We've already discussed some of the reasons, but here's another from the WSJ.
[WSJ] The indictment of 12 Russian military intelligence agents last week, on charges they hacked into Democratic National Committee and other servers during the 2016 campaign, raises questions about the timing of the announcement and the work of the hackers themselves. The news came on the eve of the Trump-Putin summit. Why then?
The president was told of the indictments before he traveled. Yet the plain effect of the announcement was to raise further doubts about the wisdom of the meeting‐and perhaps to shape its agenda. Neither is the business of the special counsel or anyone else at the Justice Department. The department has a longstanding policy, not directly applicable here but at least analogous, that candidates should not be charged close to an election, absent urgent need, lest the charges themselves affect the outcome. The general principle would seem to apply: Prosecutors are supposed to consider the impact of their actions on significant events outside the criminal-justice system, and to act with due diffidence.
#1
The point likely was not merely to inflict damage but also to send a warning.
The Russians would have had the ability to blackmail Clinton, and still do. Death by 30,000 emails, a 'Russian' insurance policy.
The 30,000 Clinton emails? They're 'now' part of an 'ongoing criminal investigation' involving a consortium of evil Russians. Sorry, you cannot see them.
#2
By tradition, evidence is necessary in court of American law. Compartmentalized info does not qualify as 'you'll have to take my word for it' in a just court of law. Given who'd play that line, let's just say, no, we don't believe you.
#3
The 30,000 Clinton emails? They're 'now' part of an 'ongoing criminal investigation' involving a consortium of evil Russians. Sorry, you cannot see them.
Add to that the DNC hacking, the Awans, DWS and all the rest. See those documents, no we're sorry. They are now all part of the on-going Russian indictments.
#4
Yet the plain effect of the announcement was to raise further doubts about the wisdom of the meeting‐and perhaps to shape its agenda.
Donald Trump doesn't do "plain effects". I have been forced to the conclusion that trump can make lemonade out of lemons faster than any other politician / celebrity. No matter what you deal him say an off suit seven deuce, he will find a way to make it a winning hand.
[Gateway Pundit] President Trump held an interview Monday with Sean Hannity from FOX News after his meeting and press conference with Vladimir Putin.
President Trump told Sean Hannity that he believes Peter Strzok was working with President Obama.
President Trump: Before I won he said this is nothing and it can’t happen. It’s a very dishonest deal. We have to find out who did Peter Strzok report to because it was Comey and it was McCabe and there was also probably Obama. If you think Obama didn’t know what was going on, when you watch, and I said it today when you watch Peter Strzok’s performance, the lover of Lisa Page, the FBI, I tell you I know so many people... He’s a disgrace to our country. He’s a disgrace to our great FBI.
[American Thinker] The conveniently timed indictments of 12 more Russians by Deputy A.G. (or should we just face reality and ditch the word "deputy"?) Rosenstein, who will never see the inside of an American courtroom, probably includes the Russian who "hacked" into John Podesta's email account secured with the password "password." All ensuring the 30,000 Clinton emails are securely nested alongside the Obama transcripts and passports, and will never see the light of day. National Security, ongoing investigations and all of that.
Rosenstein was no doubt pleased with himself to announce that 12 Russian spies were caught ‐ er, spying, on President Obama's watch, by the way, but neglected to include one small detail in his announcement ‐ namely, that DNC chair Donna Brazile and most of the Obama hierarchy let them do it.
As the Daily Caller reported:
Donna Brazile says in her new book the Democratic National Committee (DNC) went against professional advice and sat idly for a month while Russians stole data because primaries were still underway in a number of states.
"In May, when CrowdStrike recommended that we take down our system and rebuild it, the DNC told them to wait a month, because the state primaries for the presidential election were still underway, and the party and the staff needed to be at their computers to manage these efforts," Brazile wrote in her new book, "Hacks."
"For a whole month, CrowdStrike watched Cozy Bear and Fancy Bear operating. Cozy Bear was the hacking force that had been in the DNC system for nearly a year."
Cozy Bear and Fancy Bear are cybersecurity firms that have reported ties with Russian hackers. Both groups are blamed for the hacks on the DNC in 2016. CrowdStrike is a private U.S. cybersecurity firm that oversaw the protection of the DNC's servers.
The DNC never turned its servers over to the FBI, although it is not clear what Obama's and Comey's FBI would have done with them. Instead, Brazile, et al. simply stood by while the Russians emptied the computer jar of its cookies. Among stuff you couldn't make up was election cheater Donna Brazile telling Martha Raddatz, who got choked up over Trump's victory, on ABC's This Week on Sunday that Russian hackers kept her and predecessor Debbie Wasserman Schultz so busy that the DNC barely had time to put its fingers on the scale to tip the nomination to Bernie Sanders while feeding Hillary Clinton debate questions in advance. As ABC reported:
#2
We all know that they didn't anticipate Hillary's loss (and she would not have lost to a "Regular Republican").
(a) They were shocked and lashing out looking for somebody to blame.
(b) The "cognitive elites" know (because it's part of their superior education) that "the deplorables" have a blind, unthinking hatred of Russia.
(c) The top levels of CIA/FBI, who are part of the "cognitive elites" - look at the email server scandal, were willing to go along (with a bit of help from their British friends - novichok anyone?).
#4
Podesta emails with the password PASSWORD was an invitation. The Awans had carte blanche to Dem Congresscritters computers and probably DNC also. HRC server was unprotected for awhile. Weiner used his computer for nefarious things. We don't know what escaped that computer. FBI never looked at DNC servers. Probably many foreign entities could have accessed data with little difficulty.
Sheriff Joe reads the Burg ?
[Breitbart] Joe Arpaio, the former Sheriff of Maricopa County, Arizona revealed that if he wins the U.S. Senate race in his state he would push for the deployment of the U.S. military inside Mexico to stop drugs, gangs and illegal aliens before they reach the American border.
Arpaio is running for the Republican nomination for the Arizona Senate seat that will be vacated by Sen. Jeff Flake. He spoke last night in an interview on this reporter’s talk radio program "Aaron Klein Investigative Radio," broadcast on New York’s AM 970 The Answer and News Talk 990 AM in Philadelphia.
Unveiling part of his policy agenda, Arpaio explained his proposal to deploy U.S. troops inside Mexico:
#4
No thank you.
It would generate a local insurgency that wouldn't be worth the blood and treasure spent to fight it in the long run.
However, seizing a mile on both sides of the border to turn into a DMZ with barbed wire and angry dogs would do a lot to keep the foot traffic from there away.
#5
However, seizing a mile on both sides of the border to turn into a DMZ with barbed wire and angry dogs would do a lot to keep the foot traffic from there away.
Don't forget the machine guns.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
07/17/2018 14:38 Comments ||
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#6
...remote machine guns. Seems the Israelis have such a system for border surveillance and enforcement.
[PJMedia] President Trump offended the entire political spectrum with a tweet this morning blaming the U.S. for poor relations with Russia. "Our relationship with Russia has NEVER been worse thanks to many years of U.S. foolishness and stupidity," the president said, and he is entirely correct. By this I do not mean to say that Russia is a beneficent actor in world affairs or that President Putin is an admirable world leader. Nonetheless, the president displayed both perspicacity and political courage when he pointed the finger at the United States for mismanaging the relationship with Russia. People who easily offended are, probably, not very sure that they're right
An interesting perspective.
[In Military] When Russian President Vladimir Putin sits down at the table in Helsinki on Monday, he will surely have in the back of his mind some intelligence worries that have nothing to do with the U.S. president seated across from him.
Putin’s elite spy world has been penetrated by U.S. intelligence. That’s the implication of the extraordinarily detailed 29-page indictment of 12 Russian military intelligence (GRU) officers handed up by special counsel Robert S. Mueller III’s investigators on Friday. The 11-count charge includes names, dates, unit assignments, the GRU’s use of "X-agent" malware, its bitcoin covert funding schemes and a wealth of other tradecraft.
Putin must be asking himself: How did the Americans find out all these facts? What other operations have been compromised? And how much else do they know?
"The Russians have surely begun a ’damage assessment’ to figure out how we were able to collect this information and how much damage was done to their cyber capacity as a result," says Jeffrey Smith, a former CIA general counsel, in an email. "They are probably also doing a CI (counter-intelligence) assessment to determine whether we have any human sources or whether the Russians made mistakes that we were able to exploit."
Must the GRU assume that officers named in Friday’s indictment are now "blown" for further secret operations? Should Russian spymasters expect that operations they touched are now compromised? What about other Russian operations that used bitcoin, or X-agent, or another hacking tool called X-Tunnel? Has the United States tracked such operations and identified the targets? Finally, how are U.S. intelligence services playing back the information they’ve learned ‐ to recruit, exploit or compromise Russian officers?
#1
What he knows is that US intelligence/counter intelligence services are in revolt against the elected president - that gives Russia certain opportunities, which might be weighted against the risks.
#2
What he knows is that US intelligence/counter intelligence services are in revolt against the elected president - that gives Russia certain opportunities, which might be weighted against the risks.
Had Vlad not been hacking our election and political process, none of this turmoil would be taking place, NONE OF IT! The 'Reset' was working I tell you.
#3
Are Democratic computers more secure now than they were before their vulnerabilities were publically revealed? What about government computers previously compromised?
[WSJ] Eighteen months into Donald Trump’s term, the world is having trouble coming to grips with the most unconventional American president ever. Still, he is neither a bad dream from which the U.S. will soon wake up, nor a fool to be ridiculed.
For someone his critics say is a compulsive liar, Mr. Trump has been remarkably true to his word. Especially compared with his predecessor, he doesn’t moralize. It’s classic Trump to be openly exasperated by the Group of 7’s hand-wringing hypocrisy. Unlike almost every other democratic leader, Mr. Trump doesn’t try to placate critics. He knows it’s more important to get things done than to be loved.
The holder of the world’s most significant office should always be taken seriously. Erratic and ill-disciplined though Mr. Trump often seems, there’s little doubt that he is proving a consequential president. On the evidence so far, when he says something, he means it‐and when he says something consistently, it will happen.
Continued on Page 49
#1
I would read anything in der Wall Street nie Trumpf why?
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/17/2018 11:30 Comments ||
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#2
I'll read it for you, Mike. The truth is that the rest of the world needs America much more than America needs us. The U.S. has no threatening neighbors. It’s about as remote from the globe’s trouble spots as is possible to be. It’s richly endowed with resources, including energy and an almost boundless agricultural capacity. Its technology is second to none. Its manufacturing base is vast. Its people are entrepreneurial in their bones. From diversity, it has built unity and an enviable pride in country.
[Free Beacon] Self-declared Democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who defeated Rep. Joe Crowley (D., N.Y.) in a congressional primary last month, said Friday that material gains under capitalism were the result of "human evolution."
Ocasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old whom DNC Chairman Tom Perez called "the future of our party," explained her views on democratic socialism to "Firing Line" host Margaret Hoover. Hoover asked about the future of capitalism and pointed out that it’s the economic system that has brought the most people out of poverty, but Ocasio-Cortez attributed modern prosperity to humanity’s natural growth.
"I think that those things that you talk about, that you discuss, are part of the course of human evolution," she said. "So I would hope that the most recent economic system, our current economic system, is the one that is most beneficial for everyday people."
She added that her preferred system of democratic socialism would work best if people were only to vote for something if it is "a good idea."
"When we talk about democratically socialist economies, first of all, they’re done with the full input of everybody," she said. "You vote. It’s democratic. So if something is not a good idea, it doesn't get voted for, ideally."
She granted that capitalism was temporarily the "most efficient and best" system, but that it must change "as we evolve."
[Hoover] After the recent G-7 meeting, some European nations such as France and Germany expressed anger that their views were given short shrift by Donald Trump‐displaying fits of pique memorialized in a now infamous photo of standing G-7 leaders who were leaning into a surrounded and sitting Trump. "International cooperation," huffed an unidentified senior French official, "cannot depend on being angry and on sound bites. Let's be serious." The former British ambassador to the U.S., Peter Westmacott, sniffed, "Trump is readier to give a pass to countries that pose a real threat to Western values and security than to America’s traditional allies. If there is a ’method to the madness,’ to use the words of British Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, it is currently well hidden."
Yet in current foreign policy journals, a constant theme is European leaders who lament that Europe does not get its due on the world stage. Why would that be?
After all, if "Europe" is defined by the membership of the 28-member European Union, then it should easily be the world’s superpower. The European project now has an aggregate population (512 million) that dwarfs that of the United States (326 million). Even its GDP ($20 trillion) is often calibrated as roughly equivalent to or even larger than America’s ($19 trillion).
Continued on Page 49
#1
Is it just me or do the three Americans on the Thalys train in 2015 symbolize the entire issue?
Posted by: Richard Aubrey ||
07/17/2018 0:31 Comments ||
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#2
A thirty something still living in his mother's basement demands respect! Meanwhile has the bro's over, scores some pot, and trolls the net. Haven't we seen this story before?
#3
A continental ethos of agnosticism, state dependency, childlessness, and multiculturalism leaves Europe especially vulnerable to both the foreign challenges of a dangerous neighborhood, and massive influxes of mostly Muslim immigrants,
But if the peasants will reproduce, this is the plan that must be undertaken to ensure the survival of the tax schemes and ruling oligarchy.
#5
They're SO used to coasting on unearned respect. Now that it's come to an end, they're reacting poorly. Not surprising. Spoiled adult children don't take it well when Dad kicks them out of the house at age 30.
It's really rather cruel when you think about it. Why didn't Dad do this long ago?
Posted by: Herb McCoy ||
07/17/2018 7:34 Comments ||
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#6
Is it just me or do the three Americans on the Thalys train in 2015 symbolize the entire issue?
This. They were all descendants of Europe which has lost its brightest, bravest and best to US immigration and war.
Posted by: regular joe ||
07/17/2018 12:08 Comments ||
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#7
Trump is readier to give a pass to countries that pose a real threat to Western values and security than to America’s traditional allies.
I can't think of anything that poses a greater threat to Western values and security than opening Europe's borders to barbarians from the Middle East.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
07/17/2018 12:16 Comments ||
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#8
Western Values?
The new ones are nihilism and globalism. The old ones like classical liberalism, they killed a couple generations ago. There's nothing to defend.
BERLIN (Reuters) - Germany’s foreign minister said on Monday Europe could not rely on Donald Trump and needed to close ranks after the U.S. president called the European Union a "foe" with regard to trade. Thunderous applause.
"We can no longer completely rely on the White House," Heiko Maas told the Funke newspaper group. "To maintain our partnership with the USA we must readjust it. The first clear consequence can only be that we need to align ourselves even more closely in Europe." Trump's major objective: stop everyone from being so goddamned dependent on the US federal government. They're helping him and they don't even realize it.
He added: "Europe must not let itself be divided however sharp the verbal attacks and absurd the tweets may be."
Posted by: Herb McCoy ||
07/17/2018 00:00 ||
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#1
I would change Federal government to US taxpayers
#2
Trump's set them up to fail he knows the EUSSR will collapse and has very little popular support but the looting classes will close ranks and try inflicting more EUSSR on the peoples of Europe.
BLUF:
[The Federalist] By intentionally treating Trump’s denial of colluding with Russia as a repudiation of Russian interference in the 2016 election, the liberal media seeks to accomplish three goals, one silly and two significant. First, by painting the president as a "Russian interference denier," the press attempts to make Trump look foolish, incompetent, or both. While this may be music to Manhattan, Main Street America has long ago tired of this tactic and writes it off as the fake news it is.
Conflating allegations that Trump colluded with Russia with evidence that Russia interfered in the 2016 election also serves two more nefarious purposes: One, it allows the media to ignore Trump’s true criticism of the special counsel’s investigation into his presidential campaign. Two, it allows the press to pretend evidence of Russian misconduct equates to proof that the Trump campaign was complicit in Russia’s interference in the election.
Skipping down to the closing:
This all goes to prove what Trump has been saying all along‐that the special counsel’s investigation collusion between his campaign and Russia is a witch hunt.
The media may believe it is hurting Trump by continuing the Russia collusion charade, but it is not. The Left’s trial by ordeal will not destroy Trump, but it may well hurt our country and achieve Russia’s goal of sowing discord. Friday’s indictment of Russian nationals and Kremlin’s military agency should have united Americans in outrage over Russia’s attempts to influence our election, but instead a sideshow ensued, all to put Trump in his place.
What the press doesn’t realize, however, is that if it continues these efforts, Trump’s place will be the White House for another term.
[Daily Caller] Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul said critics of President Trump’s meeting with Russian President Vladmir Putin in Helsinki, Finland have "Trump derangement syndrome" Monday on CNN.
"Let me get right to the questioning. Do you believe that President Trump’s meeting with Putin made America safer?" asked CNN host Wolf Blitzer.
"You know, I think engagement with our adversaries, conversation with our adversaries is a good idea. Even in the height of the cold War, maybe at the lowest ebb when we were in the midst of the Cuban missile crisis, I think it was a good thing that Kennedy had a direct line to Khrushchev. I think it was a good thing that we continued to have ambassadors to Russia even when we really objected greatly to what was going on, even during Stalin’s regime. So I think that it is a good idea to have engagement," Paul said.
"And I think that what is lost in this is that I think there’s a bit of Trump derangement syndrome. I think there are people that hate the president so much that this could have easily been President Obama early in the first administration setting the reset button and trying to have better relations with Russia and I think it’s lost on people that they are a nuclear power," Paul continued.
The Kentucky senator added, "They have influence in Syria. They’re in close proximity to our troops in Syria. They are close to the peninsula of North Korea and may have some influence that could help us there. The other thing that’s lost and people forget this completely, the Russians tried to help us stop the Boston marathon bombing. We actually did help them stop a terrorist attack in St. Petersburg because we were communicating and exchanging information."
Paul went on to say that "all of those things are good, and because people hate Trump so much, all of that’s being lost."
#3
"When I hear Brennan or Clapper either saying the kind of things they've been saying recently, then it tells me, wow, we must be getting close to them," Gohmert said. "Those guilty dogs are barking pretty loud." Rep. Louie Gohmert
[Gateway Pundit] The Democrat Socialists of America support no borders, no profit, no prisons and no cash bail.
This weekend Ocasio Cortez held an interview with Firing Line with Margaret Hoover on PBS.
In typical Socialists fashion Ocasio-Cortez unloaded on Israel:
Ocasio-Cortez: "I also think that what people are starting to see at least with the occupation of Palestine is the increasing crisis of humanitarian condition. And that to me is where I tend to come from on this issue."
[Free Beacon] The Republican National Committee is seizing the opportunity presented by the upcoming Supreme Court confirmation battle to energize conservative voters ahead of the 2018 midterms.
Only minutes after President Donald Trump announced his nomination of U.S. Appeals Court judge Brett Kavanaugh to replace Justice Anthony Kennedy, the RNC unveiled how it planned to litigate the case for confirmation directly in front of the American public.
In its efforts, the RNC is relying on methods that previously proved successful in securing the confirmations of Justice Neal Gorsuch, CIA director Gina Haspel, and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.
The plan, relying heavily on the RNC's extensive field, data, and digital operations, is premised on two phases. The first, which has already begun, is centered on educating voters to Kavanaugh's judicial record and qualifications. To that end, a significant portion of the RNC's resources will be consigned to pushing back against distortions likely to be made of Kavanaugh's personal and professional life.
[Breitbart] Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) lambasted President Donald Trump’s joint press conference with Russian President Vladimir in Helsinki, Finland on Monday.
The Arizona senator released a statement describing President Trump’s remarks during the press conference as "pathetic," disgraceful," and "painful" to observe ‐ "a recent low point in the history of the American Presidency."
"Today’s press conference in Helsinki was one of the most disgraceful performances by an American president in memory. The damage inflicted by President Trump’s naiveté, egotism, false equivalence, and sympathy for autocrats is difficult to calculate. But it is clear that the summit in Helsinki was a tragic mistake," Sen. McCain’s statement begins. "President Trump proved not only unable, but unwilling to stand up to Putin. He and Putin seemed to be speaking from the same script as the president made a conscious choice to defend a tyrant against the fair questions of a free press, and to grant Putin an uncontested platform to spew propaganda and lies to the world."
#4
Presidents Trump and Putin sitting down and calling each other SOB's for a few hours would have availed the United States and the world so much more. [sarc off]
Darth Bolton, Mattis, Kelly, Pompeo, and the rest of the Trump team are not going to let the President fail. No one has any illusions about Vlad Putin.
As an aside, does any one think the President's wife, a graduate of University of Ljubljana is pro Putin ?
#10
The meeting was probably a more business-like (and private!) version of: Patton (1970) - Russian son of a bitch scene
Trump doesn't trust Putin, Putin doesn't trust Trump, and both have business that must be done.
#11
The meeting was probably a more business-like (and private!) version of: Patton (1970) - Russian son of a bitch scene
Trump doesn't trust Putin, Putin doesn't trust Trump, and both have business that must be done.
#12
The meeting was probably a more business-like (and private!) version of: Patton (1970) - Russian son of a bitch scene
Trump doesn't trust Putin, Putin doesn't trust Trump, and both have business that must be done.
You cannot expect that explanation to satisfy those who want war with Russia.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
07/17/2018 11:40 Comments ||
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#13
Just die, Juan
Posted by: Frank G ||
07/17/2018 11:42 Comments ||
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#14
Trump and Putin should have pre-recorded a horrible yelling match and played it through the door while they actually had a conversation.
#19
Picture Don Corleone and the Turk negotiating, I bet that's the approach Trump takes. How can you negotiate better. Be prepared. Know your strengths and the weaknesses of the other party. See a lesson from El Padrino!
[Jerusalem Post] The Democrats hated Monday’s news conference between US President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin; even some Republicans cringed when Trump said he believed Putin’s denial of involvement in the 2016 US election over what his own intelligence agencies maintain; and many Europeans leaders surely recoiled at the US president appearing so cozy with a man they view as a real and present threat.
But one man who was definitely pleased at what he saw at that extraordinary news conference in Helsinki on Monday was Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.
No, his pleasure had nothing to do with the two leaders’ answers to the questions about the alleged election collusion, or their discussion about how they will deal with their competition in the field of gas and oil.
Netanyahu was pleased because his full-court diplomatic press leading up to this meeting ‐ a diplomatic campaign that brought him to Moscow last week for less than 24 hours, and included a phone conversation with Trump on Saturday ‐ paid off.
There, at a news conference being watched by the whole world, both leaders ‐ both! ‐ acknowledged Israel’s security concerns in Syria and the need to address them. Big dogs minding the fact that it's the little dog's yard - and, actually, it's not so little
[Quillette] I drive food delivery for an online app to make rent and support myself and my young family. This is my new life. I once had a well paid job in what might be described as the social justice industry. Then I upset the wrong person, and within a short window of time, I was considered too toxic for my employer’s taste. I was publicly shamed, mobbed, and reduced to a symbol of male privilege. I was cast out of my career and my professional community. Writing anything under my own byline now would invite a renewal of this mobbing—which is why, with my editor’s permission, I am writing this under a pseudonym. He knows who I am.
In my previous life, I was a self-righteous social justice crusader. I would use my mid-sized Twitter and Facebook platforms to signal my wokeness on topics such as LGBT rights, rape culture, and racial injustice. Many of the opinions I held then are still opinions that I hold today. But I now realize that my social-media hyperactivity was, in reality, doing more harm than good.
Within the world created by the various apps I used, I got plenty of shares and retweets. But this masked how ineffective I had become outside, in the real world. The only causes I was actually contributing to were the causes of mobbing and public shaming. Real change does not stem from these tactics. They only cause division, alienation, and bitterness.
Posted by: Bangkok Billy ||
07/17/2018 08:50 ||
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#1
Blue on blue??? Uh, that's red on red, friend.
Posted by: Herb McCoy ||
07/17/2018 10:45 Comments ||
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#2
I love this sentence,
"...I was publicly shamed, mobbed, and reduced to a symbol of male privilege...."
if you are shamed and mobbed doesn't that mean you aren't privileged?
Posted by: lord garth ||
07/17/2018 18:16 Comments ||
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Our Constitution forbids the creation of "titles of nobility." The Framers thought it was important enough that the prohibition appears twice, once forbidding the federal government from doing it, and elsewhere extending the ban to the states.
And Americans, to the extent that they give the question any thought at all, probably think that the ban works: After all, nobody’s squiring about the United States, sporting titles like Duke of Pennsylvania or Earl of Internal Revenue.
But now I’m wondering if we don’t have a problem. First, Charles C.W. Cooke, a Brit who just recently became an American citizen, noted the practice of calling former government officials by their former titles and called it "grotesque." It’s something he discussed in a recent book.
"By custom, we allow our politicians to retain their titles for life. Throughout the 2012 election, Mitt Romney was referred to as 'Governor Romney,' though he had not been in public office for six years," Cooke wrote. "One can only ask, 'Why?' America being a nation of laws and not men, political power is not held in perpetuity, and there is supposed to be no permanent political class.
#1
I would say that America has a problem with rent-seeking, and the political system has a failure mode around this.
Whereas marxism is straight extortion to the state, rent-seeking is west's Achilles heel. Of course progressive policies on taxation and min wages tends to magnify these problems but the cause is basically government giving out title for free.
This sounds capitalist but title is the government's main product! The capitalist thing to do is actually charge a market rate for this (not that easy to do admittedly). My preference is for this huge amount to be disbursed as a adult citizens dividend (and replace failure reward benefits), then the states charge a fixed fee for everyone. This effectively sets the average rent = 0, it also tends to prevent land speculation which sucks capital out of the productive economy and causes banking crashes on a cycle.
#3
Cheap labour (below average wage typically) always means taxpayer subsidized labour.
The other benefit of the above is that non-citizen migrants pay their way (they don't get a dividend but pay the taxes) and thus have to be in actual demand not just a cheaper replacement.
#4
America also has a cult problem: Silly Con Valley and Elon Musk. "Elon" called the head of the Thai cave rescue operation a pedophile yesterday. Will instapundit denounce that or offer to handle "Elon's" slander suit pro bono? Schnatter got the career death penalty for saying the N word in a training call. Will "Elon's" board flush him or play "Lizzy Holmes wait-n-see?" Inquiring minds want to know...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
07/17/2018 9:42 Comments ||
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#5
When the armed might of the State gets involved in the economy then 'cheap labor' becomes corvée labor and then flat-out slave labor. The money to pay for projects will inevitably run out and then the lash will be employed. They have been floating the idea of a mandatory labor draft for decades...
[Townhall] The most frequently used description of America by those who advocate for large numbers of immigrants -- those here legally or illegally -- is "America is a nation of immigrants."
The statement sounds meaningful. But in reality, it's meaningless. What else could America be? If no one had come to America from elsewhere, the North American continent would have remained populated only by its indigenous people -- which is what many on the left wish had happened. As the late Howard Zinn, author of "A People's History of the United States," the most widely used American history text in high schools and universities, said to me, the world was not better off thanks to the founding of America.
So, the statement "America is a nation of immigrants" tells us nothing about the only questions that matter: Should be there any limits to immigration? And what should we do about illegal immigration?
Regarding the first question, an increasing number of Americans on the left do not believe in any limits: We should allow all those escaping poverty or violence into the United States. As Hillary Clinton was caught on tape saying, she doesn't believe in borders. She speaks for the American left: In the past few weeks, leftists have marched in American streets demanding the abolition of ICE, the Immigration and Customs Enforcement agency.
Therefore, for the left, the second question, "What should we do about immigration?" is essentially irrelevant. Their answer is "Nothing. All migrants are welcome."
It was also a nation of slavery. Want to go back? Society and economics change over generations. Time to end slavery came. Time to control who comes into our house is long past due.
#2
I wonder how California would feel if they were flooded by Republican voting Cubans rather than hopefully Democrat voting Mexican and Central Americans.
[WSJ] Netflix Reports Weaker-Than-Expected Number of New Subscribers:
Video site blamed faulty internal forecasting, not business reasons like price increases
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Gateway Pundit] President Trump held an interview Monday with Sean Hannity from FOX News after his meeting and press conference with Vladimir Putin.
Frankly, it's not 'Russian' intelligence officers I'm actually concerned about. 
[Gateway Pundit] The Democrat Socialists of America support no borders, no profit, no prisons and no cash bail.
[Townhall] The most frequently used description of America by those who advocate for large numbers of immigrants -- those here legally or illegally -- is "America is a nation of immigrants."
