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Finally, you’re left with that image of Adam Schiff sitting stock straight in the big chair with pursed lips and eyes bugged out, as in a very certain species of lunacy heretofore only seen in Canis latrans of Cartoon-land when, say, he has overrun the cliff’s edge clutching an anvil to his bosom. What was he thinking when he hatched this latest quixotic chapter in the ignominious crusade to reverse the 2016 election?

That he’d never get caught? On Wednesday he witlessly did gave away the game on nationwide TV, telling the witness, heroic Col. Vindman, to not state which intel agency (of 23 !) employed the one still-unnamed person he blabbed to about the epic Phone Call to Ukraine — because it would reveal the name of the Whistleblower.” How could that be? Both Mr. Schiff and Col. Vindman claimed to not know the identity of the “WB?” If so, it would be logically impossible to reveal the “Whistleblower” by just naming an agency with thousands of little worker bees. Of course, he walked right into the trap set by minority member, Mr. Ratcliffe of Texas. Who doesn’t get that Col Vindman knows exactly who the “Whistleblower” is because he was the “Whistleblower’s” accomplice? And Mr. Schiff knows, too.

If the senate majority poohbahs were wise, they would warmly welcome a trial based on articles of impeachment, which would, of course, feature no artificial limits on the witness list, nor on questions that might be asked. The list might start with the UkraineGate “Whistleblower.” Among the many untruths uttered by Adam Schiff was the nonexistent law that gave that shadowy figure a right to anonymity. And besides, in any trial based on due process, the accused has an absolute right to face his accuser.

Oddly, a month ago Mr. Schiff was avid to stick his “Whistleblower” in the witness chair, and perhaps not with a black hood over his head. Then it was discovered that the “Whistleblower” had been consorting at least with Mr. Schiff’s staff members before blowing his fabled whistle, and that they had likely assisted in the assembly of his complaint, and in connecting him to the right lawyers in the Great Blue Okefenokee backwaters of DC lawyerdom, and, naturally, nobody from sea to shining sea over age nine who had paid attention to these antics believed that Mr. Schiff could not know who this “Whistleblower” was. Likewise, the brave Col. Vindman. Both of them deserve some time in a senate witness chair, and Mr. Schiff especially is due some sort of penalty for subjecting the country to his three years of dishonorable, seditious shenanigans — beginning with expulsion from the House and perhaps proceeding to a trial of his very own.

These UkraineGate hearings of the past two weeks raised some additional questions that have not otherwise been aired much in the public arena, chiefly, exactly how much does the US government seek to control the affairs of Ukraine? And how did we become the superintendent of this partially failed state? The parade of State Department diplomats in charge of this-and-that suggests that Ukraine is virtually an occupied territory. Do we realistically suppose that, in the natural course of things, we can shield Ukraine forever from the influence of its neighbor (and former sovereign), Russia?

It is also astounding to see media shills like Rachel Maddow still carrying on hysterically about Russia. She must have cried “Russia” twenty-seven times in the ten minutes of her act I caught on Thursday night. She’s far exceeded even the paranoid raptures of the John Birch Society a half century ago when they were screaming about communists in every broom closet of America. This incessant war-cry can’t be good for the country.

Now we’ve turned the corner into that enchanted season known as “the holidays” and a multi-dimensional showdown after three years of perfidious nonsense looms over the turkeys and silver bells and holy pageantry like a freak winter hurricane out in the dark ocean barreling landward. I am sincerely wondering how the public will process the storm of indictments coming down at the cabal of government employees who devised the RussiaGate persecution at the same time the Senate prepares to go to a trial that will humiliate and possibly annihilate the Democratic Party. No political faction in history has begged so persuasively to be put to death, or deserved it more.


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582 Responses to “The Storms of December”

  1. budizwiser November 22, 2019 at 10:16 am #

    hmmm….

    • Jeremy November 23, 2019 at 8:43 am #

      A picture tells a thousand words:

      https://www.theautomaticearth.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/11/CookieJar.jpg

    • abbybwood November 24, 2019 at 3:47 pm #

      “The storms of December”…

      I presume one of those storms is “the perfect storm of screw-ups” our esteemed Attorney General Barr said is what happened with Epstein’s “suicide”?

  2. Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 10:19 am #

    The MSM is being forced to cover the FISA stuff now. Reported today that an “FBI official” appears to have edited a FISA doc. 🙂

    This would appear to tie in with Rosenstein’s previous testimony on the differences to the FISA doc. he signed quite neatly.

    I have EUR 100 on Strzok von Stroker. Can’t wait to see how wild the facial contortions get this time.

    • B_NOLA November 22, 2019 at 4:28 pm #

      Multiple people have edited multiple “uneditable” FISA and FBI 302 reports. Kevin Clinesmith is the one referred to in the breathless CNN cya report. Lisa Page and Peter Strzok have also falsified the same. Those are just the ones we know about.

      Some of us have been saying for three years that we were witnessing an attempted coup in real-time. Much crow is going to be served in the coming months. If these people get away with it then that means there is no longer any Rule of Law in the USA and millions of people will not stand for that. So buckle up.

      • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 5:26 pm #

        Preaching to the choir. I laughed when Trump announced his candidacy, and now I see the neocon/lib death machine on the back foot.

        I don’t care what kind of hair he has, or how he talks. Reelz over feelz.

  3. JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 10:24 am #

    Love your last sentence.

    How the heck did these politicos convince almost 50% of the American public that they are the real thing for this country and that socialism is the way to go.

    Makes me wonder about the mental health of the people.

    • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 11:40 am #

      I don’t wonder. It’s worse than ever.
      The worst of the mentally ill have been hitting the streets in record numbers, since health care “reform”.
      Then there’s the fact that far too many of our young people are being treated from a very young age, for conditions they don’t have.
      Yes, ADHD is real, but even the man who came up with that diagnosis says it is being terribly overused.
      The Parkland shooter needed treatment and medication for his severe problems.
      The wrong, one size fits all treatment makes people like him worse, almost worse than no treatment at all.

      I think that the almost 50% may be young people who just know, correctly, that something is very wrong with a system where they go to school or work all day and still can’t get ahead or break even.
      We broke the social contract with large swaths of America.
      The Occupiers and Tea Party were on the same side, so we separated the young people from the accumulated wisdom of their grandparents, and gave them demented college college professors who might hit you with a bike lock for having a different opinion.

      • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:11 pm #

        Yes, National Socialism or Socialist Nationalism is the higher third between Public and Private – not Cultural Marxism which will turn every citizen into a campesino, coolie, or starving beggar and every city into Calcutta.

        • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:18 pm #

          I’m sure most people associate National Socialism with Nazis in jackboots marching in lockstep Janos. How will you change this pervasive perception? Perhaps ypu best coin a new phrase to characterize your movement…

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 7:08 am #

            Nah, not just jackboots, sunburst. They were into killing children and adults who were a bit embarrassing for the perfect race as well.

          • benr November 23, 2019 at 10:36 am #

            Such is a tell tale sign of a sick society.
            How they treat children, animals and the elderly.
            Much like murdering babies in the womb just because they are not wanted.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:08 pm #

            Bravo Benny. You got her but good.

            As far as Eugenics go, we do need it, but it can be gradual and compassionate, focusing more on the positive than the negative. That would be getting smart, beautiful women to have more kidz. How? Social approval is huge with women, and tax incentives and lots of time off from work will help too.

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 3:06 pm #

            “Much like murdering babies in the womb just because they are not wanted.”

            I would agree with you there if you’re referring to actual babies. And not in cases where only suffering awaited them.

            Tiny clusters of cells like the ones ‘God’ flushes down the toilet on a regular basis even less.

            But none of it compares to what the Nazis did, which Janos seems to approve. And Mengele was happy to wait till they were properly born before killing them.

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 3:07 pm #

            “That would be getting smart, beautiful women to have more kidz. ”

            How incredibly Christian.

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 3:08 pm #

            *rather* less, rather than ‘even less’. I deleted a sentence and forgot to change it.

          • benr November 24, 2019 at 11:55 am #

            @ga

            A clump of cells?
            Really?
            We both know they are ripping them apart and extracting the limbs, body and head in pieces and then they must ensure all body parts are accounted for so they reconstruct the scene of the crime. No horror movie can compete with the gory and grisly details of an abortion done at or after the three month part.
            A simple search reveals the sordid details on can not deny.
            By the end of the third month of pregnancy, your baby is fully formed. Your baby has arms, hands, fingers, feet, and toes and can open and close its fists and mouth. Fingernails and toenails are beginning to develop and the external ears are formed. The beginnings of teeth are forming.

            Defending this practice is simply barbaric.

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 2:04 pm #

            benr

            You seem to be misunderstanding me. I am not defending the practice of tearing any fetus limb from limb.

            When I said ‘a cluster of cells’ that’s what I was referring to – an early embryo and not a fetus.

            A one-month embryo is the size of a grain of rice. At the end of the second month it is one inch. And first-trimester embryos – many of which are imperfect/defective, which is why they are not viable – are flushed out of the body and down the toilet with no help from anyone. Exceedingly frequently, which is why women are advised not to tell the world about their pregnancy until the end of the first trimester when it can be considered established.

            Anyone who considers an embryo the size of a grain of rice as a ‘human’ in any meaningful way would need to explain why the ‘corpse’ is not given a Christian burial. Some perspective, please…

            I don’t need a lesson on embryonic and fetal development, thanks. Not only have I spent years working on books on childbirth, among other things, but – unlike you – I gave birth to two children and followed every minute of their development.

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 2:13 pm #

            You seem to have missed the bit where I said I was agreeing with you – where the issue was babies (I include fetuses) but not a cluster of cells which may or may not continue to a viable pregnancy, depending on what nature – or God, for those who think that way – has in store for it.

            I didn’t always think that, but that’s what I think now.

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 2:20 pm #

            And when we refer to a ‘one-month embryo’, what we’re actually talking about is a two-week embryo, and a ‘two-month embryo’ is at six weeks actual gestation. This is because, by convention, the pregnancy is counted from the date of the last menstrual period, rather than the date the embryo was actually conceived, which is roughly half way through the cycle.

          • benr November 25, 2019 at 9:45 am #

            @GA

            What are the statistics on abortions at each month up to and including partial birth abortion at the ninth month?
            Congrats on the two kids by the way.
            Hope your feeling better after the big C scare.

            The statistic is 96% done at or before 20 weeks or five months.

            How many are done in the fist month I would say hardly any.

            Throw away society to include our children, old people and anything deemed of no value or worth.

          • GreenAlba November 25, 2019 at 10:39 am #

            “How many are done in the fist month I would say hardly any.”

            Those would be the ones dealt with by the morning-after pill, benr. I don’t know the statistics. The rest are what are known as spontaneous abortions (miscarriages).

            I don’t think we are disagreeing. And thank you for the good wishes. My treatment is now over, apart from the medication, and I’m fully cooked. They will be keeping a close eye on me for a decade. Anything could get me in that time!

            Thank you, William Beveridge and Aneurin Bevan. And my fellow taxpayers. 🙂

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:12 pm #

      Two words John: free stuff…

      • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 5:48 pm #

        For whom? The rich?

    • fineline November 22, 2019 at 8:23 pm #

      Nobody is convincing anybody about socialism. Thats right wing train wreck rhetoric.

    • fineline November 22, 2019 at 8:40 pm #

      Nobody is convincing anybody about socialism. Thats right wing train wreck rhetoric.
      Hearings held in the House are not trials, criminal or otherwise. All this talk about confronting accusers is off the rails. If there is to be a trial of any sort, then that will happen in the Senate. He will get his day in court.
      Nobody is trying to overthrow the 2016 election either. The House is doing the job the American people elected them to do,that the Paul Ryan, do nothing, know nothing, no nothing congress would not do. .

      Let the system work. Or just show me the tax returns or I would settle for the bone spur xray. Or show me a bonafide IQ test that says he is a genius, never mind the stable part.

      Just show me any one of these three things and I will go away and shut up and as a show of faith, I will kiss your ass on Pennsylvania Avenue and give you thirty days to advertise.

      how many lies can one nation stand, before it is is forever shammed?
      The answer my friend is blowing in the wind.

      • Uncle Bob November 22, 2019 at 10:54 pm #

        Yeah, and the answer on the wind is the air leaking out of Schiff’s cranium.

        You just can’t accept that your team lost to a guy who’s hated by the Establishment of both parties, and who was supposed to be an easy mark for Ms. Inevitability. Of course, between the character assassination perpetrated by the DNC, the mass media, and the Establishment, and the insane rants of the college kids, you’re driving voters away at a prodigious rate.

  4. Ishabaka November 22, 2019 at 10:26 am #

    What on earth do people think the point of foreign policy is? It’s to get other countries to do what we want. If a president isn’t doing that, he isn’t doing is job!

    • RocketDoc November 22, 2019 at 10:39 am #

      The power to represent us is to do the right thing. No need to be starry eyed about this, we don’t expect self serving mendacity. Government seems to think it is some kind of magic act of misdirection where they prepare surreptitiously in the background and then pull rabbits out of the hat for applause and acclaim. Citizenship/representation is supposed to be a cooperative responsibility. Neither leaders nor followers seem interested……

      • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:20 pm #

        Hence the Nanny State…

      • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 5:48 pm #

        The power to represent us is to do the right thing.

        Sadly, no. The power to represent us is granted by the wealthy donors who put you there, so “the right thing” is strictly circumscribed by the power of the purse. As far as “cooperative responsibility,” the above arrangement is working just fine for all “interested” parties. The wealthy donor “leaders” and their wholly owned elected political “followers” are getting along just fine. It’s the rest of us who are being bent over fucked in the bargain. This is late stage capitalism firing on all cylinders. Supercharged, at that.

  5. Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 10:28 am #

    Should I post the witness testimony again?

    I mean, I really want to. But I feel it might be salt in your wound.

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    • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 11:16 am #

      JHK: I see Seawolf’s post is gone. Feel free to delete this. I don’t mind.

    • draupnir November 22, 2019 at 3:54 pm #

      I haven’t been watching closely, but my mother has CNN on day and night (I can’t believe it’s good for her to get so riled up), and from what I’ve caught, all there seems to be is a lot of loud, self-righteous, outrage, a lot of hearsay and a lot of opinion. I saw witnesses actually encouraged to voice opinions. I suspect their “evidence” was unimpressive. Actual evidence is pretty sparse on the ground. They can infer until the stars go out, but I don’t see this being anything other than a tempest in a teapot. Perhaps it’s some sort of Hail Mary pass, because the word is that they have nothing in the field that can beat Trump. Biden is not only flailing but tainted; Bernie is unacceptable and so is Tulsi Gabbard. The rest of them are lightweights and have unfortunate baggage. Perhaps the nod will go to the great, white hope, old man Bloomberg. The whole ploy stinks of desperation. They’d be fools to issue Articles of Impeachment that would allow Trump to put on a defense.

      Meanwhile, apparently we gave the Ukraine seven billion or so in aid. Only 16.7 million disappeared into the maw of Hunter Biden and his possy. That ancient vampire, Soros, and his NGOs are named as absconding with a hefty portion of the remaining. Whispers that the Ukraine has been treated as some sort of slush fund since Obama toppled their duly elected government in favor of a free-for-all, leaves us wondering how many of our elected Democrats have been sucking at that teat.

      • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 5:39 pm #

        Perhaps it’s some sort of Hail Mary pass, because the word is that they have nothing in the field that can beat Trump.

        That’s what I’ve concluded as well. Besides, it’s a long standing deep state tactic to smear your opponents with charges of stuff that you yourself are doing. Pitiful candidate Biden’s complicity in the Obama era deep state coup and resulting financial payouts in Ukraine about to be exposed? Accuse Trump preemptively of doing the same thing. The implied cognitive dissonance is staggering. Seems to be working pretty well on about 50% of the population, however; MSM hysteria notwithstanding. The fact that it’s for the most part the liberal “intellectual elite,” who certainly should know better, that are being snookered by this shamelessly transparent ploy just adds to the irony.

        Proof once again of the pernicious corrosiveness of a state-captured press and the mind numbing effects of a full-court propaganda press. I would make the obligatory comparison to the late stage Soviet empire, but of course they were mere pikers compared to the modern day US “free press” version. Yes, Wolin’s inverted totalitarianism concept is real, alive, and well.

        • Goodwalkspoiled November 23, 2019 at 12:17 pm #

          Indeed the media tail is wagging the big Dem dog. More frightening, though, is just how eager and willing over half the population is to swallow the shampeachment lie hook, line, and sinker.

          While right in their face lays Biden’s shakedown of Ukraine for the benefit of his n’er-do-well son, Hunter. Crazy Joe is on video bragging about his deed. It is glaringly obvious Biden is the big crook here. It will be very interesting to watch them called to testify at the Senate trial. As well as Adam Schiff, and the Whistleblower, among others.

          Hitler was right. People have an incredible capacity to accept the biggest lies imaginable. And they do. Behold, it’s happening, and the media is not just fanning the flames. They are orchestrating the story line.

      • sprawlcapital November 24, 2019 at 11:39 pm #

        Hunter Biden and his possy [posse]
        ============================
        I know the correct spelling because I jrecently looked up the Posse Commitatus Act of 1878, which is a very stupid law that prevents the US military from aiding local law enforcement in securing our nation’s borders.

        Speaking in rough numbers it would require only about 3000 troops in order to have one soldier deployed every half mile along our southern border. The level of armament and the rules of engagement would have to be carefully considered to prevent a tragedy.

        But the fact is, with our military consuming over half a trillion dollars a year, there is no reason why we should allow people to enter our country illegally. There is no excuse for anything less than a secure border.

        • benr November 25, 2019 at 9:53 am #

          Speaking as someone who actually lives on the border or at least close enough to it I can smell Mexico on South winds days I don’t want our troops there in that small a number.

          There is an awful lot of serious crap that happens along our border that no one hears about or that does not get reported.

  6. fugeguy November 22, 2019 at 10:29 am #

    “I am sincerely wondering how the public will process the storm of indictments coming down at the cabal of government employees who devised the RussiaGate persecution at the same time the Senate prepares to go to a trial that will humiliate and possibly annihilate the Democratic Party. No political faction in history has begged so persuasively to be put to death, or deserved it more.”

    To me it seems that is what this is all about. After three years of making it all up and finding nothing despite unending over funded fishing expeditions, when the the fact based indictments hit, expect cries of this only being retaliation for said investigations, as if, three years of fictitious targeting does not warrant a heavy handed response.

    Those living in this fantasy land know as the beltway most likely won’t survive realities return.

    • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 10:42 am #

      The Dems are killing themselves. Trump wants the socialist side of the Dems put down permanently, but has issues that he agrees with the moderates. I heard that the WH plan includes the Senate trial during the kick off of the primary season, meaning three of the candidates cannot be away from DC during the trial. Ha! The lead of the Democratic strategy is starting to show how dumb they are up against Trump. He is about to spring the trap!

  7. Minnie Van Horne November 22, 2019 at 10:30 am #

    Senator Graham Lindsey (as b. over at Moon of Alabama calls him) announced this week that the report on FISA abuse by DOJ IG Michael Horowitz will drop on Monday, December 9th. With luck we will all be caroling by the baby grand: “12 Swamp defendants, 11 Swamp grand juries, 10 Swamp subpoenas, 9 CIA scalps, 8 Obama quislings …” etc etc etc until well into next summer’s nominating conventions.

    • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 10:35 am #

      Yep. Combined with the FISA news today, as well as Sidney Powell’s latest updates in the Flynn case (edited 302), I would say the party is about to get started.

      https://twitter.com/SidneyPowell1/status/1197668165670580224

      • Minnie Van Horne November 22, 2019 at 11:14 am #

        The talking houseplants at CNN and PMSNBC must be turning whiter than my third cousin Jasper’s KKK sheets when they are forced to read these things from their teleprompters. (And no, Jasper is NOT a Van Horne.)

        • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 11:19 am #

          “talking houseplants”

          nice

          • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 11:19 am #

            that’s a slam on houseplants! lols

          • libertysghost November 22, 2019 at 2:17 pm #

            I prefer to call them the “mockingbird press newsreaders” myself, but for most, “houseplants” is perfectly astute enough.

            I think I’ll find times where this option for interchange quite suitable in conversation.

          • messianicdruid November 22, 2019 at 4:48 pm #

            The mainstream news media gets its “talking points” each morning at 4 a.m., and they all seem to follow those talking points faithfully. See this:

            https://twitter.com/TS_SCI_MAJIC12/status/1182008427930931200

          • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 5:27 pm #

            “The walls are closing in”

        • fugeguy November 22, 2019 at 12:24 pm #

          I suspect that plans for a media leak strategy and insurance polices involved multiple high level journalists.

          The first amendment as important and protected as it is, might not prove much defense against documented intentional seditious acts.

    • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 11:45 am #

      I’m afraid it will turn out to be like the Epstein assisted suicide case.
      They are trying to get a couple of jail guards to take the fall, in return for leniency and maybe some sort of payoff down the road.
      I added that payoff part myself.
      I don’t think I’d take that deal if a were one of the guards, because I would have concerns that the “payoff” might happen a little sooner than promised.

      • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:14 pm #

        Two Black thugs. Strange to be guarding such a prisoner of high importance. Were they just hired perhaps? Did they do it?

        • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 1:19 pm #

          Were they black?
          They weren’t the two dudes from the Juicy Smolliet attack, were they?
          Juicy is suing Chicago for picking on him.

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:24 pm #

            Smolliet must suffer from a learning disability…

          • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 1:53 pm #

            Good ol’ Chappelle.

      • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 12:20 pm #

        There seems to be a repeated pattern in these kind of opertions. You get a chump to do the dirty deed, then you kill off the chump so he doesn’t spill the beans in court.

  8. SW November 22, 2019 at 10:30 am #

    What might possibly save the Democrats is the fact that other than journalists, political junkies and that ilk, the only people watching are bored retirees. How many versions of the July phone call from how many different people can anyone stand to hear?! And Joe & Hunter must be praying that there’ll be no impeachment trial b/c Burisma will be dissected with a sharp scalpel. Speaking of mental deterioration, Joe needs to plead “health problems” and exit the stage.

    • messianicdruid November 22, 2019 at 11:31 am #

      In 1999, President Clinton signed a treaty with Ukraine, pledging the two countries to cooperate in legal investigations, especially when involving corruption.

      https://www.congress.gov/106/cdoc/tdoc16/CDOC-106tdoc16.pdf

      Last July, President Trump conversed with the new Ukrainian president and suggested that he implement this treaty by checking out the allegations in regard to former VP Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.

      The Democrats in Congress apparently think that this was an impeachable offense. However, it seems more logical that it would impeachable if Trump failed to implement Clinton’s treaty.

      So now the Ukrainian parliament has passed a bill demanding that both US presidentTrump and Ukrainian president Zelensky investigate $7.4 bill of money laundering that was done under the Obama administration:

      https://thewashingtonstandard.com/ukraine-news-agency-ukraine-mps-demand-trump-zelensky-investigate-7-4-billion-money-laundering-under-obama-administration-video/

    • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 11:50 am #

      Joe can’t exit, because of the imaginary rule that if the president investigates a rival during a campaign, he can be impeached or something.
      Joe didn’t even know enough to have a statement ready when a reporter inevitably asked him about Hunter’s paternity test.
      This is the sort of “news” that “journalists” won’t leave alone, Joe should have been prepared.

      • SW November 22, 2019 at 1:27 pm #

        Joe has to know he’s got a mess on his hands with the chaos his youngest son has caused. Even though I admit, in some ways I feel sorry for him, in others, he’s overstayed in government and needs to leave. Maybe he’s afraid he’s in so deep now that there’s no escape but to bluff it out and pray all of this will go away. But it won’t. It’s so obvious watching the debates that his cognitive ability has slipped and he relies on semi-memorized statements to get through.

        • BackRowHeckler November 22, 2019 at 2:00 pm #

          Yeah, well said SW

          Biden doesn’t seem like too bad of a guy but he’s just been around too long. It’s an axiom of life if you overstay at a job, or a place, things begin to fall apart around you. An example of this is football coach Joe Paterno at Penn State. To illustrate the absurdity of Biden’s (and Sanders) candidacy, go back in time 100 years, and think if a candidate born before the Mexican War started was running for president 2 years after WW1 ended. The 80 years between the two eras is insurmountable.

          Brh

        • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 5:45 pm #

          Is that something new?

        • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 12:26 pm #

          Biden was never the sharpest knife in the drawer. His no-abilities, no-credentials, drug addict son riding a gravy train of nepotism is an appropriate continuance of the family story.

    • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:16 pm #

      Many lonely women are in love with Rachael Maddow. The more exaggerated her facial expression are, the more they love her. It’s like Mr Rogers – whom they also love. Some Women with penises (biological men) are also in this campy camp.

      • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 5:25 pm #

        Are you sure Maddow isn’t in that campy camp as well? I’ve long had my suspicions.

        • Majella November 23, 2019 at 12:53 am #

          Not ‘camp’. She’s out gay. Do at least the minimum of research when you’re feeling like doing even a half-arsed smear job.

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:25 pm #

      It won’t save them in a court of law…

    • Anon1970 November 22, 2019 at 3:18 pm #

      I am a retiree but not bored enough to watch an American version of the Stalin doctor trials. What amazes me is that Victoria Nuland, the former US Assistant Secretary of State of State for Eastern Europe and the American probably most responsible for encouraging the 2014 Ukrainian Revolution has not been called to testify at the hearings and has not been mentioned by the mainstream press. These hearings are all about bringing down Trump and Ukraine happens to be the vehicle by which the Democrats hope to accomplish their mission. Had Hillary won the 2016 election, Nuland would probably have become the Secretary of State and our relationship with Russia would probably be much worse than it currently is.

      Ukraine only achieved its independence at the time of the breakup of the Soviet Union and for the prior thousand years had been parts of other empires in Eastern Europe (Russia, Poland, Austria and Ottoman). Too bad its leaders since 1991 were so corrupt. Russia continued to occupy its only warm water port, Sevastopol in Crimea, under a long term lease with Ukraine.

      At the time of Germany’s peaceful reunification in 1990, Russia gave its consent on its understanding with NATO and the US that there would be no expansion of NATO to the east. This understanding was broken later in the decade as NATO admitted several former East Block countries, with Ukraine waiting in the wings for closer ties to the West. There was no way that Russia would ever agree to a NATO naval base in Crimea, which had been annexed from the Ottoman Empire in 1783. Administrative control of Crimea was transferred from Russia to Ukraine in 1954 by Nikita Krushchev at a time when there was no land link between Crimea and Russia and no one expected the breakup of the Soviet Union.

      I have little doubt that Russia interfered with the US election in 2016 but the US has been interfering in foreign elections for decades and helping to overthrow elected governments that it didn’t like, as well.

      • cc rider November 23, 2019 at 10:28 am #

        I agree with most of your post Anon1970. The only thing I don’t agree with is your amazement that Victoria Nuland hadn’t been called to testify. Adam Shift has no interest in calling her because the Republicans would get a chance to ask her questions which could lead to an exposure of what you outlined, which is the US influenced coup in Ukraine of 2014. The Dems completely control who gets called to testify and who does not. When the Senate has its actual trial McConnell may very well put her on the list of those to call for testimony. We’ll see. Not holding my breath on that likelihood.

        • benr November 23, 2019 at 10:39 am #

          If you think some of the Republican’s were not feeding at the Ukraine trough I have a beachfront property to sell you in Arizona.
          Just look at all that sand.

          • cc rider November 24, 2019 at 10:33 am #

            I do think some Republicans were feeding at the Ukraine trough. That’s why I said I wasn’t holding my breath on the likelihood of Nuland being called as a “witness”. Nuland is a neo-con’s neo con. McConnell is as well, even though he has to pretend not to be while Trump is the leader of his shit party.

            (Both parties are shit and are peppered with neo-cons).

  9. JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 10:32 am #

    How many times do you think the government of the US leaned on a country to get something done. HRC really leaned on Gaddafi as she lined him up in her sights.

    If this country is going to lead the world, it needs to act like it. Like any thing else, take care of home first, then help elsewhere. If the precarious position of Biden wasn’t in the fray, there would be no issue at all.

    Horowitz and Burham are going to drop bombs on the Dems involved in the Mueller fiasco. Cannot wait! Maybe they can find cell mates for Stone and Manafort.

    • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 11:13 am #

      “How many times do you think the government of the US leaned on a country to get something done.”

      It’s a very common, normal thing the US does to nations all over the planet.

      Trump is calling for a trial in the Senate, which is GOP controlled. This would turn out to be very bad for democrats on a few different levels. It would naturally be embarrassing for the democrat part as a whole, and disrupt the democrat primary.

      • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 11:23 am #

        In an actual trial, he also gets the benefit of the discovery phase.

      • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:20 pm #

        Well that’s obvious – the point is What was that something in this case. Was it personal or for the good of America? It may well have both. Things often get done when such intersectionality arises.

      • draupnir November 22, 2019 at 4:09 pm #

        Since this must be avoided at all costs, I suspect Articles of Impeachment will not be forthcoming, and this entertaining piece of political theater was performed for the sole purpose of mud slinging with no recourse or defense for Trump.

        • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 5:28 pm #

          I have said it before, it is designed to give the optics of impeachment in order to hurt Trump in 2020.

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 12:27 pm #

      I think we should lead the world by example rather than through political intrigue…

      • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:18 pm #

        You don’t know how the world works. You are the rare type, the angelic type of man. You should be living in a monastery, not Detroit.

        • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:30 pm #

          I lived in a Zen Temple in Detr Janos, will that suffice?

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:35 pm #

            Doesn’t matter how the world works anyway as long as we follow the Light ourselves. Eventually a tipping point will be reached and lo and behold! A New Order will arise like the fabled Phoenix from the ashes of the old…

          • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 12:30 pm #

            So true. But it’s the path to that pile of ashes that has some of us a little worried.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:10 pm #

            Yes Sunny, nothing purifies like fire. Water only cleans the surfaces of things, whereas fire cleans right down to the molecules. Well said, Nazi!

    • fugeguy November 22, 2019 at 12:28 pm #

      “How many times do you think the government of the US leaned on a country to get something done. ”

      Happens all the time on multiple levels. Seen it happen. Been part of the mechanism to deliver the message.

    • Peter VE November 22, 2019 at 2:54 pm #

      Things I didn’t know (but should have) and learned from the impeachment hearings: Ambassador Volker finds it totally unremarkable that a Ukrainian official would come to him for editing and approval of a public statement by the Ukrainian government.
      Did the Saudi ambassador vet the Trump administration’s statements regarding the death of Kashoggi? Did the Trump administration get approval from the Israeli Ambassador before their latest statement regarding the West Bank settlements? Oh, sorry, strike that last one.

  10. JustSaying November 22, 2019 at 10:33 am #

    They seriously thought that the rest of the country would join their insanity and Trump would be forced to resign.

    I liked it when Pete B. said at the debates that he feels like a stranger in his own country. Well, join the club!

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    • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 11:16 am #

      “I liked it when Pete B. said at the debates that he feels like a stranger in his own country. Well, join the club!”

      C’mon, all Bootygeeg has gotta do is make a trip to San Francisco if he feels strange 🙂

  11. Jeremy November 22, 2019 at 10:34 am #

    Nice one Jim.

    I would urge your audience to read a recent post by the brilliant and knowledgable Dmitri Orlov. It provides a little more context to the Ukraine/US/Russia nexus.

    https://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2019/09/look-whos-not-laughing.html#more

    Judging by what I saw while watching a few painful hours of impeachment hearings, most Americans especially those in high positions are utter clueless morons. I can’t remember a show of such blatant ignorance.

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 12:29 pm #

      Read your posted article. Orlov is a smart dude for sure.

      • Anon1970 November 22, 2019 at 3:38 pm #

        Agreed. It’s a very good article.

    • libertysghost November 22, 2019 at 2:27 pm #

      I told a coworker I would jab spikes in my ears if I had to listen to that Hill lady every day…she couldn’t have been more painfully boring or come across more full of herself if she was trying.

      I don’t think it’s “ignorance” as much as being so far removed from humanity at a normal level thus leading to the complete lack of self-awareness they all displayed.

      But when does Schiff seem to have any self-awareness either? It appears maybe when he’s participating in a demonic orgy or something…but that’s about all anyone can visualize his life being made up of as he contorts his face and body attempting “actual human behavior” while “leading the hearings”.

      It’s just plain freakish.

  12. PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 10:36 am #

    “These UkraineGate hearings of the past two weeks raised some additional questions that have not otherwise been aired much in the public arena, chiefly, exactly how much does the US government seek to control the affairs of Ukraine? And how did we become the superintendent of this partially failed state? The parade of State Department diplomats in charge of this-and-that suggests that Ukraine is virtually an occupied territory. Do we realistically suppose that, in the natural course of things, we can shield Ukraine forever from the influence of its neighbor (and former sovereign), Russia?”

    very insightful observation there, Jim. Also, how many times was the phrase “national security interest of the US” brought up in all this neo-imperial insanity? Ukraine is only in the US national security interest if there will be future war vs. Russia– which the US is already engaged in as Ukraine as our proxy. This is what I get out of all this, anyway.

    • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 10:44 am #

      Furthermore, this proxy war is defensive in nature so far. However, that may not always be the case. The US & Russia both understand the massive importance of Ukraine as the engine for Russian major power status. Offensive action means heavy armor & an effective air arm. There are only a limited number of forces on the European continent which are able to accomplish that– namely, US & German forces.

      • Minnie Van Horne November 22, 2019 at 11:51 am #

        There’s a detail I find very curious about the show trial and all the Ukraine-focused melodrama. Amidst all this pearl-clutching about “security assistance” to Kiev, nobody ever breathes a word about the fact that the Obama-era State Department, CIA and numerous affiliated NGOs all conspired to overturn the democratically-elected Ukrainian government in 2014 to install a compliant regime more amenable to “the West.” Can Adam Schiff spell “meddling in our democracy” in Ukrainian?

        Wouldn’t this seem to have some significance bearing on everything that followed, including Joe and Hoover Biden’s strong-arm tactics to extract as many million$$$ as possible from the country?

        Color Minnie perplexed.

        • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 1:56 pm #

          Coups are ok when they do it, even at home.

        • Anon1970 November 22, 2019 at 3:46 pm #

          I think the House Democrats are afraid to call Victoria Nuland in to testify before their committees. After all she reported to John Kerry in 2014 and before that to Hillary Clinton. See my comments above.

          • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 5:29 pm #

            But she could give them all sandwiches again. Or cookies. It was all so long ago …

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 5:53 pm #

            They only want people who will sling mud at Trump. Does she qualify?

      • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 12:34 pm #

        Of what benefit can a “partially failed state” in ongoing economic freefall be to either Russia or the US?

        • Minnie Van Horne November 22, 2019 at 12:51 pm #

          The Empire would love to fill it chock-full of military bases and missile silos, right on Russia’s doorstep. Naval ports in Crimea and eastern Ukraine also have an allure for the War Party in DC.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:22 pm #

            And both parties are the War Party, right? You get that, right?

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:38 pm #

            Isn’t that the Cold War all over again? Sounds oddly redundant…

          • Anon1970 November 22, 2019 at 8:49 pm #

            I think there would be nuclear war before there is a NATO base in Crimea.

  13. Jeremy November 22, 2019 at 10:37 am #

    And for a real laugh – watch 3 minutes of the lunatic Pelosi.
    “All roads lead to Putin”.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ufU7XzAoKvs

    America has gone mad!

    • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 12:09 pm #

      I can’t watch, she turns my stomach.
      She’s declared herself coequal to the president, any president, and has been running around EU countries telling them what to do.
      They allow it. It isn’t only America which has gone mad.

      • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:40 pm #

        I’ll never forget the image of her chewing on her dentures during Trump’s first State of the Union…

  14. hmuller November 22, 2019 at 10:39 am #

    They say you shouldn’t judge a book by its cover. But OMG is that Adam Schiff character odd looking, like a Botox treatment gone terribly wrong.

    I’m almost afraid that if someone pulled off that plastic looking mask of a face, we would find a reptilian underneath.

    I’m sure any resemblance between Mr Schiff and the glassy look you find on so many sex perverts is purely coincidental.

    • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 10:44 am #

      Apropos your last sentence, conicidentally, another friend of his was just arrested on kiddy sex charges about a week ago, IIRC.

      • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 10:48 am #

        Details: Bruce Hensel. Arrested for soliciting lewd photos from a child (9).

      • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 12:11 pm #

        Jeffrey might not be dead because of the Clintons.
        I don’t mean he might not be dead, I just mean it might not be Arkancide.

      • Minnie Van Horne November 22, 2019 at 12:27 pm #

        At first glance, your IIRC appeared to my icy blue eyes as HRC.
        I wonder if that is a premonition.

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:41 pm #

      He probably has to go in hiding around Thanksgiving in case someone mistakes him for a turkey…

      • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 12:42 pm #

        Every year just before Thanksgiving with much press fanfare, the President grants a Presidential Pardon to a turkey. One year the turkey died from stress before the ceremony, so now they have a second “standby turkey” ready.

        Have you ever known a dull witted guy who stumbles onto a funny joke or stunt? He gets a few laughs and therefore keeps repeating the stunt over and over – and pretty soon it’s not funny anymore. That’s how I view this whole turkey pardoning farce.

        Just for a change, maybe this year Hillary and Bathhouse Barry can dress up in feathers and receive the pardon. Or Trump can pardon the entire nation of Turkey for invading Syria – that should make the deep state happy.

  15. teddyboy46 November 22, 2019 at 10:41 am #

    I am surprised that the Democrats Leadership would show what puppets they are so blatantly. They have dropped the For The People Charade and are actively working for the Deep State in plain sight.

    Trump has the Deep State running scared. It is instructive to watch all the witness act out their roles and repeat their rehearsed answers . This was particularly obvious with Gordon Sondland he was way to relaxed and giving out way to much information, Which means it was Bull Spit.

    Can’t wait to se ethe next act in the Schiff Show .

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    • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 10:57 am #

      Yeah, you are right. This is not Dem vs. GOP, it is Deep State against DC outsiders. One of Trump’s biggest mistakes is feeling he could make a deal with the rotten characters in the Deep State. He has dumped them whenever possible as he has realized what a bunch of back stabbing SOBs they are. The Ukrainegate fiasco is just a showcase of the malcontents that he has replaced.

      I wonder what will happens with Sessions. Just think how history would be different if he had really investigated the Russiagate BS instead of playing Deep State stooge. If Trump has learned something, he will fight this weasel from become a member of the Deep State again. It is weird, he was one of the first GOPers to support Trump, I wonder who got to him to turn him Deep State.

      • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 12:21 pm #

        There is a line of thought that it should be assumed that they have dirt on everyone.
        The dirt may not be on Jeff himself, someone close to him may be in some way involved in or benefitting from the giant crime syndicate known as The Swamp.
        It could also be someone who was not involved, but could be made to appear so.

        • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:26 pm #

          He’s a caver. He caved on White Rights long ago. And then he caved on any kind of rights for regular Americans when he betrayed Trump.

          Whether his mind is compromised or not, his heart is rotten apple.

      • RocketDoc November 22, 2019 at 12:51 pm #

        Since he was our Senator, I met with him in Feb 2012 and it was clear by the guidance from his staff that he was somewhat cognitively impaired. Who is directing him? I don’t know but he is running for the Senate again and talking nice about Trump. I suspect he could lead the Republican field but he needs a majority to win without a run-off. Our current Democratic senator will have to run against an ax murderer AND a pedophile to win….

    • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 11:14 am #

      Don’t forget that when questioned by the opposition (Ratcliffe, Stefanik and co.), the witnesses openly stated there was no quid pro quo, and no bribes.

      See my videos in the previous thread.

      When questioned directly, we saw that no one was dumb enough to lie under oath, except Vindman. They coughed out the truth.

      The Schiff Show is over.

      • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 12:29 pm #

        I now understand that the incident that caused some much older men to savagely attack Ms. Stefanik as “trash” after one hearing, was a photoshopped (and obviously so) image of Ms. Stefanik behaving insolently, with her back to the Yavonovitch woman, during the time the attendees had set aside for worship of a career civil servant.

        That does not explain why these men went looking for something with which to discredit Ms. Stefanik, when Yavonovitch’s testimony should have been what they were concentrating on.

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 1:50 pm #

      They can’t avoid avoid revealing their underlying motivation because they react to everything that spacks of Trump in a knee jerk manner without reasoned, thoughtful consideration. If Trump is likened to an allied battleship, they are Kamikaze pilots on a sucide mission…

  16. venuspluto67 November 22, 2019 at 10:44 am #

    She’s far exceeded even the paranoid raptures of the John Birch Society a half century ago when they were screaming about communists in every broom closet of America. This incessant war-cry can’t be good for the country.

    My exact problem with all this RussiaGate stuff from the get-go.

    No political faction in history has begged so persuasively to be put to death, or deserved it more.

    Oh come on, just because the Democratic Party is flaunting its “stenchfulness” rather more blatantly right now doesn’t mean both parties are not at least equally awful. We have been experiencing John Michael Greer’s “senility of elites” for quite some time now.

    • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 11:02 am #

      No, the difference most of the outsiders see is the fact that the Liberal Dems are trying to turn the USA into a government dominated socialist state. Fifty years ago, these people were called traitors and Communists, now they are Media heroes and 2020 Dem candidates.

      • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 11:18 am #

        lol, they are the pro-CIA/security apparatus “resistance”

        pathetic & it were laughable if it weren’t so dangerous

        • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 2:01 pm #

          They are pro globalism. That is what binds them. When I joke about Pepsi ads with Kendall Jenner McResisting, I am not kidding.

          The Open Society Purple Resistance crowd doesn’t want their gravy train of corporate plunder distrupted.

      • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 11:27 am #

        That’s something I was wondering about John. Are the media giants willing to give this country over to Socialism simply because they hate GGG, or are they in reality closet socialists themselves.

        • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 11:50 am #

          Their livelihood depends on the supremacy of Washington, DC. They are the mouthpiece of the Left movement. It is important to remember that they believe in governmental domination just as much as the Trumpers believe in popular control. HRC ran over Bernie in 2016, using the DNC, preventing the Progressives from running then. Bernie and his cadre absolutely believe in government control and ownership of our economy and lives. They are convinced that social issues are too much to be entrusted to ordinary people and only smart guys like him and other Leftists should make important decisions.

          Ie, we want the power.

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 12:14 pm #

            This is confusing to me. The various MSM outlets are for-profit business ventures yet, as you say, “Their livelihood depends on the supremacy of Washington, DC.” Why is that? I’m not disagreeing with you buddy, just trying to understand. How do they benefit from siding with the now ‘progressive’ Left who clearly demonstrate themselves to be intolerant of free speech?

          • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 1:44 pm #

            The MSM is owned or managed by Leftists,

            Jeff Bezos. Washington Post

            CNN. Jeff Zucker

            All three TV networks are tied into Deep State propaganda machines because they are part of the DC scene.

            Remember Trump wants to decrease the power of the Federal government which the press clings to to produce “the news”.

            Just look at the coverage of the main MSM output and compare the negative versus positive reporting on Trump. It is ridiculous how cherry picked the news is. Reporting and editing produce one sided news.

            Also, the news now used to be called the editorial and opinion page. No required sources, anonymity have made the accuracy of the news a joke.

            Another thought is how the heck did so many Anti-populists end up on these mews channels. I think like hires like. Used to watch CNN for its superior presentation, wha’happened?

      • venuspluto67 November 22, 2019 at 11:57 am #

        Yeah, fifty years ago, it was also socially acceptable to beat, rob, and murder men because they were homosexuals. Nobody but rednecks and reactionaries (okay, well I guess that describes way more than half this blog’s current commentariat) cares about “fifty years ago”.

        • CancelMyCard November 22, 2019 at 12:22 pm #

          “Nobody but rednecks and reactionaries (okay, well I guess that describes way more than half this blog’s current commentariat) ”

          Yes, the comments published here lately are far, far different than those published five years ago.

          I wonder why that is so . . .

          • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 12:37 pm #

            I don’t think rednecks bother with blogs like this one.
            I haven’t noticed any here.

          • messianicdruid November 22, 2019 at 6:06 pm #

            I assume you are using the term as a pejorative rather than a physiological descriptor.

        • Epicur November 22, 2019 at 1:23 pm #

          Fifty years ago I was tending bar in Alabama and that was no where near “socially acceptable”. There were bullies who did it once that I know of, but they were in their own little club and the police tended to the matter.

        • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:31 pm #

          And now where Homosexuals reign, kids are offered up as sacrifices.

          Society must be heteronormative. That’s by definition. Gay Pride marches are thus anti-social and must be stopped. In Russia, the People and the Police work together to do just that. As it should be.

          • lilykline November 22, 2019 at 1:44 pm #

            It’s so sad that there are so many people like you Janos, such intolerance for anything different than you. The Marches are called Freedom Of Speech…Now i must get ready for some obscure homophobic response from you.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 5:18 pm #

            Obscure? Complaining about Gay Couples destroying Christian businesses is obscure? And the cunning: Why not pick on Orthodox Jews or Muslims who hate Gay Marriage too?

            It is what it is: monstrous. And the legions of Liberals, both straight and gay who support and enable it are simply without any moral compass whatsoever.

            You were never supposed to make these kind of decisions and you aren’t now either. You are simply bowing to the strongest – those who program you on the Media. I don’t blame you or Alba – you are victims. Women hate to be blamed and that should be taken seriously. You’re not to blame and you aren’t responsible. Equally, you shouldn’t have the right to vote. You weren’t given a compass so you have no True North and thus are disoriented and unable to judge anything by yourself.

          • GreenAlba November 22, 2019 at 5:54 pm #

            Skorenzy

            I am sick to the back teeth of you making up lies about things I’m supposed to have said and views I’m supposed to hold.

            Peter Tatchell, prominent gay rights activist of long standing in the UK, openly supported the right of Christian business people not to have to produce items that represented propaganda on behalf of gay rights. I’m with Peter Tatchell on this one and I told you that before when this subject came up. But you remain a liar of the first water.

            And don’t patronise me, you manipulative, misogynist weed.

          • elysianfield November 22, 2019 at 8:31 pm #

            Lily,
            You confuse outrage with intolerance. Janos has an opinion…expressing the opinion does not rise to the level of intolerance…

            To be tolerant to some outrage suggests that no abuse, physical or otherwise, be visited on the offending spectacle.

            We can be tolerant of others without offending or harming those we exercise forbearance towards. Tolerance does not mean we have to agree with, or accept as a norm, an aberration.

            Do you hate anyone? The fact that you do not kill them is tolerance on your part.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:53 am #

            Albatross: So you admit the unspeakable evil of it? Good. Now admit my second premise: that support for these actions is widespread in the Gay Community. I would guess (are you going to play with my words again?) the majority. We can disagree on this with no rancor I would hope, but you know that’s it not just a few people like you implied before. Be honest, will ya?

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 6:48 am #

            You have no idea how many people approve of it or disapprove of it.

            And it’s an entirely different issue from refusing service to gay people in normal contexts.

            The issue with the cake that I’m personally aware of (in Northern Ireland) was about a cake promoting some gay event.

            These are in any case grey areas. What if a normal, quiet, non-proselytising gay couple – of the kind that I know – are refused acccommodation in the only bed and breakfast in town because of someone else’s irrational prejudices?

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 7:49 am #

            Here is Peter Tatchell’s actual article on the matter on his own website. In fact he uses the example I just mentioned of a B&B owner refusing accommodation to gay people. Running a B&B is providing a service to the public, not publishing a view you do not support.

            https://www.petertatchellfoundation.org/belfast-gay-cake-row-is-about-freedom-of-expression/

            So in fact the ‘grey area’ point can come out of my post above, as it isn’t grey at all. You can’t refuse a service to someone you don’t approve of, under the law. But you can refuse to publish their views.

            A Christian baker would therefore be entitled to refuse to supply you with a cake with a swastika on it, or otherwise promoting national socialism.

            That is right and proper.

            Peter Tatchell is widely read within the gay community and widely respected outside it. His articles on the matter were widely disseminated. A similar one in the Guardian was followed by largely positive comments, with the positive comments receiving hundreds of ‘recommends’ in many cases. And that was the flippin’ Graun.

          • benr November 23, 2019 at 10:45 am #

            @ga

            What if a gay couple is refused service?

            Then they find another place to do what they were going to do.

            Right to refuse service to someone should be a right.
            Fools that do so out of prejudice or bigotry also deserve to go out of business for such.

          • lilykline November 23, 2019 at 11:04 am #

            Janos,
            When I first read your response to me all I could do was laugh. Then I just felt sorry for you.
            Also, in your post above you said nothing about gay couples destroying Christian businesses, your statement was just more broad about your hatred of Homosexuals. And you feel picked on, well that makes you a hypocrite. It’s laughable that you feel anybody that supports homosexuals has no moral compass..I’m not worried about my moral compass, I give back every day. I am a hospice nurse, I care for everyone the same no matter there sexual orientation, religion, color of there skin etc. What do you do Janos, beside just hate and judge..such a sad way to live. I’m a little confused as to where the needle points on your moral compass…how about hundreds and hundreds of Christian Clergy raping young men over the decades, where is your outrage in that?
            Your comment that I shouldn’t vote is another one that still makes me laugh when I read it, good one lol!!!
            ElysianField, I appreciate your comment and I gave it good thought and generally agree with you on that, but for Janos unfortunately I feel his outrage is rooted and based on his intolerance.

          • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 11:47 am #

            What if a normal, quiet, non-proselytising gay couple – of the kind that I know – are refused acccommodation in the only bed and breakfast in town because of someone else’s irrational prejudices?

            Alba,

            Your example reminds me of the fact that Joan Baez and Bob Dylan had the exact same experience…the innkeeper refused them a room because of the spectacle of Bob Dylan being, at the time, in his “rough around the edges” phase. Joan prevailed, using her evident fame at the time, and they were given a room.

            During that night, Bob Dylan wrote one hell of an anthem…”The Hour That The Ship Comes In”. Popularized by Peter, Paul and Mary…insightful, powerful.

          • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 11:51 am #

            And…the link;

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m0V5gpHkSeo

            …almost brings tears to my eyes….

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 1:14 pm #

            benr

            How do you know what they were ‘going to do’? If anything. The contract is for accommodation.

            Do you think hoteliers and B&B hosts should be able to demand of their heterosexual guests that they adhere to specific expectations and limits in terms of what sex acts they are allowed to perform on the premises?

          • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:17 pm #

            Lil: Rape is huge in the Jewish Community among the Orthodox especially. But since you folks own the media, hardly a word of it gets out.

            You think you have a compass. That’s the problem. But taking care of others is women’s best work, so it’s good you are doing that. Judging is mine. Absolutely necessary, part of Life. Without it there will be death for all.

            I notice you didn’t touch my example of why they pick on Christians and not the Semitic religions. You have no answer for that and you know you don’t. Christians are the targets. The TV told you that and you accept it.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:20 pm #

            Albatross: Obviously a lot of Gays (at least over here) approve of destroying Christian businesses. And I expect over there since a Chick fil A that opened didn’t even last a day due to the massive protests.

            But you are in denial mode and women are good at closing their eyes like little girls and shouting la, la, la, la. Which is why they are great at protests: they simply have no doubts and they have good loud voices to chant their stupidity.

          • lilykline November 23, 2019 at 1:38 pm #

            Janos,
            Where in my first comment did I say anything about Christians, nope, nowhere..read it again. You brought it up in your response to my first comment, saying why don’t i pick on Muslims or Orthodox Jews. I wasn’t picking on any religion. I was simply commenting that it is sad that you have such intolerance and hatred to other people’s views and life choices. Then in your response to my second comment, you said why dont “they”pick on other religions. Again, none of this rambling had anything to do with my comment, it wasn’t about gays and christians and businesses..you just read into it what you want. As far as your misogynist views, you seem awfully afraid of women, poor lil Janos..he doesn’t think women should vote, he thinks they don’t have internal compasses etc, what are you so afraid of Janos?

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 2:46 pm #

            More moronic misogyny.

            The issue with Chicken Fil A appears to be not that they are Christian but specifically that they financially support anti-LGBT organisations.

            If they are open about their prejudices and how they finance them, I guess they have to take the flak in terms of people’s legitimate right to protest about their actions (not their personal Christian beliefs). But I don’t support forcing them to close down. Let the footfall decide.

            I have always refused to buy newspapers owned by Rupert Murdoch or subscribe to Sky TV for the same reason, but I don’t try to stop him continuing to make his billions through his propaganda outlets.

            But it’s unfortunate that the kind of intolerance that is common over your way is increasingly crossing the pond.

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 2:48 pm #

            Next time maybe just have your rant about whatever you want to rant about and leave my name out of it. I know it’s hard, but try.

          • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 3:26 pm #

            Forgive my butting in uninvited. But lilykline, you said something curious: “how about hundreds and hundreds of Christian Clergy raping young men over the decades, where is your outrage in that?”

            Are you blaming Christianity as a religion for these acts of rape sodomy?

            Or are you blaming the gay clergymen who perpetrated these acts, and by doing so violating all Christian teaching?

            It seems to me you have just inadvertently bitch slapped the group you were defending.

          • lilykline November 23, 2019 at 4:00 pm #

            Hmuller,
            Although there are certainly a percentage of gay priests, experts draw a clear distinction between being gay and being a pedophile. Margaret Smith, a prominent Criminologist who worked on a report on Clergy Abuse pointed out “Tho the majority of abusive acts were homosexual in nature, participation in homosexual acts is not the same as sexual identity as a gay man. The report also noted that the abuse decreased as more gay men began serving the church. I wasn’t disparaging Gay Christians, I was disparaging Christian Pedophiles.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 2:14 am #

            Albie: I mentioned other religion in the context of the protestors never picking them to destroy. Nothing about you. This is simply your attempt to confuse the issue and never answer how many Gays support these evil actions. Quite a few I’d say. The best you could do is mention one Gay guy who was against it!

            Lilly: Obviously not someone who is willing and able to converse about things. The Church has a Gay problem. Most of the cases are not children, but rather young men or at least post-adolescents.. Gays like ’em young after all. Of course one could say the same for all men, but obviously one can’t compare homosexuality with the heterosexuality which keeps the human race going. These abusers of Trust are always attracted by access to the young, thus they flock to the Boy Scouts, Ministry, Priesthood and Rabbiniate.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 2:20 am #

            Alba: Disregard the part about other religions – Lilly said it not you. The rest of it stands.

            Why didn’t you just say in the first place that you were against all this? That could have saved us a shit storm. But perhaps not since apparently you fell you must defend your adopted people – the Gays. They’re sacred to Liberals just like Blacks, Maori, Muslims, etc.

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 8:21 am #

            Janos

            “Why didn’t you just say in the first place that you were against all this? That could have saved us a shit storm. But perhaps not since apparently you fell you must defend your adopted people – the Gays. They’re sacred to Liberals just like Blacks, Maori, Muslims, etc.”

            A few corrections there:

            1. The ‘shit storm’ could have been avoided if you’d said whatever you wanted to say and left my name out of it. Citing me, when I was again happy to sit out a thread, was the unique cause of your ‘shit storm’. I had no other interest in commenting on it, as I generally ignore your bigoted hyperbole, even when you feel constrained to add paragraphs of moronic misogyny to bolster it.

            2. If you don’t know my views on the matter already that’s because of your own intellectual indolence, since I’ve stated them before. I even cited Peter Tatchell before, since I agree now and agreed then with his take on the subject. And I was pleased to see that that was his take on the subject, as an influential and respected gay activist.

            3. I didn’t just tell you what I thought – I pointed out that PT’s article was also published in the Guardian, that it got almost entirely positive comments below the line, and that some of those positive comments got hundreds of ‘recommends’ from readers. Since the majority of readers aren’t even signed into the comments section, I’m happy to extrapolate that many more of those liberal readers you love to hate also agree with his view, since they’re mostly intelligent enough to identify the legal nuances he describes.

            4. You have no more idea than I do of the actual proportion of gay people who endorse either view. ‘Activists’ are a self-selecting subgroup of gay people, as they are with people who accept climate science, or religious people, or any other group of people with views on things, and it is not valid to extrapolate their views or actions to all the people in the larger group, in any of these cases.

            5. I have not ‘adopted’ any people, whether gay, black, muslim or maori. I do have an adopted greyhound, but beyond opining that they are dogs with a lovely nature, I have not carried out any greyhound activism on her behalf.

            I have a gay nephew; my husband has a gay niece; I have worked with ordinary gay colleagues. None of these people, to my knowledge, are ‘activists’. I have not researched their views on any of the issues that trouble you, because their homosexuality is no more important to me in my relations with them the colour of their hair.

            But if people make stupid statements about homosexuals per se, as opposed to proselytising attention seekers of any sexual proclivity, I am entitled to comment. Mostly I still don’t, but you in particular, insist on bringing my name into things because you can’t cope with the intellectual concept of some people having views not predictable by means of a simplistic template.

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 10:25 am #

            “The Church has a Gay problem. ”

            The church has a gay problem for which it is itself largely responsible.

            Two things have contributed to the problems the church has in this area, although they do not in any way excuse acts of sexual predation.

            (1) Your church insists on priestly celibacy, although it certainly didn’t always (so it doesn’t need to for any theological reason).

            (2) It has encouraged prejudice over the centuries against ordinary homosexual people and did not allow them to live their lives openly.

            I will use Ireland as an example, because it is the one closest to me. I’ve pointed this out before.

            If you encourage prejudice in society as a whole against a group of people who didn’t ask to be homosexuals in the first place, they’re going to try to hide what they are (at least they did back when this started). They may also try to sublimate their frustrations through religion.

            In Ireland it was always a huge thing to have at least one priest in your (large) family. And the larger your family the more likely it was that one of your sons might be gay. Law of averages.

            And if your son was gay and your church-inspired prejudices made it impossible for him to tell you that and expect any sympathy, then he was going to look for a way out. An excuse for why he wasn’t ‘courting’ the local lasses and finding himself a wife.

            And where would you find a place to hide from society’s prejudices, pressures and expectations? Well, in a highly religious society you’d find it in a church that didn’t allow men to marry.

            Job done – a church with lots of gay men.

            Note that’s an explanation of why it has lots of gay men, not why it contains a number of paedophiles. A small percentage of ALL men are paedophiles (or hebephiles).

            Putting ANY men into a situation of long-term enforced celibacy where they have no conventional outlet for their sexuality is not going to help matters. It’s not even going to help them relate to the very people they’re supposed to be serving.

            But someone thought it was a good idea. Law of unintended consequences…

          • lilykline November 24, 2019 at 2:54 pm #

            Janos,
            I knew I couldn’t have a logical rational back and forth with you. Typical of your kind.

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 12:19 pm #

      What about the underlying platforms Democrats and Republicans run on. Are these “equally awful” as well?

    • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:28 pm #

      As if the Communist Threat wasn’t real. The madness on every College Campus proves that it was. But John Birch was wrong: it wasn’t mostly funded from Russia, but rather right from here. Home grown from the beginning since they also financed the Russian Revolution.

      • benr November 23, 2019 at 10:48 am #

        I have heard this preached by Alex Jones and always chocked it up under the can’t be proven check mark.
        Not to be dismissed out of hand but not something I believe.

        Some of it makes sense in order to run the military industrial complex an enemy is needed.
        I also read the Rand white paper a decade ago discussing the need for an enemy that can actually fight back not just defend

        • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:24 pm #

          Who do you think financed the Communists? Someone did. Workers with pitchforks or hammers aren’t going to get anywhere. The popular image is simply propaganda for something far more sophisticated and deadly.

          Why finance their enemies? Because they aren’t really. The Capitalists want to get everyone in the money economy of central banking. A medieval self sufficient system like Russia doesn’t serve them at all. They want markets! So use the Commies to smash that and before you know it, Rockerfeller is over there opening up a bank and making out with Kushchev. Don’t believe me? You can find the picture on line.

        • Q. Shtik November 23, 2019 at 2:01 pm #

          always chocked it up – benr

          =============

          chalked

  17. scoubidou123 November 22, 2019 at 10:46 am #

    Only twenty-seven times in ten minutes? She must have been slacking off. Here is what she sounds like on a good day: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kgBxfHdb4OU

    • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 12:39 pm #

      I used to think you had to be smart to be a Rhodes scholar.

  18. Walter B November 22, 2019 at 10:48 am #

    “And besides, in any trial based on due process, the accused has an absolute right to face his accuser.”

    True Jim, and that is one of the reasons why they are trying this one in the court of public deception instead. It is a farce and a sham am I am so grateful to your for following and reporting on it all because I could not stomach even one minute of hearing the nails on a chalkboard.

    “No political faction in history has begged so persuasively to be put to death, or deserved it more.”

    Sad but true and even sadder that the spineless scum across the aisle sit there with their collective thumbs up their asses and do nothing that might irritate George Soros. It is no wonder that the rest of the world laughs at our pathetic situation and will shortly be signing up with a new, brighter master. Byao Zhi Yang Duh!

  19. Ron Anselmo November 22, 2019 at 10:48 am #

    His answer to the reporter could be:

    1) 40 (8/2 x 10)
    2) the square root of 320 (64/2 x 10)
    3) 8/20

    depending upon how the question was punctuated.

    So, no doubt, the question would be asked verbally, so whatever answer he gave would be correct, but those with TDS, and the MSM, could loudly proclaim, wrong!

    Give it a rest.

    • Ron Anselmo November 22, 2019 at 12:50 pm #

      Not a dangling participle…reply related to a post by Seawolf77, which was subsequently pulled…

  20. Skylark November 22, 2019 at 10:51 am #

    I think it will be a race between how this whole impeachment farce plays out-and believe me I think both sides are crooks- and the world economy going off the rails, which will be a much bigger problem for us and everyone else.

    Lots of unrest already around the world based on young folks getting angry at the system.

    Editorial comment: > “warmly welcome a trail based” should be “trial” vs “trail”…

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  21. oilie November 22, 2019 at 10:53 am #

    Excuse me for waiting to see before I believe. The Horowitz report is already being front-runned with a story that it was only a low level staffer that made innocuous changes to a 302. By the time the report is released it will have been preceded by so much smoke screen that the media will just tell everyone to move along because there is nothing to see here. By the time Durham drops some indictments during August vacations, no one will notice.

  22. butter56 November 22, 2019 at 10:54 am #

    I saw a bumper sticker this morning. It read, I sure hope the Russians trick me into voting for Trump again. That sums up the sentiments in my county right now

  23. benr November 22, 2019 at 10:59 am #

    Where is the idiot brigade?
    Majella
    Seawolf
    Evilyn
    Paulo
    legion
    What witty drivel will they fling now that the farce has been unmasked and all their wildest dreams of a world without Trump at the tiller have been dashed on the rocks of reality?

    • K-Dog November 22, 2019 at 11:18 am #

      Wild dreams of a world without Trump dashed on the rocks of reality.

      ‘There she stood in the doorway
      I heard the mission bell
      And I was thinking to myself
      This could be Heaven or this could be Hell”
      Then she lit up a candle and she showed me the way
      There were voices down the corridor
      I thought I heard them say

      benr,

      You have answered the question!

    • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:34 pm #

      Legion? Is that Alba and Elrond?

      • benr November 22, 2019 at 1:47 pm #

        No the one who has been kicked off this board over and over and has changed his/her name a bunch but always posts the same type of rhetoric one of the names was Janet.

        Alba I don’t consider a member of the idiot brigade and I don’t consider Elrond at all.

        • benr November 22, 2019 at 2:00 pm #

          looks like wpa_ccc might be legion as well.

        • elysianfield November 22, 2019 at 8:41 pm #

          ” I don’t consider Elrond at all…”

          benr,

          Well, I do consider Elrond…I consider his opinions as educated, maybe even well educated, but without the filter of wisdom.

          A person who lives in a civilized society, and is cloistered in circumstances of means, would have opinions similar to what Elrond posts.

          He might just suffer a lack of experience with those who are socially inferior….

          • benr November 23, 2019 at 10:54 am #

            He is Canadian they have crime and lower class uneducated people.

            It has nothing to do with him or his politics that I say such.

            You might how ever be correct that he has never had a group of brown or black people came after him for the crime of white skin and blue eyes.
            Never had to punch another human in the face who was bussed into your school district because theirs was so bad and then have them disrespect your school, neighborhood and you personally.
            No it’s the fact that he is not voting for the enemy of a free America and the absolute decline of my country he is only talking about it.
            I have heard over and over from progressive Democrats that view Americans that do not hold their beliefs as the enemy and I have seen the behavior up close and personal.

  24. Luhrenloup November 22, 2019 at 11:09 am #

    Right now, the dems are headed for disaster if this goes to the senate. What if they voted against impeachment? Would that deny the senate their trial? Most likely, but the dems are too emotionally involved to let it go. The polls are really hammering them for this show trial.

    • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 11:23 am #

      The polls are showing increased approval of Trump and decreased interest in the impeachment.

      • Luhrenloup November 22, 2019 at 11:36 am #

        What is quite bizarre is at the end of the day one gets headlines from the dem side that they really proved their premise on this day and the repub stating that — it’s all over now with so and so’s testimony today, the very testimony that the dems say they’ve nailed Trump with! We have entered the Kafka world.

        • CancelMyCard November 22, 2019 at 12:26 pm #

          Ditto that.

          It’s just amazing that each side is convinced that polls show the public is overwhelmingly in support of their agenda, and pulls out the “evidence” to prove it.

          Both. Sides.

          We have truly entered the Twilight Zone.

          • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:38 pm #

            So. Let’s. Separate. But the idea of Traditional Whites being happy and prosperous is simply unbearable to you and your kind.

      • K-Dog November 22, 2019 at 1:21 pm #

        Pedophilia is also on the rise.

        • benr November 22, 2019 at 1:52 pm #

          Indeed it is and you can blame the rainbow coalition for this they keep moving the ball down the field of what was not acceptable verses what is now.
          Nambla wants a seat at the table and is even coining the phrase love is love age is just a number.

          You can’t even begin to understand the depths of depravity some people are willing to accept as normal behavior to show how woke they are.

          • K-Dog November 22, 2019 at 3:27 pm #

            I’m going to agree.

      • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 1:36 pm #

        Yeah, we’re bored. We want to see the Dreamers detained but not arrested, put in chain gangs, and forced to build the Wall in order to earn their citizenship.

        Any that protest prove they are enemies and thus illegal. No more grey areas. Black and White squares only.

  25. sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 11:21 am #

    What’s this all about?

    CNN legal analyst and former U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of New York Preet Bharara, who was fired by President Trump in 2017, says the news that former FBI agent Peter Strzok altered or forged a FISA warrant application used against Trump campaign associate Carter Page is “alarming.”

    “That’s kind of an alarming bit of news,” Bharara said. “If there was an FBI agent sworn to uphold the constitution who can be proven to have altered a document in connection with a legal proceeding, including the obtaining of a FISA warrant, that’s really serious. It doesn’t get more serious on that.”

    “That’s not a good thing. It’s a terrible thing,” he continued. “Law enforcement agents and prosecutors who work with them are sworn to uphold the constitution, sure, but actually even exceed the protections of the constitution. They have to be of the utmost integrity and the utmost candor. Especially when you’re making a representation to the court, which is what a FISA application is. It’s gotta be on the up-and-up.”

    Keep in mind Strzok wasn’t just an agent, he was a senior counterintelligence agent in the Russia investigation and during the FBI’s investigation into Hillary Clinton. He was fired in August 2018 after text messages about an “insurance policy” if Trump won and other biases were discovered by the Department of Justice Inspector General.

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  26. JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 11:22 am #

    I see both sides of the politics in DC both here and TV. No newspapers, they are too manipulated. Each side believes totally in what they say and believe. Both sides say the opposition are all lying SOBs. “I believe my side is the Truth!”

    It is the job of our republic to govern the people according to what the people vote. That is our democracy. My main concern about all the Liberal Dems is that they do not want the vote to count, they want unchallenged power. Impeachment with no basis, elimination of the electoral college allowing dictatorship by the majority, encouragement of illegal and dead voting, voting alliances like Acorn, socialistic answers for all social issues.

    BTW, the RINOs are just as bad in their own right. DC is a pit.

    • messianicdruid November 22, 2019 at 12:04 pm #

      “It is the job of our republic to govern the people according to what the people vote. That is our democracy.”

      It is the job of our democracy to govern the people according to what the people vote. That is our republic.

      Do words mean anything?

      • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 5:22 pm #

        Neither makes any sense. A Republic is not a Democracy. It is a Government of Laws, not men. It may use Democratic methods to elect officials, but that’s it. And if it wise, it would limit the franchise to Men of proven character and knowledge.

  27. PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 11:22 am #

    indeed
    to whom does it serve?

  28. Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 11:29 am #

    “…it would be logically impossible to reveal the “Whistleblower” by just naming an agency with thousands of little worker bees.”

    The key word here is logically. It is shocking to me how many somewhat intelligent people I’ve been meeting don’t understand logic.

    They repeat simple slogans or ‘talking points’ they heard somewhere, probably from someone who heard it off the radio or TV news, as if it were their own deep thinking.

    I know I keep referring to Ann Coulter, but she said something really interesting about the news industry the other day. Now when you see a story, it is really only an alert that an event has taken place. You have to do your own research to find out what the story actually is.
    Now that’s deep thinking.

    The MSM has gone self-service, just like the department stores that used to wait on customers. I said that part, Not Ann.

  29. Majella November 22, 2019 at 11:31 am #

    benr I’m with oilie- let’s wait & see. Just because JHK is predicting the end of ….well, everything, and reinforces all you believe, doesn’t make it necessarily so.

    • volodya November 22, 2019 at 12:24 pm #

      JHK is predicting a lot of what already happened. It’s not like collapse is coming, collapse is here. The USA is a shadow of what it once was, its interior gutted by decades of offshoring factories and good-paying, bread-winner jobs, a multitude of formerly bustling cities boarded up, decaying ruins.

      The young uns never saw what it was fifty years ago and so to them it’s not even a case of landscape amnesia. This is more a case of Orwell’s Winston Smith, or many Smiths, doing re-writes to scrub-out historical memory. Middle-class prosperity? Never happened. Nope, the data sez and studies show it’s a figment of 1950s Ozzie and Harriet TV land.

      Speaking for myself, I saw it with my own eyes and so I’m not fooled.

      What’s that hip saying? “Ok boomer”.

      I marvel at its brevity, and depth of contempt, but if there’s any indication of knowing or showing a way forward, I don’t see it.

      • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 12:55 pm #

        I recently met a man who does flight training for Christian missionaries.
        In order to get in and out of remote locations where missions are often based, you need specially trained pilots.
        The flights are the mission for some of the young couples.

        This man said that among ‘millenials’, he finds a divide. I didn’t understand everything he said, because it got very technical, but the gist of it was that about half of the young men who showed an interest were unsuited to the amount of hard work and learning it took, but there were still young people with the aptitude, capability, fortitude and desire to undertake difficult things and carry along the knowledge from previous generations.

        Somebody pointed out to me that this naming of the generations is a means of pitting different, artificial ‘groups’ against each other.

        • K-Dog November 22, 2019 at 1:23 pm #

          But if people started believing a certain brand of bullshit at a particular historical time…………….

        • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 2:06 pm #

          Living in Virtual Reality combined with Higher Education turning into a babysitter business is undermining the good old Emersonian self-reliance of prior times. See ‘The Genius Famine’ …

      • hmuller November 22, 2019 at 1:03 pm #

        Not only prosperity died (for the mass of Americans); freedom died.

        Young people today are used to being surveilled 24-7. It’s all so normal for them. They believe “rights” are what the government allows us.

        • benr November 22, 2019 at 1:21 pm #

          That is a true statement.
          Also add in the if you have noting to hide you have nothing to worry about.

          Unless you are not in lock step with the power structure!

        • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 1:31 pm #

          Chris Cuomo even said that on live television.

          He just the other day tried to prove that yes you can hear the other person on a cell phone call when you are in the same room with someone making a call.
          Poor Fredo.

          • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 5:17 pm #

            “Remember kids, you aren’t allowed to read Wikileaks. For the news it’s different …”

  30. Majella November 22, 2019 at 11:36 am #

    What does Fox’s resident media judge say?

    https://youtu.be/DNxkYrocSu8

    As he points out, the significant number of witnesses that were refused permission to testify is evidence in and of itself.

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    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 12:37 pm #

      Resident Never-Trumper media judge Majella…

      • BenWha November 23, 2019 at 5:13 am #

        In Quebec (Canada), we have quite a few such media judges in our French-language mainstram medias’ Comments sections. Funny thing is that some can hardly consult English-language media where there more volume of information and more editorial diversity.

  31. Majella November 22, 2019 at 11:40 am #

    Or is Napolitano just a another ‘deep state shill, a liar, a RINO’?

    Who among the rabid RWNJs round here will add a paedophilia smear next?

    • hmuller November 22, 2019 at 12:25 pm #

      The high priesthood of the deep state hate your heroine Tulsi Gabbard almost as much as they hate Trump.

      “A New York Times writer who praised Hillary Clinton for wearing a white pantsuit called Tulsi Gabbard a “cult leader” for wearing exactly the same thing. ….Friedman said it made her look like a “cult leader” full of “combative righteousness” and that the white fabric has “connotations of the fringe, rather than the center” and even undermines “community building.” https://www.zerohedge.com/political/nytimes-pans-cult-leader-gabbards-white-pant-suit-after-praising-hillary-same-outfit

      This raises the question: does Tulsi buy her clothes at Clinton garage sales? And how much does she have to downsize those giant oven-mitt fashion statements to fit her.

      • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 1:06 pm #

        White is popular with some of the darker complexioned ladies for public appearances.
        They believe it flatters a browner skin tone, while looking elegant.

        Therefore the NYT is racist to comment on it.

        Actually they just wanted to bring up the cult rumors about Tulsi without appearing to.

        • hmuller November 22, 2019 at 1:16 pm #

          Who doesn’t love being shaken down for cash by dancing, chanting “hairy krishna’s”? That and Hindu telemarketers are the sunshine in my day.

          • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 1:35 pm #

            Are the Krishna’s still doing that?
            It never caught on big around here. I was just thinking the other day, I couldn’t remember the last time I saw one of those Moonies out selling flowers.
            Nostalgia…

        • benr November 23, 2019 at 10:57 am #

          In Puerto Rico marrying someone with lighter skin is called marrying up.

      • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 5:24 pm #

        To be fair, this is the kind of stuff Majjer and co. are knee-deep in:

        https://crooksandliars.com/2019/10/tulsi-gabbard-does-not-deny-being-russian

        • Majella November 23, 2019 at 1:45 am #

          Seriously? A smear by HRC has to be denied? When she has zero credibility?

          I’m disappointed, Herr Beweise. This is your nadir.

          • Nightowl November 23, 2019 at 3:39 pm #

            The point is over your head, as usual.

            The point was that you consume this sort of media. Your media Gods don’t like Tulsi.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:11 am #

            Nightowl: your intellectual arrogance is overwhelmingly self-damning. What a twat.

            You dismiss the testimony of people, like Fiona Hill, as partisan lies because her view doesn’t cosy-up to your deluded FFvCS ‘is a saviour -hero’ bullshit.

            I’d give her 30+ years of studying Russia and, more latterly Putin, a shed-load more credibility than your self-congratulatory smug opinion. It really doesn’t matter that you think you’re right, because you’re objectively wrong in the face of the facts.

          • cc rider November 24, 2019 at 10:25 am #

            I found that Fiona Hill’s testimony to be the most credible out of all. Not only that I found her to be the most credible person during that whole two week hearing show. I think she is an exceptional person and a true patriot. I’m going to read her book on Putin.

            Regarding HRC, well I still don’t believe anything that comes out of her mouth. I think she and her hubby are two of the most crooked and corrupt politicians in the history of the western world. Both are narcissists. HRC strikes me as being a full blown sociopath.

            Oh, yes I also think Trump is a narcissist. It is quite obvious. But, most in politics are. Sadly, too many are sociopaths as well.

  32. Q. Shtik November 22, 2019 at 11:55 am #

    Note the first line of my comment above at 11:14 am. That was a cut and paste from a seawolf77 comment. That seawolf comment has disappeared. What could possibly be the reason? Was there something “scurrilous” in it that went right over my head?

    • malthuss November 22, 2019 at 7:18 pm #

      Seapup was banned.
      I didnt read much of his stuff, unlike your posts.

  33. Luhrenloup November 22, 2019 at 11:58 am #

    What we know for sure is that there has always been an elite class and there will always be one; they call the shots. America’s problem is that it refuses to believe that. it has been snookered into believing that anybody can achieve that status if only . . .

  34. Q. Shtik November 22, 2019 at 12:02 pm #

    Unbelievable!! Now my 11:14 am comment has disappeared.

    • volodya November 22, 2019 at 12:07 pm #

      It also happened to me. Log out, then log back in.

    • Majella November 22, 2019 at 12:08 pm #

      Weird. JHK is usually upfront about any moderation. It must be an Alphabet agency!

      • volodya November 22, 2019 at 12:29 pm #

        Probably a glitch of some kind. I had a comment vanish and then come back if I logged out and then back in.

        • benr November 22, 2019 at 12:51 pm #

          Something has changed with the code on the board it makes lots of stuff not visible till you log on.

          • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 2:05 pm #

            This is true. I was going to mention this a few days ago. The same 6-7 posts repeat.

      • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 2:04 pm #

        Probably the Russians. Right?

        • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 2:09 pm #

          Or Deep StTe…

  35. volodya November 22, 2019 at 12:03 pm #

    No political faction in history has begged so persuasively to be put to death, or deserved it more. – Mr K

    So JHK sez that the Democrats deserve electoral annihilation and organizational dissolution. I agree that any elementary notion of justice and fair play requires it, and not only that, but also the health and vitality of that great, continent-sized commonwealth known as the USA. 

    My temporal perspective is limited to one short lifetime plus what I’ve read about history which at best gives a fragmentary picture of the past. But I have a hard time visualizing a more corrosive societal group, one more adept and unapologetic in its dissemination of the most outlandish misinformation and distortion, one more willing to alienate large segments of the populace by means of the most in-your-face bigotry, while at the same time accusing political opponents of those very same offenses and not only that, but committing the most bald-faced criminality in aid of obtaining power. 

    Republicans in comparison are feeble amateurs, but actors that nonetheless asked for the executioners block from their voters. And, happily, their voters obliged, thus removing from the body politic one source of scum and villainy. And so bye-bye Mitt, bye-bye Paul Ryan, farewell Jeff Flake, so long to your list of nonsensical talking points, you guys stunk up the joint for way too long and the same goes for your charlatan compadres declining to run in the next cycle. Fuck-you-all, see you in hell. 

    I would agree that having long ago expended the last dregs of credibility as a political vehicle for the ideals of clean governance and the common good, the Democrats are way past their guillotine date. That they’ve thus far avoided the blade is a testament to two things. 

    The first is that as a vehicle for the interests of Wall Street and its attendant clerisy, the Democrats may still have a lot of life, arguably having outdone the Republicans in sheer audacity in nakedly advocating for a narrow economic caste. And they delivered the goods. Democrat accomplishments on this score are truly impressive, starting with Bill Clinton in his shepherding NAFTA into law and then China into the WTO and then in de-regulating big banks and then in declining to regulate financial instruments which had a crying need for just that. And then Obama in rescuing Wall Street’s sorry ass by way of trillions in free money. Oligarchs have got a lot to be thankful for and so, from that one small but wealthy coterie, the Democrats have a ready source of financial assets.

    The second is the pathetic credulousness of their voters. The mystery is why are ordinary people falling for the Democrat con which is this, that you are a morally and intellectually worthy soul for voting Democrat, for those same Democrats who claim to look out for the marginalized and disenfranchised. It’s laughable, because if Democrats aren’t most transparently in the business of creating marginalized and disenfranchised then I need new glasses. It’s a joke that Democrat voters fell for this preposterous flattery.  

    It may just be that Democrat voters are willing to eat table scraps left by Silicon Valley, Hollywood and Manhattan because they can’t visualize any alternative, ie one of a self-sustaining economy that benefits the great majority instead of just those people huddling coastal cities. The pity is that it’s like Herb Stein said, if something can’t go on, it won’t. And this can’t go on. 

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    • hmuller November 22, 2019 at 12:54 pm #

      I remember an election years ago. Wisconsin allowed voter registration on election day. So Democratic party activists fanned out and registered the homeless; then shepherded them into the voting booths.

      For participating in this drill each homeless person was paid one pack of cigarettes. Now doesn’t that just reek of ‘compassion’ for the disenfranchised?

    • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 6:19 pm #

      Blah, blah, blah! These things go in cycles. I remember countless diatribes written about the R party just a handful of years ago in the wake of the Bush/Cheney conflagration.

      The better point, and I’m surprised you didn’t make it more explicitly, is that BOTH parties are beholden to the same monied interests, and this is all just an old fashioned shell game to keep the masses stirred up and guessing about where their alleged political payoff is coming from next.

      Give it four more years and the Dems will emerge from the wilderness contrite and humbled and vanquish the R heathens once again and all will be right with the world again until the game swings the other way a few years after that. Same as it ever was.

      Clean governance? Refresh my memory. Exactly when has such ever been exhibited in an environment such as this?

      • volodya November 23, 2019 at 10:02 am #

        The better point, and I’m surprised you didn’t make it more explicitly, is that BOTH parties are beholden to the same monied interests, and this is all just an old fashioned shell game to keep the masses stirred up and guessing about where their alleged political payoff is coming from next. –  E

        I’ve made that point is other posts. Distraction is the name of the game to keep people from noticing that the donor class is emptying the vault. Tranny washrooms? Drag Queen story time? Abortion? To the barricades! 

        History is highly instructive. Nothing goes on forever. Rome, for all its longevity and globe girdling might, was brought low, its Byzantine successor got whittled to nothing.

        So many ruling elites chased away or killed, the French doing a number on theirs, the Romanovs shot and stuffed down a mine shaft, the Kaiser sent packing, same with the Hapsburgs and Ottomans, and more lately, the commie regimes in Europe. Many examples out there. 

        Do you expect that it’s different this time? Each ruling elite thinks it can be dented maybe but never brought down. And yet they all are. 

        The sun never set on the British Empire, its subjects comprising one quarter of the world’s people. And now? Stick a fork in it, the UK’s present-day rulers drooling cretins.

        The Founding Fathers were titans compared to the dick-heads running the show nowadays. And the Democrats and Republicans are window dressing, just front-men for billionaires, nothing more. They’ll go down like the rest. 

  36. James Howard Kunstler November 22, 2019 at 12:23 pm #

    I’m deleting all of Seawolf’s posts. He was banned weeks ago and snuck back in. Anybody engaging with or replying to him will be banned too. I hope that’s clear.

    • benr November 22, 2019 at 12:52 pm #

      Good to know he wont be missed

    • Q. Shtik November 22, 2019 at 12:58 pm #

      This is interesting. I had no idea one could sneak back in once banned. On the prior thread the infamous wpa_ccc who you had emphatically banned several weeks ago was able to submit a comment on Nov 19. He/she/it/they have had so many names I’m not sure what name was in use at the time of being banned.

      https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/entertaining-questions/#comment-452516

      • cc rider November 22, 2019 at 1:04 pm #

        Many people use VPNs now. That and a different email address is all that is needed to sneak back in.

      • Majella November 22, 2019 at 5:09 pm #

        …and has again today, down-thread. Seems innocuous enough a post.

    • Walter B November 22, 2019 at 2:06 pm #

      Bless you, thank you James.

      • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 6:04 pm #

        Why was SeaWolf booted Walter?

        • Walter B November 22, 2019 at 10:32 pm #

          You would have to ask our host that question my friend. All I can say was that I at least found much of what SheHeIT posted to be raw, baseless and inflammatory and certainly not a productive addition to reasonable discussion. Perhaps James Kunstler prefers this place to be one where people can come and argue respectfully without resorting to bullshit personal and petty attacks, and if he does I admire him for that. A person with skill with words should be able to tell an opponent to go to hell in such a fashion that he looks forward to the trip, You know what I’m saying?

          • hmuller November 22, 2019 at 11:58 pm #

            Sometimes seawolf had a point to make; other times it was pure abusive obscenities and name calling. I don’t know for a fact, but I suspect it depended on how far down into the bottle he was at any given time.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:16 am #

            ‘Sometimes seawolf had a point to make; other times it was pure abusive obscenities and name calling’

            Huh? That could apply to quite a few posters hereabouts. benr, for one, is very quick on the ad hominem trigger, lacking the finesse of insult as displayed by the likes of Janos.

    • malthuss November 22, 2019 at 4:50 pm #

      what if others do not see this?

    • Majella November 22, 2019 at 5:07 pm #

      I’d be interested to know why, precisely, he has been booted out.

    • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 7:37 pm #

      OK, thanks Mr. Jim. I didn’t realize that he was banned.

    • elysianfield November 22, 2019 at 9:01 pm #

      ” Anybody engaging with or replying to him will be banned too. I hope that’s clear.”

      Mr Kunstler,
      It would help if the readership were aware of those who’ve been banned…insofar as future responses might jeopardize the unwary.

      I was unaware that he had been banned….I am also laboring under the perception that those banned might, as may have occurred in the past. be given second chances…double secret probation, and such. I certainly will not argue with your rules, nor your right to enforce them…just need a bit of guidance.

      • Majella November 23, 2019 at 1:50 am #

        Hear, hear.

    • Majella November 23, 2019 at 3:50 am #

      ‘Engaging with’ possibly could use some clarification as well.

      • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 12:53 pm #

        Should we engage legal counsel to define and iron out the issues involved? Maybe hold JHK impeachment hearings for abuse of power? LOL

  37. James Kuehl November 22, 2019 at 12:41 pm #

    Part of Trump’s problem is his lack of finesse. He instinctively knows the attack on him is exactly as perfidious as Mr. Kunstler so well describes. But Trump is such an oaf he can only manage to blurt out “I didn’t do the bad thing so stop picking on me!” His opponents, as inept and corrupt as they are, have him red-handed. Getting caught using his leverage over a head of state to smear a political foe will be his legacy, like Clinton’s is playing doctor with an intern.

    • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 1:13 pm #

      Didn’t Ms. Stefanik already bring out the fact that these things did not occur?
      I believe so.
      The reason for the possible impeachment keep changing.

      Know what else kept changing? The reason for our invasion of Iraq.
      That was all George Bush?
      The Democrats were on board with that too. That was the early days of the single party.

      • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 2:10 pm #

        A lot of what we are seeing is the result of the neocon/lib infestation.

        Our foreign policy was nearly entirely in line with the PNAC manifesto until Trump arrived.

        Obama did nothing different. If he ever even had good intentions, he certainly folded quickly, and paved the way for the Fake News with the removal of the ban on domestic propaganda.

      • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 2:14 pm #

        I don’t understand the ‘boots on the ground’ approach but the fact that Saddam Hussein kept bragging about having WMD made him an existential threat from the perspective of both parties.

        • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:32 pm #

          My oh my, you are naive aren’t you? Can you spell o-i-l?

  38. cc rider November 22, 2019 at 12:52 pm #

    Yes, after the hearing on Wednesday Liddle Shifty had to pray the “Hail Whistleblower” for walking in to the trap laid by Rep. Ratcliffe:

    “Hail Whistleblower, hidden of face, the deep state is with thee; blessed art thou amongst Spooks, and blessed is thine home of thy Scheme….Langley and DC.

    Holy Whistleblower, Mysterious as a Ghoul, pray for us Democrats, now and at the approaching hour of our demise. Oh, Man…”

    (Some credit to elysianfield for the above “prayer”. I used his hilarious “Hail Greta” from a few days ago as a template for the “Hail Whistleblower”).

    • Majella November 22, 2019 at 2:04 pm #

      Please, tell me you recognise the Template EF used???

      • cc rider November 22, 2019 at 2:21 pm #

        Well of course I do. I should’ve said I used elysianfield’s “Hail Greta” as an inspiration rather than as a template.

        Everybody knows that the template is the Presbyterian “Hail Calvin”. Duh.

        • Majella November 22, 2019 at 5:04 pm #

          Duh, indeed. *lol*

        • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 12:56 pm #

          I’m waiting for Greta to get her own reality show. Gotta enlighten those masses.

  39. Ron Anselmo November 22, 2019 at 12:54 pm #

    Jim – Thanks, one of your best closings ever. Nice.

  40. neon sky November 22, 2019 at 1:05 pm #

    I want to see the perp walk.

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  41. Billy Hill November 22, 2019 at 1:06 pm #

    One wonders whether the entire spectacle in its descent to theater of the absurd is in fact a smokescreen for something else, something far more sinister and threatening. Perhaps even something not yet realized or articulated but potentially real?

    In his analysis of Zelensky’s Trump-induced conundrum Dmitri Orlov mentioned almost off-handedly the Russian hypersonic capability. In a post-MAD world the threat is magnified but not because some archduke could step in front of an assassin’s bullet: I submit cyber controls have introduced a threat level beyond the reach of human intervention. Back in the good old days there were several aborted nuclear launches because someone with authority did not believe either the instrumentation or resisted attempts to violate chain of command (I think of a Canadian general who called off a use-it-or-lose it response to what turned out to be a particularly bright full moon, and a Soviet submarine commander who stood his ground during the Cuban missile crisis). The computer experts are not God.

    There are engineers in the group here. Even safety margins out the wazoo, redundancy, and designing to worst-case do not defeat Murphy’s Law. Nor monsters from the id.

  42. sprawlcapital November 22, 2019 at 1:22 pm #

    After all this raging against Russia by various Americans, I find it amazing that Russia is still willing to use its spacecraft to transport our astronauts to and from the International Space Station. We should not take for granted Russian good will in this matter.

    • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 6:05 pm #

      Putin, ever the statesman who is actually genuinely looking after his nation state, is playing the long game. First rule: never provoke your enemy when they are in the midst of committing national suicide. He also realizes that it’s not “Americans” per se who are evil, it’s only their totally corrupt Zionist globalist federal government. But you’re right. Russian goodwill will not be an open-ended thing in the future. Nor Chinese for that matter. They’re both just humoring us for now.

  43. wpa_ccc November 22, 2019 at 1:31 pm #

    JohnAZ: ““How many times do you think the government of the US leaned on a country to get something done. ”

    Fugeguy: “Happens all the time on multiple levels. Seen it happen. Been part of the mechanism to deliver the message.”

    It has never been done before Trump. No president has ever leaned on a foreign government to force them to investigate a US domestic political opponent in an election year (or announce an investigation on CNN as Trump demanded).

    It has never been done in US history. It is illegal. Trump has publicly called on both Ukraine and China to investigate Biden. That by itself is an impeachable offense.

    Any president who uses taxpayer money, money which was lawfully appropriated in a bipartisan vote of Congress, to attempt to extort or bribe a foreign power to interfere in US elections should be impeached, Democrat or Republican or Libertarian or Independent.

    Americans should decide US elections, not foreigners who are being bribed with US taxpayer dollars by a corrupt president.

    • Beryl of Oyl November 22, 2019 at 1:38 pm #

      Go back and reread Elise Stefanik’s line of questioning.

      • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 2:13 pm #

        Or Ratcliffe and Jordan.

        Every star witness folded and admitted no quid pro quo and no bribery.

        • Majella November 22, 2019 at 4:38 pm #

          I’ve reviewed each of Stefanik’s questioning of witnesses. She is solely focused on the ‘perfect call’, whereas the more damning evidence is in the weeks & days prior and afterwards, until the release of the security aid two days after they knew they were busted.

          John Bolton should sit down and testify..and where’s Pompeo? Mulvaney?

          • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 5:13 pm #

            So now it’s not about the call? Oh, no. Given the drubbing from the previous thread, I understand.

            So let’s tackle the new talking point. Provide this damning concrete evidence for this supposed crime.

            And, whatever you do, don’t look up Zelensky’s own comments on the matter.

          • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 5:58 pm #

            John Bolton? Now there’s a credible witness!

            A long standing Zionist and deep state member whom Trump rightfully fired for being an insubordinate pompous ass.

          • Majella November 23, 2019 at 3:55 am #

            Bolton, as a shit-monger, knows shit when he sees it. Hence his ‘get off the grass!’ to FFvCS re: Ghouliani, followed by sacking by Tweet.

            While I have little more than contempt for his politics, at thus point I’d believe him over Pompeo, Mulvanry of dRumpf.

          • Majella November 23, 2019 at 3:59 am #

            Nightowl
            The call is self-impeaching, but still open to interpretation.

            Clearing the decks in State Dept officers in Ukraine so Ghouliani & his thugs could get down to chasing a debunked CT re: the DNC & 2016 and what happened thereafter is the ACTUAL offence.

            Getting busted before success is not an exoneration of sleazy, even criminal, intent.

            I

          • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 1:03 pm #

            Oh Majella, say it aint so! You’re welcoming John Bolton and his revolting mustache into your ideological bed? Have you lost all self-respect?

          • Nightowl November 23, 2019 at 3:43 pm #

            Maj’s condition is inoperable.

            We see clearly that even with video evidence debunking all of her nutbar conspiracy theories, and the blessing of the Ukrainian Pres., proof does not matter. Only emotions.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:21 am #

            Nightowl, you need to get a new set of specs, and possibly upgrade your hearing aids, if you cannot see the contextual game of “Twister” your GOP ‘’heroes’’ have been playing. The transparent dishonesty is mind-boggling.

    • benr November 22, 2019 at 1:58 pm #

      Someone has no concept of history or are you simply mistaken!
      Ted Kennedy begged the Russians to help defeat the gipper Mr. Reagan.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4VgLkk_drx4

      • Majella November 22, 2019 at 2:15 pm #

        Great video, benr. Thx.

        • Majella November 22, 2019 at 4:35 pm #

          However, I can’t see the relevance to the Ted Kennedy story.

          As well, it shouldn’t be necessary to point out that Ted Kennedy was not President at the time.

          Then there’s Pappy Bush’s collusion with the Iranian Muftis to hold the hostages a few weeks longer so Raygun would get a big ‘win’ just after the election.

          It’s been going on for years, but that doesn’t make ANY of it acceptable.

          • benr November 23, 2019 at 11:02 am #

            It was just for a little bit of levity.

            That was an absolute stroke of genius which only made Jimmy Carter look even more weak and useless as President.
            Also add in huge interest rates on cars and houses.
            Terrible gas prices and the fact my wonderful country was in the throws of absolute failure.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:30 am #

            So, because Reagan was a Republican, it was okay? Tell the hostages that, please.

            Also, please explain how it was Carter’s fault that inflation went nuts just a few years after Nixon closed the gold window and OPEC decided to extort a 100% increase in the oil price?

            That was all from ‘74 to ‘83, when you were between 6 & 15 years old…I was paying 22% interest on my mortgage in 1982, in New Zealand. It wasn’t just the USA that wore that economic shit-storm – we ALL did.

            Volker got the economy of the US by the scruff of the neck and whipped inflation through crippling interest rates. That was the CURE, not the failure.

            Just, occasionally, read some history before you start spouting your one-eyed GOP talking points. Please!

          • benr November 24, 2019 at 10:31 am #

            I don’t need to read history sunshine I lived it.

            Your reality redefined is not the truth!
            Consider no internet and the news media was not enthralled by Democrats as it is now.
            Mr. Peanuts has not been viewed by history kindly.
            GOP vision or other and anyone that says he was a good President is living in a state of disinformation and abject denial.

      • cc rider November 22, 2019 at 2:29 pm #

        Oh that Ted! He had just a little too much Jameson that day. Okay, yeah, it was pretty much everyday.

        And not just a little.

    • fugeguy November 22, 2019 at 4:38 pm #

      Biden and many others in our government are crooks enriching themselves using public dollars.

      Hang ’em high.

    • JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 10:57 am #

      You will be tripping over your tongue when the malfeasance over the Dem side of the Russiagate fiasco shows up. Putting pressure on oligarchs in Russia and possibly Ukraine to put pressure against Trump, using British connections to spin tall tales about Trump and all financed by HRC and the DNC. Let’s see, I believe that was 2015 to the present.

      Gee, how come every leader in Ukraine is denying these charges? And do not use the Dem excuse that they fear Trump, he maybe gone shortly for all they know.

  44. REMONSTER November 22, 2019 at 2:56 pm #

    Oh workers can you stand it?
    Oh tell me how you can?
    Will you be a lousy scab
    Or will you be a man?

    Which side are you on?
    Which side are you on?
    Which side are you on?
    Which side are you on?

  45. Q. Shtik November 22, 2019 at 3:10 pm #

    NYT,

    I have been highly annoyed by your incessant Editorial and Op-Ed left-wing slant and will take this subscription price increase as my signal to cancel and instead drop by my local library to read “All the News That’s Fit to Print” if and when curiosity moves me.

    Regards,

    Q.

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    • K-Dog November 22, 2019 at 3:36 pm #

      “All the News That’s Fit to Print”

      Ever consider that letters and words appearing on you computer monitor might not actually be fit to print. Lighting up pixels on your screen does not count as printing.

      Reason – Many, but the lack of durability enhancing deception is the biggie. Paper has the virtue of having to rot away to hide what was printed. Now we are a land without accountability and it is not working out so well. And digital signatures are slowly being accepted, a huge mistake!

    • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 5:28 pm #

      Is this real or just a fantasy?

      • Q. Shtik November 22, 2019 at 9:04 pm #

        Is this real or just a fantasy? – Janos

        =============

        I received an email from the NYT today advising me that the weekly subscription price would go up sometime in January from $19 to $21.25. I replied by email and what you see time-stamped 3:10 pm, above is a verbatim copy.

        Whether I follow through and cancel is yet to be determined. My wife would freak out.

        • benr November 23, 2019 at 11:06 am #

          I used to love newspapers there is something about the actual printed word on paper that is lost on the screen.
          Books are the same way reading a short one now called Strategic vision America and the crisis of global power. -Vbigniew Brzezinski

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:33 am #

            Please notice how much the punctuation contributes to the sense of the material, and maybe try using a little.

            Your c&p posts stick out like a sore thumb, because they have commas & ‘shit’.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:36 am #

            Also, isn’t Brzezinski a total Deep State schill, who worked for (gasp!) a Democrat president? So, what are you learning from this fount of wisdom that Janos & Nightowl can’t give you?

          • benr November 24, 2019 at 10:28 am #

            @majella

            Oh yes he is a deep state nightmare but one must understand the enemy no?

            I suggest slowing down your reading and then suddenly my posts will pop out in other ways.

  46. RB November 22, 2019 at 3:31 pm #

    Meanwhile, Rome is burning to the ground. Trump keeps tweeting. He still thinks he is the smartest person in any room and that he is a powerful CEO with the ability to fire as the mood moves him. Who is left on his staff that is capable? He cannot trust anyone evidently. Maybe the butler did it? But hey, this is nothing new in presidential politics. Wade into American History and you’ll find MSM making life miserable for a president and other pols attacking viciously. Lincoln had to be smuggled into Washington DC to his inauguration. Reporters reporting from the battlefields made up stuff to suit their own biases making Grant’s life hell. The problem nowadays is everyone/anyone can vote. You don’t even have to be alive.

  47. Q. Shtik November 22, 2019 at 3:58 pm #

    A couple of days ago someone wrote “…production growth in December forecast to go to zero. Goose egg. Nada. Butt kiss.” and it has been bothering me ever since.

    The word (from Yiddish), meaning absolutely nothing, is bupkis. Maybe he knew this but was just trying to be cute, who knows.

    • Janos Skorenzy November 22, 2019 at 5:28 pm #

      Are they still giving you a hard time over there?

    • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 10:26 pm #

      Wasn’t there a football player with the unlikely name of Dick Buttkiss?

      • Q. Shtik November 23, 2019 at 11:36 pm #

        Butkus

  48. DEFCON1 November 22, 2019 at 4:26 pm #

    Thanks so very much Adam Schiff – I can’t imagine what you were going through trying to corral these whining ninnies for 5 days. The GOP, as is its wont these fine days, came off like a screaming pack of children who are not going to get their way. Between the dull-normal Jordan and that insufferable bitch Stefaik you had a worse load than a day-care teacher.

    Well done and I truly hope this disgusting load is impeached and gotten rid of.

    • Nightowl November 22, 2019 at 5:15 pm #

      If only you had a crime to impeach with.

      • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 6:58 pm #

        True. Schiff almost certainly just following orders in this whole affair; a mere water carrier for a much larger agenda which remains unclear at this time, but appears to be mostly a mere Hail Mary 2020 electioneering stunt in support of an increasingly desperate Dem/Deep State effort to remove a threat to their very existence. The good news is that it continues to draw the deep state out of the shadows and expose/confirm their many dirty tricks, although it remains to be seen if the somnambulant American populace is intelligent enough to figure it all out in time to salvage what little remains of their republic (“if we can keep it”).

        The upside, assuming there actually is one, is that it provides a modicum of entertainment in these barren times, when big capital has won all and is about to foreclose on everything lock, stock, and barrell, before the inevitable life of barrenness and servitude that faces us all in the near term future manifests itself.

        • Nightowl November 23, 2019 at 3:53 pm #

          Impeachment optics. It is entirely political. Not even worth discussing at this point.

          The real problem is how do we restore any semblance of decency in our institutions?

          The media as we know it is literally done, for at least a generation. A positive thing, given their abdication of duty for self-enrichment.

          The FBI, DOJ, and State are also entirely untrustworthy. Cronies hiring cronies. Their reputations tarnished to the point of no return — for decades.

          We have undergone a soft coup. We are one step away from a banana republic.

      • Majella November 23, 2019 at 4:04 am #

        On what crime was WJC impeached? The Whitewater Scandal (where the SC started) ? No.

        Screwing with interns in the broom closet of the Oval Office? No.

        Getting caught lying to Congress under oath? Yes.

        Let FFvSC sit down under oath. Please! Just 2 questions in (and that’s being extremely generous!) he’d be indicted on the same charge.

        • Nightowl November 23, 2019 at 3:45 pm #

          Impeach Trump because feelz.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:38 am #

            Impeach FFvCS because lies.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:41 am #

            As you said above:

            ‘The real problem is how do we restore any semblance of decency in our institutions?‘

            Couldn’t agree more, but phase one is getting rid of the current ‘drunk uncle’ in the WH.

  49. Q. Shtik November 22, 2019 at 6:05 pm #

    Early Feb 2020 will mark 14 years that I am retired. For the last 8 years of my career I worked for a despot I refer to as Mot Sregdor. He was a detestable character from my vantage point. Years ago I described him and his many foibles on this board. Foible is far too kind a word. He was short with the stature of a fire plug.

    He suffered with ADHD, or rather those forced to tolerate him suffered from his ADHD. He would disassemble and reassembled his ball point pen and click it open and shut incessantly while we discussed some complex financial matter. If not the pen, he would twist a thick rubber band around his fingers until, on one occasion, it snapped, flew through the air and hit him in the face. He jiggled his foot on the floor so rapidly and forcefully that his chair literally vibrated. What must a new visitor to his office think, I wondered.

    Watching him masticate his morning bagel and cream cheese and wash it down with large swills of coffee was like staring into the open end of a construction site cement mixer.

    He told me on more than one occasion that he was “brilliant.” He held a degree in physics. How he wound up in a financial position, I don’t know.

    He was recently divorced. Of course. How could such a person maintain a marriage?

    However, as I observe Trump in action I see certain traits and methods of operation common to Mot and Trump.

    Shortly after Mot came on board as Director of Government Compliance he held a meeting with his small staff of three. I wish I could remember his exact words but essentially he said we, as a department, would simply DECLARE what we want others to believe is true of us whether it is or it isn’t. And we would hold to that line relentlessly.

    I was reminded of this sometime in Trump’s first year in office when his nascent administration appeared to be in utter chaos. He told reporters with a perfectly straight face that his administration was “running like a well oiled machine.” Warm breakfast coffee shot from my nose as I succumbed to the hilarity of the bald-faced lie.

    There was something else I learned from Mot: When asked a question don’t EVER begin an answer like “Well, I imagine or I think…” Mot would explode with “I don’t give a SHIT what you THINK, go find the absolutely correct answer.”

    • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 6:30 pm #

      Opening any opinionated statement with the phrase ” I think” is also redundant, and generally a sign – especially in an oral statement – that the speaker is marking time and/or equivocating. When hearing it I immediately think to myself, “of course you think this, or why fucking else would you be saying it?

      As for Trump, if he had to actually listen to and judge himself as harshly as he did all the people he’s famously fired, he too would long since have been sent to the showers. He’s a bald-faced liar and charlatan and always has been, which makes him ideally suited for his current position in a bastion of similar psychopathic types.

      • benr November 23, 2019 at 11:09 am #

        Type A to a tee!

  50. sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 6:33 pm #

    Investors Business Daily reported in November 2018 about the fracking revolution in the United States:

    The river of oil now hitting the market from U.S. fracking has stunned global energy markets. The U.S. has already leapfrogged both Russia and Saudi Arabia as the No. 1 producer. For the first time since World War II, the U.S. is on the verge of being a net oil exporter — something that, just five years ago, would have been considered impossible.

    This, of course, has caught the 28-nation Organization of Petroleum Exporting Countries by surprise. Even just a few years ago, the consensus was that fracking and its related technologies would add a decent amount of oil to the market, but nothing like what’s happening now.

    As Javier Blas of Bloomberg notes, U.S. oil output is rising at its fastest pace in 98 years. Meanwhile, both Russia and the Saudis are also pumping at record levels. The U.S. is tipping the scale. Since 2010 in the West Texas Permian Oil Basin alone, some 114,000 new wells have been drilled, bringing millions of barrels of new oil to the market. Other parts of the U.S. are undergoing the same transformation.

    Based on what I see here we will not be running out of oil anytime soon. Now if we could only built efficiency into our energy infrastructure we’d be doing something…

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    • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:03 pm #

      Perhaps you should focus a bit more on sunsets these days? I won’t bother disputing any of this cherry-picked nonsense here, as I’m sure you spent a lot of time and energy picking it. I sincerely hope you enjoy that future you’ve chosen for us. Who knows? Unicorns might just exist after all!

      • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 7:15 pm #

        Quite the contrary. It was a quick cut and paste. Apparently for you however there is much to dispute…

        • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:18 pm #

          Apparently.

        • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 3:52 pm #

          “I don’t actually know anything about the topic, but I heard a rumor”… sounds like the beginning of witness testimony brought to us by Adam Schiff.

          But seriously, I heard a rumor all this fracking has been done at a financial loss. They’ve borrowed 250 billion dollars to frack and get oil which was then sold for less than that sum.

          Meaning – at the end of the day someone gets caught holding the bag. In this case a bag of unpayable debt instruments issued by the frackers. But don’t worry, it’s not like your pension fund really needed that money. LOL

    • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 7:22 pm #

      But for how long? I am a lessee to an oil company on their second well drilled on our family property in the Eagleford Formation in Texas. Our first well stopped pumping after five years after a long decline. Give you an idea, at first the oil pumped produced 1500 dollars per month of income for my mother than declined to between 200 to 400 during the final two years. There is very short lifetimes on these wells. Our first well was drilled to 5000 feet, the second to 10000 feet.

      These wells only last for a short while, 4 or 5 years. The sweet pots are in decline which means the return on investment is going to drop in the future.

      That is why folks like JHK are sending out the warning bells.

      Add on to this the future problems with earthquakes, sinking land, cracking earth, potential pollution of water sources etc that may occur.

      But we have to have the oil, so will continue any way possible to get it. If a way of powering the energy requirements was available for anywhere near the cost of FF, the world would be climbing on board and fast as the price of oil is going to continue to climb.

      China is going to power their new new expansion to the ME and Africa using coal, which they have in abundance. China is using its national wealth to develop great amounts of infrastructure and expanding its economy.

      While we spend ours impeaching the President and playing children’s games instead of governing our country, the latest example of which is Pelosi holding up USMCA.

      • benr November 23, 2019 at 11:11 am #

        We have more coal than China and a lot of it is low Sulphur to boot.

        • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:43 am #

          What possible relevance does the sulfur content have? Especially as you believe AGW is a Chinese hoax?

          • benr November 24, 2019 at 10:25 am #

            I suggest a quick trip to google or duckduckgo if your the paranoid type.
            Two words Acidic rain.
            No one can argue that what goes up must come down.

  51. JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 6:55 pm #

    I believe that taxing money twice is supposed to be a no-no in politics???

    How can Warren even talk about a wealth tax. People with the wealth have already paid income tax over the years, monitored by the IRS. So now, we are going to get to pay these crooks in DC twice so they can blow our money twice.

    If you think they are just going to tax the wealth of the 1%, I have a bridge to sell you. There is not enough wealth in the 10% to pay for all the ludicrous spending they want to do. Get ready to be totally ripped off by the Leftist spending. Just so they can buy your vote.

    College education really cracks me up. We are going to pay colleges and universities directly from the Feds to send kids to school. Think for a moment right now how effective college has been for the Millennials and Gen Zers to progress economically. What a fertile bed for governmental corruption. Send all those kids to these crappy colleges to get indoctrinated to all the Leftist BS being presented there. What a racket!

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 7:09 pm #

      The sad thing about it John is the enormous number of people out there that cannot see beyond their own (supposed) self-interest. They will vote for someone like Warren because they believe it benefits them personally. What impact such policies have on the country as a whole is besides the point.

      Heartfelt post my friend…

      • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:26 pm #

        And exactly whose interests should they be voting for? Their betters, who are rest assured voting for theirs?

        • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 7:35 pm #

          You are right. We live in a society where self interests have shifted from using a growing competitive society to get ahead, using the military or education or entrepreneurship, to a society that is being promised that the government is going to take care of them.

          It really sucks!

          A long time ago, a sage said that the greatest enemy of democracy is its own people, when they figure out they own the purse strings.

          • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 8:04 pm #

            Of sorts. Of course, the rich figured it out first. Smart people, the rich.

        • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 8:32 pm #

          The country as a whole. Enlightened self interest.

    • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:17 pm #

      Warren’s merely selling a product like everyone else these days. “Free college” is a non-sequitur, as is increasingly free public high school these days too. Why would a nation truly committed to “higher education” in the interests of national security and global superiority not commit to it 100% as most of our competitors do, you might ask?

      Of course that answer is laughably obvious: profits.

      The left/right bullshit is mostly irrelevant. Give it a few years and it will be “rightist” bullshit. Same as it ever was. College is bullshit because it’s become an elitist pay-to-play credential racket. It pays the money, it gets the ticket, it progresses to the next corporatist level of “thank you sir, may I have another.”

      • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 7:31 pm #

        We all write about the effects on job loss in the future. Paper pushing jobs are going to be affected by the use of AI more than any other. Our colleges produce paper pushers. So we are going to invest more, much more into educating kids for failure. How do we create jobs for college grads? Better answer that before investing trillions into a rat hole.

        • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:51 pm #

          The truth is, “jobs” – especially corporate types – are entirely illusory these days. I too fall in the trap of calling them “paper pusher” jobs all the time – it betrays our age – but in fact they’re not even that. They’re “computer starer” jobs. I’m literally paid to sit and stare at a computer monitor all the livelong day with only occasional interruptions of meaningless shit to do, which I increasingly resent. The alternative to which is to compete my way up the corporate ladder a notch or two to the managerial level, where I can add a dozen or so meaningless meetings per day to my MS Calendar just for fun. The truth is, the genuine jobs are long since gone, outsourced and exported to the third world countries in which they’re still profitable for the global elite. What remains is entirely graft, payoffs, and humor. Rest assured, when financial closing day finally comes, as it inevitably must and does for many everyday, the corporate bonanza will dry up too. Managers included.

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 8:15 pm #

            The solution to all of this is thinking holistically and being creative. You are describing a system trending towards entropy. Entropy is the opposite of life. Life however is not a specialized function, it is wholeness and it is creative. When we think holistically and when we are creative we are aligned with life and we overcome entropy.

          • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 8:34 pm #

            The “solution” to all this in a human-engineered artificial environment supporting 7B+ human beings where there should rightfully be only 700M or so is entropy. Entropy is not an attribute, it’s a fucking fact. “Thinking holistically,” is, in a word (two actually), utter bullshit. But thanks for playing.

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 9:07 pm #

            Perhaps you could explain to me what I mean by thinking holistically before you call it utter bullshit. Or would that be asking too much?

          • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 9:13 pm #

            Appreciate your post. Mindless work staring at a screen will take its toll over the years.

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 9:34 pm #

            It appears that it already has…

          • Nightowl November 23, 2019 at 4:11 pm #

            I don’t really get what SBS means by holistic thinking.

            To me, there is just a stark divide between the real (things that matter) and the Borg.

            There is the corporate world, in which we largely work toward pointless ends, and there is real life — raising my son, writing music, doing home improvements myself. For the latter, real energy goes in, real things come out. That is the way to overcome entropy, IMO.

      • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 7:38 pm #

        Right, but let me add on one. The higher education scene has been groomed to be an indoctrination ground for Leftist ideals. So who wants to fund free access to the BS.

        Guess?

        • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:53 pm #

          That’s part of it. But just the icing on the cake. “Leftist” is just the latest flavor of the day.

          • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 9:35 pm #

            Leftist is totalitarianism, not just another flavor…

        • Nightowl November 23, 2019 at 4:13 pm #

          Higher education is simply indoctrination of the slaves to the system. A finishing school for the compliant class.

          A wise man once sang, “Babylon system is the vampiiiiire. Building church and uniiiverrrrsity …”

    • Majella November 23, 2019 at 4:07 am #

      JohnAZ – if it’s income, the proposal is a 2c in the buck increase on $ over $50 million p.a.

      I’m sure, if you’re not defending your own $50 million plus income, the plutocrats & oligarchs you’re going to bat for will appreciate your support.

  52. BackRowHeckler November 22, 2019 at 7:40 pm #

    They ain’t too worried out on the Vineyard about that steady stream of swag from Ukraine not flowing in anymore. $80,000 per month what’s that amount too really? Sure the coke dealers and pimps out of Boston, and the yacht brokers in Bernardstown might be a little nervous, figuring future losses … not too worry tho. Turns out when you were focusing on the Ukraine, watching the Impeachment dog and pony show, the real action was in China. Jokes on you, suckers! Jimmy Bulger (Whiteys nephew) Chris Heinz (John Kerry’s stepson) and Hunter Biden, dba Rosemont Seneca Partners are raking in billions from the govt of China. Apparently Biden and Heinz used their high level connections to score some pretty hefty coin from Premier Xi. They’re supposed to be investing this money in productive enterprises — wink, wink — but some comrades claim it’s being invested in the best blow in New England and a bevy of fine Asian hookers. Right now not much is happening out on the Vineyard. You go out there off season it’s almost like a ghost town. But summer of 2020 promises to be the best ever, the best season ever.

    Brh

    • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 8:02 pm #

      Blow and Asian hookers. Our new/old gross national product. Probably as good as any other, I guess.

  53. PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 7:40 pm #

    Did anybody else drop their oatmeal when the testimony came out that Vindman was offered the post of Minister of Defense in Ukraine not once, but three separate times??

    • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:59 pm #

      Par for the course. Not that I eat oatmeal all that often these days.

  54. Pucker November 22, 2019 at 7:41 pm #

    Today is the Anniversary of the JFK assassination (November 22, 1963). I and a friend from the Great State of Tennessee have been at loggerheads over the issue of who whacked JFK? I maintain that the Deep State whacked President John F. Kennedy in a fit of pique because of Kennedy’s last minute decision not to send in US Marines held in reserve by C…IA chief Allen Dulles on a Navy ship off the coast of Cuba during the Bay of Pigs invasion that Dulles knew would fail thus requiring US intervention. JFK angered that he had been set up by the C…IA balked and fucked Dulles. JFK later sacked Dulles and promised to dissolve the C…IA. Dulles then whacked JFK so that everyone can keep their Iron Rice Bowl sinecure jobs.

    My friend from the Great State of Tennessee insists vehemently that I’m wrong and that it was Marilyn Monroe who whacked Kennedy. It is true that JFK used to meet Marilyn Monroe in the Waldorf Astoria in New York City for trysts. Maybe that’s where Marilyn Monroe whacked him?

    • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 7:48 pm #

      “Maybe that’s where Marilyn Monroe whacked him?”

      You extend a hard argument..

      🙂

    • BackRowHeckler November 22, 2019 at 7:55 pm #

      Only problem with that theory — and it is an intriguing one — is that Marilyn died over a year before JFK.

      • elysianfield November 22, 2019 at 9:22 pm #

        BRH,
        Perhaps the term “whacked” is misunderstood? She may have whacked him repeatedly, even regularly, during frequent bathroom breaks during staff meetings. She probably whacked RFK, too.

        I do not know what the current price of a whack job, performed in an abandoned car or dumpster, represents today…someone with experience might enlighten the readership.

  55. HapMan November 22, 2019 at 7:49 pm #

    I have no doubt that decision makers in business, finance and government, whether domestic or foreign, whose livelihoods and power depend on facts and insight, and who are required to interact with regulation and public policy, do not think in terms of a “deep state”; they recognize that Russia is continually interfering in our political processes; and they see the type of stuff in this blog and in this comment section as nonsense and the people who traffic in it as suckers.

    For those on this board who are not Russian trolls, political hacks or crypto-Nazis but continue to swallow the conspiracy theories, I actually feel badly that you have chosen to willfully delude yourselves. You have joined Trump University and have been upsold to the gold VIP plan. I don’t wish that on my fellow citizens.

    As reality continues its long-standing pattern of diverging from the consensus view on this site, you should bear in mind that at the end of the day, from an economic perspective Trump is a largely conventional Republican President – he is President Rubio or Bush III plus tariffs. Massive tax cut skewed toward asset holders, a vastly increased deficit, deregulation and a transfer of risk from the wealthy to the middle class. He hasn’t gotten us into any wars – I will give him that. But the bill will come due.

    Sadly for you and for the rest of us, what you have alongside all of that is a US that has slid into disrepute and shame. Think about the world literally laughing at Trump at the UN; Putin smirking at Trump after their private meeting in Helsinki; Erdogan returning the letter to Trump at the WH. This is not good for the US or other free countries. Great for Russia though.

    Da svidanya, suckers.

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    • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 7:58 pm #

      I actually feel badly that you have chosen to willfully delude yourselves.

      Et tu, bitch, et tu?

    • BackRowHeckler November 22, 2019 at 8:07 pm #

      Not too worry

      Next year you might have Bittgieg and his husband in the oval office, or Liz Warren, put some backbone into the presidency once again, restore respect for the United States worldwide.

      The big international swindles can resume where they left off in 2016. That should make you and everybody else happy.

      Brh

      • ellipsis November 22, 2019 at 8:19 pm #

        Not to worry. Decrepit Biden, Pete the Buttgigger, and Lil’ Lizzy Warren are all but our douvres for the main entree: the return of the magnificent HillaBeast in all of her geriatric glory! Her old fat ass WILL BE adored by all – OR ELSE!!!

        • HapMan November 22, 2019 at 9:24 pm #

          Brh, yeah, I think either the combat veteran or the Harvard law professor/finance expert, or just about anyone else in elected office above the level of alderman, would do better on that front. And I didn’t realize the swindles had stopped – the “elites” might feel badly about some of the nasty stuff Trump is doing to immigrants, but they are doing pretty nicely under his administration, thanks. Helps to have no-name lobbyists and campaign donors running some of the key cabinet departments. Draining the swamp!

          ellipsis, you realize that Trump is older than Clinton, and clinically obese, right?

    • PeteAtomic November 22, 2019 at 9:15 pm #

      “Sadly for you and for the rest of us, what you have alongside all of that is a US that has slid into disrepute and shame. Think about the world literally laughing at Trump at the UN; Putin smirking at Trump after their private meeting in Helsinki; Erdogan returning the letter to Trump at the WH. This is not good for the US or other free countries. Great for Russia though. ”

      Agreeing with BRH there, in a little over a year the big sucking sounds might just get turned back on with a flurry of alphabet sounding unilateral trade deals like TPP.. and the sound of the panzers warming up in Ukraine– On to Moscow!

  56. wpa_ccc November 22, 2019 at 8:00 pm #

    JohnAZ: “being promised that the government is going to take care of them.”

    That is exactly the purpose of government… as spelled out in black and white in the Constitution.

    “We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.”

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 8:18 pm #

      Government is not ‘the people’ it is a bureaucracy…

      • wpa_ccc November 22, 2019 at 8:55 pm #

        SBS: Government is not ‘the people’ it is a bureaucracy…

        Yes. And that is a good thing. Government bureaucracy is of the people, by the people, for the people.

        Government bureaucracy is why your social security payment appears on the exact same day every month. Government bureaucracy is dependable and helpful. Pays 80% of my medical bills through Medicare. Repairs infrastructure. Inspects meat. Supports public libraries, schools, prisons, Etc. Etc. Etc.

        I like being taken care of by government bureaucracy and happily pay my taxes.

        • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 9:02 pm #

          Yeah you are right, that is the upside of bureaucracy. We are so busy complaining about the downside we forget sometimes to count our blessings. Thanks for the info you shared on the four pillars of Western Civilization as well…

        • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 9:11 pm #

          Baloney!

          The government bureaucracy is of the Deep State, by the Deep State and for the Deep State

          Period.

    • JohnAZ November 22, 2019 at 9:08 pm #

      Promote the general welfare it says, not give everyone free everything.

      It is not the purpose of government to take care of you, it is your responsibility. The job of government is to give you the environment, security, tranquility and liberty for you to succeed using your talents and skills.

      Not give you total support.

      Obviously, you side with the Progressives in this argument.

      Oh yeah, we are 22 trillion in the hole trying to do guns and butter, it won’t last much longer. Then you and everyone else favoring the dole will have nothing. What are you going to do when the government says to you,

      Sorry, we are broke.

      • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 9:27 pm #

        John I think the point he is making is that government bureaucracy is more than just Deep State, it also keeps the trains running on time…

      • wpa_ccc November 22, 2019 at 9:36 pm #

        JohnAZ: “Oh yeah, we are 22 trillion in the hole trying to do guns and butter, it won’t last much longer…. Sorry, we are broke.”

        LOL. Yes, we are broke. Being broke is as American as apple pie and being broke is not a problem. Being broke is our national norm.

        JohnAZ, except for about a year during 1835–1836, the United States has continuously had a public debt since the Constitution went into effect on March 4, 1789. Because government must spend money to take care of people, and it does not matter if it has the money. Debt and QE are the new normal.

      • malthuss November 22, 2019 at 11:57 pm #

        100-200 trillion down.

      • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 12:00 pm #

        “Oh yeah, we are 22 trillion in the hole trying to do guns and butter, it won’t last much longer.”

        John,
        In this you are probably correct. I do believe that the Government has no choice but to now produce both…and the guns keep the butter flowing.

        Without the guns…no butter

        Without the butter? Well, there are those, in their millions, who would object.

  57. sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 9:48 pm #

    Deep State is only possible when government becomes too centralized, too large, and too distant from the people it serves. The solution is simple, place more stress on local governments, i.e., neighborhood, city, county, region, state.

    Note: I say the solution is simple, I didn’t say it was easy…

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 10:06 pm #

      Actually the whole system is currently upside down. The proper (right side up) order would dictate we spend the bulk of our time working on the neighborhood level and utilize city, county, region, state, and national governments only when absolutely necessary.

      As long as nation-states remain viable entities we will need national governments primarily for defense, trade, and world level problem solving…

      • wpa_ccc November 22, 2019 at 10:18 pm #

        SBS: The proper (right side up) order would dictate we spend the bulk of our time working on the neighborhood level and utilize city, county, region, state, and national governments only when absolutely necessary.

        Might as well go all the way and say self-government (anarchism) is the best!

        Anarchism is an anti-authoritarian political and social philosophy that rejects hierarchies deemed unjust and advocates their replacement with self-managed, self-governed societies based on voluntary, cooperative institutions. –Wikipedia

        • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 10:29 pm #

          Do you mean by self-government treating the individual as an autonomous unit? What is meant by ‘self-managed, self-governed societies based on voluntary, cooperative institutions’?

      • JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 8:26 am #

        Which is exactly what the Constitution says in the preamble.

    • sunburstsoldier November 22, 2019 at 10:30 pm #

      Unfortunately most neighborhoods in this country during our present era are not communities, which is to say, those who live in them share little in common with their neighbors. We are ‘stangers in a strange land’. This is a profound psycho-social hurdle which must be overcome before we can turn our government right side up…

      • axisboldaslove November 23, 2019 at 2:18 am #

        Neighborhoods occasionally do become more community oriented in America. Not often, but sometimes.

        I live in a semi-rural area these days and haven’t lived in a big city in several year, so my own recent experience is with smaller towns. But I’m told a few places like Portland have neighborhoods that are community oriented, so I’m guessing it happens in large cities occasionally as well.

        Our neighborhood has become more community oriented because we have a common goal- to not become another Paradise/Magalia California (the Sierra foothills towns destroyed by wildfire last year). We are also in the foothills and very much susceptible to that kind of deadly threat. That threat has brought many of us together to work to find solutions. Many of us have attended out local Oak Hill Fire Safety Council Meetings. I’ve worked with our Department of Transportation to make improvements on our rural road for safe egress in case of wild fire. People in America still can and do work together when motivated.

        As the world become more tangled, as resources become more stretched, as environmental conditions become more unfavorable to human habitation, I’m guessing we will see some neighborhoods working together as community, and some rampaging and going apeshit.

        I’m guessing many here have read Jim’s World Made By Hand Trilogy and know exactly what I am talking about.

    • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 12:59 pm #

      Well, even a local level of organization always has a “Deep State” aspect. It’s unavoidable human nature. People associate with others they find more like themselves for better and for worse. This is why there will always be societies within societies and classes within classes. And this is the typical path that power and centralized control of resources arrives by. Even at the village level. The ideal society would have mechanisms to prevent any one group from compromising the whole and would allow for the recognition of merit from all and the ability to move up for those who so desire.

  58. K-Dog November 22, 2019 at 11:21 pm #

    He is getting better with his claptrap. More philosophical. The hate is becoming more nuanced and accepting of the human condition.

    • Majella November 23, 2019 at 2:48 am #

      K-Dig
      The thread had become too extenuated to figure who you were referring to – JohnAZ?

  59. tucsonspur November 23, 2019 at 3:28 am #

    Epitaph to a Dog

    “Near this spot
    Are deposited the Remains
    Of one
    Who possessed Beauty
    Without Vanity,
    Strength without Insolence,
    Courage without Ferocity,
    And all the Virtues of Man
    Without his Vices.

    This praise, which would be unmeaning flattery
    If inscribed over Human Ashes,
    Is but a just tribute to the Memory of
    “Boatswain,” a Dog
    Who was born at Newfoundland,
    May, 1803,
    And died at Newstead
    Nov. 18, 1808.

    When some proud son of man returns to earth,
    Unknown by glory, but upheld by birth,
    The sculptor’s art exhausts the pomp of woe,
    And storied urns record who rests below.
    When all is done, upon the tomb is seen,
    Not what he was, but what he should have been.
    But the poor dog, in life the firmest friend,
    The first to welcome, foremost to defend,
    Whose honest heart is still his master’s own,
    Who labors, fights, lives, breathes for him alone,
    Unhonored falls, unnoticed all his worth,
    Denied in heaven the soul he held on earth –
    While man, vain insect! hopes to be forgiven,
    And claims himself a sole exclusive heaven.

    Oh man! thou feeble tenant of an hour,
    Debased by slavery, or corrupt by power –
    Who knows thee well must quit thee with disgust,
    Degraded mass of animated dust!
    Thy love is lust, thy friendship all a cheat,
    Thy smiles hypocrisy, thy words deceit!
    By nature vile, ennoble but by name,
    Each kindred brute might bid thee blush for shame.
    Ye, who perchance behold this simple urn,
    Pass on – it honors none you wish to mourn.
    To mark a friend’s remains these stones arise;
    I never knew but one – and here he lies.”

    By he who was “mad, bad, and dangerous to know.”

    • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 8:07 am #

      Nice poem, Tuscon – hadn’t seen it before. Although some of the last stanza is a bit over-harsh as a generalisation, maybe!

      • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 12:51 pm #

        Yes, mankind is essentially debased and corrupt in nature. Such that one wonders sometimes if people are even comparable to animals. After all, dogs do have noble qualities. You recognize the truth of the Fallen Nature. The Creation groans and awaits the Day of Purification. Thus life can be harsh and people cruel. For some a dog is their only friend. It’s uncomfortable and sad to consider though and understandable to want to wish away.

        • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 2:58 pm #

          “You recognize the truth of the Fallen Nature. ”

          ‘Fallen’ has nothing whatever to do with it. We’re primates, however evolved, and we share many of their characteristics without ‘falling’ anywhere.

          You were going to explain to me about the ‘fallen’ world affecting the whole universe in terms of the laws of thermodynamics, I think? In your own time…

          • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 4:18 pm #

            GA. Nobody, even Janos, can push your buttons like SSL. So cheeky, that one! Sorry, sometimes I just have to laugh.

            But on the topic of human nature, allow me to present an idea which I neither endorse nor deny. “Human are the means genes use to propagate themselves.”

            Many people would die to save their children. Would they die to save the neighbor’s children? Some but fewer. How about saving children in a Lagos slum you’ve never met? Even fewer.

            Some things do seem to be a case of genes guiding human thought processes. Take the case of wives committing adultery. It irks a man to work himself into an early grave earning money just so someone else’s gene pool gets a good edge in the competition of life. The husband may not even care about issues like his wife’s love and affection. But his genes demand propagation.

            When a new male lion takes over a pack, he kills the nursing cubs. They are not his genetic offspring, and so long as the females nurse, they will not get pregnant.

            Cases of a human biological father killing his offspring are very rare compared to the stepfather or mother’s boyfriend doing the deed.

            Anyway, just some random thoughts on a Saturday afternoon.

          • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 5:42 pm #

            That is so interesting! So please, do explain more of Evolution. Do you believe in Evolution? Gosh, after all these billions of years one would have hoped that we could have evolved beyond our inherent ape nature as you state. But then again, some things never change as they say. Funny how we can’t seem to move past that base nature, but yes! Absolutely, Evolution!

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 5:46 pm #

            “GA. Nobody, even Janos, can push your buttons like SSL. So cheeky, that one! Sorry, sometimes I just have to laugh.”

            Glad you enjoyed it, hm. I can’t even make a one-sentence comment on a poem I appreciated without SSL whacking me over the head with a bible. Read literally, without any appreciation of metaphor.

            I don’t see anything new or controversial in the rest of your post, hm.

            We are indeed programmed, one way or another, to take care of our own children. But I’ve known good men who’ve loved the children of their previously widowed wife as they would their own. Or even their previously divorced wife, including in cases where the biological father has been undeserving of the honour. We can rise above as well.

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 6:00 pm #

            “Gosh, after all these billions of years one would have hoped that we could have evolved beyond our inherent ape nature as you state. ”

            I believe the earliest common ancestor of apes and monkeys dates to about 25 million years, so I’m not sure to what the billions relate.

            We have indeed evolved beyond our inherent ape nature, whether I state it or not. But we remain primates and will probably never totally escape our primate characteristics, before we become extinct. I mean all these millions of years and you’ve still got a vestigial tailbone, so hey, don’t be in any hurry… 🙂

            I don’t know what ‘Absolutely, Evolution!’ means. I know you and Janos are fond of starting caps for dramatic effect, but ‘evolution’ doesn’t require one. It’s just a concept. A theory for which the evidence just kept on and kept on accumulating. You are not required to ‘believe’ in it. You can just look at the evidence proposed for it and argue intelligently against the detail should you wish to. Same as with climate science. If you have new evidence on either issue, I’m sure it’s always welcome.

            But I note that you have evaded my question, for the third time. You were the one who posited entropy as a consequence of a fallen world, so either the entire universe is fallen or it’s infectious. A short description of the mechanism would be appreciated.

          • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 6:00 pm #

            Whacking you over the head with a Bible? This is a philosophical issue and question is it not? You conveniently ignore the central themes of my statement. But I am talking to you about it because it is something we both understand, though from different angles. And you can dismiss it but that is why you reacted viscerally. Because you understood exactly why I said what I said when I said it.

          • GreenAlba November 23, 2019 at 8:29 pm #

            “Because you understood exactly why I said what I said when I said it.”

            Why would I not understand what you said? You talked of ‘fallen nature’. I consider it just ‘nature’. The ‘fallen’ bit is metaphorical. You choose to make it literal, which is your right, as it is mine to point you toward a less literal reading of the late Bronze Age books from which you get your beliefs.

            You still haven’t answered my question re your previous statement.

          • SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 2:18 am #

            You are asking me to explain phenomena that scientists cannot explain, and I am not a scientists to begin with. In the end I am wondering why an answer is so important to you. I have a hard time believing you would seriously entertain a thought out response regarding the matter anyway since this is just all so much Bronze Age mythology and metaphor in your eyes. But since you asked, I believe the entire universe is fallen. Thus why eventually the entire universe will be rolled away like scrolls and burned until all the elements melt. Thus entropy is a universal phenomenon.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:48 am #

            Oh, really, SSL…???

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 7:36 am #

            Why thank you, SSL, that was worth waiting for. 🙂

          • SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 2:00 pm #

            And I am curious as to why you feel it was so worth the wait. Though I am pleased your experience was a pleasant one. Malleja feels that my attitude is holier than thou. If so I do apologize. It is not my intention. Though certain forms of communication are worth it if your attention is captured.

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 2:49 pm #

            Only pleasant in that it provided some light amusement, SSL.

            What normal people do is embrace new knowledge and tweak their world view to accommodate it. That’s what ‘learning’ is.

            What religious people of the literalist persuasion do is to try to make the new knowledge fit their existing world view.

            Hence with the second law of thermodynamics. And hence no learning.

            The majority of educated Christians took evolution on board and developed a more adult and less literal approach to their bible. They remained Christians (not all of them, obviously), although in any religious tradition you will find purists who pride themselves on purity, as they see it, rather than sense.

            I don’t find you ‘holier than thou’ at all, on the whole. I just find that you seem afraid to use your critical faculties as much as you might, in certain spheres.

  60. Pucker November 23, 2019 at 3:42 am #

    Iced “Holy Water” tastes better because it is purer since it’s been filtered of Sin, right? What about “Holy Iced Tea”? What about ice cubes made with frozen “Holy Water”?

    I guess that you could fill a swimming pool with Holy Water, like in the Vatican swimming pool, but that’s really high end extravagance?

    If the swimming pool was filled with Holy Water, then would Old Lady Barbara Bush still refuse to swim in it and get all pissed off and ball out the Millennial pool service bloke if the water wasn’t exactly a temperature of 86 degrees Fahrenheit?

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  61. Pucker November 23, 2019 at 4:20 am #

    The Media refers to the Hong Kong Democracy protestors as “The Resistance” (Di Kang), which is the same term that the Democrats ascribe to themselves as being Anti-Trump, albeit Trump and China are at loggerheads. Joe and Hunter Biden who took a US$1.5 billion bribe from the Chinese refer to themselves as “The Resistance”. Go figure…. “Resistance” to what?!

    • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 12:33 pm #

      I personally do sympathize with the Hong Kong protestors. Mainland Chinese literally harvest and sell the body parts of their foes and perceived and/or subversives so wouldn’t you freak out at least a teeny bit if suddenly it was announced that you would be under their control now? The problem is that the Progressive Western Globalists want to use the regular Hong Kong protestors to further their own stealth invasion of Mainland China. So the little people are stuck in layers of conflict.

      • Majella November 23, 2019 at 5:51 pm #

        SSL:
        ‘ Mainland Chinese literally harvest and sell the body parts of their foes and perceived and/or subversives ’

        Is there ANYTHING you won’t believe?

        • malthuss November 23, 2019 at 9:40 pm #

          With Pizza Gate, the Ambrose Kane blog disappeared.

          He had footage of a chink eating a fetus and praising such.

          search—cannibal restaurants in africa.

          then read the free ebook–Negros in Negroland.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:52 am #

            SSL was referring to organ harvesting.

            Thanks for the referrals to nut job websites. Very amusing. If this is the sort of crap you call ‘doing your own research’, then your falling a bit short of the standards set by the Flat Earth & Moon Landing conpiracy-plot busters.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:55 am #

            https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/restaurant-ser

          • SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 1:55 pm #

            Majella, there is an international slave industry. Human trafficking is as much an issue now, if not more than it was in the days of European colonialism. This slave industry includes international pedophile rings. Think Jeff Epstein times a million. And yes, people in high places and of high esteem are involved. So what seems impossible is actually very probable.

  62. Pucker November 23, 2019 at 4:52 am #

    Are you Pro-Miscegenation?

    How come none of the MSM reporters ever ask the candidates where they stand on the issue of Miscegenation? They ask about Transgenderism and gender fluidity issues, and about oral and anal sodomy, but you don’t see Anderson Cooper, Wolf Blitzer, or Rachel Maddow pressing any of the candidates about Miscegenation? Should Miscegenation be confined within the narrow boundaries of traditional Christian morality, or should Miscegenation also include trans humanism, Country-Western, and other forms of Freakie Deakie?

    • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 12:07 pm #

      “the issue of Miscegenation? ”

      Puck,
      It is cultural.

      Our former culture was…”tolerant” to a degree.

      Our current culture is being manipulated to a foregone conclusion.

      What does your culture say about coital relations with wallabies?
      (I know, they run fast and are difficult to mount…)?

      Our culture would be tolerant….

    • malthuss November 23, 2019 at 9:38 pm #

      2 of the 3 you mentioned are queers.
      race mixing questions would be seen as archaic, as in race doesnt
      exist.

      -national-inclusive-schools-week

  63. Pucker November 23, 2019 at 5:30 am #

    Do you remember a couple of months ago when everybody was going to March on Area 51? What-the-Hell was that all about?! How come you can get the deranged Americans to march for UFO’s, but you can’t get them to protest the endless foreign wars, the decrepit infrastructure, and/ or the lack of national health insurance? Weird society….

    • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 12:14 pm #

      I thought there were actually a number of people who were going and then the military said they would use full force to protect the base or whatever it is from trespassers.

  64. Pucker November 23, 2019 at 5:42 am #

    Prince Andrew and Bill Clinton:

    According to the book about King Leopold in the Congo, Belgian King Leopold II of The Congo used to make special trips to London to visit young underage girls for sex. Apparently, there was an infrastructure set up in London at the time to cater to European “Royalty” and other high end client pedophiles. Apparently, this continues today…. They’ve got all that money and power, but they still have an insatiable itch for the young girls for sex.

    • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:31 pm #

      Prince Andrew has resigned. Can he do that? Alba?

      Chinese Aristocrats used to have many kids with concubines. Spread the good genes far and wide. We are so constrained by our false morality and the sterility of whoredom.

  65. Pucker November 23, 2019 at 6:03 am #

    Is the Corrections Corporation of America sponsoring another College Football bowl game this year? Sports are very therapeutic for the inmates. According to the book, “American Prison” about a Corrections Corporation of America run prison in Louisiana, also popular is the TV soap opera, “The Days of Our Lives”. This must be a soap opera about Anomie? Didn’t the US Military sponsor the last Super Bowl and they had everyone clad in desert camouflage with fighter jets buzzing the stadium and everyone on alert for an attack by Muslim terror-Tits?

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  66. BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 6:24 am #

    Who knows when the Dems hooked up with the Winter Hill Gang? Yeah Whitey Bulger is dead and Shot Caller Billy Bulger has been discredited (but keeps his $100,000 per year state pension) but you think the gang just evaporated? The Winter Hill Gang was known in Boston for extortion, a big moneymaker BIG! So who pressured Jingjang Xi to hand over $1.5 billion to Hunter Biden, Chris Heinz and Jimmy Bulger? Somebody leaned on him, and Dems connection to organized crime is well known. For example, there are persistent rumors of links to Mexican Cartels. Why else would Beto ORourke cross the border and campaign for votes in Mexico (other than score a few oz of primo Oaxacan Red)? Why else would Bernie Sandals and Liz Warren put the interests of illegal aliens over American citizens? Why else indeed?

    Brh

    • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 11:34 am #

      Yes! Progressives are international terrorists and subversives. Very good point!

    • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:36 pm #

      I’ve been up on Winter Hill. It’s nice up there. Whitey kept peace in South Boston. That’s the job of any Crime Boss. He disgusted his underlings by kissing Maffia bosses on the cheek and drinking wine with them. The Irish and Italian mobsters hated each other typically. But because Whitey had ceased to be a regular Irish American guy is why they couldn’t catch him for so long. I mean if he needed to hang out in Irish bars he wouldn’t have lasted a year.

  67. BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 6:45 am #

    Yeah, I’m saying after Whitey Bulger got nabbed, Joe Biden stepped up as honcho of the Winter Hill Gang, and the Winter Hill Gang was running foreign policy and turning it into a big international extortion racket. It had many tentacles — like an octopus. Why do you think so much swag was flowing into Clinton Foundation coffers, and the Biden’s scored such sweet deals? In fact all these impeachment efforts is an attempt to prevent Trump and Barr from blowing the lid off! Prove me wrong, CFNers.

    Brh

    • JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 8:21 am #

      Better watch out, BRH. Someone around here might think you believe in conspiracies

      ? uh-huh.

      • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 9:52 am #

        Well, somebody leaned on JingJang Xi, JAZ.

        “Come up with the payola, or else”. That was the word.

        The dictator of Communist China, leader of 1.5 billion citizens, head of the Chinese Communist Party and CnC of an army of 7 million soldiers, just doesn’t fork over $2 billion to Hunter Biden and Jimmy Bulger without a little persuasion, if you know what I mean JAZ. I’m not saying there’s any kind of conspiracy. I’m the only poster on this blog that I know of who believes Oswald acted alone, one single lunatic with a milsurp rifle who took a twisted unbelievable (to him) opportunity when it presented itself. So I’m not an easy believer in conspiracies.

        Brh

        • JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 10:41 am #

          BRH

          You read me wrong. I was being very tongue in cheek with my comment. I am a big conspiracy guy. It is the only way I can explain to myself how the clowns in the DC scene and the media can have the same story and opinions within 20 minutes after an occurrence of some sort. Want to see proof soon. Watch what happens on December 9 when the all the Dems come out totally unified with the same story within minutes of the Horowitz report.

          How does one explain the coordination of all the protests against anything conservative when people come from all over the country, are recruited in advertising, paid and the source is regularly international.

          How do you explain the coordination of the Central American migrant caravans? I think our government could take a few lessons from these organizers.

          The Left has been extremely successful with its take over of the Deep State center of the Federal government, and the judicial system. A very wise man, Soros, has openly admitted that he is supporting elections of liberal prosecutors across the country. Kim Foxx is one. It is a great way of spreading influence across the country. He is one of many. There is a top individual or group who is running the show. This blog puts out lots of ideas of who it is, but I am not really sure. Whoever it is, they are very effective and are effective because no one knows who they are. And they are as legally able to do it as any one else.

          Hint: it is not Russia or Ukraine.

          Example: bills are being introduced in the House to allow illegal immigrants the right to vote in federal elections. Hope all you people that prize your citizenship stand against this Dem sponsored legislation.

          • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 11:43 am #

            JAZ

            Well, if the MSM wasn’t the agit/prop arm of the DNC, they might look into a few of those things.

            As it stands now they spend their time and resources trying to take down the president; everything else is secondary, including the news.

            Brh

          • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 12:20 pm #

            “Example: bills are being introduced in the House to allow illegal immigrants the right to vote in federal elections. ”

            BRH,
            Read an excellent book several years ago…”The Death of Money” by James Rickards. I found it so intriguing that I actually took several pages of notes.

            Near the end of the book he listed, as I recall, six “signs of the Apocalypse”…occurrences that would precipitate the beginning of the end of our political system and the US as an entity…one of those, at the time I considered least probable, was the attempt to allow illegals to vote.

            I heartily recommend the book.

          • JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 2:08 pm #

            Yup. A very good question is what is going on that is almost forcing the Dems to go for broke with the impeachment? They are taking horrendous political risk as the polls are already showing. What changed Pelosi’s mind about letting two numbskulls turn loose on Trump? We are going to find out this year before the election that both sides are equally guilty of political malfeasance, it is almost a contest. Trump has Muellergate, Biden has Son of Ukrainegate.

            Are we BSing ourselves? Is there so much graft in DC that the Deep State is spending all its time trying to cover up?

            A sadder commentary is that the present state of affairs is so bad, that no one in DC has a clue what to do. Listening to the Dem debates certainly indicates this. All their issues are addressed in such ridiculous methods to be laughable.

            So the deal degrades to protecting their no action on anything and getting away with it, both parties.

            One solution, bring up Muellergate and Ukrainegate and waste the US time and money on non-issues.

            Is their one taxpayer that is going to benefit from Trump getting impeached? No! Removed, no.

            My guess on why the Dems are taking the risk. One, they have some RINOs in the Senate that have made anti-Trump obligations to Pelosi, and two, the real polls that the campaigns run show that a potential landslide is brewing because the Dems have nothing to offer, issues or personalities.

          • JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 2:13 pm #

            EF

            The end of our political system is exactly what the Left is striving for. They want these uneducated votes in their pocket.

            The prophesied death of the Dem party will come when the three major minority groups realize that the Dems have done nothing for them. It has started already, Kanye West is an example.

        • jim e November 23, 2019 at 11:09 am #

          What about the umbrella man?

          • jim e November 23, 2019 at 11:49 am #

            and… on an earlier note…
            On July 7, 1865, a middle-aged, middle-class widow, unremarkable in appearance, stepped onto the gallows and plummeted to her death, becoming the first woman to be hanged by the United States government… historicalnoveisociety

          • jim e November 23, 2019 at 11:59 am #

            Victim or the crime?… GD 5/26/93 Cal Expo

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MOURLDljrKo

        • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 12:11 pm #

          But the bullet had to go backwards to do what it did and everybody who ever passed an intro physics course knows the product ‘mv‘ otherwise known as MOMENTUM, can’t change. We have all seen the film and goddam if it doesn’t re-write the laws of physics.

          Video is the Devil’s tool. It puts the brain to sleep and then when explosive bolt plumes are removed from both of the twin tower videos on all four corners of the buildings as they fall for instance; everybody’s mind agrees to forget what they saw. A mass hysteria of forgetfulness enforced by deep social instincts and re-watching the video to put the noggin straight. Showing a remastered video is all it takes.

          The true and obvious lesson is if video challenges fundamental assumptions which define our reality we will change our perception of video to match the reality in our heads so powerful are our social instincts. At least to start with and I’ll guess it takes several milligrams of blood sugar per person to pull this stunt off.

    • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 1:41 pm #

      Yes the world is being run from Winter Hill. Good BRH. And you actually live on Goat Island. All your talk of “going there” is simply misdirection. You walk around the Island in pirate gear and with a stuffed parrot on your shoulder. Your pet parakeet hates the stuffed parrrot…..

      Your wife and kids visit you but you pretend not to know who they are. You bellow and shake your sword at them, treat them as rebellious crew members.

      Ray Flynn ran Boston from a bar in South Boston. He was Ok and did Ok. For some Beer is what makes life possible. It is by Beer alone that they set their minds in motion.

      • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 2:01 pm #

        No the world is being run from Martha’s Vineyard. Why else do you think John Kerry and Obama bought oceanfront mansions there, despite sea level rise threatening to drown all coastal communities?

        Brh

      • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 4:11 pm #

        I forgot you said you were from Boston. Is that misdirection? I find that interesting. Boston? A fellow New Englander, huh?

        We all have our own Goat Island, Janos. It’s like Xanadu, or Emerald City.

        • malthuss November 23, 2019 at 5:38 pm #

          I thought he lived in Idaho.

          • malthuss November 23, 2019 at 5:38 pm #

            and the way he uses English reminds me of the way east Europeans use English.

  68. Pucker November 23, 2019 at 9:28 am #

    Would it be appropriate for me to pull down my pants and to expose my penis and testicles when the TSA goons ask me to undergo another “Random Inspection” in airport security? They can then rub that b,,,omb detector swab thing on my dick.

    • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 11:38 am #

      No, don’t do that. Well endowed dogs already have to go through that big round clear tube scanning tube thingie twice as it is to verify what they are packing in their pants is not a bomb. Every time they fly and it gets old. They have to endure getting swabbed and have the paper swabs checked out for traces of boob-boom before they can board a plane. Takes a long time.

      So it would not be appropriate to moon the TSA and it would add ten minutes onto something that is already taking too long to do and something we should not be having to do in the first place. If the inspections came with adult movie contracts that might be another thing, I need a job, but they don’t. I’ll stop now because If you were wanting to drop your shorts you already know about that big round tube.

    • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 12:24 pm #

      “Would it be appropriate…”

      Puck,
      Again, it is cultural. I suppose in the great “Outback”, this might pass as a dating ritual?

      • Majella November 24, 2019 at 1:20 am #

        Ah. So Pucker is ‘Strine?

    • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 1:09 pm #

      You know your life is sad when you have to go to the airport to get anyone to touch you in those tingly private places.

      • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 3:51 pm #

        That would be true. It would also be expensive.

        • hmuller November 23, 2019 at 4:51 pm #

          Not if you have frequent fondler points. Not that I do…just saying.

  69. SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 11:30 am #

    I’m glad Adam Schiff’s bulging bulbous eyes were brought into the discussion. I’m leaning toward believing its because he is a psychopath, but perhaps he has an overractive thyroid? See that is our weakness. White Christian Conservatives are too nice and considerate, always looking to excuse and forgive. That’s because we have been subjected to lifelong cuckservative indoctrination from those we trusted and believed in. Daddy said Joe McCarthy was actually right about Communists being in every broom closet. Of course now they are out and proud in the House of Representatives, Senate, Pentagon, CIA, FBI, ABC, CNN, MSNBC, CBS, Fox, every school and city council USA, and on and on and on. But it’s never too late to learn. What are they doing that is so right? Well, they are merciless, ruthless, unforgiving, committed to total victory and the annihilation of all opposition. Thank you, lesson learned very well to the point where we will never forget. The path to victory is reversing it all back on them except with zealousness beyond anything they could ever conceive of. Remember how you relish revenge Golden Golem and go forth to destroy!

    • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 11:49 am #

      Bulging eyes, where have I seen them before? Oh yeah. Ribbentrop!

      “Nuremberg” starring Alec Baldwin as Robert H. Jackson

      Current impeachment bruhaha being a historical rhyme with this movie. We do have our Goering! Anybody want to slip a cyanide capsule to ours?

      • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 12:26 pm #

        ” We do have our Goering! ”

        Dog,
        Maybe. Neither were guilty of what they were charged.

        • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 1:12 pm #

          The original took no responsibility for his actions. We have a rhyme. In the movie I’m thinking now it was Jodl with the bulging eyes.

          Ve ver chest following d’orders.

          • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 1:32 pm #

            The fact that you even consider such a comparison to be valid is demonstrative of the total disconnect from reality that so many are under. But thank you for admitting that the complete destruction of those who believe differently than you is what you are after.

          • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 1:51 pm #

            K-Dog

            Over on you site I was looking at the XR video

            Pretty catchy tune, ‘Ready or Not’

            I noticed more than a few signs stating the protests are ‘Nonviolent’. I was wondering, how long do you think the movement will remain nonviolent, before a militant strain emerges willing to start blowing things up like electro power plants, gas stations, tanker trucks etc.? Some of those demonstrators appear pretty serious and don’t seem like they will stay ‘Nonviolent’ much longer. There has to be the kernel of a Weatherman’ type group germinating in there somewhere ha.

            Brh

          • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 3:24 pm #

            Well Backrow,

            That is not really fair.

            Nowhere in the core principles is violence mentioned. It turns out a really serious movement does not need violence. It needs membership and organization and after making a study of it, Roger Hallam determined violence is counterproductive.

            Demand 1: Government must tell the truth by declaring a climate and ecological emergency, working with other institutions to communicate the urgency for change.
            Act Now

            Demand 2: Government must act now to halt biodiversity loss and reduce greenhouse gas emissions to net zero by 2025.
            Beyond Politics

            Demand 3: Government must create and be led by the decisions of a Citizens’ Assembly on climate and ecological justice.

            The Dogs in ER are very paper trained dogs and unless violence is done to them first there won’t be violence. An informal poll of ‘doomers’ was done last year which showed over half of dogs responding had a Masters degree or PHD. Dogs into doom have brainz it turns out.

            Are dogs with brainz violent?

          • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 3:31 pm #

            But come to think of it.

            Expect men in jet black skin tight form fitting suits and sunglasses to make the news smashing something up soon. There will be video but wit will be quick. You will only get a peek.

            Perhaps they will knock out all the windows of a Starbucks in their black clad tailored splendor. When finished they won’t be around to get the plywood sheets out of the storage room to cover the broken glass that were placed there ahead of time. Other people will do that.

            That the sheets were placed there ahead of time nobody will notice. The last time something like this happened (May Day) I was the only one who did.

          • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 3:34 pm #

            There will be video but it will be quick

          • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 3:43 pm #

            I’ve always respected the Weathermen for doing what they could to keep people from being hurt by their bombs.

            example:

            “Around October 12 eight bomb explosions occur, Five in Rochester New York, Two in NYC, and One in Orlando FL. Despite warnings three persons are injured, none seriously.The Weatherman never claimed responsibility for the bombings nor have they ever been linked to them.”

            That last part, oh come on get serious, who else was bombing then.

            It was a different world, bombers would put out warnings so people could clear the area. A cut above the murderers of today for sure.

          • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 4:02 pm #

            Membership and organization to what end, K-Dog? End greenhouse gas emissions within 5 years? How? It seems absurd. No government on earth would attempt such a thing. I notice the protests in London have a definite anti capitalist bent. Do they put their climate hope in the communist system? That’s pretty funny because China and NKorea are rapacious consumers of coal, and in China’s case, all the oil it can get its hands on.

            Brh

          • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 4:10 pm #

            SSL,

            Goering did himself in so the comparison ends. Trump would never have the balls, he is too much of a narcissist to do himself. And act is, Trump does have blood on his hands so the comparison is valid and the personalities also ring like a goddamn bell. Go look at pictures of them both smiling. It is the same.

            The only one disconnected from reality is you. Asserting that I want the complete destruction of those who believe differently than I is an insult for which you should be ashamed. Fact is people are suffering because of Trump who would not have to be suffering at all. Compassion is the source of my venom not hate.

            Trump ticks away valuable time and his inattention to the fate of our nation could do us all in. All Trump can do is double down on existing arrangements which with his lack of compassion and stupidity is a disaster when we desperately need more than existing arrangements.

            The rhymes between the two men are as huge as their pork bellies though we can be sure Goering was the smarter of the two. The failure to admit the similarities says more about you than I. I’m just having fun because Trump is a pig who should not be running the country. I’m not the one trying to find decency where there is none to be found.

          • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 4:13 pm #

            Membership and organization to what end, K-Dog?

            Membership and organization so to have a world worth living in. Do you have a better idea?

          • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 4:32 pm #

            BR,

            Pulling North Korea into a climate change discussion is getting desperate. They really are small change in the bigger picture.

            China will not be able to hold back the demands of their own people when their people become ER aware which they will. No stopping awareness anywhere once the chaos train gets a good head of steam on her, and right now the boiler on that train is bubbling hard.

          • K-Dog November 23, 2019 at 4:32 pm #

            The belt and toad needs to be stopped.

          • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 4:47 pm #

            NKorea is a major supplier of coal to China.

          • SoftStarLight November 23, 2019 at 5:31 pm #

            And it has nothing to do with any of that, and everything to do with what you state right here that essentially you know better as to who should be doing what and when. You are acting as authoritarian as those you accuse. Determining what demands it is that you think society must meet and who should be shunned and shamed. The really funny part of all this is that the environment will never ever be saved under a Global Progressive regime you dream of. The open borders and micro managed mass migrations are set to move 100s of millions probably a billion migrants into Western Countries. Meanwhile the smokestacks in India and China will multiply probably as fast as the breeding of Sub Saharan Africans. Obviously Trump is far from any savior and a disappointment to many. But the alternatives right now? Weather Undergound and Climate Extinction? Yeah, all that is the real and actual White Privilege that “liberals” love so much.

          • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 6:27 pm #

            “I’ve always respected the Weathermen for doing what they could to keep people from being hurt by their bombs”

            Dog,
            Well, the group, as well as others of that time, were reported to have planted TWO bombs at a time…one to go off minutes before the other…the second to catch law enforcement at the scene, they being the first responders. IT IS POSSIBLE, however, that they were just trying to scare us….

            …What it did was pissed us off…also what they wanted, considering the whole charade was designed to have us over react and thus alienate the population.

            In the bad old days, I would enjoy having over reacted during the arrest of any one of em…perhaps a wood shampoo, but administered with love….

    • JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 2:23 pm #

      A real question is what happened to the US that changed it from McCarthy’s viewpoint in Communism and changed it to today’s tolerance of Communists running for President.

      Is this an unavoidable mutation of the country’s philosophical direction?

      Why do civilizations become more dependent as they mature?

      • Walter B November 23, 2019 at 4:40 pm #

        Come on JAZ, I know that you know the answer to your own question don’t you? American generations grew softer and lazier as everything was handed to them. All the toys they wanted, easier and easier school curriculum’s, free higher and worthless education (even if their parents paid the bills or they defaulted on their loans) and then good paying “work” at a desk playing video games and surfing porn. Far too many had it all handed to them without effort and eventually the entities doing the hand outs got greedy, ran dry, or simply crapped out. But not to worry, AI will take care of that problem won’t it?

        • tucsonspur November 23, 2019 at 5:32 pm #

          I guess that you’re saying American generations are depraved because they Weren’t deprived. In contrast:

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=j7TT4jnnWys

          • Walter B November 24, 2019 at 6:42 am #

            Not depraved, just weak and lazy. While I have always despised cliches, they do make the point such as, “No pain, no gain” and “Nothing ventured, nothing gained”. In America, the home of professional sports unlimited, the team that works the longest and the hardest and that puts out the best efforts wins the Super Bowl, The World Series, The Stanley Cup (Canada I know). Only Barney the Purple Dinosaur and soccer Mom’s hand out trophies to everyone but those have no real value, do they?

            If it’s too easy to acheive, it ain’t worth much.

      • tucsonspur November 23, 2019 at 5:19 pm #

        I think that the descriptive, ‘Communists’, is not accurate, John. Socialism and Communism are intertwined in the sense that one is the precursor of the other, and that they are both economic and political schools of thought with Socialism more economically and less politically centered than Communism.

        I think that most of these candidates don’t have any real belief in either of these systems, but tout them only insofar as they appear to be attractive to the public. Bernie probably the exception. Most argue for a better deal for the poor and middle classes, which can be effectuated in a variety of ways, and this is all too easily construed to be Socialism. Or worse, Communism.

        Things like healthcare for illegals of course makes one shudder and cringe at the mere mention of Socialist ideas, and mutes any discussion of their positive aspects.

        • sunburstsoldier November 23, 2019 at 6:02 pm #

          What are the positive aspects of Socialism?

          • tucsonspur November 23, 2019 at 6:35 pm #

            Social Security and Medicare. A more equal society and more selflessness than selfishness.

            Maybe the Postal Service. Rich and poor pay the same.

            Can you name some?

          • sunburstsoldier November 23, 2019 at 6:49 pm #

            Not off the top of my head, nor am I convinced the things you mention are necessarily positives. They are the products of a centralized bureaucratic government which, in our case (USA), we have come to depend upon as a consequence of the loss of community at the local (neighborhood, city, region) level due largely to the Industrial Revolution.

          • Ricechex November 23, 2019 at 9:09 pm #

            Health Care for active duty military and families. Regardless of rank they get the same services. (Although I do imagine rank may help in getting faster service).

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 9:24 am #

            Sunburst

            I think maybe you look at the past through rose-coloured spectacles. It’s nice to think that your neighbours would look after you if you hit the bad times, but it was always selective. Those who made the distinction between the deserving and undeserving poor were just as blinkered in their decisions as people who make decisions in bureaucracies.

            And being consigned to the parish workhouse wasn’t fun – you were considered morally deficient scum.

            One of my nephews looked into my father’s side of the family – proletarians all. The only personal documentation he could find was regarding a female antecedent who was widowed and left with children to bring up. The documentation was her humiliating request for help from the parish. And it wouldn’t have been much.

            One side of the religious view back then was the duty of charity – the other side was the belief that poverty demonstrated moral failure.

        • Majella November 24, 2019 at 4:08 pm #

          Sorry Tucson but ‘Socialism and Communism are intertwined in the sense that one is the precursor of the other’ is not really objectively accurate. “Socialism” is not like a gateway drug.

          The two systems of social organization really couldn’t be more different.

          “Communism” as practiced in China doesn’t include any free public healthcare or other cash benefits for those in need of support.

          As practiced in the Soviet Union, it was the APPEARANCE of fairness rather than its actual creation.

          In both cases, the Elite who run/ran the system, benefit personally to a huge extent and at the expense of those they rule and this disparity was disclaimed.

          At least in the West where capitalism rules to varying extents, the wealthy don’t try to pretend that they’re not fabulously entitled.

          Where capitalism rules most fairly is under democratic socialist systems – no need to list them yet again – where the ‘commonwealth’ means a fairer, more just society where ALL the efforts & inputs of the lowliest citizen are recognized by having access to basic human rights such as healthcare.

      • sunburstsoldier November 23, 2019 at 5:59 pm #

        I think McCarthy’s viewpoint of Communism was a minority opinion even in his time. What has happened is that the liberal factions that opposed McCarthyism back then have simply become more and more ‘progressive ‘. Obvious such a trend is not an ‘unavoidable mutation’ nor is it necessarily a symptom of societal decline in a universal sense.

        • sunburstsoldier November 23, 2019 at 6:10 pm #

          The question is what drives the ‘progressive’ trend? Since the end result will be some form of totalitarianism it is here where we may find an answer. How do totalitarian systems come into power in the first place? I think Walter B ‘s comment pretty much explains it. Is this form of societal decline a characteristic of ‘mature’ civilizations? I don’t see why it needs to be.

          • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 9:18 pm #

            They come into power by brute force.

            Lenin, Stalin, Mao, Castro, Pol Pot … it took a lot of dead bodies and rivers of blood for those guys to reach the top.

            What drives them? Pretty simple, they like pushing people around, telling them what to do, scolding them about this or that. What do you think this whole global warming scam is all about? Wait till these f#kkers get the power to tell you where to set your thermostat or what kind of car to drive. Read ‘Lord of the Flies’, give you an idea what’s coming your way.

            brh

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 3:55 pm #

            “Wait till these f#kkers get the power to tell you where to set your thermostat or what kind of car to drive. ”

            The totalitarian f*ckers made people use blackout curtains during the war even if they wanted to keep their rose-covered chintz. Everywhere. Like they were pod people or something.

            Bastards…no respect for freedom and individuality.

    • Majella November 24, 2019 at 1:29 am #

      Baloney – from first to last word. Only one person on this board could misrepresent EVERY point so devastatingly.

      It’s like watching Fox ‘Opinionaters’ competing for FFvCS’ attention & a favorable tweet, only SSL’s ‘Audience Of One’ is Emperor Janos, First of his Name, & Sup , followed by Supreme Ruler of the impending Whote Utopia.

  70. Sean Coleman November 23, 2019 at 3:51 pm #

    How Google manipulates information and interferes in elections: (Ggoge whistleblower Zach Vorhies)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6LjrH1ljFM

    How Eric Schmidt o Google ‘invented’ the term fake news late in 2016 to sink the Trump presidency: (Sharyl Atkisson) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UQcCIzjz9_s&list=PLpUAbNK9GAkGOsK4gKQevnqEWNGt-ooW_&index=2&t=0s

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    • Nightowl November 24, 2019 at 1:27 pm #

      Yep. Clinton was the first one to use it, and it was a creation of Brock (Sharblue, Media Matters Orc King) and Schmidt.

      Eric Schmidt was actually on staff in Clinton’s campaign. Propaganda on a massive scale.

      The term backfired as the MSM was producing endless buckets of verifiable fake news. And nothing has changed.

      Obama made domestic propaganda legal before leaving office, likely to help fully weaponize the corporate media.

  71. sunburstsoldier November 23, 2019 at 5:48 pm #

    What is the correspondence between Deep State and Globalism? Are the terms more or less synonymous or is Globalism a particular form of Deep State? Can one, in other words, be a member of the Deep State and opposed to the Globalist worldview at one and the same time?

    • Nightowl November 24, 2019 at 1:09 pm #

      Globalism is the ideology or world view.

  72. tucsonspur November 23, 2019 at 6:24 pm #

    “I’m just having fun because Trump is a pig who should not be running the country. I’m not the one trying to find decency where there is none to be found.”

    Who should be running it? Some mindless dimwit for open borders and health care for illegals?

    Flawed as he is, Trump at least has the decency to recognize what this country was and what it can and should be. No, he can’t make it what it was in the fifties. Sure, in some ways that’s good. But he can make it a country that takes care of its legal citizens before it takes care of invading lawbreakers. He’s broken the chains of PC, and exposed the Deep State along with the phony press. He supports his race and for that is condemned by the weak minded and racially confused.

    Bad as it may be, there’s no choice but Trump. Hail the Great Gadfly of Gotham!

    How about Booty Gig for example, he’s rising in the polls? A ghost of Obama, out of nowhere, slick and articulate, gay instead of black. Might be a shoo in. Takes it up the ass but has a lot of class.

    Rather than go down the list of candidates, let me ask, who do you support? Lay your Leader on me.

    • sunburstsoldier November 23, 2019 at 6:52 pm #

      He’s broken the chains of PC, and exposed the Deep State along with the phony press.

      This I believe will be his lasting Legacy. It’s almost as if he were designed to attain this end.

      • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 9:08 pm #

        He was born for it, tough New Yorker that he is.

        And his work is not done yet. But he has 5 more years to complete the job.

        brh

  73. San Jose November 23, 2019 at 6:26 pm #

    Pleased to report that we have sold our home in San Jose! Deep, deep sigh of relief. Maybe I’ll have to change my name from “San Jose” to “Salt Lake City.”

    Good to know that they manage to keep the electricity grid running in Utah. The homeless, or as I refer to most of them–Zombie Tweakers–are getting worse and worse. Open drug use, peeing in the streets, and stealing stuff isn’t prosecuted around here.

    The final straw was the murder of our neighbor, Bambi Larsen, last February. Living just 7 blocks from me, she was murdered in her home by a zombie tweaker who also had 7 outstanding ICE warrants over his head. Because Santa Clara County is a sanctuary county, he was free to murder and steal.

    ( PS I’ve been following Messianic Druid’s commentary on the subject of California. )

    Jen

    • elysianfield November 23, 2019 at 6:32 pm #

      Jen,
      CONTRATULATIONS!

      You might also consider coastal Southern Oregon…lots of rain, no problems with the grid…stay away from the I-5 Corridor, and life is somewhat 50’ish….

      My main complaint is the lack of cell phone service and a serious lack of cultural diversity.

      • San Jose November 23, 2019 at 9:03 pm #

        Part of the reason we are moving to Utah is because my mother is aging and she can use a little more TLC than I can manage from 800 miles away. She’s getting to that age where she needs someone to drive her around.

        • Q. Shtik November 23, 2019 at 11:28 pm #

          Congrats on the house sale. It’s not a simple thing. It’s a big deal.

    • Janos Skorenzy November 23, 2019 at 6:38 pm #

      Glad to see you have finally taken my advice. What is the answer? Here it is:

      https://lastmessagetothewest.com/video/last-message-to-the-west-liv-heide

      If we would live, we must listen to liv, founder of whitedate.net. Freedom, Diversity, Civilization: pick any two. If you want White Civilization, you need Whites. And if you want Freedom, you have to keep all others out.

      • tucsonspur November 23, 2019 at 6:48 pm #

        White Pride. Worldwide. Worldwide. White Pride!

        • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 11:48 am #

          Solidarity forever. The Flying Nun Sally Field is still flying and will take you higher. If only we could all fly, we could impregnate our Sallies in the air and then help them build nests back on Earth. They flying is so intoxicating that no thought of contraception would occur. They’d be helpless against our advances up there….

          Her thing with Burt Reynolds didn’t work out. Of course not: they couldn’t fly and her “car-eer” wreck was in the way.

      • malthuss November 23, 2019 at 9:27 pm #

        -national-inclusive-schools-week

        https://www.smdp.com/smmusd-recognizes-national-inclusive-schools-week/183287

      • malthuss November 23, 2019 at 9:36 pm #

        very unpleasant talk..plus the swastika riff.

        • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 11:10 am #

          The Swastika is Sun Wheel has been a symbol of evolution in countless cultures. It’s not just “Nazi”. Look at it: the Cross or intersection of Spirit and Matter is there – but it is made to spin like a frisbee. Can you catch it? What is a UFO but a cosmic frisbee?

          That bad DNA inside you is really acting up. We’re going to have to go in and try and deactivate it with laser surgery and prayer. Doctor Sunburst will be assisting me. Call my office and we’ll schedule it.

          • SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 1:40 pm #

            The Swastika is a deeply spiritual symbol as well and its origins go way back into Indo-European prehistory. In early European Christianity the Swastika was a revered symbol of Christ’s victory over Death and the Principalities of Darkness.

          • GreenAlba November 24, 2019 at 3:01 pm #

            How thoughtless, then, of the Nazis to crap all over it instead of sticking with something suitable to their own movement, like a skull and crossbones.

          • Majella November 24, 2019 at 3:52 pm #

            It would have been more accurate of the Nazis to have used the counter-clockwise image, symbolizing ‘night or the tantric aspects of Kali’ – “the Hindu goddess (or Devi) of death, time, and doomsday and is often associated with sexuality and violence”

          • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 11:37 pm #

            I thought sexuality (and Women!) were supposed to be all sweetness and light? Maj, you’re a Nazi after all, just like J.K Rowling.

    • tucsonspur November 23, 2019 at 6:42 pm #

      Southern Utah canyon country, nothing like it!

      • San Jose November 23, 2019 at 9:04 pm #

        The National and State parks in Utah are a treasure. Hiking in the midst of red rock is my happy place!

        • Majella November 24, 2019 at 1:12 am #

          State Parks? Not Socialism?

        • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 11:50 am #

          National Parks are very dangerous. Don’t forget to carry something.

    • BackRowHeckler November 23, 2019 at 6:55 pm #

      Best of luck to you, Jen.

      I’m happy you were able to escape from that Cal craphole aka lefty utopia. Now, now you can breath free air!

      brh

    • Ricechex November 23, 2019 at 9:15 pm #

      Congratulations Jen! I am sure it will be a relief to escape San Jose. The homeless issue–and they should be renamed–criminal addicts–is awful down here in San Diego and just when you thought it couldn’t get any worse, it does. Wishing you the best and will look forward to your postings as “Salt Lake City.”

      • JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 11:45 pm #

        Call them fallout, with no backing by the government to provide for them.

    • stelmosfire November 24, 2019 at 9:53 am #

      Congrats on the house sale! I think you may have hit the top of the market. What goes for $800,000 in San Jose would maybe get $200,000 around here ( western MA).
      Now after getting to Utah and seeing after your Mom, your next job is to get rid of that nitwit “Mittens.”

  74. malthuss November 23, 2019 at 9:57 pm #

    Janos,

    refugees and spies,

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R6L8ZSxbQBw

  75. JohnAZ November 23, 2019 at 11:44 pm #

    Back to Socialism, Communism and Capitalism and the USA.

    What people continuously call socialism, SS, Medicare, Medicaid, food stamps were all created to provide a safety net for folks that the capitalistic economy we have fails to cover certain groups of folks, whether their problem or integral to the process.

    For example, SocialSecurity was invented to allow older folks to retire and get out of the way for young folks during the Great Depression. Medicare was invented to cover elder health coverage when 65 was considered retirement age and people started living much longer than that. Both are funded by payroll taxes during folks’ working careers.

    The government steps in to plug gaps in social issues, a good thing. Remember though, it is one form of taxes or another that fund (sorta) these programs, ie we own them.

    Start talking about providing unbacked welfare, food stamps or healthcare to 73% of illegals with no tax backup to pay for them and it ends up in the deficit and debt. Unbacked spending creates debt, not SS, Medicare etc.

    Capitalism works when its social weaknesses are covered by benevolent socialism.

    Pure socialism fails because there is no entrepreneurial incentive to excel and advance. Communism is worst as all means of production are owned by the government and folks just do not give a damn about much of anything as there is no payback for any individual incentive.

    When the majority of people in a society choose to take instead of give to society, the society is doomed.

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    • K-Dog November 24, 2019 at 1:32 am #

      During the Great Depression old broken and ready to kick the bucket happened by the early 60’s. Nowadays people hitting their 60’s have maybe another good 20 years. In the great depression there was no getting in the way of young folks. There were no jobs because everything was broken.

      Why do you want to peddle these ancient useless canards? It can’t pay that well but correct me if I am wrong.

    • SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 1:59 am #

      Socialism seems to be a foregone conclusion in any sort of advanced society. The family, church, and neighborhood can provide for much in the way of a social safety net, but the government also has a role in mitigating the negative consequences of market forces, technology, inflation, etc., or at least it should. It is so refreshing to see you arriving to this point. Now just think if all of this was done for the genuine good of the nation and its people. And the nation invested in each citizen so that people could truly develop and perfect their talents and skills!

      • Majella November 24, 2019 at 9:20 am #

        Commie!

        • K-Dog November 24, 2019 at 11:26 am #

          Alternatively loyalty to group can supersede all commitment to social good and every group can duke it out until only one dog is left standing, which in our connected world means no dog stands at all.

          The real issue is resource depletion and one way to deal with that is to go fascista and that is how America looks to be rolling. In America differences between groups are on the grow and being encouraged. Our cities are developing alternate transportation systems. A system for the rich and bumper to bumper next to bike lanes for the poor. The same is happening in housing and everything else. Even food. Everywhere evil blossoms like flowers in the gardens of blind men and the cult of inequality is nourished. When the dieoff begins our trust-fund barbies expect it to be orderly and we have enough of them so such fascist ideation really can do us in.

          • K-Dog November 24, 2019 at 11:43 am #

            We even have one in the Oval office and people who allegedlywant to be his brown shirts come here and pollute the stream. Personally I do not think they are real and their true purpose is to eliminate dissent because that is what about 50 billion dollars is the American federal budget is allocated to do every year.

            Yes, Today I dodge the details and look at the problem as if it were a physics problem that can be solved by simple conservation of energy considerations without solving long equations, the other way to solve the problem. The money goes into a hole. What does it do? That question is for you to answer. My reasoning is sound. I could say follow the money and solve an equation but that would be a dangerous thing to do.

            The equations in this problem are long disgusting and nasty. I have seen some of them though experienced is more apropos to describing that situation.

  76. SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 1:35 am #

    SSL:
    ‘ Mainland Chinese literally harvest and sell the body parts of their foes and perceived and/or subversives ’

    Is there ANYTHING you won’t believe?

    AMAZING and astonishing coming from one who apparently takes great pride in being a humanitarian and calling out all of the evils heaped upon helpless minorities and indigenous peoples. LOL, did you really believe New Zealand’s golden haired immigrants were so bad? Or better yet, you immigrated to a racist, White supremacist country right. But have you nothing to say about the brutal cruelty of the East Asians and their ruthless methods of genociding minorities? Why don’t you speak out about their racism and barbarity? But instead your focus is Whites. I’m sure you’ll insist its really Whites dressed in Yellow Face who are cutting the hearts and livers and spleens out of all those Falun Gong followers, and Tibetans, and Uighurs, and House Christians. I mean after all you seemed pretty subdued about the slaughter of the Ainu by the Japanese.

    https://www.chinaorganharvest.org/

    • Majella November 24, 2019 at 9:25 am #

      No, SSL.

      My focus in this instance was, once again, your utterly stunning credulity and ability to make such sweeping statements of conjecture read as a ‘fact’.

      Everything you’ve stated in response is just rambling nonsense…as usual, your ‘holier-than-thou’ tone notwithstanding.

    • K-Dog November 24, 2019 at 11:56 am #

      https://youtu.be/CBtjRJXEzIQ

      • Majella November 24, 2019 at 3:41 pm #

        Hmm.

        Thanks, K-Dog. I was blissfully unaware of this issue. If it’s for real, it’s pretty shocking. I assume it’s not a cheap thing, so the market would be aimed at those with money.

        Those with money hold power & influence, so like turkeys, they wouldn’t ‘vote for Christmas’ by seeking a public inquiry and call for cessation.

        SSL – I apologize because there do appear to be credible sources discussing this question.

        However, the rest of your response is blithering, uninformed bulshit.

  77. SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 1:41 am #

    Oh yeah, and by the way, who was that again who said Ching Chang was running for office so you better not vote for the Ching Chong?

    https://www.wnd.com/2018/08/democrat-to-asian-opponent-dont-vote-for-the-ching-chong/

    • tucsonspur November 24, 2019 at 3:37 am #

      Yes, there it is, a great example of black hypocrisy. Why not chink or coolie? Is Ching Chong less pejorative?

      I bet she knows nothing of Ching Chow, whose immortal words always stay with me. “A wise man is always a student”.

  78. Pucker November 24, 2019 at 3:47 am #

    Do you remember when as a kid at home alone on the weekends you’d get an occasional knock on the door by some evangelicals handing out literature about the imminent apocalypse, and you’d rebuff them with some lame excuse and threaten to call the cops and then just go back to watching TV?

    “The Brady Bunch” was a story about drug abuse and sodomy in Los Angeles, California. Do you remember the episode of “The Post-Collapse Partridge Family” when the divorced Shirley Partridge, without the protection of a vigorous, stalwart Male in the house, was gang raped by an itinerant motorcycle gang of overweight crank heads and pot smokers?

  79. tucsonspur November 24, 2019 at 4:01 am #

    The Peace of Wild Things

    “When despair for the world grows in me
    and I wake in the night at the least sound
    in fear of what my life and my children’s lives may be,
    I go and lie down where the wood drake
    rests in his beauty on the water, and the great heron feeds.
    I come into the peace of wild things
    who do not tax their lives with forethought
    of grief. I come into the presence of still water.
    And I feel above me the day-blind stars
    waiting with their light. For a time
    I rest in the grace of the world, and am free.”

    Wendell Berry

    • SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 12:55 pm #

      This is such a beautiful poem.

    • sunburstsoldier November 24, 2019 at 7:04 pm #

      THE LAKE ISLE OF INNISFREE

      I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
      And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
      Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee,
      And live alone in the bee-loud glade.
      And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow, Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
      There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
      And evening full of the linnet’s wings.
      I will arise and go now, for always night and day
      I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
      While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
      I hear it in the deep heart’s core.

      Y.B. Yeats

      This poem is one of my all time favorites…

      • sunburstsoldier November 24, 2019 at 7:23 pm #

        Let’s try that again:

        THE LAKE ISLE OF INNISFREE

        I will arise and go now, and go to Innisfree,
        And a small cabin build there, of clay and wattles made:
        Nine bean rows will I have there, a hive for the honey bee,
        And live alone in the bee-loud glade.
        And I shall have some peace there, for peace comes dropping slow,
        Dropping from the veils of the morning to where the cricket sings;
        There midnight’s all a glimmer, and noon a purple glow,
        And evening full of the linnet’s wings.
        I will arise and go now, for always night and day
        I hear lake water lapping with low sounds by the shore;
        While I stand on the roadway, or on the pavements gray,
        I hear it in the deep heart’s core.

        Y.B. Yeats

      • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 11:42 pm #

        I love the sound of bees. In the Martian Chronicles, one of the Martians killed an Earth invader with a rifle that shot bees. His wife had telepathically fallen in love with the Earthling and he was jealous.

        • SoftStarLight November 25, 2019 at 9:21 am #

          OMG that is so romantic! Did the killing of the Earthling renew their relationship?

  80. Pucker November 24, 2019 at 4:05 am #

    I heard that in the Vatican that you get “Holy Water” as well as “Wholly Water”. And if you’re on a diet, you can order “Holy Water Light”, which is spiritually less filling. After they filter out all of the Sin, I heard that they then sell it in bulk containers to the Chinese who just love it…..

    I was watching an Oklahoma Sooners football game tonight on the Boob Tube. Oklahoma was beating the crap out of some evangelical Christian football team from Texas, which is where Beto is from, which is really weird…. I felt like I had dropped acid because the black Alabama quarterback, Jalen Hurts, was playing for Oklahoma. I freaked me out…. The college football players have these new football helmets that are really big and which make the adult players look like pee wee football players. It’s like dropping acid…. Everything in the US, especially the political circus on TV, is like dropping acid….

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    • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 1:05 pm #

      Sally needed to give up her Field and become Mrs Burt Reynolds. What man could have resisted that? Thus she would have found happiness and given happiness, and created new life. Alas she did not. She who loses her life will save it as the Master so wisely said.

  81. tucsonspur November 24, 2019 at 4:21 am #

    Ginsberg’s ‘Howl’ :

    https://poets.org/poem/howl-parts-i-ii

    Are you howling yet?

    • SoftStarLight November 24, 2019 at 12:17 pm #

      What a catharsis! It’s true that the god of this world often seems all-powerful, pervasive, and inevitable. I can only imagine that in a city like the Big Apple Moloch is truly king, or appears to be. But not so much in far away quiet forests and pastures. If only the forests and pastures could retake the cities of concrete and metal. The cities could be our offering to the one Jehovah. Fire offerings. Forgive us for bowing to the demon god that devours men and the spirit. Sorry for the digression. Thank you for sharing.

      • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 1:07 pm #

        Yes, they must be Gomorrahized. They’re going to be anyway, so….

  82. Pucker November 24, 2019 at 4:32 am #

    Chaz 10 Buttigieg once posted a photo of his and Pete’s wedding in a purple-colored church in South Bend Indiana. The wedding attendees were mostly young, thin Middle Eastern males who appeared to be Persian homosexuals. Pete speaks Farsi and Dari and did a 6 month stint at the Bagram Airbase “Black Site” in Afghanistan, probably “interrogating” prisoners with a big powerful enema water hose. After 6 months, Pete got-the-hell-outta-there…. It’s like Dropping Acid….

  83. Pucker November 24, 2019 at 5:13 am #

    It’s like Dropping Acid while driving on the insane 8 lane highway from Los Angeles to San Diego while digesting a high carbohydrate Mexican meal of corn chips, melted cheese, chili peppers, and beans….

    The Hollowing Out of America
    November 20, 2019
    Here is hollowed-out America, an economy of ever-greater financial wealth piling up in the hands of the few while tens of millions of wage-earners can’t afford what was available to everyone, even the working class, in previous eras.
    America is being hollowed out, but since we don’t measure what actually matters, the decline has been deep-sixed by the government and media. As I explain in my new book Will You Be Richer or Poorer? , there are a number of reasons why what’s important –social capital, for example–doesn’t get measured.
    The most obvious reason is that it’s politically inconvenient for those in power for the hollowing out of America to be quantified. To conceal the decline, institutions only measure what can be massaged to appear positive . These statistics include inflation (Consumer Price Index, CPI),the unemployment rate, Gross Domestic Product (GDP), and hundreds of financial numbers: net wealth, bank loans and so on.
    Everyone knows from experience that big-ticket expenses such as healthcare (see chart below), childcare, rent, college tuition, etc. have been rising at double-digit rates, while shrinkflation has reduced the quantity and quality of goods even as price has remained unchanged.
    In other words, the official statistics are gamed to appear positive even as the nation is being hollowed out. People sense the disconnect but since what actually matters isn’t measured, there are few objective indicators of the decline we all experience in everyday life.
    The second reason is that it’s difficult to measureintangible forms of capital such as social mobility and shared purpose. People are feeling increasingly insecure financially, but how do we measure this with any accuracy? We can track the number of people working second jobs in the gig economy, those with uncertain work schedules, etc., but even households with above-average incomes and conventional white-collar jobs are financially precarious in ways that don’t lend themselves to easy quantification.
    And so while we’re constantly told the American consumer is in good shape, with manageable debt and rising incomes, in the real world auto loan defaults are soaring, 40% of those suffering from cancer are wiped out by the co-pays, and superficially middle-class households are one layoff away from default and insolvency.
    As a result, we’re like the blind men touching different parts of the elephant and drawing completely erroneous conclusions about the size and nature of the animal. Much of what we measure is misleading (i.e. cheerleading), and what can’t be easily measured is dismissed as unimportant. Even worse, we conclude that since we can’t measure it easily, it doesn’t exist.
    America is being hollowed out even as we’re constantly hectored that all is well. We’re told saving $10 on a pair of poorly made shoes is a tremendous benefit of globalization and neoliberal policies, but does a couple hundred dollars in savings on poorly made stuff (which is itself offset by an unmeasured decline in quality and durability) offset the fact that a huge swath of American households can no longer afford to rent their own apartment or house, much less buy a house?
    Does this modest reduction in the cost of consumer goods offset the upward-spiraling cost of healthcare that is bankrupting small business and households? Does it offset the stagnation of wages for the majority of wage-earners? Does it offset the insecurity of work and benefits? Does it offset the decline of competition and the subsequent domination of profiteering monopolies and cartels in the American economy?
    The U.S. Only Pretends to Have Free Markets From plane tickets to cellphone bills, monopoly power costs American consumers billions of dollars a year.
    These are the forces hollowing out America: the relentless rise of the cost of big-ticket essentials while wages stagnate for the bottom 80%; the normalization of profiteering monopolies and cartels who buy tax breaks and regulatory capture in our pay-to-play political system; the decline of social mobility; the erosion of shared purpose and social capital; the silencing of dissent and independent thought; the erosion of financial security as everyone is forced into risky casinos of speculative financialization; the erosion of the rule of law as the super-wealthy are more equal than everyone else ; the criminalization of poverty; the decline of small business formation; the erosion of well-being and health; and so on in a long list of landslides in everything that matters that we don’t dare measure.
    What’s Been Normalized? Nothing Good or Positive
    Most perniciously, America is being hollowed out as local enterprises that reinvested profits back into their own communities have been wiped out by monopolies and cartels drawing upon unlimited credit lines of cheap money supplied by the Federal Reserve and other central banks, a system that guarantees the top few will collect whatever “wealth” is being generated by globalization and financialization: The 1% grabbed 82% of all wealth created in 2017 (and 2018 and 2019…).
    Here is hollowed-out America, an economy of ever-greater financial wealth piling up in the hands of the few while tens of millions of wage-earners can’t afford what was available to everyone, even the working class, in previous eras: to buy a family home, however modest; to be able to afford to have children; to build meaningful capital; to have a positive social role in the community; to have a say in the political system; to have the opportunity to become self-employed without gambling the entire family’s capital on the venture; access to the ladder of social mobility and access to the shared capital of a functional government and infrastructure.
    The whole point my book Will You Be Richer or Poorer?is to contrast the happy story reflected by what we do measure– an endless increase in financial wealth–withthe disturbing account of what we’re losing or have already lost that we don’t dare measure lest it reveal how little is left of America’s non-financial wealth.
    Here’s your 2% annual inflation:

    • K-Dog November 24, 2019 at 12:29 pm #

      CHS can give a nice rant.

  84. Pucker November 24, 2019 at 5:35 am #

    I support the Second Amendment. When the police come to throw me off the building, there’s no point calling the police. I want a shotgun.

    Beto O’Rourke
    @BetoORourke
    ·
    Nov 21
    The story of Luis & Marcela is inspiring. Says something about the strength of El Paso and what it takes to recover from a shooting like the one we had in August. Says something about why we have to stop gun violence and racism in America.

  85. Pucker November 24, 2019 at 6:26 am #

    The Chinese say that the Democrats “are easier to deal with”. The speculation is that China may try to crash the US stock market next year to try to take out Trump.

    Do you remember the second Rambo movie? It was like Dropping Acid…. Rambo got tangled up during the air drop and he had to pull out his trusty survival knife to cut himself loose thereby losing his gear and forcing him to survive in the jungle and to fight the Gooks using just his killer instincts and his wits…. Rambo later gets taken prisoner by the Evil Russians, but he escapes to free the American POW’s in “NAM”.

    Biden Ukraine Take Was $16.5 Million

    November 20, 2019 “Information Clearing House” – An indictment drawn up by Ukraine’s Office of the Prosecutor General against Burisma owner Nikolai Zlochevsky claims that Hunter Biden and his partners received $16.5 million for their ‘services’ – according to Ukrainian MP Alexander Dubinsky of the ruling Servant of the People Party.

    http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52585.htm

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  86. sunburstsoldier November 24, 2019 at 10:49 am #

    “i don’t really get what SBS means by holistic thinking.

    To me, there is just a stark divide between the real (things that matter) and the Borg.

    There is the corporate world, in which we largely work toward pointless ends, and there is real life — raising my son, writing music, doing home improvements myself. For the latter, real energy goes in, real things come out. That is the way to overcome entropy, IMO. ” –Nightowl

    Holistic thinking is a means for us to be creative in all aspects of our life NightOwl. For instance in your post you recognize a stark divide between “the corporate world in which we largely work towards pointless ends” and “real life” or that aspect of life where you are in creative control, where, as you well put it, “real energy goes in (and) real things come out”. The reason for this “stark divide” is because, within the current Western technological approach to life (it’s important to remember Western Christian Civilization was not always so focused on technology as an end in itself) the individual is unable to relate to life in terms of its wholeness, but is compelled to specialize (learn more and more about less and less). Despite all the benefits accrued through such specialization (benefits primarily associated with comfort and convenience) the downside is we lose our creative autonomy, we become a “cog in a vast machine, and AS A COG we are completely controlled by the machine, having little to say concerning what the machine does or what direction it moves in. The only way we can get our creative autonomy back as a whole person is to learn to approach life holistically once again. Can it be done? Yes if you have the right methodology. Is it easy? Quite the contrary. Trying to live life in terms of its wholeness within our present societal context is extremely difficult and demands untold sacrifice. Is it worth it? Yes, as it is the only way to recover our freedom to be who we were meant to be, not merely “human” but superhuman.

    I was trained in a methodology for approaching life holistically back in the early 70s, and have spent the intervening years attempting to practice it. Such practice has been a source of great suffering for me as well as great joy.

    • sunburstsoldier November 24, 2019 at 11:06 am #

      Holistic thinking is also idealistic thinking, for hidden within the Whole is an Ideal or optimal way of life wherein humankind can unfold its full creative potential while living in harmony with the natural world and all living things…

    • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 11:14 am #

      I like this. As Heinlein said, specialization is for insects. Mumford and many others have pointed at this as a disaster. A guy tightening a bolt on an assembley line all day long is far fall from a master craftsman who makes an entire thing and can thus take pride in himself and his creation.

      Can you give a concrete example of one victory you’ve had in this regard to make clear how you’ve overcome the divide?

      • sunburstsoldier November 24, 2019 at 11:33 am #

        Concrete example? Like winning an award or something?

        For me the practice of holistic thinking is a progressive enhancement of my comprehension of reality, and leads to ever deepening insights into the ‘awesome mystery’ of the world about us.These insights are in themselves a source of joy and exhilaration (I think you know what I mean as you’ve most likely been there yourself), but in terms of a practical breakthrough, say starting a school to pass this methodology on to others, that’s yet to happen. I did send JHK an outline of this methodology and how I happened to be the recipient of it a while back. He said the ideas really resonated with him (so that’s a minor victory right there).

        • Janos Skorenzy November 24, 2019 at 11:43 am #

          Like winning an award or something?

          You are infuriating. I could not have been more clear yet you say something like that. A school? Think the students won’t ask what I just asked?

          • K-Dog November 24, 2019 at 12:16 pm #

            “Nothing is unthinkable, nothing impossible to the balanced person, provided it comes out of the needs of life and is dedicated to life’s further development.” – Mumford

            Manage the specialization, fight the specialization. Mumford uses the word balance. Balance can reign in poison to the soul. To some extent we can’t help living like insects in this system. But balance with passion and success is possible. Rage against the dying of the light.

            If you are rendering unto caesar make sure you get a piece of the action. Better yet, make sure other people do to.

          • K-Dog November 24, 2019 at 12:17 pm #

            too

          • sunburstsoldier November 24, 2019 at 12:42 pm #

            I was just kidding Janos. I really appreciate your interest and see you as a kindred spirit in some ways. I did give a concrete example at the end.

            You said “overcome the divide”. I think I missed that the first time. Yeah that’s the key point isn’t it. This will sound crazy but I overcame the divide literally through a series of miracles. I really could not have done it under my own steam…

          • sunburstsoldier November 24, 2019 at 12:44 pm #

            How familiar are you with Mumford are you k-dog? Have you read any of his books?

          • BackRowHeckler November 24, 2019 at 5:13 pm #

            I had read Mumford’s The Story of Utopia, one day was up in Amenia, NY, right over the NY/CT line, decided to look up Mumford’s house, which is in the national registry of historic houses. It took some searching, but there it was, a dignified old house, the kind of place you’d expect Lewis Mumford to live in. (Really not too far from where JHK lives) We chatted with the then current owner, a real estate developer — isn’t that ironic?

            Brh

          • K-Dog November 24, 2019 at 10:03 pm #

            Yes I have. I read ‘The conduct of Life‘ last month and I also have the ‘Lewis Mumford Reader‘ which I hope to read in the near future.

            Balance and self direction is the way to go!

          • BackRowHeckler November 24, 2019 at 10:53 pm #

            If you want to read a moving tribute, pick up a copy of Mumford’s book about his son, Geddes, who was killed in 1944 at Anzio. The most personal and eloquent of all Mumford’s writing.

            It’s good to see Lewis Mumford getting a mention on this site. I see JHK as a writer (and above all Mumford considered himself a ‘writer’) very much influenced by Lewis Mumford.

            Brh

          • sunburstsoldier November 25, 2019 at 4:53 am #

            I have a very old copy of Mumford’s ‘The Culture of Cities’ which I treasure and still crack open from time to time…

            Mumford was one of those rare birds like Toynbee who attempted to take the whole of life into account and did not succumb to the charm of intense specialization…

  87. amb November 24, 2019 at 2:05 pm #

    Another masterpiece crafted by our Mr. Kuntsler. Thank you.

    One suggestion, if I may be so bold…

    I aver that it is erroneous to refer to these degraded beings as the “Democratic Party”. “Democratic” connotes a positive governmental structure created by intelligent political architects at some point in the evolution of governing here on Earth. This party of degraded and evil beings are the antipathy of the adjective, “democratic”. They are the “Democrat Party” and should be referred to as such. (Personally, I refer to them as the “Degraded Party”.)

  88. malthuss November 24, 2019 at 3:14 pm #

    How thoughtless, then, of the Nazis to crap all over it instead of sticking with something suitable to their own movement, like a skull and crossbones.

    for ONCE we agree.

    But the Nazis left, the Muslims are there to stay [thanks P Buchanan for that insight].

    • SoftStarLight November 25, 2019 at 1:09 am #

      What a shocking and scandalous post! Millions upon millions have died and been enslaved because of the Crescent. Would you therefore demand that the Islamic symbol be one that denotes toxicity?

  89. malthuss November 24, 2019 at 3:21 pm #

    From Unz.com

    I’m sure I’ll see the Target ad sooner or later,.
    Target has nothing on Nissan.
    Using rapid cuts, THREE different mudshark exit the dealership.

  90. BackRowHeckler November 24, 2019 at 4:17 pm #

    China’s Coal Boom

    NY Post 11/24/19

    “As of July, China had 4,436 operating coal plants, with 487 under construction, and many more on the pipeline”.

    That’s what I’m talking about!

    Brh

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    • Majella November 24, 2019 at 7:57 pm #

      “China’s renewable energy sector is growing faster than its fossil fuels and nuclear power capacity. … In 2017, renewable energy comprised 36.6% of China’s total installed electric power capacity, and 26.4% of total power generation, the vast majority from hydroelectric sources.”

      • BackRowHeckler November 24, 2019 at 9:48 pm #

        Ok, good enough.

        Next we’ll be examining coal usage in India.

        Here’s a clue: Coal is King!

        • sunburstsoldier November 25, 2019 at 4:58 am #

          How much coal is out there Brh? I thought that was a dwindling resource as well as oil. Doesn’t coal have a lot of pollutants it releases into the atmosphere or have they found away to burn coal cleanly? I took a couple of college courses on energy when I was sixty, but that was a few years back…

  91. BackRowHeckler November 24, 2019 at 4:59 pm #

    Like Jim said in The Long Emergency 15 years ago “We will be using a lot more coal in the future.”

    The future is now.

    Brh

  92. BackRowHeckler November 24, 2019 at 7:27 pm #

    At least the Climate Hunger Strike is over, thank God!

    Did anybody go on a Climate Hunger Strike in China?

    I wonder how it would go over, say, if a few XC protesters set up shop in downtown Beijing and announced they would not be eating any Chinese food — or any other kind of food, in effect declared a Hunger Strike — until Jingjang Xi, top Chinaman, declared a Climate Emergency, and banned all coal fired power plants? They’d probably get some pretty funny looks from passersby on the street. Then they’d be hustled off to a labor camp, where they would experience honest to God hunger, and be struck with batons.

    Brh

    • sunburstsoldier November 25, 2019 at 5:00 am #

      China appears to becoming more totalitarian rather than democratic…

  93. Majella November 24, 2019 at 8:24 pm #

    Just for fun…

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=my-5beVW0v4

    • sprawlcapital November 25, 2019 at 12:11 am #

      Not bad, considering Stephen Colbert was involved.

      Now for a drink of rum.

    • SoftStarLight November 25, 2019 at 12:58 am #

      You know those hearings interrupted General Hospital don’t you? What is going on between Nina and Valentin is far more serious than anything Schiffter has to say. He should be impeached for the inconvenience!

  94. BackRowHeckler November 24, 2019 at 10:36 pm #

    Bloomberg is in it!

    Here you have a multi billionaire vying for the same position as two candidates whose platforms rest partially on whipping up hatred for billionaires. It makes for an interesting situation, does it not?

    The problem for these Dem candidates now seems to be efforts in Congress to impeach the President is the sucking all the oxygen out of the room, so to speak. Who care what Bernie Sandals or Liz Warren is saying when you’re on the edge of your seat waiting for ‘bombshell’ testimony that will finally bring Trump down? I think I read Bloomberg has $55 billion, enough to fund any campaign. He’s 77 and can’t take it with him.

    Brh

    • Walter B November 24, 2019 at 10:49 pm #

      I could have sworn that the loonie lefties had problems with wealthy old white men.

      • sunburstsoldier November 25, 2019 at 4:37 am #

        I guess they are the only ones who can afford to run…

  95. sunburstsoldier November 25, 2019 at 5:23 am #

    As we learn to approach life in terms of its wholeness we come to realize it is not mechanically deterministic but miraculous, and miraculous things will happen to those who seek life on its own terms as an undivided Whole…

    • sunburstsoldier November 25, 2019 at 5:24 am #

      Been hittin the vape again…

      • SoftStarLight November 25, 2019 at 9:35 am #

        I saw a miracle recently. An uncle had a knee replacement and he not only went home the same afternoon after his surgery (he was laughing and joking and taking crazy pics in the recovery room), he was up and walking without any cane or walker in two days. And now a few weeks later he is driving and back to normal activity. His scar also is healing very fast. Even his doctor was shocked at his progress. He said it was because he prayed to the Lord and everybody was praying for him too. I was so happy for my uncle when I saw him recently that I shouted with him “Praise God!” I know some people chuckle at me because I get so excited and zealous sometimes. But it’s true nonetheless.

        • elysianfield November 25, 2019 at 11:38 am #

          . He said it was because he prayed to the Lord and everybody was praying for him too. I was so happy…”

          SSL,
          Can we then agree that it was the Devil who fucked up his knee in the first place?

  96. sunburstsoldier November 25, 2019 at 5:38 am #

    For SSL,

    You’re right deep state exists to some extent at all levels of government from nation to neighborhood. You must admit however (I would think) the smaller the unit of government the less pernicious deep state will be simply due to unavoidable transparency and accessibility…

    • SoftStarLight November 25, 2019 at 9:28 am #

      You maybe vaped a little too much :-)? I think what you mean is that the less pernicious deep state is simply due to unavoidable opaqueness and inaccessibility (at certain points and times) because power and control require a certain level of secrecy and esotericism. I am in total agreement with you though that the small deep state of the village is, oftentimes, much more oriented to the direct concerns and daily lives of the villagers than a monstrous leviathan of a deep state in a very distant and far removed capital city.

  97. sunburstsoldier November 25, 2019 at 6:09 am #

    Back in my LSD days this song by King Crimson always seemed prophetic to me and reflected the time we were living in…

    Epitaph

    The wall on which the prophets wrote
    Is cracking at the seams
    Upon the instruments of death
    The sunlight brightly gleams
    When every man is torn apart
    With nightmares and with dreams
    Will no one lay the laurel wreath
    When silence drowns the screams

    Between the iron gates of fate
    The seeds of time were sown
    And watered by the deeds of those 
    Who know and who are known
    Knowledge is a deadly friend
    If no one sets the rules
    The fate of all mankind, I see
    Is in the hands of fools

    The wall on which the prophets wrote
    Is cracking at the seams
    Upon the instruments of death
    The sunlight brightly gleams
    When every man is torn apart
    With nightmares and with dreams
    Will no one lay the laurel wreath
    When silence drowns the screams

    Confusion will be my epitaph
    As I crawl, a cracked and broken path
    If we make it, we can all sit back and laugh
    But I fear, tomorrow, I’ll be crying
    Yes, I fear, tomorrow, I’ll be crying
    Yes, I fear, tomorrow, I’ll be crying
    Crying, crying
    Yes, I fear, tomorrow, I’ll be crying
    Yes, I fear, tomorrow, I’ll be crying
    Yes, I fear, tomorrow, I’ll be crying
    Crying

    King Crimson

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  6. Forget 'Ides Of March', Washington 'Storms Of December' Loom Over "The Holidays" | WeAreChangeTV.US - November 22, 2019

    […] Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com, […]

  7. What Lies Ahead? | Not Something Else - November 22, 2019

    […] so we enter that time of the year (as Kunstler suggests in his latest blog post – The Storms of December) known as ‘the holidays’ or the ‘festive season’.  But the storm clouds […]

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  8. Forget ‘Ides Of March’, Washington ‘Storms Of December’ Loom Over “The Holidays” – The Conservative Insider - November 22, 2019

    […] Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com, […]

  9. The Storms of December - The Daily Coin - November 23, 2019

    […] Continue Reading / Kunstler >>> […]

  10. Forget ‘Ides Of March’, Washington ‘Storms Of December’ Loom Over “The Holidays” | Raw Conservative Opinions - November 24, 2019

    […] Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com, […]

  11. Forget ‘Ides Of March’, Washington ‘Storms Of December’ Loom Over “The Holidays” – republican freedom - November 24, 2019

    […] Authored by James Howard Kunstler via Kunstler.com, […]

  12. #366 11-22-19 Book Club: Who Dares Wins: Britain, 1979-1982 – Trumpathon – News and information on latest top stories, weather, business, entertainment, politics, - November 24, 2019

    […] The Storms of December […]

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  13. The Storms of December « Financial Survival Network - November 29, 2019

    […] by James Howard Kunstler Kunstler.com […]

  14. Contra Corner » Adam’s Schiff Show: From Completely Phony To Downright Stupid - December 15, 2019

    […] https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-storms-of-december/ […]