By Lambert Strether of Corrente
Trade
“We don’t know of any bookmakers taking bets yet on which date the United States, Mexico and Canada will reach a revised NAFTA deal. But even though Mexico is pushing hard for the talks to conclude before the end of 2017 to avoid the negotiations becoming a big issue in next year’s July 1 presidential election in Mexico, some long-term trade experts say a lot of things would have to fall into place to get a fully agreed-to package by year’s end” [Politico].
Politics
Policy
“Sanders and others decided to continue trying to get [drug] importation to a vote. This led to the most recent, and less-publicized, fiasco” (legislative details omitted) [Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone]. “Sanders, along with co-sponsors Elizabeth Warren and Robert Casey, offered an amendment to the user-fee bill that would have allowed for importation of drugs from FDA-approved facilities in Canada…. Once again, Democratic discipline broke down. The amendment this time was beaten in committee, 13-10. Two Democrats, Patty Murray and Michael Bennet, both of whom accept a lot of pharmaceutical money, voted no.” To the contrary: I’d say that Democrat discipline held up quite well!
Obama Legacy
“̌Obama’s Drone Warfare Is Something We Need to Talk About” [Teen Vogue]. “Despite all the criticism — including the valid criticism that killing civilians creates more extremism — Obama has defended drone warfare and its remote-controlled killings. During remarks at the University of Chicago Law School in 2016, the then-president stated, ‘What I can say with great certainty is that the rate of civilian casualties in any drone operation are far lower than the rate of civilian casualties that occur in conventional war.’ Thanks, Obama.” Important, considering Teen Vogue’s likely demographic. Maybe somebody will pitch an article on the foreclosure crisis to them!
2016 Post Mortem
“A 2016 Review: Why Key State Polls Were Wrong About Trump” [The Upshot, New York Times]. “At least three key types of error have emerged as likely contributors to the pro-Clinton bias in pre-election surveys. Undecided voters broke for Mr. Trump in the final days of the race, or in the voting booth. Turnout among Mr. Trump’s supporters was somewhat higher than expected. And state polls, in particular, understated Mr. Trump’s support in the decisive Rust Belt region, in part because those surveys did not adjust for the educational composition of the electorate — a key to the 2016 race…. Many of the challenges that pollsters faced in 2016 aren’t going away. Next time, the challenges could easily be greater.” One way to stretch newsroom budgets on polling would be to hae less of it, especially as election day approaches; 38 countries do, including Canada. I’d consider going even further and banning television and digital media advertising as well. Force the parties to make their case in person. Worked in the days of the Lincoln-Douglas debates!
“It’s time to bust the myth: Most Trump voters were not working class” [WaPo]. “Among people who said they voted for Trump in the general election, 35 percent had household incomes under $50,000 per year (the figure was also 35 percent among non-Hispanic whites), almost exactly the percentage in NBC’s March 2016 survey. Trump’s voters weren’t overwhelmingly poor. In the general election, like the primary, about two thirds of Trump supporters came from the better-off half of the economy.” I argue that at the margin, they were: The Obama voters who flipped (the same voters that the current Democrat leadership is resolutely refusing to flip back, preferring to replicate Clinton’s 2016 strategy by appealing to suburban Republicans).
“Hillary Clinton: Writing new memoir has been ‘painful'” [USA Today]. I’m sure. “Hillary Clinton is still deciding on a title for her new memoir, which will be published this fall.” Readers, can you help her out?
“Why can’t Hillary let it go? Donald Trump’s not the only one still obsessing over the election” [Paul Greenberg, Salon]. “In a bizarre performance, Clinton blamed Comey, WikiLeaks, Russia, the New York Times and Netflix. What’s missing?” Not to defend Trump, but I keep seeing him described as a petulant manchild. Is Clinton’s behavior that different? More mature? Less ego-centric? More intellectually honest?
2017
“In Georgia, a Democratic upset depends on a balancing act” [AP]. “[Ossoff’s] two-track approach – going directly to typically Democratic voters and vocal opponents of President Donald Trump, while using television to convince just enough independents and even moderate Republicans – is a necessary balancing act for Ossoff to pull off an upset over Republican Karen Handel in a district Republicans have held since 1979.” Seems like sending one message over the airwaves and another in person is a discrepancy a clever Republican campaign could exploit; it’s rather Clinton-esque. And here are the stakes: “‘If we can win over 50 percent in this district, we know we can do that statewide and around the country,’ says Georgia Democratic Chairman DuBose Porter.” In other words, a Clinton-esque strategy of appealing to suburban Republicans, vacuous centrist messaging, lots of favorable media coverage, and heavy dependence on donor. It’s Clinton 2016, so expect the Democrat establishment to try that in 2020 if Ossoff wins. (The difference is that Ossoff, unlike Clinton, is a “fresh face.” Hello-o-o-o, Cory! And good-bye Joe, you lovable goof, you.)
2020
“As self-evident as it may seem to liberals that the Trump presidency has been a disaster and is doomed to defeat, the daily cycle of scandal and outrage that dominates social media is no substitute for a viable presidential candidate. And the Democratic Party, it seems, has yet to learn the key lessons of Hillary Clinton’s failure in 2016. While Donald Trump has already filed paperwork for his re-election campaign, Democrats are facing a distressingly shallow bench of potential challengers. Trump may be flirting with an all-time low approval rating, but many of the politicians maneuvering to challenge him are not necessarily in a much stronger position” [Vanity Fair]. Article lists Biden, Warren, cites Mike Allen approvingly on Kirsten Gillibrand, Mark Cuban (!), Terry McAuliffe (!!), Rahm Emmanuel (!!!), as well as Cory Booker and Kamala Harris. Please kill me now.
New Cold War
“The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee said Sunday there is no “smoking gun” so far showing collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign in an effort to influence the 2016 election, adding that hearings this week will be crucial to congressional investigations into the matter” [Wall Street Journal]. “‘Listen, there’s a lot of smoke. We have no smoking gun at this point,’ Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia said on CNN on Sunday. ‘But there is a lot of smoke.'” Named sources with evidence the public can see would be nice, especially considering that some Democrats frame Russian “meddling” as a casus belli. I mean, in both the Gulf of Tonkin and the Iraq WMDs, the administration that wanted war had the common decency to fake some physical evidence; they didn’t rely on anonymous “officials,” “17 intelligence agencies,” and so forth. (Oh, the word now seems to be “colluding.” It used to be “meddling.”)
“The Latest: France says no trace of Russian hacking Macron” [AP]. I’m so old I remember when that was a done deal. Everybody believed it!
“A Noun, a Verb and Vladimir Putin” [Politico]. “To those with a bit of distance from cable news—that is, every sane person in America—Democrats seem to be replaying the exact strategy that lost them the last election. What, pray tell, is the Democratic Party’s message otherwise? That they don’t like Russia, except when they did? That they believe Russia is the biggest national security threat to America, except when it wasn’t? Democrats appear to have spent about two minutes trying to figure out why the voters of Wisconsin, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania and, very nearly, Minnesota rejected them only a few months ago. And why, despite an ostensibly popular Obama presidency, they now have less political power than at any point in memory. But this is hard and painful spadework, and what’s unearthed might prove unpleasant. So why bother?”
Realignment and Legitimacy
“‘We call for a #MarchForTruth on Saturday, June 3rd to raise our voices and let our elected leaders know that Americans want answers,’ the site reads. ‘The legitimacy of our democracy is more important than the interests of any party, or any President” [Time]. Democrats doubling down on Russia. Crowd sizes: Chicago, hundreds; Washington, DC, a thousand; New York, hundreds.
“A Field of Lavender Nourished by Trump’s Tweets” [HyperAllergic]. “Using a Raspberry Pi, [artist Martin] Roth has synced grow lights on the small room’s ceiling so the strength of their bulbs corresponds with the activities of nearly two dozen Twitter accounts. Most belong to people in President Trump’s closest circle: feeds included along with @POTUS and @realDonaldTrump are those of Press Secretary Sean Spicer and White House counselor Kellyanne Conway. Other accounts represent the mainstream media, from CNN to Fox News. When any of these accounts retweets a tweet, the grow lights brighten, increasing in power if there’s a flurry of retweets… With all of this curious wiring, Roth intends to create a sort of underground retreat that transforms our media-born anxieties into something therapeutic. Lavender has long been used to soothe the mind and encourage better sleep in addition to healing physical wounds; the more these select politicians and pundits fire tweets, the stronger the scent to the installation’s visitors….” You can visit the exhibit until June 21 if you are in the New York City area; here are the details.
“RONALD REAGAN, THE FIRST REALITY TV STAR PRESIDENT” [JSTOR]. “‘Politics in the United States has always been a performance art,’ writes Tim Raphael in his analysis of the branding and image-crafting that now dominate our political system. Throughout his eight years as president, Ronald Reagan had much more positive poll numbers (60-70%) as a person than did his actual policies (40%). Raphael attributes Reagan’s success to the potent combination of advertising, public relations, and a television in every home. (There were 14,000 TVs in America in 1947; by 1954, 32 million; by 1962, 90% of American homes plugged in.)… Ronald, Nancy, and four-year-old Patti were TV’s ‘first all-electric family’ with ‘electric servants’ making magic as the folks at home watched and dreamed of the good life as seen on television.”
* * * We aren’t quite in Nullification Crisis territory (1832), but the trend is clear:
“California could be a ‘sanctuary state’ from federal pot laws, thanks to razor-thin vote” [Los Angeles Times]. “The state Assembly approved a bill Thursday barring state and local law enforcement officers, absent a court order, from helping federal drug agents in arresting people who are complying with state laws allowing the use and sale of marijuana.”
“A “climate coalition” of states producing 30% of US GDP is seceding economically from Trump” [Quartz]. “So far, nine states have joined to form the United States Climate Alliance (paywall) to implement the Paris accord’s goal of cutting carbon emissions by as much as 28% at the local level, undermining the US president’s pullout and acting as as a sort of rebellious “shadow government” on the environment. The states—California, New York, Massachusetts, Washington, Connecticut, Rhode Island, Vermont, Oregon, and Hawaii—collectively represent a quarter of the US population and produce 30% of the country’s annual GDP.”
* * * “Drug Deaths in America Are Rising Faster Than Ever” [New York Times]. “Drug overdose deaths in 2016 most likely exceeded 59,000, the largest annual jump ever recorded in the United States, according to preliminary data compiled by The New York Times.” Great to see Democrats focusing like a laser beam on this. Oh, wait…. And now–
“Is there a neo-Nazi storm brewing in Trump country?” [Guardian]. This is an important article; neo-Nazis stop in a coffee shop on their way to an event:
Their political party had been misrepresented, Heimbach explained to the waitresses. They’re not the KKK. They’re focused on family and faith and local control, on fighting the international corporations who came into Appalachia and took all the profits from Kentucky’s coal. Heimbach did not try to sell the waitresses on his plan for a white ethno-state, his conviction that the Holocaust did not happen, his belief in thousands of years of Jewish conspiracy. He just talked about family struggles and immigrants taking jobs and hurting workers and how white Americans needed more representation.
Wooton, who had voted for Trump, was responding enthusiastically. She was furious at the lack of government response to the opioid addiction crisis and skeptical of establishment politicians. Her husband, a coal miner, had lost his job under Obama and been hired again three days after Trump’s inauguration. Wooton came back to the table repeatedly to press Heimbach for more answers, explaining her manager was still calling him a racist. She asked if Heimbach was willing to work with people of other races. He said of course he was. He talked about the importance of black communities making decisions for themselves, about how black policemen might be better at policing black neighborhoods. Wooton agreed and agreed again.
Talking to Wooton, Heimbach acted like a local politician: polite, a little longwinded, but genuinely passionate.
Notice Wooton trying to do her due diligence! If the Democrats think it’s still true that “they have no place to go,” they’re delusional. And if they focus on suburban Republicans, they’re in essence consigning Wooton, and a large part of the populace, to a secular version of hell. Is that what they want? It’s certainly not what Sanders wants, and it’s what the Sanders wing can prevent, if anyone can.
Stats Watch
Labor Market Conditions Index, May 2017: “The Labor Market Conditions Index for May is, due to the 10-day blackout period leading into an FOMC meeting, delayed until late in the June 16 week. No further information is available” [Econoday]. Isn’t this a little unusual?
Factory Orders, May 2017: “The weak run of second-quarter data continues with April’s 0.2 percent decline in factory orders. The durable goods component fell 0.8 percent in the month reflecting a give back in aircraft orders and wide weakness for most readings. Orders for non-durable goods rose 0.4 percent reflecting moderate gains for food and energy” [Econoday]. The working class voters who gave Trump his margin of victory won’t appreciate this. And: “According to the seasonally adjusted data, it was civilian aircraft that caused the decrease. The data in this series is noisy so I would rely on the unadjusted 3 month rolling averages which declined” [Econintersect].
Productivity and Costs, Q1 2017 (Revised): “Reflecting an upgrade for output, first-quarter nonfarm productivity came in unchanged with unit costs up 2.2 percent both near Econoday expectations” [Econoday]. “Improvement in this revision is welcome but the no change headline for productivity is not, pointing to squeezed margins among employers and going to the heart of this cycle’s low growth trend.” Hmm.
Gallup US Consumer Spending Measure, May 2017: “May average spending levels continued to be relatively healthy in May.at $104, similar to the $107 average in April. May was the fourth consecutive month that Americans’ spending averaged $100 or higher” [Econoday]. “Among both higher- and lower-income earners, average spending in May was similar to April. Americans living in households earning $90,000 or more annually spent an average of $169 — which is among their highest averages in the past year. Spending among Americans in households that earn less than $90,000 annually averaged $79. This too is among the highest rates for this group over the past year.”
Purchasing Managers’ Services Index, May 2017: “Moderate is the message from the PMI services index which finishes May … lower-than-expected” [Econoday].
Institute For Supply Management Non-Manufacturing Index, May 2017: “just about as expected” [Econoday]. “This report is far from flat, continuing to point to rates of growth that the actual economy has failed to match.” And: “The ISM data overall still suggests very firm growth in the services sector and a notable strengthening in the employment index should counter some of the concerns seen following the employment report” [Economic Calendar]. And: “One survey maginally up whilst the other marginally down. I would assume there is little change in the rate of expansion” [Econintersect].
Credit: “The charts [Commercial and Industrial Loans] show it all went bad around November. And it continues to deteriorate with every passing week, with the latest data showing cars, housing, and employment decelerating accordingly” [Mosler Economics]. “Must have been some event that set it off? It was around the time of the election, but I can’t recall specifically what would set off something like this?” Speculating freely on the charts, the consumer drop is 10%-ers losing their “animal spirits” on November 9, spending discretionary income on psychiatrists instead of more marble countertops, etc. However, I’m not sure how the drop in commercial real estate correlates to the weirdly optimistic survey data (not born out in government data). Shouldn’t it? Readers, thoughts?
Shipping: “The number of containerships of 13,000 teu or above deployed on the Asia-US West Coast trade has nearly doubled since the start of 2017, according to container analyst Drewry, posing questions about how well terminals will cope and how long it will be before the trade is regularly served by ‘mega-ships'” [Lloyd’s Loading List]. Fascinating to see concentration take physical form.
The Bezzle: “Alphabet Inc., parent of Google, YouTube and a small army of other business, sports a stock price of $996, and it is poised to hit the $1,000 a share mark, as Amazon.com Inc. has just done. The question about whether Alphabet can get there, and stay there, relates to its non-Google, non-search businesses” [247 Wall Street]. “When Alphabet announced its latest earnings, Chief Financial Officer Ruth Porat said: ‘[corporate blather omitted].’ She neglected to mention that, in her own numbers, search represented the lion’s share and other businesses nearly nothing.”
Political Risk: “[I]t’s not a question of whether [Trump] wants to put more money here, there or anywhere. It’s whether an investor wants to put his or her money into something. If [Trump] says he’s going to bring back coal, that’s very different from an investor saying, ‘I’m going to come in and build a brand-spanking-new, coal-fired power plant that’ll sit around for 50 years.’ I think that would be an exceedingly reckless investor, especially if Trump is going to get kicked out” [In These Times]. “Whether it’s four years or eight years, he’ll be gone soon. Maybe his successor will be a Democrat, the mood will have changed and U.S. climate policies will become significantly stronger. So, you’d have to be a really risk-taking investor to put your money in carbon-intensive industries now. It’s just too risky over the long term” (quoting Glen Peters, a senior researcher at Norway’s CICERO Center for International Climate Research).
Political Risk: “President Donald Trump’s decision to pull out of the Paris Agreement is unlikely to sway U.S. companies that have begun to factor climate change into their supply-chain strategies” [Wall Street Journal].
The Fed: “if these [Randall Quarles and Marvin Goodfriend] are eventually confirmed, the tone of the Fed Board will instantly swing to a far more hawkish tenor. Many market participants have been barking up the wrong tree, arguing that Trump is an easy money guy because he borrowed a lot when he was a real-estate tycoon. As with so much else so far in his Administration, after you sift through all of the tweeting and extraneous noise, his platform has been very much traditional Republican in most economic areas (with the clear exception of trade policy) [Amherst Pierpont Securities, Across the Curve]. “Likewise, his rumored Fed nominees are people who are likely to be far more sympathetic to much of his fiscal and regulatory agenda and, perhaps more importantly from a market perspective, are likely to shift the thinking of the Fed away from the radically dovish stance seen since the crisis and back toward a more traditional posture. The trajectory of rates may or may not be altered significantly, but if this story is correct, I am pretty confident that the balance sheet will normalize more quickly under the 2018 FOMC than it would have under the 2016 FOMC. Look for the Chair slot to be filled by someone who is closer to Goodfriend and Quarles than to Yellen.”
Rapture Index: Closes unchanged [Rapture Ready]. Record High, October 10, 2016: 189. Current: 183. Oddly, Crime Rate is +1 (“The murder rate in several American cities has risen”) and there’s no -1 to bring the net reading to 0. This disturbs me, since in my many years of tracking the Rapture Index, I’ve never seen them make this error.
Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 58 Greed (previous close: 57, Greed) [CNN]. One week ago: 47 (Neutral). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed. Last updated Jun 5 at 12:39pm.
Health Care
“The Single-Payer Party? Democrats Shift Left on Health Care” [Alexander Burns and Jennifer Medina, New York Times]. This is a very sloppy article, to say the least. Take this paragraph — please:
Democrats and activist leaders seeking political redemption have embraced an unlikely-seeming cause: an actual government takeover of health care
First, if “Democrats… seeking redemption” includes all Democrats, the claim is false. Clinton’s “never, ever” views on single payer mirror those of the Democrat leadership. Second, single payer is not a government takeover of “health care” (that would be the UK’s National Health Service, and not Canada’s Medicare). It’s called “single” “payer”, right? Health care delivery remains as private as now (a long-ago compromise in the universal health care movement). And then there’s this:
Supporters of universal health care, including activists with Ms. DeMoro’s union, repeatedly interrupted speakers at the California Democratic Party’s convention in May, challenging party leaders to embrace socialized medicine.
As above, single payer is not “socialized medicine” (a long-ago scareword fomented, IIRC, by the American Medical Association). I’d like to give Burns and Medina the benefit of the doubt, and believe they’re simply ignorant instead of dishonest, but now that’s difficult. Too bad The Times abolished the Public Editor, or I’d write them!
Gaia
Last week I asked for an “elephant curve” on differential impacts of climate change policy; as with trade, there’s no reason to think they’ll be evenly distributed, and averages conceal. Here is how the Times addresses that issue: “Any credible effort to combat climate change endangers millions of jobs involved in the extraction and processing of fossil fuels. But the reality of the modern economy is that industries are constantly in flux, and the workers who lose jobs may well* find better ones” [New York Times]. And by “addresses” I mean “ignores.” So who’s the patsy at the poker table? I don’t know. Oh…. (NOTE * Translation: “I don’t care enough to find out. I am, after all, a New York Times reporter!”)
“Just 90 companies are accountable for more than 60 percent of greenhouse gases” [Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists]. From 2016, still useful. “[Y]ou could take all the decision-makers and CEOs of these companies and fit them on a couple of Greyhound buses.”
“5 reasons why Trump’s exit from Paris isn’t the end of the world” [World Economic Forum]. “The planet is moving towards a low-carbon future, with or without President Trump.”
“Green Tea Party” [Harpers]. Debbie Dooley is a Tea Party founder. And: “She is also one of the country’s most effective grassroots campaigners for clean energy…. Renewable-energy policymaking tends to happen at the state level. Because utility coverage often falls along state lines, measures that favor solar energy do too. So even if Trump were to try going after renewables, there is only so much he could do from Washington—and plenty that statewide coalitions like Dooley’s can help pioneer outside of it. States like New York and California are obvious places for left-leaning groups to advocate for renewables these next four years; but Florida and other red states could prove a tougher nut for them to crack. With so much of the electoral map shaded red, Dooley’s approach might be able edge greens closer to bringing renewables into Trump country.”
“Now politics, not skepticism, may be wind power’s biggest barrier. Under new leadership with ties to conventional energy interests, the Energy Department is scrambling to complete an internal study in the next month that could lead to an upending of the policies that fostered the rapid spread of solar and wind” [New York Times].
“When placing tenders and requests for quotation, companies are now paying greater attention to the green credentials of potential suppliers, and − in more and more countries − local and central government purchasing bodies are routinely setting green performance standards for their service providers. Consumers, too, are becoming increasingly aware of the role that manufacturers, distributors and retailers can play in helping to reduce emissions, with abundant evidence that a majority of consumer purchasing decisions are now influenced by the perceived environmental performance of the company supplying the product” [Lloyd’s Loading List]. “Most importantly, more efficient use of fuel resources reduces oil consumption, which of course brings down costs and improves the bottom line. The issue has become even more critical as the globalisation of modern supply chain ecosystems has led to complex elongated logistics networks. These involve more frequent and longer distance journeys, which consume vast amounts of fuel and generate substantial carbon emissions, as products and components travel by plane or ship around the world, enabling international trade flows.”
Black Injustice Tipping Point
“Ferguson was incorporated in 1894, as an all-white town. Blacks were not allowed to live here. There were racial covenants in place in Ward 2 Ferguson (my ward), as late as 1979. They broke those up, and where the covenants were in place, those neighborhoods are now mostly comprised of black folks” [On the Top Step]. “The town, which was founded by whites, for whites, and with its government emanating from whites, was fundamentally unprepared institutionally to address this turnover of its population when it happened.” Blog from a Ferguson resident and candidate for office.
.@EBONYMag front cover looking nice with @chancetherapper on it — but they still haven't paid all their freelancers. #ebonyowes pic.twitter.com/OGg8LFtH9W
— Ernest Owens (@MrErnestOwens) May 27, 2017
Still true, not all freelancers paid. Nice.
“Investigators are searching for the driver of a pickup who witnesses say intentionally ran down two Quinault tribal members at a campground, killing one and injuring the other” [Seattle Times].
Class Warfare
“The Chinese Factory Workers Who Write Poems on Their Phones” [Literary Hub]. “Since China’s reform and opening-up era of agricultural de-collectivization, privatization of industry and the shift towards a self-styled socialist market economy, it is estimated that 274 million Chinese migrants have moved from the countryside to work in mines and on urban assembly lines. … Today the most famous migrant worker poet is 24-year-old Xu Lizhi who committed suicide in 2014. He worked at Foxconn city, the electronics mega-factory in Shenzhen famed not only for manufacturing all our Apple products, but for a spate of suicides in 2010 that exposed the sinister myth of opportunity and social mobility on the assembly line: “To die is the only way to testify that we ever lived,” wrote one blogger at the factory. (Foxconn subsequently erected netting to prevent not the despair but the death toll.) But when Xu threw himself from the 17th floor of a building four years later, having published much of his work online, it was not his death that made headlines, but his skill as a poet.” Important topic of which we hear almost nothing in the business press, or indeed the press generally. There is the portal: 工诗联首页 – 工人诗歌联盟.
“Between the Black Body and Me” [R.L. Stephens, Jacobin]. A critique of Ta-Nahesi Coates, worth reading in full: “Instead of finding relief in political action, Coates finds it in a cookout at Howard University’s homecoming, surrounded by black people. He fantasizes that he is ‘disappearing into all of their bodies,’ as the music and dancing, the black cultural zeitgeist of the moment, cure him of the ‘birthmark of damnation.’ The curse is lifted. Blackness is transfigured, becoming a space ‘beyond the Dream.’ It’s another ontological pivot, this time allowing Coates to conclude that The Mecca’s — his term for Howard — cookout has a ‘power more gorgeous than any voting rights bill [!!!]’.” Episode 113 of Chapo Trap House includes an informative and hilarious interview with author Stephens.
“”I’m as Poor as Sh*t”: A Look at Downward Mobility in Lancaster, Ohio” [In These Times]. “Brian Alexander in his new book Glass House: The 1% Economy and the Shattering of the All-American Town makes the case that Lancaster’s decline is not the result of individual “bad” decisions, like not using birth control, dropping out of high school and getting addicted to opioids. Instead, it’s the consequence of deregulatory economics on Wall Street that eviscerated working-class communities in small towns across the United States…. In Glass House, Alexander struggles to find a satisfactory explanation for Lancaster’s support for government austerity, self-reliance and Right-wing politics under expanding conditions of poverty. Perhaps this is because he barely touches on the Democratic Party’s strong ties to Wall Street and its corresponding failure to protect unions and unite the working-class across racial lines. Instead, Alexander resorts to vague platitudes about nationwide decline….” (“Glass House” from glass manufacturer Anchor-Hocking, who come across as particularly vile corporate malefactors.
“But governments must consider ways to manage the transition to driverless trucks in order to avoid potential social disruption from job losses, it urges. Automated trucks could reduce the demand for drivers by 50-70% in the US and Europe by 2030, with up to 4.4 million of the projected 6.4 million professional trucking jobs becoming redundant, according to one scenario” [Lloyd’s Loading List]. Or we could simply throw the drivers under the, er, bus, as we always have before. Why tamper with success?
News of the Wired
“The ‘Wow!’ Signal” [The Center for Planetary Science]. The answer to “Where is everybody?” continues to be “Not here, that we know of.” Sigh.
“5 of Humanity’s Best Ideas of What Dreams Actually Are” [New York Magazine].
“Jean Sammet, Co-Designer of a Pioneering Computer Language, Dies at 89” [New York Times]. “COBOL was initially intended as a short-term solution to the problem of handling business data — a technology that might be useful for a year or two until something better came along. But it has lived on. More than 200 billion lines of COBOL code are now in use and an estimated 2 billion lines are added or changed each year, according to IBM Research.”
“Snake Oil Salesmen Were on to Something” [Scientific American]. “For centuries snake oil has been a folk remedy in Chinese medicine, used primarily to treat joint pain such as arthritis and bursitis. Its introduction to the U.S. most likely occurred with the arrival of Chinese laborers who came to build the Transcontinental Railroad in the mid 1800s. They may have offered snake oil to fellow workers as relief for suffering long days of physical toil.”
Zeitgeist Watch:
Man mowing lawn with tornado behind him says he "was keeping an eye on it." https://t.co/iz8fN0bMtT pic.twitter.com/9Lnqb8iViq
— David Nelson (@DavidNelsonNews) June 4, 2017
Readers, feel free to contact me with (a) links, and even better (b) sources I should curate regularly, and (c) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi are deemed to be honorary plants! See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here.
And here’s today’s plant (EU):
EU writes: “Botanizing season is in full swing down here, and I’ve been coming across many interesting components of our native flora. Here are but a few, if you’re in need of photography to dull the pain of our modern times” (here being southeastern North Carolina). Artful focus, there!
Asclepias lanceolata (few flowered milkweed)
Readers, Water Cooler is a standalone entity, not supported by the Naked Capitalism fundraisers. Please use the dropdown to choose your contribution, and then click the hat! Your tip will be welcome today, and indeed any day. Water Cooler will not exist without your continued help.
223 comments
Comments are closed.
2016: Dollary Clump, the identity persists well into 2017, either way you loose.
Campaigning for Dummies: How to Lose and Lose again
or
Campaigning for Dummies: a Winning Strategy for the Deplorables
Title for Hillary’s new book:
The Terrible, Awful, Very Bad, No Good Campaign
If Hillary wrote a book with that title, it would be about Trump’s campaign and how it was helped by The Putin’s nasty spies, Boris and Natasha.
And how she was failed by the DNC, her staff, and most of all those deplorable voters.
What else would she write about?
Reminds me of the recent article entitled ^The Elites Feel Let Down By The People”.
My reply: “then maybe they should get a new one”
It Takes a Foundation: And Other Lessons Oligarchs Teach Us.
“A Night to Remember” is already taken…
(By Source, Fair use).
“$500M and all I got was this Teeshirt”
Whatever the title, the picture that ABSOLUTELY MUST be on the cover is the one where she’s in sunglasses on her phone.
Potential title: “Opiate of the Elites”
Title for Hillary’s new book:
“Why aren’t I 50 points ahead?”
Plunk you magic twanger, froggy!
The reason that I’m so subversive and independent is because I watched “Andy’s Gang”.
Niiiiiiice
where is the return desk… the story of a little girl and a life worth living…again and again and again…
With Apologies to Gerald Durrell.
Lard Choices: One Woman’s Guide to Pork Belly Politics and Wall Street Money
Sanders And The Putin Ate My Election, by Hillary Clinton
“I Am Woman, Hear Me Bore“
Hillary’s memoir should be called: “Stop Me Before I Kill Again”
Yes!
“Readers, can you help her out?”
Deplorable You.
Me, Myself and I.
I Came, I Saw, My Campaign Died.
“I Came, I Saw, My Campaign Died”
I’m dying with laughter at this one.
Oh crap! Beat me to it.
If I Did It: Alternative Tales of Absolution
“The Ceiling’s Concrete!”: Hillary’s Guide to Hardware (complete with a bad photoshop of her in a yellow hard hat, blue button up holding a hammer)
The Electorate Shrugged
I’m with Nobody
Plus 1000. Way funnier than my attempts.
Losing together.
I’m With Stupid.
Nobody’s With Me.
“With A Cloth: How Others Wiped (Out) My Campaign”
“My Journey Through the Woods: A Guide for Coping With Loss”
Hey, how about “Nearly Doesn’t Count!”
Golden Snowflake Falls
Goldman Snowflake Fails
“I Leaned In and Fell Over”
That’s a good one!
Stronger Untethered
Never Ever
What Difference Does It Make?
I Came, I Saw, My Campaign Died.
Alternatively:
I Maimed, I Whored, I Lied.
“I got it! I got it! I got it! I ain’t got it.”
I have no insight on Ga 6 but if the Dems think they are going to capture Georgia as a whole then they are smoking some powerful weed (perhaps that’s the smoke Warner was talking about). The rural parts of Ga are very conservative and Republican and have forgotten all about Sherman burning the place down.
In the bountiful cornucopia of possible drugs, cannabis is the probably the least likely to give its partakers delusions of grandeur. (not that I would know, my, ahem, friend told me).
Might I suggest the DNC is hepped out on something else? Looks to me more like a toxic cocktail of organic-certified meth, overpriced coke, and Whole Foods kale, all mixed in one of those IOT juicer thingers.
A title for Clinton’s new book:
“Hubris, Corruption and Arrogance: the downfall of the Clinton machine.”
Give us some titles which use the HRC initials?
“Hubris, Racketeering and Corruption” ?
How about “Her Royal Cluelessness”?
Shape Shifting, Blame Shifting Thru the Decades: An old Goldwater Girl tells why she still deserves it, it’s my turn and you b*tches better let me have it!
>>Article lists Biden, Warren, cites Mike Allen approvingly on Kirsten Gillibrand, Mark Cuban (!), …..
The Democrats have no bench. That’s what you get when one circle of cronies has controlled the DNC apparatus since 1992. (even Obama is a partially Clinton creation as Obama’s political career was propelled by William Daley, a Bill Clinton Chief of Staff)
The DNC had some potential to build a bench when Howard Dean was running the show through his 50 state strategy with its grass roots level organizing in the states and its success in winning majorities in both houses. Opportunity that had the potential to bring new younger blood into the party and have them move up the food chain. Guess Barack and Rahm got too scared of the left getting the upper hand and scaring the big donors away, so they brought in stiffs like Tim Kaine and DWS to keep the donors happy, even at the expense of congressional majorities and bench building.
Where the rubber meets the road for me is in the total abrogation of interest in controlling state legislatures and governorships. This is the level of governance where not only Congressional districting is decided, but also where influential policies and laws such as insurance regulation and such happens.
The Democrat party is all about centralized power in Washington. This enhances the effectiveness of Congressional grifting; toll gates ahead, mofos. To them states should only be administrative districts of the Federal government.
Whoops, it’s a federal republic; more limited than in the past due to overreach through the Interstate Commerce Clause expansion over time, and through the Feds’ propensity to declare war on everything which has the effect of giving them primacy on matters that could equally well, or perhaps in a superior fashion, be addressed on a state (or even local) level. When the centralizing strategy comes a cropper, they have so disempowered themselves on the state level, that they got nothin’. Well, not them personally, ’cause they have generally seen to that aspect; but the citizens who might be habitual Democrat voters, and who favor old-school Democrat priorities are rude, screwed, and tattooed.
Take a bow, assholes.
Hillary’s book:
“She Stoops to Conquer”
“I Flirted With Victory But He Gave Me the Cold Shoulder”
“That Craazyman Promised Me a Ten Bagger and I Like a Fool Believed Him”
“Pantsuits for Beginners”
“Microsoft Windows Server 2012 for Dummies”
> “Microsoft Windows Server 2012 for Dummies”
+1000!
“Ada sent me to Chicago and New Orleans”
“How to Uberize your Campaign”
“I Just Put it in Autopilot”
“Self Driving Politics”
Lawnmower/ Tornado Is that Randy from Trailer Park Boys? Not his usual Lemon Chiffon slacks…
Nope. That’s a real guy from the Prairies…they’re a tough bunch :)
He’s a South African Afrikaner. They are very, very tough.
Not that tough or he wouldn’t be in Canada. Lol.
Hillary’s book: Sipping Wine by “Myself”
Clinton book title:
“It Takes a Village (of People to Blame)”
“It Takes A Pillage”
You think anyone will plagiarize that title?
BWA-HA-HA-HA-HA!!!!
Great.
“It takes a neoliberal to raze a village”
“Why does this keep happening to me?”
“Readers, can you help her out?”
***********
Firstly, forget the book. Millenials gofer youtube vids!
A victory song, of course!
I Won!
[Trump Lost. Loser, Loser Trump!]
(need to buy wah-wah pedal]
I don’t need your crying wah-wah racket
So they found my little e-mail packet
[use genuine AR accent here!]
You can take yo cryin’ and stick-it
Up yo’s the wah-wah – guitar string picket.
Take yo spyin’, and Putin with it.
Yo can bare it, Putin grins it.
[Baptist Choir Girls]
Boo who, wah-wah
Do do, da da
What a crock, yo nose yo pick it
Take yo cryin’, you baby can stick it.
Cry baby, sissy boy, respect not in it!
Not a bit, Not bit. Yo didn’t win it!
Yo Orange ape boy ain’t with it.
[Again…at least once.]
Suggested titles for new Clinton book:
“Russians, Comey and The DNC: Why I Could
Not Get It My Way”
“Dammed Serfs: I Am Still Your Leader”
May I suggest the lawnmower guy photo for the cover of HRC’s book?
A good one.
I also think it would be a perfect cover for a book on climate change.,
“The Russians are Comey”
With apologies to Barry O:
“The Audacity of Nope”
“The Audacity of Parrhesia.”
When disrespecting, have the guts (dare to) say, ‘with all due respect…”
When hurting someone, have the courage to claim, ‘Believe me, it hurts me more than you…”
That, my friend, is audacity.
New word (to me); “Parrhesia (hmm, spellcheck no likey) – to speak candidly or apologize for doing so”
Thanks for the vocabulary lesson.
+1.
I think given all the pre, during and post campaign Clinton behavior just “The Audacity” would suffice.
As of today I would say that Bernie will be the 2020 nominee. Watch who gets invited to campaign for other Democrats, watch who can raise $. The endorsement primary will tell us everything we need to know. The days of spending a year in Iowa are over.
So long as his health holds. My friends think he’s too old, I think he would crush trump… and hard for Msm to ignore him next time.
He only campaigns for progressives, not many of those.
With Tulsi as his VP? Women’s vote, age/disability protection, etc.
Tulsi is BARELY a democrat.
And have you heard her speak? She makes Hillary sound like a spellbinder.
Gabbard is an agent of influence for India and for Hindutva nationalism.
So?
Who was the last Real Democrat President we had? Can you even remember?
I hope he is not the 2020 nominee. The fight for the policies Sanders champions (free universal healthcare, free universal tuition punishing wall street crime…) and those which he should champion (free Palestine, ending foreign wars, crushing the praetorian intelligence services…) must be much, much stronger than the health of a septuagenarian.
It all depends:
Golda Meir was prime minister of Israel for 5 years from 1969 to 1974 when she was 71 to 76 years old. She retired after she led the Israeli’s in winning the 1973 Yom Kippur war.
Don’t be an automatic ageist. Strength and durability at any age varies. Think about a much younger boy Bush.
Governor Jerry Brown is about 79 and still going strong.
Title for HC’s memoir?
The Biggest Loser
After that weight loss show.
“I lost to a Pussy Grabber”
Hillary’s book title:
It was supposed to be my party, and I’ll cry if I want to.
“Moose and Squirrel and Me”
Moose & Squirrel & Me under Attack by Boris & Natasha as usual.
It’s my (Democrat) Party, and I’ll Lie if I want to.
+1.
Here’s a take down of another Dem. A critique of an Obama biography, the hollow man filled with ruling class ideas.
It’s pretty brutal, but at this point, only surprising in its honesty.
https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/06/02/obama-a-hollow-man-filled-with-ruling-class-ideas/
Spoiler alert: deciding to be prez in his 20s, and taking a black wife because he thought that would help is far worse than anything I read here about the Obamamometer’s ego. Ugh!!!
Three things, and this bothered me:
-one there is a jilted lover here.
-two, there was a “back to black” phenomenon in the yuppie black community in the 80’s.
-Michelle always seemed pretty groovy to me. I decided to vote for Obama over Kucinich who probably wasn’t on the ballot based on her stump speech. It was last minute. Is it possible Michelle reeled him in?
As far as two white girlfriends prior to Michelle, what circles did Obama run in? Who is he meeting?
OK, all fair points.
Re the Politico link “A Noun, a Verb, and Vladimir Putin:”
Of course they’ve only spent “about two minutes” trying to figure it out. The primary motivation of the Party establishment and their paymasters for standing up the Herbal Tea Party and setting off on protest marches and what not is to distract what’s left of the Democratic Party’s grass roots from demanding any such analysis.
Sadly, the local Dems here in Wisconsin haven’t spent much time trying to figure it out either. The state Dem party convention was this past weekend and not only is there no selection of candidates to challenge Walker for Gov (the only announced candidate is a 25-YO recent college grad), the endless talk about how 2018 was going to be a great year for Dems because 1)Trump and 2) people are “tired” of Rep rule was positively delusional.
Note: this is media coverage. I wasn’t there.
My 95% white semi-rural Iowa county, beginning with Mondale in 1984, voted for every single dem presidential nominee until 2016 when it went for Trump–a run of thirty-two years. But, those loyal dem voters have now all been dismissed as misogynist racists.
Send us some more money, the Republicans are out-raising us.
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trump-infrastructure-idUSKBN18W215
Pilot– Chicago O’Hare I’m asking for permission to land.
Tower– Please listen closely because do upgrades our message has changed.
Chicago O’Hare I’m asking for permission to land.
Tower– Please all pilots in O’Hare landing pattern talk among yourselves to work out who is first.
Pilot– WTF
Tower– This being the first Monday of Month there are no ground crews so just drive around until you find a location to unload the sheeple. That is all and Good F$$$$$$ Luck!
Still dead Ronnie-ray-gunn would be so proud.
British Airways version:
Tower: BA 200, permission for takeoff..
………………….
Tower: BA 200, come in please..
…………………
Help, I’m stuck in moderation and can’t find my way out;)
Re: Shipping
Some of my robotics students told me that the container ships require a crew of 9 to operate, and that this is largely independent of ship size, so that most of them have a crew of 27-30 on board (3 eight hour shifts/day * 9). Panamax, Neopanamax, or larger. 27 crew members. Everything is largely electronic, computerized, gps-controlled, so that once they leave port, there really isn’t much to do except watching panels for red lights and checking out the weather report.
Good thing there’s always (allegedly) someone awake to keep an eye on the electronic panels.
All those outer space stories of the crew being in suspended animation until they reach their target planet always end badly.
Gotta stay awake and alert, it appears. ;-)
Have a one-legged stool like in gunpowder factories, fall asleep, fall over, wake back up.
I’m reminded of the good ship Nostromo…
Yes, Large Tankers also have similar sized crews, and when crossing the British Channel in a Sailing Yacht, all those powered ships always give way to sail….
I didn’t know it was a lesson on Thatcherism’s rule of law and consideration for others.
RE: New Cold War
This is an interesting take on the situation:
https://www.counterpunch.org/2017/06/02/jihad-2-0-the-making-of-the-next-nightmare/
“So the key piece of the puzzle is the configuration of Albania as the center of Jihad 2.0 — against the Slavs in Macedonia, against Tehran, and also against Ankara. No wonder the chief adviser of the Albanian government, until a few months ago, was a certain Tony Blair.
But then there is the “invisible” enemy that really matters.
In late March, Serbian President Tomislav Nikolic went to Beijing in his last official visit before the April 2 elections. Chinese President Xi Jinping stressed that economic cooperation with Serbia – and the Balkans at large – is a priority for China….”
Yes, the west pressing hard on Serbia but they have turned to China and neighbor Russia. Russia just gave them so reconditioned Migs and other small arms for their army. Then also are training their police and army. I would think they’ll soon be part of BRICS.
Hillary’s Book Titles:
“1.2 Billion Ways to Lose”
“Like, With a Cloth or Something?: Story of My Campaign”
“It’s My Turn to Squander”
“Onward Together into the Woods”
“How to Have Massive Media Backing and Still Lose – Kinda the Story of My Campaign”
Angry Bird
Hair On Fire
Sore Loser
With a – re re re re re re re re introduction of Myself
It’s My Pity Party (And I’ll *itch Slap Everyone I Want Too)
Putin On A Fit
Red Mist In My Eye
Hypocrisy Now!
Neo Karma
Me Me Meeeeee
Uranium Homesick Blues
It’s Still My Turn
Trump is a manchild, a spoiled brat who was never told “no,” always had to be the best at everything, and had a whiny excuse ready for how it wasn’t fair whenever he wasn’t the best. Hillary is that obnoxiously precocious kid, the one who did every by the book to a t, who was condescendingly patronizing to the kids that she sees as below her, and who flipped out whenever another student won an award over her even though she had better grades.
A real-life Tracy Flick, all grown up, without having grown as a person.
I think of Margaret from Dennis the Menace.
“Despite all the criticism — including the valid criticism that killing civilians creates more extremism — Obama has defended drone warfare and its remote-controlled killings. During remarks at the University of Chicago Law School in 2016, the then-president stated, ‘What I can say with great certainty is that the rate of civilian casualties in any drone operation are far lower than the rate of civilian casualties that occur in conventional war.’ Thanks, Obama.”
Wowsers. When you lose Teen Vogue…
What I note here is that the author marshaled her facts and citations carefully, yet in the middle of the article, you have the paragraph above, in which Obama goes to a law school (you know, as in rule of law) and pours out a bucket of bullshit. Two things: What on earth does he mean by his two rates of casualties? Pure “quant” bullshit. Second, after years of degradation by the Law & Economics crowd, and the Becker & Posner Institute of Theology, his audience has less of a critical faculty than the readership of Teen Vogue. Yet the U of C has had a disproportionate impact, and should bare proportionate blame, for our current economic and ethical disaster.
I had the occasion to chat with Becker’s widow not too long ago. We met under peculiar circumstances, and what with my accent, she kind of assumed I am an ignorant immigrant fresh off the boat, and hence a prime target for her missionary zeal to enlighten the aborigines of the world about the virtues of St. Ronnie of Hollywood, the free market, and the inherent evil of “socialized” whatever. So she goes on in that spirit for about two minutes, literally like a missionary starting with “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” I am fidgeting and trying to find a polite way to tell her to shove it, when I glance across the street and notice my alma mater. So I butt in: “You know, I am a Lab graduate, among other things.” She: “Oh…”
Nice lady on personal level, though.
When I was at the College, back in the Minoan Era, one of Becker’s daughters was there, maybe even in my class. Can’t recall. Nice enough person. Becker was another know-it-all. And all you had to do to provoke him was to mention Chile.
Chile still sets off lots of UofChicago(trademark) people.
That was a great article. Again maybe we are nearing another “the common wisdom is right until it isn’t” threshold.
Sure teenagers just want to be teenagers, young adults (except for BO and the like) just want to work their way into the world. But the common wisdom that they will never, ever change things? Why would anybody think that.
This world may be doing the equivalent of poking a small brown bear — you can get away with it once, twice, maybe a few times. But when it finally snaps, you realize that “small” relates to other brown bears, not you.
They are young, their bodies don’t hurt, they don’t need sleep, their brains are faster… give them no hope and you’ll be sorry.
“I’m with Me”
“Wronger Together”
“The Unbearable Lightness of Being the Most Qualified Person Evah”
“Do I Dream of Electric Deplorables? (I do, of killing them with drones)”
“Ozywomandias”
“Something Deplorable this way Comes”
“The Fountain@$$”
“The Great Patsy”
“The Third Coming”
“Ozywomandias”
I met a traveller from an antique land
Who said: `Two vast and trunkless cankles of stone
Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand,
Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown,
And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command,
Tell that its sculptor well those passions read
Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,
The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.
And on the pedestal these words appear —
“My name is Ozywomandias, queen of queens:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!”
Nothing beside remains. Round the decay
Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
Heh.
: )
If we are going to go classics, how about “Remembrance of Things Trashed”?
Lambert: Thanks for the reference to the original Fermi Question. You are a gentleman and scholar and an astronomer.
But if you want to see how unlikely it is that some aliens will turn up, just get out the old Drake equation. Plug in one high value (one low probability), and you’ll end up with twelve planets in the Milky Way galaxy that have achived a technological civilization. They are around, but maybe not out here on the Orion arm. And they don’t to come here, unless they can recite Vogon poetry.
The Fermi Paradox vanishes in a puff of smoke when you realise that technologically advanced civilisations achieve that advance by exploiting local energy resources insatiably, then collapse. Just plug in an average lifespan of 500 years, factor in how unlikely concentrated fossil energy resources are to begin with, and add the probability of premature collapse due to nuclear conflict, you’ll find the probability of two advanced civilisations existing simultaneously within 100,000 light-years of each other is infinitesimal.
Thoughts from Deep Space . . .
I think the National Enquirer — or it might have been another tabloid — had a story that said 12 senators were aliens. That might have been a decade or more ago, so they might not be senators any more. But all it takes is one to prove the point! I hope it’s not Senator Sanders because I would have voted for him and you can’t be president if you’re an alien.
Also, what’s the point of looking for alien life on other planets when there’s a lot of it here on earth? There’s some very strange people here on earth. Some of them I used to see in National Geographic — people with painted faces and bones in their noses like rings. With the satellites up there now you’d think they coudl take some pictures and see if they’re still there. Still with bones in their noses. That’s weird. Why would they do that? If aliens from another planet also had bones in their noses, how weird would that be? It makes you wonder, that’s for sure.
I’m not sure about the Drake equation math here. There’s at least 12 planets in our solar system. IF they all have alien life, that means NO planets anywhere else do? That doesn’t sound reasonable to me since there’s billions of planets. If only one in ten have alien life, that’s at least 400 or 500 Star Trek shows worth of planets right there. And that’s not counting the Andromeda galaxy. Although that might be double counting if they flew back and forth between the two galaxies. At any rate, lets say 400 Star Trek shows.
Under no circumstances could Clinton be described as a petulant manchild.
Not petulant?
” Pantsuit blues “. ” Trump for Crissakes “, ” Oh Bummer “, ” Infamy, infamy….they all had it in for me “,
On a much more serious note – I came across a youtube video the other day which covers my pet historical period – namely the Bronze Age in the Mediterranean. It is a talk given by Eric Cline PhD based on his book: 1177 BC : The Year Civilisation Collapsed. He speaks in an entertaining way about a globalised world in miniature & draws parallels with the present.
After a Dark Age in which Homer romanticised one of the causes, Greece introduced Democracy, philosophy & science to the world. It adds much more to the simplistic explanation that the ” Sea People ” were solely to blame.
Hopefully it will be of interest to someone : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bRcu-ysocX4&t=294s&list=LLHavDAeDMMItTuPCAqIIPUA&index=1
I watched that one awhile back. Very enjoyable. I know very little about that period of history, so found it interesting.
Thanks, I’ve been meaning to get the book.
Don’t tell me how it ends ;)
I will be myself – more detail.
I find it interesting that NK wants actual evidence as opposed to smoke in the whole campaign meddling affair. Evidence? There is plenty of evidence. Emails were hacked. Fake news was propagated all over the internet. We are up to our necks in evidence. The problem is that we don’t know whodunnit yet. This is not the game “Clue” where everyone has an equal probability of being the murderer. This is real life and we have two entities who we all know are likely culprits. Russia, which has a strong history of disinformation. And Trump, who has less morals then a toad and has made spreading disinformation and lies an art form. I suppose the alternative would be to profile 400 pound men who live in basements?
> We have two entities
Lets not forget Democrat insiders (a third) and random hackers (a fourth). I mean, Podesta was taken in by a childish phishing script.
Yeah, but only because the vastly credentialed dems are so incompetent.
Kronos’ first assumption that emails were “hacked” rules out the possibility the emails were leaked. The next assumption that “fake news was propagated all over the internet” rules out the possibility the emails were genuine and not fake. I don’t think either has been established yet.
One thing that has been established is Hillary and the Dems and mainstream news enablers have continued to dig a deeper hole trying to assign blame rather than acknowledge their corrupt behavior and self-defeating “strategy.”
All major leaks, not least Snowden, what’s her name and Ellsworth, were done by insiders.
Granted all the major spy orgs could do it, but these guys find it more valuable to retain what they find for future use.
All the evidence to date is that interference in foreign elections is the nearly exclusive province of USA.
And particularly interesting neither FBI or CIA ever showed any interest in the servers… wouldn’t they be expected to be interested if they thought the hacking was by Russia?
What the (FAMILY BLOG) does “meddling” even mean? Utter nonsense.
Too many Scooby Doo cartoons for the pearl-clutchers, I think…
Lots of people, including myself, created FB accounts solely to post material related to the 2016 Democratic Primary and the election. I have just under 5,000 friends on FB, all of whom are”friends in Bernie.”
I posted 99% anti-Hillary material. It consisted mostly of newspaper articles about many issues, ranging from her support for a right wing coup in Honduras that resulted in an escalation of violence, to her massive pay to play at the State Dept, to her disastrous regime change attempts in Libya and Syria (not to mention her support for the coup in Ukraine and the installation of a Neo Nazi regime). There were also many articles about her numerous campaign promise betrayals, such as her support for bad trade deals with Colombia, South Korea, and Singapore, despite her promises to oppose these (her change of position re: Colombia was after getting a $10 million donation). These articles were all from mainstream sources, including The Nation, The Hill, even the NYT.
The thing is, Hillary was so corrupt and her judgment and actions so bad, that there was a seemingly never-ending wealth of bad things to post about her. It wasn’t fake news, it was the actual historical record of her dastardly deeds. It wasn’t just I who did this. This is what folks on FB and other social media sites did throughout. She probably would refer to what we all posted as “fake news” because she psychopathically denies the truth on a continual basis.
So please tell us your Russian connections.
Ooh, that’s a good book title for Hillary:
“This is Not a Game of Clue!”
That’d stiffen their spines. I’d thought of “Someone, Zip me Up!” but that doesn’t really work with pant suits. I like the imperative though – maybe just “We All Know!”
(She wouldn’t want to be accused of spreading disinformation, though. You can see why I hesitated.)
>Between the Black Body and Me
I recall Adolph Reed essentially saying that Coates is The Atlantic’s token pet black boy. He’s there to impress all his white colleagues with the cute monkey tricks he can do, while never seriously threatening any status quo. Nothing actually needs to substantively change out in the real world, so long as Coates has all black parties he can visit and feel good about himself at.
Ugh, “monkey tricks”? Really?
For HRC…
“Nolonger Together”
or
“Adventures in Sustained Mediocrity”
“The Gas Ceiling”?
Never Ever Together
Nice one!
“Hacked” or better stilled, “Hack”
“A snowflake in hell”
Llyod’s Loading doesn’t understand what it is inconvenient for them to understand:
Um…how about re-localizing production and consumption? Seems like shortening supply chains would be a better long term strategy than praying for miracle tech, and not just for reasons of fuel efficiency…but an outlet devoted to shippers probably can’t fathom that one.
My thought was how vulnerable a “complex elongated” supply chain would be to, say, the Teamsters, were they to organized globally. But you’re right.
This is the beauty of national labor law – there is no obvious way to organize multi-national unions. Most countries “certify” unions and there is no possibility that a country that is not the U.S. would ever allow a U.S. union to represent that countries’ workers, much less engage in cross-national co-ordinated activity like strikes. Yes, the unions could do like the 1930s and do it regardless of what the law says. But no union with a bank account will do that because they would be fined away their bank account, which their dues-paying members would likely not appreciate (though I suppose it could be put to a member vote).
But that’s the easy problem. As the history of European works councils and the formerly ‘international’ UAW (US + Canada) show, there is not yet made an international working class, even at the North American or European level, that could engage in multi-national class representation. The UAW actually used to negotiate a single contract with the Big Three to cover the US and Canada with virtually identical wage rates across nations. But that was back in the old days of “national” economies. The UAW split in 1984 precisely because the breakdown of the social contract played out differently in the US and Canada. The US arm was desperate to save jobs – Ford had already cut its US employment in half in the preceding 5 years. The Canadian arm, due to low currency value and national health care, did not suffer serious job loss and was committed to more aggressive bargaining and confrontation. So, splitsville.
Likewise, the now 30-year history of European works councils is that they continue to be not ‘European’ but more ‘multi-national’ works councils in which various national union representatives represent/promote their national interests. There are conferences, sharing of materials, some shows of solidarity, but nothing like joint bargaining over substantive issues.
The big point is that it is incorrect to think that neoliberalism/globalization/whatever hits different working classes in the same way and will naturally lead to global working class solidarity. But it is also incorrect to think that Fordism ‘created’ the (national) industrial working class. ‘Making’ a working class, as EP Thompson showed, is long, hard work.
Good thing the Dems are on it! /s
There’s that d*mn national health care again…
If everyone is so fired up about the climate maybe we can take a quick look at container ships that burn bunker C fuel oil. An oil so foul and tar like that it must be heated to 110deg just to flow and it not used within sight of land so people don’t see the plumes of soot.
However I’m fairly sure that discussion is off the table since a domestic economy is harder for the globalists to insinuate themselves into.
Autonomous vehicles.
Ivan Ascher, author of Portfolio Society, and Pam Brown of Occupy Debt on the Laura Flanders Show:
http://www.lauraflanders.com/watch?video=ywZAePc36nY
Outstanding plant photo, with the framing and selective focus. I especially appreciate the fact that it doesn’t obey the rule of thirds. I get tired of people treating that as settled law. I prefer to call it the suggestion of thirds.
I think the Rule of Thirds is useful as a forcing device, to get one’s eye off the notion the center of interest and the center of the frame are identical. But and the reason to learn the rules is to know when to break them….
HRC book:
“Purple is the new black”
“Into the woods..and back again”
“Huma and Hills excellent adventure”
Purple is the new orange
The Russia madness, a summary:
https://medium.com/@caityjohnstone/the-big-fat-compendium-of-russiagate-debunkery-4278a753a3af
This is also a good read:
https://theintercept.com/2017/06/05/top-secret-nsa-report-details-russian-hacking-effort-days-before-2016-election/
For those who have not seen this:
https://arstechnica.com/science/2017/06/mylan-chairman-drug-pricing-critics-ought-to-go-copulate-with-themselves/
This whole Epipen mess is a dramatic illustration of the greed in America.
Also, for those who have not seen this before:
https://www.thenation.com/article/noam-chomsky-neoliberalism-destroying-democracy/
Noam Chomsky interview.
As far as Clinton’s campaign name, probably something like:
I’m top good to deserve to be President of such a deplorable nation
Behind closed doors, that is probably what she really thinks about the American people.
In just reading that it looked to me to be another of the stories if the intell club say it’s true than it is. I wonder why the cia wasn’t asked and what were they doing that day?
The intercept is becoming suspect to me. Just saying.
If the NSA knows who got spear fished at what email addresses, they ought to be grabbing those PCs immediately and doing further research on the PCs, the registration or voting systems accessed, and the vote totals connected to those registration
I didn’t have time to read the full article, but it didn’t seem like there was much talk of going down that path.
My main question after I finished what I read: Got paper?
Cloaking PR materials as ‘leaks’ is their new strategy for generating credibility.
Oops autocorrect fail:
I’m too good to deserve to be President of such a deplorable nation by Hillary Clinton.
Ironically that echoes what Gloria Steinem said after the election.
Heat But No Light—The Story of a Weak Star, by Hillariously Rotten Clintoon.
Re, Dreams
There is an online magazine called “LDE, Lucid Dreaming Experience”
http://www.dreaminglucid.com/
Lucid dreamers from all over the world, send in descriptions of their dreams. This is my respite from …….”Fake, fake News”.
In My Opinion, particularly as I approach the End Point of My Particular Life, dreaming is the most wonderful, and enCOURAGING activity that I can practice. In dreams, there are no limitations age or infirmity. Implicit is the certainty that there are other worlds and realities! Ones that can be tasted, felt, heard, seen…
Experiencing Lucid Dreaming yourself is straightforward. (1) Want to (2) Set it up (3) persevere (4) Bingo!
“While carrying out dream work, you never know whom you are going to meet after having fallen asleep. In most cases, openness towards dream characters seems to promote their readiness for discussions….
“Lucid, I jump through the opening of a spiral staircase to take a shorter route out of the building where I have just met my parents. I am astonished at the fact that I glide slowly towards the floor instead of falling like a stone. When I reach the ground, I discover a very handsome, young blonde woman standing thoughtfully in the hallway. Remembering one of Paul Tholey‘s questions, I slowly approach her and ask:
―Why are you here?
I am genuinely amazed by her answer:
―I am here to make sure Father does not forget anything.
It is hard to grasp what she means. That is why I just speak out the confusing idea that is about to go spontaneously through my mind:
―So you are my mother‘s brain?‖
―Exactly.‖
She gives me a radiant, coquettish smile, taking me by surprise…
By questioning dream figures, I discovered that they often represent my typical character traits, through the appearance of family members or friends, If I avoid taking them for granted, which the dream scene described below brings to the surface:….”
Also, here is the full book, “Exploring the World of Lucid Dreaming”, by Dr Stephen LaBerge
http://www.bibliotecapleyades.net/archivos_pdf/exploring_luciddreaming.pdf
Am enjoying a book called “beyond the gates” that deals with Western esoterisicm and mysticism. Very interesting read and actually goes quite well in explaining some of my own experiences and I like the logic. Deals with lucid dreaming as well as part of it.
I lucid dream on a pretty regular basis. I’ll start debating whether I am dreaming in the dream. The usual way I resolve it is by starting to fly. Then I grumble “Why can’t you do this while you are awake?”
I also do things like rerun sequences I like or back up and take the dream in another direction.
How To Lose An Election To Donald Trump, by HRC
There are many good entries out there, but this!!!!! says it ALL.
Thanks for the good laugh!
This one is so close, but I would suggest some clarifications:
How To Lose A Presidential Election To Donald Trump For Dummies, by HRC
““Sanders and others decided to continue trying to get [drug] importation to a vote. This led to the most recent, and less-publicized, fiasco” (legislative details omitted) [Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stone]. … To the contrary: I’d say that Democrat discipline held up quite well!
Taibbi is so cynical about so much but… not enough for the Dems.
Sadly, both Bennet of Colorado and Murray of Washington State won’t be up for reelection until 2022. That’s a long time to wait before they can be primaried. They’re also both Trade Traitors, and they managed to be reelected in 2016.
I lived in CO and Bennett is a corporately owned scumbag.
From 2010 D Sirota article.
Bennet left his job as a corporate raider for right-wing billionaire Philip Anschutz, later became head of Denver Public Schools and in that position orchestrated a deal with JP Morgan — a deal that destroyed the Denver Public Schools’ balance sheet and made JP Morgan, Citigroup and Bank of America millions. Bennet’s senate campaign (no surprise) is a recipient of hundreds of thousands of dollars from the financial industry, including PAC contributions from JP Morgan; individual contributions from a Citigroup lobbyist and director; and an individual contribution from a Bank of America executive.
““Why can’t Hillary let it go? ” Not to defend Trump, but I keep seeing him described as a petulant manchild. Is Clinton’s behavior that different? More mature? Less ego-centric? More intellectually honest?”
I have said for a while now that this is all a big fight between different sects of the 1%, who are grownup spoiled brats, and has little to do with us.
Yes. That’s my take on it as well.
While their MOs are somewhat different, the outcomes from both Trump’s and Clinton’s behaviors are remarkably the same.
Neither appears to be the LEAST bit introspective. Both suffer from an entitlement derangement syndrome. Neither appears capable of accepting ANY responsibility for their own actions.
Clinton may be a tiny bit smarter than Trump, but not by much.
Both are quite deplorable, imo. Ugh.
A professional diagnosis might be in order.
“I Should have Bought a Bigger Tent,” by HRC
But seriously, any thoughts on Kevin De Leon, of the California Senate, for 2020?
For what Congress? The Senate? The governorship (2018 for Cali)? If you mean, the White House, surely you jest. Lets be honest, I had to look him up, and if I don’t recognize a politicians name, he’s a nobody when it comes to the national stage. Just to give you an idea, George Washington was a famous name in Europe. He started the French and Indian War which led into the Seven Years War. He was a big deal. Most Presidents or candidates have achieved a moderate amount of fame. I was the kind of person who knew who Bernie Sanders was when I was a kid and he was on Burlington City Council. I know unique individuals.
A state legislator isn’t becoming President without some kind of celebrity status. It doesn’t happen, and it won’t happen.
He endorsed Hillary and is wishy washy on medical marijuana. Talk about a profile in courage. Yawn. The man is a walking advertisement for why government by lottery makes sense. If he had a reason to run other than being a Hispanic version of a blank space, sure, why not? Oh, I see he doesn’t like Trump. Wow, I bet when people start to not like Trump he will look like a Cassandra. Oh, right, everyone already hates Trump.
Trump may be a shock to the system, but he was fairly prominent prior to running. People are hungry for leadership or the perception of leadership. Nina Turner is credible because of the short Team Blue bench, but at the end of the day, she became credible by endorsing Sanders and speaking quite elegantly about real issues all over. Nina Turner stretches credibility because she lacks a Congressional legislative or statewide record.
If DeLeon isn’t an empty suit, let him prove it. The force that brought Obama to national prominence has been wasted on Obama.
A few things:
Immigration and guns aren’t issues that drive the majority of potential left of center voters. They simply don’t care. These are De Leon’s issues.
Okay, I read Shattered. Not snarky enough for Evil Slim. And it didn’t have enough to say about what Donald Trump did right.
Well, I’m pleased to report that I found a book that satisfied my curiosity, The Making of the President 2016. Author Roger Stone does spend a lot of time in the right-wing fever swamps — calling HRC’s followers far-left, for example — but he also lands some zingers. Especially when it comes to what Wikileaks reported.
Ooh. Tell us more?
I agree with your take on Shattered. It disconcertingly took the side of the HRC campaign and that made it sound, kinda, oh I dunno, weird.
To be fair, that was really the point of the book…to tell the story of the Clinton clusterfuck from an “inside” perspective. With that focus, the book does seem to be myopic or just plain blind to actual reality, as experienced by real people. But I don’t think the authors claim it to be the definitive story of why she lost…only the definitive story of what it all felt like from inside that hot mess of a campaign.
How about, “Deranged, Depraved and Deluded.”
Or: “The Not-So-Quiet American.”
“The Turn of the Shrew.”
Another Hillary Clinton book title (as if we needed one):
“Deplorably Russian: All Those Hating Haters Who Hate Me”
Regarding the Danielle Ryan piece on Clinton, I ran across this one earlier today:
Dear Hillary Clinton, please stop talking about 2016
What makes this one interesting to me is that, in contrast to most of the criticism I’ve seen, this seems to come from someone who admires (or used to admire) her. It’s milder than Ryan’s piece, but I think it would sting more if I were Clinton.
Nice to see Chapo Trap House get a look-in here
Hillary’s Web
A Season in Hell
I, Hillary
The Long Goodbye
Nausea
Bitch Out of Arkansas
Satanic Emails
The Last of the Democrats
The Sound and the Hillary
Fear and Loathing … Period.
The Purloined Primary
Never, Ever Land
All About Hillary
Raging Hill
Here we get to see the creative side of “The News”.
CNN Caught Being Fake News – Staging A Backdrop Of Protesters
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=22FYY1IJV2A
Re Drone strikes in Teen Vogue. Lambo, surely you or a suitable volunteer from the commenters can indeed rustle up something about the foreclosure crisis and indeed submit it to Teen Vogue?
o “Obama’s Drone Warfare Is Something We Need to Talk About” [Teen Vogue]. “Despite all the criticism — including the valid criticism that killing civilians creates more extremism — Obama has defended drone warfare and its remote-controlled killings. During remarks at the University of Chicago Law School in 2016, the then-president stated, ‘What I can say with great certainty is that the rate of civilian casualties in any drone operation are far lower than the rate of civilian casualties that occur in conventional war.’” — Obama may have been able to say so with great certainty, just not with great honesty. Lawyerly parsing, public v private position and all that, right? Fascinating, though, over the past year to have seen Teen Vogue doing much better journalism than probably 99% of the corporate-shilling-and-establishment-propaganda-spewing MSM.
o “A 2016 Review: Why Key State Polls Were Wrong About Trump” [The Upshot, New York Times]” — NYT mentions that “Turnout among Mr. Trump’s supporters was somewhat higher than expected”, but I don’t see anything prominent about turnout among swing voters who’d gone for Obama in 2008 and 2012 staying home by the multi-millions. Instead we get this tepid little admission in paragraph 18: “Mrs. Clinton’s supporters were likelier than Mr. Trump’s supporters to stay home after indicating their intention to vote”, followed by redoubled blathering about “Focus on Education: well-educated voters far more likely to vote for HRC”, all of which sounds like a not-so-subtle way of saying “Hillary was the smart choice, and only deplorable dumb-heads didn’t see that.” Possibly the obsession-with-education is because mentioning that Hillary “inspired” Obama voters to stay home in droves would clash with the Hillary iz da Gratest evah narrative the NYT et al worked so hard to cultivate all these years? Nah, that couldn’t be it.
o “Hillary Clinton: Writing new memoir has been ‘painful’” [USA Today]. I’m sure. “Hillary Clinton is still deciding on a title for her new memoir, which will be published this fall.” Readers, can you help her out? — How about It Takes a Pillage. Or Dreams From My Goldman Sachs Handler. Or The Mendacity of Hope. Ha, I’m mentally picturing Dan Ackroyd in one of his classic SNL-days Nixon sketches, specifically the one where Tricky Dick is beginning the writing of his memoirs: “Memoirs … by Hillary Rodhouse Nixon … I was born in the house my father received as a bribe for certain political favors, erm, I mean, speechmaking … my parents named me after Sir Edmund Hillary … [STFU Bill! So $!#$# what if he didn’t climb Everest until 6 years later? It’s called ‘poetic license’, ya big nosey-noseying doofus! Don’t you have some Foundation intern you could be porking right now, rather than sticking your big bulbous nose into my private business?] …”)
o “The top Democrat on the Senate Intelligence Committee said Sunday there is no “smoking gun” so far showing collusion between Russia and the Trump campaign in an effort to influence the 2016 election, adding that hearings this week will be crucial to congressional investigations into the matter” [Wall Street Journal]. “‘Listen, there’s a lot of smoke. We have no smoking gun at this point,’ Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia said on CNN on Sunday. ‘But there is a lot of smoke.’” — Sure, there’s a lot of smoke, Sen. Warner, and dipshits like yourself are blowing it out of your asses. No smoking gun … I’ll bet they don’t even have a smoking loose hairpin.
Question: When a Democrat Party honcho uses the word “we”, to whom would they be referring?
A certain slithering reptile in the snake family.
“Haughty, Recidivist & Corrupt”
“Dr. Hillaryhate or How I Learned to Stop Peddling Snake Oil and Insult the Deplorables”
Hillary book
“Oops I did it again” (huma get me a saniwipe)
Lambert writes:
Which just adds to my suspicion that leading Democrats aren’t really in it for political power, they’re in it for the money, or some other fringe benefit of running for office. After all, one of the most important rules of electoral politics is to try to persuade the people who might change their votes – in this case, that includes those Obama to Trump voters. Why did they switch? That’s what Democrats would be asking if they want to ever achieve power to do something at the national level.
Another article today on this site points out the lucrative power of the revolving door syndrome that the Obama gang and Clintonites are so enamored with.
Yes, that’s one of the ways they’re in it “for the money”. Another appears to be campaign consulting and media buys, which are certainly profitable for the consultants, despite their lack of success in getting Democrats elected.
I’m afraid that Democratic “leadership” won’t change their ways until they can’t profit from these things anymore. I suspect that will require that Democrts become as irrelevant as door to door encyclopedia salesmen.
The Iron Law of Institutions, as I have learned about thanks to NC.
Titles for Hillary’s memoir? How about:
“Ego-A-Go-Go”
“Everyone’s To Blame But Me!”
“Why Wouldn’t You Stupid, Worthless, Subhuman Peasants Vote For ME, Your Superior In Every Way Imaginable?!?!?”
The last one’s a little clunky, but probably best matches her mood right now.
+1, pretty good.
“How Green Was My Dalliance”
“True Grift”
“A Greed Dies in Brooklyn”
“What the Meaning of ‘Is’ Is”
“A Guide to Tuscany and Umbria with the [Mark] Rich Family”
And, of course, The Crucible.
True Grift.
Best one I’ve seen so far.
In the name of equal snark for equal effort we should come up titles for the book Trump will inevitably release on his presidency.
Trump: The hero who spared us both Jebbie and HRC
“You voted for me, suckers”
HRC book
“I really suck but Bill still prefers Monica”
“I suck more than you can grab”
“Funnel vision: the foundation of a great life for me and nothing for you”
” So, you’d have to be a really risk-taking investor to put your money in carbon-intensive industries now. It’s just too risky over the long term” (quoting Glen Peters, a senior researcher at Norway’s CICERO Center for International Climate Research).”
Norway is a petro-socialist state, like Venezuela or Russia – or, in its own peculiar way, Saudi Arabia. I gather it’s on the downhill side of the resource, and the country itself mostly runs on hydroelectric; they should be a good bet for tidal energy, too. So Peters may be speaking for his host nation.
” The answer to “Where is everybody?” continues to be “Not here, that we know of.” Sigh.”
One explanation for the increasingly sinister silence is that the technology that makes them audible from another star also enables them to exterminate themselves, as we are constantly on the verge of doing.
Not a good sign.
Re: Bougies piece by Damon Young
It reminded me of this book by Lester K. Spence, Knocking the Hustle: Against the Neoliberal Turn in Black Politics. 2015.
It’s really pertinent to everyone — black, white, and brown. Or at least the 90-99%ers.
Fifty Shades of Delusion: I Shall Return. by HC
Rules Don’t Apply
Russia Ate My Homework
The Tyranny of the Minority, How Russia, the FBI and the worst of America denied the most deserving candidate in history her Presidency
For Trump
The Greatest
Nobody Did it Better
First Among Equals, the President All Others Will Be Measured By
Data Mining Is A Girl’s Best Friend (With Notably Rare Exceptions)
The Goddess That Was Failed: How America Can Make It Up To Me In 2020
(apologies to Arthur Koestler)
You’re Not Rid Of Me
(apologies to PJ Harvey. Admittedly, the visuals are horrifying.)
Did anyone notice the choice of “candidates” in Illinois gubernatorial campaign? You know, the state collapsing from financial mismanagement with junk-rated bonds?
Repub Bruce Rauner, running unopposed for re-election and “J.B.” Pritzker, also running unopposed for the democ party nomination. Who can afford to run against these guys?
Rauner, of course running as the party of business, and Pritzker running as man of the people, caring for kids and innocent convicts released from death row…
Rauner, worth 1 billion and Priztker worth 3 billion ARE BOTH VENTURE CAPITALISTS WHO RUN HEDGE FUNDS.
This is more of the Trump, Bloomberg, Haslam, Dayton club of billionaire politicians who, dissatisfied with the work done by their paid servants in legislatures and executives state and national, have decided to take matters into their own hands, followed by a bigger crew of sub-billionaires like Kerry, Feinstein et al, too numerous to mention.
Choice!
I am a horrible human being but this made me spit my coffee all over my screen, my italics:
“The neo-Nazis were on their way to Whitesburg, Kentucky, where”
I have no doubt that the name of the town is completely unrelated to skin color, but still.
““A 2016 Review: Why Key State Polls Were Wrong About Trump” [The Upshot, New York Times]. “At least three key types of error have emerged as likely contributors to the pro-Clinton bias in pre-election surveys. Undecided voters broke for Mr. Trump in the final days of the race, or in the voting booth. Turnout among Mr. Trump’s supporters was somewhat higher than expected. And state polls, in particular, understated Mr. Trump’s support in the decisive Rust Belt region, in part because those surveys did not adjust for the educational composition of the electorate — a key to the 2016 race…”
And once again ignoring the very high levels of likely election fraud evidence…
Without a doubt, the Democrat primaries were a cesspool of fraud and corruption.
Hillary memoir title: The Buck Stops There.
The Psychopathic President Who Wasn’t
Don’t Start the Coronation Without HER >>>!
Purple Lapels and White Pantsuits: Hillary’s Electoral Fashion Sense
The Once and Future Queen
Money for Nothing
Popular Delusions and the Madness of Dems
Bleak White House
Little Horrit
The Donor Code
The Crass Ceiling
Profile in Hubris
Nifty Grifty Dirt Bag
Who’s Not Who in American Politics
…. wish I’d seen this thread when it went up!