March 29, 2018

How Trump got elected, episode 429

https://www.boredpanda.com/customer-complaint-blanket-price-krafty-katt/?utm_source=newsletter&utm_medium=link&utm_campaign=Newsletter

Long story condensed: Guy texts Instagram crocheter "Krafty Katt" to commission an afghan that's 6 feet wide x 7 feet long, in a three-color complex stitch, and made from wool. She quotes a $400 price (which is Krafty Katt screwing herself out of a LOT of money - her estimate is the project will require 150 hours and 20 skeins of $8 yarn) half up front and customer pays shipping, and gets totally berated by this bully. When he found out she has a day job, he decided she could work for free and get the yarn on sale at a craft store, so he ordered her to make the blanket for $70, payment sent when the project was completed.

At this point you can see where she is much nicer than I am: after being told this she offered to make the afghan for $800. I would have told him to piss up a rope.

March 26, 2018

Just for entertainment, take a look at the society the extreme right wants

http://7cconstitution.blogspot.com/2016/04/the-full-7-concepts-constitution-based.html

Some fun excerpts:

2am) All jobs must be enjoyable. If they are not, you must quit.

2ar) All proven lethal/harmful pharmaceutical drugs/chemicals will be abandoned. The pharmaceutical drug philosophy will be replaced with homeopathic, herbal, psychic, hypnotic, alternative, etc., health care.

4j) Vigilante justice must be done in a way to benefit the public.

5m) Males who proclaim or practice superiority over others, will be automatically rewarded with a full sex-change into extreme womanhood. (Once 10mg/day of estrogen is secretly given, the PONR is 6 months, and the full transformation will be addictively consensual without resistance.)

5n) No one has the right to perform genital or sexual manipulation on children or adults without their individual consent. (No circumcisions, or inter-sex surgery.)

(How does 5m coincide with 5n?)

5o) Every invention must be applied or used upon its own inventors.

March 20, 2018

I just wrote Rep Schiff

I asked him to enter a bill to buy the Secret Service a fleet of John Deere Gators or equivalent to use on golf guard duty, which will ease the burden on the public purse as they’ll no longer have to rent carts from the president.

March 13, 2018

Idaho schoolteacher arrested for child pornography

http://www.cdapress.com/local_news/20180310/teacher_held_on_child_porn_charges

According to another source I have, there was a hearing on Friday, March 9. At it, they revealed that much of Jeremy Campbell's alleged porn was of children the same age as the children in his class. The Idaho Internet Crimes Against Children Task Force found 28 videos and 34 still images depicting child pornography on his computer.

March 13, 2018

The optics of Tillerson's replacement are really bad

Let me get this straight: The best person to replace America's chief diplomat is America's chief spymaster?

March 13, 2018

I doubt the Trump-Kim meeting will ever happen

The two are way too far apart.

Trump's position is, "you give me everything I want, and I'll give you a peace treaty."

Kim's position is exactly the opposite: if he gets a peace treaty from the outset, he will do things for Trump. And I suspect one of Kim's demands will be for the removal of US troops from South Korea - which will be a death sentence for South Korea.

Given that both parties think they have the upper hand in this, neither one is going to move.

March 11, 2018

Has Trump explained HOW he will bring back the steel industry?

Many of the closed steel mills he needs to fulfill his dream of "bringing back steel" are not just closed - they have been eradicated. And it's not like Republican-favorite "struggling small businesses" are going to suddenly pop up to start making steel.

Without steel mills to make additional steel there will be no additional steel made...so what's his plan? Does he have one, or is he going to wriggle his nose, say "The American steel industry is back!" three times fast, and suddenly have roll after roll of steel emerge from Pennsylvania's lush hills?

March 8, 2018

The question is not why Ryan Zinke spent $130k on a door

The real question is why are Trump's Cabinet officials are implementing NSA-grade security in their departments.

March 1, 2018

Is Trump's announced bump stock EO a trial balloon for dictatorship?

An Executive Order is a presidential proclamation that can be used for two things: directing the operations of a government agency, or controlling the operation of an existing law.

Mr. Trump attempts neither with his proposed executive order banning bump stocks. He is attempting to create a completely new law. The Constitution is extremely clear on how new laws are to be made - they have to be passed in exactly the same form by both houses of Congress (in cases where a bill passed by one chamber is amended by the other, members of both chambers are required to negotiate a common bill and send it back to be revoted on) and then presented to the President, who can sign them into law, veto them or allow them to become law without his signature by sitting on them for two weeks.

The Constitution does NOT say "a president who can't get what he wants from a useless Congress can create new laws unilaterally." (If it did, President Obama would have been the most productive president of the last 150 years.)

My feeling is that Trump chose this particular trial balloon because it's something Democrats want to happen - not Trump making things up as he goes, but the elimination of bump stocks from our midst. If we complain he'll stay up all night tweetstorming us. If we let him get away with his attempt at divine right, he'll tweetstorm us over our two-faced reaction..."it was okay for me to write a new law when it was something they liked, why not now?"

Trump wants a "terrific" bill to be sent to him. The only "terrific" bill our useless Congress needs to send him is a writ of impeachment.