#2
Either that or they cut a deal on the wall hoping to influence his decision on her replacement. In fact that may be the reason behind the whole wall showdown to begin with, they knew her health was bad and were trying to manufacture bargaining chips.
#9
Troublingly similar in appearance to Lexx baddie Mantrid...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
01/10/2019 22:31 Comments ||
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#10
A lawyerly little old lady --
Let's call her Ruth Bader O'Grady --
Croaked, "Girls, to the gurneys!
You'll all be attorneys
And rule from the bench till you're eighty!"
Jabotinsky... something... Lewinsky? Sigh. I tried.
CHICAGO (Reuters) - How bad was 2018 for investors? They pulled a record amount of money from stock and bond funds late in 2018 and tucked it into safe havens such as CDs, money market funds or U.S. Treasuries that mature in a year or less.
In better times, investors usually use bonds as a buffer when stocks turn nasty, but last year stock and bond funds alike were losers. The Standard & Poor’s 500 fell 4 percent for the year and the bond funds tracked by Lipper, on average, dropped 1.7 percent. Meanwhile, the top money market funds provided returns of more than 2.4 percent.
"The flight to safety was perplexing because this was not a 2008 market meltdown, but I don’t think people are willing to wait anymore to see," said Tom Roseen, Lipper Head of Research.
Among the concerns gnawing at investors: uncertainty about interest rate increases, the U.S. trade dispute with China and slowing global growth.
"This is the first time in years, that I have been looking at cash as a viable asset class," said Linda Erickson, a Greensboro, North Carolina certified financial planner.
Every quarter last year she advised clients to sell 2 percent of their stock portfolio and add the money to a money market fund. The goal was to create a safe stash that would not suffer losses in bonds if interest rates continued to rise. With some money market funds and savings accounts yielding more than 2 percent, parking cash was far more acceptable in 2018 over previous years where interest rates were closer to zero for the same accounts.
#2
...or two years calculating, that while there will be significant regional spikes (particularly in NIMBY locations), inflation on certain commodities.
#4
..what do you mean 'unless', that's what the Fed did for 8 years under Obean. Those half million dollar homes and their paper that went to quarter million dollar homes and paper in 2009 are now back to half a million. Meanwhile the peasants are paying double for gas, bread, milk, etc.
#5
That's good inflation whereby the taxpayers fund an asset class that does nothing for the productivity of the economy, the establishment protection agency AKA the fed will worry about all those workers not being fined so much and getting pay rises.
#8
over the past 10 years, the S&P (based on various exchange traded funds) has, on average, risen by about 10% a year (compounded and assuming dividends were reinvested)
this is true even though in 2018 the S&P lost about 5%
Posted by: lord garth ||
01/10/2019 21:30 Comments ||
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[WSJ] The U.S. Senate is back in session, and therefore so is the Democratic nominations blockade. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer demanded Wednesday that President Trump withdraw his nomination of Bill Barr as Attorney General, even though Mr. Barr served with distinction as President George H.W. Bush’s AG. The question is whether Senate Republicans are going to do anything more to overcome this deliberate political obstruction than they did in the last two years.
The Senate confirmed 77 stalled nominees‐a collection of ambassadors, U.S. attorneys or other non-controversial picks‐by voice vote on Jan. 2. But thanks mostly to Democratic objections, the upper chamber returned to the White House 384 nominees it failed to confirm in the 115th Congress. That includes some 70 judicial nominees.
The White House will now have to renominate these men and women, assuming they haven’t given up in frustration. Mark Greenblatt was nominated to be inspector general of the Ex-Im Bank in September 2017, 16 months ago. The Banking Committee approved him three months later; he’s still waiting for a floor vote. Burlington Stores exec Janet Dhillon, the nominee to lead the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, has been waiting 18 months.
The Partnership for Public Service reports that 543 of President Trump’s 934 nominations had been confirmed by Dec. 19, 2018. At the same point in Barack Obama’s presidency, 809 of his 1,003 picks had Senate approval.
The White House was rightly criticized for its slow start with executive-branch nominations, but the main problem long ago became the systematic Democratic effort to prevent President Trump from filling out the government. First, Democrats take as much time as possible tying up nominees in committee. Once even non-controversial nominees get to the floor, Democrats then object to a quick voice-vote confirmation and demand a cloture vote that requires 30 hours of floor debate.
In the 115th Congress, there were 128 cloture votes for Trump judicial and executive nominees, compared with 12 for Mr. Obama’s nominees in his first two years. Mr. Trump’s six most recent predecessors combined faced no more than two dozen cloture votes in their first two years.
Consider David Schenker, who was nominated last April to be assistant secretary of state for near eastern affairs. A fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, Mr. Schenker speaks Arabic and held a high-ranking Pentagon job in the George W. Bush Administration.
Yet Virginia Democrat Tim Kaine has held Mr. Schenker hostage, demanding that the Trump Administration turn over the memo that authorized U.S. air strikes against the Assad regime for using chemical weapons. Mr. Schenker’s nomination was returned to the White House last week.
Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has made confirming judicial nominees a priority given their lifetime tenure, and the upper chamber confirmed 85 judges in the last Congress. Yet there are still 145 judicial vacancies, and Democrats will try to delay the nominations for every one in hopes of leaving many for what they expect to be a Democratic President in 2021.
Mr. McConnell had his best success on nominees last Congress when he threatened to keep Senators in town over weekends and recesses until certain nominations received a floor vote. He should do that again starting in the first weeks. Republicans also should negotiate a change in the cloture rule for non-controversial nominees to eight hours of debate from 30. The GOP granted that to Democrats from 2013-15. If Mr. Schumer won’t do the same, Republicans should unilaterally change the rule at least for the executive branch.
The Beltway press corps is full of stories about the trouble caused for civil servants by the current partial government shutdown. Yet the media don’t report that an elected American President can’t put a government in place even after half his term is over. This gives the permanent bureaucracy far more power than America’s Founders intended.
This affront to democratic self-rule is more damaging to effective government than temporary furloughs, and don’t be surprised if Republicans return the favor the next time there’s a Democratic President.
[Breitbart] Tuesday on Fox News Channel’s "Hannity" after President Donald Trump’s Oval Office address and the joint response given by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA), syndicated conservative talker Mark Levin praised Trump for the address but excoriated Schumer and Pelosi for their response.
Levin called Pelosi and Schumer "pathological liars" and went on to point out their previous positions on a wall.
"First of all, the president gave an outstanding speech. It was concise. It was compassionate ‐ truly compassionate. He provided the context both in terms of what’s going on in the border: the expense, which is de minimis and who is really responsible. Now, let’s keep a few things in mind when you watch Schumer and Pelosi, they are pathological liars. They have been in Congress over half a century. What the hell have they done about the border? They are part of the scam artists. They get amnesty, legalization, citizenship, and never secure the border. Just spend billions and trillions more ‐ more debt, more deficits on the redistribution of wealth, on $200 billion a year on illegal aliens. One more time: They fooled Reagan. They fooled Bush 41. They fooled Bush 43. But they are not going to fool Donald Trump who has got tougher than Pelosi and Schumer."
[Townhall] Liberals are all about freedom…their freedom to tell us Normal Americans what to think, how to feel, and what to do. And the highest form of liberalism is the ban, a bar to an activity, institution, or attitude that they wish to suppress either to enhance their own power or just for the sheer joy of telling people like us – who they hate – what to do. Often, it’s both.
The following ten targets for prohibition may seem wacky now, but give the left time. “Really?” you might ask. But then, a decade ago everyone knew which bathroom to use, yet here we are. In my three novels about what America would look like if it split into red and blue halves, I tried to invent the craziest aspirations of libs gone wild. And my predictions keep coming true. Mark my words, it’s just a matter of time before they really do resurrect J. Edgar Hoover as an icon of non-binary gender identity.
The following bans are going to happen, as nutty as they may sound. Maybe not tomorrow, and maybe not completely at first, but they will. They can’t not happen, because the fascist imperative of leftism is control, control over every aspect of normal peoples‘ lives.
#4
As a firm believer in the Constitution, I know it theoretically stops them. And yet even today we see constant examples of them flat out ignoring the Constitution and their judges going along with that. DACA is a huge glaring example.
#5
If you're gonna ban private doctors you might as well ban private schools while you're at it.
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
01/10/2019 11:47 Comments ||
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#6
Don't give em more ideas. They already fight charter public schools
Posted by: Frank G ||
01/10/2019 11:56 Comments ||
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#7
Marxism is the belief that :
The choices of others should be ignored and only yours listened to.
Extortion is superior to reciprocation.
The societal cancer will grow until no choice is possible as this reveals the narcissist is not infallible.
It's why islamists want to destroy the infidel west. It shows following the paedo profet makes a shit hole in comparison, they too want to remove the evidence.
#10
The left will crack up in the next decade and the SJW and PC nonsense will be mostly sidelined because they helped get Trump re-elected in 2020.
The left will still be dangerous, but it will be obvious they don't have the support so they will mostly return to universities, silicon valley, and coffee-houses with their nonsense.
#11
#8, they will live in gated compounds and inside those compounds will be private scbools, but not for the common native outside the compound's walls.
h/t Instapundit
This past week Carlson said in a monologue that everyone’s goal should be "strong American families." Sounds innocuous, right? Yet it isn’t, for precisely the reason Carlson gives: America’s elite refuse to address the greatest impediment to reaching this goal.
The dearth of employed men and the subsequent disintegration of marriage.
For stating the obvious, Carlson has been vilified. (Just Google his name and you’ll find all the articles denouncing him for bringing this matter to light.) Even Red Lobster has pulled their advertising from his show. (Note to Red Lobster: What cowards you are!)
Journalists are supposed to report the facts, not make people feel good about those facts. But our politically correct culture no longer allows problems that cause people discomfort to be discussed, let alone solved. So the problems just sit there and wait to be noticed.
...There are two main reasons women‐even feminist women‐prefer to marry men who make more than they do:
1. Because women have babies and men do not, and women want and need the option to cut back or move out of the workforce to care for those babies. No matter how "equal" the sexes seem prior to having kids, it all changes when children come along. At that point, sex differences become glaring. That's why the Left likes abortions so much
.
.
. 2. Because completely upending traditional gender roles, or having a marriage in which the wife and not the husband is the primary breadwinner, is problematic to say the least. And there’s ample research to support this. Never mind the facts, what matters is the feelz!
...In other words, there’s plenty of data to bolster Carlson’s claim that we "consider some of the effects" of women out-earning men. The fact is, he’s right. It’s a lose-lose scenario for everyone.
For men, surely, because an unemployed man who lacks purpose in his life is downright dangerous. And for women, since they can’t find "good" (read: educated and employed) men they want to marry. And for children, who as a result of all this grow up without a dad. It’s a G-damn mess, and no one wants to talk about it except Tucker Carlson.
#1
Formerly, Tucker was a political [an un]common tater at CNN and MSNBC. I hope Carlson doesn't move on from Fox since the Murdock boys took over.
The breakup of male-female families has a detrimental effect on society, women are different than men and the rest of the media are cowards. Yup, yup and yup.
Millenial suburbanites, those children who won't grow up, are screwing up their families big time for all sorts of reasons based on what is considered proper now a days.
It's tough on the kids when the wife wants to wear the pants and the husband the skirt.
#4
>women, since they can’t find "good" (read: educated and employed) men they want to marry.
There's a lot of quite well earning women on the shelf waiting for the bad-boy to marry them lol. Lots of women get the (largely male) taxpayer to fund their reproductive lifestyle.
[The Chattanoogan.com] Lately I've seen a fair amount of criticism of the President's National Security Strategy by retired generals and admirals. Let me throw in my two cents worth.
First, I know a little something about generals and admirals. I was one of them for 13 of my 39 years of active military service. Indeed, I personally know most of the ones who are currently expressing themselves regarding Presidential leadership.
For starters, please understand that since World War II America has pretty much been at war -- continuously. There have been at least 25 wars in which we've participated since WWII. Call them what you will, but to a young sergeant, war is war. Some of these wars have been repeats so the real number approaches 30. Many are so-called "small" conflicts -- again tell that to a young sergeant under fire -- but several have been major including Korea, Vietnam, the 1st Gulf War, Iraq and Afghanistan. If you add CIA operations where the military has been surreptitiously involved, the total number is closer to 40. In just over 70 years we've been actively engaged in up to 40 overseas wars where American service members have been engaged and American wealth has been expended.
That's more than one war every two years. Do we really have that many enemies? What's going on here? And, the cost of these wars has been in multiples of trillions of dollars -- dollars that might otherwise have been put into better future military readiness, infrastructure, lower taxes, social programs, or into a balanced budget.
In short, near continuous wars have been maiming and killing our youth and draining our wealth pretty much continuously since World War II. For all this, today we have an indescribable $21 trillion national debt. And Americans are riding into space on Russian rockets and returning to earth in Kazakhstan -- Kazakhstan! We've sure come a long way since being able to land astronauts on the moon in 1969 and bringing space shuttles home to landings at Cape Kennedy. Meanwhile we have military missions in over 70 countries worldwide. That's over a third of all the countries on Earth.
About the author:
During his 39-year active duty career, Bell's command positions included L Troop, 3d Squadron, 14th Armored Cavalry Regiment; D troop, 5th Reconnaissance Squadron; the 2nd Squadron, 9th Cavalry, 24th Infantry Division (Mechanized); and the 24th Infantry Division's 2nd Brigade Combat Team. Bell deployed as General Schwarzkopf's Executive Officer in Desert Shieldand Desert Storm; and later served as Chief of Staff, USAREUR Forward Headquarters, Taszar, Hungary during Operation Joint Endeavor in the Balkans.
As a BGen, from June 1995 through August 1996, he served as an Assistant Division Commander in both the 3d and 1st Infantry Divisions located at Warner Barracks in Bamberg, Germany.
From August 1996 to July 1999 he served as Chief of Staff of V Corps, and as DCSOPS and subsequently Chief of Staff, United States Army, Europe and 7th Army.
As a MGen, he commanded the U.S. Army Armor Center and Fort Knox from July 1999 through August 2001.
As a LtGen Bell commanded the Army's III Corps from August 2001 to November 2002, headquartered at Fort Hood, Texas.
Following Corps Command, Bell was promoted to four-star general and commanded the United States Army, Europe (USAEUR) and 7th Army, as well as NATO's Land Component Command, Heidelberg, Germany. On completion of his command assignments in Europe, in 2006 Bell was reassigned to South Korea where he commanded U.S. Forces, Korea, the Korea—U.S. Combined Forces Command, and the United Nations Command. Continues.
#1
Well, when you assume the role of the world's police chief...
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
01/10/2019 11:37 Comments ||
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#2
The Real World is more like Go than Chess... Have you ever played Go? Placing extra stones on a board actually hurts you... Empires tend to go bankrupt exceeding the borders they can afford and occupying the bandit lands beyond.
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.
[The Chattanoogan.com] Lately I've seen a fair amount of criticism of the President's National Security Strategy by retired generals and admirals. Let me throw in my two cents worth. 
