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Why not war with Canada? That pissant “nation” is cluttering up the northern half of OUR Continent, which we struggled mightily to free from wicked Old Europe. What doesn’t Justin Trudeau get about that? And when we’re done with him, how about a few rounds with Frau Merkel and the wee frog, Monsieur Macron? I’d like to see the Golden Golem of Greatness in a leotard and one of those Mexican wrestling masks, tossing these peevish international dwarves out of the ring like so many sacks of potting soil.

And now it’s off to Singapore for a championship bout with the opponent known as “Little Rocket Man.” There’s an odd expectation that these two avatars of unreality will settle the hash that has been simmering for sixty years between the divided Korea and the USA. Mr. Trump will make a deal to turn North Korea into a golfer’s paradise and Mr. Kim will promise to beat his nuclear arsenal into nine irons and putters. And then they’ll celebrate on Air Force One with bags of Big Macs and Buckets o’Chicken. (Let the aides and advisors fight over the Singapore Noodles and squid beaks in garlic sauce.)

The New York Times lost its shit Monday morning with a lead editorial that hauled onstage the stock villain from The Times’ repertory of international bogeymen: Russia.

If a president of the United States were to sketch out a secret, detailed plan to break up the Atlantic alliance, that plan would bear a striking resemblance to Trump’s behavior. It would involve outward hostility to the leaders of Canada, Britain, France, Germany and Japan. Specifically, it would involve picking fights over artificial issues — not to win big concessions for the United States, but to create conflict for the sake of it. A secret plan to break up the West would also have the United States looking for new allies to replace the discarded ones. The most obvious would be Russia, the biggest rival within Europe to Germany, France and Britain. And just as Russia does, a United States intent on wrecking the Atlantic alliance would meddle in the domestic politics of other countries to install new governments that also rejected the old alliance.

Ah, so…. To The Times, Canada, Britain, France, Germany and Japan are little more than a pain-in-the-ass-ex-wives-club, and North Korea is the irresistible porn star with a huge rack, proffered by that evil old pimp, Russia, in the never-ending game of Rope-a-Dope they’ve been running on Mr. Trump since even before he glided down that fateful escalator in his gilded Fifth Avenue tower. Surely, the wicked Putin has rigged up the Singapore hotel with the latest spy-ware and loaded the president’s closets with whores and real estate developers to tempt Mr. Trump into every sort of unnatural act dreamed up in the Kompromat labs of Yasenevo.

I’m all for world peace, and I would like to attempt to take the Kim-Trump meeting seriously, but it is hard to imagine two characters less prepared by the rigors of reality than this pair. Each has been dwelling in a magic kingdom of his own life-long. Both exhibit behaviors typical of children: sulking, threats, bluster, and mysterious mood shifts. The supposedly serious adults around Mr. Trump must be going through the Xanax like Tic-Tacs. The military attachés around the inscrutable Kim might recall the 2016 execution of two NK ministers shot to death with anti-aircraft guns for displeasing the boss — one of them for merely falling asleep during a Kim speech. Who cleaned up that mess, I wonder.

Maybe something good can come out of this improbable set-up. I expect a kind of vaudeville act: a few moments of the two principals pretending that they understand what each is saying… a hopeful communiqué announcing the blooming of a million flowers, and a fateful blowup a few hours into the honeymoon when Kim, Trump, and all the spear-carriers on both sides realize that they had no idea what they were talking about.

Then, on Thursday or thereabouts the long-awaited DOJ Inspector General’s report comes out, after a going-over by the very folks at the FBI whose conduct is the subject of that review. I expect a new layer in the mighty cake baked by the white knights of the Resistance. This one will be called Redacto-Gate.


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James Howard Kunstler is the author of many books including (non-fiction) The Geography of Nowhere, The City in Mind: Notes on the Urban Condition, Home from Nowhere, The Long Emergency and the four-book series of World Made By Hand novels, set in a post economic crash American future. His most recent book is Living in the Long Emergency; Global Crisis, the Failure of the Futurists, and the Early Adapters Who Are Showing Us the Way Forward. Jim lives on a homestead in Washington County, New. York, where he tends his garden and communes with his chickens.

425 Responses to “World Wrassling Diplomacy”

  1. Georges1202 June 11, 2018 at 9:57 am #

    Of course His Serene Jackass has to blurt out that he can take the measure of someone in the first 5 seconds, so if he sits there manspreading with that petulant old bull scowl at the start we can then turn the channel?

    The world in the hands of two horrid haircuts. The 21st century tragicomedy rolls on.

    • K-Dog June 11, 2018 at 11:57 am #

      Not two horrid haircuts only one!

      Cabellera contra cabellera. In Lucha Libre (Mexican wraslin) a loser of hair vs. hair match has their head shaved bald. A wrassler with a Lucha Libre mask has to move it enough to be shaved after the match. Wrasslers without masks obviously don’t have to.

      But that is not what we want to see. We would prefer a Carrera contra carrera match. In Lucha Libre that means the loser has to retire.

      Regardless of the match, Kim is going to have a cheerleading team of SJWs dressed as pussies screaming grab it now pinky pig! Grab it now! It is going to be an awesome sight.

      As a Lucha Libre masked match things have not been properly promoted. We need a choice!

      The choices:

      Máscara contra máscara – mask versus mask
      Cabellera contra cabellera – hair versus hair
      Máscara o cabellera contra campeonato – mask or hair versus title
      Máscara o cabellera contra retiro – mask or hair versus career
      Carrera contra carrera – career versus career

      If it is Carrera contra carrera then after a few inscrutable body slams which do in Trump Kim would become the president of the United States. That would demonstrate for all time the awesome power of nuclear weapons for sure.

      Since anything goes now, that Kim would be constitutionally disqualified as not being a native born American won’t matter a noodle. Besides if Kim brings in NK with him as our Fifty First State instead of just holding it as foreign property and makes Pyongyang the new District of Columbia once he takes Trumps title then he will have been technically born here anyway.

    • jean.baptiste.moquelin June 11, 2018 at 4:12 pm #

      This will probably the one and only time I will speak up for Justin Trudeau, but he is not just a limp-wristed snowflake: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XuSpZ3_5pTc&t=602s. No, he is an multiculturalist, SJW airhead – who would still punch the living daylights out of Trump 30 seconds after both step into a ring. So would Macron for that matter.

    • 100th Avatar June 11, 2018 at 5:02 pm #

      Look at Seawolf with the nom de plume after a correspondence course through “Not That Iowa Writers Workshop brought to you by DesMoines Area Community College”

  2. Dumbedup June 11, 2018 at 10:09 am #

    There’s enough anti-russo phobia left in both parties so that some sort of re-alignment of allies and economic partners will get him impeached. That would be irregardless of Mueller or any Inspector-General Report. Of course, either of those could speed it along.

  3. Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 10:14 am #

    Great post today, Jim! I’m picturing Trump and the Lil’ Fat Man stripped to their mawashis going at it sumo style. All while Mad Dog Mattis intones breathlessly in his best Col Kurtz voice in the background, “THE HORROR! THE HORROR!”, as he takes in sights that no living thing should ever be forced to see.

    • GreenAlba June 11, 2018 at 1:53 pm #

      Oops. I seem to have plagiarised you pictorially above, Scratch. Apologies for the lack of copyright credit 🙂

    • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 2:05 pm #

      New Fash: Middle, Upper Middle, and Upper Class WASPS or any and all who assimilate to their culture do all kind of sulking and blustering, except they do it with a hideous, frozen smile plastered on their face. Kim is simply unable to grok this or their pandering to him. He needed a fellow blusterer to deal with. Trump may yet attain a coup that all y’all were unable to pull off.

      • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 2:59 pm #

        Your grammar is uncharacteristically poor this morning, oh mighty prophet of renewed white supremacy. Just greeting the new day?

  4. RB June 11, 2018 at 10:15 am #

    Oh my, oh my. Mr. Trump ran for the presidency and actually had the misfortune of winning the damn thing. That will show him. Meanwhile he embarrassed, destroyed, screwed all of the other candidates on both sides of the divide and did it New York style which is “hey, fuck you”. Why would anyone think his ways would conform to what has been done since Adams went to England and sucked up to King George? Good old Paul Giamatti. In your face assholes!!! What is there not to like? The problem with America is Washington, DC and has always been so. It will always be so. Americans are getting what Mr. Mencken said in regard to democracy. We are getting it good and hard. I love it!! We are all terminal so enjoy the moment.

    Europe has been bleeding our blood and treasure for way too long. They provide huge subsidies to their citizens such as healthcare while Americans prop up a monstrous Pentagon and go without healthcare. I do wish Mr. Trump would take a different tack on defense but he is cornered there. Most presidents soon discover that it is across the Potomac in the odd shaped building where they at least get fake respect whereas they get none elsewhere. Hence, embrace the Pentagon and continue to shovel loads of cash to it.

    For my part, Trump is a lot of fun. The only thing missing in the Merkel picture was Trump lifting his middle finger to them all.

    • Georges1202 June 11, 2018 at 10:27 am #

      Jack Kennedy started to issue impious rumblings about doing something about the Pentagon and I’m convinced (along with the American University speech) that that led to Dealy Plaza.

      • Billy Hill June 11, 2018 at 11:27 am #

        I think following the Bay of Pigs debacle Kennedy wanted to break up the CIA into a million pieces rather than the Defense Dept, but he managed to alienate them as well with his no boots-on-the-ground policy in Vietnam. His assassination could read a bit like Murder on the Orient Express. Mind you he intended to supply the “freedom-loving” Vietnamese in their fight against Ho Chi Minh , so he was no peacenik.

        When I was in Dallas a year or so ago I traversed Dealey Plaza daily. It would be hard to imagine a more perfect kill zone. I have lately been listening to various YouTube interviews and etc., most recently an explication of the oddities surrounding the autopsy. Not that this should surprise anyone given the 1976 House Select Committee conclusions.

        We must keep in mind Sherlock Holmes’ dictum relating to what is impossible rather than merely improbable – in which case the single bullet theory may well be reality. Still, there is symbolic truth (concept borrowed from Henry Louis Gates’ NY Times Op Ed on Tawana Brawley) in viewing 11-22-63 as a National Security State Coup, a watershed moment.

        • Walter B June 11, 2018 at 11:58 am #

          Oh it was a coup Billy, never doubt that.

          From “The Brothers” by John Le Carre:

          Page 305 – “Allen was at his home at Lloyd Neck when he received news of John F. Kennedy’s assassination on November 22, 1963. A week later, Johnson called. He wanted Allen to serve on a high-level panel that would investigate the assassination – the Warren Commission.

          Johnson told friends in Congress that the Kennedy assassination had “some foreign complication, CIA and others things.” Placing Allen on the Warren Commission ensured that these “complication” would remain secret. Allen never told the other members that the CIA had plotted to kill Castro, or revealed what it knew about Kennedy’s accused assassin, Lee Harvey Oswald. He advised other members of the commission about ways to question CIA officers, while at the same time advising the officers how to reply. By one account he “systematically used his influence to keep the commission safely within bounds, the importance of which only he could appreciate…From the start, before any evidence was reviewed, he pressed for the final verdict that Oswald had been a crazed gunman, not the agent of a national and international conspiracy.”

          Allen was in a unique position: the former director of central intelligence, dismissed by President Kennedy, helping to investigate Kennedy’s murder, while guarding the CIA’s own murder plots. Some have found this suspicious.”

          • Billy Hill June 11, 2018 at 12:49 pm #

            I believe there was means motive and opportunity and lots of grudge holders including even Howard Hunt’s cuckold CIA agent that came out of nowhere in his deathbed confession.
            The noise is sometimes conflicting and makes one wonder if the real conspiracy is that of disinformation.

            But some things stand out such as the chain of custody of the body and the limo in the crucial hours following the event. Texas law should have prevailed. A good case can be made that the crime scene evidence was compromised.

          • hmuller June 11, 2018 at 1:08 pm #

            Walter, may I add that in 1963 a good friend of Allen Dulles, a high society lady named Ruth Forbes Paine Young had a son and daughter in law living in Dallas (Michael Paine and Ruth Hyde Paine). Marina Oswald was living in their house when Kennedy was assassinated. Small world?! Yet the Warren Commission never revealed this odd coincidence.
            https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ruth_Paine

          • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 3:02 pm #

            What the Warren Commission left out could fill (and has filled) volumes.

          • sprawlcapital June 12, 2018 at 3:02 am #

            Walter,

            The author of The Brothers is Stephen Kinzer. I’m reading that book now.

            John Le Carre wrote The Spy Who Came in From the Cold.

        • SpeedyBB June 11, 2018 at 5:34 pm #

          Billy Hill – my late elder sister, a long-time Dallasite, took me on a tour of downtown at precisely the moment the film ‘JFK’ was premiering. We even passed the notorious Texas Theater, and it was improbably running the film for the pious good Dallas Baptists.

          One of my ex-motorcycle road racing acquaintances used to complain about how J.D. Tippits used to steal his girlfriends. The Tippits story is one of the many of the day that do not add up, by the way.

          When we drove around Dealey Plaza I too was frankly amazed at how compact it was. I had imagined some vast area (perhaps misled by 2-D photographic coverage) but as you mention it is a most compact and convenient shooting gallery / abattoir.

          I do not think those sponsoring the event counted on the cinematographic genius of one Abraham Zapruder, whose grainy 8mm. footage is most difficult to ‘splain away.

          ‘Back and to the left’ – the late Bill Hicks

          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1LcvNM7oc7k

        • Walter B June 12, 2018 at 10:39 am #

          Thanks for the correction sprawl, I mistook the cover’s endorsement from Le Carre as being the author.

          • sprawlcapital June 13, 2018 at 9:27 am #

            Thanks, Walter.

            I see Le Carre’s name on the front cover. On the back cover is his full quote: “A secret history, enriched and calmly retold; a shocking account of the misuse of American corporate, political, and media power; a shaming reflection on the moral manners of post imperial Europe; and an essential allegory for our own times.”

            This book, and others by Kinzer, are absolutely essential for American citizens if they are to participate in the making of foreign policy. Which is why it is disturbing that it was so easy for me to obtain them from our local library a few weeks ago. The Brothers and Overthrow: America’s Century of Regime Change, From Hawaii to Iraq were both there on the shelves, waiting for me to check out. There was no waiting list.

            That means most people are not reading these books. That means Americans do not have the information needed to evaluate whether it is a good idea for our country to continue acting as if the world needs our global network of military bases, our CIA as a covert paramilitary force, and our constant intervention in the workings of other countries.

    • pequiste June 11, 2018 at 10:37 am #

      I’m with you on this matter, RB.

      The only thing I disagree with you about that “Merkel” picture is that I wish DJT would have provided the toffee-nosed twits and traitors in the photo the full “bras-d’honneur”.

      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bras_d%27honneur

      Well understood by Euro-trash and tough guys from Queens alike.

      Regarding the halftime show entertainments in Singapore; I’m kind of hoping that everyone declares peace, and the Best Koreans throw a fabulous Juche Party:

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lwoSFQb5HVk

      (I wonder what the quietly powerful Lee Kwan Yew would have privately advised both The Donald and Kim. He built one amazing place there; a true city-state nation that sets the standard for greatness. We in the Yew Es Ay could learn a thing or two from the Singaporeans on how to run a surplus, without anything but location, a well-motivated populace plus the rarest commodity of all: forward-thinking leadership.

      • SpeedyBB June 11, 2018 at 5:46 pm #

        Not so fast there, Kemo Sabe. Excuse me Pequiste for daring to correct your appraisal, but as for the late Leak On You building a ‘true city-state nation that sets the standard for greatness’ just be careful you never cross the line and attempt to exercise your putative ‘free speech’ rights or something large and painful will slam down upon you. Along with the taxman and every other legal and extra-legal device they can drill you with.

        That Singapore, once a sad joke of crumbling British imperial enterprise, has succeeded so niftily is due in large part to its acceptance of laundered money excuse me runaway capital excuse me again ‘foreign investment’, defended by a more or less workable English legal system, as a beacon of safety for rich crooks in a sea of corrupt SE Asian nation-states. As soon as Indonesia, Malaysia, Vietnam or (most likely) Thailand gets their act together, this outpost of free enterprise will become an overpriced backwater once again.

        ‘Disneyland with the death penalty’ – William Gibson

        https://www.wired.com/1993/04/gibson-2/

    • Dumbedup June 11, 2018 at 11:11 am #

      The arrangement with Europe has kept the peace since WWII. Remember, Europe had been at war with itself for 100s of years. Back to back world conflicts could easily have been followed by a 3rd in the 50s or 60s, but for the tacit agreement for the US to provide for military defense and a permanent presence.

      If we go back to isolationism and withdraw that support there will be another war and this one will be the end of everything we know. There won’t be some sort of contraction or collapse which might live through.

      I don’t much care for globalism as it currently manifests itself; one giant arbitrage opportunity to scrape off more wealth of ordinary people. But the core concept is solid. We are all connected to this planet and to each other’s health and happiness. The less influence tribalism has on our behavior towards each other the better.

      • Elrond Hubbard June 11, 2018 at 12:23 pm #

        This.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 2:13 pm #

        Calcagus on the Romans: They make a desert and call it peace.

        Pyrrus: One more Victory like that will be the end of us.

        The Traitor Elite and their Muslims allies are hoping that the peace of death continues to ensure a peaceful transition to Islamic rule in Europe. Thankfully there was violence in Britain over the weekend – signs of life?

      • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 11:08 am #

        “Back to back world conflicts could easily have been followed by a 3rd in the 50s or 60s, but for the tacit agreement for the US to provide for military defense and a permanent presence.”

        And for the creation of the European Coal and Steel Community, which stopped France and Germany scrapping over the Ruhr Valley and led eventually to the Common Market and the EU.

        • Dumbedup June 13, 2018 at 9:07 am #

          Only between the original members of the common market. You still had the “iron curtain” and Russia. That is the reason we kept our forces there. We were 1 assassination, one errant missile, or one mistake at the button away from WWIII.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 9:05 am #

            True. We have a book in the house, which you will presumably be familiar with (but which I haven’t yet read – can’t remember its name ATM) which details the near misses and almost accidents, some terrifying from the point of view of the banality of human error.

    • GreenAlba June 11, 2018 at 11:31 am #

      “They provide huge subsidies to their citizens such as healthcare while Americans prop up a monstrous Pentagon and go without healthcare.”

      I hope that’s meant to be funny. The US spends a higher percentage of GDP on healthcare than any other OECD country, but with incredibly poor outcomes per dollar spent.

      But it’s your choice to spend your ‘healthcare’ dollars on rip-off insurance companies and rip-off pharma companies. You’re not even allowed to buy cheaper medicine from Canada, as far as I’m aware. Other countries, even those who pay insurance, spend a higher proportion on actual healthcare.

      That’s your choice, not Europe’s.

      http://stats.oecd.org/Index.aspx?DataSetCode=SHA

      Percentate of GDP spent on healthcare 2017:

      France 11.0%
      Germany 11.3%
      Switzerland 12.4%
      UK 9.7%

      US 17.2%

      Americans aren’t just propping up an enormous Pentagon, they’re propping up an enormous healthcare mafia that no other country would put up with.

      Don’t blame your healthcare mess on Europe.

      • marcus1 June 11, 2018 at 1:04 pm #

        Great reality check there GA. We the People are the ones that have floated a bloated military complex over social well being for citizens.
        Don’t buy the BS that our motivation is to keep the world safe. It’s about power.

        My hope is that the rest of the “modern” societies realize that we live in Trumpistan now, and even though the Orange will fade in time, the ignorance and destructive behavior will remain. The US cannot be trusted to promote peace and prosperity and the remaining mature powers should prepare and protect themselves accordingly.

      • JustSaying June 11, 2018 at 1:43 pm #

        As if Americans actually have a choice on what to spend on Healthcare….

        • GreenAlba June 11, 2018 at 2:06 pm #

          I take your point, JS. However, many people seem to approve the system when they’re shouting abuse about ‘socialised’ medicine, even when the alternatives proposed are about as socialist as my dog’s back paw.

          There are workable systems between the two extremes. People need to be on the streets demanding change.

          But yeah, I know, it’s easy to say.

      • Exscotticus June 11, 2018 at 5:00 pm #

        @GreenAlba

        Correct—the USA’s “self-chosen” health care system combines the worst aspects of both capitalism and socialism.

        Trump and Republicans had an opportunity to make systemic changes, but it’s clear that the only thing they could all agree on was to end the ACA. All those years of hating Obamacare with no Plan B. Total failure of leadership.

        It has also been the USA’s choice to subsidize Europe’s national defense and market economies—until now. So the USA can’t really blame Europe for that, either.

        But the USA can blame Europe for acting peevish now that their Sugar Daddy wants to end the arrangement.

        • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 6:56 am #

          Exscotticus

          Glad we agree on the ideologically driven nature of your healthcare system.

          Our own is not exactly flourishing (although I’d take it any day over yours). I’ll spare you the details, which are not necessarily what you would list yourself – suffice it to say that human nature intervenes to make each less than ideal. But both could do better.

          Re your Sugar Daddy point, please note that Sugar Daddies aren’t generally in the Sugar Daddy business out of the goodness of their hearts – quite the opposite, one might say. And so, as marcus points out, any Sugar Daddy activities engaged in by Uncle Sam are engaged in for the usual payback that Sugar Daddies get.

          Uncle Sam doesn’t do charity (although his individual citizens certainly do). As I mentioned to Walter, it took the UK 61 years to pay off its Marshall Plan loans – I know for a fact that there are Americans who think these loans were not loans. Not that I’m saying they should have been. But ‘Sugar Daddy’ demands his pound of flesh, with apologies for mixed metaphors.

          • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 7:45 am #

            Not that I’m saying they *shouldn’t* have been…

          • Exscotticus June 12, 2018 at 11:14 am #

            > But ‘Sugar Daddy’ demands his pound of flesh, with apologies for mixed metaphors.

            LOL. I love mixing metaphors as well.

            OK so what decrepit sex acts do you imagine the USA demands of Canada? For example, there are no USA military bases in Canada, which is the usual price the USA demands of its Sugar Babies.

            > I’ll spare you the details, which are not necessarily what you would list yourself – suffice it to say that human nature intervenes…

            Exactly. What do you do about the leeches, parasites, and locusts of the world? The ones that will suck your social services dry? And do you think Canada should rename itself “New Haiti” or “New Nigeria”?

            “Pity for all would be hardness and tyranny toward you, my dear neighbor.”
            ?Friedrich Nietzsche

          • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 11:38 am #

            There is no reason to be too literal with the metaphor, Exscotticus. I wasn’t thinking of specific acts – I’m just wagering that the US doesn’t do things or spend money that it doesn’t consider well spent *in its own interests*. Even regional peace may count as in its own interests, as may good relations with its neighbours.

            It is also for this reason (and not just for reasons of charity, which, in its original sense, is a good thing) that I am happy to have my own government spend some of my taxes making things more liveable in less fortunate countries, so that their populations may be less inclined to flee them. Enlightened self-interest added to genuine charity.

            Unfortunately, as you know, both our countries have a long history of interfering in other countries primarily for their own ends and interests, and thereby (whether by immediate or delayed result) helping turn them into places people flee.

            I’m not getting into Canada (as it were), as I haven’t remotely kept up with developments of whatever stripe there, although I realise that is my failing. Apart, because of my environmental interests, from the tar sands, which have long been an unfortunate scourge on the state of Alberta, although, like many scourges, from casinos to brothels to recreational poppy growing, it provides jobs.

          • Elrond Hubbard June 12, 2018 at 12:02 pm #

            Ex: “There are no USA military bases in Canada, which is the usual price the USA demands of its Sugar Babies.”

            There are no U.S. military bases in Canada because the military cooperation between the two countries is far too close for that to be necessary. Use of each other’s basis is routine, ubiquitous and has been going on uneventfully at least since the Cold War. You know what NORAD is, right? It didn’t go away when the Soviet Union broke up — it’s alive and well.

            Quote: “The NORAD commander and deputy commander (CINCNORAD) are, respectively, a United States four-star general or equivalent and a Canadian three-maple-leaf general or equivalent.” (Link.)

            Quote: “Unknown to many, the Canadian Armed Forces and all branches of the United States Armed forces have formal and informal work and service sharing agreements… Many US aircraft carrier groups will find a ‘Halifax Class’ Canadian Patrol Frigate as part of the assignment. A significant amount of military logistical ‘trade’ exists between the militaries of the two countries. This is not to be confused with capital acquisitions. It is joked that a US Air Force aircraft can land and gas up in Cold Lake with less paperwork than if it landed in Miramar.” (Link.)

            On February 14, 2008, the U.S. and Canada signed a Civil Assistance Plan that allows the military from one nation to support the armed forces of the other nation during a civil emergency. There was no action required by the two governments; none was deemed necessary by either side. The agreement was signed by the respective military commands of the two countries. (Link.)

            The relationship between the USA and Canada isn’t that between sugar daddy and sugar baby; it’s the relationship between husband and wife, living under one roof. We don’t mind your little pieces on the side, honest we don’t. But we do mind when hubby gets it in his head that he has the right to punch us around.

          • Exscotticus June 12, 2018 at 12:15 pm #

            > I’m just wagering that the US doesn’t do things or spend money that it doesn’t consider well spent *in its own interests*.

            Agreed—but this apparently sociopathic behavior is hardly endemic to the USA. Don’t all successful nations act in their own interests?

            Isn’t Canada wanting to keep a 40+ year status quo of trade surplus with the USA in their best interests?

            > both our countries have a long history of interfering in other countries primarily for their own ends and interests

            I can’t speak for Canada, but certainly the USA involves itself in world affairs far too much. And why is that? As you will recall, America tried isolationism. Twice. It didn’t really work out.

            > and thereby (whether by immediate or delayed result) helping turn them into places people flee.

            Is it your theory that Canada and/or the USA is responsible for Nigeria and Haiti’s failed cultures, and that is why they’re pouring into Canada?

            You don’t sound like someone who has totally swallowed the victimization Kool-Aid. Is there no room in your world for choice and personal responsibiity? Do you really believe that we control Nigerian and Haitian culture? That we tell young Haitian men to impregnate as many women as they can despite HIV/AIDS and no ability to feed themselves? Haiti is grossly overpopulated. Is that our fault?

            I watched some liberal dreck wherein a Palestinian was being interviewed. He attacked the wall and got himself shot in the leg, making it even harder for him to support his numerous children. And despite being lame, he has another child on the way! He simultaneously complained that there’s no work and that there’s garbage in the streets. Think about that. So instead of helping to clean up the garbage, he went and got himself injured for no reason, putting his entire family at risk.

            The problem here isn’t the USA—the world’s favorite boogeyman. The problem is poor choices by idiots in parasitic cultures that lack any concept of personal responsibility.

          • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 12:27 pm #

            Excotticus

            I think we are talking at cross purposes. I am not Canadian – I am a CurrentScottica 🙂 .

            And now I’ll read the rest of your post…

          • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 12:29 pm #

            Sorry, mis-typed your name again.

          • Exscotticus June 12, 2018 at 1:13 pm #

            @Elron Hubbtard

            > it’s the relationship between husband and wife

            Following your logic, this is a wife that likes to sit at home eating bon-bons while the husband slaves away to make ends meet. This is a wife who spends all the family wealth on shoes instead of securing the frontier farm from wild savages just outside the gates. This is a wife who welcomes crazies inside the home…

            We can play these word games all day long. Canada is a sovereign nation. We’re renegotiating an unfair trade treaty. Grow up you sugar baby and deal with it.

          • Elrond Hubbard June 12, 2018 at 1:27 pm #

            Accuses me of making ad hominem comments: Exscotticus.
            Repeatedly addresses me as ‘Hubbtard’: Also Exscotticus.

            If we were that kind of spouse, we would hardly be selling you so much of the steel, aluminum, cars, lumber, and who knows what else that America scarfs down in such ungodly quantities, would we?

            We’re a two-income household, and you know it. But only one of us is having a psychotic break right now.

          • Exscotticus June 12, 2018 at 2:02 pm #

            > We’re a two-income household, and you know it.

            More silly analogies. You truly believe that Canada is entitled to an unfair trading arrangement. Like it’s a national Canadian birthright. Tell us more about this entitlement, this Canadian privilege.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 7:17 am #

            Exsctotticus

            “Agreed—but this apparently sociopathic behavior is hardly endemic to the USA. Don’t all successful nations act in their own interests?”

            Yes, of course they do. But they don’t then turn round and say ‘look what you forced me to spend my money on’. If you have military bases in other countries it’s because you think, rightly or wrongly, that they serve your interests, however defined.

            The refugee problem will continue to be a problem and dilemmas will continue to be dilemmas, for as long as we have human feelings and human failings. Also, the citizens of Haiti were not responsible for either the earthquake that devastated their country in 2010 or the cyclones that have left devastation in their wake since. From what I recall, the people of Haiti aren’t historically even responsible for being in Haiti in the first place.

            Refugees have a status in international law. They are assessed in each country where they claim asylum (which has signed up to the Refugee Convention) and a large number will be sent home if it is considered that their lives are not at risk.

            If receiving countries consider that ‘enough is enough’, then let’s see some hefty international programmes to rehabilitate the countries refugees flee from so that the hospitality we offer them can be temporary in as many cases as possible and they can go home, which many of them wish to do. That’s a different thing from planting a US-friendly ‘leader’ who will advance US (or UK or Russian) interests.

            Let’s hope that when Yellowstone blows, other countries will be at least as welcoming to you and your children as you would wish to be in the same circumstance.

            As they say, be nice to those you meet on the way up – you may meet them again on the way down.

          • Exscotticus June 14, 2018 at 5:36 pm #

            > Yes, of course they do. But they don’t then turn round and say ‘look what you forced me to spend my money on’.

            I don’t follow you. The USA isn’t blaming Canada for American consumption. AFAIK, the USA isn’t blaming Canada for anything. America simply wants a more equitable trading arrangement.

            Your argument seems to be: because the USA consumes more imports, nations are entitled to sell more exports. That’s a tautology. Market economies determine prices which, in turn, moderate consumption. If you doubt this, then you’ll have no problem with tariffs. By your logic, they won’t affect consumption at all.

            Canadians don’t consume American dairy products because there’s an enormous tariff on them. Allow me to paraphrase you: Do Canadians, in their heart of hearts, want to pay twice as much for dairy products made by their compatriots? Do they really?

            How is Canada protecting its dairy industry any different than America protecting its steel and aluminum? Why does China charge a crazy high tariff on Tesla cars? Are you arguing that some tariffs are fair and others aren’t? Who decides? What standard? And why is it that all these determinations benefit the world at the expense of the USA? Just a coincidence?

            > Also, the citizens of Haiti were not responsible for either the earthquake…

            No they weren’t. But they are responsible for not living within their means and in accordance with their geography. There are numerous nations in the Caribbean that are doing just fine. Thriving in fact. To understand why Haiti is not among them, you simply have to examine its people and its culture. The earthquake, you say? No—Haiti was a shithole prior the earthquake, prior to the same storm systems that have battered other islands. Meanwhile, the world has gifted billions to Haiti to no effect. And this is precisely because we DON’T impose our cultural values on them. We surely ought to. Things like rule of law, meritocracy, market economy, personal responsibility, and all the other values that lead to a non-parasitic existence.

            If Haiti lived within its means, then storms and earthquakes wouldn’t be so disastrous. The population size would be commensurate with what the islands can support on their own, without constant external food aid. Homes and infrastructure would be built to withstand the vagaries of island life. And perhaps that means a simpler form of existence‚ as our host often advocates. Liberals would freak at such a suggestion, because they believe a middle class American lifestyle is a “human right” that belongs to all people. And we should of course redistribute wealth to achieve this end.

            In another post I asked you if there was room in your philosophy for personal responsibilty. Apparently not. Apparently failed people and cultures do nothing wrong; it’s someone else’s fault; it’s nature’s fault; it’s no one’s fault; we’re all equal; all cultures and all people are equal and equally deserving of everything. What nonsense.

            > Refugees have a status in international law.

            International law is nothing more than treaties between nations. There is no international government. Whatever “status” refugees have does not give them the right to overwhelm another nation’s social services and culture.

            > Let’s hope that when Yellowstone blows, other countries will be at least as welcoming to you and your children as you would wish to be in the same circumstance.

            Cheap shot. When Katrina hit, no one in the USA expected Canada to absorb the entire population of New Orleans. And, btw, you better check your facts. Canada asked the USA to deny visas to people who might then go on to cross into Canada illegally. The USA is the most charitable nation on earth. It’s easy to be sanctimonious when your charity is not being abused.

  5. Paulo June 11, 2018 at 10:19 am #

    When I read Trump’s (and minions) name calling after Trudeau reiterated Canada’s trade position (for the umpteenth time), I felt real pride that our Country was firmly and defintely opposed to such ignorance. That 1st Trump tweet, made safely from 40,000 feet, did more to bring us together as a Country than anything we could ever imagine.

    If only Chamberlain had done the same with Angry Adolf in 1938, so many things might have been different? I am not alone in recognizing the similarities as you edge ever closer to ‘Kristallnacht’, version 2.0 USA.

    I am trying to imagine what the history books in 100 years will say about this Man, but after Trump’s remarks on how ‘he’ll know within a minute’ whether the NK summit will succeed, because, “It’s what I do, my touch”, I realised that we may only reach understanding around a campfire. That is, if ‘we’ survive? (We are talking about a fool with nuclear weapons….and I don’t mean Kim).

    It must feel terrible being an American these days, but rest assured others understand you are no more culpable than the German people in times past. Or, are you culpable in what’s happening?
    https://psmag.com/social-justice/nazi-germany-politics-power

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    Support this blog via Patreon or Substack
    • JohnAZ June 11, 2018 at 10:38 am #

      You notice that when Trump suggested that all tariffs be removed between the G7, that idea was shelved quickly. Ha! No wonder as the G7 has been ripping us off since WW2 with 10 to 1 tariffs and one sided trade balances. We were the good guys after Europe was destroyed by that war, but maybe they should start taking care of themselves with even up trade balances.

      • Paulo June 11, 2018 at 11:40 am #

        Do you really think/believe Trump would remove all tariffs? Come on. It was his 2nd firmest election promise after The Wall. Removing tariffs would result in even more US job losses as it’s sclerotic industries swirl ever downwards.

        Trump will never get rid of Tariffs, he’ll add to them.

        Meth, opiates, booze, obesity, my goodness what a workforce to draw upon! The rust belt can’t even staff what’s running now. Oh I know, just take in more ‘refugees’ to man up the jobs. https://www.recoveryunplugged.com/addiction-rust-belt-syrian-refugee-crisis-whats-link/

        Add in high energy costs and defintely NOT being energy self-sufficient and tariffs look more and more enticing for the Trump voter. Good luck removing them. That first step was the TPP.

        Plus, there is plain old US inefficiency. “Since 2007, the number of operational smelters in the U.S. has shrunk from 18 to 5, according to the U.S. Aluminum Association, which represents most American-based producers. That’s in part due to the high cost of operating in U.S. currency and the difficulties of competing with producers in Quebec, who benefit from access to cheap hydroelectricity.” http://business.financialpost.com/news/economy/u-s-tariffs-on-canadas-aluminum-industry-will-raise-costs-for-u-s-manufacturers

        Good article worth reading.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 2:16 pm #

          Why shouldn’t America get to impose tariffs too? It’s a nation builder. There’s been a trade war in effect for decades but we weren’t fighting it. Only a tiny minority benefited from these deals, not America the Nation.

        • Majella June 12, 2018 at 7:19 pm #

          Trump’s ranting about ‘unfair’ trade is so much bullshit. The fact is that it wasn’t ‘foreigners stealing our jobs’ – it was US corporations fleeing high wages, taxes & collateral costs of doing the core manufacturing work in the US that got everyone to this state of affairs.

          The ‘trade imbalances’ appear to be wealth going to another country, but as likely as not, those profits are being booked by US corporations that are domiciled offshore – viz, Google, Apple etc. who all sit on mountains of cash that they do not wish to expose to the US IRS.

          Then the GGG (fool that he is) goes and does things that ‘look great’ to his ignorant base, without bothering to understand the consequences & collateral damage. For example tariffs on imported solar panels making them so expensive that demand drops precipitously & thousands of people working in the installation & maintenance businesses associated with a sweet, clean renewable energy are out of work, while there’s been no huge return of the ‘coal jobs’.

          • JohnAZ June 12, 2018 at 11:19 pm #

            Here is the rub. Because of the effects of the Deep State and their collusion with WallStreet most of the Mainstreet companies and the mid sized companies have been destroyed by the economies of scale from the large corporations which now are international and do not give one damn about the US or us. The Elite have just about destroyed what used to be the bulk of the economy. Perhaps Trump’s advisors want to put a wrench into the international monopoly that the Deep State has become with the tariffs to try to keep more money in the US to allow the mid and small business bases to start back up and become a competitive force against the globalist megacorporations. When is the last time you bought anything from a US company?

            That is one reason these SOB’s want Trump destroyed, because his goal is to destroy them! And so far, he is winning!

    • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 10:47 am #

      Good arguments on both sides of the culpability question. Could it be the answer is both, or at least a hazy shade of gray?

      Regardless, extensive documentation exists that the US and Britain were both on the fence about Hitler for much of the war, choosing to support Hitler – whether explicitly or implicitly – against the true existential threat, Communist Russia, and what the hell do the lives of a few million Slavs and other assorted riff-raff matter anyway?. Hitler turned out to be a little too good at his job in that respect, so the allies had to step in at the last minute to claim credit for the victory and pontificate endlessly about their boundless moral virtue, even as the Dulles boys and their extensive network of proto-fascists laid the groundwork for what would become a greatly improved Nazism 2.0 in the US, which would start emerging immediately after the war and has yet to peak as we speak. How all this will eventually turn out remains to be seen, but regardless of who’s at fault, the great lumbering beast they gave birth to in the ashes of WWII, will not be denied absent a truly monumental calamity, which, unfortunately, remains nowhere in sight at this time.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 2:18 pm #

        Hitler would have never turned the West over to Non-Westerners like Dulles and Co. You’re confusing Totalitarianism with Fascism and National Socialism – a common and deadly mistake of the dumbed down West.

        • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 3:13 pm #

          All three can exist in concert, in combination, or in isolation. But thanks for “clarifying” things for me. No doubt the Dulles crew was for fascism first, with totalitarianism emerging as needed later. Hitler kind of spoiled its reputation for a few generations, but like most things, its cyclical and back in vogue again. A veritable “Springtime for Hitler” if you will, although the parts are played by different actors now, of course. Sing it with me now!

          Germany [The USA] was having trouble
          What a sad, sad story
          Needed a new leader to restore
          Its former glory
          Where, oh, where was he?
          Where could that man be?
          We looked around and then we found
          The man for you and me
          Where, oh, where was he?
          Where could that man be?
          We looked around and then we found
          The man for you and me!

          The Fuhrer [The Donald] is causing a furor!
          He’s got those Russians on the run
          You gotta love that wacky hun!
          The Fuhrer is causing a furor
          They can’t say “no” to his demands
          They’re freaking out in foreign lands
          He’s got the whole world in his hands
          The Fuhrer [The Donald] is causing a furor!

        • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 7:27 am #

          “You’re confusing Totalitarianism with Fascism and National Socialism”

          Fascism, National Socialism and Soviet Communism ALL included totalitarian practices within their societies, including the encouragement of snitching on your neighbours – or even your parents – who weren’t toeing the ideological line.

          Totalitarianism is a characteristic of many kinds of government.

    • capt spaulding June 11, 2018 at 11:49 am #

      You can’t blame the German people for Hitler, because he lied to them. He told them they’d win.

      • Majella June 12, 2018 at 7:22 pm #

        Sounds familiar!

    • Exscotticus June 11, 2018 at 5:26 pm #

      @Paulo

      Yes comparing Trump to Hitler is totally reasonable. I heard American tanks our gearing up for the blitzkrieg into Canada any day now.

      > I felt real pride…did more to bring us together as a Country than anything we could ever imagine.

      Well then I guess you owe Trump some gratitude for reintroducing this now alien concept of nationalism to both you and the world.

      Watching Canada fight for Canadians—however ridiculous the position—fills me with hope as well. It’s nice seeing Trudeau fighting to keep this Sugar Daddy arrangement alive. It sure beats him welcoming immigrants who want to displace Canadian culture with their own.

      > It must feel terrible being an American these days

      On the contrary. Watching an American president actually work for American interests for a change instead of trying to please allies and enemies is incredibly refreshing. Obama promised HOPE and CHANGE, whereas Trump is actually delivering it.

  6. PeteAtomic June 11, 2018 at 10:30 am #

    Don’t worry folks!

    I’m sure Industry & their think tanks will get the next administration to implement their policies & have this whole thing turned around in no time.

    So, no worries! Your jobs as Walmart greeter, or as a censorship technician at Facebook, are safe.

    Who the hell wants to do the work in a higher paying mining or manufacturing job in the states, anyway?

    • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 5:33 pm #

      Don’t bet on it. Many would welcome Greeter Robots – So Cool!

  7. JohnAZ June 11, 2018 at 10:31 am #

    The US government has been giving away its economy to “cheaper” nation’s ever since WW2. We are by at least 4 fold the consumer base for the world. We protect all our allies with a defense group that spends us into the poor house. Trump sees the obvious and is reacting. Of course all the jerks in DC who is benefitting from all this corruption hate him so much. All you folks who sign up to the MSM need to have your filters adjusted because what is being said is media BS.

    To all you impeachment dreamers, dream on. No one has found one single impeachable offense that he has done, not one. Witch hunt! This president along with the Deplorables, are going to jerk us back away from the insane path the government has been on for the last thirty years. Take your choice, individual freedom and the responsibility that goes along with it, or socialism and the government domination and lack of liberty that happens with it.

    • Georges1202 June 11, 2018 at 10:39 am #

      Has there ever been a holder of an office higher than dog-catcher with the talent of stepping on his own wanker as reliably as the Orange Godzilla? Trump will do himself in eventually – he wants to exit as a martyr. I’m convinced he never wanted this job at all, just the braggin’ rights that he was able to pull the #1 Con of this young idiotic century.

      Stay tuned – this mad fucker is loose and AF1 is full gassed up.

      • K-Dog June 11, 2018 at 1:07 pm #

        True enough, dog-catchers are despicable bully scum and Trump is like them. Everything is a violent contest to them. It is about winning and nothing else. They will put you in a cage no matter how much fun you are having.

        It works for them but the problem with being a big tough dogcatcher as President is that it does not work on an international level. If every international transaction is approached as a zero-sum game then the whole world will rapidly learn to return in kind, and Trump is incapable of seeing things any other way. Dog catchers have all the tools so pissing you off is never a concern for them. They just muzzle you but trump does not have the tools to put a muzzle on the rest of the world.

        Trump can’t imagine winning at anything without humiliating his opponent in some way. It is a rentier world view which he got from his father Fred. It traps his awareness in a mental apartment out of which windows have no view. It is all metal and concrete, no green and no humanity from any of Trumps windows. No child’s playground where laughter fills the air. The windows are all sealed tight. It is gray stone and metal with glints of silver and gold if the sun shines. Trump’s favorite sight is a flash of gold. Sometimes the sun on glass looks like it but Trump’s favorite sight is seeing the real thing. It shines even when it is cloudy.

        But no view shows anything out Trumps windows where people in an exchange both are winning so hostile international relationships are inevitable. Trump can’t see things happening any other way.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 5:35 pm #

          Boys in men’s clothing like Jeb and Justin humiliate themselves by just being what they are.

    • sprawlcapital June 11, 2018 at 11:30 am #

      Good comment, AZ, up to a point.

      I’m all for securing the southern border and extricating ourselves from entangling foreign alliances, and the enormous military spending they require.

      But how does my collecting social security retirement benefits, which I paid for responsibly with years of work, reduce my liberty or subject me to government dominance? Social Security is a government program that to me is in every way socialist.

      • capt spaulding June 11, 2018 at 11:53 am #

        Yes, it’s right in the name, sprawl, Social security.

      • Walter B June 11, 2018 at 12:28 pm #

        Government dominance over those of us who collect our Social Security money back may be introduced one day if those that control it mandate that in order for us to keep on getting it we are required to accept a Verichip RF implant or hit the highway. If they ever decide to do this, they had better disarm us all first or an army of angry geezers on Mobility Scooters may been seen assaulting the White House.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 5:36 pm #

          Yes, those who accept the Mark of the Beast will not see God.

      • sprawlcapital June 11, 2018 at 8:06 pm #

        “paid for”
        =============

        That should be payed for. Paid is an adjective, as in a paid bill.
        Payed is the past tense form of the verb pay.

        Q would have caught this error.

        • Q. Shtik June 11, 2018 at 11:39 pm #

          Q would have caught this error.

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

          Actually, probably not. I am given credit for being moor asstoot than I actually am.

          • sprawlcapital June 12, 2018 at 3:23 am #

            Glad you’re still with us, Q.

        • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 3:54 am #

          https://www.grammarly.com/blog/paid-payed/

          First time I’ve ever seen ‘payed’, but I see it’s used in a nautical sense (only), so I’ve learned something.

          • ozone June 12, 2018 at 9:56 am #

            G.A.,
            From [slightly unreliable] memory:

            “…Well, the whale was struck and the line payed out,
            But he gave such a flourish with his tail,
            That he capsized our boat and we lost five men,
            And we never did catch that whale, brave boys,
            We never did catch that whale…”

          • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 10:44 am #

            Thanks, ozone – you’ve now reinforced my nautical learning 🙂 .

            I was curious enough to look for the song (as it turned out).

            You can hear/see it sung here in full costume, but curiously, in all the links I came across no-one seems to be aware of the ‘payed’ spelling!

            https://mainlynorfolk.info/lloyd/songs/thegreenlandwhalefishery.html

      • JohnAZ June 11, 2018 at 9:05 pm #

        Social security, pensions, 401K , putting 20% of your money into savings, all ways of saving money for retirement. Social Security is a payroll tax, pensions are a tax if in the public sector or a union tax if associated with union shops, 401K are a way of avoiding tax while saving, but you eventually pay and the 20% plan is entirely voluntary. Why the emphasis on tax, because the very intelligent American public does not save voluntarily. Let alone the larger and larger percentage of immigrant population that do not have a clue what saving for retirement even means.

    • Majella June 12, 2018 at 7:25 pm #

      Ha! “…spends us into the poorhouse”. You’re kidding right??? he vast majority of defense dollars are spent in the US.

  8. robert magill June 11, 2018 at 10:36 am #

    Trump is doing the presidential dirty work all those “real presidents” skipped doing. That smoldering half century old mess on the Korean peninsula that saw the North dig out from the most tonnage of bombs and napalm dropped on a comparable land mass in history without one dime of Marshall Plan type assistance. Dirty commies, no help for you!

    Re: the steel tariffs cock-up. Think back to the late fifties when US Steel, rather than invest in new technology for steel making, let the rest of the world do it: abandoned mills and jobs and started the never-ending US job losses to cheaper, more efficient foreign markets. 

    • JohnAZ June 11, 2018 at 10:40 am #

      The end result of which is we have little or no way to make our own weapons. Nice!

      • Elrond Hubbard June 11, 2018 at 11:43 am #

        Uh, JohnAZ, you have heard of the military-industrial complex, haven’t you? That’s the scheme whereby Congress appropriates hundreds of billions of taxpayer dollars a year to build weapons systems, and the spoils of all those contracts get distributed far and wide so everyone gets a taste. There isn’t a Congressional district that doesn’t have its plant building planes, tanks, or Humvees, or its lavishly appointed offices where armies of engineers design and specify every screw, nut, and million-dollar toilet seat.

        Are you actually under the impression that the world’s largest military has to import its weapons from somewhere else? The U.S.A. is the #1 arms exporter in the world, edging out Russia which is #2. Numbers 3 through 10, added together, still don’t add up to what the U.S.A. sells abroad all by itself. Six of the top 10 arms manufacturers worldwide are U.S.-based. America is positively suppurating with the capacity to build weapons — so many that it has to sell them to everyone under the sun just to keep the pile-up from getting too unwieldy.

        Mercy me. Crack open a book sometime.

        • Walter B June 11, 2018 at 12:16 pm #

          A book you say?

          From Three Days in January by Bret Baier:

          Page 203 – “THE IDEA OF EXPRESSING his concerns about the military industrial complex in a farewell speech did not just come to Ike in his final days. According to Hagerty, he had been talking about it since he became president. “We had many, many hours over the years alone – in a plane, in a car, in a hotel suite, for breakfast, for late dinner – where he would, to some extent, just let his hair down and I’d listen. The military-industrial complex was a rising concern to him from the day he became president.”

          Halfway through his second term, Ike told Hagerty, “Jim, I’m going to make this speech. I’m going to make it as the last major speech before I leave office.” In 1959 and 1960, Ike and his speechwriters set to work on this final address, with the urgency of speaking in a sober way about this new reality high on everyone’s minds. Crafting the original military-industrial complex premise, Malcom Moos found what he saw as a tripod of concerns.

          The first leg of the tripod involved the forceful presence – almost a takeover – of the military by industry. Some of the input for the idea came from Ike’s own military advisors. Ike’s naval aide, Captain Aurand, took to leaving piles of aerospace journals on Moos’s desk. Paging through them, he counted some twenty-five thousand different companied involved in the military’s aerospace efforts – a figure that alarmed Moos.
          The second leg of the tripod involved the revolving door from the military to industry. Moos was working on a study tracing the number of people retiring from the military at young ages (in their forties) and immediately becoming directors of aerospace and other related industries. This idea never made it directly into the speech, but it was on Moos’s mind – whether such a transfer of influence could be damaging. The implication, of course, was that a massive underhanded quid pro quo had become virtually institutionalized. As a side note, this concern continues today. In 2008 the Government Accountability Office found 2,435 former generals and senior officers employed by 52 large defense contractors – some working on the same contracts they oversaw while in service. This revelation led to Congress to pass a law requiring the Pentagon to maintain a database of high-ranking military officials who pursued jobs with defense contractors. But according to a 2014 Washington Post investigation, the Pentagon failed to do so, calling the law “an unfunded mandate.”

          The third leg was the domination of military pursuits in the awarding of federal outlays and private grants for scientific research – massive funding overlays that made the federal government and its military interests the de facto shaper of the knowledge industry. Again, not all of these ideas would make it into the speech, explicitly but they unpinned Ike’s broader argument.

          Ralph E. Williams, a staff assistant to Aurand, summarized the concerns Moos expressed in an October 31 meeting on the subject – a week before the 1960 election:
          The problem of militarism – for the first time in its history, the United States as a permanent war-based industry…Not only that but flag and general officers retiring at early age take positions in war based industrial complex shaping its decisions and guiding the direction of its tremendous thrust. This creates a danger that what the Communists have always said us may become true. We must be very careful to insure that the “merchants of death do not come to dictate national policy.””

          • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 12:36 pm #

            Nice! Too bad Ike didn’t use his “bully pulpit” to prevent any of that madness until after he left office. Fair to say he was likely terminally compromised as well.

          • Walter B June 11, 2018 at 12:52 pm #

            Yes Scratch, and I do believe that Ike was shocked and terrified when he saw that his warnings to the nation, which were taken seriously by JFK were probably what led to his assassination. Ike’s comments, body language and demeanor in the interview he gave that day told me that he feared for his own safety as well and chose to quickly STFU!

          • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 1:06 pm #

            He self-edited on the term alone right up front. MICC (Military Industrial Congressional Complex) was pared back to MIC, presumably because he knew going after the Congressional chorus was a bridge too far. Little did he know.

        • Exscotticus June 11, 2018 at 5:58 pm #

          @Elrond Hubbard

          You can hyperbolize all you want, but the USA’s military expenditure is still less than 5% of its GDP.

          Would you have the USA rely on Canada for its national security? That trick only works when your neighbor actually has a military. Too bad we can’t all be like Canada…

          If you think biting the hand that feeds you is so unpleasant, try being the hand for a change…

        • JohnAZ June 11, 2018 at 9:11 pm #

          Question if steel and aluminum being manufactured overseas are cut off from us by a belligerent country, how the hell is the MIC going to make all those weapons. Hmm, sounds like petroleum being controlled by a few nations running the world. We need a larger percentage of our raw materials produced here for national security purposes.

        • Elrond Hubbard June 12, 2018 at 11:08 am #

          Wow… just, wow. Exscotticus and JohnAZ: the two of you are such a brain trust that I’m going to roll my responses into one to save effort.

          Ex: “The USA’s military expenditure is still less than 5% of its GDP”. According to the World Bank, the U.S. spent 3.3% of its GDP on its military in 2016. The spendiest country is Oman at 13.7%, followed by Saudi Arabia at 9.8%. (Link.) Sounds puny, until you look at the absolute numbers: the U.S. economy, and thus its GDP, utterly dwarfs most others at 18.57 trillion per year, making total annual U.S. military expenditure at least $610 billion dollars.

          Now, let’s slow down. Stop and savour that number for a moment. Give it the respect it deserves. Six hundred and ten billion U.S. dollars. A year. I already explained above how the USA is the world’s biggest arms exporter, but it can afford to be, because that $610 billion accounts for 35% of all military spending on Earth. To match that level of expenditure, you have to add together China, Saudi Arabia*, Russia, India*, France*, the U.K.*, Japan* and Germany* (source) — and six of those eight countries are U.S. allies, which I’ve helpfully marked* for you. If the U.S. carries on alienating its allies in favour of Russia, as POTUS is currently in the process of doing, he’s shrugging off all that military support in favour of one country whose military ($66.3 billion in spending) is about the same size as India’s* ($63.9 billion). And this guy bills himself as a dealmaker who is making America great?

          Ex: “Would you have the USA rely on Canada for its national security?” Stop putting up straw men. And stop conflating metals with national security. There is no conceivable set of circumstances in which Canada can threaten U.S. national security. Your president is simply being a bully. And his motive is clear: He’s expecting not to get what he wants in the NAFTA negotiations, which will make him look bad, so he’s pre-emptively painting Canada as the villain.

          Ex: “Try being the hand for a change.” Everyone understands what ‘stop hitting yourself’ means, and how it makes you look.

          JohnAZ: “Question if steel and aluminum being manufactured overseas are cut off from us by a belligerent country, how the hell is the MIC going to make all those weapons.” Canada is not ‘overseas’. We share the world’s longest undefended border, we have a long history as your ally, and we are anxious to do business. Regardless of what goes on overseas, Canada is not, and never will be, part of the problem — unless your POTUS decides to make us one, for petty reasons that help him and absolutely no one else.

          Jeez. All you have to do is take ‘yes’ for an answer. I really don’t get it.

          • Exscotticus June 12, 2018 at 11:40 am #

            @Elrond Hubbtard

            You want a double standard. When it comes to Canada, % of GDP is OK; when it comes to the USA, absolute numbers only. My guess is you would flip that standard back and forth whenever it suits your liberal agenda.

            The USA has already experienced many times what happens when we reduce military expenditure. It ends up with a fectless military similar to what Canada and Europe has—one that’s incapable of carrying out even simple objectives.

            > stop conflating metals with national security

            I’m sorry you don’t see the obvious connection between the two, and believe that military weapons are made from rainbows and unicorns, and enemies defeated with kumbaya and flowers. You stick to your charm offense; we’ll stick with kill power.

            > If the U.S. carries on alienating its allies

            If demanding that allies treat each other fairly means alienation then so be it. Is Canada a friend or a frenemy? Because friends don’t rip each other off.

            You haven’t said one word to justify why you think the trade imbalance status quo should continue. The USA is not in the Canadian welfare business. Time for Canada to move out of its parents’ basement and get a job…

          • BackRowHeckler June 13, 2018 at 2:23 am #

            Hey Elrond, WTF do you care what our defense expenditures are?

            Worry about what Canada spends on defense, which isn’t too much, seeing as how you’ve pretty much farmed out your national defense to us.

            brh

          • Elrond Hubbard June 13, 2018 at 10:02 am #

            BRH, I’m not the one making an issue of it. Exscotticus is promoting it as a bogus justification for steel and aluminum tariffs, and I’m answering him. No one would be happier than me to see Canada pay for its own military and have a foreign policy of its very own. Until the United States is a very, very different country, that’s not going to happen. You guys have no clue of the kind of shadow you project around you.

            Meanwhile, Ex is acting as if the U.S.’s trade deficit is something imposed on it by the rest of the world, rather than a function of its own choices to consume everything in sight (Dick Cheney declared that the U.S. standard of living was non-negotiable), on credit. What a sad, abused country; the whole world ganged up on you to stuff big-screen TVs down your throats, totally against your will, when what you really wanted was to save prudently and invest for a better tomorrow. Poor babies.

            To hear Ex talk, you’d think the U.S. military is somehow underfunded, when it’s the most lavishly funded, gold-plated death machine the world has ever known, with overwhelming superiority against any conceivable enemy. And absolute numbers demonstrate this fact better than % of GDP.

          • Exscotticus June 13, 2018 at 10:41 am #

            > To hear Ex talk, you’d think the U.S. military is somehow underfunded, when it’s the most lavishly funded, gold-plated death machine the world has ever known

            Perhaps. But it’s a “death machine” that saved the entire world. Twice. It’s also the “death machine” that’s protecting Canada, ensuring that China doesn’t make the entire South China Sea its personal pond, keeping Putin’s aggression in check, etc.

            And despite the “lavish” 3.3% GDP that the USA spends, 9/11 still happened, Crimea was still annexed, the Taliban are still around, Bashar al-Assad is still around, Russia is still in Syria, etc. So apparently this “gold-plated death machine” is still not good enough. Perhaps the USA should take the savings from fair trade deals with its allies and upgrade to platinum.

            All of this is misdirection. Explain why Canada is entitled to a never-ending trade surplus arrangement with the USA. That’s the crux of the argument.

          • GreenAlba June 13, 2018 at 10:47 am #

            “Meanwhile, Ex is acting as if the U.S.’s trade deficit is something imposed on it by the rest of the world, rather than a function of its own choices to consume everything in sight..”

            I’m no expert on trade deals but this is the exact point that has always jumped out at me.

            Similarly, the idea that Americans, in their heart of hearts, want to pay twice as much for cars made by their compatriots. Do they really?

            We had a ‘Back Britain’ campaign in the 60s when people were exhorted to buy stuff made at home. It was about as effective as you’d expect it to have been, beyond the first month.

            As for brh’s question ‘why do you care about…?, this comes from someone who worries about what schoolchildren wear in British comprehensives in hot weather (which in itself lessens the potential worrying time).

          • Exscotticus June 13, 2018 at 11:27 am #

            Every nation has a right to control what passes through its borders. If we can’t agree on this then there’s really no point in debating.

            Trade goods and services are things that pass through national borders. Therefore, every nation has a right to control imports and exports.

            If a nation wants access to another nation’s markets, then they must negotiate a trade deal—a treaty.

            All deals can benefit no one, benefit one party more than another, or benefit both equally.

            Canada has enjoyed 40+ years of trade with the USA in which it has benefited far more than the USA. We’re talking tens of billions annually.

            The USA is now asking for a change, from benefitting one party more than another, to benefitting both equally.

            Canada is upset, because they want to keep the status quo arrangement wherein they benefit more.

            It’s that simple.

            Unfortunately, to paraphrase Upton Sinclair: It is difficult to get a man to understand an inequity, when his entitlement depends upon his not understanding it.

    • Paulo June 11, 2018 at 12:01 pm #

      That’s what you get when a country rests on its ass of the World Trading Currency, military domination, and proudly proclaims to be a Service Industry nation. In other words, “We don’t need no stinkin’ job, we’ll just buy shit ’cause were ‘Muricans, By God. No money? Borrow it.”

      I think Rome did the same. 🙂

      Face it, Canadians are just better at mining, logging, smelting, and sawmilling. 27% tariff on softwood for the 5th time! And Trumpet complains because we protect our farmers? Give. Me. A. Break.

      As soon as US gets its industrial butt kicked they implement tariffs and try to punish other countries. Now, Dear Orange Leader is calling names. Fuckit, when the Trans Mountain pipeline gets built we’l just sell our oil to China, and when Energy East is reversed we’ll sell the rest to Europe.

      Don’t get me wrong, this Trade war is going to crash things big time. Maybe it’s time. It could be a long hot summer in some of those big ole cities. It’s a freaking powder keg looking for a match, imho. Then you’ll get Martial Law, and some emergency decrees to contend with. You’ll know the end is near when the Generals start wearing their uniforms to work instead of civilian cammo.

      • Paulo June 11, 2018 at 12:08 pm #

        Maybe Trump will start wearing uniforms…epaulets for golf days as a start, then a discrete medal or two; Bone Spur in the line of duty kind of thing. I laugh every time I see him head for the helicopter and salute the Marine Guards. President Bone Spur, Military Saviour. At least Hitler was a corporal. Like I said, the history books will be scathing.

      • Billy Hill June 11, 2018 at 4:28 pm #

        “That’s what you get when a country rests on its ass of the World Trading Currency,…”

        Demand for the US 10yr and 3yr Treasury was solid today. That’s what the USA has to offer: debt. Or put another way, a place to park capital. Yet another way, a place where foreigners enjoying the benefits of the current trade regime get to park all those dollars that accumulate in their accounts. Current account versus Capital account.

        Yeah, you probably need a few carrier battle groups projecting power around the globe to convince people that the dollar is something worthy of trust, maybe even respect.

        Strange system to be sure but the distinguishing feature of humanity is the ability to make shit up and believe in it.

        As for sclerotic American manufacturing you need to get out more and take a look around. Don’t believe everything you read. Remember it’s just made up shit.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 5:39 pm #

          Yes, Canada is just a northern province of the New World Order. They depend on the US for protection. The Elite maintain the illusion of separate countries for their own convenience – for now.

        • JohnAZ June 11, 2018 at 9:18 pm #

          Here is the rub. Every year that goes by, less is manufactured by humans. Trump is trying to get more humans building thing, jobs. Tariffs are 20th century tools. The real job crushing problems are an aging population that do not need as much stuff and the effects of AI and robotics. So far, not much activity on either count.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 10:45 am #

            Needing less stuff is a good thing, surely? The problem is the existing debt that makes needing less stuff a problem, when it should be the opposite.

  9. amb June 11, 2018 at 10:41 am #

    The qualified, the wise, the competent, the intelligent, the committed, the compassionate, etc. will never show up in DC. It will always be rats and snakes and clowns. It is indeed a circus swamp. They will complete the destruction of America.

    • TiredOfTheTreadmill June 11, 2018 at 12:32 pm #

      Yep. With heavy cog-dis on the part of the true believers of whichever party is in power and them doing some good shit to make this country a’right. Meanwhile, that smallish minority of Americans with the qualities you list will continue their efforts to exist in the gray parts of the economy, away from the spotlight. Watching the country decline across the spectrum, knowing there is no changing the inevitable arrival in the cesspool.

      While out and about this weekend I was astounded at the gigantic size of my fellow citizens in their hot weather attire. Obesity abounds! Many looked miserable and rather silly with tattoos on display. I guess this is what winning looks like to the MAGA crowd?

  10. pequiste June 11, 2018 at 10:42 am #

    The Loonie is sinking faster than a soggy Tim Horton’s cruller in week old decaf coffee. Take that Justin Trudeau.

    It will be OK tho’. The Canadians will soon be so stoned that they won’t give a cold shit about their American cousins, British brothers or French family at all. Only the First Nations will be planning a revanchist revolution with, Oka, Qc. Cornwall, On. and Nain, NFLD, as the primary beacheads being considered.

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    • SpeedyBB June 11, 2018 at 6:39 pm #

      “Only the First Nations will be planning a revanchist revolution with, Oka, Qc. Cornwall, On. and Nain, NFLD, as the primary beacheads being considered.”

      Don’t forget the jihadists, biding their time. First step will be to establish a “cordon sanitaire” around the ummah neighborhoods, inside which shariah and purdah are de rigeur. And no infidels need apply (or enter).

      By the time it all comes to pass Trudeau’s children will be in charge. As imams, most likely.

  11. akmofo June 11, 2018 at 10:56 am #

    Trump should stop all oil refinery services to Canada. Let them anti-American kanuckistanis go shit in woods and enjoy the full glory of their arctic winters, just like old times in the Nazi army. Call it operation barbie-ass-ya.

  12. nwcodetalker June 11, 2018 at 10:57 am #

    Thank you Jim for the smile on my face this morning

  13. Walter B June 11, 2018 at 11:05 am #

    So the New Your Times is now in the business of Conspiracy Theory? My how things have changed. Perhaps I should stock up on these rags for when the dog pees on the floor before they stop printing them due to lack of interest. Personally, I think it is about time that the USA cut our Deep State ties to Merkel the Sellout. Perhaps I cannot forgive the French for Vietnam, but after all, they have been almost totally useless since Napoleon’s defeat at Waterloo haven’t they? Besides Royal Weddings and the decadence of regal pomp and ceremony, why exactly are we still friendly with the British anyway? I cannot understand why developing a working relationship with Russia is somehow evil, but perhaps I was too impressed and influenced by Jack Kennedy.

    We civilians are fortunate that we are allowed to have opinions on our government because so many of those who spout out their mindless hatred these days are really far too stupid and angry to do so. They cannot understand why the nation cannot keep doing the same stupid things over and over perhaps because change frightens them and they lack the insight to understand it all. Perhaps the Dulles brothers destroyed far more of America’s abilities to think than we know.

    • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 11:24 am #

      The best way to discredit “conspiracy theory” is to appropriate it by giving it a label and then take it mainstream. When everything’s a conspiracy then nothing’s a conspiracy.

    • GreenAlba June 11, 2018 at 11:53 am #

      “Besides Royal Weddings and the decadence of regal pomp and ceremony, why exactly are we still friendly with the British anyway?”

      Well, perhaps you don’t feel you need to be, Walter, now that we spent 61 years paying back the money you kindly lent us to help fight WWII. I occasionally get the impression that some of your compatriots think it was a gift.

      The ‘special relationship’ is a fantasy held to mostly by a certain section on this side of the pond. On your side, it seems useful mostly for such occasions as George W wanting an aspirational useful idiot with a man-crush on him to go fight an illegal war with him in Iraq.

      But I think the tariff issue has finally allowed it to dawn on the Atlanticist Brexiters, with their delusions of a major trade deal with the US, that the ‘special relationship’ was only ever in their obsequious heads.

      I still think of you all as faraway cousins, of course, but our elites will do what they will and you will give them the support that you choose. I have family over there too, as do many of us.

      • Walter B June 11, 2018 at 12:03 pm #

        As always GA any problems that I have with foreign powers is with the governments, not with the people. You Scots have always held a special spot in my heart as you spent so much time fighting the Romans and then the Brits and after all, your country must certainly be one of the most beautiful places on earth. Even if it does lack large expanses of deciduous forests.

        • GreenAlba June 11, 2018 at 12:51 pm #

          Our scrappy Scots pines (such as are left) can’t compare to what must surround you, Walter. And most of the Caledonian Forest succumbed to an earlier change in the climate several thousand years ago, although it arose there in the first place, following even earlier changes. What’s left is home to some of the rarest wildlife in the country, though.

          https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Caledonian_Forest

          Thankfully we currently have the warming Gulf Stream (for now) so ‘many are cauld but few are frozen’ 🙂 .

          Our elephantine neighbours to the south, of course, lost their great oak forests to the navy that ruled the waves before we shrank back to being a service-economy basket case that hasn’t realised yet that it is one. Living within economic eruption distance of the City of London is like living beside Mount Etna, to me anyway.

        • Elrond Hubbard June 12, 2018 at 1:45 pm #

          I believe your heart is in the right place, Walter B. A pity the same can’t be said of POTUS.

          Trump says he’ll punish ‘the people of Canada’ because of Trudeau’s news conference

          https://www.thestar.com/news/world/2018/06/12/we-just-shook-hands-trump-confused-by-trudeaus-pushed-around-comment-after-g7-summit.html

          “WASHINGTON—Escalating his attack on Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, U.S. President Donald Trump is now pledging to punish ‘the people of Canada’ economically because of the post-G7 news conference in which Trudeau criticized Trump’s tariffs.

          ‘That’s going to cost a lot of money for the people of Canada. He learned. You can’t do that. You can’t do that,’ Trump said Tuesday in Singapore after meeting with North Korean dictator Kim Jong Un.

          Trump repeated the vague threat in an interview with ABC.

          “‘I actually like Justin, you know, I think he’s good, I like him, but he shouldn’t have done that. That was a mistake. That’s going to cost him a lot of money,’ Trump said.

          “Trudeau offered a restrained response.

          “‘Obviously we support the continuing efforts by the president on North Korea. We look forward to looking at the details of the agreement. On his comments, as I said, I’m going to stay focused on defending jobs for Canadians and supporting Canadian interests,’ Trudeau told reporters in Ottawa.

          “This is the first time Trump has threatened to take out his frustration with Trudeau on the Canadian people.”

          Trump is certainly petty and vindictive enough to follow through on his threat. The only question is whether he’ll be distracted first, either by something shiny or in a bikini.

          • Tate June 12, 2018 at 3:54 pm #

            Here’s my restrained response to that:

            Trump will go down in history as the greatest President of the first half of the Twenty-first century. Everything has changed because of Trump. Now if he can just remove the shackles of Wall Street, the Koch bros., the Deep State, & AIPAC, he will go down in history as the greatest since Andrew Jackson.

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:25 am #

            Trump Nominated for Nobel Peace Prize by Norwegian Politicians.

            Donald Trump has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize by two Norwegian politicians after his historic meeting with Kim Jong Un.

            Christian Tybring-Gjedde, an MP, and former justice minister Per-Willy Amundsen said Mr Trump “had taken a huge and important step in the direction of the disarmament, peace and reconciliation between North and South Korea”.

    • K-Dog June 11, 2018 at 12:11 pm #

      Just authors thoughts which got by the editor. The wording seems familiar. Very familiar. So familiar that it looks to me like one of the trolls here is moonlighting.

      Lucky dog. I bet it pays better too! The private sector usually does.

  14. volodya June 11, 2018 at 11:22 am #

    I think JHK is right, that if something worthwhile comes out of the Singapore summit it will be a miracle on the same order of magnitude as the Virgin Birth.

    In my view, if anyone wants to get anything done with respect to North Korea, for example, their periodic mischief-making like the sinking of that South Korean boat, you have to talk to the Chinese. If you want something done about North Korean nukes, you have to go straight to the go-to guy, Xi Jin Ping.

    That’s assuming Xi will deal. And it’s assuming that the geniuses at the State Dept understand the shape of the world after the epically absurd American offshoring to China of US industrial might. I don’t think that the Big Thinkers have got their heads around that one yet. It changed the balance of power drastically in favor of China.

    The shape of the agreement with China will look something like this: Xi will step on Rocketman’s neck and take possession of North Korean nukes if and only if the US military vacates South Korea and Japan and maybe Asia in general.

    That will be the quid pro quo. No US pull-out, no deal. Rocketman keeps the nukes.

    But it has to be Xi at the table, and it has to be Xi giving the order to Rocketman.

    If Americans were wise to their own best interests, which I do not believe they are, they would close ALL their Asian military installations. ALL of them. There is no reason that the locals can’t handle things themselves and besides, the US no longer has the economic wherewithal to do it.

    • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 11:28 am #

      Exactly right, which of course means Trump and the current MICC will never let it happen. It cedes too much power to China, of whom the US is rightly deathly afraid of, what with “full spectrum dominance” still being a thing and all that.

      • SpeedyBB June 11, 2018 at 10:13 pm #

        The enduring Pentagon fancy of ‘full spectrum dominance’, about which the 60-year-old generals may be wistful, is nearly as absurd as the current fancy – among the 40-year-old war planners, entitled oafs who never experienced the balance of terror of the 1960s – of ‘winnable nuclear war’.

        Wrap your head around that one. What, I’m kidding? Would I kid about something like that?

        Winnable. Nuclear. War.

        Only a country which has never been invaded and half-destroyed could entertain such a conceit.

        After the resolution of the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962, my Air Force colonel brother cracked ‘The only danger would have been our bombers running into one another on the flight to Russia’. Following the humiliating backdown of the USSR, Ambassador Dobrynin told Kennedy ‘We will never let this happen again’ and thus the escalation of the arms race.

        • Tate June 13, 2018 at 10:41 am #

          It could be argued that the old Confederacy was a sovereign nation that was invaded & half-destroyed. And yet Southerners are often the most enthusiastic warmongers. Of course, that was a long time ago.

    • sprawlcapital June 11, 2018 at 12:24 pm #

      It is interesting to speculate whether Japan, without US help, could in a reasonable time build up their military sufficiently to defend themselves
      against China.

      In 1940 Japan was the dominant power in east Asia. This is not 1940.

  15. Cavepainter June 11, 2018 at 11:33 am #

    All this hysteria about Trump; maybe the guy does have loose marbles which is probably at least as common among holders of the office of President who, with credibly good intentions, find the difficulty of conducting that office to be like walking on a floor strewn with marbles.
    Which, by-the-way, illustrates the genius of our nation’s founders who in creating its structure and process architect ed into it the self-check mechanism of “separation of powers”. Witness; even against what is argued the personal flaws of past holders of that office we’ve managed never to have the likes of Hitler or Stalin gain full control. Unfortunately though, the press is no longer acting as “the fourth estate”.

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    • PeteAtomic June 11, 2018 at 11:40 am #

      I think most of the press (I’m not gonna say all) are simply proxy PR firms for their parent companies.

    • Cavepainter June 11, 2018 at 12:20 pm #

      But,….we’re no longer back in the age when shift’s in public perception, discourse and, hence, the veil of fear moved no faster than the pace of setting type and distribution by horse drawn cart; today news (or rumor) circulates hardly slower than brain synapse — “goes viral” in web speak. Maybe our doom is written into national reflex now being as fast as a convulsive twitch.

  16. Tate June 11, 2018 at 11:34 am #

    With a blind controlling interest in LesterCorp — through which the Kremlin obtained the technology — Vladimir Putin now operates a network of secret portals into the brains of most of the world’s leaders. The G7 summit yielded ample evidence of this set-up. Among a handful of the world’s political leaders that the operation has been unable to penetrate, Trump stands foremost among them. It is unknown if Kim is also “clean”. The mind of Trump, of course, could not be infiltrated due to the deployment of advanced bullshit detector technology & active anti-horseshit countermeasures. Trump will play an advanced combined game of 4D Chess, Chinese Checkers, Quantum Parcheesi & Nuclear Mumbly-peg. It may be that Kim will attempt a diversion by challenging Trump to a game of Horse using Dennis Rodman as a proxy. If Trump can get the endorsement of Rodman’s faction in the mid-terms, it will be a solid Win for MAGA.

  17. RobH June 11, 2018 at 11:39 am #

    Mexican wrestling?

    You nearly hit the mark

    SUMO!!!

    Trump and Kim

    It would be like the Frankie Goes to Hollywood ‘Two Tribes’ vid come to life in more than vivid hyper reality

    Wow. That’s surreal

    • RobH June 11, 2018 at 11:41 am #

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SXWVpcypf0w

      Just imagine the sumo cossies

    • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 1:11 pm #

      Sumo’s where it’s at. Trump might need to use a diaper, though. Don’t think the traditional mawashi’s going to be enough.

  18. volodya June 11, 2018 at 11:50 am #

    If the Big Thinkers at the State Department could step outside the box they’ve been thinking in for the last three generations it would be a salutary thing for the US and the parts of the world that America has been busily screwing up.

    What would change equations massively all over the globe is a unilateral pull-out of the US military from South Korea and Japan.

    Imagine two advanced countries, one of 50 million (South Korea), the other 127 million (Japan) facing an an economically Sub-Saharan country of 25 million (North Korea). Who comes out on top? Who starts bossing who?

    Imagine nuclear-armed China and nuclear-armed North Korea suddenly looking at one another, cheek by jowl as they’ve been since time began, without the common modern-day adversary (the US) that smoothed out their mountain-sized cross-border frictions.

    Asia can have only so many shot-callers. China will be one, India another. But North Korea will aspire to shot-caller-hood given its nuclear arsenal and I think this won’t rest well with the boys in Beijing.

    My bet is that the animosity previously festering between Rocketman and the US will be re-directed to China.

  19. volodya June 11, 2018 at 11:59 am #

    Sean Coleman, i saw your reply to my post last week so this is getting back to you.

    The reality may be that the sexual abuses by the Roman Catholic clergy are massively overblown. Let’s assume that they are overblown.

    But, as you said, most everyone believes that the abuses are real and widespread. So, if everyone believes that they are real, how can it possibly be that the Roman Catholic Church is still up and running? It’s inconceivable that it be allowed to stay in business. Yet, it’s still in business.

    • Sean Coleman June 11, 2018 at 5:22 pm #

      Volodya

      That is a good question. The Church itself accepts the story, it seems, with few exceptions. I think many reason that, while there is exaggeration, there is an undeniable core of abuse that has existed since time immemorial, that has been covered up or at least downplayed because of the exaggerated respect that there was for the institution (particularly in Ireland) and that only recently has it come to light, not least by the brave actions of survivors and victims making to step forward and the fearless reporting by the press and media.

      A good example in Ireland would be David Quinn, who is one of the very few traditional Catholic voices standing his ground in the press and on the national broadcaster, RTE, where he plays the role of token reactionary. He is involved in the ‘shadowy’ Iona Institute (anything they don’t approve of is shadowy) and came under enormous pressure in the period before the homosexual marriage (‘marriage equality’) referendum. Yet I think he accepts the above ‘narrative’ (sorry for using the word).

      Some people, I think, don’t trust the story in their bones but cannot argue it because they don’t know much, or enough, about it. I have just about reached the stage where I do and can. Media coverage is, of course, not only biased but insanely hysterical.

      I heard two leading broadcasters on the radio, a few years ago now, ask why the Church had not been closed down. It is the logical next step, but there are still too many traditional Catholics, most of them getting on in years, around for them to do this without making it obvious. It will be a long process of attrition. Already moves have been made to reduce the Church’s role in education (it was intimately involved in setting the schools up in the first place). There is a with-it association of priests which is outspokenly critical of the ‘hierarchy’ (eyes roll) and in favour of the latest trendy ideas. This has been happening openly for at least the last thirty years, and was doubtless earnestly discussed in private by our numerous liberals (who have held the real ‘power’ for a very long time), but Ireland would never dream of acting out of step with progressive opinion elsewhere, in particular America and England of course.

      If and when it does happen I would expect something similar to pre- and Civil War Spain with widespread atrocity, presumably on the strength of sensational new ‘discoveries’ of clerical depravity.

      • Sean Coleman June 12, 2018 at 2:24 am #

        “I have just about reached the stage where I do and can.”

        It occurred to me while on holiday that I have spent the last three or four years (and possibly more) studying the damned lies of damned liars. The subject is very important but I wish I didn’t have to waste all that time on them.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 5:46 pm #

      I assure you that it is no exaggeration. Whole seminaries were taken over by the Gaze. A book called “Goodbye Good Men” talks about this and how many innocent young men were driven out, often leaving a lasting bitterness against the Church.

      • Sean Coleman June 12, 2018 at 2:19 am #

        Janos

        You cannot assure anyone because the facts (when one actually looks at them, but nobody does – why?) do support the outrageous claims, which originate from liars of weak character aided and abetted by a willing media. You have to examine the individual claims and the known facts rather than read sensationalist books by sensationalists, fantasists and charlatans. This is an exchange of ideas between adults.

        • Sean Coleman June 12, 2018 at 4:41 am #

          All right, out of interest what is the argument of the book, and who wrote it?

          Fr Paul Shanley was the source and origin of the Boston scandal as far as I can make out.

          From Irish Salem:

          “Paul Shanley was both a priest AND a promiscous homosexual who was a great hero to American liberals and gays – until it suited their purposes to throw him to the wolves.

          “During the late 1960s and the 70s Father Paul Shanley was part of the Church’s outreach to gays in the Boston Archdiocese. He “outreached” so far that he adopted their lifestyle hook, line and sinker. He openly denounced Catholic teaching on sexual issues and could hardly be accused of hypocrisy as he lived his life in accordance with his professed ideas. He was furiously denounced, for so doing, by Catholic traditionalists and the Boston Church built up a huge file on him. Finally in 1979 he was removed from his “Gay” ministry to the fury of his gay and liberal friends. No other action was taken against him and he remained a priest.

          “The pusillanimity of the Boston Archdiocese was to have lethal consequences for itself and for Father Shanley. If Shanley had been dismissed from the priesthood under pressure from traditionalists, he would have become a liberal martyr and a permanent icon for gays. However he remained – officially – a clergyman and as such became a victim of the wave of anti-clerical hysteria that swept America from the mid 1990s onwards – in the form of the Retrieved Memory movement (itself a follow-up to the Satanic Ritual Abuse hysteria of the 1980s). In 2002 he was accused of regularily raping four 6 year old children on a weekly basis, 20 years previously. All four accusers knew each other and all claimed they had suddenly recovered their memories having repressed all knowledge of the rapes for decades. There was a ferocious media assault on the Church led by the Boston Globe – with the full support of the “liberal” National Catholic Reporter. (The file that had been built up on Shanley, was used as evidence that the Archdiosese “knew” he was a child molester; the fact that it largely consisted of denunciations by conservatives of his gay antics was ignored!)

          “The media onslaught had the unintended effect of bringing to light some unpleasing facts about the accusers and the authorities dropped two of the four – including Gregory Ford the man who started it all. A third dropped out after facing tough questioning during a pre-trial hearing and eventually only one case – that of Paul Busa actually made it to court in January/February 2005. During the trial Busa again managed to “forget” the relevant details about one of his allegations (presumably he felt unable to face cross-examination on that issue) but nevertheless the jury convicted Paul Shanley on the other charges and he was sentenced to 15 years imprisonment. There can be no doubt but that the vile behaviour of the “liberal” media – including the National Catholic Reporter – was a major factor in the jury’s decision.

          “The case against the now defrocked (in 2004) Paul Shanley was based entirely on Repressed Memory evidence; yet RM was being heavily attacked by 2005 and that kind of hysteria seemed to be going the same way as had Satanic Ritual Abuse a decade before. On the contrary, the conviction of the former Father Shanley served to revive a dying witch-hunt. In January 2010 the Massachusetts Supreme Court dismissed Paul Shanley’s appeal and re-affairmed the validity of Repressed Memory.”

          I understand from an article by MaryJo Wypijewski that one of the accusers (the accusations were of garish abuse when they were little boys) got his own epiphany on a plane on the way to Las Vegas for a few days gambling. The pay-outs were reported as enormous.

          There was a scandal last year about alleged homosexual activity in the Maynooth seminary in Ireland and the Archbishop of Dublin was critical of that institution. Earlier this year there was another scandal about two Irish seminarians in Rome, who went out celebrating the anniversary of Pope John Paul’s De Humanitate Vitae (?) and ended up in bed together. This was reported all around the world. I found out two weeks ago (from The Irish Catholic) that the story was just another fib – but for that chance discovery I might have believed it myself. The media are an almighty disgrace (as we know).

          http://www.irishsalem.com/international-controversies/usa/index.php

          If you go to this link look up Christine Buckely, the serial liar and fantasist who stood at the heart of the Irish hysteria.

          “Louis Lentin’s documentary “Dear Daughter” which was broadcast by RTE in February 1996 tells the story of Christine Buckley and her experiences in Goldenbridge residential school from 1950 to 1964. Her allegations against the Sisters of Mercy who ran the school, and in particular Sister Xavieria set off a wave of atrocity stories in the media – up to and including allegations that the nuns had caused the death of an infant who had been left in their care.

          “The allegations contained in “Dear Daughter” itself were shocking enough. In the words of Irish Times journalist Eddie Holt (writing on 24 February 1996) “Christine Buckley was once beaten so badly by the unidentified Sister Sadist of the Shining Stick that she had to get about 100 stitches in her leg. On another occasion, perhaps too tired from walking up a flight of stairs, Stick just poured a kettle of boiling water over 10 year old Christine’s right thigh”.

          “The Report of the Ryan Commission published in May 2009 contains no reference to these allegations by Christine Buckley. However UK cultural historian Richard Webster deals with them in his essay “States of Fear, The Redress Board and Ireland’s Folly” which is itself an extract from his book “The Secret of Bryn Estyn”:
          http://www.richardwebster.net/print/xbrynestynireland.htm

          “In 1996 the producer and director, Louis Lentin, made a television documentary about abuse in children’s homes which was shown by RTE, the main public service broadcasting station in Ireland. It focused on the brutal regime which was said to have been operating during the 1950s at St Vincent’s Industrial School, Goldenbridge, one of a network children’s homes or detention centres which were funded by the state and run by the Catholic Church. The documentary featured allegations made against Sister Xavieria, one of the nuns belonging to the Sisters of Mercy order which ran the home.

          “The woman ‘survivor’ at the centre of the film claimed that, on one occasion, she had been caned by Sister Xavieria so severely that the entire side of her leg was split open from her hip to her knee. She says she was treated in the casualty department of the local hospital and believes that she received 80 to 120 stitches. No medical evidence has ever been produced to substantiate this bizarre claim. The surgeon who ran the casualty department at the hospital in question has given evidence which renders it highly unlikely that such an incident ever took place. Apart from anything else, the surgeon points out that caning would not have caused a wound of this kind, which would have required surgical treatment under a general anaesthetic and not stitches in a casualty department.

          “Yet although the evidence suggests that the woman’s memory was a delusion, her testimony was widely believed at the time. In the wake of the broadcast, atrocity stories about Goldenbridge and other industrial schools began to proliferate. [3]

          “[3] Sunday Times (Ireland), 28 April 1996, citing the views of the surgeon, J. B. Prendiville.

          “One of the “atrocity stories” referred to by Mr. Webster was that Sister Xavieria had been responsible for the death of a baby, Marion Howe in Goldenbridge. This allegation was then supported by Christine Buckley who said she was “angry at the failure by the Sisters of Mercy to admit liability for what had happened to Marion Howe. This is what the above-mentioned Sunday Times article had to say about this particular “atrocity”:

          “One of the more chilling allegations to surface was that an 11-month-old baby died four days after she was put into Goldenbridge. When the infant’s father, Myles Howe. returned from England and went to St Ultan’s hospital, he was told by a nurse that his baby had burns on her knees but the staff had got her too late to save her. The postmortem said the child died of dysentery.

          “The Howes have never been satisfied by the official response.

          “[Doctor] Prendiville recalls that St Ultan’s was established largely for dealing with bowel complaints such as dysentery or gastroenteritis, a common illness among children which at that time could reach epidemic proportions in Dublin. He speculated that Marian Howe was more than likely admitted to St Ultan’s with a bowel complaint. “I wouldn’t say that burns of that size on a child’s legs would have been the cause of death. They didn’t treat burns in St Ultan’s. If the baby died from a burn, there would have to be an inquest. But failure to communicate information is a defect in many hospitals,” he said.

          “But if the burns were not the cause of Marian’s death, asks Howe, why was he told by Xavieria that it was an “accident” and not dysentery that killed his child? Why, on his arrival at St Ultan’s to see his dead child, did a nurse indicate to him that his daughter had died of burns? And why could nobody explain to him the large burn marks on the sides of her knees?

          The outrage that followed the Prime Time programme *** was directed as much at Xavieria’s denials of abuse as at an apparently “soft” line of questioning. The allegation that a baby in her charge died of burns was not put to her on the programme. The reason was that after researching the allegation, the Prime Time team could find no evidence to support it. according to an RTE source. The reporter did ask Xavieria about the incident, he said, but her response was edited out of the programme.

          “Both Buckley and Dear Daughter producer Louis Lentin, regard the Prime Time report as an effort by RTE to undermine the documentary. “Sister Xavieria is perfectly entitled to any right of reply, but this programme bent over backwards to be reverential,” said Lentin. “The facts were not put to her in a strong, investigative manner.”

          This last paragraph here caught my attention. The

          “Report of the Commission to Investigate Child Abuse (Ryan Commission) published in May 2009
          “The Ryan Report contains no reference to the atrocity stories made or supported by Christine Buckley in relation to Sister Xavieria. I originally thought that Ryan had simply ignored them. I subsequently discovered that the claims were investigated by the Commission sitting in private session and no evidence was found to support them. However instead of reporting this very significant fact, the Commission Report simply omits Buckley’s allegations.”

          It just omits it!

          The Ryan Report was among those listed by name in a recent study by Mark Smith and a colleague from the University of Dundee, which throws a critical eye (putting it mildly) on the Duncroft School founding myth of the Savile legend. Such official reports, it argues, are used merely to support a certain version of the truth. In other words official reports are invariably part of the problem rather than the solution.

          • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 5:36 pm #

            The book is (again) titled, “Goodbye Good Men” by Michael Rose. It is well respected by Catholic Traditionalists – most of whom don’t deny the obvious Gay invasion. By some estimates, the priesthood is 25% Gay. This comes from liberal Priest, Andrew Greely – who thinks it’s great. You might also check out “The Permanent Instruction of the Alta-Vendita” about the Communist plan to infiltrate the seminaries.

            I’m from Boston. Paul Shanley was only one of many. I believe a book or two has been written about all this but the titles escape me right now. You can find them if you look.

          • Sean Coleman June 13, 2018 at 10:28 am #

            Janos, I just worked out your reference to ‘the Gaze’. I had thought it was some kind of hypnotic stare emanating from the Vatican.

            “Paul Shanley was only one of many.”

            It only takes one big story to kick off a witch hunt. Brave ‘survivors’ won’t be long in stepping forward.

            Can you tell me of any other cases?

            As I said already, I feel I have wasted a few years getting to the bottom of damned lies told by damned liars, but I suppose I won’t miss another few months or so.

            It is an unequal contest. It takes much time and effort running these stories to ground while the liars seem to make them up off the cuff. Like most of their kind they do it easily, and very badly.

  20. 4014HAMPHEDGE June 11, 2018 at 12:37 pm #

    In September 1985 we met with a Chinese visitor, a Mr. Kong Shiao Liu, US Director of Sino American Machinery Corporation, US office in Fort Lee, NJ. He was travelling America in a rental car, and early on, we asked how he was able to travel away from China without a “minder” or in more controlled manner? Mr. Liu gave a short and all-telling answer: ” As a young man, I was with the Chairman on the Long March”…

    We were already known as persons concerned with the strategically irrational, systematic abandonment and destruction of the US branch Line railway {think capillaries) matrix. We had written in various venues on the subject, largely ignored in the US rubber tire vision scheme of things. The Chinese then and now were not ignorant of railway mod; so we were on his trip itinerary and were treated to 5-6 hours of smoke-filled (Camel regular) conversation with Mr. Liu over 2 days.

    We ended friends, with the knowledge China was going to industrialize on the wings of US investment and American consumers… We were assured China was very interested in the role as counterweight to Russia to the benefit of America… Which may be a helpful line of thinking with some role-reversal as we see a president, no doubt with visions of hotels dancing in his fevered brain, recasting Russia as counterweight to the Chinese Empire.

    Sparing the peanut gallery chapter and verse on why America must redo the Branch RR Matrix, simply note this resource: publishes North American Railway line map books showing all-time railway corridor. As in, starting point for independent action among citizen strategic thinkers at the local level, in COLLUSION with the 3000+ US County Planning Bureaus with brain space to consider more robust Famine Hedge food distribution after EMP event. Oh, and west coast Tsunamis owing to Cascade Subduction event and or faster-moving KilaueaHinila Slump, with lava overburden building.

    Losing California Great Valley food production for a year or more would put upward pressure on grocery prices… Salt water douche would reduce future yield as well.

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  21. 4014HAMPHEDGE June 11, 2018 at 12:47 pm #

    Old age left out web address spv.co.uk for the comprehensive US & Canadian railway line all-time rail corridor footprint. Useful also to search out appreciable tonnage of rail and track hardware still in the weeds. Might be hard to get in the “Long Emergency”.

    And you, Mr. Kunstler: of all hands reading this, have least excuse not having RR map resource on the shelf…

  22. ClayGIll June 11, 2018 at 1:11 pm #

    The machine gun story started out as a parody first published by a Chinese website similar to the Onion. A Unification Church (Moonies) related newspaper in the ROK printed it as fact and from there it was off and running. Both of the DPRK government ministers are alive doing well and taking part in the Singapore meeting. Same goes for the uncle of the Marshall supposedly feed to dogs and the members of the Moranbong Band who have performed in China and Russia of late.

  23. FincaInTheMountains June 11, 2018 at 2:23 pm #

    I am glad you find amusing the relationship of Trump with American “traditional allies”.

    The American troops in Europe are under NATO command, the organization Trump perhaps has less control over than his own Justice Department.

    Hypothetically, Europeans could provoke a war with Russia using American troops and bravely fight Russians to the last American GI, which they almost succeeded at in 2015, when Merkel, despite the US State Department, started a coup in Ukraine and then arranged a provocation with Malaysian Boeing over Donbass.

    Another good question is under whose exactly control is the World Trade Organization (WTO), and how it allowed the 270% tariff on American dairy exported to Canada.

    https://twitter.com/realDonaldTrump/status/1005586562959093760

  24. jean.baptiste.moquelin June 11, 2018 at 2:24 pm #

    It is a tribute to how robust the United States is as a society that it can withstand a person so unqualified to serve as its president. Unlike so many of his critics, I do not recoil at some of the ideas that helped him get elected – for instance that the United States should control its borders and who crosses them, or that modern, prevailing economic policies have hurt a certain fraction of its population. And since his election I have been more shocked by how his opponents lost their minds at everything the president ever said or did. But his latest antics are starting to get truly scarily idiotic and irresponsible. If american workers have been hurt, it is by what are euphemistically called “low-cost countries”, NOT Canada and Germany. If your company cannot compete with a country whose workers are paid more than yours and enjoy mandatory 6 weeks paid vacation, maybe you are not as good as you think you are and they are doing something right. Seriously pissing off pretty much every country on planet Earth, including what can only be described as its closest allies is idiotic. Journalists in Canada who had started to criticize and poke fun at Justin Trudeau (hell, political opponents too!) are now back to praising him as Captain Canada. See what you are doing? You are starting to make **Justin Trudeau** look like the adult in the room, like an elder stateman, like our last, best hope.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 5:49 pm #

      You may be right, but that’s not the point. Nations should be independent to the extent they can be – if they want to retain their independence. It’s all part of Economics as if People Mattered. You know, think Globally, Act locally?

      • jean.baptiste.moquelin June 14, 2018 at 5:26 pm #

        I believe that countries should do what is best for their citizens, not what brings them as close as possible to autarky. And in some cases, not preventing producers from beyond their borders to sell in their markets may be what’s best for their citizens.

  25. FincaInTheMountains June 11, 2018 at 2:35 pm #

    Fuck de Niro!

    An acquaintance of mine for some time shared the same staircase with de Niro and smoked on the balcony with his women. They told him everything about de Niro and how they got the roles through him!

    And then he seems to not know the Russian proverb about that you don’t shit where you live!

    As an actor, he is certainly still brilliant, but this means that the decay of culture is of a worldwide and fundamental nature. When people like de Niro start to support frank Nazis with foam at their mouth, and still claim their right to determine the further development of culture, it becomes clear how right Putin was when he said about the “geopolitical catastrophe”.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1zNr8Pf1QkY

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    • Ol' Scratch June 11, 2018 at 3:26 pm #

      A stupid and patently gratuitous applause line on the part of DeNiro. Jordan Peterson was right, you can’t have half of the population openly denigrating the elected leader of your country in such stark terms like that and expect anything good at all to come from it, especially when the only alternative they offered up was at least as bad, if not worse. Putin is in the catbird’s seat by default, simply by virtue of not being crazy.

      • PeteAtomic June 11, 2018 at 5:06 pm #

        “when the only alternative they offered up was at least as bad, if not worse.”…and backed BTW, by most of the MSM who actively support foreign governments & their leaders versus the elected executive of the US, on nearly every topic from meeting with North Korea to trade issues.

      • BuckP June 11, 2018 at 6:50 pm #

        Whatever happened to respecting the position? I have worked for a lot of managers, who I didn’t admire or agree with, but I always respected the position and met my professional obligations. I didn’t like the vicious, often-racist attacks on Obama and, even though not as smooth as Obama and often vulgar and crass, I don’t like the vicous, profane attacks on Trump. This rhetoric just keeps us divided and will be met with a tit for tat response from the other side. I think sports teams forget this when declining to visit the White House after winning a championship.
        Both political parties support endless war, Wall Street and predatory capitalism with more and more concentration of power. That is why I am an independent voter. Both parties voted for a $700 billion dollar defense budget but no funding for healthcare for all, infrastucture or education.

      • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:37 am #

        The other night I had a dream that kindergarteners in Stockton, Cali were chanting “Fuck you, Trump!” to the enthusiastic applause of their teachers.

  26. janet June 11, 2018 at 3:04 pm #

    Kim is simply unable to grok this or their pandering to him. He needed a fellow blusterer to deal with. Trump may yet attain a coup that all y’all were unable to pull off. –janos

    No previous America president pandered to Kim. What Kim has wanted is to be respected and recognized and no American president has given in to his hijinks or his temper tantrums… until now. Trump is rewarding Kim for threatening the USA with a nuclear ICBM attack.

    No matter if the “summit” meeting lasts five seconds or five hours, no matter what eventually comes of it… Trump has already given Kim what he has craved for so long, the attention that every other American president denied him.

    China is also a winner, though Trump probably does not know it. It would not be a disaster from China’s point of view to see North Korea (with its limited nuclear stockpile) locked into a never-ending set of disarmament negotiations while Chinese businesses get on with the job of building infrastructure and expanding trade.

    But Trump is diverting attention from America, diverting attention from America’s lack of infrastructure, lack of universal health care, lack of UBI, lack of affordable education, lack of a “big beautiful” border wall, lack of response to the opioid epidemic, etc., etc.

    I doubt our “deal maker” president will do anything to keep his “America first” promise. So far, I don’t see what the USA is getting from Trump going to Kim. The weaker party is the one made to travel thousands of miles to attend a meeting. Why didn’t Trump insist Kim travel to our hemisphere? Trump’s behavior is worse than bowing to Kim.

  27. janet June 11, 2018 at 3:31 pm #

    “Don’t get me wrong, this Trade war is going to crash things big time.” –Paulo

    JHK has been predicting an economic crash for years, but it was always related to credit default swaps and financialization of the economy. I don’t recall JHK ever predicting a good old-fashioned trade war would trigger collapse.

    But hey, Trump is unique. America First! Trump is looking more and more like a Black Swan. A MAGA Black Swan. A mega Black Swan.

  28. janet June 11, 2018 at 3:38 pm #

    If voting mattered, they wouldn’t let you vote.

    Trump won a Supreme Court decision today. The Supreme Court has just given a stamp of approval to voter suppression. Ohio’s system of purging voters that choose not to participate in some elections unfairly silences hundreds of thousands of voters in the state, especially people of color and the homeless. But, hey, the fewer people who vote, the better for the Republicans.

    Today’s decision could provide a road map to other states to follow Ohio’s lead and to adopt aggressive rules for culling their voter rolls going forward, even with respect to folks who are still living in Ohio and legally eligible to vote.

    Voting matters. That is why they are suppressing the vote.

    • Tate June 11, 2018 at 4:09 pm #

      Only real Americans should be able to vote. They should be further qualified according to mental competency, age, and of good moral character (no felony convictions). In this way, we can restore sanity to domestic politics.

      • janet June 11, 2018 at 4:26 pm #

        Only real Americans should be able to vote. –Tate

        That’s right, Tate. Fortunately, real Americans come in a variety of gender orientations, races, cultures, political orientations, and religions.

        Felons who have completed their sentences, or who have been pardoned by Trump, should be able to vote. After an inmate, like Alice Marie Johnson, repays her debt to society, she should be able to participate fully in the political life of society by voting.

        No taxation without being able to vote for representation. We fought a war over that principle.

        E PLURIBUS UNUM!

        • Exscotticus June 11, 2018 at 6:05 pm #

          @janet

          You forgot to mention dead Democrats! They get to vote as well!

    • Cavepainter June 11, 2018 at 6:12 pm #

      But,….we’re no longer back in the age when shift’s in public perception, discourse and, hence, the veil of fear moved no faster than the pace of setting type and distribution by horse drawn cart; today news (or rumor) circulates hardly slower than brain synapse — “goes viral” in web speak. Maybe our doom is written into national reflex now being as fast as a convulsive twitch.

  29. Sean Coleman June 11, 2018 at 5:27 pm #

    The NYT quote is one of the most hilarious things I have heard in a long time, probably since the last time they said something just as stupid (so perhaps not so long after all).

  30. Ishabaka June 11, 2018 at 5:35 pm #

    Unlike Saint Obama of the Nobel Peace Prize, and She Whose Turn it Was, Donald Trump has started no new wars. That is a fact. Deal with it.

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    • janet June 11, 2018 at 5:52 pm #

      “Donald Trump has started no new wars.” –Ishabaka

      Trump just started a trade war with Canada last month. An analysis of 2016 voter turnouts and trade flows with Canada shows that states such as Ohio, Texas and Indiana that supported Trump generally enjoy a surplus in goods trade with Canada.

      By contrast, the biggest deficits in goods trade with Canada are in states such as California and Illinois that voted for Clinton.

      So not only did Trump start a war, his trade war with Canada is hurting those in the heartland of America who voted for Trump. Deal with it.

      As for hot wars in the middle east, Trump seems happy to follow in Obama’s footsteps and to continue all Obama’s wars, even stepping up the bombings and dropping the Mother of All Bombs.

      • Exscotticus June 11, 2018 at 6:04 pm #

        > Trump seems happy to follow in Obama’s footsteps and to continue all Obama’s wars

        janet! did your democratic party cadres give you permission to slip in that tacit criticism of Obama? You better watch yourself!

  31. Ishabaka June 11, 2018 at 5:38 pm #

    Oh yes – and Kim Jong Un has started no new wars – and neither did his pops, Kim Il Sung. Given the carnage caused by the “mature” politicians, I’ll take the childish Trump & Kim any day.

  32. PeteAtomic June 11, 2018 at 5:46 pm #

    Kinda surprised nobody else here posted this in lieu of the title of Jim’s post there:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MMKFIHRpe7I

    Just imagine Little Justin in the chair there, instead of Vince McMahon 🙂

    • janet June 11, 2018 at 5:59 pm #

      Trump’s reality show presidency is just as scripted/fake as WWE.

      • PeteAtomic June 11, 2018 at 6:17 pm #

        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N4O1sbKEIl8

        couldn’t resist this wrasstling vid as a reply 🙂

        it may be scripted, but its not fake. Dave Schultz, as an allusion to the Trump Presidency, is reality. It all depends on who is writing the script.

        • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:41 am #

          I love that clip. Scripted or not, those guys endure tremendous pain.

  33. PeteAtomic June 11, 2018 at 6:24 pm #

    btw, if anybody wants to know how to correctly pronounce ‘wrassling’ then listen to my former Gov.Rudy Perpich announce Verne Gagne Day in Minnesota:
    (the word starts about 1:30)

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NExTZyyC280

  34. Luhrenloup June 11, 2018 at 6:31 pm #

    My predictions for the DOJ inspector general’s report:

    Andrew McCabe and Peter Strzok are the designated fall guys, and are thrown into the volcano while the real culprits are whiplashed with some nasty labels and sent on their way to continue their nefarious dealings.

  35. BackRowHeckler June 11, 2018 at 8:46 pm #

    6/13/18

    London, England

    ‘Pregnant Man & Flower Power at London men’s fashion week’

    “We are prepared to welcome a future of male pregnancy.”

    “Male models wearing evening dresses, mini skirts, or opting to go bare chested featured heavily.”

    “Transexual model Munroe Burdoff strut the catwalk dressed only in a pair of black boots and a long, long T shirt with the words ‘High Content Character’.”

    Hey Vlad are these the Anglo Saxons Kipling wrote about and who held out against 10,000 Zulus at the Battle of Rourke’s Drift?

    100,000 Muzzy gangsters roam the streets of London with their shivs, viles of acid and pipe bombs, taking the measure of noted transexual model Munroe Burdoff, the pregnant man, and the T shirt that reads ‘High Content Character’ and conclude, it won’t be too hard to take down this f-kkin place. Just give us the word.

    One has to wonder, where are you headed, white man?

    brh

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    • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 8:54 pm #

      You killed HE who was destined to lead our Race for the next thousand years and now you regret it – or would if you knew more. Even that vile fool Churchill had second thoughts, but he was just shouldered aside when he tried to stop mass minority immigration.

      • BackRowHeckler June 11, 2018 at 9:34 pm #

        It wasn’t me; it was my dad and all the uncles.

        and even some of them were in the Pacific fighting the Japs.

        brh

        • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 11:14 pm #

          Yes, they live in you. Their wisdom is your wisdom. Their ignorance is your ignorance. That’s the tragedy. If you go beyond them, you feel like you are betraying them. So you don’t and won’t.

    • janet June 12, 2018 at 1:13 am #

      I can’t wait until men replace women in having to bear the burden of pregnancy.

      • elysianfield June 12, 2018 at 11:26 am #

        ” …Where is John Howard when we REALLY need him?”

  36. Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 8:49 pm #

    The swiftly coming Dark. Liberalism has brought up to the precipice of doom. There is no equality among individuals or races. Hierarchy is the final truth in this world. And a people who refuse to honor and heed it, are on their way to extinction. JS

    I am afraid, without a radical change in a number of policies, your pessimistic assessment is far too optimistic. Below are Richard Lynn’s concluding remarks at the 2012 American Renaissance conference. His talk was entitled “Eugenics and Dysgenics: A Promise Denied”:

    It looks as if they European peoples will continue their downward trajectory. Dysgenic fertility has been with us for six generations and is still present. It’s unlikely that this will end. High IQ young career women will continue to have low fertility. The migrations of Third World people into European populations in North America and Western Europe will continue pulling down the IQ . . . This will very likely spread to Eastern Europe later in the century as the United States, Canada and Western Europe become successively less attractive places — as in the United States the single largest group becomes Mexicans, the population will become a less attractive place for Mexicans to enter. Why do they wish to enter the new Mexican United States? They might as well stay home . . . Third World immigrants looking for a higher standard of living will turn to Eastern Europe.

    So I see the future in rather pessimistic terms for the European peoples. Possibly it might be solved by secession in the United States. Some of the northern states — Maine and Vermont perhaps — might declare independence from the Union . . . The same might take place in some of the Northwestern states — Montana, North and South Dakota . . . The populations of these states, considering that they see the rest of the states being overwhelmed by immigrants, might opt for secession from the Union and develop their own European populations with very strict immigration controls.

    The Third World is also on a downward trajectory. Dysgenic fertility has just begun . . . They will also be adversely affected by dysgenic emigration as the elites from the Third World migrate to the First World.

    The Northeast Asians will be less severely affected by these processes. They have some dysgenic fertility, but this will very likely in time be overcome by embryo selection. They do not have any dysgenic immigration and are unlikely to have it in the foreseeable future.

    China, in particular, will probably be the most successful of these countries because it does not have the handicap of being a democratic country. I don’t believe the dysgenic problem can be overcome in democracies, and China has a big advantage in this regard, in that it can introduce policies such as paying high sums of money to female graduates that have children but not to the rest of the population. They can introduce policies of this kind which would be unacceptable in democracies.

    China also has one considerable advantage arising as an unforeseen consequence of the one-child policy. The consequence of this has been that many couples restricted to one child who have had a girl have killed her and hoped to produce a boy . . . So there are many more young men in China than there are young women. This could have a significant eugenic effect because it places power in the hands of the women to select men.

    Women who select men as their mates or marriage partners generally select men who are successful and of high moral character. So the effect of this [is] . . . to sterilize 23 percent of the male population. This is really talking — as compared to sterilizing one percent of the population in Sweden in the 1930s or ½ of one percent of the population in Germany.

    When you talk about sterilizing 23 percent of the population this will have a considerable eugenic effect. So . . . my view of the probable future is that while the genetic quality of the European population declines, that of China will increase together with her economic and military power.

    And to conclude on a note of qualified optimism, I think it probable that the torch of civilization will pass from the European peoples to the Chinese. Thank you.

    • malthuss June 11, 2018 at 9:05 pm #

      China and Chinese I dont think much of.
      I dont know what the future holds but I know QOL has declined sharply, as USA population increases, with non Whites and mid eastern ‘Whites.’

      China also has one considerable advantage arising as an unforeseen consequence of the one-child policy./ More of the Chinese Horror.
      Screw China before it screws us.

      high moral character–lacking in Chinese.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 9:29 pm #

        Well they’ve always had a strong commercial side. But as someone said last week, Communism destroyed much of what was noble in their culture, leaving the materialism since that is what Communism is all about as well. As I’ve tried to explain to people, the two systems are the opposite sides of the same coin and cooperate very well – the fulminations of doctrinaire Marxist notwithstanding.

        I saw a video of a little Chinese girl getting hit by a car. Driver didn’t stop, nor did the next car which ran her over. She got hit again too. Didn’t make it. Life is very cheap there, at least in the big cities. Third World type consciousness.

        • malthuss June 11, 2018 at 11:31 pm #

          Cannibalism, too many people, pollution, and now an interest in things American [crass consumerism].

        • malthuss June 11, 2018 at 11:41 pm #

          I had a teacher, in the 1970s.
          She was in China, I assume in the 1920s-40s?
          Before it was a closed society.
          She mentions a boat sinking and people saved the animals and let people die.
          So the ‘ a chinamans life is cheap’ must be pre Mao.
          Thats how Mao was able to kill so many.

          • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 12:47 am #

            Ah, so. Bad became worse.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 5:52 am #

            ‘so bad became worse”

            So how does that enable them to carry the ‘torch of civilsation’?

            Although one should be wary of believing one story by one person who may have had an agenda.

    • Tate June 11, 2018 at 10:06 pm #

      The Chinese will inherit tomorrow. It wouldn’t surprise me if at some point they didn’t step into the increasing chaos in North America & take over. They already have a large fifth column in place here. Blood will trump civic nationalism every time no matter how much our elites protest otherwise. The US & Canada combined make a tempting target. Strategically, it’s the most important real estate in the world.

      A key event for the Chinese to begin to think this a serious proposition is when it’s discovered that the US Navy is a paper tiger because of AA. Suspicion may already be building because of its inability to keep its ships from colliding at sea with each other & various other assorted items.

      After the takeover, the Chinks would act to sort out our various racial problems, and not in a pretty way.

      • malthuss June 11, 2018 at 11:37 pm #

        Thanks for your OP but I think ‘Afreeka first’–easier for the taking.

        • Tate June 12, 2018 at 10:43 am #

          They will redirect to North America once they realize it’s theirs for the taking. They’re just waiting at the moment for the right turn of events.

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:44 am #

            And notice I didn’t say they have character. When White civilization is superseded by the Yellow horde, the world descends into Darkness.

      • janet June 12, 2018 at 1:18 am #

        “Strategically, it’s the most important real estate in the world.” –Tate

        More American exceptionalism. Paraguay is sitting on the world’s largest supply of fresh water. It will be water that is king in the future, not oil.

      • SpeedyBB June 13, 2018 at 9:21 am #

        Eastern Canada folk transferred to Vancouver. Company agreed to give them a loan for a [sky-high] mortgage – all thanks for Chinese flight capital driving prices into the stratosphere.

        Agent takes the couple for a ride, turns into a side street with FOR SALE signs in front of homes here and there. Woman says ‘Oh this is a lovely street. Why didn’t you show it to us before?’

        Agent sighs. ‘Everyone living in this street is an overseas Chinese family that has relocated to Canada.’

        Man says ‘What’s wrong with that? We wouldn’t mind living with Chinese neighbors. We’re no prejudiced.’

        Agent (wry smile): ‘No, but they would not want you living among them.’

      • zizzybalooba June 14, 2018 at 5:58 pm #

        Looks like you’ve been making good use of your medical marijuana card.

    • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 4:28 am #

      Nothing quite like the ravings of a vile and ignorant eugenicist who doesn’t know what the real consequences are of a massive difference in male and female populations.

      https://edition.cnn.com/2016/04/17/asia/vietnamese-girls-child-brides-china/index.html

      https://www.economist.com/china/2017/11/04/demand-for-wives-in-china-endangers-women-who-live-on-its-borders

      And not just China:

      https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/india/Close-to-40-of-all-abductions-are-of-women-for-marriage-NCRB/articleshow/48535179.cms

      Where do you people keep your brains? ‘Power in the hands of women to select men…’

      As if.

      “many couples restricted to one child who have had a girl have killed her and hoped to produce a boy . ”

      I was kind of waiting for a vast outpouring of condemnation for this, given views expressed on related issues. But no… it’s just about maths, it would seem.

      • Elrond Hubbard June 12, 2018 at 1:08 pm #

        When Janos posts a dense wall of text, I for one know from experience to skip it. It’s not as if any mere words could further lower my opinion of him, after all.

        David Hume observed: “Reason is, and ought only to be the slave of the passions, and can never pretend to any other office than to serve and obey them.” People like Janos are among the grosser manifestations of this maxim, because he has elected to bend all his reason to the service of the most simian of the passions: territoriality and xenophobia; cringing to authority, versus bullying abuse of those he deems subordinates; and of course, hatred and contempt, driven by envy, of the female sex that he impotently yearns to conquer.

        In short, bigots as far gone as Janos manifest all the traits that make chimpanzees such unpleasant company, including the propensity to cathartic violence — or at least fantasizing about it. That they’re actually human, while putting the nobler human faculties such as reason and the power of speech to such base uses, makes them all the uglier.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 1:50 pm #

          Professor Lynn is a famous psychometrician, yet you won’t read what he said, just as the “Court Scientists” of the Church wouldn’t look thru Galileo’s telescope. Yet I’m the ignorant one? Why should anyone be surprised? You rejoiced over the destruction of James Watson, co-discoverer of the genetic code, yet I’m the chimp? Look in the mirror, Bonzo.

          • GreenAlba June 12, 2018 at 7:56 pm #

            “Professor Lynn is a famous psychometrician, yet you won’t read what he said,”

            Let’s look at what he said:

            “So the effect of this [is] . . . to sterilize 23 percent of the male population. This is really talking …”

            “China also has one considerable *advantage* [my emphasis]…many couples restricted to one child who have had a girl have killed her . . .

            “…the torch of civilization will pass from the European peoples to the Chinese.”

            You just quoted, with explicit approval, a grotesque wall of text that concluded by saying that the murder of little girls provided the fuel for the torch of civilisation. The torch of CIVILISATION.

            Do you never wonder, Janos…

            What…Would… Jesus… Say?

            I think he might forget his manners and say ‘May God forgive you for you are one sick fuck’.

            “Richard Lynn’s concluding remarks at the 2012 American Renaissance conference…”

            How would anyone who sat through that ever scrub themselves clean?

      • Tate June 13, 2018 at 10:19 am #

        GA, Where do you keep your brain?

        ‘Power [is] in the hands of women to select men…’

        And yet statistically, this is fact. Women, by & large, determine their choice of mate. Just because the principle doesn’t operate perfectly doesn’t make it any less true. And he is correct, it would have the eugenic effect predicted by Lynn. No amount of moralizing by the ‘bien pensants’ such as yourself will change that fact.

        • GreenAlba June 13, 2018 at 2:28 pm #

          Tate

          People say, rightly, I think: ‘women are the gateway to sex; men are the gateway to relationships’, which as you know means it’s a lot easier for a woman to get sex than a man, if that’s what she wants, and a lot easier for a man to get a relationship with a woman, if that’s what he wants, than it is for a women to get one with a man.

          Lots of men want sex without strings attached. So do some women, but not nearly as many as men.

          Add to that all the women who have to accept arranged marriages and the situation isn’t as clear cut as you suggest.

          And you don’t appear to have looked at any of the links I supplied showing consequences of having more lots more men than women in a society at a single time. None of them matches your picture of women selecting men.

          When it’s the other way round (e.g. after WWI) women aren’t known for instigating raiding parties to steal men to marry.

          I remain shocked (but possibly not surprised) at your attitude as a ‘Christian’. I spent the larger part of my life as one and we clearly got different things out of it. Being able to contemplate the murder of large numbers of little girls and figure, primarily, that would have a eugenic effect in the direction you’d like was bad enough.

          To suggest, as Janos did, that the end result of killing little girls could be greater ‘civilisation’ is one you’ll have to leave with me till my stomach’s stronger. Perhaps the robots will do better after all – at least it won’t matter then

          • Tate June 13, 2018 at 7:14 pm #

            GA, c’mon, sex is what produces children, not “relationships”, per se. But if you want to talk about relationships, women held the key to both in traditional societies. They were one & the same within stable families. A “relationship” was called a marriage. When the traditional constraints are cast aside, and extramarital sex becomes the norm, then is it any wonder what the results are. Men seeking only sex, and women seeking only a “relationship,” an impossibly idealized version of marriage.

            But I would dispute your contention that men are only interested in sex. Some men are but I think most are interested in a stable loving relationship the same as women. The problem today is that women’s standards are impossibly high. What happens (so I’ve heard, not being active in this arena) is that the top physically attractive 10% of men get all the interest & everyone else gets nowhere. The result is general cynicism & a burnt-out jaded outlook among all parties.

            The links you provided show an unintended consequence of China’s one-child policy where there is a demographic imbalance between the sexes. To the extent Chinese men are able to continue using this strategem to obtain a bride, it does indeed invalidate Lynn’s thesis. I do wonder though about its overall success rate, especially its continuing success rate.

            I by no means approve of the killing of children. If it seemed so, let me remind you that the term bien pensant is used ironically. But it seems there is a double standard here. Don’t most of you approve of the killing of the unborn just in order to give the mother a ‘choice’? Where are you on this issue? You have no right to condemn my acknowledgement (not approval) of the practice in having a eugenic effect if you yourself approve of abortion.

          • Exscotticus June 14, 2018 at 1:38 am #

            > I spent the larger part of my life as [a Christian] and we clearly got different things out of it.

            Well then you clearly never read Numbers 31.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 5:59 am #

            “Numbers” is pre-Christian. Was I not supposed to eat pork or shrimp either?

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 6:07 am #

            “sex is what produces children, not “relationships”, per se.”

            I assumed that wasn’t relevant to the discussion, given your horror of children produced out of wedlock. And I used ‘relationship’ rather than ‘marriage’ because that’s what the saying is. Substitute marriage, if you will, and you’ll find it’s even harder for the women to find a ‘committer’.

            “What happens (so I’ve heard, not being active in this arena) is that the top physically attractive 10% of men get all the interest & everyone else gets nowhere.”

            Go on, surprise me – you heard if from er… men? And nothing to do with the women they’re pursuing, of course, who are from which percentage of ‘lookers’?

            I ‘heard’ from a friend just last week that her son blames his best friend’s inability to find someone to have a relationship on his many, many years of having his benchmark dictated by pornography. That’s far from a small problem. Who can compete with the pornucopia?

            Most people still seem to be pairing off, however, although it does seem more difficult *on both sides* than it used to be.

            “Don’t most of you…?” Don’t most of who what, Tate – generalise on the basis of no knowledge whatsover?

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 6:11 am #

            And I didn’t comment on anyone’s ‘acknowledgement’. I commented on the explicit approval of the idea that such practices could be said to lead to carrying the torch of ‘civilisation’. That simply means we differ in what we think ‘civilisation’ covers.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 7:33 am #

            someone to have a relationship *with*…

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 9:40 am #

            So you could clear things up for me easily as to who ‘you’ is. But you know that, and are avoiding the discussion. Not that I want to have a ‘discussion,’ just a simple answer. Yes, or no, do you support the killing of unborn infants? Or, if you prefer, do you support abortion?

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 12:35 pm #

            I have never done anything to support or not support abortion, Tate.

            In my own life I turned down the opportunity, on the occasion of each of my pregnancies, to have an entirely cost-free amniocentesis (to detect foetal abnormalities). I did this strongly suspecting that (a) had I had the test and had it shown abnormalities, my then-husband would have wanted an abortion (so I didn’t tell him or ask him, given that I was me who was carrying the child, and he never asked anyway), and (b) that had I given birth to a child with any serious defect he would very likely not have hung around for too long. There are women with disabled children who are abandoned by their husbands, as I’m sure you know.

            In the event, even having a second daughter instead of the son it turned out he had ‘assumed’ was enough to lead him to ignore her almost totally for her early life, so I think I was not wrong in my assumptions (oh, the stories I could tell you, but I won’t).

            I left the ungrateful beggar when the object of his disappointment was 20 months old and did the job myself (she’s the happy high flyer, so it seems not to have done her any harm).

            So yes, in spite of my suspicions, which I have every reason to believe were correct, I chose not to know so that whatever would happen would happen. I now feel that was somewhat irresponsible – it’s one thing bringing a child into the world with something like Down’s syndrome that’s perfectly liveable; it’s entirely another bringing a child into the world with a condition that’s going to cause it constant pain and distress, even for a short life – and I might have unknowingly done that.

            In fact, Tate, I was such a purist that I even eschewed the IUD as a contraceptive method, even though I now think that was somewhat mad, but there we are.

            And I wasn’t even a Catholic!

            But it’s not for me to make up other people’s minds about their own personal situations. I can’t imagine, for instance, how a woman already struggling in a desperately poor family would feel if she found herself unintentionally pregnant again, perhaps with a husband who wasn’t going to be entirely sympathetic or to whose already heavy burdens she didn’t want to add. So I don’t judge. And I think politicians, especially male ones, should keep their noses out of women’s and families’ personal decisions.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 12:40 pm #

            So you see, Tate, ‘yes’ or ‘no’ is a bit too simplistic for some questions.

            Whereas for killing a little girl who’s already here just because she’s a girl, the only answer is ‘no’.

          • Exscotticus June 14, 2018 at 5:38 pm #

            > “Numbers” is pre-Christian. Was I not supposed to eat pork or shrimp either?

            Last I checked, the Old Testament is holy scripture in all Christian religions. Last I checked, the Holy Bible contains both testaments. And, fyi, Jesus was a Jew.

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 7:06 pm #

            TMI, GA, on your personal life.

            Women who don’t want to have unwanted children should not be having unprotected sex, it’s that simple. There’s the case of the woman in Brazil, a drug addict & mother of seven, who was ordered by a judge to be sterilized. That’s a ‘eugenic’ practice. Does the state have an interest in that woman’s reproductive health?

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 9:21 pm #

            You asked if I supported abortion. It’s not a yes/no question. You were so hoping for an illustration that I was so very pro-abortion that I treated you to the exact opposite. I can see you’re miffed. Janos has pushed on several occasions as well, for the same reason. I avoided the subject but sometimes you get fed up with the goading. So now you won’t need to ask again.

            Was it not you who described to me the highly personal (and pretty racey) conversations you were used to having at work? I thought you’d be able to cope with a little insight into what goes into such decisions. You don’t know me and you never will, so you don’t need to be embarrassed.

            “Women who don’t want to have unwanted children should not be having unprotected sex, it’s that simple.”

            Except it isn’t always. Contraceptive methods fail sometimes. I used to know all the percentages.

            Men who don’t want to have unwanted children should not be having unprotected sex. Why do you and Janos always make it sound as if women are having babies all by themselves? It’s the responsibility of both the people who had sex, except in cases of rape.

            “There’s the case of the woman in Brazil, a drug addict & mother of seven, who was ordered by a judge to be sterilized. That’s a ‘eugenic’ practice. Does the state have an interest in that woman’s reproductive health?”

            I’m not an expert on medical ethics and I don’t know the circumstances. I’m not entirely sure what your point is, but if the state is obliged to care for her other children, then it probably has some rights to take care of the situation in the best way it can for everyone involved.

            It’s an exceptional circumstance, like depriving a person of their freedom under the mental health act in exceptional circumstances, and therefore not relevant to everyday situations.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 9:33 pm #

            “Last I checked, the Old Testament is holy scripture in all Christian religions. Last I checked, the Holy Bible contains both testaments. And, fyi, Jesus was a Jew.”

            You don’t say… I’m not a Jew. Nor was I ever a fundamentalist Christian.

            And I think it was Paul who pointed out that a person was defiled by what came out of their mouth and not what went into it, hence arguing against the shrimp and pork proscriptions.

            Maybe you missed that bit while you were concentrating on Numbers.

            Over and out.

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 9:46 pm #

            Alba, just to clear up a misunderstanding, I’ve never described to you any highly personal and/or racy conversations I’ve had at work or anywhere else. You must be thinking of someone else. I’ve always meticulously avoided those kinds of conversations, even over the internet.

            Anyway…

            We had our good days in the West before the depravity & immorality took charge. Just be glad you were privileged enough to see it, albeit as a child. Those days will never come again.

          • Exscotticus June 14, 2018 at 9:57 pm #

            > I spent the larger part of my life as [a Christian] and we clearly got different things out of it.

            > You don’t say… I’m not a Jew. Nor was I ever a fundamentalist Christian.

            Whatever sort of Christian you were, it was the kind that selectively chose to celebrate the kumbaya bits while ignoring the god-ordained girl-child-rape bits. In this regard I suppose you followed your mommy’s advice? A little sugar helped the bitter medicine go down…

          • GreenAlba June 15, 2018 at 8:18 am #

            Exscotticus

            “Whatever sort of Christian you were, it was the kind that selectively chose to celebrate the kumbaya bits while ignoring the god-ordained girl-child-rape bits. In this regard I suppose you followed your mommy’s advice? A little sugar helped the bitter medicine go down…”

            Call me stupid, and I’m sure you’ll be happy to, but I really don’t now where you’re coming from. I don’t know if you’re a miffed Christian or a miffed non-Christian.

            I haven’t read the bible from cover to cover. I don’t know which specific child-rapey bits you’re referring to, although I remember some bits that seemed very dodgy by our standards, especially in the OT. They wouldn’t tend to be the bits they’d study with you, on the whole, I suppose, but maybe my memory’s failing.

            My memory is definitely failing. I wouldn’t expect to remember the lesser read bits from 50 years ago. I’ve put it behind me. Some bits stick in my mind, but not from ‘mommy’ or even daddy. They were good people and good parents, on the whole, but they were stronger on the ‘honour thy father and thy mother’ side of things than anything very kumbaya. That and not getting too close to young people of the opposite sex, as much as possible, once you’d reached an age to take an interest in them.

            In any case, I chose, with the benefit of increasing age and wider reading, to consider the whole thing both a product of its time and internally very inconsistent.

            I don’t imagine there is a religious person on the planet who doesn’t cherry pick from their particular sacred texts or institutional exhortations. And I once read (possibly from M. Scott Peck) a suggestion that the kind of Christianity we end up with individually, if we are believers, corresponds closely to the kind of parents we had.

            So, if you had kumbaya parents (I didn’t, in my judgement, albeit seen through the usual filters) you’d end up with a kumbaya version of Christianity. If you had authoritarian parents (I did – again, seen through the same filters) you’d end up with a Christian faith that might incorporate a lot of fear about what was going to happen to you if you did anything bad.

            It’s just a theory.

            What my personal experience of Christianity has left me with, now that I’ve been able to dump the fear and the superstition (there is plenty else to be afraid of), is a code of ethics that I’ve cherry picked myself and added to from elsewhere, so maybe they’re the same ethics I’d have picked for myself anyway if I’d been brought up in some other faith or none.

            BTW I just haven’t got round to responding to your other post, it’s not that I’m avoiding it. I have stuff to do, but I will try to respond later.

          • GreenAlba June 15, 2018 at 8:40 am #

            Tate

            Apologies – I did only say I *thought* it was you. And it wasn’t anything dreadful – it was just someone (else) talking about raunchy conversations with colleagues, with the gals allegedly being worse than the boys! And yes, you got a bit more information that you needed – put it down to pent-up exasperation over the number of times my opinion on the matter has been completely assumed, with the usual right-wing sneering (not thinking especially of you).

            “We had our good days in the West before the depravity & immorality took charge.”

            I think that may be partly rose-tinted retrovision. As someone else said (kind of) on this thread, societal norms work a bit like a pendulum.

            The hypocrisy of the Victorian era is legendary. Depravity has always existed. It can move around a bit, chronologically and geographically. Sometimes it is normalised and other times it is hidden behind chintz curtains. And sometimes it was far from the nice parts of town people didn’t go out of much.

            Back in the thirties and forties, when my parents lived in the kind of society you’d have approved of (respectable, church-going working class) others in other places not that far away were preparing to gas their fellow humans and burn them in ovens.

            Earlier, your slave owners and ours were taking their families to church, strutting their stuff as the pillars of their communities, then coming home to rape the cuter slave girls while ‘mommy’ was arranging flowers.

          • GreenAlba June 15, 2018 at 9:01 am #

            Exs’s

            don’t *know*

  37. Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 9:12 pm #

    Little George just referred to President Trump as President Chump by “accident”. This historic moment is unbearable to the Liberal. They are down on all fours howling in agony.

    • BackRowHeckler June 11, 2018 at 9:31 pm #

      Most of ’em are down on all fours as a matter of course.

      brh

    • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:47 am #

      Little George? Are you talking about the failed businessman/disgraced pol known as ‘Shrub?’

  38. BackRowHeckler June 11, 2018 at 10:11 pm #

    well, no matter.

    Upon further investigation it looks like this London Mens Fashion week is just a freak show.

    Not much different from what you’d see up at P’ town early off season.

    brh

  39. Janos Skorenzy June 11, 2018 at 11:17 pm #

    https://ntknetwork.com/bill-clinton-norms-of-what-you-can-do-to-someone-against-their-will-has-changed/

    The Big Dog speaks. Feminists love this guy, revealing their utter hypocrisy.

    • Tate June 12, 2018 at 10:29 am #

      He’s in hot water now over it. Couldn’t happen to a ‘nicer’ guy. rofl.

  40. janet June 12, 2018 at 1:19 am #

    “Strategically, [US/Canada] is the most important real estate in the world.” –Tate

    More American exceptionalism. Paraguay is sitting on the world’s largest supply of fresh water. It will be water that is king in the future, not oil.

    Support this blog on PatreonSupport this blog on Substack
    Support this blog via Patreon or Substack
    • BackRowHeckler June 12, 2018 at 1:27 am #

      Larger than the Great Lakes? The Mississippi River?

      brh

    • Tate June 12, 2018 at 10:31 am #

      What about Antarctica, janet? Towing icebergs would be just as feasible. Oh yeah, & we’re going to be mining asteroids, LOL.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 3:22 pm #

      What’s it called? The Gitchagoomi? Or Woebegone?

      Harada Roshi’s words are apropos, “For forty years I’ve been selling water by the riverside. By efforts are wholly without merit.”

      • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 4:12 pm #

        My not By by the bye

  41. janet June 12, 2018 at 1:22 am #

    “President Chump” –janos

    Trump would be nowhere if it weren’t for the Black people who decided it was worth saving his ass. Like Kanye West and Dennis Rodman.

  42. janet June 12, 2018 at 2:05 am #

    Trump said the document he and Kim signed was “very comprehensive.” He added that the process of denuclearization would begin very quickly. I can only hope the document specifies that denuclearization is to be mutual until neither the USA nor North Korea have any nuclear weapons… not even one.

  43. FincaInTheMountains June 12, 2018 at 2:13 am #

    The Chinese will inherit tomorrow. It wouldn’t surprise me if at some point they didn’t step into the increasing chaos in North America & take over. == Tate

    China for the Chinese is the Celestial Empire, and the rest of the world, including America, Japan and Russia, are barbarians on whom you can not voluntarily stretch the Celestial Empire for moral reasons. This would be just an outrage toward China as an idea, the greatest absurdity.

    The Great Wall of China was built in order not to allow the Chinese to flee, not to allow China’s expansion because every escaped Chinese takes with him a particle of China, which everyone can make sure of by visiting China-town of any American city.

    And in America, any most successful billionaire of Chinese descent wants to return to China. It’s just not so easy to do it if he, of course, wants to remain a billionaire.

    And if the Chinese begin to expand instead of improving the Celestial Empire, China will disintegrate and half the Chinese will simply die of moral torment and the general disorientation of the national organism, and not of atomic bombs and other weapons.

    Just as in the nineties, half of the thirty-year-old men of the USSR, who had lost the dream and a great planetary mission, who, instead of being happy for all mankind, effective managers by shock therapy forced to build the capitalism with a cannibal beast’s face, died of longing and hopelessness.

    • Tate June 12, 2018 at 11:07 am #

      Have to disagree, Finca. This is a timeworn meme, that China will not expand beyond its traditional borders, that it has no interest in any lands beyond its own. And exactly why is that? What supports that belief beyond historical circumstance? It can be safely surmised that indeed it will not expand into Korea — because the Korean people will prevent it; that it will not expand into Vietnam — because the Vietnamese will say no; that it will not take over Japan — because the Japanese won’t allow that. That it will not expand into Russia — for temporary strategic reasons, and for its less than clement climate; that it will not invade Taiwan — well that’s a maybe. But once it begins to understand that North America is up for grabs, then it will show interest.

      America, and particularly the Northeast part of the country stretching out through the Great Lakes and beyond into the farmlands of Iowa & Nebraska, the Ohio & Mississippi river systems, this is the most valuable temperate zone real estate in the world. Combine that with the strategic value of bestriding the two oceans facing east & west, offering traditionally a ‘fortress’ created by distance & assailable only by sea power, controlling by its military power the Panama canal (if not in name) which allows it to dictate the terms of trade between Atlantic & Pacific, it will become a tempting target to a great unified power like China once the US begins to splinter & disintegrate.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 2:09 pm #

        Yeah, look at them go in Africa. And they may well have designs on Australia and New Zealand as well. On the other hand, there is much dissent. I talked with a famous poster, “Chinese Nationalist Maiden” who utterly loathes the regime. She emphasized the diversity of the Chinese People, and she thought that it should be reflected in the political landscape: several Chinas at the very least. And that’s not even getting into the unassimilated minorities, though they are numerically small compared to the “Han”. But the ones in the East are Muslim and that spell trouble for the future if they were ever to split.

        • Tate June 12, 2018 at 10:03 pm #

          The Chinese would only pose a danger to America if America should fracture into warring factions over an extended period of time, but this is a likely possibility. Otherwise, as you suggest, China has its own enemies to worry about. The external threat to China has traditionally come from their north & west in central Asia. But that traditional historic threat from nomadic horsemen isn’t likely to reoccur, at least not until the fossil fuels run out. The Muslim reawakening is probably the greatest long-term danger to China on the Asian mainland.

          America would probably not be threatened ever again from the European powers as they find themselves with considerable problems of their own not unlike the threat facing America. I see China as the great power that will survive the coming instabilities.

  44. FincaInTheMountains June 12, 2018 at 7:40 am #

    Trump as a litmus paper

    One can easily derive from this that 57 percent of american jews are not jews. They are americans!

    Poll shows deep divisions between Israelis and American Jews

    https://www.yahoo.com/news/poll-shows-deep-divisions-between-israelis-american-jews-070458265.html

  45. FincaInTheMountains June 12, 2018 at 7:48 am #

    In the NOW is with Anissa Naouai.

    When it comes to real-talk on Syria, being the daughter of a warmonger does not make you an expert. Not even on women’s daytime TV.

    https://www.facebook.com/inthenow/videos/1006341726182863/

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  46. Chris at Fernglade Farm June 12, 2018 at 8:40 am #

    Hi Jim,

    I’m curious that the New York Times appears to be wasting their text on possible motivations, rather than reporting on actual news. It seems a bit weird to me because motivations can’t be known and endless speculation can be rather tiresome.

    Cheers

    Chris

  47. Dumbedup June 12, 2018 at 9:29 am #

    “You should have golf courses and hotels instead of missiles.”

    Make Trump Great Again.

  48. FincaInTheMountains June 12, 2018 at 9:59 am #

    End of the Korean War: it’s interesting who guarantees security to whom

    Kim Jong-un and Trump signed a declaration of intent, and Trump guarantees Kim Jong-un (and his country?) security. Now there will be no Trump, there will be no guarantees of Kim Jong-un, nor will there be nuclear disarmament to North Korea?!

    However, judge for yourself, the headlines located in the correct order explain everything

    1. Trump to Pence: so that none of my fucking helpers on the eve of the meeting with Kim Jong-un did not dare to make any fucking statements!!!

    https://www.yahoo.com/news/trump-told-mike-pence-not-165207052.html

    A month ago, Bolton immediately after the first summit was announced for the first time, said that Kim Jong-un was waiting for the Libyan solution, that is right after he will nuclear disarm, the United States will throw all the agreements in the trash and kill its partner in the negotiations, as it happened with Muammar Gaddafi.

    A few days later, Pence also made a similar statement, after which Kim Jong-un said that there would be no negotiations until the stupid Pence was removed from the talks. And rightly so – this can not be tolerated, but Trump pretended that he was offended for Pence and canceled the meeting, but resumed preparations for it the next day allegedly after he was begged by Kim Jong-un.

    2. Trump gears up for Kim Jong-Un meeting after bashing G7
    https://finance.yahoo.com/news/trump-gears-kim-jong-un-meeting-bashing-g7-124244840.html

    3. Donald Trump Says He Can Guarantee Kim Jong Un’s Survival. What Does That Mean?
    https://www.yahoo.com/news/donald-trump-says-guarantee-kim-215436396.html

    Well, first of all we are talking about security guarantees for North Korea, and not for Kim Jong-un, which is significant, as Whoopi Goldberg’s “peace doves” said that Trump can guarantee personal security to the North Korean dictator, but that he did not dare to guarantee security to the brutal regime.

    Secondly, the main thing that is being discussed is the end of the provocative maneuvers of South Korea and the United States and the Chinese peacekeepers on the 68th parallel line.

    I wonder what would Whoopi Goldberg, our dove of peace, say if the peacekeepers turn out to be Russians and they will be armed with S-500?

    4. Russia Is Quietly Playing Three Roles in the Korean Drama: behind-the-scenes negotiator, spoiler, and unholy ally.
    https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2018/06/russia-quietly-playing-three-roles-us-north-korea-drama/148895/

    which, put together, makes Russia the central figure in the negotiations. Vile because it uses “chemical weapons” in Syria and in England.

  49. volodya June 12, 2018 at 10:44 am #

    They used to say with respect to the scientific realm that progress comes one funeral at a time. I think that it applies to geo-politics too.

    You read that Trump handed China a huge victory by committing to an end to joint US-ROK war games, that this is what China has wanted for a long time. But as along as US forces remain in place it’s not a victory.

    I would frame the issue in reference to American interests, a small step towards getting out of a place that US forces don’t need to be, a place that drains scarce American resources. Getting out of South Korea would be a huge victory for the US, in which case American interests and Chinese wants are in alignment.

    But these things only come as old players exit the scene ie retirement and death. They’re straight-jacketed in their thinking because they have neither the intellect nor strength of character to do otherwise. It’s really too bad that they don’t have the flexibility of mind to consider aspects of a situation they may not have looked at before, and have neither perceptual faculties to accurately assess a situation nor the creativity to come up with their own ideas.

    They cannot conceive of what the area might look like without American forces acting as a de-facto buffer between China and North Korea and South Korea. Or maybe they REFUSE to consider it. Maybe for a government bureaucrat it would be career limiting, maybe likewise for an academic.

    What would happen without the US there? IMO, China and Korea would be at one another’s throats, the shot-callers in Beijing mightily pissing-off those in Pyongyang who figure they deserve a place in the sun.

    The weenies in South Korea would either stop shitting their pants and start behaving like men, or they fall under the sway of Beijing or Pyongyang. Either way it’s up to the South Koreans, not the US. What the folk in Beijing, Pyongyang and Seoul work out among themselves is of zero concern to Americans.

    The Chinese victory was in another area, getting US industrial might on Chinese soil and getting it under the fist of the Chinese political regime and military and police. That’s pretty much done now, leaving the US a spavined version of its former self.

    • FincaInTheMountains June 12, 2018 at 1:06 pm #

      Would be funny to look back at your post when the Chinese peacekeepers in Korea will be replaced by the Russians armed with latest air-defense systems.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 2:12 pm #

      How few recognized what we did to ourselves! Some of the Japanese will mourn our passing in their cold Oriental Way. But the Chinese? Not one!

      • volodya June 12, 2018 at 2:19 pm #

        Arguably the reason for the Trump presidency is that a LOT of people recognized it. Millions in fact.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 4:10 pm #

          True, in a general sense. But the betrayal of our workers and industrial base to China is simply epic. Many Trump voters may not understand how much so.

  50. wm5135 June 12, 2018 at 11:45 am #

    “because they have neither the intellect nor strength of character to do otherwise”

    “Or maybe they REFUSE to consider it. Maybe for a government bureaucrat it would be career limiting, maybe likewise for an academic.”
    volodya

    Keen eye sir. The American in Chief has pulled back the curtain and to a large extent NO One wants to pay attention to the man, the truth about humanity’s precarious situation, behind the curtain.

    The truth will set you free, free to face the uncertainty that is life. Looks to me like most of our fellows would rather kiss a fat lady’s ass than have any association with reality.

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    • volodya June 12, 2018 at 1:45 pm #

      The truth is non-negotiable, it’s something that you deal with or it deals with you.

      The Niander Wallace character in Bladerunner 2049 said something to the effect that no amount of courage ever changed a fact. Meaning that facts (ie reality) are stubborn things. Better to acknowledge what’s behind the curtain and act on it.

  51. FincaInTheMountains June 12, 2018 at 1:04 pm #

    Trump is Red, and acts in the interests of the US labor class, which includes part of the real sector bourgeoisie and even a part of the financial sector. For them, the collapse of North Korea after nuclear disarmament, like the death of Gadaffi and the collapse of the USSR, would be a geopolitical catastrophe 2.0, since it will lead to a new triumph of the Black Project.

    Therefore, Trump and Kim Jong-un, with the mediation of Putin, have agreed on everything LONG TIME AGO, and now are thinking about how to present the results of these talks either immediately before the midterm elections in the US or immediately after them, since it is in the elections that the winner of the World Civil War will be determined.

    Please see the link below as to why the midterm elections in the United States became the main point of application of geopolitical and meta-historical forces.

    http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/the-summer-of-discontent/#comment-356009

  52. Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 3:19 pm #

    “Listen, you queer, stop calling me a crypto-Nazi or I’ll sock you in your goddamn face and you’ll stay plastered”.

    William F Buckley to Gore Vidal. I greatly prefer Vidal, at least the later Vidal in his battle against the Neo-Cons. Buckley contrast, succumbed completely, becoming a mockery of his earlier self. But at least he said this great line and a few others.

    • Billy Hill June 12, 2018 at 4:37 pm #

      One of the regrets of my life is failing to have produced Buckley intoning Wild Thing, by the Troggs.

      Wild Thing, I think I love you…
      But I want to know for sure.
      C’mon, hold me tight…
      Chiliastic!

      Indeed, I witnessed the Vidal-Buckley exchange. Those were the days.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 5:15 pm #

        I can almost hear it. That snobby almost queer lisp where sophistication merges imperceptibly into decadence and then – mercifully – back into barbarism. You have a Rabelaisian wit.

        The hob nailed boot that became silk slippers become for a time the bare foot and the moccasin before becoming again the hob nailed boots that stomps up the stairs and down on human faces.

        Can we got off this “merry” go round? No. We are a fallen species. Only by transcendence. Otherwise, we’ll keep going up and down.

    • Sean Coleman June 13, 2018 at 10:53 am #

      I liked Vidal too, for all his faults.

      Two things have remained in my memory.

      American encouragement (probably arrangement) of a military coup in Honduras or Guatemala in the early 50s to secure the interests of a US fruit corporation there, when the scales fell from his eyes: [from memory] “I knew the Senator. He was a friend of the family.”

      Secondly, his essay Mickey Mouse, Historian, about his dispute with the (Disney-owned?) television History Channel. He made a series for it and they didn’t like his references to an American ’empire’. Can’t remember the argument but it made me laugh.

  53. baroto June 12, 2018 at 3:43 pm #

    A deal was made in advance, the meeting was for show, hence China and Russia are not running interference. Denuclearization first then United Korea. This is one of the most historic moments in modern times and y’all missed it. Next the Iranian people will be free.

  54. Tate June 12, 2018 at 5:07 pm #

    Here’s a link to a study that says that average IQ among Norwegians has been declining about 7 pts per generation. That’s some serious intellectual degradation. They claim the causes are not eating enough fish! I’m not kidding, that’s what they are suggesting is one of the causes, along with lifestyle changes such as playing too many video games.

    https://medicalxpress.com/news/2018-06-iq-scores-1970s.html

    They don’t consider Richard Lynn’s dysgenic hypothesis. That the changes are due to genetic causes, such as the immigration of foreign ‘brainiacs’, as well as the fact that the stupidest are encouraged to breed and the smartest are discouraged.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 5:20 pm #

      Seven points per generation is huge. And that was even Before the invasion? Dysgenics indeed.

      I’ve always heard fish was a brain food….

      • K-Dog June 12, 2018 at 7:38 pm #

        I’m sure you have another explanation.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 10:56 pm #

          You must like fish then.

  55. Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 5:40 pm #

    Much credit is due to Mr Trump for not forgetting about Otto Warmbier and his family in his moment of triumph. The savages pulled out all his teeth and then put them all back in wrong. This was the least of their tortures. He came back to America almost a zombie or animal, mindless but howling in pain.

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  56. wm5135 June 12, 2018 at 6:43 pm #

    Who is profiting from this total disarray of humanity? I cannot see how the history that we know and the evidence that biology provides us can make the current course of events profitable to any group in the long run.

    Are we truly so myopic as a species that the goose and the golden egg nursery rhyme is the the true course of our lot?

    Throw me a bone, I would have your thoughts.
    wm

    when I moved to the area that is now my home a country band at a converted movie theater on Friday and Saturday night and wrasslin on Tuesday night were the cultural events. Having moved from one of the cultural centers of the southeast I was perplexed by the arrogance of the local populace, I was eleven years of age. Not much has changed.

    • BackRowHeckler June 12, 2018 at 8:25 pm #

      wm5135, humanity has always been in disarray.

      In the 20th century several desperate attempts were made to impose rigidity and order on humanity — in Russia and Germany — but the results weren’t the best, if you know what I mean.

      I think what you describe in your last paragraph is called provincialism, which Sinclair Lewis mined to the limit in his early 20th century novels. i will admit tho the entropic disorder besieging the world right now does at times seem overwhelming, and the main event hasn’t even begun yet. What this main event might be I don’t know, some Black Swan so far not on the radar.

      brh

    • Tate June 12, 2018 at 8:54 pm #

      There are always three hostile groups that profit and/or benefit from the subversion & dissolution of a culture. Tell me if I’ve got this right.

      1. the Unassimilable Ethnics

      2. the Sexual Deviants

      3. the Privileged Misfits, not otherwise classified

      At first, the efforts of these hostiles are so subtle that hardly anyone notices. They work through surreptitious means, as they must. At some point, they recognize one another as natural allies. They then begin to work through what is now called ‘intersectional’ means to consciously & deliberately bring down the society they inhabit. The three groups together are what we commonly know as the ‘Left.’

      They have advantages that the dominant majority culture does not possess. The Unassimilable Ethnics are often much more ethnocentric than the dominant culture. Their morals are particularistic, not universal, thus favoring themselves in business & hiring practices. The Sexual Deviants, not being constrained by the burdens & expense of child-rearing, are able to devote considerable time & resources to further their own egoistic interests. The Privileged Misfits, being born with silver spoons in their mouths, and fueled by resentment, have all the advantages that accrue to the circumstance of their birth. They are motivated primarily by propaganda-indued guilt to ally themselves with the two former groups.

      At the advanced stage of the process in which we now find ourselves, even normal people who don’t easily fit into any of these categories are infected by the injurious ideas that have ravaged the moral fiber of the culture, and its doom is a foregone conclusion.

      • BackRowHeckler June 12, 2018 at 9:24 pm #

        True enough.

        i’d like to add to the list Hollywood Scum, and tenured academics and professors with their heads up their asses. (altho these could be classified as Privileged Misfits)

        Both these groups appear to be working day and night to bring the Republic to its knees.

        brh

      • Janos Skorenzy June 12, 2018 at 10:54 pm #

        In his book “The Dispossessed Majority”, Wilmot Robertson distinguished between the Elite who believed in this rubbish, and those merely using it for gain. Eleanor Roosevelt was the former, the Clintons the latter. And I would add that the Super Elite are using this as a Master Plan for world conquest by throwing down the West. Robertson’s fine book doesn’t get into that.

      • Dumbedup June 13, 2018 at 9:55 am #

        These groups may profit from a culture in decline but they don’t cause it as you have implied. We’ve had ethnic enclaves, deviants and misfits in the US since the beginning. It is more likely that we have done a poor job with how we respond to conflicting social forces. For example, we pay lip service to the rule of law but we do not follow it. Justice in the USA is determined by class and culture as often as by the facts. The powerful can get away with financial crimes and a President can lie under oath and never suffer the consequences. Our prisons are occupied by the poor, the mentally ill and minorities. We have allowed our health care system to degenerate simply because the medical industry has deep pockets. We protect corporate rights of free speech and religion but turn our backs on individual rights.

        The degradation of our society is complicated but it comes down to this: will we allow tribalism (“us and them”) to be more important than our shared humanity?

        • Tate June 13, 2018 at 12:22 pm #

          “We’ve had ethnic enclaves, deviants and misfits in the US since the beginning.”

          Yes, we have. And it has happened temporally just as Hemingway described of bankruptcy in The Sun Also Rises (“Gradually & then suddenly”) except on a national instead of a personal timescale.

          “The degradation of our society is complicated…”

          Nope, not all that complicated. It has happened functionally just as I described. You have submitted merely a hodgepodge of deflective bromides to avoid addressing my thesis. Open your eyes, my friend.

          • Tate June 13, 2018 at 12:24 pm #

            Nope, not all that complicated. It has happened functionally just as I described. You have submitted merely a hodgepodge of deflective bromides to avoid addressing my thesis. Open your eyes, my friend. [no italics]

    • Sean Coleman June 13, 2018 at 11:08 am #

      “Who is profiting from this total disarray of humanity? I cannot see how the history that we know and the evidence that biology provides us can make the current course of events profitable to any group in the long run.”

      In my view nobody is profiting.Various explanations, with varying degrees of plausibility, are offered, the most popular of which is ‘Follow the money’, but it is just insanity. To be more precise, it is a huge fantasy.

      Talking of the latter, I watched a short video the other night of London’s Carnaby Street in 1967 (when the Dream had found focus).This was the psychedelic craze, following the Beatles’ Sergeant Pepper, showing crowds of young people, all in the latest fashions. Anyway, one commenter, while bewailing the lack of diversity (all those shown were English by the look of it, and at a guess most of them born in London, and the city was as I remember it), came out with this beauty: “We should remember that it is to these people we owe our present liberties, such as they are.”

      Well it made ME laugh.

      • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:04 pm #

        That’s what passes for intellectual discourse today. Very shallow. I’ll admit I’m no intellectual heavyweight but when even ordinary people like I am can see through the flummery, things are in bad shape. Let’s be thankful we have the Internet (for the short time we’ll probably have it.) I know mostly it’s used for porn, but still there are pockets & back-eddies of serious content.

  57. BackRowHeckler June 12, 2018 at 9:48 pm #

    Each time an elitist NYC dooshbag like DeNiro shouts “F-ck Trump” to his echo chamber award ceremony audience and gets a standing O for his efforts, its at least 100,000 votes for our side in the next election. So Hiollywood Scum, keep it coming. Springsteen was up on stage with him; only one missing was this aging skank who blasphemously calls herself The Mdannna. Ever heard of her?

    brh

  58. janet June 12, 2018 at 10:37 pm #

    Finca, the great deal maker said he was not going to give North Korea anything unless they agreed to verifiable denuclearization.

    Then the great deal maker got orders from the head of one of the countries that borders on North Korea. This country protested every year about the joint military exercises conducted by USA and South Korea. This country that borders on North Korea is led by Putin.

    Putin wanted the joint military exercises to stop. So what did Trump do for his puppet master? Trump cancelled, unilaterally, without consulting anyone, the joint military exercises. Putin is happy. But Trump is revealed to be a crappy deal maker. North Korea did not have to give up anything in return. Trump just gave away the store.

    • BackRowHeckler June 12, 2018 at 11:16 pm #

      Maybe. But did NKorea get $150 billion in cash, flown in on American Carge planes? Iran did. And some of the swag turned up a few weeks ago on the dead bodies of Palestinians paid in 100 dollar bills to storm the Israel border.

      brh

      • janet June 13, 2018 at 7:12 am #

        Since 1992 North Korea has been “promising” to denuclearize. Of course, Trump does not read or listen to intelligence briefings so he just went into it on his “feelings.” Trump came out singing the praises of Kim.

        Kim runs a regime in which if you get caught with a radio that has a dial, not only do you go to the gulag, three generations of your family go to the gulag. Not that Trump cares. He has good “feelings” about Kim.

        South Korea may feel betrayed by Trump innocently accepting the North Koreans at their word, trusting without verifying, but Trump got his pound of publicity and that is what he really cares about.

    • Q. Shtik June 13, 2018 at 11:10 am #

      Trump cancelled, unilaterally, without consulting anyone, the joint military exercises. Putin is happy. But Trump is revealed to be a crappy deal maker. North Korea did not have to give up anything in return. Trump just gave away the store. – janet

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

      Being the pacifist that you are, why are you not happy about the cancellation of these military exercises? Inconsistency is thy middle name.

      • janet June 14, 2018 at 3:05 pm #

        You must have me confused with someone else, Q.

        A pacifist cannot even vote for the COMMANDER IN CHIEF OF THE ARMED FORCES dedicated to destroying property with bombs and murdering human beings. Not killing, murdering.

        A pacifist would not vote for anyone, man or woman, to be president… who is COMMANDER IN CHIEF OF THE ARMED FORCES.

        • Q. Shtik June 14, 2018 at 5:36 pm #

          Cut the bullshit, Asoka.

  59. KesaAnna June 13, 2018 at 2:02 am #

    ” just as the “Court Scientists” of the Church wouldn’t look thru Galileo’s telescope. ”

    Basically the reason Galileo was looking through telescopes and writing books , instead of digging ditches , was because he was on the Pope’s payroll.

    It was the Vatican Press that published his books.

    the issue of his trial was not astronomy , the issue was , was he a loyal son of the Church , or an agent provocateur ?

    A great many people saying his trial was about astronomy is neither here nor there , because you can look up what it was about , and those great many people are full of shit.

    ” Do you never wonder, Janos…

    What…Would… Jesus… Say? ”

    Umm , I give up , why would he wonder ?

    Like yourself , he invokes Jesus Christ when and where and how it suits him , otherwise , like yourself , he goes to some pains to disavow Jesus Christ.

    • GreenAlba June 13, 2018 at 6:53 am #

      I invoke Christ in this particular situation because JANOS claims to follow him. I’d have thought that was completely obvious.

      Hypotheticals. If I were still a believer in Christ, that’s what I’d be asking myself. I’m not a believer in Christ any more (never say never again, as they say – none of us knows what life will bring – ask A.N. Wilson).

      But for the moment, I expect believers in Christ to act and talk as if they believed, which is what I did when I believed. In many cases I act more as if I believed than some of them do.

      • GreenAlba June 13, 2018 at 7:23 am #

        And that you ‘give up’ is neither here not there, since I wasn’t challenging you. The question was addressed to Janos, the one who agrees it’s a very happy accident for the Chinese pedigree that so many Chinese parents didn’t value their little girls enough not to kill them.

        Although he seems, like the dozy eugenicist he quotes, to be unaware of the actual consequences, in real life, rather than in an algorithm, of what happens when very large numbers of men are deprived of any chance of having a mate.

        And I asked Janos, because he tells us, interminably, that his life is based on his religious beliefs. I don’t take it upon myself to ask Janos to justify his belief in Christ. I just ask for a little internal consistency.

        • Janos Skorenzy June 13, 2018 at 6:05 pm #

          The self of Spirit and the self of matter cannot exactly meet. It’s like trying to square the circle, or exactly define Pi. One can only approximate or do the best one can. If you think they can meet, I don’t think you know much about Life, either spiritual or material. St Paul said the things of the Spirit are foolishness to the materially minded. And the things of the world are the same to the spiritually minded. Possible Resolution? Not completely, not in this world at least.

          You Jesus is just a bearded faggot. Obviously the West would have fallen centuries ago if we followed what you believe Christianity to be – which is your only interest in Jesus anyway – using his teaching to demoralize and pacify natural, healthy male aggression. Obviously you don’t care to apply Christianity to abortion for example.

          Ditto most of the Sufis by the way. The most popular poet in the world, Rumi, was an orthodox Muslim who believed in the Jihad or conquering in the name of Islam.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 7:58 am #

            ” Obviously you don’t care to apply Christianity to abortion for example.”

            Do show me all my utterances on these threads regarding abortion, with or without its relationship to Christianity. Thanks.

            The fact remains that *you* are the one who opposes abortion, yet thinks the killing of actual living children leads to something called greater ‘civilisation’.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 4:13 pm #

            “You(r) Jesus is just a bearded faggot. ”

            I almost wish I could believe he exists, so that I could imagine the two of you having THAT conversation.

            https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t_q0phyM3rk

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 8:03 pm #

            Do show me all my utterances on these threads regarding abortion, with or without its relationship to Christianity. Thanks.

            Here’s one, located above.

            GreenAlba
            June 14, 2018 at 12:35 pm #

            “I can’t imagine, for instance, how a woman already struggling in a desperately poor family would feel if she found herself unintentionally pregnant again, perhaps with a husband who wasn’t going to be entirely sympathetic or to whose already heavy burdens she didn’t want to add… And I think politicians, especially male ones, should keep their noses out of women’s and families’ personal decisions.”

            I don’t know, GA, it sounds to me like that’s extending very broad license to abortion-on-demand, although you artfully couch it in sympathetic terms.

          • GreenAlba June 15, 2018 at 10:28 am #

            Tate

            “Here’s one, located above.”

            But chronologically later, you’ll notice 🙂 .

      • GreenAlba June 13, 2018 at 7:57 am #

        “Like yourself , he invokes Jesus Christ when and where and how it suits him ”

        If you check back, not that I’m suggesting you’d bother, I would hope you’d find that most other times I’ve invoked Christ (in a challenge-y way), it’s been to a person who claims to believe in him. Otherwise it would make no sense.

        Although occasionally I may have quoted something for what you might call ‘poetic’ reasons. There are insights (Truths with a capital ‘T’ as Janos would say) to be found even in accounts that aren’t literally true, that being why they were written in the first place. English is a metaphorical language.

        • GreenAlba June 13, 2018 at 8:54 am #

          “English is a metaphorical language.”

          I presume Hebrew, Greek or Aramaic are too, but I don’t know any of them, so I have to rely on ‘invocations’ at several removes.

      • PeteAtomic June 13, 2018 at 6:28 pm #

        “But for the moment, I expect believers in Christ to act and talk as if they believed, which is what I did when I believed. In many cases I act more as if I believed than some of them do.”

        well, noble pagans like yourself go to Heaven, so 🙂

        you’re covered.

        I’m hoping for Purgatory, myself.

        • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 8:02 am #

          Purgatory sounds too like detox 🙂 .

          And don’t get me started on Limbo (I only learned about that from reading some of the less demanding James Joyce at school, aged 16, and, even at that age, it brought out an early ‘WTF?’, except that I was unfamiliar with such language.

          Sadly, I am neither noble nor pagan. Just agnostic and struggling, like most of the rest of humanity.

          • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 1:17 pm #

            Except your righteousness exceedeth the righteousness of the Pharisees you will in nowise enter into the Kingdom of Heaven.

            I believe most of the Chinese killing of little girls is via abortion now days, once the sex is identified. Nice try though.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 2:23 pm #

            Well that would be something the Chinese would need to take responsibility for, Janos, not me.

            And I’m not aiming at the ‘Kingdom of Heaven’ – that would be you. I’ll settle for doing as little harm as possible while I’m here.

          • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 5:43 pm #

            So by the same coin, where do you get off blaming me for their evil deeds? I merely stated that their brutality actually serves them, whereas ours is merely personal and selfish. I’ve never heard of a liberal making a distinction between the aborting of a healthy baby and one that was defective. The criterion is merely the convenience of the mothers. And that is no principle worthy of the name.

          • GreenAlba June 15, 2018 at 10:37 am #

            Janos

            I didn’t blame you for their evil deeds, but for not finding them worthy of condemnation. You did not in any way condemn the killing of the little girls, yet you went on endlessly, hysterically, disingenuously and with deliberate dishonesty about the NHS ‘killing little Alfie’, when they had done no such thing (I only wish you’d published that accusation in a newspaper so that you could have been justifiably pursued through the courts for libel).

            And you specifically suggested that the process started by the killing of the little girls would lead to greater ‘civilisation’. Again, I repeat that we have differing ideas on what constitutes ‘civilisation’.

            I believe there’s a chapter in the book ‘Freakonomics’ which points out that the rise in abortions in the US corresponded with a reduction in crime rates, the implication being that without it more children would have been born to deprived and/or dysfunctional families, with a corresponding effect on crime rates resulting from those hypothetical children.

            That would seem to fit your criterion of a ‘useful’ outcome of something that might not be desirable in itself. So does it?

  60. KesaAnna June 13, 2018 at 2:05 am #

    ” Each time an elitist NYC dooshbag like DeNiro shouts “F-ck Trump” to his echo chamber award ceremony audience and gets a standing O for his efforts, its at least 100,000 votes for our side in the next election. ”

    Correct .

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  61. KesaAnna June 13, 2018 at 4:54 am #

    ” The reality may be that the sexual abuses by the Roman Catholic clergy are massively overblown. Let’s assume that they are overblown.”

    They are grossly , fantastically overblown.

    But , hey , for funnsies , let’s assume that they are not overblown.

    Your own secular society abounds no less in sexual abuses.

    And to such a degree that in any comparison religion comes off looking the better , not the worse.

    Take porn for example.

    for religion , we have the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel and all those nudie pagan statues we preserved . ( despite our presumably being so bigoted )

    For the secular world , porn is a billion dollar industry , easily accessed by any ten year old with internet access.

    ” But, as you said, most everyone believes that the abuses are real and widespread. ”

    I can’t say where Sean Coleman has , or has not , been hanging out.

    Otherwise , this characterization , ” most everyone believes ” , is odd to the degree of the bizarre.

    ” Most everyone” who has never set foot in a Catholic Church ?

    ” Most everyone ” who last set foot in a Catholic Church ten years ago , twenty years ago , thirty years ago , and say in so many words that they dislike or even hate it ?

    It’s like if you said , ” Most everyone believes that the United States sucks. ”

    And your ” everyone ” consisted of –

    — people who have never set foot in the United states.

    — People whom you already know , or should know , have an axe to grind against the United States.

    But now it gets really curious ;

    ” … how can it possibly be that the Roman Catholic Church is still up and running? It’s inconceivable that it be allowed to stay in business. Yet, it’s still in business. ”

    It’s inconceivable that a voluntary association at least no more , and arguably far less , abusive than many associations which are not voluntary , should persist and endure ?

    WTF ?

    • Sean Coleman June 13, 2018 at 10:21 am #

      KesaAnna

      “I can’t say where Sean Coleman has , or has not , been hanging out.”

      It is Volodya you are quoting here not me. I assume you know this already but there is no harm in clarifying. Volodya’s point is reasonable: if the Church is believed by so many to have committed such crimes then how come it has not been closed down?

      Where I hang out: Killarney, Ireland.

      I, like yourself, consider the vast, vast majority of the accusations to be lies and fantasy. The best sources I have found for information are:

      Ireland: Irish Salem (Rory Conor) – separate website and blog. Deals almost exclusively with the witch hunt against the Catholic Church. He has not updated his website in years to include more recent stories, such as the ridiculous Tuam Babies scandal (“the wicked nuns dumped their little bodies in a septic tank!”), while he blogs only infrequently.

      Britain and world: the late Richard Webster’s Sceptical Essays website, which is maintained by friends and family, I believe. Deals more with the witch hunt against workers in children’s homes but includes other witch hunts. Also looked into Freud, Lacan and other figures.

      There are also Moor Larkin and Rabbitaway’s blogs about the Jimmy Savile nonsense.

      Independent journalist Alexander Baron, based in South London, has investigated the stories against Bill Cosby, Rolf Harris and other fairy tales.

      Can I ask you how you reached the conclusion that the attacks on the Church are a witch hunt? As I said in my earlier post to Volodya most people where I am assume that, even if there is bound to be exaggeration, there is some truth to them. (There is very little truth in them.) Is it innate scepticism or is there another reason? I am just interested in knowing.

  62. wm5135 June 13, 2018 at 9:44 am #

    Perhaps it is necessary to deny mysticism to engage in the debate about the Roman Catholic Church as it is normally framed. There are two churches that are conflated. The first is the community of faith that is the target of the second, the corporate hierarchy.

    I do not believe that a true case can be made against the contributions of the faithful to their families, communities and humanity itself. When the insights of the mystics of the faith are considered and compared to the experience of the written history of all mystics the Christian path can hold it’s own.

    Want your children to get a good education in the Uniteds States? Send them to a Roman Catholic school. Discipline and responsibility are still at the core of the programs.

    I do not trash the troops of the US Armed Forces, I do not hesitate to condemn the Congress, the Exective Branch and it’s chiefs of staff.

    The hierarchy of the Roman Catholic Church is abusive. The discrimination along financial lines is apparent to anyone who has been a member. Mental and emotional abuse of the children of families unable to meet their tythe has been a tested and proven method of extracting what is desired. It is unjust to denigrate those who live their faith and who contribute the welfare of humanity by tempering their desire and being themselves a charitable contribution simply because of the organization that claims their membership.

    Hell was created for corrupt clergy. The Roman Church, the hierarchy, has just had more practice than most. My only hope is not to be in that particular circle of Hell. Sprinkled or duncked, once saved always saved the only sin not forgiven is a sin against the Spirit. Mental and emotional abuse of a child meets that criteria in my view. Physical and sexual abuse added on just moves the tormentor into a deeper circle.

    Power corrupts – those in the clergy seldom understand or accept a vow of poverty and vocation. Men of men, not men of God.

    • Dumbedup June 13, 2018 at 10:12 am #

      All structures and organizations that are created by men are abusive and corrupt. They are tainted with the same sins as individuals. That is why men instituted governments with rules and laws. It is why nuns rap the knuckles of the freckle-faced 10 year looking up the dress of the little girl across the room. But somehow, in the modern age, we have adopted Randian objectivism. A Russian immigrant taught us that profit is the highest moral good and that corporate actors are constrained in the behavior by the market for ideas and for goods.

      We have ebbed and flowed from permissiveness to Puritanism over long cycles for hundreds of years. Can we beat the evil out of our children and make a better society? If we beat them too much have we abused them and made them worse?

      The Christian way is to follow the example of Jesus. (I have a hard time with Paul) Jesus would say, “You are forgiven. Now go, and sin no more.”

      • Walter B June 13, 2018 at 8:29 pm #

        Yes it is Dumbedup, our mission is to follow and then lead by our example which is the most difficult part. It is one of the reasons that I try to avoid these “bottom of the blog” conversations for they always get far too personal, too ugly, and frankly not too useful. It is hard to keep in control. Your comment, however was noteworthy and of great value and I thank you for saying it!

        • Dumbedup June 14, 2018 at 9:12 am #

          Thank you for your reply.

          Yes, the conversations degenerate this far down the blog comment section.

          We cannot pull ourselves up by our own bootstraps. For that we need the Savior Jesus Christ.

  63. FincaInTheMountains June 13, 2018 at 10:39 am #

    Trump’s foreign policy is very clear, understandable and rational – it gets rid of the excessive US imperial infrastructure, thereby trying not to repeat the failed Soviet experience of “Perestroika”, as a result of which a similar disposal of the imperial infrastructure of the USSR went according to one of the most disastrous scenarios of the collapse of the Empire and its provinces.

    According to Trump’s clear logic, all the contracts imposed by the world’s “democratic lobby” for feeding geopolitical midgets for the sake of maintaining its supposedly imperial status, and in fact sucking out juices from the country, just like supporting African regimes for the USSR, will be torn, whatever it costs.

    All these protectionist measures will survive President Trump, they are here for a long time, if not forever. The flood of “trade restrictions” and other sanctions will only grow.

    No matter how much “advanced economists” laugh at the strategy of import substitution, in the US it is also already launched and is in full swing.

    This program is called Buy American and Hire American and approved in the spring of 2017. Its purpose is to return to the United States those industries and jobs that left the country in the era of globalization since the distant 1970s and 1980s.

  64. volodya June 13, 2018 at 11:27 am #

    Kesa Ana, this is only a rough analogy but Weinstein’s company went belly-up not least because of a torrent of abuse allegations by grown women who had the benefit of grown-up common sense and judgement (at least presumably) when they accepted invitations to ole’ Harv’s hotel suites. Now, it wasn’t really a secret in the entertainment biz what Harvey was all about. Yet women still accepted his invites and they still went to work for him. Yes, the company was in debt and yes, it had been financial issues in prior years. But Harvey’s troubles, IMO, put a spike in it.

    Now, I’m just a simple country boy, and I’m not well versed in the looser ways of the city let alone the sophisticated mores of Hollywood. But even I would be awful suspicious when the meeting isn’t in a company office, but rather in a rented hotel suite, and the dude in question is sitting around in a bath-robe.

    But in the case of the Roman Catholic Church the abuse allegations by-and-large involved minors, not grown adults, and we aren’t talking about a pit of scum and villainy like Hollywood, but rather an organization that’s supposed to be the civilizational bulwark AGAINST scum and villainy, that is, a society all about behavioral restraints.

    Now, the charges against Weinstein have yet to be tried in court, but that didn’t prevent the disemboweling of his company. As you say about voluntary associations, nobody was OBLIGED to do business with Weinstein’s firm, nobody was obliged to rescue it, and so down the shitter it went.

    But there were many court cases that went to trial and resulted in convictions of Roman Catholic clergy. Not just a few but many. Not just in one place but in different countries. Given this circumstance I find it amazing that an organization that apparently harbored not just one or two pedophiles is still around. As you say the association is voluntary and it’s not like the RC Church is the only game in town.

    It’s not only that people still voluntarily set foot in RC Churches. If there’s any faith in the judicial system to suss out the truth, and if the established truth is the guilt of so many priests in diddling kids, then how is it possible that law-makers, who after all are there to ensure public safety and security, haven’t taken action to dismember the organization like they would the Sicilian mob? By an act of law ban the fucking thing IOW, close the churches and shut down all its offices. If such a ban results in court challenges on the basis of freedom of religion, well, then go to court. But taking action against religious associations has been done before, as in the Branch Davidians in Waco.

    Now, it could be that all the allegations and convictions are bogus, that all of this is the result of a mass witch-hunting hysteria. After all we’ve seen this movie before. But if a lot of folk believe otherwise, and if they believe in the magnitude of the harm done to so many kids, and if church membership is voluntary, and if law-makers are there to protect society, then the question is a simple one, why is the Roman Catholic Church still around? As you so aptly put it, WTF?

    • Sean Coleman June 13, 2018 at 4:29 pm #

      Volodya

      I hope you don’t mind me making a couple of points here.

      “But in the case of the Roman Catholic Church the abuse allegations by-and-large involved minors, not grown adults, and we aren’t talking about a pit of scum and villainy like Hollywood, but rather an organization that’s supposed to be the civilizational bulwark AGAINST scum and villainy, that is, a society all about behavioral restraints.”

      Most of the cases I have seen were taken by adults claiming that they had been abused as children, adults I wouldn’t trust to tell me the time of day. In the Fr Paul Shanley case which started off the Boston witch hunt the allegations were made by grown-up young men who said they were abused by as young children. If you look into it most of the charges were dropped at the last minute because they did not stand up. They were based on recovered memories. Just think about it. One of them heard from his girlfriend that his old schoolmate was going to court and he could not get out quick enough from the airbase he was stationed in to get into the action. Another had his epiphany on the plane to Las Vegas for a spot of gambling. The payouts were reported as 500k.

      The many trials and convictions. This happens in witch hunts. If people looked into them in any detail whatsoever this would become clear very quickly (but they never do – why?). The late Richard Webster wrote a comprehensive analysis of the North Wales ‘children’s’ homes abuse scandal, got to the bottom of the lies and deceit, looked at how the law had been weakened to accommodate similar case testimony (the banning of which had been a real achievement in the previous century) and proposed sensible actions to prevent repetition. He told at one point of a home worker who had been acquitted of physical abuse of the teenagers in his care. Down the pub afterwards one of the jurors told him that if had been sexual rather than physical abuse they would have convicted him. Can you make any sense of that?

      One of the best cases to illustrate this is the Shieldfield case which Webster describes on his Sceptical Essays website. Two nursery workers in Newcastle were taken to court by Newcastle City Council for the most disgusting abuse claims. The judge looked at the paperwork and threw it out before it got to trial. The Council only went and carried out their own investigation which found that they did do these crimes after all. A doctor, psychologist, social workers and a university professor of sociology (a Prof. Barker I think) got together and agreed that this had happened. The pair went into hiding for their lives. Eventually they took a case against the Council and cleared their names. The doctor admitted that she had not after all seen the evidence of sexual abuse which she had reported earlier. And so on and so on. This is what happens in witch hunts.

      It is an hysterical and emotional state that robs responsible people of their judgment. It is extremely dangerous, yet nobody but a tiny handful ever looks into it. Why?

      Webster argued constantly that the present generation is in more danger from witch hunts than any one for the simple reason that people think they are rational and above all this. The are not rational, they are if anything insane.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 11:54 pm #

        I’m from Boston and there were many allegations against many priests. Do you think the Church shelled out tens of millions for nothing? Or that fake victims killed themselves for just fantasy? That would be like thinking that the martyrs were just fooling around and didn’t really believe in what they died for – which is what Akmo thinks.

        Now multiply Boston times a hundred all over America and the world and you’ll begin to have an inkling of the situation.

        • Sean Coleman June 15, 2018 at 12:49 pm #

          Janos

          You still do not understand.

          That the Church paid out means nothing. They were made to pay out. They paid out in Ireland and most Catholics believe the story. As I said above, many of them might think it is exaggerated but they still believe there is a lot of substance. There is very little substance when you examine it.

          The ‘numbers’ are meaningless in a witch hunt. Everyone points to the numbers. They are so high they can’t all be wrong. Well, they can and always are.

          “Or that fake victims killed themselves for just fantasy? That would be like thinking that the martyrs were just fooling around and didn’t really believe in what they died for – which is what Akmo thinks.”

          Who killed themselves? How many? Have you got any names that can be checked? In the Savile case everyone knows that ‘thousands’ of accusations were made, but when you count them I think there are less than two hundred. After all that hysteria and publicity? Only that much? (In the same way everyone knows that 97% of scientists believe in AGW; when you actually look at that statistic you find out it is much smaller.) So you need to get down to specific allegations, and then it gets interesting.

          I recall (I think) that one of the accusers in the Bryn Estyn ‘children’s’ home scare (I use inverted commas because they were teenagers when the abuse was alleged to have occurred, and adults of course when the allegations were made) committed suicide. Many of these accusers were alcoholics, serial liars, drug users and probably racked with conscience. Your comparison with martyrs is far fetched.

          Now think about it again and you will begin to have an inkling of the situation.

          • Sean Coleman June 15, 2018 at 12:53 pm #

            And in the Savile case that figure of 200 or so includes anonymous calls to helplines and absurd, impossible accusations of all sorts, just as you get nutcases claiming to be the murderer in high-profile cases. And then when you sift out the dross and look at the cases that look as if they might have substance they turn out to be nearly as bad. I can tell you that when I did that it was an odd sensation – all those people believing this and yet when you look at the accusations they are completely laughable.

  65. janet June 13, 2018 at 11:28 am #

    “DeNiro shouts “Fuck Trump” … and gets a standing O for his efforts, its at least 100,000 votes for our side in the next election.”

    To be fair, DeNiro later apologized:

    “I just want to make a note of apology for the idiotic behavior of my president. It’s a disgrace. And I apologize to [Canadian Prime Minister] Justin Trudeau and the other people at the G7. [Trump’s behavior] disgusting.”

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    • janet June 13, 2018 at 11:30 am #

      This will all be cleared up when Mueller indicts Trump. It will be at least 900,000 additional votes from the anti-Trump forces.

  66. Elrond Hubbard June 13, 2018 at 11:57 am #

    Why pharmaceuticals could be the prescription for trade warfare that truly hurts America
    Opinion: If Canada wants to decisively threaten maximum pain and stop the escalating trade war with the U.S., it should propose expropriating pharmaceutical patents

    https://www.macleans.ca/opinion/why-pharmaceuticals-could-be-the-prescription-for-trade-warfare-that-truly-hurts-america/

    “What began as a trade skirmish over Donald Trump’s imposition of a 10-per-cent tariff on Canadian steel and aluminum is now clearly a trade war. The miasma is only just lifting from the G7 summit in Charlevoix, Que., in which a Justin Trudeau press conference over a spiked communiqué sparked a Trump tantrum.

    “But the war’s final battle will not be the tariff that our government has already imposed in retaliation on American pizza, whisky, mattresses, coffee, et cetera—in fact, our tit-for-tat tariffs have only caused the White House to double down and promise even more tariffs against Canada soon. That means that Canada’s symmetrical retaliation is not working—and if we do not rethink our strategy now, we could soon be inside a tornado-like spiral of escalating tariffs, causing rising prices, sinking economies, and growing joblessness on both sides of the border.

    “If we are not to let the bully win, Canada must find an asymmetrical way to retaliate in this trade war. One that destroys American resolve, but spares us—or even benefits us. But how?

    “There are several ways, but Canada should consider—and threaten—expropriating American pharmaceutical patents.

    “Pharmaceutical patents are ultra-valuable assets. Whoever controls a drug’s patent has the exclusive right to make and export that drug. With typical drug prices growing an average of 12 per cent annually, and with certain specialty drugs priced over $500,000, controlling the right pharmaceutical patents is like having several gold mines.

    “But what makes pharmaceutical patents ripe for retaliation is the vulnerability of America’s pharmaceutical industry. Six of the world’s top ten pharmaceutical companies are American. No industry throws more lobbying dollars around Washington—more than the banking, defence, and automobile industries combined. Any trade retaliation aimed at pharmaceuticals certainly will be felt on Wall Street and heard in the White House.”

    Trump held a billion-dollar Chinese company (ZTE) hostage, enacting tariffs that basically put them out of business. Then the Chinese government coughs up a $500 million loan that just happens to benefit Trump’s business interests in Indonesia; and lo and behold, the tariffs are lifted and ZTE rises from the grave. Tens of thousands of Chinese workers rejoice! And so does POTUS, all the way to the bank. American workers and taxpayers? Not so much.

    Trump thinks he’s a shakedown artist, but just imagine the howling shitstorm that will land in the White House if this actually happens. Just remember, your guy set the example.

    • FincaInTheMountains June 13, 2018 at 12:16 pm #

      Should NOT have burnt down the White House in 1814!

      Russia, by the way, was an ally of US in that war.

      Even more so, should not now support Hillary and Mueller investigation.

      • Elrond Hubbard June 13, 2018 at 4:28 pm #

        Shoulda, woulda, coulda. Let bygones be gone.

    • PeteAtomic June 13, 2018 at 7:02 pm #

      Canada may be able to take away (or maybe not) patents domestically, however, not on US companies working inside the US.

      I say Canada maybe not because of NAFTA or other international laws which are binding such types of thing. The article mentions this problem.

      The drug companies make such tremendous money, and have such tremendous influence– that it won’t matter what a government does, anyway.

      The drug companies have enough money to literally hire a mercenary army to overthrow governments.

  67. Q. Shtik June 13, 2018 at 12:47 pm #

    I have a pronunciation question:

    Does the Un in Kim Jong-Un sound like the oon in moon or like the un in under? Or something altogether different?

    The media never bothers to clarify this.

  68. janet June 13, 2018 at 2:38 pm #

    Wrassling the Fed

    “And if, for instance, the interest rate on the benchmark 10-year US Treasury bond goes up past 3.00 percent, well that may be all she wrote for the US government’s ability to service its monstrous debt. And it may be tits up for the real estate sector, too, because mortgage rates will rise, and fewer people will buy houses.” –JHK (Forecast 2018)

    Interest rates are going up again, and again. The Fed lifted its benchmark rate by a quarter of a percentage point, the second hike this year. And a majority of policy makers now expect a total of four interest rate increases this year. Fed officials had been split about whether to raise rates three times this year or four. Policy makers said in a one-page statement that the labor market “has continued to strengthen” and than economic activity “has been rising at a solid rate.”

    JHK said the economy is not recovering and is not going to recover…. EVER. He has been emphatic about that. So these interest rate increases must be a sign that collapse is just around the corner.

  69. FincaInTheMountains June 13, 2018 at 2:59 pm #

    In continuation of the previous post
    http://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/world-wrassling-diplomacy/#comment-356287

    Believe me, most of all I want to continue the topic touched on in the post about the quarrel between Robert de Niro and Donald Trump, and not because I like strong expressions, but because this quarrel reveals really important, I would even say the principal things connected with what Putin called a geopolitical catastrophe and with what I call the Clintonization of America.

    But lately I feel like a Soviet information bureau announcer in the midst of the Battle of Stalingrad, providing the information on which the life of millions of people depends on and I have to keep on informing about the course of the battle in real time.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JI1uXq_0sAs

    I understand how stupid it sounds, but I feel that way.

    Indeed, according to one of the Internet reports, very reminiscent of the leak of one of the American intelligence agencies, the last test of Korean ICBMs was not a test, but a demonstration of strength, that in fact, North Korea has 60 nuclear warheads, capable of reaching some American cities with population of a million or more.

    And I’m sure that those who are currently trying to demonize the agreement concluded by Trump and Kim Jong-un in the United States have repeatedly gone through relevant intelligence reports, but they do not care that these warheads can visit them and send greetings to tens of millions of their constituents, and in general no one in the world will be left out of this visit.

    The main thing for them is to defeat Trump, and for this you can risk a couple of hundred million, and even the whole of mankind.

    The main “official” charge is the surrender of the sacred right of America to conduct exercises with the army of South Korea, and the leader of the Republicans in Congress, Mitch McConnel essentially supported those who try to sabotage the agreements concluded by Trump and Kim Jong-un, conducting these exercises contrary to the president’s order, and another Republican senator claims that the vice president Pence supports the continuation of the exercises.

    https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/jun/12/us-south-korean-military-exercises-still-gop-senat/ – This link was working few hours ago, no longer valid!!

    They quite seriously argue that if American soldiers do not exercise for several days, they will lose the ability to repel North Korean aggression, but I think that they all flew off their coils when they heard from Trump that these exercises are provocation, they are simply afraid to say so openly. If the exercises on the North Korean border are provocations, then the NATO exercises on the Russian border, the deployment of Euro ABM in Poland and Romania is a provocation, and provocation of this kind is an act of war and the aggressor is not Russia, but the good (non?)American guys.

    https://www.cnbc.com/video/2018/06/13/trump-suspends-provocative-joint-military-drills-with-south-korea.html

    http://www.businessinsider.com/nato-multinational-battle-groups-in-eastern-europe-to-counter-russia-2018-6?r=UK&IR=T

    And all this is the realization of the theses voiced by Hillary Clinton during the pre-election debates with Donald Trump who immediately after he won the primaries offered her a discussion about US foreign policy, having in mind primarily the thesis of the moral superiority of the United States, which in the political philosophy of the Cold War in the Clinton’s corporate style is naturally called Moral Equivalence.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Moral_equivalence

    And the Russian version of this article calls it “moral equality” and with blistering skill confuses the essence of this philosophy, first voiced in 1986 by the US representative to the UN, Jeane Kirkpatrick.

    Subsequently, this philosophy was implemented in full by Mikhail Gorbachev, who clearly used this speech by Jeane Kirkpatrick as a guideline from his supervisors, and the brilliant use of semantics in it really suggests that the author of this speech was the wife of the Governor of Arkansas, Hillary Clinton.

    Meanwhile, the semantics is a very complicated thing and very precise.

    • janet June 13, 2018 at 5:43 pm #

      “wife of the Governor of Arkansas, Hillary Clinton” –finca

      The most amazing thing is how HRC has managed, without paying any rent at all, to take up residence in your head.

      The North Koreans still have all their missiles and delivery systems, they still have the capacity to continue adding to their stock of nuclear missiles. The so-called “summit” accomplished nothing to make America safer. It just gave Kim what he wanted: attention and a cancellation of joint USA-South Korea military operations. Trump got played by Kim, and perhaps brainwashed… Trump came out speaking so highly of Kim, while completely ignoring Kim’s abuse of the North Korean population. HRC opposed sitting down without any prior conditions established. HRC would have protected the USA.

  70. Q. Shtik June 13, 2018 at 3:54 pm #

    Is it too soon in this blog essay cycle for me to change the subject or would that be considered rude to our host? I’ve been hankering to talk about me Me ME.

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    • FincaInTheMountains June 13, 2018 at 4:18 pm #

      Colonel of the US Army James McDonough, now in the diplomatic service, taught Russia a “moral lesson”.

      And he stressed that the Russians should remain silent and listen when the Americans say something to them, because the US actions are based on morality and ethics, and Russia is guided by cynical selfishness.

      https://taskandpurpose.com/russias-moral-hypocrisy/

      Do you have something to say, Mr.Q?

    • ozone June 13, 2018 at 6:01 pm #

      Q.,
      LOL! Good one.
      In answer to your burning question, it appears that about an hour from the time of JHK’s posting (and onward to the biweekly next) would be fine and fair for gasbaggery of any and all sorts! The age of common courtesy is lost and gone forever (dreadful sorrow, Clementine).
      …..Hey, did I tell you about ME?
      “Well, I woke up this mornin’, and I was on my mi-i-i-ind,
      And, I was on my mind.”

    • elysianfield June 13, 2018 at 8:01 pm #

      Sooo…Oakland is up to #27? With 40% of the population having at least an undergraduate education? With a 1440+ violent crime rate per 100K population, those grads must be mugging each other….

      “I has a Master’s Degree”
      Overheard in a Ghetto eatery.

      • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 8:11 am #

        Simon Wilder: Which door do I leave from?

        Professor: At Harvard we don’t end our sentences with prepositions.

        Student: Okay. Which door do I leave from, asshole?

        (With Honors, 1994)

        • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 8:12 am #

          Mea culpa – half edited that! Either ‘student’ or ‘SW’ will do as they are the same person…

      • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:11 am #

        “Man, youse gets you’s CPA, you set fo’ life!”

        “CPA, wut’s dat, cat?”

        “Certified Parking Attendant, brutha.”

  71. FincaInTheMountains June 13, 2018 at 4:31 pm #

    Meanwhile, the semantics is a very complicated thing and very precise, and with this in mind, what kind of victory is there in the informational war, if this philosophy, which was developed by several research institutes (for example, RAND) in all of the Russian talk shows in the course of the week, without speculation, was called the hypocrisy of Colonel McDonough, and in Solovyev show, the denial of moral equivalence is called a claim to the exclusiveness of the United States, passing the blame from a sick head to a healthy one.

    In this case, from Hillary Clinton on Donald Trump, who two years ago rejected this philosophy and offered a public discussion on this topic to Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders, who then was confidently going to the nomination for the post of US presidency from the Democratic Party.

    But Hillary Clinton declined this discussion, motivating it by saying that Trump can not be the president of the United States, not because of his principles, but because of the instability of his character. He says this instability will make him start a war with North Korea, and until yesterday Trump negotiated with Kim Jong-un all the time dodging those accusations, although when he offered this discussion, he meant the moral equivalence of Russia and the US, for which he was subjected to violent attacks of the Clinton State Department.

  72. FincaInTheMountains June 13, 2018 at 4:32 pm #

    As you see again masterful command of semantics, and the only thing that warms my heart, is that Hillary has disappeared somewhere, and without her, Clintonoids, apparently, can not generate new ideas.

    But taught by the bitter experience, I will not presume that she was whacked.

    • janet June 13, 2018 at 5:45 pm #

      HRC is alive and well and living securely ensconced in your head.

  73. JohnAZ June 13, 2018 at 6:13 pm #

    Watch out Dems. Polls showing that Nikki Haley is becoming more popular with women voters. I can see it now, the first woman President is a Republican. What just desserts.

    • janet June 13, 2018 at 7:04 pm #

      “Polls showing that Nikki Haley is becoming more popular with women voters.” –JohnAZ

      I would love to see a Sikh woman as president! Nikki attends both Sikh and Methodist worship services. She made a pilgrimage to the Harmandir Sahib with her husband in 2014 during her visit to India.

      Obama is a member of the United Church of Christ. It would be great if Nikki becomes the first woman president. It’s about time we had a non-Christian woman as president.

      • San Jose June 13, 2018 at 8:21 pm #

        I admire Nikki Haley and would vote for her!

        Jen in San Jose

        • Janos Skorenzy June 13, 2018 at 11:46 pm #

          Why? I assume you know she’s a Neo-Con warmonger. So it’s because she’s female and/or non-White? Oh Jen we hardly knew ye.

          • Exscotticus June 14, 2018 at 1:59 am #

            She’s definitely confused. Earlier I caught her blaming blacks for Trump’s ascendancy. Next she’ll be attacking Muslims and immigrants.

        • Q. Shtik June 14, 2018 at 12:07 am #

          Nikki Haley – SJ

          =======

          Any relation to the comet dude?

      • Tate June 13, 2018 at 8:47 pm #

        It’s about time we had a non-Christian woman as president.

        Why? Just for the sake of it? LOL.
        Behold the female psyche.

        • Walter B June 13, 2018 at 10:45 pm #

          Bot(tom) feeder, no doubt, watch out Tate, it is a pile that once stepped in, leaves tracks all around the house…

          • janet June 13, 2018 at 11:43 pm #

            I would vote for her, even if she runs for president using her birth name: Nimrata Randhawa. She is qualified to be president.

            If Nimrata Randhawa makes all her positions on issues clear, exalts her experience and education (which she has plenty of), and releases her tax returns, then I’m in.

            I will not vote for any candidate who runs for public office, but hides their conflicts of interest by refusing to make public their tax returns.

            Nimrata Randhawa 2020

            Has a nice ring to it, don’t you think?

          • Q. Shtik June 14, 2018 at 12:20 am #

            Nimrata Randhawa

            ===========

            I assume Nimrata is the female form of Nimrod, an inept person.

          • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 12:37 am #

            Nimrod was a mighty hunter before the Lord.

          • Walter B June 14, 2018 at 1:47 pm #

            And how exactly do a person’s tax returns reveal their “conflicts of interest” janet? Have you eve seen or filed an income tax return, because I have been doing it for going on 50 years and I have NO idea what you are getting at.

        • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 5:24 am #

          “Behold the female psyche.”

          Extrapolating from one person to half the population.

          Behold the male psyche.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 8:14 am #

            My generalisation was ironic. Given your previous extrapolation from one retiring judge to the entire UK population, I’m beginning to see yours as a pattern. But not one that I’ll really extrapolate to all your compatriots 🙂 .

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 9:58 am #

            Ha-ha-ha-ha. Prejudices showing?

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 10:26 am #

            Nope, just observing…

          • Walter B June 14, 2018 at 12:50 pm #

            Any and every voter that casts their vote based on race, gender, or what kind of sex they have and who they have it with should never be allowed to vote in the first place. Voting should be done based on the abilities of the candidate to perform an honest and satisfactory job at what they are being elected to do and NOT a popularity or beauty contest.

            Unfortunately, at least from my observations, a vast majority of those who vote do not appear to be doing an intelligent job of it. Fortunately, we were able to overcome this last Tuesday in our Township and so the incompetents shall have three more years of having to take the heat from me from the dais, not the audience.

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 1:49 pm #

            May I offer my congratulations, Walter.

            We could have done with you, I think, when our city decided to give itself a famously unnecessary tram system (not that I have anything at all against tram systems when done properly in places which would benefit from trams – on the contrary).

            Needless to say the tram system cost many times more than planned (it was commissioned from German and/or Dutch contractors by council people who wouldn’t know a tram from a cow’s backside) and now we struggle to pay for schools and nurseries. I’m sure you know the kind of story…

            I remember them having to re-lay the tracks in Princes St because they were sinking into the tarmac – and everyone squabbling about who had to pay, the contractor or the council, so everything stopped for months, with attendant debts piling up. You’d have loved it…

          • GreenAlba June 14, 2018 at 1:55 pm #

            And then you have to pay for inquiries into fiascos…

          • Walter B June 14, 2018 at 3:16 pm #

            Thanks GA, looks like you have your own version of the NY/NJ Port Authority across the Pond. People here often choose to forget that construction projects provide the most easily accessible means to take someone else’s’ money and split it up between decision makers and contractors. New Jersey did not simply make up the title of “Soprano State”, we earned it! Chris Christie made his name by busting almost 200 corrupt politicians. Like shooting fish in a barrel. Even at the small Town level here it is easily found. Fortunately for me it is still fightable which provides me much entertainment as the sight of payoffs and corruption turns my stomach. Not on my watch you don’t!

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 7:22 pm #

            Congratulations, Walter. And yes, you’re correct. Voting should be restricted to the competent, preferably with a little experience in the world, & of good moral character who can prove they are U.S. citizens.

          • Walter B June 14, 2018 at 9:15 pm #

            And consider this Tate, that of all of the jobs that are available to have here in the USA, the only ones that require no skills, talents or abilities and pretty much has ZERO minimum requirements is an elected official. And there is NO resume or previous experience required, all you have to do is win the popularity contest at the polls. Pathetic really.

          • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:29 pm #

            I think there should be enacted a requirement that only military veterans with honorable discharges should be allowed to vote.

            That would eliminate whole fields of incompetents from the voter rolls, especially the Privileged Misfits & Sexual Deviants who don’t serve in the military, or at least who didn’t up until recently. Voting should be a privilege, not a right.

  74. Janos Skorenzy June 13, 2018 at 11:54 pm #

    The mob could have had Christ, but they chose Barrabas. They could have had the noble Danton but chose the murderous Robespierre. And the Fem Mob could have the lovely Tulsi Gabbard (radiant with inner beauty), but they choose the shrill virago Nikki Haley.

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  75. Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 12:36 am #

    The Martial Lord of Wei asked one of his ministers what had caused the destruction of a certain nation state. The minister said, “Repeated victories in repeated wars.”

    The Martial Lord said, “A nation is fortunate to win repeated victories in repeated wars. Why would that cause its destruction?”

    The minister said, “Where there are repeated wars, the people are weakened, why they score repeated victories, rulers become haughty. Let haughty rulers command weakened people and rare is the nation that will not perish as a result.

    The Masters of Huainan, ancient Taoist compendium of learning

    • Walter B June 14, 2018 at 10:05 am #

      “Let me have men about me that are fat,
      Sleek-headed men, and such as sleep a-nights.
      Yond Cassius has a lean and hungry look.
      He thinks too much. Such men are dangerous.”

      A nation grown fat and slothful, ruled by those who concern themselves with emotions and feelings rather than logic or intelligence always fails and then falls. It is the natural order of things and we are overdue.

      • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 2:09 pm #

        It gives new meaning to the old insult “fat head” often used in Joisy if in fact it is.

  76. FincaInTheMountains June 14, 2018 at 1:23 am #

    Western Colored Projects in Blues and Jazz

    Also the unity and struggle of Black and White: when the white is black inside.

    Courtney Hadwin
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gPHVLxm8U-0

    Janis Joplin, To Love Somebody
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yX-OkV_2z8A

    Janis Joplin – Summertime
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bn5TNqjuHiU

    Ella Fitzgerald – Summertime
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u2bigf337aU

    Ella Fitzgerald is signing as White and Janis as Black.

    • janet June 14, 2018 at 2:23 am #

      HRC is directing the Western Colored Projects in Blues and Jazz … be careful!

      • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:09 pm #

        All the more astounding when you hear her Voice!

  77. FincaInTheMountains June 14, 2018 at 8:31 am #

    Nunes is building a case to accuse top of DOJ of high treason and give a chance to Trump to fire them all and return DOJ to the executive branch of the US government.

    https://www.yahoo.com/news/nunes-deadline-arrives-doj-handover-173825614.html

    • ozone June 14, 2018 at 9:35 am #

      Did you read what you wrote here? Bugs sez: “What a maroon!” (Besides being a prime purveyor of gasbaggery.)

  78. ozone June 14, 2018 at 9:18 am #

    In a comedic but accurate assessment of a supposedly serious editorial in the venerable New York Times, JHK sez:

    “Ah, so…. To The Times, Canada, Britain, France, Germany and Japan are little more than a pain-in-the-ass-ex-wives-club, and North Korea is the irresistible porn star with a huge rack, proffered by that evil old pimp, Russia, in the never-ending game of Rope-a-Dope they’ve been running on Mr. Trump since even before he glided down that fateful escalator in his gilded Fifth Avenue tower. ”

    Keee-rekt! …And speaking of those discarded losers of “The Continent”, here’s a great response to some clown-car propaganda from some think-tank liberally slathered with petroleum institute monies. The general idea is that the US will gather these aforesaid losers under its energy wings and keep it safely NATO’d there. Well, suuuure!

    “USSA can’t even get its crap into orbit without Russian rockets yet expects its vassal Europeons to go back to the stone age to appease the chosenite scum running Washing town and Pentacon Murder Inc. Funny!

    The only thing sustaining the illusion of the so-called USSAN energy bonanza BS is the entire Ponzi scam swamping the Wall St sewer behind the fake “economy” of war and debt without end on Chinese credit. And then with fewer than a half a dozen LNG plants barely functioning after hurricane damage and rusting infrastructure the Europeons are supposedly going to pay triple prices to get USSAN gas shipped to Urupp instead of continuing with guaranteed problem free Russian supplies piped directly to consumers.

    USSA can’t even supply Mexico with LNG yet expects Europeons to bend over and pay through the nose for what USSA can’t produce. The Europeons see through the lies and are ready to board the One Belt One Road Sino Russian mega global project and jump the sinking ship of USSAN fools and blowhards.

    The only viable gas being produced from squeezing rocks in USSA’S “shale Miracle” is the gas coming from the corrupt hubris bloated morons in Washing town. When the Jim Willie Scheisse dollah post reset finally becomes the local currency USSANS will be lucky if they haven’t maxed their credit rating to afford their Chinese stuff at the Peoples Walmart feeding kitchens let alone become the masters of global energy. In their opioid delusions perhaps.
    Not even 6 plants in operation yet these clowns are going to supply the planet with ships not even built! Dream on.” — Fireman

    • FincaInTheMountains June 14, 2018 at 9:37 am #

      Is that the same Jim Willie who has been predicting his Scheisse dollah longer than he’s been boozing and partying with VERY young women in Costa Rica at the expense of American morons listening to his “financial advice”?

      Despite our obvious mutual affection, I hope that you, Ozone, has followed none of his “financial advice” whispered into his drunken ear by the Voice.

      • malthuss June 14, 2018 at 8:08 pm #

        Jim Willie is a bit odd.

        I found—

        Willie has never been correct about anything. He just makes thing up. He has no experience trading any financial markets but here he is making forecasts on markets he doesn’t trade. He simply markets a subscription service. His claim that the US lied to China about the rate rise is just total nonsense. Everyone on the planet knew they were going to raise rates as it was already priced into the dollar. Does he think the Chinese are idiots? He was recently claiming that the equipment maker bobcat who is owned by a Korean firm was refusing treasuries at US ports for the equipment. Now first of all treasuries are not used at ports.

        The exporter even before it ships anything receives a letter of credit from the importers banks stating how and when payment is transferred. Second of all bobcat doesn’t import products into the states as they are made in North Dakota. This plant services North, Central and South America. The plant in China services Asia. Why would they ship products across the seas when they are made here? This is typical of how he just makes things up.

      • ozone June 14, 2018 at 8:15 pm #

        No Jim givin’ the Willies for me. I’m where I wished to be.
        I find it strange (as with most of your blurtings) that you chose to zero in on that little tidbit; likely the most innocuous portion of the snark-fest. It matters not who pronounces the death of the *petro* dollah, but it *will* happen fairly soon; possibly by the end of the Triple Gee Regime when the rest of the known world is good and sick of being pushed around by (and kissing the yuge ass of) a pudgy reality teevee persona.

  79. wm5135 June 14, 2018 at 10:41 am #

    As I watch this weekly wrasslin match between “it’s their fault” and “I am not responsible” i often think of Mr. Rove’s statement concerning reality.

    The twist I take that amuses me is – The cosmos and the cloud of possibilty create reality and while everyone is judiciously studying what they assume is concrete reality the cosmos moves forward creating a new reality that might be compared to a bow wave.

    With a cloud of infinite possibilty and one probablility it is humorous to watch people make a personal observation, measurement, and believe that they will alter the true probable outcome. When a baker mixes all of the ingredients for a yellow cake and puts the pan in the oven to bake a chocolate cake does not come out of the oven.

    Probability will have her way with us whether by dragging us kicking and screaming or allowing us to ride the bow wave with ease.

    The nod of casual indifference given to our hubris as the cosmos courses by is truly a thing of monumental beauty. Why is “I don’t know” such a terrifying phrase?

    Inspector generals report today, ooh boy, about a lucky man who made the grade. apologies to Lennon and McCartney

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    • Tate June 14, 2018 at 10:57 am #

      Well, Justify just won the Belmont & secured the Triple Crown, so I’m predicting the Winners will keep on winning, & the Losers will keep on losing.

  80. FincaInTheMountains June 14, 2018 at 11:30 am #

    Comey Broke From FBI Procedures in Clinton Probe, Watchdog Finds

    https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2018-06-14/comey-broke-from-fbi-procedures-in-clinton-probe-watchdog-finds

    He, he…

    I would say that leaking the highly classified info on identities of American intelligence operatives in the ME, including the schedule of American Ambassador Stevens to jihadis and getting a free pass for that from the director of FBI, qualifies as “Breaking normal FBI Procedures”.

    • FincaInTheMountains June 14, 2018 at 11:32 am #

      Did they whack her already and intend to sweep the dirt under the rug?

  81. elysianfield June 14, 2018 at 12:04 pm #

    Well, ladies and germs,

    An E-commerce firm in Shanghai, China has built and is operating a fully computerized “fulfillment center” that employs only four humans (for the purpose of satisfying the requirements of the robots) that surpasses Amazon’s push to full automation. It is a delightful minute + of video that will both amaze and trouble.

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RFV8IkY52iY

    Behold your children’s future….

    • FincaInTheMountains June 14, 2018 at 12:15 pm #

      Who’s gonna miss those jobs?

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DfGs2Y5WJ14

      • capt spaulding June 14, 2018 at 12:52 pm #

        Read “Rise of the Robots” by Martin Ford, it’s a fascinating book by someone who knows what he’s talking about.

        • malthuss June 14, 2018 at 8:09 pm #

          J Rifkin warned us, circa 1995 in a book of his about ‘The End of Work.’

    • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 1:25 pm #

      But think of all the jobs servicing those robots. I wonder what kind of whores the robots will like….

      • Q. Shtik June 14, 2018 at 1:58 pm #

        But think of all the jobs servicing those robots. – JS

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

        Oh come on Janos, they’ll have robots to service the other robots.

        The robots will like other (whore) robots that have huge “racks.”

        • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 2:08 pm #

          One is reminded of the old “Rake Hells” of Hellfire Club. No doubt they will make female sex robots into Rack Hells, perhaps hunting for dissidents with know propensities in that direction….

          • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 11:56 pm #

            Rack Hell? Raquel? Raquel Welch? Q you’re a genius….

  82. pequiste June 14, 2018 at 1:23 pm #

    Who knew?

    First DJT breaks the more than half-century Gordian Knot of the state of war with The Hermit Kingdom, Best Korea, via a meet-and-eat in Singapore with Kim Jung Un. Who knew impossible geopolitical diplomacy could be sooooo easy.

    Those naughty folks at the FBI under Jim Comey did not follow established protocols in the Hillary Clinton classified email investigation. Who knew that Federal investigation of national security could be so cavalier?

    One of the (secular) saints of the 20th Century, it turns out, was RAYCISS! Yes, no one is beyond the reach of Social Justice inquiry and thought crime indictments across time and space. None other than Albert Einstein! is being exposed as a God-damned racist and misanthrope. Who knew that one of the world’s all-time greatest minds, and victim of raysism himself, was a rayciss?

    https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-44472277

    Just WOW.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 1:31 pm #

      Arguably one of the great minds of the 20th Century revealing his observations. From the above article:

      Written between October 1922 and March 1923, the diaries track his experiences in Asia and the Middle East.

      In them, he makes sweeping and negative generalisations, for example calling the Chinese “industrious, filthy, obtuse people”.

      Einstein would later in life advocate for civil rights in the US, calling racism “a disease of white people”.

      JS: Classic Jew move. Project your own darkness – and remember, the Jews are the ones who demonized all such thoughts – and then project them onto Whites. What a horrible person he was.

      • malthuss June 14, 2018 at 8:11 pm #

        was he so smart?
        Did you see the stuff online–some religion of race.com or something?

        Albert Einstein’s private diaries detailing his tour of Asia in the 1920s reveals the theoretical physicist and humanitarian icon’s racist attitudes to the people he met on his travels, particularly the Chinese.
        Written between October 1922 and March 1923, the diaries see the scientist musing on his travels, science, philosophy and art. In China, the man who famously once described racism as “a disease of white people” describes the “industrious, filthy, obtuse people” he observes. He notes how the “Chinese don’t sit on benches while eating but squat like Europeans do when they relieve themselves out in the leafy woods. All this occurs quietly and demurely. Even the children are spiritless and look obtuse.” After earlier writing of the “abundance of offspring” and the “fecundity” of the Chinese, he goes on to say: “It would be a pity if these Chinese supplant all other races. For the likes of us the mere thought is unspeakably dreary.”
        Ze’ev Rosenkranz, senior editor and assistant director of the Einstein Papers Project at the California Institute of Technology, said: “I think a lot of comments strike us as pretty unpleasant – what he says about the Chinese in particular.

        THAT ALBERT EINSTEIN IS ARGUABLY THE MOST INFAMOUS JEWISH PLAGIARIST TO EVER LIVE. HOWEVER, THAT IS NOT TODAY’S TOPIC. OUR TOPIC TODAY IS THAT

        ALBERT EINSTEIN WAS A RACIST! OR HE WOULD BE IF HE HADN’T BEEN JEWISH.

        BELOW, WE HAVE AN ARTICLE ONE OF THOSE INDUSTRIOUS, FILTHY OBTUSE PEOPLE FROM THE MIDDLE EAST. IN IT HE DISCUSSES HOW EINSTEIN WAS RACIST BECAUSE OF WHAT THE ESTEEMED PLAGIARIST HAD TO SAY ABOUT CHINKS AND ARABS. OF COURSE THE REPORT OF EINSTEIN’S BLATANT ANTI-WHITE RACISM IS TREATED AS FACT AND NOT RACIST IN THE SLIGHTEST.

        The author treats Einstein as a White Man denouncing his own kind, when in truth, Einstein was Jewish, and therefore cannot be racist, because as ever libtarded SJW and mud says, Only White People Can Be Racist!

        Chinks: ‘Industrious, filthy, obtuse people’: Albert Einstein’s travel diaries reveal the scientist’s shocking racism and xenophobia as they are published for the first time in English

        * Theoretical physicist went on five-and-a-half month voyage Middle and Far East
        * Chinese are ‘filthy’ and ‘obtuse’ who squat to eat like Europeans on the toilet
        * It would be ‘a pity if these Chinese supplant all other races’, said Einstein
        * This would be ‘dreary’ adding that the Chinese have ‘abundance of offspring’

        Tariq Tahir | Daily Mail | 13 June 2018

        https://www.theguardian.com/books/2018/jun/12/einsteins-travel-diaries-reveal-shocking-xenophobia

        https://www.mirror.co.uk/science/albert-einsteins-shocking-racism-revealed-12702559

        http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-5838903/Albert-Einsteins-travel-diaries-reveal-scientists-shocking-racism-tour-Asia.html

        Extract: Albert Einstein’s private diaries reveal the iconic scientist’s racist attitudes on a trip to Asia in the 1920s.

        In the autumn of 1922, Albert Einstein, along with his then-wife, Elsa, embarked on a five-and-a-half-month voyage to the Far East and Middle East, regions that the renowned physicist had never visited before.

        Einstein’s lengthy itinerary consisted of stops in Hong Kong and Singapore, two brief stays in China, a six-week whirlwind lecture tour of Japan and a twelve-day tour of Palestine

    • FincaInTheMountains June 14, 2018 at 1:44 pm #

      They hate Einstein not for his alleged racism, but for creating General Theory of Relativity which lead to Friedman Cosmological model affirming the Abrahamic teaching of Creation of Universe from Nothing – not from infinitely small amount of primordial matter.

      General Theory of Relativity is the most suppressed scientific theory of our times and is replaced by Gauge theory crap.

    • janet June 14, 2018 at 1:46 pm #

      “Just WOW.” –pequiste

      He is a product of a patriarchal white European imperialist society. And you are surprised that white Europe’s racist values were transmitted to a scientist.

      Watch the movie “The Man Who Knew Infinity” to see how white racist Europeans treat a scientific mind.

      https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0787524/

      • Walter B June 14, 2018 at 6:22 pm #

        We white guys understand that we are all tagged as “racists” simply because of our lack of color, but I must say that the biggest racist I ever knew was a brown guy, an “African American” friend of mine who once recited the entire list of grades of “blackness” by type. He started with Nairobi blue blacks and proceeded down the spectrum through Red Bone Creole Something or Anothers, to Mocha Choco Javas, and Crème Brule light skins, of which he considered himself to be one of. It was hilarious because he actually judged himself better than all of the darker shades and of course we laughed heartily at it all and assured him that they were all brown to us. Of course he preferred impregnating white women so in the end, well I just don’t know what to think, so I try not to. All I know is that I am a racist by color and apparently can be nothing else so go ahead Bridge Keeper, ask me the questions, I am not afraid!

        • Q. Shtik June 14, 2018 at 9:24 pm #

          the biggest racist I ever knew was a brown guy, an “African American” – Walt

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

          Your African American friend is not the least bit unusual. Just about everybody in the world would prefer to be white or at minimum a lighter shade of brown. Indians (dot, not feather) are notorious in this regard. Africans and even Koreans risk their health using dangerous skin lightening products. I posted an article here on this subject (which I believe came from the NY Times) within the past year.

  83. janet June 14, 2018 at 1:28 pm #

    “…and NOT a popularity or beauty contest.” –Walter B

    LOL.

    Nimrata Randhawa is a Sikh for cryin’ out loud.

    When did anyone ever win the popularity contest in the United States by being a Sikh? My pro-Sikh prejudice is a minority, unpopular, position, I guarantee you.

    But that is beside the point. As I stated in my previous post the point is that Nimrata Randhawa is qualified to become president. That she is also a woman, that she is also Sikh, is just icing on the cake for me, not the main reason to vote for her.

    We could use a competent Sikh warrior in the White House compared to the narcissistic draft-dodging bone spur coward who is there now (temporarily).

    • Tate June 14, 2018 at 1:58 pm #

      She desires constant war (except when it’s Eastasia on Tuesdays.) No thanks.

  84. janet June 14, 2018 at 1:35 pm #

    “Did they whack her already and intend to sweep the dirt under the rug?” –finca

    HRC is alive, finca. I was just talking to her earlier today. By the way, she is obsessed with you. Every other word is finca this, finca that. I told her you feel the same about her.

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  85. Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 2:05 pm #

    In ancient times those known as good warriors prevailed when it was easy to prevail. Therefore the victories of good warriors are not noted for cleverness or bravery. Therefore their victories in battle are not flukes. Their victories are not flukes because they position themselves where they will surely win, prevailing over those who have already lost. Therefore a victorious army first wins and then seeks battle, a defeated army first battles and then seeks victory.

    Sun Tzu, The Art of War

    He also says elsewhere “not to cross great rivers”. In other words, defense not offense. He was no warmongering imperialist even though his words are often quoted and used by the same. Thus Taoists claim him as one of their own.

  86. janet June 14, 2018 at 2:12 pm #

    The new report discredits the idea that a “deep state” exists and doubly discredits the idea that the “deep state” is anti-Trump.

    Despite Republican suggestions that anti-Trump forces within the FBI worked against Trump, all of the bureau’s public actions during the campaign hurt Clinton and helped Trump.

    If the “deep state” really was trying to stop Trump’s election, it did a terrible job. Trump was elected president.

    • Walter B June 14, 2018 at 4:34 pm #

      Putting a cutsie tootsie name on something like “Deep State” allows for denial to be ratcheted up to the highest level. Stating that American foreign policy has for decades consisted of promoting revolution, discord and murder both inside of the United States and throughout the world is not so easily denied. What do you think the CIA does for a living? Party and fornicate? Neither of these pastimes are profitable and profit is what it is and always will be about.

    • Q. Shtik June 14, 2018 at 5:32 pm #

      The new report discredits the idea that a “deep state” exists and doubly discredits the idea that the “deep state” is anti-Trump. – janet

      ===========

      “The new report,” of course, was written by the deep state.

    • Tate June 14, 2018 at 7:43 pm #

      Akmofo here has claimed that the ‘Deep State’ is one & the same as the SES, the Senior Executive Service of the U.S. government. Is it really essential to locate exactly where it is & how it’s comprised? James Burnham referred to the Managerial State. The point is that decisions get made that are not accountable to the voters and often that are directly contrary to the wishes of ordinary folks. Mass emigration is an example.

  87. Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 2:27 pm #

    It’s time to read or reread Nietzsche’s “Twilight of the Idols”. All the heroes of Liberaldom (Mandela, King, Einstein, Cosby Clinton(s)) are turning out to be Scum.

    JFK was good (kinda) – so they killed him. He didn’t fit you see.

    I bought a Conspiracy Book in a Goodwill Store about his assassination. Right where it talked about the Debt Free Currency he issued (the reason he was killed according to the book) there was one of his two dollar bills, with a red stamp not a green, and no mention of the Fed upon it, inserted as a book mark perhaps.

    • janet June 14, 2018 at 3:39 pm #

      Wasn’t JFK a Roman Catholic (kinda)? Any conspiracy book worth its salt would reveal that the Vatican is secretly controlling secular society with a Satanic agenda for global domination. (kinda)

  88. FincaInTheMountains June 14, 2018 at 5:16 pm #

    The first fruits of the end of the Korean War

    Indeed, the Korean wars ended when Trump acknowledged that joint exercises with the South Korean army are a provocation, since it had no other goals other than provoking the Third World War.

    Moreover, this war is directly connected with the concept of “moral superiority of the United States” to the extent that the “god-given” US morality makes moral the immoral actions of the US Army.

    In this case, provocations by the US Army are not provocations, but containment of an evil-obsessed North Korea, but if provocations are just that – provocations – then there is nothing to fight North Korea for.

    Similarly, the Cold War, also the Third World War, will end when the US president recognizes that the expansion of NATO and the construction of Euro-ABM facilities in Poland and Romania is the provocation of the Fourth World War. And as long as the global West continues to maintain that it needs European missile defense to protect against Iranian missiles, and the US battalions in the Baltic and Ukraine to contain Russian aggression, the Cold War will continue.

    It is another thing that the Cold War 1.0 can provoke the Cold War 2.0, but this will already be the IV World War, with other goals and means. And all this manipulation with the numbers of the World Wars is not a trick or blah blah, but a way to prevent the onset of this enemy, after which preparations for the IV World War will commence by the method of accumulation of sticks and stones with holes for sticks.

    Einstein messed up with the numbers, but he guessed the point.

    And Donald Trump during his election campaign outlined a program for the US to abandon the extremely costly role of the world policeman, or if you want a global hegemon in favor of re-industrialization of America, which President Obama began.

    And the Americans, electing him president despite the massive falsification of election results in favor of Hillary Clinton, supported not only him, but also his program. And he already then made fundamental statements in passing, just as he had the day before yesterday ended the 65-year-old Korean War in passing, calling the US-South Korean exercises provocative.

    But the “talking heads” on Russian TV have no time to watch the debates of candidates for the US presidency and they are amicably engaged in complete fucking nonsense, trying to explain the objective changes in American politics by the fact that Trump is first crazy, and secondly that he’s a born businessman.

    Meanwhile, if the US will be overwhelmed by the Blue Wave and Trump is overthrown, we can compare his insanity with the insanity of Hillary Clinton, who will instantly turn his policy 180 degrees around and start a new world war without too much provoking or counting its serial number.

    Therefore as I have already written many times, the point of application of the entire world politics are the midterm elections in the US and immediately after the press conference at which Trump announced the end of the 63-year Korean War, he endorsed via Twitter Katie Arrington as Republican congressman from North Carolina several hours before the polls closed.

    During the election campaign, she openly advocated the transformation of the Republican Party into Trump’s party against Mark Sanford, who spoke out against the President-Republican along with the Democrats.

    And the republican-Clintonoid lost the primaries with a bang, dispelling the myth of Trump’s loss of his voter base and sending a message to all the other candidates from the Republican Party for US Congress, what will happen to those of them who oppose Trump.

    To the same piggy-bank go the actions of Trumpists against special prosecutor Mueller and immediately after the end of the talks in Singapore they conducted a public opinion poll showing not only that most Americans consider Mueller’s investigation politically motivated, but 31 percent consider it illegal, but they praise as victory Trump’s negotiations in Singapore.

    Even the democrats and independent voters turned away from Mueller, whom the American press six months ago hailed as an example of honesty and impartiality, and any doubts in Mueller were seen as an attempt to undermine the US political system.

    Mueller Investigation: Even Democrats, Independents Have Turned Against Probe, New Poll Suggests
    https://finance.yahoo.com/news/mueller-investigation-even-democrats-independents-130542766.html

  89. janet June 14, 2018 at 7:00 pm #

    “Report: Comey’s actions ‘extraordinary and insubordinate’ ” –finca

    No one is above the law. It does not matter what a poll suggests. Law enforcement is not done by vote. You go after criminals. You don’t take a poll. Trump is a criminal and an illegitimate president.

    Report: Comey’s actions ‘extraordinary and insubordinate’

    Clinton won the popular vote even after Comey’s action to aid Trump. Clinton would have won the electoral college if Comey had not intervened insubordinately on Trump’s behalf.

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    • Tate June 14, 2018 at 7:49 pm #

      Clinton won Cali, but Cali is full of illegals who voted. That’s how she edged out Trump in the popular vote. It would be interesting to see how she’d have done if voting was restricted to U.S. citizenship.

      • janet June 14, 2018 at 8:13 pm #

        Trump’s Commission of Election Integrity investigated and did not find a single undocumented immigrant voted. Non-citizens cannot vote. They don’t have voter registration.

  90. janet June 14, 2018 at 8:09 pm #

    World Wrassling Diplomacy is easy. Ignore the words. Watch their actions.

    Kim is gettin rid of his nukes the same way Trump is building the wall: they’re not.

  91. KesaAnna June 14, 2018 at 10:44 pm #

    @ Sean Coleman

    ” “I can’t say where Sean Coleman has , or has not , been hanging out.”

    It is Volodya you are quoting here not me. ”

    I joined the Catholic Church five years ago. ( my family , on both sides , is protestant )

    I go to Mass at least once a week , sometimes pay visits to church three or four times a week. I work closely with Priests on a regular basis , have had lunch and dinner with Bishops .

    That ‘s my background here.

    I was referring — albeit indirectly — to the fact that many people here , OBVIOUSLY , know no more about the Catholic Church than they know about yesterdays weather on the moon Europa.

    And they are getting their information concerning it from — the equivalent of — a Nazi narrative of Gypsy life.

    I use the example of Nazis here not to denigrate them , but for simplicities and brevities sake , to , hopefully, to show just how NOT unbiased and even-handed their news sources are.

    Though , unfortunately , my experience is that one of the hardest jobs in the world is to convince people that the facts ………are mundane and prosaic.

    For example , I spent the first ten years of my life in East Germany.

    And yet , even on a blog entitled , ” Clusterfuck Nation ” people simply will not believe that my life there was not any less , or more , fearful or anxious than it is here.

    No more , or less , liberating , or restrictive , than my life here.

    When i say that the two regimes and cultures merely use different means , to arrive at the SAME ends —

    Well, I must be a Commie.

    I actually despise Lenin , Stalin , Walter Ulbricht , and Erich Honecker , but never mind.

    Like i said , it is very hard to convince folks that the news is really rather dull.

    As for where You are coming from —- well, as I indicated ( ? ) , I have no idea.

    • Janos Skorenzy June 14, 2018 at 11:47 pm #

      This guy is my new hero A gay Black fundamentalist Christian aesthete who yells fuck you at Michael Moore as he accepted an award and “you’re a pathetic garbage man” at the Black actor in Twelve Years a Slave when he accepted his. The writer doesn’t think he has the right. I say he does. Things have gone too far and politeness must yield to Truth which has claims all it’s own. This guy is you if you were a gay male movie critic.

      http://ew.com/article/2014/01/13/armond-white-kicked-out-of-ny-critics/

  92. janet June 14, 2018 at 10:49 pm #

    Really, we are not so good at world wrassling diplomacy. We specialize is massive organized violence, i.e., war and terrorism. We Americans are the terrorists.

    The Kim-Trump Kabuki theatre troupe continues the USA global reign of terror. Martin Luther King, Jr. correctly identified the USA as the world’s “leading purveyor of violence.”

    The USA sees itself as a purveyor of virtue, freedom, democracy, etc. and enlists the help of dictators around the world.

    These partners in global virtue include:

    ? Thirty-six nations receiving U.S. military assistance despite being identified as “dictatorships” in 2016 by the right-wing U.S. organization Freedom House.

    ? The Saudi regime, the leading source and funder of extremist Sunni jihadism and the most reactionary government on earth, currently using U.S. military hardware and ordnance to bomb Yemen into an epic humanitarian crisis.

    ? The openly racist occupation and apartheid state of Israel, which has sickened the morally sentient world this spring by systemically sniper-killing dozens of young, unarmed Palestinians who have had the audacity to protest their sadistic U.S.-backed siege in the miserable open-air prison that is Gaza.

    ? Honduras, home to a violently repressive right-wing government installed through a U.S.-backed military coup in June 2009.

    ? The Philippines, headed by a thuggish brute who boasts of killing thousands of drug users and dealers with death squads.

    ? Rwanda, a semi-totalitarian state enlisted in the U.S.-backed multinational rape of the Congo, where 5 million people have been killed by imperially sponsored starvation, disease and civil war since 2008.

    ? Ukraine, where a right-wing government that includes and relies on paramilitary neo-Nazis was installed in a U.S.-assisted coup four years ago.

    You don’t have to be a leftist to have the elementary moral decency to do the Chomsky exercise of imagining yourself in other nations’ shoes—on the wrong side of the Pax Americana and its dutiful, consent-manufacturing “mainstream” media.

    The Chomsky Challenge for Americans

    https://www.truthdig.com/articles/the-chomsky-challenge-for-americans-in-understanding-our-dangerous-world/

    I am Janet and I love Noam Chomsky, the world’s leading intellectual.

  93. janet June 15, 2018 at 12:03 am #

    IMMORAL WRASSLING (CHILD ABUSE)

    The Trump administration’s official policy of child abuse (separating children from their mothers) is the latest tactic in a long-fought campaign to dehumanize immigrants, particularly women who are mothers and victims of domestic violence.

    Aside from being wrong, Trump’s policies and treatment of immigrants are fundamentally un-American. America is a country formed by immigrants who have historically welcomed, with a number of exceptions, those from other nations in their greatest time of need. In turning our backs on that noble tradition, the Trump administration is creating a humanitarian crisis.

  94. KesaAnna June 15, 2018 at 12:34 am #

    @ Volodya

    I guess i must be something of an unusual freak and pervert ,

    because in my cosmology , how I primarily define good and bad , right and wrong , hot and cold , is by making comparisons.

    And that’s apparently very unusual ?

    ” The abuse allegations by-and-large involved minors, not grown adults ”

    ” By and large ” is right , because ” minors ” covers a lot of ground.

    Everything from toddlers , to Sixteen year olds voluntarily smoking pot , voluntarily perusing bestiality porn , and voluntarily doing the horizontal bop with the family dog.

    In my case , frankly , ” minors ” never meant much , or really anything. Not at 54 , but not at 9 either.

    The differences between 54 years of age and 12 years of age ?

    At 54 , I can drive a car , smoke cigarettes , and a few other trivial , ( but nice ) privileges .

    In youth , every tragedy is a special , end – of -the -world , Armageddon.

    But after you have been through three or four dozen special , end – of -the -world , Armageddon’s ?
    Even the worst news doesn’t seem so bad.

    And acne has slacked off a bit.

    And that is about it for the differences between age 12 and age 54.

    Otherwise , life is one long ( or short ) grim adulthood.

    Cry me buckets for wrongs done to adults you don’t even like , and you might get my attention.

    Ply me not with minors though.

    Like I said , my experience of life is that it is one long grim adulthood , and I don’t remember being innocent even when I was eight years old.

    So , at the very least , I don’t have a fucking clue what that is about.

    You could be an exception ? But when I was eight years old , my experience of the especial concern of adults for children was that it was largely a show , and crocodile tears.

    And excuse that kicks the can down the road , until the day when they can openly treat you the way they always really felt.

    So to ply me with minors is to instantly invite skepticism and doubt about your motives.

    ” a pit of scum and villainy like Hollywood, ”

    You said it , I didn’t. 😛 See next =

    ” Now, the charges against Weinstein have yet to be tried in court, but that didn’t prevent the disemboweling of his company. As you say about voluntary associations, nobody was OBLIGED to do business with Weinstein’s firm, nobody was obliged to rescue it, and so down the shitter it went. ”

    Maybe Weinstein’s firm has gone down the shitter ?

    but people do seem to have very short memories where the foibles of the aristocracy are concerned , and it would be quite tedious for me to give even a short list of the cases where I know these people , after an interval , went on to greater success after the blackest of black marks.

    But , ok , maybe Weinstein and his firm is done ?

    Hollywood is , likewise, a voluntary association , but it goes on its merry way , despite being , as you characterized it ,

    ” a pit of scum and villainy ”

    Some folks even describe Disney as wholesome !

    ” but rather an organization that’s supposed to be the civilizational bulwark AGAINST scum and villainy, that is, a society all about behavioral restraints. ”

    ^ Leave out the word , ” supposed ” for clarities sake.

    Is this an actual comparison , or another one of those empty or fake comparisons like ” minors ” ?

    If it is an actual comparison , then I’m pretty sure you have , yourself , answered your own question as to how the Catholic Church endures.

    ” But there were many court cases that went to trial and resulted in convictions of Roman Catholic clergy. ”

    Indeed , and compared negatively to what ?

    You don’t find the same , or worse , in secular public schools ?

    You don’t find the same , or worse , in little league sports ?

    You don’t find the same , or worse , in the Girl Scouts ?

    But these are not bulwarks against scum and villainy ? These are not associations devoted to behavioral restraints ?

    Hey , if you want to knock secular materialism , I sure don’t want to hamper you in that endeavor ! 🙂

    So , again , comparing badly to what ?

    Granted , I don’t suppose you would find that sort of thing in the Mason’s Lodge . But then the Mason’s is a gathering of old men.
    I doubt you’ll find many pretty thirteen year old girls hanging around the Mason’s lodge giving each other the secret handshake.

    ” Not just a few but many. ”

    Now I’m starting to get a bit peeved.

    MANY COMPARED TO WHAT ??

    ” Many ” as opposed to few , WHERE ?

    — To be continued .

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  95. janet June 15, 2018 at 1:19 am #

    Wrassling with ACA (again!)

    Under orders from Attorney General Jeff Sessions and with the support of President Donald Trump, the Justice Department sided with the states and urged the courts to invalidate two of the law’s key protections for people with pre-existing medical conditions.

    If that position prevails, insurers could go back to charging higher premiums or denying coverage to people with medical problems, including everything from hay fever to multiple sclerosis. The decision could throw insurance markets into chaos, affect employer-sponsored coverage and ultimately leave millions of people without a way to pay significant medical bills.

    How do you like it now, gentlemen? Trump’s “tax cuts” are completely wiped out by increased medical costs up to and including medical bankruptcy. Wasn’t Trump going to bring down drug costs? Seems like his campaign promises were all lies.

  96. KesaAnna June 15, 2018 at 1:57 am #

    ” Given this circumstance I find it amazing that an organization that apparently harbored not just one or two pedophiles is still around. ”

    Now I’m really getting pissed off .

    Because unless you have been living in a cave your whole life , I really fucking doubt your amazement .

    And I really , really , really , doubt that, ” harbored ” part.

    But , ok , let’s pretend you were born yesterday.

    Go out on the ocean , and throw out a bucket of blood , and some meat , and where a minute ago there were no sharks , now there are dozens.

    I don’t know what marine biologists call this , but LAWYERS call it ,

    ” The shark effect. ”

    Every trucking company in America gives its truck drivers the same three -part formula to follow if they become involved in a traffic accident ;

    1 . DON’T SAY ANYTHING. KEEP YOUR MOUTH SHUT.

    2 . Call the trucking company lawyers. THEY WILL SPEAK FOR YOU.

    3 . Call the police ( and STILL keep your mouth shut. )

    By the way , this formula is to be followed even if the accident was not your fault. Your innocence or guilt in the matter is entirely irrelevant.

    Confession may be good for the soul ……

    …….. If you are a religious type who believes in things like souls.

    In the secular world , 99 times out of 100 , any admission of any wrong -doing only compounds your misery.

    Makes what might have been no problem into a big problem.

    As often as not , or more often than not , will transform what was actually innocence into an appearance of guilt.

    Can produce a shark effect.

    Once apon a time , the seal of the confessional applied not just to lawyers and priests .

    ( And notice these secular types are so loving and pacifistic that they bitch terribly even about this small concession to privacy and integrity . Apparently because it might inconvenience their sadistic justice a little. )

    it also applied to physicians and to bankers.

    It strikes me as terribly suspicious that there is so much to-do about , narrowly , what one does with ones sex organs .

    But any other part , or aspect , of the body is fair game for the scrutiny , opinions , and fancies , of the anonymous mob.

    Confidentiality where your money or property is concerned ?

    The vast majority of people became Bolsheviks in lock-step agreement with Lenin on that one a long time ago.

    Institutions habitually play cover – up .

    Institutions habitually play cover – up, EVEN WHEN THEY HAVEN’T DONE ANYTHING WRONG.

    The Catholic Church is hardly some sort of exception in this .

    Law enforcement Institutions habitually play cover – up.

    ( Need I say it again ? Even when the police haven’t done anything wrong. )

    Ok , so maybe you aren’t a lawyer , and maybe you have never been associated with any institution ?

    Well, unless you have been living in a cave , and you are the fucking Virgin Mary , I have no doubt that more than once in your life you have , yourself , orchestrated a cover -up , and did so even in a case where you did nothing wrong.

    And you did it because a great many people are not really fair.

    Some people , and you often do not know who , ahead of time , or even later , are actively your enemies.

    And some people would hang you from a tree , and not for any special reason , but just for the fun of it.

    But , ok , let’s pretend this is really some sort of fucking revelation to you .

  97. KesaAnna June 15, 2018 at 3:16 am #

    ” taking action against religious associations has been done before, as in the Branch Davidians in Waco. ”

    Funny you should mention that incident.

    What I remember about that incident is folks ramming a tank into a building occupied by children.

    Now my memory , granted , concerning youth is not what it once was , but I am pretty sure that , when I was , say , nine years old , if some folks had rammed a tank into a building I occupied , I simply would not fucking believe that they did so because they loved me.

    And I wouldn’t believe it forty years later.

    ” It’s not only that people still voluntarily set foot in RC Churches. ”

    No , not only.

    JUST PRIMARILY.

    ” close the churches and shut down all its offices. ”

    We are talking about real estate and square footage ?

    I suspect you are really talking about putting guns in the faces of little old ladies and 15 year old girls , but don’t want to put it that way.

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