (The more weight one trains with the more careful you need to maintain proper form.)
While running is a popular aerobic “fitness”,activity, it can be detrimental to ankle, knee, and hip joints in later years. (Many of the folks I see running on hard pavement have poor gait, and some are overweight— better to lose the weight first.) Learning to do appropriate weight training (for the desired fitness level) is essential to maintaining strength, metabolic and physical balance in one’s Senior years.
Many women still believe that weight training will shape their bodies to be too “muscular” looking. For most that is unlikely, as the average woman has a muscle type that doesn’t “bulk up”. They get stronger without appearing like a hulk. (See: the photo of Carly Lloyd standing next to Lionel Messi after they received their Best Player awards 2015—Lloyd appears stronger than Messi but not bulky.)
Every body is different and everybody has a different goal with their fitness regimen. It’s important to incorporate weight training into a mixed regimen. Modest running on a “soft” surface is a great way to get the endorphins flowing; so is swimming.
Here’s the Lloyd/Messi photo link:https://duckduckgo.com/?q=lloyd+messi+best+player+award+photo
i don’t run on hard pavement (except for running stairs, but there seems to be a little more give on stairs)–much prefer running tracks.
hike, swim, cycle, ski, drink craft beer. That’s it, a no brainer.
The G loading on a knee joint when running? out of this world. The contact area in the joint is a pretty small surface in reality. And it doesn’t scale up w/ body mass. Draw a line directly to the idiocy of contact team sports.
No, no, no. What the first guy wrote is correct. Squat, deadlift, bench press, overhead press can increase for many years or even decades if an individual is doing the program.
Eventually enough people are just going to do the program as it is written and the results will be undeniable.
No, that is not correct. Or put it another way: any gains you get will come MUCH MUCH MUCH more slowly if you do not change your program regularly. There is LOTS of research on this (a lot of the best research is in German).
Plus why would you want to do the same program? It’s much more challenging and interesting to change your exercises. You devise a program, stick with if for X workouts (depending on your training age) and then start a new one.
I respectfully disagree and suggest checking out Starting Strength and Practical Programming for Strength Training, both by the author of the article. They present a much more sound model for strength training than current thinking (“confuse the body” by providing “constant variation”).
In brief, strength gains are made by doing the same movement patterns (squat, deadlift, overhead press, bench press) over and over again, with the weight increasing each time training session. As long as the person consumes a significant calorie surplus and gets enough sleep, they will be able to increase the weight used in each session for months on end.
Eventually the loads they use will become so great that they cannot recover between each workout. For a male in his 20s and thirties it will probably be high 300’s/low 400s for a set of 5 on the deadlift, and low to mid 300’s for 3 sets of 5 for the low-bar squat. At that point, workouts will need to be arranged in a way to provide stimulus while also allowing more time for recovery time (e.g. the Texas Method or 5/3/1).
I also see there is a lecture on Youtube called “The Case for the Starting Strength Model”, though I haven’t gotten around to watching it personally as I assume it’s a rehash of material covered in the first two books I mentioned.
That’s 100% not correct. If you stick with the same program, your body gets used to it. Your body is an adaptation machine. The same old program becomes routine activity. You stop getting meaningful increases in strength. Lots of research confirming this.
You need to change your program regularly and how often depends on your “training age,” meaning how long you have been weight training. The longer you’ve been training, the more often you need to change. I need to change my program every 6 workouts.
The first two sentences are 100% correct; the way the 3rd sentence is avoided is to increase the load (or reps in some cases, but most people will benefit more quickly by keeping reps the same and doing a few pounds more.)
I don’t have access to WSJ (too poor) so I do the “type in the title’ to find information. Because I am a curious person, I read the title of other information that is displayed on a blog.
Today I discovered a 45 minute video documented by ABC. Au ( 4 corners) on the corruption in Malaysia. http://www.abc.net.au/4corners/stories/2016/03/28/4431284.htm
The good news (?) corruption in the US and EU have not quite devolved into the killing of opposition voices, but perhaps the Drumph campaign is a warm-up act?
I only first noticed Benjamin Studebakers’ work a month or so ago on HuffPo, but the few things that I have seen of his are always spot on. He is a really impressive political analyst and I hope to see a lot more of his work in the future.
It is always a pleasure to see quality work. Thanks for putting this one up!
The linked Studebaker post is a great piece and lays out the arguments so very well. Thanks for pointing him out!
+1
This is an excellent article.
Minus the discussion of Trump, it takes up, in shorter form, the same issues raised in Thomas Frank’s new book Listen, Liberal, which I can HIGHLY recommend.
As far as I’m concerned, Studebaker’s conclusion should be seriously considered by those who would switch their support to clinton or the Green Party or not vote at all should Sanders be denied the nomination.
“It is better for a fake right nationalist to win in 2016 and lose to a left egalitarian in 2020 or 2024 than it is for a neoliberal to win in 2016 and lose to a real right nationalist in 2020 or 2024.”
This is the point Susan Sarandon was trying to make with Chris Hayes several days ago and, despite the logic, was roundly criticized for.
Hillary goes to Nuremberg (jpg image courtesy of Banzai7):
The best laid plans of mice and men (plus women)…
Do we know what will happen in 2020 or 2024?
One option is to act in accord with what one believes and if there is no choice, don’t vote, skipping over the lesser of two whatevers.
2020 or 2024 will be way too late, four years of Rupert/Henry K/Kagan/AIPAC’s candidate Hilary may mean we’re more worried about dodging Cesium 137 fallout clouds than the niceties of public policy.
“Obama has earmarked $1 trillion over 10 years for more nuclear weapons, especially the new tactical B-61, whose small size the Pentagon says ‘will make usage much more thinkable’.
Oh joy.
http://i.imgur.com/DX0aJvk.jpg
(And BTW I think you’re doing a perfect job with moderation, don’t change a thing)
Late to chime in but I totally agree and thanks to Yves for posting this. The default position for all lefties in this election should be “anyone but Hillary” and the recent surge of Trump hysteria could just as well have been orchestrated by the Hillary camp–even if they were not involved–as it serves their TINA purpose.
The consumer part of the US GDP is 66% of the total (not form long as austerity bites, I suspect), of that 66% women spend 66% of the consumer GDP.
Thus it follows, women spend $2 for every $1 spent by males.
I suggest addressing the perversion of gathering, aka shopping, by banning the advertising and sale all items which are not NEEDED (note need, not want) for living.
We’d need two committees, one male and one female, each controlling the market for the others gender’s products.
Similarly, government spending would have to be controlled by the similar committies.
Speech, being free, despite male opinions, would not be so regulated, After all speech is free.
Looking for saving in all the wrong places.
Hi there, I am a woman and I manage the money in my house. We may both go groc shopping, but I am the one who pays the cashier. I do the bankie thing to pay the utilities and taxes and such. I went with my DH last week, was bored out of my mind as he tried on nearly every shoe in the place, then I presented the debit card to pay. So, I probably *spend* much more than 66% of the money in my household. What’s your point?
I’m another female CFO. Pretty much every single penny goes through me even though my spouse is the one who makes the money. Hubby is a great guy, works hard, loyal to a fault (I genuinely consider myself a lucky woman) but sucks when it comes to saving. We’d be in a state of perpetually living from paycheck to paycheck and acquiring debt every time something came up or he “needs” something if he were in charge of money. I’m definitely the less expensive of the two in our relationship. His new obsession is cameras. He needs one……that’s right, not wants, needs. *shakes head* If I have to watch another video on Nikon and Canon I’m going to scream(and I’ll probably wind up watching them until I give in or save enough for him to have one or the other.)
Advertising is not indoctrinating. Or maybe it is.
Why do people want to buy this season’s hottest dress, color their hair, after shave, deodorant, perfume, etc?
Why do people like gemstones or precious metals?
Why do you shave your legs?
Why do people not go naked in their homes (more often)?
All due to indoctrination.
Indoctrination in moderation can be a good thing. While I’m all for people going naked in their homes more often, you might want to go buy a bathrobe if your houseguest happens to be your wife’s best friend. It keeps harmony in the home.
I am volunteering at the local grassroots Sanders campaign office in WI. Our walk lists seemed to be completely Republicans. The grassroots leader is getting cut lists from a Sanders campaign staffer at another location (an offical office)
I told the grassroots leader I know how to cut lists with the VAN. So we sat down to do a list. Interestingly, their VAN has no “likely party” designation. So when I tried to help her cut walk lists it’s not easy to find the likely favorable voters (strong dems, independents) Does anyone know why this is so?
In this area if you cut your list only on prior voting history, it leans heavily republican, so it’s not very efficient. And I think the people cutting the lists are not very familiar with the local political climate, or the leanings of local voting wards.
It’s seems to put the Sanders campaign at a big disadvantage, especially at achieving face to face contact at the door, which all politicals know is the most effective campaign tool. It’s frustrating us because we know we can have the best impact by doing doors.
My very conservative Rep town has more visible Bernie signs up and the young people streaming into the grassroots office is extremely encouraging.
VAN, the cutout org that “owns” the DNC one database to rule them all, who is also owned by a big time clinton supporter.
Why would anyone even begin to believe they are anything but clinton moles?
Better yet, why does the DNC outsource what it constantly treats as one of it’s most important tools?
Because they’ve already outsourced the tool in charge? One tool to rule them all.
Hillz!!!!!
Interesting. As the company running the DNC VAN program has long ties to the Clintons, this could be another means of fucking the Sanders team over. Admittedly the DNC is not known for wanting to get out the Democratic vote, but I cannot imagine that the Clinton campaign would look kindly on not having access to that information. You have to wonder if the ‘likely party’ field has been termed Clinton only information and thus is one of the fields that the Sanders team does not have access to even if it should.
I think this entirely possible and a very subtle way to disadvantage the Sanders campaign. Could they justify because he was not a party member?
In a congressional primary challenge to Ron Kind in Eau Claire, the candidate, Myron Bucholz has been denied access to the VAN. Same argument given as in the DSW race in Florida, but didn’t they give in on that one? The argument is they don’t give VAN access to primary challenges to an incumbent.
They tried that w Tim Canova in FLA, running against DWS. They stalled and stalled. I don’t know what he did to finally get access, but he finally got access.
I think they were happy to have him lose a bit of time. Apparently, optics (Broward-Palm Beach New Times) drove the Florida Democratic Party to allow Tim Canova back in as an exception, just as he was fixing to file a lawsuit. (Florida and those electoral exceptions, geez.) Sanders got back in lickety-split by filing suit as well. It appears that someone doesn’t want to see these arbitrary policies challenged in court.
(Note in the letter from the Florida Progressive Dems: “lead to a breakdown of discipline on VAN use by our Democratic candidates and increased fragmentation of data.” Maybe that’s exactly what’s needed — progressives might need their own silo for their voter data. Time for those open-source interchangeable software components to do something good.)
Given the confusion over on the Republican side, I would think disenfranchised old school Republicans might be a great base for Sanders to draw voters from. While he isn’t running in Republican primaries, seeds for the GE could be planted now. He has integrity, he’s honest, he works hard. He’s running as a Democrat but has historically been an independent. He’s opposed to monopolies that choke off competition.
The ‘we wont’ vote for Hillary’ is a Pyrrhic Victory threat for Hillary.
Be prepared for the Clinton household to engage in Kamikaze combat as well.
With confusion over on the Republican side, the D side will not likely to be spared either.
Old school republicans may still sit on their hands—the small government people that they are would despise the perceived increased tax burden of single payer health care and infrastructure spending from a Sanders administration and either sit on their hands or vote Trump.
Sanders should keep raising the consciousness of the democratic base and reach out to independents.
Don’t know what it’s like in other states but here in CA you can get the voter registration lists directly from your county registrar. There are also political data firms that will provide the same info divided any way you want it: alpha and/or numeric by streets, or set up in so-called “walking routes” that are designed to take a person up and down the various blocks of a precinct or district in sequential order. We have used both types for local referendum and initiative petition drives. Which brings me to the suspicion that it may be easier to get voter reg lists in states which allow voter-sponsored initiatives and ballot measures, simply because the local and state officials are used to non-party groups needing to get those lists. (And of course, you can get lists of voters just by party affiliation, including all the small parties and “Declined to state” or “No preference”.
Those local lists are available in WI too, but there is no party affiliation. We don’t declare that here. The VAN will also incorporate things like the recall vote, other lists which help to indicate the leanings of a voter. It’s not great info, but still can greatly improves your efficiency to reach your likely voters. It has the voting history of a voter in all elections In a primary, you need that to figure out who will participate. For instance, we had a state wide primary in Feb. Essential only the Supreme Court race, very low turnout. You know anyone who voted then will vote next Tuesday and you need to talk to them.
I do wonder if the other political data firms might be a better source. Especially for an outsider:). That is what the WI dem party suggested Myron Bucholz use.
This sounds like the continuation of Dem Party Rat F__king the Sanders Campaign. Did you view the video from the links section? I’d recommend it to give you a sanity check on what could be happening in WI.
re: Massachusetts Volunteers for Bernie Sanders Report Internal State Level Campaign Sabotage
youtu.be/JuEMOKSaTk0
Regarding the Black Injustice Tipping point article, please see RT pieces over the past few years as to what the TSA has been doing to women.
Try telling that to the indigenous peoples, and opposition organizers of Central, and South America who have had a curious habit of ‘disappearing’ if they get in the way.
Or an open return to the historical norm?
oops, this was supposed to be a reply to afisher@ 10:17
I rarely wish to post, yet half the time it is not recorded. A few minutes ago your moderation rejected my post claiming that I’d said this before. Well. If everyone who returns to a repeated topic… written with mild disgust.
If it’s the one at 10:46am abt the Black Injustice TippingPoint, it is showing. I have gotten the “you’ve said this before” the odd time, too. I figured it’s b.c I tend to double-click. My post usually shows up after Skynet has a good snuffle at it, tho.
“Bernie Sanders As Democratic Capitalist Forbes. Qyrs: “Anti-monopolist’ is probably clearer, but the headline does its job of grabbing attention”
This is a nice easy read. I like the distinction between a “free market” and a “competitive market”. I think that’s language that pro-regulation politicians and activists could use to make their case better.
Will wonders never cease.
Terry O’Neill, President of NOW, was interviewed this morning on msnbc. She was asked to comment on Trump’s “horrifying” remarks about punishing women for seeking/having an abortion. Her response, and I am paraphrasing:
Trump’s initial statements were accurate. “By definition,” when abortion is criminalized, women seeking an abortion are engaged in criminal activity and must be punished. Anti-abortion activists have tried to cover this fact up by calling women “victims.” She noted that their policies “inevitably” lead to “prosecution” and “imprisonment,” and punishment is already being meted out in states like Indiana which have passed draconian anti-abortion or fetal mortality laws.
The interviewer asked for a comment on the suggestion that Trump was the republican candidate most likely to protect women’s reproductive freedom given his previous pro-choice stance. While O’Neill was unwilling to “go that far,” she noted kasich’s “vicious” construction of a “web” of abortion restrictions and regulations as governor of Ohio, and that cruz wants to “make it a crime entirely.”
We never seem to tire of jailing “criminals” in this country, and, to that end, have relentlessly redefined the term. Not to mention that “victim”-blaming has pretty much become a national sport.
Once again Trump calls a spade a spade.
In Indiana a woman was sentenced to a 20 year prison term for a miscarriage, which the law called a “feticide”:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/04/01/indiana-woman-jailed-for-feticide-its-never-happened-before/
I believe there is at least one more case in the south where a woman was jailed for a miscarriage.
“Criminalization” does not leave much room for ambiguity.
Sharia, American-style. Horrifying.
accurate
Makes forcing women to wear the Chastity Belt seem almost less insane.
We never seem to tire of jailing “criminals” in this country
Well, only if they’re the right kind of criminal, of course. I’m pretty sure Jamie Dimon and LLoyd Blankfein will never see the inside of a prison cell.
or for that matter Secretary of State Clinton…..
A friend linked to the Huffpo article on the collapse of support for Hillary among non-white voters in Wisconsin (friend is a Latino Republican). I commented that the title should have been “Sanders support surges among non-white voters in Wisconsin.” My friend liked that. I Commented from perspective of news blackout on Sanders, but I was surprised at my friend’s reaction. Sanders doesn’t seem to generate hostility from my harder core Republican acquaintances. (Hillary on the other hand….)
“Sanders does not seem to generate hostility from my hard core Republican…” This is ABSOLUTELY TRUE!!!!
I’m doing doors and talking mostly to Repubs. While they aren’t committing to voting for Bernie, they like him and they hate Hillary. They want to talk. They are very disappointed with their choices. My favorite comment was, I’d like 1/3 Bernie, 1/3 Cruz and 1/3 Kasich. So what would THAT look like?
The Trump supporters totally fit the stereotype of working class. Harley Davison emblems on the trucks in the driveway. We have a very contested Supreme Court race here too and the NRA has been out in force driving on that one race.
Once the dragon of hostility is aroused, it will continue of its own momentum.
They will just let loose their hostility at anyone from the D side.
Regarding the article on the ancient American civilization that may have been wiped out by climate change; “Neolithic societies everywhere shared relatively large and sedentary populations that faced two novel problems: how to coordinate ever-larger groups and how to avoid degrading local environments.”
Other than tools, what makes anyone think that that the human race has, socially, crawled that far out of the Stone Age?
Problems lead us to create solutions. Solutions lead to their own problems, which lead us to more solutions, which lead to more problems. The solutions change, the problems never really change:
“how to coordinate ever-larger groups and how to avoid degrading local environments.” When we finally fail at the solving the second problem adequately, the first problem also goes away…then we recover and the whole cycle repeats.
Fun fact for the future Apocalypse: you can knap pretty decent arrow heads from porcelain toilet tank covers…probably good to start practicing now.
Stone Age humans degraded local environments.
Space Age humans aim to degrade inner-space and out-space environments.
“We are more powerful.”
Did stone age Amazon River Indian Nations DEgrade or UPgrade their local environments? Didn’t a book ( “America 1491”) get written about that?
Yes to both questions. I can recommend the book.
“This does not have to be either/ or”
It shouldn’t be either/ or. Steady state aerobic exercise, interval training, and strength training are all good for you in various ways and they can all be harmful if you do them wrong. And the average person will do them wrong at some point and get injured– I have in all three cases. If running hurts your joints, then bike or swim or walk fast.
Rippetoe and a lot of the strength training gurus are like evangelists pushing a cult– they are right that strength training is important, but the cultists don’t stop there. They have to argue against the competing religion, the cardio cultists. What’s funny is how they even start tearing into each other– the barbell faithfull may feel it necessary to sneer at the Church of the Kettlebell, though when it comes to health for the average middle aged person it might be safer to do some goblet squats with a KB than do back squats with increasingly heavy weights assuming that you will always have perfect form.
Not that I have a dog in this fight, but I don’t think I’ve seen any mention of Bruce Lee-style weight-training yet — i.e. small amounts of weight, massive amounts of reps — which seems like a much safer way to go about things than lifting really heavy things a few times.
What about push-ups and sit-ups?
(Just finished 2 sets of 15, a couple of seconds ago. Hey, that’s all I can do.)
My preference too, actually. Cheap, portable, available on the fly. Wall sits, and leg lifts are good too, for core strength.
i’ve been trying pullups (2 is my recent best) to add to my massive 12 pushup routine, and my jogging and stair climbing. trying to remember to do some backwards stair climbing.
If you’ve actually read Rippetoe’s books, you’ll see that he’s a big fan of pullups, chinups, and dips as accessory exercises (if your shoulders can take them – many people have serious shoulder issues with dips) – although he advocates incrementally adding load once the rep count gets sufficiently high in order to increase resistance and avoid plateauing. His only real objection to pushups is that he believes there’s no way to get any substantial increase in load (you can probably balance a single barbell plate on your back when you do them, but anything past that is asking for trouble).
i haven’t yet, but i will look for them. i guess i’ll have to break down and join a fitness club to get easy access to the equipment i want to use.
I didn’t know Bruce Lee did that, but there are advocates of very high rep training, including, but not limited to body weight stuff. There is evidence it produces hyper trophy and some strength gains, though of course it is better for strength endurance.
No links handy, but I was reading about this because I have a hernia. My doctors said I don’t need an operation, contrary to what websites claim, but that my strength training should be the high rep low weight version that people like Rippetoe despise.
I read a little more and I can probably do some low rep heavy stuff too, depending on the exercise. Basically you don’ t want to strain the abs in my situation.
IMHO I think for abs high rep makes sense. Functionally you don’t use your abs for “strength,” you use them for stabilization.
:-)
Hate to tell you, but at an anti-aging conference (MDs only, “anti-aging” is what endocrinologists turn their practices into when they get sick of dealing with insurance companies), everyone was asked if they had to pick one physiological measurement that best predicted biological ages, as opposed to physical age, what would it be?
They were give a list which had stuff like resting pulse, cholesterol levels, glucose levels, sex hormone levels, resting pulse, etc.
What was the best predictor?
Strength
The second best?
Muscle mass
Low weight, high rep training is not an efficient way to get either. It’s good as a variant but not as a steady diet.
This Pine Tree Watchdog article supports the reference to “The Hillary Victory Fund” corruption in Maine noted in the Counterpunch article. Note the one of the Montana donators, Donald Sussman, is a funder of Pine Tree Watchdog.
Although their divorce is pending, billionaire Donald Sussman is also currently married to Maine’s US House Rep from District 1 Chellie Pingree who has already endorsed sHillary : http://bangordailynews.com/2015/09/17/the-point/clintons-winning-maine-endorsement-primary-but-can-she-win-voters/
To Sussman’s credit, he does donate to quite a few actually worthy causes. To Pingree’s discredit, she’d like us to consider her a ‘progressive’ but like most in DC today she toes the party line when push comes to shove.
AP starts sniping at Hillary’s brittleness — this article is headlined on the sensationalist Drudge site as “HILLARY CRACK-UP”:
One can understand the Clintons’ frustration. This was supposed to be a cakewalk. Superdelegates were wired to assure crushing majorities. Sanders (in the Clintons’ estimation) was a fringe candidate.
In 2012 blue states (states that actually contributed electoral votes to Obama’s win), Hillary has 626 elected delegates to Bernie’s 616. Results from Wisconsin could push Bernie into the lead.
If the Clintons resort to the brute force of big money and insider influence to push through Hillary’s nomination, they are setting up an electability issue. Picking a candidate supported by a minority of Democratic voters in 2012 blue states is a recipe for low turnout and voter defections to other parties.
I have instructed both the Washington Democrats and all of the turn-coat super delegates, “You people insist on voting directly opposing the electorate, I will vote in opposition and across party lines to vote you out. All of you.”
That’s the way to go.
Hopefully they will listen to reason, unlike many ‘super-delegates’ of our representative democracy who voted for bailing out banks.
Maybe no one, or not enough voters, demanded that they be held accountable – “I will vote in opposition.”
Many of them are still there in Washington today.
Oh, pretty sure the WA Democrats are concerned. I received 4 emails from them soliciting money after Saturday’s caucus. Today, I received donation envelopes from Inslee and Ferguson.
In Inslee’s envelope, I inserted a letter that said “until you very publicly announce your super delegate vote will go to Bernie Sanders, both my wallet and my vote will go elsewhere.”
In Ferguson’s envelope, I inserted a letter that read, “in your 1st campaign, I sent you money and voted for you because you were the only candidate for Attorney General in the nation campaigning on stopping unlawful foreclosures. You lied. What you’ve done while in office to stop foreclosures? Not a damn thing, other than hiring bank attorneys to head up your consumer protection division. Therefore, not only will my wallet stay shut, but my vote will go to your opposition.”
We all need to send these pertinent messages.
Didn’t the sexual predator husband announce that his superdelegate vote would be going to the one with the most votes? That he switched horses like that in 2008? Seems to me much more hay needs to be made of it.
Did they bring Terry Mcauliffe home with them? He was plucked from obscurity as a fund raising master from syracuse. Their money man, now gov of VA. Carpetbagging seems a thing with these people.
Don’t sleep where you shit?
Jim, as a student of schadenfreude, you may appreciate his “fundraising” for the 90’s tech boom. Tellergy was a good mess. Fleecing pro golfers, and GOP acolytes alike. You may realize pat barret in there….long time NY GOP.
http://www.bloomberg.com/research/stocks/people/person.asp?personId=605023&privcapId=867423
There are other much more detailed stories on who and what was….misplaced?
http://freebeacon.com/politics/questionable-business-connections-may-hurt-democrat-terry-mcauliffe/
“In that capacity, he was paid $1.2 million for “assisting [Telergy] in raising equity capital,” according to a company SEC filing. He reportedly helped broker a $40 million investment by Global Crossing, also a telecommunications firm, in Telergy.”
He was paid 1.2 million for raising equity capital? Their pre IPO must have been the longest ever on record. Maybe teaching the next gen of tech fraudsters how to do it…..don’t. Just pretend you might, one day…
j pat was the long time head of the NY gop. His turning pro hillz really bought her the election to the senate.
One of those guys to keep an eye on, if its even possible. Weathervane of sorts.
More on McAuliffe’s GreenTech, briefly mentioned in your link:
Always the Clintons are consistent in surrounding themselves with people who think like they do: namely, in terms of exploiting public goods to create private wealth.
Grifting: it’s not just an income. It’s a lifestyle.
Bob, that bloomberg link goes nowhere. You peaked my interest mentioning J Patrick Barrett. I worked with him back in the day at Carrier. He was a nice guy back then, though that was before Lewis Powell’s memo.
It was supposed to be a link to his bloomberg bio. Not working here either now.
Why wouldn’t he be nice? He’s one of the guys in charge of NYS, but has no responsibility or rank. He just has to cash the checks, and there are lots of them.
True Aristocracy. Bipartisan!
Indeed! It was a very different time back then. The concept of leveraged buyouts hadn’t even occurred to Pat’s buddy Bill Simon at that time.
Has Bill lost ‘it?’
No one is asking what he wears these days.
Where have those young impressionable voters gone these days?
Hipness — not a prob!
We might have been fooled if she’d rumbled up to the event on a Harley Davidson, sporting a brand new tattoo, with Huma riding pillion.
Does she know how to play rough?
Is she paying boo-birds at Sanders events to counter his voluntary boo-birds at her events?
Does she need more fundraisers to hire more vociferous boo-birds?
Don’t under-estimate her.
April fools joke?
…….politics-as-usual……
Particularly discordant, in my opinion, are clinton’s theatrical flourishes.
Waving an extended arm with a pointing finger while referring to “my opponent,” or jabbing an again pointed finger while accusing Sanders of “lying.” Especially when he’s not.
It all seems like such a contrived attempt to generate outrage where there is none.
Bernie Sanders could easily have been a fringe candidate, but Hillary won’t even commit to trying to helping people. She promises a thin gruel, at best. There is no nourishment for the middle class in her message, and no relief for the punched out people at the bottom of the ladder. Let me butcher a very nice poem to explain:
You don’t have to be too old to remember all the way back to 2008, and the Hope campaign. Even people as young as 26 years were eligible to vote in that campaign. I would wager that many Bernie supporters are calculating that it is better to have someone fighting for you, regardless of the number of victories, than to have someone unwilling to sincerely commit to fighting for you. If the Clintons can’t grasp that their message is uninspiring, dull and weak then they deserve to have a crack-up. It wouldn’t have been that hard to have advocated for some zestier policies, but then the wealthy donors . . .
That Counterpunch article doesn’t name the 22 states that have rigged the Democratic nomination, but I will bet Washington State took the tainted money. This state rivals Chicago politics for its dirty dealings.
Anyone know for certain?
Here you go: sadly there are 32, plus Puerto Rico
Alaska, Arkansas, Colorado, Florida, Georgia, Idaho, Indiana, Kentucky, Louisiana, Maine, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Ohio, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, Puerto Rico, Rhode Island, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, Virginia, West Virginia, Wisconsin, Wyoming.
Link is below, please put http and colon and double down slash in front of said link (trying to avoid, skynet trigger)
docquery.fec.gov/cgi-bin/forms/C00586537/1024982/
Is the party beyond redemption?
Is trying for its nomination tilting at the windmills?
Perhaps no one human is capable of redeeming the wicked, unless we believe…belief in one savior.
By the way, if you are going to tilt at a windmill, assume that windmill might bite back. It’s not Quixotic to be prepared like that.
If the Democratic party was beyond redemption, I think it would have happened when they were pro-slavery, or pro-segregation, or pro-whatever-they-were-between-Wilson-and-FDR.
A party is never beyond redemption because it’s just a collection of people. Change the people and you change the party.
What? Washington not included? I don’t believe this list. Our super delegates appear to have taken the money.
Thank you!
+1
I saw that as a big negative of an otherwise good article. Where is the list of the states? Why isn’t that included? Did I miss a link?
i linked it above your comment, in reply to perpetualWar
http://www.syracuse.com/auto/2016/04/tesla_model_3_electric_car_orders.html
Uh oh. He was counting on those tax credits, the only real product he ever wanted to build.
“The orders came from across the globe even though the car isn’t scheduled for sale until late in 2017. But they could jeopardize a $7,500 U.S. electric car tax credit that many buyers are counting on to reduce the price. The tax credits gradually phase out after a company hits 200,000 in U.S. sales.”
So, he doesn’t know how many he can make? Even “old iron” detroit, with their slide rules and protractors can put a number to production capacity.
“This is the digital edge! we don’t do planning, we allow the customers to do that!”
The product is tax credits, not cars, as many still believe. He doesn’t want to make cars, WAY too hard.
You can’t be just rich.
You have to be rich and more virtuous than the poor sap who doesn’t care about our precious planet and rides to work everyday on his donkey.
Or, have a bunch of capital, that needs a capital intensive business, with a gov subsidy- tax credits!
Keep the capital, and get paid for it! Learn how next week on TED talks. Elon will discuss his new plans for a methane* powered rocket to mars.
*methane not included– all passengers must be vegetarian and agree to have their flatulence captured via our brand new nano-tech reclamation system, and a hose up your ass.
According to Elon, up to 96.7% of his drivers would be willing to pay up to $900k for a fart powered car, even with the constant stick up the ass. “Some see that as a bonus. Our drivers are often asked if they have a stick up their ass– now they can proudly answer- YES!”
Supercharged smug on!
Isn’t it?
It’s a sin not to recapture your own methane-rich flatulence.
Go say 100 Hail Gaia’s.
I assure you, my cat’s methane is far richer than mine. She probably has better politicians, no thin gruel for her!
I’m picturing a v-6- 2 rows of 3 cats, slightly opposing each other. The sticks are at about 30 degrees to vertical.* The close quarters, on top of hood, and in front of the driver, will encourage them to fight with each other, making them more efficient.
*Mounting the cats not included…
Yesterday there was some question about the correct English translation of “wasichus,” the Lakota (I think) word for white people. I said it meant multitudinous, while others had heard “fat eaters.” Here’s my source, for the record (any actual Lakota speakers, please chime in):
from Black Elk Speaks, as told to John G. Neihardt
From NativeLanguages[dot]org
Interesting. Thanks for the research. That explanation sounds plausible from my experience. The Indian sense of humor, at least around these parts, is subtle, deadpan, and hilarious. Best game of pool I ever played, I was partners with a young Indian guy at a neighborhood tavern. He pretended to be fall-down drunk, gave the other team a bunch of “well-intended” boozy advice, much to their consternation, and would then proceed to sink impossible shots. They folks we were playing with were boiling mad, trying to figure out how this “drunk Indian” was whoopin’ so, while we tried to not burst out laughing…good times.
For those not fortunate enough to get first-hand experience of Native American culture and humor, check out the movie Smoke Signals. That movie was a huge hit up on the Flathead Reservation, so I’m told.
I drove taxi in Minneapolis for many years and took quite a few loads out of the ‘Indian Bars’ that used to be on East Franklin.
One night I picked up a bunch of folks who looked to have been partying for good part of the day, among them was a young wasichu who loudly announced that his ‘new friends’ had given him an Indian name.
This announcement was accompanied by a loud outburst of laughter on the part of the group.
“Tell him your new name!”
“As of today, I’m called pajogin-face”
Another outburst of laughter, and I figured this guy must be the brunt of some kind of joke.
We arrived at their destination, and as they were leaving, one of the group told me quietly, that pajogin was Ojibwe for vagina.
Time to check in on the Craazyman Fund, a junkyard dog portfolio consisting of 50% junk bonds, 30% emerging market stocks, and 20% gold bullion.
Since inception at March 2nd closing prices, Craazyman Fund is up 3.27%, versus a 2.49% gain in its benchmark (50% S&P 500 stocks, 50% Barclays Aggregate bonds).
With a month of daily data, we can check on volatility: 8.86% for Craazyman Fund versus a sedate 4.33% for the benchmark.
Neither of these vol values are scary (stocks average 15% volatility, long term). But why does Craazyman Fund exhibit double the volatility?
Both of its most volatile components — emerging market stocks and gold — are benefitted by US dollar weakness. Their currency sensitivity adds an extra layer of volatility, as exchange rates fluctuate.
On the calmer bond side, Barclays Aggregate is a vast portfolio of investment grade taxable bonds — Treasuries, mortgage securities and corporate bonds. Junk bonds are a much smaller subset of below investment-grade corporate bonds, which are also positively correlated with the issuers’ stock prices.
Junk bonds are to the BarAgg as a tugboat is to a battleship: far more maneuverable, and thus more volatile.
RE: Video shows white cops performing roadside cavity search of black man Washington Post (guurst).
Yesterday the “reverend” al sharpton was asked on msnbc why African Americans were such ardent clinton supporters. He opined that they did not want to relinquish the “gains” they had made during the obama administration. He did not elaborate on the nature of said “gains.”
Presumably he was referring to the fact that, given the past eight years, African Americans are more likely to be tolerated swinging a golf club on the golf course and not just carrying the bag or as a small statue wearing a red and white jockey outfit to which white men can hitch their horse.
Personal gains for sure.
The Washington NAACP, in their celebration for surviving as a non-profit for 100 years, celebrated with a black tie gala, while the Seattle Central District was being devastated with a massive black wealth grab in the form of unlawful foreclosures in response to reverse redlining.
Keep in mind, the Clinton’s ushered in bank deregulation. Oh, the massive ironies.
Unaoil continues not to be covered outside the Huffington Post, Fairfax outlets in Australia and the occasional AP or Reuters release which is largely not picked up or well-indexed.
Today we have investigation of Citibank and HSBC with connections to KBR mentioned. Just as the stories of raids in Monaco at the behest of Britain’s Serious Fraud Office should’ve been UK news (barely reported anywhere there at all), shouldn’t Citi’s possible role here be American news and shouldn’t HSBC’s possible role again be UK news? What’s the Fourth Estate equivalent of calling your congressperson to complain? “Hello, Editor, why the hell isn’t this newsorthy to you guys?”
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/unaoil-citibank-hsbc_us_56feba02e4b0daf53aefa1da
Separately there was a brief mention on CNBC in a video segment which avoided naming the accused outside of Unaoil, talked of how this was “business as usual” to some extent, and ended inexplicably with some demonization of Russia. But hey, that’s CNBC; I’m not sure how much more is to be expected.
http://video.cnbc.com/gallery/?video=3000506030
And apparently there’s a Reuters release that Baghdad is looking into the Unaoil disclosures.
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/iraq-probe-claims-unaoil-corruption-122807385.html
Even if there was fear among journalists that this story wasn’t well-enough sourced, the governmental investigations in several countries are news. It’s still rather amazing to see this story barely covered, so many days later.
Reminds me of Riggs Bank and BCCI….just follow the money.
From zh today I think.
http://www.bloomberg.com/features/2016-how-to-hack-an-election/
Pros at work.
As a general rule, or at least it happens from time to time, one hires hackers to combat hacking.
And cheaters to combat cheating.
Can’t we hack their hack?
WHERE’S ANONYMOUS?????????
Why IKEA’s Australian Profits Are Mostly Tax Free
Will billary clinton kill off the democratic party like another clinton(dewitt) who was there when the federalist party died ?? The plutokratz who warship the democratic wing party need to stage their own little coup against fearless leader billary…it is over…allowing mrs itzmyturn and her ego to lead to the destroying of the democratic party today will create a splinter that will allow the warshippers of the creep party to take us back to life under the psychotic narcissism of corrupt judge landis…allowing billary to do an adlei Stevenson is not a good thing…you plutocrats will survive the bern and might actually learn something…he will not wholesale fire you (as long as you are not fully obstructionist)…billary is well past her sell by date…it is over…now if the republicans were guaranteed to do a whig party funeral ritual then by all means let the clintons and the creep wing destroy the standing parties leaving the average american with five to seven parties to choose from…but it does not seem the donald would be able to actually build and sustain a third party…
Bretton Woods was held up and not finalized to see if certain germans could off the one nut wonder with the chaplin moosestash…when he survived the suitcase…the session closed and the world went to plan b…certainly if you nudge her out Now, history will remember hellary as the woman who wedged open the door for the eventual(and soon) first female president…you democrat plutocrats may not want to be remembered as the fools who sat on your hands while rome burned…and even if she convinces you the population will “forget” that she stole the coronation…margie thatch did not blaze a trail for other female leaders in the uk…it is getting close to 40 years since mt took the seat as “the” prime minister (never forget the the)…no one in uk mentions the need to have a second female the pm…
The Naked Truth: Protestors strip bare to demand fair access to drugs
Putting people before profit
Protestors stripped naked at drug company Gilead’s London HQ this afternoon to expose the profit before patient attitude that is costing millions of lives.
“Act Up, fight back, fights AIDS” echoed through High Holborn this afternoon, as a slightly bizarre looking crowd of people darted towards an imposing glass fronted building in central London.
As a bemused looking security guard watched on, five protestors stripped off their specially donned hospital gowns and stood brazenly in the window, the word “greed” carefully painted out on their skin. The action, co-ordinated alongside 25 healthcare advocacy groups spanning 6 continents, was part of a wave of 11 protests taking place across the globe.
The London leg of the protest was targeting international drug company Gilead, who despite making billions in profits continue to charge tens of thousands of pounds for lifesaving hepatitis C treatments.
“The current system enables big pharma to charge extortionate costs for life saving medication”, Jake Chambers told me, as Gilead staff watched on from above. “They’re preventing millions of people accessing lifesaving treatment, 10 million people die every year because of this, and 2 billion people don’t get the drugs that they need.”
Back outside the chanting grew louder, as bright pink banners unfurled, spelling out “Pharma Greed Kills” combined with the naked bodies lining the floor to wall glass.
http://www.huckmagazine.com/perspectives/activism-2/naked-truth-protestors-strip-bare-highlight/ …
Keep it simple:
“Clinton v Trump=President Trump
Sanders v Trump=President Sanders”
And screw you Nancy Pelosi, and your “Democratic Donor Survey” that’s just an advanced begging bowl for Hillary.
Yes, we will send you a large check to fight Republicans–After Bernie is on the November ticket.
If it’s Hillary, you’ll never get another cent from us. But we will send back your postage paid envelope with a “get lost” message.
Re. Obama warns of terrorist nuclear attack | BBC — I expect that’s what the $Trillion US pocket-nuke initiative described in yesterday’s Links is for … or could it be that Obama means those *other* terrorists? (You know, the ones from outta state.)
And like most elites, Obama’s dire irony-deficiency on full display a few links later: Obama attacks Trump over nuclear remarks | Financial Times. So we should be more worried about typical Trumpian blowhardiness than actual $Terasums committed to field-usage-tempting compact nukes? Good to know.
Re. the long-vanished Pueblo civilization — Fails to mention the “progressive deforestation due to overharvesting” hypothesis advanced by Jared Diamond in Collapse. However, the embedded-linked IBTimes article gives a broad hint:
The monumental great houses constructed by the ancient Puebloan people were made with 240,000 trees transported from forests over 75km (50 miles) away, scientists have discovered.
My instinctive reaction to this was “You can be pretty sure that the log-transport distance didn’t start out anywhere near as large”, but the same article disputes this:
Eventually, the great houses were abandoned. It has been suggested widespread deforestation and drought were factors involved, with the culture serving as a warning for unsustainable land-use practices. However, a 2014 study also published in PNAS suggested this was not the case.
In it, researchers from the University of New Mexico said: “There is no substantive evidence for deforestation at Chaco and no obvious indications that the depopulation of the canyon in the 13th century was caused by any specific cultural practices or natural events.
“Clearly there was a reason why these farming people eventually moved elsewhere, but the archaeological record has not yet produced compelling empirical evidence for what that reason might have been. Until such evidence appears, the legacy of Ancestral Pueblo society in Chaco should not be used as a cautionary story about socioeconomic failures in the modern world.”
OTOH, the latest study *does* claim to provide “compelling empirical evidence” for a episodic-megadrought link. Scientific-knowledge advancement is, as ever, a messy, clarity-only-with-hindsight business.
For more on the extraordinarily fascinating history of Chaco Canyon and its culture, check out:
The Mystery of Chaco Canyon. The dvd covers the astronomy, archaeology, ceremony, the connection of the Chacoan people to Mesoamerica and to contemporary Pueblo people, sky-watching and astronomical cycles, the cycles of time differing between cultures and the evolution of scientific knowledge over time. What I’d give to live in such a place…
http://www.bullfrogfilms.com/catalog/mocc.html
Alrighty, folks. Who among you said that the Clinton campaign would suggest a debate during the NCAA finals? Because, ding! We have a winner! From the Sanders campaign: “We are very pleased that Secretary Clinton finally has accepted our request for a debate about the needs of New York and America. Unfortunately, the dates and venues she has proposed don’t make a whole lot of sense. The idea that they want a debate in New York on a night of the NCAA finals – with Syracuse in the tournament no less – is ludicrous.”
that prediction came from neverneverland:
Peter Pan
March 30, 2016 at 3:14 pm
Unfortunately, the New York primary is April 19, so Debbie Wasserman Schultz can’t schedule the debate opposite the Game of Thrones Season Six premier on April 26. But I’m sure she’ll come up with something!
Let’s look at the schedule. Hmm, the NCAA basketball championship is April 4th right before the Wisconsin primary. Will that work?
https://wikileaks.org/imf-internal-20160319/
Also zerohedge.
Conspiracy theory confirmed as conspiracy fact.
Hate to tell you, but there is not much in that leak that is not already public, including on Thomasen’s blog at the IMF. This is just a more blunt statement. We wrote last year that the IMF wanted out of the Troika, for instance. The big new news is the degree to which the IMF and Brussels are at odds.
The Huffington Post story about “When Commercialism Trumps Democracy” paints a sad picture of US media. It laments “…ubiquitous click-bait exposing readers to invasive and deceptive advertising”.
Here’s a link from a sidebar to that article:
“This Spring Trend Is Perfect For Women With Small Chests”
Just so we really know what the quote is about!
vaya. imagine if huffington were to buy out naked capitalism:
“Trump Predicts Massive Recession”
Oh wait, that’s for real:
Paying down $19 trillion in debt in eight years implies a budget surplus north of 10% of GDP.
If that comes to pass, then a “very massive recession” is a lead-pipe cinch.
But it’s for our own good. :-)
Capitalism means shopping to many in the West. Millenials don’t want to own anything. What a paradox. One reason why Adult kick scooters are used by the younger generations to commute to work instead of driving a car.
It isn’t just economic means. Young people don’t see the point in owning a car. They’d much rather use Uber in locations where it is available. Lotta data on this. Car companies are freaked out about the lack of interest among the young for car ownership. I can relate. I’ve never owned a car and have no desire to own one. Way too much cost and hassle relative to the benefit.
But the other issue is that cost in terms of typical incomes is also way outta whack. A reader in comments went through how much time it would take an average worker to pay for a car in the 1950s v. now. Huge difference.
With you on that, Yves. I’m 58 and have never learned to drive, never driven a car and never wanted to, and never wanted to own one. I’ve always lived in places – or visted places – where public transport is not a poor person’s choice but a social good. (The UK is degrading, outside of London, as far as I can see, but first class train travel in Italy is so cheap and there are buses to and from everywhere.)
Now, shoes… that’s a different story…
I assume its related to the way that prices of other things long thought to be indispensable to American life are also now out of whack, like healthcare, education, and housing. Only unlike those things, cars really are dispensable, and will be first on the chopping block. Education may follow in a decade or so. Going to be harder to get rid of the other two completely.
I wonder if at some point the car companies are going to push back at Uber and its destabilization of their rice bowls. Personally I wouldn’t mind if they fought to the death and both lost.
I think this depends a lot on where you live. Here in flyover country (perhaps to be renamed Trump country soon?), it’s almost impossible to earn a living and engage with society without your own car.
Yes, I agree. they don’t see the point of ownership like previous generations did.
I think they understand better that in most cases it’s really the bank that owns it.
http://wcmcoop.com/2016/04/01/saboteurs-of-sanders-campaign-lead-to-clinton-national-security-think-tank/ in relation to that video about the sabotage of Sanders campaign.