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2:00PM Water Cooler 9/13/2019

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By Lambert Strether of Corrente

Patient readers, I had a lot of trouble uploading graphics today, so this is a lighter Water Cooler than it should be. (Also reading about the debate made me think I was being beaten around the head and ears with bags of wet sand). And I don’t have time today to catch up with UPDATEs, as I usually can. So, enjoy your weekend and hopefully I’ll come back strong on Monday! –lambert

Politics

“But what is government itself, but the greatest of all reflections on human nature?” –James Madison, Federalist 51

“They had one weapon left and both knew it: treachery.” –Frank Herbert, Dune

The Debate

“A Complete List of Everyone Who Lost the Democratic Debate” [Paste]. “1. Joe Biden lost because he rambles and his teeth maybe almost fell out.” The writer had this exchange in mind:

Holy moley…

“The Official Rolling Stone Debate Drinking Game, Part III” [Matt Taibbi, Rolling Stones]. • Taibbi hadn’t published this by the time I posted. The lead: “The first rule of the third Democratic Party presidential debate probably should be, “Don’t watch.” The Democratic National Committee has been so imperious and annoying with its rules, excluding a host of candidates who are clearly (or at least arguably) outperforming some of the participants in tonight’s debate, that it feels wrong to reward these arbitrary rulemakers with an audience.” • But Taibbi watched anyhow:

“Democrats clash over health care and more in debate that started with calls for unity” [WaPo]. “But the lengthy discussion appeared to do little to change the overall contours of the Democratic primary, with few standout moments or major missteps during the course of the nearly three-hour event.” And: “Warren, who has been ascendant in the polls in recent months, spent long stretches without speaking Thursday, and did not end up challenging Biden directly during her first face-to-face debate with the former vice president, who sits atop most polls.” • So Biden v. Warren turned out to be a damp squib.

“Joe Biden Cleared a Very Low Bar in Last Night’s Debate” [Politico]. “By clearing the extremely low bar of appearing coherent and not having any of his body parts malfunction on stage, Biden has already been awarded top marks for his performance, even declared the winner. But it’s important to remember that Biden’s performance rested on a patina of lies. Challenged by moderator Jorge Ramos on the distinctly Trumpian nature of the “Obama-Biden” administration’s immigration policies, Biden dubbed the comparison “outrageous.” “We didn’t lock people up in cages,” he said. “We didn’t separate families.” Both are untrue. As fact-checkers quickly pointed out, Obama and Biden infamously did detain immigrants, including children, in cages. And while it’s true the administration didn’t make snatching children from migrants an official policy as Trump has, breaking families apart, sometimes permanently, was a cornerstone of the Obama-Biden approach to immigration, usually by arresting and simply disappearing the undocumented parents of US citizen children, but also, under the Alien Transfer and Exit Program, by separating families traveling together at the border, including minors. Pressed by Ramos for dodging the question, which asked if Biden and Obama had made a mistake by deporting as many people as they did, Biden was forced to re-endorse the policy, saying that Obama “did the best thing that was able to be done at the time.” • Perhaps this is why all the virtue-signaling on immigration has died down for now.

“7 Key Moments From the Third 2020 Democratic Debate” [Vogue]. “Last, but certainly not least, let it sink in that during the approximately 180 minutes of debate time, the moderators failed to ask the candidates a single question about abortion access or reproductive rights.” • It doesn’t seem that ABC did a very good job.

Impeachment

“Dems stumble on impeachment messaging” [Politico]. “Some see the muddled messaging as a strategic boon — it allows moderate Democrats to sidestep politically explosive questions about impeachment while permitting progressives to insist they’re aggressively hammering President Donald Trump. But others doubt the tactics are intentional and note that it has strained the Democratic Caucus, that it has aroused suspicion among the party’s base and that it could weaken the House’s hand in court.” And:

Sixteen House Democrats, in interviews, offered conflicting assessments of the status of the House Judiciary Committee’s investigation of Trump, which its chairman — Rep. Jerry Nadler — bills as an “impeachment investigation.”

“We have been in the midst of an impeachment investigation,” said Rep. Pramila Jayapal (D-Wash.), a member of the Judiciary Committee.

“No, we’re not in an impeachment investigation,” said Rep. Jim Himes (D-Conn.), a member of the House Intelligence Committee.

A third, Rep. Gregory Meeks (D-N.Y.), said the House is investigating to determine “whether or not there should be an impeachment investigation.”

Lol, with any luck, the Democrats will end up impeaching Trump in an election year, politicizing another piece of Constitutional machinery.

“House Judiciary Committee Approves Impeachment-Themed Resolution” [HuffPo]. “On a 24-17 party-line vote, the committee approved the resolution, which has a stated purpose of determining ‘whether to recommend articles of impeachment.’ That may sound like the beginning of an impeachment inquiry, but Democratic leadership has been all over the place in describing the significance of this vote.” • You’d think that an “impeachment inquiry” is the sort of thing that party leadership would be able to explain.

Realignment and Legitimacy

“In an Age of Policy Boldness, Think Tanks Have Become Timid” [The Nation]. “Biden’s campaign is idiosyncratically personal, emphasizing the former vice president’s friendship with Barack Obama. Sanders and Warren, by contrast, have been running the most ideas-fueled campaigns in living memory…. Yet the new hunger for policies hasn’t been a boon to the outfits that traditionally provide Democratic candidates with their ideas. With a few exceptions, liberal and centrist think tanks such as the Center for American Progress (CAP), New America, the Brookings Institution, Demos, and the Roosevelt Institute have had little impact on the campaign season. And when these influential think tanks have made nods at the big policy debates within the Democratic Party, they’ve often done so in the spirit of hold-your-horses caution, with quibbles about feasibility, or by struggling to play catch-up with campaign proposals…. If Democratic think tanks remain out of sync with the nominee’s policy preferences, this could hobble a future administration.” • I bet it won’t. I’m guessing there are plenty of who’ve been banished from the Ivies. I think it would be a good think if this particularly inbred region of the dense network of NGOs in which the Democrat Party is embedded were razed to the ground. With some minor expections, of course. It doesn’t do not to be nuanced.

NC-09: “Democrats see silver lining in suburbs, but rural challenges remain after close loss” [Reuters]. “McCready won the densely populated Charlotte suburbs in Mecklenburg County by 12 percentage points, continuing the national trend of traditionally Republican suburban areas shifting toward Democrats as highly educated voters tire of Trump. Those gains were not enough to overcome a poor performance in rural counties like Robeson and Bladen.” • As it turns out, Chris Arnade visited Robeson County for his book, but that chapter didn’t make the cut. Since Arnade sets his tweets to auto-delete, so here are some screen shots:

So, Robeson County is diverse. And (see above) flipped from Obama to Trump. One wonders why:

(Lumberton is in Robeson County.) Democrats winning Republican suburbs while losing Robeson County says notning good about the party’s direction. I was commenting as early as 2015 (here, here) that voting for Trump was a gigantic upraised middle finger, and here we have one such in real life!

Health Care

“When will Democratic debates move past ‘Medicare for All’ fight?”‘ [Politico]. “Moderators have used the issue to frame all five debate nights so far, and even advocates say they’re tired of rehashing the often-wonky differences in candidates’ health coverage plans. Democratic strategists also have urged candidates to shift the focus to broader health care topics, regardless of what moderators ask them. Polls increasingly show that while swing voters prioritize health care issues, they’re worried about problems like high drug costs and out-of-pocket spending — which have gotten relatively little attention on the national debate stage.” • So the liberal Democrat strategy of creating brand confusion is working. At the same time, the concept that not only can you walk into your doctor’s office and get the care you need and end up with more money in your pocket doesn’t seem to be taking hold either. But to answer the question in the headline: When the bill passes.

Stats Watch

All the statistics I missed yesterday, plus today’s.

Jobless Claims, week of September 7, 2019: “Both payroll growth and job openings may have moderated this year, but layoffs based on unemployment claims have remained historically low” [Econoday]. “There are no special factors in today’s report and no states were estimated. Employers, however much their business optimism may be easing and however fewer jobs they may be creating, continue to hold firmly to their existing staffs.” • A big deal, given all the recession talk.

Consumer Sentiment, September 2019 (Preliminary): “Following a steep drop in August tied to heightened tariff concerns, consumer sentiment rebounded but only moderately” [Econoday]. “Despite September’s general improvement, the headline index is still sitting at one of its very lowest readings of the last three years which, however, is an indication that is offset by still very solid readings from the rival consumer confidence report that unlike this report has held in very well on the strength of the labor market.”

Retail Sales, August 2019: “In a report that in sum is favorable, a big lift for auto sales gave a boost to retail sales” [Econoday]. “Total sales were up 4.1 percent in August, an unspectacular but solid rate that speaks to the strength of the consumer and in turn the strength of the US jobs market.”

Import and Export Prices, August 2019: “[I]mport prices continue to slump to three-year lows in a trend that reflects slowing global demand as well as the strength of the dollar and which will make it harder for the Federal Reserve to reach their 2 percent inflation goal” [Econoday]. “Export prices fell” more sharply than expected.

Business Inventories, July 2019: “Business inventories rose…. largely in line with business sales” [Econoday]. “The headline build for today’s report gets inventories off to a positive start for third-quarter GDP and, given the steady growth in sales, do not point to the risk that higher inventories are unwanted.”

Consumer Price Index, August 2019: “Core inflation in the consumer price report [was] higher-than-expected” [Econoday]. “Though mostly centered in medical costs, the overall 0.3 percent for core prices — again the third in a row — is less than moderate and does suggest that the Federal Reserve may be able to limit its efforts to stimulate inflation.” • Hmm. Medical bills, eh?

“Crisis-hit Boeing readies huge effort to return 737 MAX to the skies” [Reuters]. “Although regulators must still approve the jets for flight, Boeing and airline staff and executives say the world’s largest planemaker is weeks into an elaborate blueprint for production, maintenance and delivery that one source said involves 1,500 engineers – as many as it takes to design a small new jet.”

* * *

Today’s Fear & Greed Index: 68 Greed (previous close: 65, Greed) [CNN]. One week ago: 35 (Fear). (0 is Extreme Fear; 100 is Extreme Greed). Last updated Sep 13 at 11:59am. Note that the index is not always updated daily, sadly.

Our Famously Free Press

Judy Miller’s mini-me:

I think “harsh realm” for “bummer” ought to be real, even if it isn’t.

Groves of Academe

“The Choirboy” [New York Magazine]. • A horrific article about Lawrence Lessig’s experience at a boy’s choir school, which lends some nuance to his views on Epstein and MIT.

Photography

“All you see is lazy photography everywhere” (interview) [Martin Parr, It’s Nice That]. • Amazing color photos of people in the UK.

Class Warfare

The case for handing HR over to AI:

News of the Wired

“How to repair the parts that explode in Lenovo Yoga laptops” [Adam Munich]. “Lenovo Yoga laptops, especially those from the “900”, “920”, “930”, and “940” series, have a design defect where their power circuitry can self-destruct. The company will not acknowledge this defect as serious enough for a recall, and has left many customers with broken audio (or worse) on their notebooks…. I have received no response from Lenovo and decided that the only productive way forward was to take the issue into my own hands.” • Yikes.

Real-life affordances:

“United by feelings” [Aeon]. “Without the same fanfare, a group of intensively creative scientists, including the neuroscientists Jaak Panksepp and Antonio Damasio and the neuropsychologist Richard Davidson, have been developing a new field of affective (or emotional) science since the 1990s. The field of affective neuroscience isolates emotional brain systems (largely in regions of the brain that we share with other mammals) that undergird adaptive behaviours in vertebrates. With the help of neuroscientific and behavioural research, we are beginning to appreciate how the ancestral mammal brain is alive and well inside our higher neocortical systems. Unlike the computational approach to mind, the affective turn is deeply rooted in what we know about the brain as a biological reality.” • Fascinating, but I’m not sure I want to hand the keys to our emotional brain systems over to capital.

* * *

Readers, feel free to contact me at lambert [UNDERSCORE] strether [DOT] corrente [AT] yahoo [DOT] com, with (a) links, and even better (b) sources I should curate regularly, (c) how to send me a check if you are allergic to PayPal, and (d) to find out how to send me images of plants. Vegetables are fine! Fungi are deemed to be honorary plants! If you want your handle to appear as a credit, please place it at the start of your mail in parentheses: (thus). Otherwise, I will anonymize by using your initials. See the previous Water Cooler (with plant) here. Today’s plant (TH):

TH writes: “This shot is taken from a pull-out on Highway 330 which runs between Highland (funny, because it’s not—it’s the low land) and Running Springs in the San Bernardino mountains (California). The orange tubular blooms in the lower left are a pretty little blooming chuparosa bush, a favorite of hummingbirds, though not this morning. We left a perfectly sun drenched morning cooled by mountain breezes to descend into the overcast world of San Bernardino, then on to (also overcast) Orange County.” California. One does see the attraction!

* * *

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About Lambert Strether

Readers, I have had a correspondent characterize my views as realistic cynical. Let me briefly explain them. I believe in universal programs that provide concrete material benefits, especially to the working class. Medicare for All is the prime example, but tuition-free college and a Post Office Bank also fall under this heading. So do a Jobs Guarantee and a Debt Jubilee. Clearly, neither liberal Democrats nor conservative Republicans can deliver on such programs, because the two are different flavors of neoliberalism (“Because markets”). I don’t much care about the “ism” that delivers the benefits, although whichever one does have to put common humanity first, as opposed to markets. Could be a second FDR saving capitalism, democratic socialism leashing and collaring it, or communism razing it. I don’t much care, as long as the benefits are delivered. To me, the key issue — and this is why Medicare for All is always first with me — is the tens of thousands of excess “deaths from despair,” as described by the Case-Deaton study, and other recent studies. That enormous body count makes Medicare for All, at the very least, a moral and strategic imperative. And that level of suffering and organic damage makes the concerns of identity politics — even the worthy fight to help the refugees Bush, Obama, and Clinton’s wars created — bright shiny objects by comparison. Hence my frustration with the news flow — currently in my view the swirling intersection of two, separate Shock Doctrine campaigns, one by the Administration, and the other by out-of-power liberals and their allies in the State and in the press — a news flow that constantly forces me to focus on matters that I regard as of secondary importance to the excess deaths. What kind of political economy is it that halts or even reverses the increases in life expectancy that civilized societies have achieved? I am also very hopeful that the continuing destruction of both party establishments will open the space for voices supporting programs similar to those I have listed; let’s call such voices “the left.” Volatility creates opportunity, especially if the Democrat establishment, which puts markets first and opposes all such programs, isn’t allowed to get back into the saddle. Eyes on the prize! I love the tactical level, and secretly love even the horse race, since I’ve been blogging about it daily for fourteen years, but everything I write has this perspective at the back of it.

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114 comments

  1. Jason Boxman

    If nothing else, those voting for Trump can enjoy that the likely intended effect, a collective freak-out of the Establishment, happened and is ongoing. It’s been as horrifying to watch as it is hilarious. Unfortunately, the attendant carnage visited upon citizens (and foreigners) is quite real. In truth, though, it’s only more brazen and obvious than it was under Obama. (See immigration, above, among countless examples.)

    Also, I skipped the debate entirely. I can’t drink that much during a work week. It’s not good for being at least marginally productive with my life.

    2. polecat

      I watched a couple more episode of GofT last night … more clarity and honesty (even if of malicious intent) than ANY DCN sponsered clown show. Certainly, I can refrain from participating in drinking games (unlike Tyrion) until my liver explodes, so there’s that at least ….
      As for myself, my mind is pretty much made up – it’s either Sanders, or, if screwed as in ’16 … then it’s the middle finger, biggly-like .. of Julius de Orange, version 2.0 … for even moarrrr chaos !

    3. jrs

      Yea maybe I’ll watch them next time at a bar, with leftists, if I must, this time I couldn’t even bear. Doing one’s civic duty is such torture.

      But I still can’t catch the start of them 5pm PST, I-have-to-work-for-a-living, working people aren’t all getting out before 5pm. Oh well this government isn’t being run for working people.

      2. Geo

        Not sure watching the debates is our civic duty any more than watching commercials makes us smarter shoppers or listening to street preachers betters our soul. Reading news such as the articles here at NC is much better for informing your vote, in my opinion.

        1. Cal2

          Why isn’t the debate on CSPAN? Free?

          Why the hell do we have to subscribe to, or give our credit card for a ‘free trial” to ABC, when it’s a debate for the American people?

          Went to youtube and typed in “Debate”, it opened right up. Yes, I have an ad blocker, screw Google, they’re profiting off DARPA, paid for by the taxpayers, that invented the internet, which should be free access everywhere.

        2. Oh

          If they wanted you to watch that charade they would not make you go to youtube (you give up your privacy tube) or go thru a paid channel.

      3. John

        When 2020 rolls round and the endless preliminary bouts are out of the way, I shall pay more attention than I do at present. But not much, unless and until they get to the only issue that really matters and that is climate change and the havoc it is going to cause. It is not that in ordinary times the issues they do discuss are unimportant, but in the face of a creeping catastrophe, they are diminished to the vanishing point.

      4. Lambert Strether Post author

        > Oh well this government isn’t being run for working people.

        Sanders was hoarse because he prioritizes speaking to voters in person over speaking to voters while mediated through questions posed by political class buffoons in a reality-TV format.

        Hard to argue with those priorities (though, again, it’s a missed opportunity for Sanders to say “Sorry, I’m hoarse because I blew out my vocal cords speaking to 20,000 people in…” The dude just never toots his own horn).

    4. Arizona Slim

      To tell you the truth, I joined a friend for a drink. And, blessed be, the bar doesn’t have a TV. So, no debate torture for us.

  2. Wukchumni

    Import and Export Prices, August 2019: “[I]mport prices continue to slump to three-year lows in a trend that reflects slowing global demand as well as the strength of the dollar and which will make it harder for the Federal Reserve to reach their 2 percent inflation goal” [Econoday]. “Export prices fell” more sharply than expected.
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    I read that the US sold 600 million tons of soybeans to the Chinese the other day, and at about 30% less than the farmers could’ve got for them, before tariffism.

    https://www.reuters.com/article/us-usa-trade-china-soybeans/exclusive-ahead-of-trade-talks-china-makes-biggest-us-soybean-purchases-since-june-traders-idUSKCN1VX2ER

  3. John k

    But no new wars to date… so carnage maybe even in decline… especially if we get out of Syria and Afghanistan.

    1. Robert McGregor

      I’m no fan of Trump, but I would like to see a comparison of the total “US instigated foreign fatalities” for his last 2 & 1/2 years compared with Obama’s last 2 & 1/2 years, and what we guess the number would have been under Hillary. I’m sorry, but I think Trump’s number would be the lowest. In coming up with an explanation, I like to use the “Reality Show Entertainment Value” theory which many have described. In this case, people like to watch Trump bullshitting and freaking out the establishment, but they really don’t like watching dead bodies burn up or be carried away in body bags. That reality is not attractive entertainment, despite the fantasy of it being bankable entertainment when Tarantino flame throws a teenager at the end of “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood.”

      Obama and Hillary are not “reality TV fans.” They are more immersed in their megalomaniac view of themselves as world actors, and will willfully kill a few hundred thousand if they think it advances their misguided objectives.

      1. Jonathan Holland Becnel

        Whoa there, buddy.

        Spoiler alert.

        -Tarantino fan :)

        P.S. ‘It 2’ is def one of the best movies of the year. Still need to see Parasite and the Joker.

      2. Punxsutawney

        Well, the “Liberal” excuse for this is that Putin is controlling him. Well if so, that’s one thing to thank the Russians for.

      3. Acacia

        I would also be curious to see a tally and share your suspicion that Trump’s overall numbers might be lower. However, I think I did read somewhere that he’s approved more drone strikes than even King Drone Obama himself. He also issued an EO this year that civilian deaths incurred during said strikes would no longer be reported — so there’s that.

      4. Mo's Bike Shop

        Every time I thought about Hillary in a nuclear brinkmanship situation I got a picture of spending the last day or so of my life listening to her explain how it was not her fault. Just hit me with lasers already.

  4. Samuel Conner

    re: “When will Democratic debates move past ‘Medicare for All’ fight?”

    perhaps say, rather,

    “when the damn bill passes”.

    —

    I seem to be in copy edit mode lately; hope this is more amusing than annoying.

    1. Lambert Strether Post author

      Hah.

      (However, I do think Jayapal’s bill is better, because it breaks the link between hospitals accumulating capital for facilities expansion through fees for patient care.)

      1. Mike

        Agreed, and it is saddening that Sanders will not engage Jayapal to rectify the shortcomings of his own bill and unify the efforts.

        Also, as an aside, it is a disaster to call these Q&A sessions on TV “debates” at all – they actually should be billed as Dems talking to each other to iron out a common platform for the general election. This in combination with polling/voting done by listeners to gauge actual response to policy presentations. Once hammered out, a WRITTEN party policy summary should be mailed to every voters residence (nursing home/homlesss shelter/prison?) to allow final feedback. Too “democratic”? Exactly, methinks.

  6. BlueMoose

    Not totally related to anything but since we are talking politics or the failure of politics in the US, I’d just like to chime in about a quaint custom I had the pleasure to experience again here in Poland.

    At least twice a year we have a meeting in our village with the equivalent of what would be the county commissioner or their representative to discuss how available funds should be spent and address any and all questions that anyone who attends might care to ask. And boy do they have a lot of questions to ask. It can get fairly disorderly but the local rep usually is good at knowing when to bring things to order (even if I don’t understand everything, I can catch the drift. 20 people speaking Polish at the same time makes my head explode).

    We have the meeting at the house of the soltys (village person in charge of letting everyone know what is going on in the gmina/community). Everyone has a chance to speak and get on record. I like it. Not everyone agrees about everything, but at the end of the meeting, the soltys trots out some of his home-made alchohol and some food and all is well.

    This seems to me how it should work. Bottom up. There are also higher level meetings in the gmina that are open for discussion. Of course we have the same issues as everyone else at the national level (idiots fighting for power/control).

    It kind of motivates me to get more involved locally.

    Do people in other countries have the same opportunities to participate at the local level?

    1. Mo's Bike Shop

      New England Town meetings were like that when I was brought along as a child, on the condition I shut up.

    2. deplorado

      This is remarkable. Especially for formerly Soviet block countries. Thank you for sharing that.

      I’m interested to know more about the Polish gmina practices. It reminds me of what they do in Switzerland, only actually sounds like the Poles are more interested in it. Do young people also participate or only the older generation? Remarkable, please write more about it if you can.

      1. BlueMoose

        I will have to ask why young people are not present. It is entirely adults of all ages. It seems like we get about 50% turnout as in 1 adult from each househould in the village. Usually the same faces. At the gmina level we have had a new Wójt for a few years that seems much more interested in improving the community. I remember her walking alone from house to house during her election campaign. Everyone seems very pleased with her.

        Basically, anyone at the gmina level can walk in and file a complaint and get a receipt that the complaint has been put on the record. No recriminations.

        If you have a specific question, let me know. Have you lived before in Switzerland?

        1. deplorado

          No, have not lived, at one time was looking to move to Switzerland and while exploring I got to learn a bit about their town meetings.

          What is your sense about how widespread and historically deep is this town democracy in Poland? Was it developed or revived post-Communism or was it an institution maybe long before that and continued even throughout those years? To me, again, this is particularly surprising to hear because of Poland’s Soviet bloc past (when local or any democratic practices were de facto annihilated and any decision making was hugely centralized). In contrast, Im not aware of anything like the gmina you describe, at all, in Bulgaria, which I know quite well and also has a Soviet bloc past.

  7. Wukchumni

    It might work in EnZed, but a mime would be a horrible thing to waste on somebody getting fired here, the money would be better spent on Kevlar vests & ricochet-proof furniture.

    1. Geo

      Alternet was bought but Raw Story and has gone to *family blog* ever since. Humorously though, many of the old time commenters still troll the threads there dismantling the DNC propaganda.

  9. ambrit

    I wouldn’t want to turn over my “lower order mammalian” thinking centres to capital either. Imagine the ad campaign, (perhaps run by that NZ adman with a sense of humour,) : “Kapital One – What’s in YOUR limbic?”
    We will most certainly soon enough be arguing about the proper policy to address an “emotional deficit.”

    1. Wukchumni

      I’ve been spreading rumors for years about a pending Thai restaurant about to open in town any day now. It allows me to address my “emotional deficit” and gives people hope, not that there’s a scintilla of Pad Thai possibility as far as I know.

      1. ambrit

        Disney has a less than stellar track record out your way, so, why not pitch the idea to them as a ‘Star Wars’ themed eatery?
        Pad Awan Thai Cantina.
        I’m sure you won’t find a more wretched excess of scum and villainy in the Sierras.
        My “emotional deficit” causes pandemonium at the old ranch from time to time. Phyllis somehow manages to keep me within the bounds of decorum. The original ‘thankless task.’
        Apropos of nothing, I would love to read something autobiographical by Oscar Wilde’s wife. (Yes, he was married and they had two sons.) She was literary in her own right.

    2. kiwi

      Of course these thinking centers are already subject to capital. What do you think the entire advertising, propaganda, lobbying, and public relations industries (and news) are about?

  10. Jonathan Holland Becnel

    Lambert. Bruh. Your typos this afternoon are almost as bad as a Michael Hudson article!

    Zing!

  11. Wukchumni

    (Also reading about the debate made me think I was being beaten around the head and ears with bags of wet sand)
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    I’ve never had the pleasure, but I think it felt like that last night watching, and the claim is that if you listen hard as you’re being walloped, you can hear the ocean and/or Joe Biden.

    1. Geo

      I won’t speculate on Biden’s mental faculties but listening to him speak makes me question my state of mind. If he gets the nom and we have debates between Biden and Trump i think it will sever the last thread tying our society to sanity. The Onion will have to just start printing straight news because reality will be a mirage and comedy will have no foundation left to stand on.

      “The fact that millions of people share the same forms of mental pathology does not make these people sane.” -Erich Fromm

      People taking sides and absorbing the insanity of those two will make all who take part insane.

      1. Mo's Bike Shop

        Biden and Palin talking over each other made me finally realize how much I was reading into these spectacles. I really felt bad about my quick judgement of Admiral Stockdale.

      2. richard

        Joe Biden has become the number one source of gaslight in the us:
        “don’t you want to beat trump?” “we’re all after the same thing” “he’s not melting in front of you, goddamit, do you wanna believe me or your lying eyes”
        Listening to joe biden is like listening to the tape flapping at the end of an empty reel.

        1. richard

          i expressed this poorly
          he is not the biggest source of gaslight, but the (current) subject that arouses the most notable in your face, bald-ass lying

          1. OpenThePodBayDoorsHAL

            Any politician who has not noticed the recent effectiveness of the bold-faced, in-your-face lie is simply not keeping up, my goodness look at Cheetoh if you need just one example. Truthiness has become a bug not a feature.

    2. RWood

      Maybe if you’re really feeling savagely impressed by those bags, you can vault to hearing Rudra as that energy of Mother Earth coming to heat again.

      “More, more, you always want more!”
      “I have much more to give you!
      “This!”
      “This!”
      “This!”
      “What is that wind screaming?”

      “I can’t hear you!”

  12. Bugs Bunny

    Clowns should be increasingly used in redundancy (layoff, firing) meetings until it becomes the norm and employers start to compete with each other to offer the best clown redundancy experience and promote it as a benefit.

    It would also create clown jobs, which would probably require more clown schools, meaning that the tuition prices would go through the roof and young people dreaming of becoming redundancy clowns would either have to come from wealth or take out massive clown loans to fund their education for clown universities and grad schools. Shareholders can only take so much top line costs and Wall Street pressure would force corporations to improve return on investment and reduce redundancy clown labor expenses. Sadly, redundancy clowns would find themselves training their own replacements – HB1 clowns from “low cost” countries. Employers would respond to quality criticisms of the HB1 clown experience by publishing survey results showing very similar almost ex-employee satisfaction with the new clowns.

    Eventually, of course, redundancy clowns will be replaced by AI and robots. It’s just the future and we will need to think about how to adapt to it today by putting in place a UBI for the inevitable redundant redundancy clowns.

    1. ElectricMiniVanGuy

      I would make that last sentence the back of the NC T-shirt. Maybe job guarantee instead of UBI

    2. Mo's Bike Shop

      I could not read the article, I reached my Poe’s Law limit. Are you allowed to punch the clown? Might be a great position for an android. If they could build one.

      I suspect our Bronze Age ideas of organizing things need a little tweaking on how it incentivizes sociopaths.

      1. Lambert Strether Post author

        > I suspect our Bronze Age ideas of organizing things need a little tweaking on how it incentivizes sociopaths.

        I saw this thread on Roland Martin:

        Classic idpol, for good and ill. On the one hand, the poster is clearly correct. It’s ridiculous to make being a star athlete the bar for coaching for blacks, and not whites. On the other, it’s not clear to be why — this is the “Bronze Age” part — why organizing a society like a football team is necessary or desireable. Neither, extremely neither, IMNSHO.

  13. Mattski

    Other than for the fact that in any sane world Joe Biden would not be a credible candidate, I didn’t think that last night’s Democratic debate fundamentally altered our picture of the principles’ chances.

    The Biden candidacy risks becoming a horrifying in-joke that the whole nation shares, and which Democrats ride to another defeat next November.

    I thought that Warren AND Sanders both looked a little frail too, in fact, though they were clearly. . . compos mentis. Perhaps people like them are precisely the kind of wise older heads one WANTS in the presidential role.

    I also find the specious arguments against Medicare For All–when we know people would pay less though their TAXES WOULD GO UP (EXCLAMATION MARK)–reprehensible. Having seen ABC as well as CNN sell this garbage now, I come to believe that the biggest purveyors of ‘fake news’ are our own corporate mass media.

    Found myself liking O’Rourke, Yang, Booker, and Butigieg more, Kamala Harris less. (I am a strong fan of her personally, but not of her police politics.) Think Klobuchar is fundamentally decent, and will vote for any of the them if it comes down to it, possibly excepting Biden.

    But ALL of their gestures toward ‘letting people keep their plans,’ ‘not taking away their FREEDOM (all caps) of choice’ are in fact gestures toward Big Pharma and Big Medicine, and every single person in the United States knows it. Both Sanders and Warren made clear that people could keep ALL of their actual providers. . . the rest is sound and fury signifying money.

    Looking beyond the election, I think we need a mass movement for change more than we need another placeholder for cutthroat 1% corporate capitalism–as the world burns–and would vote accordingly if it were Biden.

    My hunch is that many millions would not vote at all, which might be precisely what our ruling class betters desire. . . as they continue to manage us through this tedious and undemocratic made-for-TV process.

    —
    Favorite moment: When the godawful Rahm Emmanuel, looking more Njinsky than ever, tried to plump for Biden mid-debate, only to be followed by two young Black women who both said they were most impressed by Bernie! Emmanuel had disappeared when the cameras came back. . .

    1. NotTimothyGeithner

      I guess maybe its a payoff, but does anyone actually do a cost/benefit analysis of hiring Rahm? Does he bring any viewers? Couldn’t they just hire an actor to play a “Democratic consultant” and get better results? I figure with all the mileage Buttigieg is getting out of being Mayor of South Bend they could grab a couple of random elected and produce better results.

      1. rowlf

        Couldn’t they just hire an actor to play a “Democratic consultant” and get better results?

        May I suggest actor David Leisure, AKA Joe Isuzu? A perfect fit for the media reality.

          1. JBird4049

            I guess something Kamala Harris remembers as probably does Governor Newsom. My state has had some oddly effective political actors.

    2. Pavel

      I stumbled this morning on a Tulsi Gabbard clip with Dave Rubin (not a fan of his but that is a different matter). This was after I somehow managed to watch the entire “Democratic Debate.”

      In that ten minute video there was more humanity, intelligence, common sense, and sheer straight talk than in the entire 3 hour debate. (I use the word loosely.) Tulsi was notably more articulate than front-runner Biden, as well.

      That the DNC barred her from the debate says it all.

  14. Wukchumni

    Re: Fake list of grunge slang:

    …a fabulous tale of the South Pacific by William Manchester

    The Man Who Could Speak Japanese

    “We wrote it down.

    The next phrase was:

    ” ‘ Booki fai kiz soy ?’ ” said Whitey. “It means ‘Do you surrender?’ ”

    Then:

    ” ‘ Mizi pok loi ooni rak tong zin ?’ ‘Where are your comrades?’ ”

    “Tong what ?” rasped the colonel.

    “Tong zin , sir,” our instructor replied, rolling chalk between his palms. He arched his eyebrows, as though inviting another question. There was one. The adjutant asked, “What’s that gizmo on the end?”

    Of course, it might have been a Japanese newspaper. Whitey’s claim to be a linguist was the last of his status symbols, and he clung to it desperately. Looking back, I think his improvisations on the Morton fantail must have been one of the most heroic achievements in the history of confidence men—which, as you may have gathered by now, was Whitey’s true profession. Toward the end of our tour of duty on the ‘Canal he was totally discredited with us and transferred at his own request to the 81-millimeter platoon, where our disregard for him was no stigma, since the 81 millimeter musclemen regarded us as a bunch of eight balls anyway. Yet even then, even after we had become completely disillusioned with him, he remained a figure of wonder among us. We could scarcely believe that an impostor could be clever enough actually to invent a language—phonics, calligraphy, and all. It had looked like Japanese and sounded like Japanese, and during his seventeen days of lecturing on that ship Whitey had carried it all in his head, remembering every variation, every subtlety, every syntactic construction.

    https://www.americanheritage.com/man-who-could-speak-japanese

    1. RMO

      Thank you for this link! I’ve read books by Manchester but had only heard a few snippets from writing covering his own wartime experiences and this was fascinating.

  15. laughingsong

    ‘ “7 Key Moments From the Third 2020 Democratic Debate” . . . . • It doesn’t seem that ABC did a very good job ‘

    Pretending that I was a fly on the wall at one of the DNC meetings crafting the debates: “Hey! Let’s let Disney do one! What could go wrong?!?”

    1. Wukchumni

      I was really hoping that if Joe was going to the mid 20th century gadget gambit in the debate, why not include iron lungs?

    2. OpenThePodBayDoorsHAL

      All candidates should be required to watch The Roosevelts by Ken Burns on Netflix, the pitiful shame of their own tiny pissant personalities and motivations will be laid bare. The freaks and grifters and midgets we have in politics today and the extended concentric circles of their enabling press and party sycophants and hustlers are worthy only of our abject scorn.

  17. Rod

    It kind of motivates me to get more involved locally.

    sounds like your “Soltys” are a unique liason between governors and the governed and I like the result you mentioned above. I like that you went to their house with your neighbors to discuss stuff and have hospitality. I bet it reinforced that you lived in a ‘community’ not just a place.
    Years ago I lived in a much smaller agricultural part of another northern usa state where ‘Township’ Government’ was the first level of Political Organization.
    Monthly meetings varied in attendance but everyone at least knew of the Family Names of those there and really did lend a familiarity and personalized atmosphere to the gatherings as well as bringing to the Public information on policy and rulings pending that were often not very publicly known without constant private monitoring of legislators’ in the County or State level.
    I currently live in another part of the southern usa which has a different Political organization without Township Organization as level 1–instead relying on a County Council of elected Representatives from all unincorporated areas(not organized into geographic areas encompassing Towns and Cities) who meet in Public Venue once a month–starting at 6pm.

    A few observations about my experiences:

    The most consistant Council attendees seem to be Real Estate, Legal, and Business people
    Although the Agenda is online, additional items seem to make it on the agenda
    You can speak to Council for about 2 minutes if you sign up–no response guaranteed
    I know my councilman by sight–they do not know me from Adam’s housecat
    My councilman does not return phonecalls
    the Agenda items do not have to be brought up in the order listed on the Agenda
    and more
    It does not motivate me to get more involved locally, but it hasn’t completely stopped me from driving 19 miles one way to occasionally attend

    1. BlueMoose

      It would be nice if as others mentioned in other comments to my post, if the local town-hall meeting could make a come back in the US. I can walk down to the Soltys (Piotr) and let him know that one of our street lights are out and he will contact the gmina and in a few days it gets replaced.

      I haven’t been to a gmina level meeting (my goal for 2020) but from what I read about it in out local newsletter (once a month) it seems to also be very local, without any outside ‘business’ interference. I’m sure at the next level things start to change, but at least in our gmina we know what funds are available and it is up to us how those funds get spent.

      I have my Wójt’s phone number and she does return calls. She is conversant in English, but usually I ask my wife to make the call.

      Maybe try to start some grassroots effort in your area or move to an area where people still feel involved. Even if it all comes crashing down, at least you will have identified others you can work with.

    1. richard

      A good interview if brief. Sanders does not sound great, as others have noticed (and he himself acknowledges). A week off please. Read, swim, rest, don’t talk.
      Great answer on primarying dems who oppose him. I will f*&^ing hold him to this when he is president, as we will all need to, from my lips to glob’s ear.
      I’m not exactly sure what an “even hand” between saudi and iran actually means, but it sounds non-interventionist and I will settle. I hated hearing him say “promote democracy”; that shining city on a hill s$#@ is what got us here. Oh well; old stupid ideas die hard. I much prefer the expression, I forget if it was adams or jefferson or some other bewigged dude, “well-wisher of democracy everywhere, protector only of her own”. Go with that bernie.
      I was surprised but happy to see kulinski get this interview. j. dore next!

      1. Lambert Strether Post author

        > A week off please. Read, swim, rest, don’t talk.

        Should have been Labor Day weekend. And if Sanders has any sort of health issue, you can imagine the pearl-clutching (in contrast to Biden’s bloody eye and the sports on his forehead).

  19. Expat2uruguay

    “Support and attend the People’s Mobilization to Stop the US War Machine and Save the Planet, September 20 through 23, in New York City. Christian liberationist intellectual Cornel West and Omali Yeshitela, chairman of the Black Is Back Coalition for Social Justice, Peace and Reparations will speak, and much of the Black Agenda Report team are participating.

    Only a mass movement of the streets can begin to dismantle the twin imperial policies of endless austerity and war, end the military occupations of Africa and Black America, and save the world from a wounded and angry ecosphere.”
    https://www.blackagendareport.com/what-does-boltons-ouster-mean-victims-us-imperial-aggression

  20. The Rev Kev

    “Asked about his past comments denying responsibility, as a white man, for America’s sins, he gives an answer insinuating that black parents don’t know how to raise kids.”

    Well, he learnt that from his boss, old what’s-his name. Early in his Presidency, Obama went on air and tore into black men for their irresponsibility with their families. I thought at the time that they were pretty big words from a man who led a privileged background and who never had to do it tough nor really deal with a system that habitually imprisons black people a a matter of course.

    1. Cal2

      Here’s one for you Kamala;
      If a black kid has a father in the house past age 4, they’re ahead of 90% of their peer group.

      What policies pro-black family has Kamala ever promoted?
      Arresting the parents of kids who miss school? Keeping their parents in prison to serve as cheap labor?

      How many white people in the Rust Belt are going to want to tax themselves to pay for the Harris’s
      “proposal that we will put $2 trillion into investing in our HBCUs for teachers…”

      Sometimes I think the Trump campaign is secretly sending money to Kamala’s campaign.

  21. Tim

    “In an Age of Policy Boldness, Think Tanks Have Become Timid”

    I think the logic is they can’t fight the good policy being proposed by progressives with bad policy. They would just get their nose rubbed in it.

    So the next best thing is to just try to ignore new policy proposals and defend the status quo, because if your still breathing, how bad can the current policy be? The status quo is a great consolation prize for the elite funding the think tanks at this point and they know it.

  22. Wukchumni

    I’ve got around 30 Sundowner apples getting a little pink, and a few weeks out from ripening, and so far so good on the planned ‘strike’ by the UFW (Ursus Field Workers) in doing their deed.

    Boo-boo is waiting it out, and with a sense of smell 7x as strong as a dog, might be a better judge of ripe than I.

    The bear might pick early out of hunger pangs, I might pull them off early as tree survival is really more important than the little harvest, but if I could somehow straddle it to get the best of both worlds?

    https://www.davewilson.com/product-information/product/sundowner-apple

  23. stillfeelinthebern

    Anyone following the Deray takedown of Shawn King yesterday on Twitter? Not sure what to think.

  26. Heraclitus

    About the Chris Arnade photo from Lumberton of the guy with the messed up leg. I suspect there is more to the story. If he’d made it to a hospital they’d have repaired his leg, and if they didn’t have a surgeon who could do it, they would have shipped him to Charlotte. This is not to say he would have gotten great followup care, but the bone would have been properly set, as this one clearly wasn’t. I think the law is if you show up at the hospital, they have to treat you, regardless of ability to pay. I know a young women with no insurance who broke her ankle in a stupid motorcycle accident a few months ago. They sent her to Carolinas Medical Center in Charlotte, where surgeons repaired the ankle and installed pins, then the hospital discharged her as quickly as possible.

    I was at Carolinas Medical waiting for someone to get out of surgery earlier this year, and I met a sixteen year old African American girl who was in high school in Laurinburg, which is one county over from Lumberton. Her father, who weighed 406 lbs, fell and broke his leg on some cooking grease in the kitchen. It was a bad break, and they decided to send him to Charlotte, because the operating table in the local hospital was too small for him. Ultimately the family made the decision that he should go to Charlotte. I don’t know what happened to him, because our person’s surgery was over before his, though it was supposed to have taken longer. I hope he made it out alright.

    The girl told me there were few opportunities in Laurinburg. Her plan was to join the Air Force. They told her she might have to spend two years in Afghanistan, but she was game to do it. She was on the track team, and was quite petite, as well as bright, with good social skills. That is to say she could handle to physical, and apparently the intellectual requirements of the Air Force. I encouraged her to stick with her plan.

    The options for the rural poor are just a world away from the options available to the wealthy and well connected who live in the cities.

    1. VietnamVet

      This is similar to missing teeth that are now a neo-liberal class identifier. The broken leg had to hurt. It was either a conscious decision or mental illness not to get it treated. His arms and clothes look thirtyish. If rational, the reason had to be his history. When broke and in debt, if not turned away because of no insurance, he knew the bill for thousands of dollars to set the leg would never be paid off. He has found a way somehow to cope and stay alive. He is Hillary Clinton’s deplorable “white trash”.

      2. Lambert Strether Post author

        > When broke and in debt, if not turned away because of no insurance, he knew the bill for thousands of dollars to set the leg would never be paid off. He has found a way somehow to cope and stay alive. He is Hillary Clinton’s deplorable “white trash”.

        That’s my reading. Or raising his head above the parapet in the hospital would draw fire in some other way, possibly for some other debt (which would not have to be high to be unmanageable).

        Of course, if this were a Third World country, he could probably make good money on the street as a beggar, although he’s have to “just move,” there being no money in Lumberton. Perhaps Charlottesville.

    2. Lambert Strether Post author

      > The options for the rural poor are just a world away from the options available to the wealthy and well connected who live in the cities.

      There may be “more to the story,” but I think the moral of the story, no matter what it might have been, would be that this gentlemen was faced with a “choice” — dread word — that no human being should be faced with.

      Everything’s going according to plan.

    2. Ted

      Taika Waititi is fabulous, can’t wait to see this! Hunt for the Wilderpeople is a good alternative for folks who need to catch up with his work.

    4. rowlf

      OMG. Kung Fu Hustle has met its match!

      Will there be Life Of Brian style protests over the film? The spirit of Otto seems to still be alive.

  28. marym

    Re: Alien Transfer Exit Program – Not surprising that the #resisters wouldn’t want to own this one. I thought I knew some of the Obama immigration horror stories, but this was new to me. Here’s a link.

    Till they get back on the case, here’s some recent news to fill the virtue signaling gap.

    Refugees: Politico 7/18/2019 Trump officials pressing to slash refugee admissions to zero next year

    During a key meeting of security officials on refugee admissions last week, a U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services representative who is closely aligned with White House immigration adviser Stephen Miller suggested setting a cap at zero, the people said.
    …
    USCIS official John Zadrozny and the State Department’s Andrew Veprek — both known as Miller allies — argued in the meeting that the refugee cap should be low because of ongoing security concerns and the ability of the U.S. to offer humanitarian protections through the asylum process, according to an attendee.
    …
    But even as Trump officials weigh dramatically cutting refugee admissions, the administration also has sought to greatly reduce the availability of asylum.

    Asylum seekers: Slate 09/12/2019 The Supreme Court’s Devastating Asylum Ruling Follows a Troubling Pattern

    On Wednesday, the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to drastically alter immigration law by closing the Southern border to most migrants seeking asylum.

    What may be most surprising about Wednesday’s decision, however, is the court’s apparent rush to issue it. The 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals has not yet heard arguments on the merits of the case, Barr v. East Bay Sanctuary Covenant, let alone issued a ruling… Historically, the court seldom grants the DOJ stays of any kind. Yet the government now regularly demands them, and the court is often happy to oblige.

    Medical deferred action: Philadelphia Inquirer 09/13.2019 Immigrant families with severely ill or disabled children now face deportation by Trump administration

    In mid-August, with no public notice, U.S. Customs and Immigration Services (USCIS) ended what’s called medical deferred action, a small, humanitarian program that the government has run for decades. It allows undocumented families to live and work in the U.S. while fighting serious or life-threatening illnesses…

    The government gets about 1,000 requests a year for deferred action, which grants no immigration status, but shields families from removal by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE).

    Temporary Protected Status: Vox 03/12/2019 Trump administration puts end of TPS on hold for Hondurans and Nepalis

    Their fate is now linked to a lawsuit challenging Trump’s efforts to end the program for several other countries.
    …
    The administration’s attempts to end Temporary Protected Status designations for hundreds of thousands of immigrants from El Salvador, Haiti, Nicaragua, and Sudan had already been put on hold by a federal judge in October.

    And then they came for: High-skilled brilliant US workers (well, not to be deported, just assumed not to exist): Chicago Tribune 05/17/2019 Trump’s new plan would shift immigration focus to ‘merit’

    Unveiling a new immigration plan, President Donald Trump said he wanted to provide a sharp contrast with Democrats, and he did — aiming to upend decades of family-based immigration policy with a new approach that favors younger, “totally brilliant,” high-skilled workers he says won’t compete for American jobs.

    1. Lambert Strether Post author

      > some recent news to fill the virtue signaling gap

      Thank you doing this important work.

      Do the Democrats actually have an immigration policy?* It seems to me that Trump is rushing into a vacuum. (A policy short of “open borders” which seems to me to be NGO-driven, and not electeds-driven). There certainly seems to be nothing on the order the two bills for Medicare for All, for example.)

      I’m all in favor of abolishing ICE, and DHS too, if it comes to that; we are developing and normalizing operational capabilities that a democracy should not have or need. But that’s not the same as saying we should have open borders.

      I see nothing wrong with skills-based immigration in principle, as opposed “family unification.” From 1990:

      In the 1965 law, Congress placed a new emphasis on family unification, intending to favor those from southern and eastern Europe, who by then had grown numerous and politically influential. The legislation gave unlimited immigration slots to immediate kin of U.S. citizens and legal residents and 80 percent of the numerically limited slots to their other close relatives. But as it turned out, the 1965 law spawned migration from regions that had previously supplied relatively few immigrants: Asia, the Pacific, Latin America, and Africa. Kennedy administration officials predicted that only 5,000 Asians would migrate in the first year and virtually none thereafter, and that few Western Hemisphere immigrants would come. Those predictions could not have been more wrong. In 1976 Congress imposed the first ceilings on Western hemisphere immigrants.

      The Refugee Act of 1980 is another case of unanticipated consequences and unrealized goals. It was intended to regularize the flow of humanitarian-based admissions by asserting more congressional control over an ideologically and geographically driven, ad hoc, discretionary process. Although the Refugee Act gives Congress as well as the President influence on the number and geographical origins of overseas refugee admissions, the actual patterns of refugee selection have changed little. They are still based on ideological affinity prior linkages to the U.S. government, foreign policy goals, and family ties. Admissions still benefit the same groups (especially Soviet Jews, Pentecostals, and Indochinese who supported U.S. policy in Southeast Asia) to the disadvantage of everyone else (especially Africans). The act’s universalistic aspirations were further undermined by a recent amendment sponsored by Senator Frank Lautenberg, which relaxes the eligibility standard for particularly favored groups. Even the 1980 act’s effort to limit the number of refugee admissions has failed; over 100,000 were authorized in 1989, more than twice the “normal flow” specified in the statute.

      I had always vaguely thought that the emphasis on family unification was driven by the right wing “family values” surge starting, IIRC, in the 80s. But I see I was wrong, and in fact the motivations are even seamier; electeds managing demographics for partisan gain (take a bow, Ruy Teixeira!). As it has been, so shall it ever be…

      Canada does just fine with skills-based immigration, and it also makes labor arbitrage manageable (if administered with public purpose in mind, a big “if” I grant).

      NOTE * Besides wringing their hands over media events that are in essence a high-end and socially acceptable version of pr0n? Further, if you believe that climate migration is coming, and there’s no reason not to, Trump has a policy. What is the Democrat policy? “You can’t beat something with nothing.”

      1. Marym

        Thanks for the history. Short answer due to internet issues. Trump is also managing demographics. His demographic goal is, imo, more dangerous to more demographics.

      2. marym

        Service restored – yay! Late to this but, we can’t say Trump has a policy for climate migration, jobs and wages, healthcare, or anything that people of good will may argue would be more manageable with fewer immigrants. He has policies for none of those things. He doesn’t claim immigration restrictions (or other domestic authoritarian exclusions) to be anything but removal of dangerous Others, a low end version of pr0n. “You can’t assume something good will result from something bad.”

  29. RWood

    Oh, my stars and garters, what am I fussing about!

    Change has to happen if we as a species are to survive, and it has to happen soon and it has to happen somewhere. We cannot force others to change, but we can recognise our own need to change and offer a vision of change for others to follow. That can begin only when we stop shielding ourselves from the consequences of our decisions, stop hiding in someone else’s ideological life-raft in the forlorn hope that it will weather the coming, real-world storms.

    Jonathan Cook
    https://zcomm.org/znetarticle/brexit-reveals-jeremy-corbyn-to-be-the-true-moderate/

    1. kiwi

      Why does everyone assume that the species should survive?

      The earth has had multiple extinction events. Why should humans be an exception to these forces?

  30. richard

    re fake grunge lexicon
    you gotta love cob nobbler
    i’m pretty sure they used that on mr. show
    or at least i can totally picture brian posehn saying it

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