The day began with news that during Trump’s first impeachment trial, all the Republican senators believed Trump had broken the law when he tried to force President Volodymyr Zelensky of Ukraine to smear Hunter Biden before he would release the money Congress had appropriated to help Ukraine fight off Russia. “Out of one hundred senators, you have zero who believe you that there was no quid pro quo. None. There’s not a single one,” warned Senator Ted Cruz (R-TX), according to a forthcoming book by
Today Biden named the Republicans who voted against the infrastructure law and then asked for money. Biden said, “I was surprised to see so many socialists in the Republican caucus.” ...
Isnt it amazing that "Sleepy Joe" who's been accused. of dementia, Alzheimers and other old age diseases is qble to speak so coherently when his opponent who has a "good brain" (unused apparently) can't get beyond one syllable words.
The whole dementia thing is absurd. Those of us who are old enough to have watched Biden over the years know that the swing from clarity into rambling "gaffes" has been characteristic of his way of speaking forever. It's just the way his brain and mouth seem to work. I suspect it's about half just a tad of eccentric goofiness (one of my favorite qualities in anyone) and half the fact that he is always working against his long history as a stutterer.
William, the "stable genius" has dropped some of his rants about Sleepy Joe since he's been attempting to ward off an indictment for stealing classified documents and seditious conspiracy. With all that Joe Biden has been doing for two years to clean up TFG's horrible mess, it is stunning to have not only the right (I call them the wrong) constantly lambasting him and even the MSN pointing out his gaffes, while ignoring his having united NATO, repaired the handling of Covid, avoiding a depression with his recovery plan, helping to unsnarl supply chains, passing valid legislation that helps everyone, bringing unemployment to an unprecedented low, and much more. With our voters apparently unable to see through the fog of misinformation and disinformation, it is no wonder that they have no idea what a good politician is, and many are still willing to vote for the Herschel Walkers, Marjorie Taylor Greenes, Lindsey Grahams and Paul Gosars, to name a few.
He is "Dark Biden." A phenomenal super hero who has literally achieved the impossible due to his super tools: experience, knowledge of how goverment works, compassion, tenacity & brilliance. We all need to understand the power of words/tags & bury the harmful ones. TFG is the one who was screened for cognitive impairment/Alzheimers with a Montreal Cognitive Assessment & then was stupid enough to share that info w the public. The irony is mind boggling.
Yes, SusanT. As you probably know, the MoCA is a quick, initial screening test for cognitive impairment. For real professionals--unlike "Dr. Jackson"--it yields suggestions for more extensive screening and testing, if needed. When Trump in his Chris Wallace interview bragged about "acing" the test including his stupendous memory, he hesitatingly recited "Person, Man, Woman, Camera, TV" as the words he was asked for testing remote recall. No cognitive test would use words so obviously associatively linked. Various versions of the MoCA use different words, but one, e.g., uses "face, velvet, church, daisy, red". So Trump went on national TV to demonstrate that (1) if he aced it, he had to cheat; and (2) he remains perfectly willingly to try to brazenly lie his way through any situation.
Don't forget TFGs stroke ie his never explained visit to Walter Reed and his careful shuffling gait after it. And now his difficulty in pronouncing common words. The next step can't come too soon.
William! You are forgetting his most famous word: Covfefe….remember? More than one syllable. Of course, covfefe is not a word, just three syllables of gibberish. Probably his adderall had really kicked in that night…..omg.
Considering that even his tweets were transcribed by a WH aide (short fat fingers do not do well on tiny keyboards), you have to wonder if the aide thought WTF but just put it down as a slam. It was a good one.
There are few among us who haven't committed gaffes, at any age. The whole recent kerfuffle about his calling for the late Congresswoman from Indiana is a case in point. It was disconcerting, at first, but as I think about it, no different from a mother going down the list of her kids' names.
When you consider what this man deals with on a daily basis, I have no idea how he is able to do it physically, let alone cognitively. I doubt that he has a minute to himself, ever. All one has to do is look at Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and other former presidents, many of them much younger than Biden, and it's easy to see what their time in office has done to them. Still, he soldiers on and has accomplished an amazing list of tasks - all off them while under a microscope.
Is anyone surprised that Republicans uniformly say one thing and do another or do one thing and say another? I think that is consistent with every Republican I have seen since 1980.
Republicans, like Ted Cruz, who is particularly reprehensible, are the essence of hypocrites.
And, in Cruz' case? He literally LOOKS like a hippo.
Hey! That’s an insult to the Count, who may have been my favorite Muppet when I watched Sesame Street with my daughters. (What other Muppet used the word “mountebank?”).
I am from Texas; I totally agree with your sentiments. He is horrible. What he posts on his Facebook page is awful. I make sure to respond to his posts on a daily basis. Fortunately, most of responses are from people who totally oppose his posts.
Socialism. Facetiously playing football with the term. Use the term - long associated with poison ivy by both sides - to shame the other. Har.Har.Har.How clever. Capitalism's (and neoliberals') cunning way to keep the term both undefined, in the dark, and weighted as an anathema. The "unspeakable." Biden's recent opening of the Medicare door wider to private equity's clutches together with his 40 year record of willingness to cut Social Security (The Intercept.com) suggest the authentic nature of his long term attitude toward "socialism". Oughtn't all old people - today's and tomorrow's- be enraged at Biden's beckoning Wall Street's involvement? With our for-profit corporate managed health care, how does the USA stack up internationally? How has Josh Gottheimer stoppered the right of the government to bargain for all drug prices? What sector has blocked health care for all/single payer in the USA? "U.S. Health System Ranks Last Among 11 High-Income Countries (an analysis by the non-profit Commonwealth Fund) By Marcia FrellickWebMD.com" "Top-performing countries in the survey have universal coverage, annual out-of-pocket caps on covered benefits, and full coverage for primary care and treatment for chronic conditions." Haven't we allowed "capitalism's" profit obsessed Chamber of Commerce-ilk, corporate adherents et al to undermine our quality of life? "Big corporations that claim to support voting rights are still funding right-wing state AGs Coke, GM, AT&T pay "lip service" to voting rights while funding
GOP vote-suppression forces, says watchdog group By Igor Derysh Salon.com). "Americans have succumbed to the notion that we can mitigate climate change without fundamentally restructuring corporate America, a sentiment that pins blame on consumers and distracts us from advocating more seriously for corporate reform."(Wupr.org) What sector wants our citizens to feel powerless and passive in changing the way things are?
Please explain. "Biden's recent opening of the Medicare door wider to private equity's clutches together with his 40 year record of willingness to cut Social Security (The Intercept.com) suggest the authentic nature of his long term attitude toward "socialism". Oughtn't all old people - today's and tomorrow's- be enraged at Biden's beckoning Wall Street's involvement? "
Direct Contracting is a Medicare program started by Trump’s people near the end of his term. It vastly expands the role of corporations in the care of seniors and those with Medicare due to disabilities. If Congress doesn’t stop it, tens of millions of us will be enrolled in managed care plans without our permission, and the managing will be done by for-profit companies (including private equity firms).
Under Biden (who I think is otherwise doing a fantastic job), this is now called the Medicare REACH program. It was scheduled to roll out this winter, I believe, but fierce opposition from single payer (Medicare For All) supporters has slowed it down. Resisters include Physicians for a National Health Plan (of which I’m a member), Rep. Jayapal, Bernie Sanders, and others.)
I encourage all to read what its supporters and opponents say, and see what you think. IMO, Medicare should cover all it can afford, based on what health care providers advise and patients want. For-profit “managers” should have zero say, and not be getting our tax dollars, unless patients chose to let their care be managed.
I SOECIFICALLY request Original Medicare every year. NO scammy Medicare Advantage plan for me. Anyone who has had a dire illness requiring at the end an organ transplant knows this. I used to have a MediGap plan that covered the 20% remaining. Niw Medicare does NOT offer that anymore. So I have to go outside for more insurance. How did that happen? It SUCKS when you live on Soc Sec alone and are “too old” for Medicaid. That bites too
You're correct re the discontinuation of the Medicgap program. I've been very fortunate- I had to retire from nursing after 35 years of service in a NH County nursing home due to disability (before retirement age), & was able to get Social Security Disability FIRST try (a very rare thing). Here in NH, we have County Nursing Homes & are a political subdivision of the state, and as such have pensions and the County provides a Medicare Advantage like plan that covers almost everything that Medicare doesn't and it includes prescription drugs w/ reasonable med co-pays. I didn't even consider a "real" Advantage plan. The cost isn't too bad and much less that COBRA payments.
You’re quite fortunate Barbara. I got SSDI also with the help of a Fla senator - back in 2007. It’s pretty hard now. I also got Extra Help from Soc Sec - best offer fro rx drugs. Pays for Plan D and big discounts on all drugs - except for immunosuppressants which are paid thru Schedule B since that’s how my transplant was paid for. My sister wants to consider Advantage. Still opposed. Too many rules, more paperwork. Only thing I want is the gym membership! Not enough enticement
Ellie - please Google: private equity making inroads into Medicare and or Medicare members involuntarily switched into private equity plans. Odd - in the past couple months - I’ve read a couple of essays about the Biden’s administration’s welcoming private equity I to the Medicare market - but in googling the matter just now none that I read show up. An argument itself for the necessity of net neutrality. Let me know if you come with zero in your search. And I’ll spend some time willingly to search for and give you specific web sites
Google tends to return results with most hits. You can get a far more honest look by using a search engine that does not save clicks and thus can list more results on your search terms. I recommend Duck Duck Go. I know, funny name, but then Google is too. Duck Duck Go not only gives deeper results, it also protects your privacy because it does not collect data on you or your searches.
Exactly, for example, the word "conservation" is never mentioned in the climate change milieu. Nor are the words "Reduce, Reuse" heard by the Recycling crowd. The actions that would really work would hurt our current lifestyle too much.
This should be an ingredient of any debate between a Democratic and Republican candidate, especially a presidential debate, if one takes place. In addition, I would suggest that the Dem candidate ask the Repub candidate why they keep repeating "socialism" when they know it isn't true, and not back down until the Repub gives a reasonable answer ( a high bar). There are other issues, such as the validity of the 2020 election: the Dem candidate should say that "a lot of people have questions about whether the Earth is flat, do you believe that the Earth is flat?" Something along those lines.
Sadly, we surely did deserve Presidents Reagan, Nixon, Bush, Bush and Trump...
Gen. Dwight David Eisenhower chose the wrong VP, and
President Ford blinked. Wickedly.
Alcoholism is a constant... influencing and affecting Ronny Reagan, Jerry Ford, G W Bush and Bush and Laura, Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller’s Mary Toddhunter Clark,
Hi Folks, guess who had a birthday today? And celebrated by staying up until 2:00 am ET to help save democracy with her Letters from an American? Well, The States Project has one more week to collect funds for good candidates in critical state legislatures to keep or get a Democratic majority. Give a gift in Heather's name--our small donations add up to make a difference! Thanks!
Thank you, folks, for your rally for democracy! Relayed to Heather with your "in honor of" happy birthday wishes:
"72 LFAA Substackers donated for your birthday, with donations that ranged from $5 to $500 (literally), with the average range from $20 to $100. Some people had already joined this Tending to Democracy Giving Circle and specifically made an additional donation today. Also today a few people signed up to donate monthly.
BTW Melissa Walker [at The States Project] can tell you that 100% of donations go out the door to the selected campaigns, since The States Project gets its overhead funded by separate donors.
So happy happy birthday, Heather! When you say to 'speak up' and 'time for all hands on deck,' people are listening!"
Thank you, Ellie, for inviting us to the Birthday Party for Heather and the opportunity to make a contribution in her name. Happy Birthday, Heather, all 365 days of your Birthday Year.
I donated what I could right now, not much (I have to replace my oil tank, ouch) but I figure every little bit helps. I fully agree with what you are doing. But I confess I dedicated my little pledge to honor my dad, who was a union man frustrated with the kind of politics that allowed privileged white men take down unions and trash the environment. He predicted a lot of what has come to pass.
It's all good, and we really are all in this together riding a big blue wave. Working America is another smart progressive fundraising organization that comes out of the AFL-CIO. They also research where best to apply our small dollar donations, and what kind of outreach to voters is most effective where, e.g. social media in Michigan and door-to-door in North Carolina.
Thanks, Ellie. It's interesting to see what various small groups of folks like us are doing and testing. This info will be essential in 2024. But even simply the actions now are hopefully going to help stay the erosion of democracy. I'm so glad to have made the acquaintance of so many choosing to do these things. We are what is going to make the difference in the long run- and the short run, fingers crossed!
We are watching a series called Sherwood about the 1984 coal strikes in England....Maggie Thatcher's doing. My own father did not like unions and he was upset when he figured out that I belonged to the teacher's union.
Ellie, I have unsubscribed from all of the idiotic screaming I have got from the dem PArty's fundraising arm because it has made me furious--and not in the way they intended. But I trust you folks and I agree wholeheartedly that the job of securing democracy has to begin on the local level. So just donated. Thanks for the link!!
Linda, I resigned out of disgust from the Dem executive committee here because they were doing the same old s***, focusing on fundraising instead of building party structure bottom up. Fortunately, there is a solid progressive base here who do their own thing, so at the local level races progressives (with or without capital P) are actually increasing, plus the strongest candidate for Lt Gov is progressive.
It is almost certain our R gov will retain his seat. Dems were not eager willing to take him on: he's popular because of VT pandemic response, and huge dark money is coming from out-of-state to support him. However, a woman, Brenda Siegal, who started shaking things up as a citizen activist decades ago (and almost no one taking her seriously) is running. She has name recognition, running a good campaign, and doing better than anyone expected. She's not expected to even come close, but she is garnering respect. I hope she at least gets enough votes to make the current gov nervous.
You betcha I'm voting for her. I respect how Scott handled the pandemic (by basically staying out of the way), but as the pandemic eased, he went to work building his Repub creds. I worry about Vermont's future with a gov who follows that route and is willing to use his veto power to protect it. Maybe he'll surprise us. Hm.
I agree with you, Linda. The Dems and Repubs appear to use the same awful screaming hyperbolic marketers who cry wolf. Their emails are easy to spot and it no longer pains me to delete delete delete.
The States Project works smart. Thank you for donating!
Thanks for both the happy birthday to Heather and the place to donate in her name. We will be donating this weekend to this and several D. pols. Here in the Oregon governor's race, Uncle Phil, (Phil Knight) has donated millions to Machine Gun Betsy, the spoiler, and now a million, to Drazan (Dracula), the R candidate because Johnson is not going to win, so he is hoping to have influence with the R. Of course, zero to the D, Tina Kotek, and what will happen if she wins....it's close, so I hope she prevails.
As someone who was born and grew up in OR, and still have close ties, I am keeping my fingers crossed. Betsy would be a disaster and Drazen is not a deep thinker. Hope is that Betsy would pull down Drazen, but Betsy is very much a strategist. It is possible she could build a base to hand over to Drazen by pulling out of the race- though her ego might not allow her to do that. I feel sad because there were things I admired about Betsy, but also things about her that limit her.
I have long been impressed with Tina Kotek and her ability to get people to accomplish things in spite of the constant barrage of obstacles the extremist right keeps throwing out. Drazen, despite toning down her rhetoric, is still under the thrall of the extreme right branch of the people calling themselves Republican and who have taken over the Republican party.
I know a number of old-style Republicans who are resisting what that camp is doing. The Republican party in Oregon fell apart years ago, after giving us some fine leaders, when the tea partiers oozed their way in. I do not see a real leader in the current bunch, period.
I do agree. I am not a fan of Betsy because, among other things, she is a fan of Timber Unity (they are calling themselves something else these days) and stands in the way of sensible gun laws. I did wonder if she would pull out, but I don't see that happening. Her ads were on long before anyone else's...probably thanks to Uncle Phil. Tina's ads are the only ones who show exactly what she has been doing and will continue. Now Dracula has an ad out that says that Tina was a bully in the legislature. I think this has to do with dealing with a jerk of a D who, I think, finally resigned. Most of the Rs I know (I confess to not knowing many) did not vote for Trump and can't stand him. Our next door former R pol is registered as an I and I am sure he votes mostly for Ds. Next door in Washington's 3rd district we have a D woman who owns a body shop. Her R opponent is Joe Kent and he is truly awful. In an ad where he was talking to a group, they were all older. We haven't got our ballots yet, but soon. I hope the voters in Clackastan (Clackamus) throw out the county clerk, Sheryl Hall, who is an ongoing disaster and a Trumper.
The animosity toward Tina is because she ran a tight ship. The 21-22 legislature was a sometimes contentious group, and several of the R's were in-your-face contentious at times, holding bills hostage. In spite of that, Tina kept them working, at times bargaining on a fair basis, other times holding the house to the grindstone. But the clincher was the 2021 redistricting process, when the house R's refused to participate on the bipartisan committee under the conditions they had agreed on. and kept blockading progress. Some of them, including one woman I will leave nameless, could not wrap their minds around the fact that each district has to have close to the same population. Land does not vote, people vote, and that's the law. So no, the sparsely popultated eastern part of the state could not be split in two just because it is big, unless each part was combined with some of the more heavily populated western areas. These recalcitrant R's resisted both options and kept accusing the Dems of "gerrymandering". (I followed this process closely, and the R's were the ones drawing strange boundaries.)
Finally, Tina had enough, and removed the Rs who refused to recognize the rules of redistricting from the committee. The Rs threw a major temper tantrum over that, but they did it to themselves.d The whole session was a series of Republican temper tantrums in both houses, spiced by a few scandals to boot, including the removal of an R rep who deliberately let rioters into the building. I could go on.
Yet, at all times during the session, Tina had the house working to pass the most critical bills. It was impressive. I guess if you are a right wing Republican malcontent and you don't get your way, that means that the person in charge is a bully- especially when you don't have any accomplishments of your own to run on. The truth is Tina did one heck of a job, at a time when the Senate was held hostage by a few childish Republicans refusing to participate. This, by the way, is only the tip of the iceberg. Looking back, the Oregon legislature did get some remarkable things done in spite of it all.
2021 was a tough session with a lot of hard feelings all around. I was impressed with the R senators who honored the long tradition of bipartisanship, and by the willingness of most of the house Rs to keep on working in spite of the attempts by a few of their colleagues to disrupt the process.
By Oregonians in general, who just kept on keeping on in the face of everything else that was happening: wildfire, heat, heavy rains and mudslides, and an over-blown media show that was confined to 4 square blocks in downtown Portland but made to look as if the entire city was a combat zone. The BLM folks (including two of my daughters) peacefully marching, singing, chanting. The Moms, a group of white allies, standing around them as a human shield, and The Dads with leafblowers to clear the air of teargas.
In the background of many video feeds in the evening, you could see infiltrators from the Proud Boys and similar sneak in behind and try to start something, some caught vandalizing or starting small fires to entertain lazy media. So the nation got distorted images about what was going on, both in the media and in the demonstrations - until the truth came out and the media had to start taking a hard look at how it did things.
A wonderful drone flight demonstrated the truth as it lifted above the tight focus of other media, and showed people simply going about their business in the surrounding blocks and streets. It pulled up to view the city in the long, sunlit evening looking like it normally does.
This election will, as in many states, set the tone for Oregon for the next decade at least. I keep my fingers crossed, but it is still functioning, and still seems to be connected to the values that have helped it make it through the 20th century and which are still guiding it to remain and grow the progressive state I raised my kids in, in spite of the regressive push to undo decades of forward thinking.
BTW, I love your reference to Clackastan. That place has been run as a sort of low-level autocracy for far too long. I hope the folks there finally take the steps to make it really what the people there want.
Thanks for this long post on all the things going on. I can't claim Clackastan as my own as a friend of ours in Portland calls it that. They can start in that county by getting rid of that Trumper, incompetent county clerk.
Ah yes, the guy who let rioters into the building and did it on camera. He was unrepentant, but removed. We, btw, think we were sacrificed to the new districting. Our old friend, Kevin, Maddox, is running for our house district., may he rot in hell. Mike Erickson is suing Salinas for her advertising when she relied on the police report and referenced a drug incident found when he was arrested for drunk driving. He also had his girlfriend at one point have an abortion.
I believe the R ad against Tina refers to a he, so I am not sure what exactly which incident it is trying to reference. I think Tina did a great job in the legislature despite the problems you have described. We live in Salem and the Proud Boys have been here plenty of times causing havoc including harassing people on a public road when the Mike Flynn show was in Keizer. That whole thing stunk, but at least it was not right down the street from us.
We were quite exasperated with the coverage of the problems in Portland. Unfortunately, there is a small group of vandals and thieves who take advantage of every situation. I think they are mostly opportunists and not political. Portland was named the number one food city by someone, so there is that.
Here in Salem we have a black owned business which has been plagued by Proud Boy types because they are very upfront about their politics and still require proof of vaccination. We are dining there with friends later this month.
Thank you for suggesting this. We had an "itchy trigger finger" to make more contributions before it's too late. To honor HCR is such a great idea. DONE!
Thanks Ellie for posting this! Happy Birthday Heather and thank you for your work helping us to make sense of our times. I live in one of the States that has a very critical House race. I hope this donation adds to the help I have already given!
This dovetails right into Governor DeSantis's request for 100% Federal funding to Florida for Hurranxe Ian damage.
My wife noted yesterday on the news that all of the services to help Floridians with immediate support appear to be coming from national not for profit and Federal organizations, and FEMA. She heard no state services mentioned.
In Maine, our state and localities deal with nor'Easters, ice and snowstorms that can damage and shut down areas. These are our weather risks that we pay taxes for. Taxes that are budgeted, put aside, and increased when budgets are used up. Florida is a hurricane state, hence the use of "hurricane" in many of their team sports names. But Florida and other hurricane states have low taxes and then lean on the Federal government and northern snow states like Maine for their clean up. And worse, when we have occasional hurricane damage, their politicians like DeSantis advocate against our being assisted, claiming we are putting our expenses on the national "credit card".
Oh well said David. When I last visited Maine (summer before last), I saw approximately one for one "black lives matter" signs there for every "support your police" signs we have down here in TN. And that is alot. Maine, IMO, is more along the lines of a state that is in consonance with what the USA should be. TN, like every single one of the southern states, is still in Confederacy mode. It's a sickness - a terrible debilitating sickness. I think every country, and perhaps every state in the USA, has right-versus-left divides. But USA's divide has gone out of control.
I grew up in rural East Texas from 1960 to 1978. Our school integrated in 1966, about 12 years before Boston did. Us kids, black, white and brown, all attended the same regional rural school from K-12.
So, I have a minority last name. I can honestly say that, among the kids and then teenagers we did not really have or feel any "issues" with our black classmates nor did the black and brown classmates feel any particular negativity toward the white kids.
We were all on the same basketball team (small school). Same baseball team. Same gym loccer room. Once in a great while a fistfight would occur but that was more likely to be between two white guys than anyone else. Those guys got their backs up pretty easy if their youthful "manhood" was challenged.
Yes, the Black folks WERE segregated into very, very poor "housing" (more like Shacks). But, us kids did not have anything to do with that.
So, honestly, at age 18 and today, I don't feel any prejudice.
Now, I have met LOTS of folks in the NORTH who are profoundly predudiced. In Boston? Man, it is BAD. I bet you anything that in Maine, it is bad too.
It is easy to put up a sign along an all white street saying "black lives matter". But, how many blacks actually LIVE on those Maine streets. Last time I was in Maine, man, it was lilly white as far as I could see.
Glad that you had a past more devoid of racism and discrimination. It's a good input. I spent a good portion of my high school years in Columbus Georgia, and I can tell you it wasn't like you describe for East Texas. It was more like "The Help". I went to college in Atlanta - I saw racism EVERYWHERE. I spent a few years in the Philadelphia area after college. Although that area did not appeal to me at all, it was refreshing to get away from most of the racist air in Georgia (not completely - the Italian influence there had a dim view of blacks as well. Spent most of my adult life in the Seattle area - the least racist place I have ever lived, although not a large black population. I have family in Montgomery Al - must I describe the air there? Let's just say it is disgusting.
I live in TN too—you are right but didn’t even go far enough. The governor is a pushover and one of our senators is a national joke. (The other doesn’t have an original thought.)
My blue dot, albeit small, is one of the handful in TN — helps me remain hopeful.
Similar to Mike S, I was also born and raised in a crimson state, AL (in the 70’s), and attended an elementary school where white students were a slight minority. No strife of which I was aware — think we all felt and treated each other the same. That’s been true for me lifelong, at home and out in the world. I’ve given my children the same foundation. We The People, All of Us and Now!
100%, David. However, I saw news clips of people so grateful to DeSantis who is showing up to their damaged communities. I wonder if they know where the money is actually coming from.
You are so right, everything he does from now on out is for one reason only!
Small but telling thing I noticed when he was with the Bidens. He refers to his wife Casey as First Lady ( of FL) all the time but never used the title for Jill. Just " Jill".
At this point, with so much destruction here, we dont think about where the help is coming from…we are just glad we have some……Thanks for thinking of us
A tough trope to write out loud, but, I agree. Although, I think I would not be able to write it given that trope was highly effective at electing Ronald Reagan.
It is widespread and doesn't always involve emergency relief. Our media contribute to the problem of misperception when writing headlines (which I believe 90% of people read and ignore the article). For example: Post Register headline in Idaho Falls: "Idaho ag department awards $1.85 million to 16 projects."
The headline would have been more truthful and complete: "Idaho ag department awards $1.85 million of FEDERAL funding to 16 projects."
Attack-dog Biden is my new best friend. I'm so happy — and democracy will be better off — to see and hear him off-leash. He's like a boxer landing jab after jab at Republicans for their hypocrisy and disdain for anything the federal government does to help citizens. The video of him tonight calling out Ron Johnson for wanting to essentially end Social Security and other entitlement programs was priceless.
Now if he’ll only let Floridians know that neither FL Senator Scott nor FL Senator Rubio voted for the disaster aid bill that will fuel Florida’s recovery from Hurricane Ian’s devastation. Scott actually voted NO & Rubio couldn’t be bothered to vote at all!
Actually, Biden has done exactly that, in his comments after Ian. I guess it depends on which media you are exposed to. Some do better than others but it also is our responsibility to seek them out. In this case, it actually got quite wide coverage and quotes. I think part of it is that right now news is moving so fast that if you miss a day, you might miss something key. And it is just damn difficult to try to keep up on everything. I think that maybe when one has a critical comment, it's a good idea take a few minutes to see if it's really warranted, rather than inadvertently state a false assumption.
Annie- thank you, I must have missed it . . . and I meant no criticism of President Biden - he has been doing an incredible job since day 1. I am attentive to WAMC-FM, my local affiliate of NPR, PBS & MSNBC and did not hear it mentioned from any of these 4 sources. If I missed it others did too, it needs to be top of fold in print media & a constant scroll for news & opinion programming. I am sick and tired of tRUmpista attacks on Dems & MSM’s constant free advertising for TFG.
Oh, well, Robert. Like I said, so many things are happening so fast that sometimes my brain just needs to shut off. Today I got out the bag of raw wool I bought last weekend, and took breaks throughout the day to sort the locks (this is a lovely fleece, but a challenging one to prepare). A good meditative occupation for my hands and my mind.
In between wool sorting, I did my best to catch up on the scuttlebutt, which I've mostly caught in bits and pieces on the radio this week, taking advantage of some decent weather to clean up my neglected garden. Stunned by the density of the news.
I listen to NPR, skip cable outlets, but subscribe to a bunch of mags and newspapers, most of them readable online, as well as a select group of podcasts and activist groups. So I have a broad range of perspectives and sources. I think that is important. Except when I'm doing a deep dive on something in particular, I do not spend a lot of my day, but do generally set aside time to get an idea of what's going on. And make sure I have an hour or two before bed just to read something non-political or just relaxing. And then there's the dog making sure I take her out. She keeps me balanced.
So agree with you about the Trumpist party. But I think at this point they are operating in a kind of silo. Even Fox is catching on. And MSM is starting to realize that they need to be on the ball. My week-long break brought me back with fresh eyes (like how not seeing a grandchild for a few months can mess up your mind). I think there is good cause for optimism.
He had dark skin, which made him a very visible target for racists and those who hate skunks (from a sign I saw in Texas after 2008). I thought his skin was a nice tan, but it weighed heavy and put an extra burden on him that was invisible but gave him an extra battle to fight. Every hour of every day. The “tea party” was just another hate group with good PR. He had a target on his head, always. The SS kept him alive through two terms, no small miracle. And yes, he underestimated the vitriol that would come his way, as did I. I thought we were better than that, I keep getting reminded that so many of us are not.
Well, dear Jeri, he had dark skin, a WHITE mother and grandparents who raised him like a young prince. He had a Harvard education, he wrote like Shakespeare about hope and his family is the epitome of beautiful, intelligent, gracious and a wife who actually helps the world to be a better place. Jealousy (envy) is one of the Big SIns in Christianity, as I understand it, and boy! Those racists, bigots, violent monsters are still furious about it all. AND the people of the US and the Whole World loved him…and still do. We The People elected Obama and we ARE “better than that….”
He was still a “skunk” in parts of Texas. I was a fan from his first oration. Love an educated man (and I have to admit to a few who never had the chance). I worked in schools in Galveston where biracial kids were sprinkled all over. They seemed to exhibit the best of both races (depending on parental craziness of course). Racial purity is such a joke, in my whitey mind.
Those people don't want a street brawl. They want to be guttersnipes, gang members and ambush vipers.
Their squealing and pearl clutchings at the recent street riots should be a good indicator of how intensely they fear a one-on-one brawl. You know the heathens and "eddicated liburrals" who taught them how to tie their shoes and feed themselves scare the hell right out of them.
Same with Joe, they always equate good works with socialism (paraphrase HST). Why they hate Ike. Reasoned positions will never replace a street brawl in the vernacular/actions of the cult.
Yes, Obama's whole time in office and the election of Trump were more driven by plain old-fashioned racism than we like to admit. There have been days when I wonder what, exactly, we accomplished back in the days of John Lewis and Julian Bond. There are also days, thank goodness, when I believe accomplished a few darned miracles.
It’s too easy to forget that in many ways Obama had to walk on eggs knowing that this country is still very racist and he knew he couldn’t be viewed as an angry Black man...people were just waiting in the shadows to jump out and make that accusation.
Michael, my younger brother, who also reads LFAA, sent me a text this morning, quipping that Biden has let loose his working-class inner Irish bulldog finally. “He should do that more often!” I agree entirely!
“ Biden said, “I was surprised to see so many socialists in the Republican caucus.”
Politics has become a sport. A game. Teams.
I often wonder why a Republican who is totally against something, say Medicare or Social Security, would accept that “handout.” If they were true to their beliefs wouldn’t they opt out?
Like Trump for example: Divorced two or three times I cannot count, spending quality time with porn stars, kids with multiple women that he has little to do with, I mean, Trump is the very model of family values.
Or, Herschel Walker? Four kids with four different women and spent not one minute raising any of those kids. But, that is REPUBLICAN family values.
I've seen far too many of that type and their "family values". Dodging taxes, avoiding child support, smacking the old lady around, avoiding monogamy, pilfering. Damnedest "family values" I've ever seen.
Given that the R's want to ban abortion, birth control etc-will they next put forth the idea of mandatory involuntary insemination? Possibly. Would this RW SCOTUS OK it? Probably.
Evelyn, it would insure those repugnants would never get re-elected or elected at all. I wish they would refuse the help and show their constituents who they really are: bastards!
Unfortunately, since Republican officeholders are shameless and Republican voters don't have the brains to find their ass with both hands on a clear day with a three hour advance notice, calling them out for the shameless hypocrites they are will not change a thing.
The Republican Party has so marinated Democrats in language like "radical leftist Democrats", "communists", "socialists", etc., that Republican rank and file, when they tear themselves away from watching Survivor and Football, no longer care, or know of, what POLICY Democrats actually have and they are also unware that Republicans have NO POLICY except destruction.
Funny, Republicans constantly say that Democrats are going to DESTROY "our country". But, it is the Republicans themselves who actually desire that outcome.
Yeah, they’ve been calling us commies, socialists and radical leftists for years. Then they and the both-sideser media get the vapors and clutch their pearls when Dark Brandon calls some of them semi-fascists (which is true!). Let’s see, which is worse? Imaginary communists who wants to use government spending to improve the lives of ordinary Americans, or real fascists who want to establish a repressive christianist authoritarian state, strip away the rights of women and the BIPOC population and massively move wealth up to the top 1%? Gee, that’s a tough one!
I've been texting GOTV for several outfits for several weeks now. The vitriolic response to as simple a survey question as "Can we count your support for Dems in the election?" is head-spinning. Pathetic, actually, in the rhetorical stupidity. Writing postcards and letters is rather relaxing since ya don't have to deal with a response.
Be careful, in one weekend of watching football (or maybe two or three) you COULD have read the new and powerful: 1619 Book written by a handful of the most thorough black historians in history. Edited by Nicole-Hannah Jones.
Just a thought. I only watch football once per year. The Superbowl, because I have a friend that invites me to his big party. But, I chat with folks while there and pay no attention to the game.
Mike: Reading 1619 & other books AND enjoying watching sports, including football, & even participating in fantasy leagues are hardly mutually exclusive. In fact, “talking sports” often proves to be a commonality wherein other topics (like politics) are easier to segue into as common ground has already been established.
Mike S - "I only watch football once per year. The Superbowl, because I have a friend that invites me to his big party. But, I chat with folks while there and pay no attention to the game."
I am so jealous. I can only dream of having a "one-track" mind. They tell me it is the goal of Sainthood... or being well on the way.
Unfortunately, being "open-minded" has, for me, put the kibosh on any such ambitions.
What a great Letter. It is truly remarkable that Republicans seem to favor lying about the economy (and much else), even when it works against them. It must be the case that they are irretrievably chained to the donor class that wants lower taxes on the wealthy, less spending on infrastructure and other social goods like healthcare, and elimination of government oversight. It doesn't even make sense that the donor class wants less spent on infrastructure, except where they hope to create infrastructure privately and charge big bucks for it, such as toll roads or a private postal service. But those appear to be the people demanding Republicans bray about "socialism" whenever Democrats invest in the economy or our citizens. What we need is full disclosure, either by law or by extremely effective journalism, of the degree to which the wealthy control these puppet politicians.
You nail it, privatization is the goal with CEOs raking in the dough. So sick of the lies and the sheep who fall for the propaganda, however clever it might be. Just hate the right guys and we are compadres forever. Money buys the votes of the deliberately ignorant.
"It must be the case that they are irretrievably chained to the donor class that wants lower taxes on the wealthy".
Yes, most Republicans are indeed in this category.
Sadly, we in NY also have Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul who is chained to her donor class. She is a politician who is firmly ensconced in one "pay to play" activity after another.
Most recently, Hochul was found to have purchased 50 million CV19 tests, produced by Access Bio in NJ, from an intermediary company filled with Hochul donors, Digital Gadgets, for an eye popping $637 MILLION dollars.
California bought exactly the same number of tests directly from Access Bio and paid $300 million for them.
So, Hochul granted $337 MILLION dollars to Digital Gadgets. Her campaign donors at that company instantly turned around and donated to her campaign (public knowledge) and probably opened a gigantic Swiss Bank Account for her as well.
Kathy Hochul is a DEMOCRAT. And, she is about as corrupt as they come.
"...political scientists have identified a distinct new demographic group perched geographically and economically apart from the hoi polloi. Made up of individuals with the means and inclination to influence the outcomes of congressional races far afield, this small group of wealthy, highly educated urban and suburban residents constitutes the growing donor class." -The Wilson Quarterly (2008). The article goes on to point out that the typical congressional candidate receives more than 2/3 of all their individual donations from people outside their district --and that was 14 years ago.
Nope. What Biden said was perfectly clear. And aimed at the right audience: those who will pick up on the obvious hypocrisy and vote accordingly. It doesn't matter whether or not Republicans in office get the implication (thought they will, and then look for ways to squirm out of it). And it doesn't matter if extreme right wing voters miss it or get upset about it. They may or may not vote, but are unlikely either way to be swayed by any argument. We should not allow ourselves to shape our strategy to them: it is a waste of time.
So much good news about our economy and the continuing positive change we are seeing daily, thanks to President Biden and the Democrats. And it’s expected that repubs will criticize and take credit at the same time. No surprise. What is troubling is the news of the loss of K-12 teachers and support staff. Many of my teacher friends who had to teach online during the Pandemic and then endure complaints and controversy about masking in person, were happy to take early retirement even losing value of benefits. Add to those retiring teachers those who teach in communities that are fighting over what and how to teach, specifically CRT, Critical Race Theory, even if they don’t understand it, our system of Public Education is in trouble. John F.Kennedy: “Let us think of education as the means of developing our greatest abilities, because in each of us there is a private hope and dream which, fulfilled, can be translated into benefit for everyone and greater strength of the nation.”
The news about K-12 teachers troubles me, too, Irenie; though, I can hardly blame the ones who left. Who wants to be berated at every turn while just trying to do their job.
And let's not forget the ongoing defunding of public schools by the diversion of Public Ed money being sent to private/religious/home schooling via school vouchers. If your Republcan gov't start talking about doing this, PLEASE SPEAK OUT. The mantra they use is "School Choice" (The idea is being pushed by ALEC in order to dumb down the public). In NH, this is an ongoing effort to privatize education-the legislature cut our Public Ed money even more after the diversion of funds. The voucher plan was implemented last year by the Republican legislature &n governor, despite massive opposition by the public. The issue was so problematic, they had to hide it in the state budget. Their original projection was about $130 K for the first year. It's now costing about $8 MILLION over budget after only ONE year and could easily balloon much more over time. As a result, the poorer towns' public schools may have to be closed or a face major increase in property taxes since a goodly part of the state public ed funding comes from property taxes. This, despite a court case decided in 1997 that mandated a different way to fund public schools. Nothing has been done. Advocates for Public Schools are suing the state about this yet again.
WONDERFUL! :-)) Today Biden named the Republicans who voted against the infrastructure law and then asked for money. Biden said, “I was surprised to see so many socialists in the Republican caucus.”
So it has now become common practice for journalists like Rachael Bade and Karoun Demirjian to withhold information vital to our survival as a democracy in order to get a lucrative book contract. If they had the receipts proving that every Republican senator believed 45 broke the law in that phone call to Zelensky, they were obligated to report it at the time, not a year and a half later.
Our democracy is in peril not only because Republicans have become overtly authoritarian thugs, but because the fourth estate has abandoned its fundamental responsibility to report the facts. How depressing.
What are you talking about? Books gather material from many sources and try to build a larger picture from what previously were scattered, often disjointed, snapshots of moments and events. Reporters and journalist do spot news and some do analysis of events as they occur. Book authors bring it all together including material from other sources. In this case, one journalist quoted something Ted Cruz said. It was covered. Then he covered himself. Interesting person, Ted Cruz. Hear him say something. Hear him reverse himself. Hear him deny both the original quote and his reversal. Which Ted Cruz do you believe? And how in the world do you make the jump from "Ted Cruz said..." to accusing someone who later quoted Ted Cruz of withholding information? Yeah, there has been a lot of sloppy news coverage for a long time (I've been talking about it for a long time), but your reasoning in this case doesn't hold.
Interesting take, Annie. Maggie Haberman kind of touches on this in interviews we've seen of her as she makes the rounds, promoting her new book. I trust you and her - integrity-wise. Not that i agree with you yet... more thinking on this. I do believe you raise valid points. Thank you for sharing your view.
OFF TOPIC: Per WAPO, Reuters & Stringer, the Kerch Strait Bridge is on fire. The major bridge is Russia's main supply route to southern Ukraine. Few details.
Got it: thank you. Good photo. Per The Guardian UK, a blast occurred at 6 am Saturday, Crimean time from two [2] railway cars with the train side of the Bridge billowing black smoke. Separately, a section of an adjacent & parallel roadway has collapsed.
Your last sentence warmed the cockles of my heart. I will only reiterate two voices from the past. From Nov 26, 1932, Will Rogers said “The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn’t know that money trickled up. Give it to people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will at least have passed through the poor fellow’s hands.” From HST, “Socialism is their name for almost anything that helps all the people.” Why do we have to keep learning these same lessons over and over. Propaganda works, we don’t have the Japanese to jolt us out of our attraction for the Republican/Nazi lying machine almost 81 years after they did it before.
Many thanks for the quote summarizing Hoover economics. Henceforth, I will refer to Republican economic policy as "HOOVER ECONOMICS". Because, hopefully, even the most ignorant American will know who Hoover was and what he wrought with 10 years of Republican "Policy".
I might add: Having been amassed at the top, those at the top LOST it all and then jumped out of windows in a fit of unwillingness to take responsibility for their poor judgement.
Sadly, but the Japanese put an instant stop to the America First fascists. Not sure that anything can shut up Rupert and his ilk these days, unless it’s a direct hit and they are more “tactical” than that …
I have reposted this on LinkedIn, and every single Republican who created a lie in their recent posts on Twitter -- McCarthy, Jordan, Paul, the awful Marsha Blackburn. Thank you Heather. And BTW A most happiest of happy birthdays. I saw the post of someone on Twitter. 🎉🍧🧁🎂🍨🍬🍭🍡
Twitter is where all things political happen now . It is very easy to do. I can show you if you like. No different from having a FB account. Twitter and Instagram are where more people who are involved socially and politically are than FB. Also Tik Tok. I made myself do it. I hate it, but I do it.
I actually find FB very active. I tweet and have met a ton of cool, progressive people. I put my art (photos) on Instagram. I am curious about Tik Tok, but, well, just not my thing. Thanks for your comment. Gailee.
Today Biden named the Republicans who voted against the infrastructure law and then asked for money. Biden said, “I was surprised to see so many socialists in the Republican caucus.” ...
That's a good one!
Isnt it amazing that "Sleepy Joe" who's been accused. of dementia, Alzheimers and other old age diseases is qble to speak so coherently when his opponent who has a "good brain" (unused apparently) can't get beyond one syllable words.
The whole dementia thing is absurd. Those of us who are old enough to have watched Biden over the years know that the swing from clarity into rambling "gaffes" has been characteristic of his way of speaking forever. It's just the way his brain and mouth seem to work. I suspect it's about half just a tad of eccentric goofiness (one of my favorite qualities in anyone) and half the fact that he is always working against his long history as a stutterer.
Who among us, even without having to overcome a stutter, has been thinking one thing and have something completely different come out of our mouth?
✋
Oh, more times than I want to acknowledge.
me
Yeppers
Me!
Yes!
William, the "stable genius" has dropped some of his rants about Sleepy Joe since he's been attempting to ward off an indictment for stealing classified documents and seditious conspiracy. With all that Joe Biden has been doing for two years to clean up TFG's horrible mess, it is stunning to have not only the right (I call them the wrong) constantly lambasting him and even the MSN pointing out his gaffes, while ignoring his having united NATO, repaired the handling of Covid, avoiding a depression with his recovery plan, helping to unsnarl supply chains, passing valid legislation that helps everyone, bringing unemployment to an unprecedented low, and much more. With our voters apparently unable to see through the fog of misinformation and disinformation, it is no wonder that they have no idea what a good politician is, and many are still willing to vote for the Herschel Walkers, Marjorie Taylor Greenes, Lindsey Grahams and Paul Gosars, to name a few.
Formula - he even helped babies (future Democrat voters that won't forget)
He is "Dark Biden." A phenomenal super hero who has literally achieved the impossible due to his super tools: experience, knowledge of how goverment works, compassion, tenacity & brilliance. We all need to understand the power of words/tags & bury the harmful ones. TFG is the one who was screened for cognitive impairment/Alzheimers with a Montreal Cognitive Assessment & then was stupid enough to share that info w the public. The irony is mind boggling.
Yes, SusanT. As you probably know, the MoCA is a quick, initial screening test for cognitive impairment. For real professionals--unlike "Dr. Jackson"--it yields suggestions for more extensive screening and testing, if needed. When Trump in his Chris Wallace interview bragged about "acing" the test including his stupendous memory, he hesitatingly recited "Person, Man, Woman, Camera, TV" as the words he was asked for testing remote recall. No cognitive test would use words so obviously associatively linked. Various versions of the MoCA use different words, but one, e.g., uses "face, velvet, church, daisy, red". So Trump went on national TV to demonstrate that (1) if he aced it, he had to cheat; and (2) he remains perfectly willingly to try to brazenly lie his way through any situation.
He was proud to be able to name the silhouette of a horse or a dog, tough stuff to do in his case.
The test was given to Trump "under Dr. Ronnie Jackson" (https://www.nbcnews.com/health/mental-health/trump-cognitive-test-what-montreal-cognitive-assessment-exam-n1234762). Remember him?
You don't need to say more!
Don't forget TFGs stroke ie his never explained visit to Walter Reed and his careful shuffling gait after it. And now his difficulty in pronouncing common words. The next step can't come too soon.
William! You are forgetting his most famous word: Covfefe….remember? More than one syllable. Of course, covfefe is not a word, just three syllables of gibberish. Probably his adderall had really kicked in that night…..omg.
It’s the verbal equivalent of a fart.
Considering that even his tweets were transcribed by a WH aide (short fat fingers do not do well on tiny keyboards), you have to wonder if the aide thought WTF but just put it down as a slam. It was a good one.
There are few among us who haven't committed gaffes, at any age. The whole recent kerfuffle about his calling for the late Congresswoman from Indiana is a case in point. It was disconcerting, at first, but as I think about it, no different from a mother going down the list of her kids' names.
When you consider what this man deals with on a daily basis, I have no idea how he is able to do it physically, let alone cognitively. I doubt that he has a minute to himself, ever. All one has to do is look at Barack Obama, George W. Bush, and other former presidents, many of them much younger than Biden, and it's easy to see what their time in office has done to them. Still, he soldiers on and has accomplished an amazing list of tasks - all off them while under a microscope.
It just makes me glad I'm in public office.
“Sad!”
Is anyone surprised that Republicans uniformly say one thing and do another or do one thing and say another? I think that is consistent with every Republican I have seen since 1980.
Republicans, like Ted Cruz, who is particularly reprehensible, are the essence of hypocrites.
And, in Cruz' case? He literally LOOKS like a hippo.
He looks like the Muppets’ Count Dracula.
Hey! That’s an insult to the Count, who may have been my favorite Muppet when I watched Sesame Street with my daughters. (What other Muppet used the word “mountebank?”).
Agreed!! Don’t insult the Count, who can *definitely* count better than Cruz can.
I’m laughing, and thinking also “That’s an insult to The Count!”
I am from Texas; I totally agree with your sentiments. He is horrible. What he posts on his Facebook page is awful. I make sure to respond to his posts on a daily basis. Fortunately, most of responses are from people who totally oppose his posts.
Don't lower yourself to a "Republican style insult"!!
appreciating him more and more, every day!!!
Biden has gotten some pretty good punches in lately
And I wish he would continue to name names and highlight their “No”votes vs their “Gimme the Money!” applications. List them ALL
Yes, his comments at the Volvo plant were priceless. Really good for an Alzheimer's patient!
I love Biden's sense of humor. This made me laugh out loud!
🤣
The irony is wasted on the stupid.
He gave Professor Richardson a barnburner of a final paragraph!
Have a good weekend jon and all!
Unita! 🗽
The Money Ball
And it gave the Repubs another chance to use the smelling salts and fainting couch.
Socialism. Facetiously playing football with the term. Use the term - long associated with poison ivy by both sides - to shame the other. Har.Har.Har.How clever. Capitalism's (and neoliberals') cunning way to keep the term both undefined, in the dark, and weighted as an anathema. The "unspeakable." Biden's recent opening of the Medicare door wider to private equity's clutches together with his 40 year record of willingness to cut Social Security (The Intercept.com) suggest the authentic nature of his long term attitude toward "socialism". Oughtn't all old people - today's and tomorrow's- be enraged at Biden's beckoning Wall Street's involvement? With our for-profit corporate managed health care, how does the USA stack up internationally? How has Josh Gottheimer stoppered the right of the government to bargain for all drug prices? What sector has blocked health care for all/single payer in the USA? "U.S. Health System Ranks Last Among 11 High-Income Countries (an analysis by the non-profit Commonwealth Fund) By Marcia FrellickWebMD.com" "Top-performing countries in the survey have universal coverage, annual out-of-pocket caps on covered benefits, and full coverage for primary care and treatment for chronic conditions." Haven't we allowed "capitalism's" profit obsessed Chamber of Commerce-ilk, corporate adherents et al to undermine our quality of life? "Big corporations that claim to support voting rights are still funding right-wing state AGs Coke, GM, AT&T pay "lip service" to voting rights while funding
GOP vote-suppression forces, says watchdog group By Igor Derysh Salon.com). "Americans have succumbed to the notion that we can mitigate climate change without fundamentally restructuring corporate America, a sentiment that pins blame on consumers and distracts us from advocating more seriously for corporate reform."(Wupr.org) What sector wants our citizens to feel powerless and passive in changing the way things are?
Please explain. "Biden's recent opening of the Medicare door wider to private equity's clutches together with his 40 year record of willingness to cut Social Security (The Intercept.com) suggest the authentic nature of his long term attitude toward "socialism". Oughtn't all old people - today's and tomorrow's- be enraged at Biden's beckoning Wall Street's involvement? "
I think I missed something??
Here’s what is being referred to:
Direct Contracting is a Medicare program started by Trump’s people near the end of his term. It vastly expands the role of corporations in the care of seniors and those with Medicare due to disabilities. If Congress doesn’t stop it, tens of millions of us will be enrolled in managed care plans without our permission, and the managing will be done by for-profit companies (including private equity firms).
Under Biden (who I think is otherwise doing a fantastic job), this is now called the Medicare REACH program. It was scheduled to roll out this winter, I believe, but fierce opposition from single payer (Medicare For All) supporters has slowed it down. Resisters include Physicians for a National Health Plan (of which I’m a member), Rep. Jayapal, Bernie Sanders, and others.)
I encourage all to read what its supporters and opponents say, and see what you think. IMO, Medicare should cover all it can afford, based on what health care providers advise and patients want. For-profit “managers” should have zero say, and not be getting our tax dollars, unless patients chose to let their care be managed.
I SOECIFICALLY request Original Medicare every year. NO scammy Medicare Advantage plan for me. Anyone who has had a dire illness requiring at the end an organ transplant knows this. I used to have a MediGap plan that covered the 20% remaining. Niw Medicare does NOT offer that anymore. So I have to go outside for more insurance. How did that happen? It SUCKS when you live on Soc Sec alone and are “too old” for Medicaid. That bites too
You're correct re the discontinuation of the Medicgap program. I've been very fortunate- I had to retire from nursing after 35 years of service in a NH County nursing home due to disability (before retirement age), & was able to get Social Security Disability FIRST try (a very rare thing). Here in NH, we have County Nursing Homes & are a political subdivision of the state, and as such have pensions and the County provides a Medicare Advantage like plan that covers almost everything that Medicare doesn't and it includes prescription drugs w/ reasonable med co-pays. I didn't even consider a "real" Advantage plan. The cost isn't too bad and much less that COBRA payments.
You’re quite fortunate Barbara. I got SSDI also with the help of a Fla senator - back in 2007. It’s pretty hard now. I also got Extra Help from Soc Sec - best offer fro rx drugs. Pays for Plan D and big discounts on all drugs - except for immunosuppressants which are paid thru Schedule B since that’s how my transplant was paid for. My sister wants to consider Advantage. Still opposed. Too many rules, more paperwork. Only thing I want is the gym membership! Not enough enticement
Great explanation. I should have know Republicans we’re trying to monetize medicaire
Hiya, Uncle!
Many thanks Tyler Taylor for your helpful clarification!
Ellie - please Google: private equity making inroads into Medicare and or Medicare members involuntarily switched into private equity plans. Odd - in the past couple months - I’ve read a couple of essays about the Biden’s administration’s welcoming private equity I to the Medicare market - but in googling the matter just now none that I read show up. An argument itself for the necessity of net neutrality. Let me know if you come with zero in your search. And I’ll spend some time willingly to search for and give you specific web sites
Google tends to return results with most hits. You can get a far more honest look by using a search engine that does not save clicks and thus can list more results on your search terms. I recommend Duck Duck Go. I know, funny name, but then Google is too. Duck Duck Go not only gives deeper results, it also protects your privacy because it does not collect data on you or your searches.
Thanks Annie Stratton....very helpful....
Same here. Puzzled … or being scammed
Exactly, for example, the word "conservation" is never mentioned in the climate change milieu. Nor are the words "Reduce, Reuse" heard by the Recycling crowd. The actions that would really work would hurt our current lifestyle too much.
Scathing, Selina! And dead center on!
This should be an ingredient of any debate between a Democratic and Republican candidate, especially a presidential debate, if one takes place. In addition, I would suggest that the Dem candidate ask the Repub candidate why they keep repeating "socialism" when they know it isn't true, and not back down until the Repub gives a reasonable answer ( a high bar). There are other issues, such as the validity of the 2020 election: the Dem candidate should say that "a lot of people have questions about whether the Earth is flat, do you believe that the Earth is flat?" Something along those lines.
We can only hope those folk fall off the edge (maybe they already have mentally). For TFG to embrace and promote the Q criwd is pretty good evidence.
Mic drop. Peace out.
👋 👋 👋 👋 👋 👋 👋
Irony is Biden, what’s his choice.
Do we deserve President Biden?
Did we deserve President Obama?
Did we deserve President Clinton?
Sadly, we surely did deserve Presidents Reagan, Nixon, Bush, Bush and Trump...
Gen. Dwight David Eisenhower chose the wrong VP, and
President Ford blinked. Wickedly.
Alcoholism is a constant... influencing and affecting Ronny Reagan, Jerry Ford, G W Bush and Bush and Laura, Nelson Aldrich Rockefeller’s Mary Toddhunter Clark,
What a doozy!
Hi Folks, guess who had a birthday today? And celebrated by staying up until 2:00 am ET to help save democracy with her Letters from an American? Well, The States Project has one more week to collect funds for good candidates in critical state legislatures to keep or get a Democratic majority. Give a gift in Heather's name--our small donations add up to make a difference! Thanks!
https://www.grapevine.org/giving-circle/1XQhnyD/Tending-to-Democracy
Thank you for this opportunity. Adding a “Happy Birthday” to Heather Cox Richardson. And happy to be part of honoring Heather and this group.
Done
Done. Thank you for what you and others are doing.
Thank YOU! We're all in this together!
Yesterday, I was just thinking about making another donation, and voila, here you are!
Thanks, Ellie; and done!
Good waves in the air—thank you!
DONE. Very easy EK, thank you.
Thank YOU!
This Giving Circle, launched only in August, has achieved 95% of its goal of $20,000 toward saving democracy. Almost there …
Thank you, folks, for your rally for democracy! Relayed to Heather with your "in honor of" happy birthday wishes:
"72 LFAA Substackers donated for your birthday, with donations that ranged from $5 to $500 (literally), with the average range from $20 to $100. Some people had already joined this Tending to Democracy Giving Circle and specifically made an additional donation today. Also today a few people signed up to donate monthly.
BTW Melissa Walker [at The States Project] can tell you that 100% of donations go out the door to the selected campaigns, since The States Project gets its overhead funded by separate donors.
So happy happy birthday, Heather! When you say to 'speak up' and 'time for all hands on deck,' people are listening!"
Thank you, Ellie, for inviting us to the Birthday Party for Heather and the opportunity to make a contribution in her name. Happy Birthday, Heather, all 365 days of your Birthday Year.
I donated what I could right now, not much (I have to replace my oil tank, ouch) but I figure every little bit helps. I fully agree with what you are doing. But I confess I dedicated my little pledge to honor my dad, who was a union man frustrated with the kind of politics that allowed privileged white men take down unions and trash the environment. He predicted a lot of what has come to pass.
It's all good, and we really are all in this together riding a big blue wave. Working America is another smart progressive fundraising organization that comes out of the AFL-CIO. They also research where best to apply our small dollar donations, and what kind of outreach to voters is most effective where, e.g. social media in Michigan and door-to-door in North Carolina.
https://www.workingamerica.org/
Thanks, Ellie. It's interesting to see what various small groups of folks like us are doing and testing. This info will be essential in 2024. But even simply the actions now are hopefully going to help stay the erosion of democracy. I'm so glad to have made the acquaintance of so many choosing to do these things. We are what is going to make the difference in the long run- and the short run, fingers crossed!
We are watching a series called Sherwood about the 1984 coal strikes in England....Maggie Thatcher's doing. My own father did not like unions and he was upset when he figured out that I belonged to the teacher's union.
Done. Happy Belated Birthday Dr. Richardson!
Ellie, I have unsubscribed from all of the idiotic screaming I have got from the dem PArty's fundraising arm because it has made me furious--and not in the way they intended. But I trust you folks and I agree wholeheartedly that the job of securing democracy has to begin on the local level. So just donated. Thanks for the link!!
Linda, I resigned out of disgust from the Dem executive committee here because they were doing the same old s***, focusing on fundraising instead of building party structure bottom up. Fortunately, there is a solid progressive base here who do their own thing, so at the local level races progressives (with or without capital P) are actually increasing, plus the strongest candidate for Lt Gov is progressive.
It is almost certain our R gov will retain his seat. Dems were not eager willing to take him on: he's popular because of VT pandemic response, and huge dark money is coming from out-of-state to support him. However, a woman, Brenda Siegal, who started shaking things up as a citizen activist decades ago (and almost no one taking her seriously) is running. She has name recognition, running a good campaign, and doing better than anyone expected. She's not expected to even come close, but she is garnering respect. I hope she at least gets enough votes to make the current gov nervous.
You betcha I'm voting for her. I respect how Scott handled the pandemic (by basically staying out of the way), but as the pandemic eased, he went to work building his Repub creds. I worry about Vermont's future with a gov who follows that route and is willing to use his veto power to protect it. Maybe he'll surprise us. Hm.
I agree with you, Linda. The Dems and Repubs appear to use the same awful screaming hyperbolic marketers who cry wolf. Their emails are easy to spot and it no longer pains me to delete delete delete.
The States Project works smart. Thank you for donating!
Thanks for both the happy birthday to Heather and the place to donate in her name. We will be donating this weekend to this and several D. pols. Here in the Oregon governor's race, Uncle Phil, (Phil Knight) has donated millions to Machine Gun Betsy, the spoiler, and now a million, to Drazan (Dracula), the R candidate because Johnson is not going to win, so he is hoping to have influence with the R. Of course, zero to the D, Tina Kotek, and what will happen if she wins....it's close, so I hope she prevails.
Tina Kotek in Oregon is among 5 pivotal governor races to support.
https://twitter.com/palmerreport/status/1578843625558986752?s=46&t=RVaiMLI_PN9HnEQQdZCYgQ
We have to do it all up and down the ballot, and Tina Kotek for Governor of Oregon is another race that needs our attention. Thank you for donating!
We have donated to Tina a couple times and others locally as well.
As someone who was born and grew up in OR, and still have close ties, I am keeping my fingers crossed. Betsy would be a disaster and Drazen is not a deep thinker. Hope is that Betsy would pull down Drazen, but Betsy is very much a strategist. It is possible she could build a base to hand over to Drazen by pulling out of the race- though her ego might not allow her to do that. I feel sad because there were things I admired about Betsy, but also things about her that limit her.
I have long been impressed with Tina Kotek and her ability to get people to accomplish things in spite of the constant barrage of obstacles the extremist right keeps throwing out. Drazen, despite toning down her rhetoric, is still under the thrall of the extreme right branch of the people calling themselves Republican and who have taken over the Republican party.
I know a number of old-style Republicans who are resisting what that camp is doing. The Republican party in Oregon fell apart years ago, after giving us some fine leaders, when the tea partiers oozed their way in. I do not see a real leader in the current bunch, period.
I do agree. I am not a fan of Betsy because, among other things, she is a fan of Timber Unity (they are calling themselves something else these days) and stands in the way of sensible gun laws. I did wonder if she would pull out, but I don't see that happening. Her ads were on long before anyone else's...probably thanks to Uncle Phil. Tina's ads are the only ones who show exactly what she has been doing and will continue. Now Dracula has an ad out that says that Tina was a bully in the legislature. I think this has to do with dealing with a jerk of a D who, I think, finally resigned. Most of the Rs I know (I confess to not knowing many) did not vote for Trump and can't stand him. Our next door former R pol is registered as an I and I am sure he votes mostly for Ds. Next door in Washington's 3rd district we have a D woman who owns a body shop. Her R opponent is Joe Kent and he is truly awful. In an ad where he was talking to a group, they were all older. We haven't got our ballots yet, but soon. I hope the voters in Clackastan (Clackamus) throw out the county clerk, Sheryl Hall, who is an ongoing disaster and a Trumper.
If anyone is interested the Oregonian has a long article on Betsy today.
The animosity toward Tina is because she ran a tight ship. The 21-22 legislature was a sometimes contentious group, and several of the R's were in-your-face contentious at times, holding bills hostage. In spite of that, Tina kept them working, at times bargaining on a fair basis, other times holding the house to the grindstone. But the clincher was the 2021 redistricting process, when the house R's refused to participate on the bipartisan committee under the conditions they had agreed on. and kept blockading progress. Some of them, including one woman I will leave nameless, could not wrap their minds around the fact that each district has to have close to the same population. Land does not vote, people vote, and that's the law. So no, the sparsely popultated eastern part of the state could not be split in two just because it is big, unless each part was combined with some of the more heavily populated western areas. These recalcitrant R's resisted both options and kept accusing the Dems of "gerrymandering". (I followed this process closely, and the R's were the ones drawing strange boundaries.)
Finally, Tina had enough, and removed the Rs who refused to recognize the rules of redistricting from the committee. The Rs threw a major temper tantrum over that, but they did it to themselves.d The whole session was a series of Republican temper tantrums in both houses, spiced by a few scandals to boot, including the removal of an R rep who deliberately let rioters into the building. I could go on.
Yet, at all times during the session, Tina had the house working to pass the most critical bills. It was impressive. I guess if you are a right wing Republican malcontent and you don't get your way, that means that the person in charge is a bully- especially when you don't have any accomplishments of your own to run on. The truth is Tina did one heck of a job, at a time when the Senate was held hostage by a few childish Republicans refusing to participate. This, by the way, is only the tip of the iceberg. Looking back, the Oregon legislature did get some remarkable things done in spite of it all.
2021 was a tough session with a lot of hard feelings all around. I was impressed with the R senators who honored the long tradition of bipartisanship, and by the willingness of most of the house Rs to keep on working in spite of the attempts by a few of their colleagues to disrupt the process.
By Oregonians in general, who just kept on keeping on in the face of everything else that was happening: wildfire, heat, heavy rains and mudslides, and an over-blown media show that was confined to 4 square blocks in downtown Portland but made to look as if the entire city was a combat zone. The BLM folks (including two of my daughters) peacefully marching, singing, chanting. The Moms, a group of white allies, standing around them as a human shield, and The Dads with leafblowers to clear the air of teargas.
In the background of many video feeds in the evening, you could see infiltrators from the Proud Boys and similar sneak in behind and try to start something, some caught vandalizing or starting small fires to entertain lazy media. So the nation got distorted images about what was going on, both in the media and in the demonstrations - until the truth came out and the media had to start taking a hard look at how it did things.
A wonderful drone flight demonstrated the truth as it lifted above the tight focus of other media, and showed people simply going about their business in the surrounding blocks and streets. It pulled up to view the city in the long, sunlit evening looking like it normally does.
This election will, as in many states, set the tone for Oregon for the next decade at least. I keep my fingers crossed, but it is still functioning, and still seems to be connected to the values that have helped it make it through the 20th century and which are still guiding it to remain and grow the progressive state I raised my kids in, in spite of the regressive push to undo decades of forward thinking.
BTW, I love your reference to Clackastan. That place has been run as a sort of low-level autocracy for far too long. I hope the folks there finally take the steps to make it really what the people there want.
Thanks for this long post on all the things going on. I can't claim Clackastan as my own as a friend of ours in Portland calls it that. They can start in that county by getting rid of that Trumper, incompetent county clerk.
Ah yes, the guy who let rioters into the building and did it on camera. He was unrepentant, but removed. We, btw, think we were sacrificed to the new districting. Our old friend, Kevin, Maddox, is running for our house district., may he rot in hell. Mike Erickson is suing Salinas for her advertising when she relied on the police report and referenced a drug incident found when he was arrested for drunk driving. He also had his girlfriend at one point have an abortion.
I believe the R ad against Tina refers to a he, so I am not sure what exactly which incident it is trying to reference. I think Tina did a great job in the legislature despite the problems you have described. We live in Salem and the Proud Boys have been here plenty of times causing havoc including harassing people on a public road when the Mike Flynn show was in Keizer. That whole thing stunk, but at least it was not right down the street from us.
We were quite exasperated with the coverage of the problems in Portland. Unfortunately, there is a small group of vandals and thieves who take advantage of every situation. I think they are mostly opportunists and not political. Portland was named the number one food city by someone, so there is that.
Here in Salem we have a black owned business which has been plagued by Proud Boy types because they are very upfront about their politics and still require proof of vaccination. We are dining there with friends later this month.
Thanks for this suggestion!
Great idea! Doing this now.
Thank you for suggesting this. We had an "itchy trigger finger" to make more contributions before it's too late. To honor HCR is such a great idea. DONE!
Morning Ellie!
Fabulous. The grapevine is abundant.
Unita! 🗽
Thanks Ellie for posting this! Happy Birthday Heather and thank you for your work helping us to make sense of our times. I live in one of the States that has a very critical House race. I hope this donation adds to the help I have already given!
Go Team, G0...!
This dovetails right into Governor DeSantis's request for 100% Federal funding to Florida for Hurranxe Ian damage.
My wife noted yesterday on the news that all of the services to help Floridians with immediate support appear to be coming from national not for profit and Federal organizations, and FEMA. She heard no state services mentioned.
In Maine, our state and localities deal with nor'Easters, ice and snowstorms that can damage and shut down areas. These are our weather risks that we pay taxes for. Taxes that are budgeted, put aside, and increased when budgets are used up. Florida is a hurricane state, hence the use of "hurricane" in many of their team sports names. But Florida and other hurricane states have low taxes and then lean on the Federal government and northern snow states like Maine for their clean up. And worse, when we have occasional hurricane damage, their politicians like DeSantis advocate against our being assisted, claiming we are putting our expenses on the national "credit card".
Republicans are con artists.
Oh well said David. When I last visited Maine (summer before last), I saw approximately one for one "black lives matter" signs there for every "support your police" signs we have down here in TN. And that is alot. Maine, IMO, is more along the lines of a state that is in consonance with what the USA should be. TN, like every single one of the southern states, is still in Confederacy mode. It's a sickness - a terrible debilitating sickness. I think every country, and perhaps every state in the USA, has right-versus-left divides. But USA's divide has gone out of control.
James,
I grew up in rural East Texas from 1960 to 1978. Our school integrated in 1966, about 12 years before Boston did. Us kids, black, white and brown, all attended the same regional rural school from K-12.
So, I have a minority last name. I can honestly say that, among the kids and then teenagers we did not really have or feel any "issues" with our black classmates nor did the black and brown classmates feel any particular negativity toward the white kids.
We were all on the same basketball team (small school). Same baseball team. Same gym loccer room. Once in a great while a fistfight would occur but that was more likely to be between two white guys than anyone else. Those guys got their backs up pretty easy if their youthful "manhood" was challenged.
Yes, the Black folks WERE segregated into very, very poor "housing" (more like Shacks). But, us kids did not have anything to do with that.
So, honestly, at age 18 and today, I don't feel any prejudice.
Now, I have met LOTS of folks in the NORTH who are profoundly predudiced. In Boston? Man, it is BAD. I bet you anything that in Maine, it is bad too.
It is easy to put up a sign along an all white street saying "black lives matter". But, how many blacks actually LIVE on those Maine streets. Last time I was in Maine, man, it was lilly white as far as I could see.
Still is lily white. 100% on point, Mike. The fact that Lepage and Poliquin have the support to run for office again proves that.
Glad that you had a past more devoid of racism and discrimination. It's a good input. I spent a good portion of my high school years in Columbus Georgia, and I can tell you it wasn't like you describe for East Texas. It was more like "The Help". I went to college in Atlanta - I saw racism EVERYWHERE. I spent a few years in the Philadelphia area after college. Although that area did not appeal to me at all, it was refreshing to get away from most of the racist air in Georgia (not completely - the Italian influence there had a dim view of blacks as well. Spent most of my adult life in the Seattle area - the least racist place I have ever lived, although not a large black population. I have family in Montgomery Al - must I describe the air there? Let's just say it is disgusting.
I live in TN too—you are right but didn’t even go far enough. The governor is a pushover and one of our senators is a national joke. (The other doesn’t have an original thought.)
My blue dot, albeit small, is one of the handful in TN — helps me remain hopeful.
Similar to Mike S, I was also born and raised in a crimson state, AL (in the 70’s), and attended an elementary school where white students were a slight minority. No strife of which I was aware — think we all felt and treated each other the same. That’s been true for me lifelong, at home and out in the world. I’ve given my children the same foundation. We The People, All of Us and Now!
I recommend reading The 1619 Project. It explains a lot.
I did, Maia, and it does!
https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/1619/id1476928106
Podcasts are really good.
Am half way through the book.
100%, David. However, I saw news clips of people so grateful to DeSantis who is showing up to their damaged communities. I wonder if they know where the money is actually coming from.
Trust me on this one. He’s not checking on jacksh*t. He’s campaigning. What a loser.
Morning Lynell!
Unita. 🗽
You are so right, everything he does from now on out is for one reason only!
Small but telling thing I noticed when he was with the Bidens. He refers to his wife Casey as First Lady ( of FL) all the time but never used the title for Jill. Just " Jill".
Yikes, almost afternoon, Christine!
At this point, with so much destruction here, we dont think about where the help is coming from…we are just glad we have some……Thanks for thinking of us
And that is as it should be, Nancy. I think the president would be the first to say so. Hope you get better and better every day, Nancy.
They know….
One hopes.
Excellent post. I have taken the liberty to share it (with reference) to many people.
Also, lets start using the right langauge for Desantis; DESANTIS IS A COMMUNIST.
Thank you.
The corporations getting all the breaks are “Welfare Whores”. Period.
A tough trope to write out loud, but, I agree. Although, I think I would not be able to write it given that trope was highly effective at electing Ronald Reagan.
It is widespread and doesn't always involve emergency relief. Our media contribute to the problem of misperception when writing headlines (which I believe 90% of people read and ignore the article). For example: Post Register headline in Idaho Falls: "Idaho ag department awards $1.85 million to 16 projects."
The headline would have been more truthful and complete: "Idaho ag department awards $1.85 million of FEDERAL funding to 16 projects."
DeSantis Will crow about how he played Biden, wait for it.
Attack-dog Biden is my new best friend. I'm so happy — and democracy will be better off — to see and hear him off-leash. He's like a boxer landing jab after jab at Republicans for their hypocrisy and disdain for anything the federal government does to help citizens. The video of him tonight calling out Ron Johnson for wanting to essentially end Social Security and other entitlement programs was priceless.
Now if he’ll only let Floridians know that neither FL Senator Scott nor FL Senator Rubio voted for the disaster aid bill that will fuel Florida’s recovery from Hurricane Ian’s devastation. Scott actually voted NO & Rubio couldn’t be bothered to vote at all!
Actually, Biden has done exactly that, in his comments after Ian. I guess it depends on which media you are exposed to. Some do better than others but it also is our responsibility to seek them out. In this case, it actually got quite wide coverage and quotes. I think part of it is that right now news is moving so fast that if you miss a day, you might miss something key. And it is just damn difficult to try to keep up on everything. I think that maybe when one has a critical comment, it's a good idea take a few minutes to see if it's really warranted, rather than inadvertently state a false assumption.
Annie- thank you, I must have missed it . . . and I meant no criticism of President Biden - he has been doing an incredible job since day 1. I am attentive to WAMC-FM, my local affiliate of NPR, PBS & MSNBC and did not hear it mentioned from any of these 4 sources. If I missed it others did too, it needs to be top of fold in print media & a constant scroll for news & opinion programming. I am sick and tired of tRUmpista attacks on Dems & MSM’s constant free advertising for TFG.
Oh, well, Robert. Like I said, so many things are happening so fast that sometimes my brain just needs to shut off. Today I got out the bag of raw wool I bought last weekend, and took breaks throughout the day to sort the locks (this is a lovely fleece, but a challenging one to prepare). A good meditative occupation for my hands and my mind.
In between wool sorting, I did my best to catch up on the scuttlebutt, which I've mostly caught in bits and pieces on the radio this week, taking advantage of some decent weather to clean up my neglected garden. Stunned by the density of the news.
I listen to NPR, skip cable outlets, but subscribe to a bunch of mags and newspapers, most of them readable online, as well as a select group of podcasts and activist groups. So I have a broad range of perspectives and sources. I think that is important. Except when I'm doing a deep dive on something in particular, I do not spend a lot of my day, but do generally set aside time to get an idea of what's going on. And make sure I have an hour or two before bed just to read something non-political or just relaxing. And then there's the dog making sure I take her out. She keeps me balanced.
So agree with you about the Trumpist party. But I think at this point they are operating in a kind of silo. Even Fox is catching on. And MSM is starting to realize that they need to be on the ball. My week-long break brought me back with fresh eyes (like how not seeing a grandchild for a few months can mess up your mind). I think there is good cause for optimism.
Please, please please may this be highlighted!
Like he said, you don't fuck with a Biden
Obama was too passive, mistakenly thinking actions speak louder than words.
He had dark skin, which made him a very visible target for racists and those who hate skunks (from a sign I saw in Texas after 2008). I thought his skin was a nice tan, but it weighed heavy and put an extra burden on him that was invisible but gave him an extra battle to fight. Every hour of every day. The “tea party” was just another hate group with good PR. He had a target on his head, always. The SS kept him alive through two terms, no small miracle. And yes, he underestimated the vitriol that would come his way, as did I. I thought we were better than that, I keep getting reminded that so many of us are not.
Well, dear Jeri, he had dark skin, a WHITE mother and grandparents who raised him like a young prince. He had a Harvard education, he wrote like Shakespeare about hope and his family is the epitome of beautiful, intelligent, gracious and a wife who actually helps the world to be a better place. Jealousy (envy) is one of the Big SIns in Christianity, as I understand it, and boy! Those racists, bigots, violent monsters are still furious about it all. AND the people of the US and the Whole World loved him…and still do. We The People elected Obama and we ARE “better than that….”
The racism beast is alive and well and no longer hiding.
Like cockroaches crawling out of the woodwork.
That’s an insult to cockroaches.
He was still a “skunk” in parts of Texas. I was a fan from his first oration. Love an educated man (and I have to admit to a few who never had the chance). I worked in schools in Galveston where biracial kids were sprinkled all over. They seemed to exhibit the best of both races (depending on parental craziness of course). Racial purity is such a joke, in my whitey mind.
Like many good people, us here included, he thought good works would speak for themselves. Not when the other side wants a street brawl.
Advertising is what speaks
It was demonstrated in 1930’s Germany and its demonstrated today
Messaging in American politics has replaced humility
We can no longer afford humility
And Jesus wept
The cult follows the Nazis and makes a joke of Jesus.
Truth.
Those people don't want a street brawl. They want to be guttersnipes, gang members and ambush vipers.
Their squealing and pearl clutchings at the recent street riots should be a good indicator of how intensely they fear a one-on-one brawl. You know the heathens and "eddicated liburrals" who taught them how to tie their shoes and feed themselves scare the hell right out of them.
Good point, although some of the Oath Keepers and Proud Boys ilk in Texas are itching for a battle in which they have the only arms.
Same with Joe, they always equate good works with socialism (paraphrase HST). Why they hate Ike. Reasoned positions will never replace a street brawl in the vernacular/actions of the cult.
Hi, Jeri,
Yes, Obama's whole time in office and the election of Trump were more driven by plain old-fashioned racism than we like to admit. There have been days when I wonder what, exactly, we accomplished back in the days of John Lewis and Julian Bond. There are also days, thank goodness, when I believe accomplished a few darned miracles.
Yes, some miracles in there. Hope they are enough to prove that “inferior” applies to schitty products made by Schitty men
Look where the lust for power has brought us. 😞. Thank you, Professor. 💙
May all Maggats burn in hell!
It’s too easy to forget that in many ways Obama had to walk on eggs knowing that this country is still very racist and he knew he couldn’t be viewed as an angry Black man...people were just waiting in the shadows to jump out and make that accusation.
sooo fundamental to understand on a deep level
Michael, my younger brother, who also reads LFAA, sent me a text this morning, quipping that Biden has let loose his working-class inner Irish bulldog finally. “He should do that more often!” I agree entirely!
Been waiting for that. Nobody mentions it in Texas.
“ Biden said, “I was surprised to see so many socialists in the Republican caucus.”
Politics has become a sport. A game. Teams.
I often wonder why a Republican who is totally against something, say Medicare or Social Security, would accept that “handout.” If they were true to their beliefs wouldn’t they opt out?
"Beliefs"? fidelity? Republicans?
Wait, but Republicans support family values!
Like Trump for example: Divorced two or three times I cannot count, spending quality time with porn stars, kids with multiple women that he has little to do with, I mean, Trump is the very model of family values.
Or, Herschel Walker? Four kids with four different women and spent not one minute raising any of those kids. But, that is REPUBLICAN family values.
So, we know who they are.
I've seen far too many of that type and their "family values". Dodging taxes, avoiding child support, smacking the old lady around, avoiding monogamy, pilfering. Damnedest "family values" I've ever seen.
"Family values" is such BS! A meaningless slogan.
However, it fools ALL Republican rank and file ALL the time. Useful Lies for sure.
Messaging works
It need not contain a shred of truth
Nazis knew that, Rupert knows that.
A mantra. Blocks out thought.
Hey MIke, perhaps "family values" means having as many families as possible?!
Sorry, poor joke. I'm fried from all the politics.
Given that the R's want to ban abortion, birth control etc-will they next put forth the idea of mandatory involuntary insemination? Possibly. Would this RW SCOTUS OK it? Probably.
Hahaha, the idiots even say, don’t mess with my Medicare while voting for it’s “sunset.” Lies and propaganda work, the cult is proof positive…
Evelyn, it would insure those repugnants would never get re-elected or elected at all. I wish they would refuse the help and show their constituents who they really are: bastards!
First they have to know it’s a government program and therefore “socialist.” Second, they say “well, I earned it.”
…..or against abortion…
For anyone else. When it’s convenient for them it’s just fine.
If 100% of Republican senators believed TFG was guilty, but voted to acquit regardless, that is 100% dereliction of duty. They swore an oath.
They make me do the same almost every day.
All Republicans are HYPOCRITES. Let us use the correct word for who they are. All the time.
Mike, I think Republicans passed being hypocrites some time ago; they've dropped the public pretense of decency and honesty.
Let us refer to them, then, as Pharisees, and condemn in the full force manner Jesus did when he encountered them openly praying in the street.
Jesus knew who they were......and so do we.
My name for them when most people had forgotten what they were
stunning, isn't it?
"They make me do the same almost every day." 🤣🤬
Unfortunately, since Republican officeholders are shameless and Republican voters don't have the brains to find their ass with both hands on a clear day with a three hour advance notice, calling them out for the shameless hypocrites they are will not change a thing.
Correct,
The Republican Party has so marinated Democrats in language like "radical leftist Democrats", "communists", "socialists", etc., that Republican rank and file, when they tear themselves away from watching Survivor and Football, no longer care, or know of, what POLICY Democrats actually have and they are also unware that Republicans have NO POLICY except destruction.
Funny, Republicans constantly say that Democrats are going to DESTROY "our country". But, it is the Republicans themselves who actually desire that outcome.
Just like during the McCarthy era: the “red” scare. Funny how language changes over the decades….same shit different day.
Yeah, they’ve been calling us commies, socialists and radical leftists for years. Then they and the both-sideser media get the vapors and clutch their pearls when Dark Brandon calls some of them semi-fascists (which is true!). Let’s see, which is worse? Imaginary communists who wants to use government spending to improve the lives of ordinary Americans, or real fascists who want to establish a repressive christianist authoritarian state, strip away the rights of women and the BIPOC population and massively move wealth up to the top 1%? Gee, that’s a tough one!
I've been texting GOTV for several outfits for several weeks now. The vitriolic response to as simple a survey question as "Can we count your support for Dems in the election?" is head-spinning. Pathetic, actually, in the rhetorical stupidity. Writing postcards and letters is rather relaxing since ya don't have to deal with a response.
Ooh, stirring the hate pot is a dangerous thing.
Be careful. I like football 😉
Jeff,
Be careful, in one weekend of watching football (or maybe two or three) you COULD have read the new and powerful: 1619 Book written by a handful of the most thorough black historians in history. Edited by Nicole-Hannah Jones.
Just a thought. I only watch football once per year. The Superbowl, because I have a friend that invites me to his big party. But, I chat with folks while there and pay no attention to the game.
Mike: Reading 1619 & other books AND enjoying watching sports, including football, & even participating in fantasy leagues are hardly mutually exclusive. In fact, “talking sports” often proves to be a commonality wherein other topics (like politics) are easier to segue into as common ground has already been established.
Mike S - "I only watch football once per year. The Superbowl, because I have a friend that invites me to his big party. But, I chat with folks while there and pay no attention to the game."
I am so jealous. I can only dream of having a "one-track" mind. They tell me it is the goal of Sainthood... or being well on the way.
Unfortunately, being "open-minded" has, for me, put the kibosh on any such ambitions.
Ha! Read it. I multitask 😉
Exactly, roadmaps, GPS, Braille won’t help.
Truth doesn’t seem to work either. I just hope all those Republicans living on social security and Medicare vote Blue. A girl can dream....
I actually Laughed Out Loud. :-)
They turn around to see if their ass is behind them but it disappears!
What a great Letter. It is truly remarkable that Republicans seem to favor lying about the economy (and much else), even when it works against them. It must be the case that they are irretrievably chained to the donor class that wants lower taxes on the wealthy, less spending on infrastructure and other social goods like healthcare, and elimination of government oversight. It doesn't even make sense that the donor class wants less spent on infrastructure, except where they hope to create infrastructure privately and charge big bucks for it, such as toll roads or a private postal service. But those appear to be the people demanding Republicans bray about "socialism" whenever Democrats invest in the economy or our citizens. What we need is full disclosure, either by law or by extremely effective journalism, of the degree to which the wealthy control these puppet politicians.
You nail it, privatization is the goal with CEOs raking in the dough. So sick of the lies and the sheep who fall for the propaganda, however clever it might be. Just hate the right guys and we are compadres forever. Money buys the votes of the deliberately ignorant.
"It must be the case that they are irretrievably chained to the donor class that wants lower taxes on the wealthy".
Yes, most Republicans are indeed in this category.
Sadly, we in NY also have Democratic Governor Kathy Hochul who is chained to her donor class. She is a politician who is firmly ensconced in one "pay to play" activity after another.
Most recently, Hochul was found to have purchased 50 million CV19 tests, produced by Access Bio in NJ, from an intermediary company filled with Hochul donors, Digital Gadgets, for an eye popping $637 MILLION dollars.
https://www.wxxinews.org/capitol-bureau/2022-10-04/hochul-defends-covid-test-purchases-against-pay-to-play-allegations
California bought exactly the same number of tests directly from Access Bio and paid $300 million for them.
So, Hochul granted $337 MILLION dollars to Digital Gadgets. Her campaign donors at that company instantly turned around and donated to her campaign (public knowledge) and probably opened a gigantic Swiss Bank Account for her as well.
Kathy Hochul is a DEMOCRAT. And, she is about as corrupt as they come.
But she wore a halo while trashing Cuomo
Why? why? why? If asked, face to face, how could they defend lower taxes on the wealthy (just to begin with)?
You spark an ad, Anne-Louise: "Vote Republican if you think all those who make OVER $400,000 should pay LOWER taxes!"
Love ❤️ LOVE that billboard!
Why is that not in every Dem ad
"...political scientists have identified a distinct new demographic group perched geographically and economically apart from the hoi polloi. Made up of individuals with the means and inclination to influence the outcomes of congressional races far afield, this small group of wealthy, highly educated urban and suburban residents constitutes the growing donor class." -The Wilson Quarterly (2008). The article goes on to point out that the typical congressional candidate receives more than 2/3 of all their individual donations from people outside their district --and that was 14 years ago.
Tea party grown????
That Biden guy can be a droll dude.
Biden said, “I was surprised to see so many socialists in the Republican caucus.”
I honestly think he should have used the correct word for their behavior:
“I was surprised to see so many HYPOCRITES in the Republican caucus.”
We might confuse Republicans by not being clear.
Nope. What Biden said was perfectly clear. And aimed at the right audience: those who will pick up on the obvious hypocrisy and vote accordingly. It doesn't matter whether or not Republicans in office get the implication (thought they will, and then look for ways to squirm out of it). And it doesn't matter if extreme right wing voters miss it or get upset about it. They may or may not vote, but are unlikely either way to be swayed by any argument. We should not allow ourselves to shape our strategy to them: it is a waste of time.
Better yet
So much good news about our economy and the continuing positive change we are seeing daily, thanks to President Biden and the Democrats. And it’s expected that repubs will criticize and take credit at the same time. No surprise. What is troubling is the news of the loss of K-12 teachers and support staff. Many of my teacher friends who had to teach online during the Pandemic and then endure complaints and controversy about masking in person, were happy to take early retirement even losing value of benefits. Add to those retiring teachers those who teach in communities that are fighting over what and how to teach, specifically CRT, Critical Race Theory, even if they don’t understand it, our system of Public Education is in trouble. John F.Kennedy: “Let us think of education as the means of developing our greatest abilities, because in each of us there is a private hope and dream which, fulfilled, can be translated into benefit for everyone and greater strength of the nation.”
The news about K-12 teachers troubles me, too, Irenie; though, I can hardly blame the ones who left. Who wants to be berated at every turn while just trying to do their job.
I worked for 20 years in public schools. Never again
Thank you Jeri. 20 years is a lifetime in teaching.
And let's not forget the ongoing defunding of public schools by the diversion of Public Ed money being sent to private/religious/home schooling via school vouchers. If your Republcan gov't start talking about doing this, PLEASE SPEAK OUT. The mantra they use is "School Choice" (The idea is being pushed by ALEC in order to dumb down the public). In NH, this is an ongoing effort to privatize education-the legislature cut our Public Ed money even more after the diversion of funds. The voucher plan was implemented last year by the Republican legislature &n governor, despite massive opposition by the public. The issue was so problematic, they had to hide it in the state budget. Their original projection was about $130 K for the first year. It's now costing about $8 MILLION over budget after only ONE year and could easily balloon much more over time. As a result, the poorer towns' public schools may have to be closed or a face major increase in property taxes since a goodly part of the state public ed funding comes from property taxes. This, despite a court case decided in 1997 that mandated a different way to fund public schools. Nothing has been done. Advocates for Public Schools are suing the state about this yet again.
WONDERFUL! :-)) Today Biden named the Republicans who voted against the infrastructure law and then asked for money. Biden said, “I was surprised to see so many socialists in the Republican caucus.”
Repeat, ad nauseam
So it has now become common practice for journalists like Rachael Bade and Karoun Demirjian to withhold information vital to our survival as a democracy in order to get a lucrative book contract. If they had the receipts proving that every Republican senator believed 45 broke the law in that phone call to Zelensky, they were obligated to report it at the time, not a year and a half later.
Our democracy is in peril not only because Republicans have become overtly authoritarian thugs, but because the fourth estate has abandoned its fundamental responsibility to report the facts. How depressing.
"...withhold information vital to our survival as a democracy in order to get a lucrative book contract." That drives me 🤬
Agreed
Amen!!!
What are you talking about? Books gather material from many sources and try to build a larger picture from what previously were scattered, often disjointed, snapshots of moments and events. Reporters and journalist do spot news and some do analysis of events as they occur. Book authors bring it all together including material from other sources. In this case, one journalist quoted something Ted Cruz said. It was covered. Then he covered himself. Interesting person, Ted Cruz. Hear him say something. Hear him reverse himself. Hear him deny both the original quote and his reversal. Which Ted Cruz do you believe? And how in the world do you make the jump from "Ted Cruz said..." to accusing someone who later quoted Ted Cruz of withholding information? Yeah, there has been a lot of sloppy news coverage for a long time (I've been talking about it for a long time), but your reasoning in this case doesn't hold.
Interesting take, Annie. Maggie Haberman kind of touches on this in interviews we've seen of her as she makes the rounds, promoting her new book. I trust you and her - integrity-wise. Not that i agree with you yet... more thinking on this. I do believe you raise valid points. Thank you for sharing your view.
OFF TOPIC: Per WAPO, Reuters & Stringer, the Kerch Strait Bridge is on fire. The major bridge is Russia's main supply route to southern Ukraine. Few details.
See NYT reportage
Got it: thank you. Good photo. Per The Guardian UK, a blast occurred at 6 am Saturday, Crimean time from two [2] railway cars with the train side of the Bridge billowing black smoke. Separately, a section of an adjacent & parallel roadway has collapsed.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/live/2022/oct/08/russia-ukraine-war-live-news-fire-engulfs-part-of-kerch-bridge-between-crimea-and-russia?page=with:block-6340eb648f08e561623cb7b6
Your last sentence warmed the cockles of my heart. I will only reiterate two voices from the past. From Nov 26, 1932, Will Rogers said “The money was all appropriated for the top in the hopes that it would trickle down to the needy. Mr. Hoover didn’t know that money trickled up. Give it to people at the bottom and the people at the top will have it before night, anyhow. But it will at least have passed through the poor fellow’s hands.” From HST, “Socialism is their name for almost anything that helps all the people.” Why do we have to keep learning these same lessons over and over. Propaganda works, we don’t have the Japanese to jolt us out of our attraction for the Republican/Nazi lying machine almost 81 years after they did it before.
Jeri,
Many thanks for the quote summarizing Hoover economics. Henceforth, I will refer to Republican economic policy as "HOOVER ECONOMICS". Because, hopefully, even the most ignorant American will know who Hoover was and what he wrought with 10 years of Republican "Policy".
I might add: Having been amassed at the top, those at the top LOST it all and then jumped out of windows in a fit of unwillingness to take responsibility for their poor judgement.
Will Rogers died too soon, we need reminding over and over
Don't worry, there's still Kim Jong-Un. Or is it Il? Little Rocket Man.
Sadly, but the Japanese put an instant stop to the America First fascists. Not sure that anything can shut up Rupert and his ilk these days, unless it’s a direct hit and they are more “tactical” than that …
I have reposted this on LinkedIn, and every single Republican who created a lie in their recent posts on Twitter -- McCarthy, Jordan, Paul, the awful Marsha Blackburn. Thank you Heather. And BTW A most happiest of happy birthdays. I saw the post of someone on Twitter. 🎉🍧🧁🎂🍨🍬🍭🍡
I don't tweet, but I do read LFAA, so I second that heartily. I don't know how to import ice creams and cupcakes.
Twitter is where all things political happen now . It is very easy to do. I can show you if you like. No different from having a FB account. Twitter and Instagram are where more people who are involved socially and politically are than FB. Also Tik Tok. I made myself do it. I hate it, but I do it.
I hate it, and I won't. But thanks for the offer, friend! :)
I understand. Believe me. But right now the stakes are just too high for me.
I actually find FB very active. I tweet and have met a ton of cool, progressive people. I put my art (photos) on Instagram. I am curious about Tik Tok, but, well, just not my thing. Thanks for your comment. Gailee.
I understand. I have a reason.