January 19, 2016

A neuroscientist explains: Trump has a mental disorder that makes him a dangerous world leader

http://www.rawstory.com/2016/01/a-neuroscientist-explains-trump-has-a-mental-disorder-that-makes-him-a-dangerous-world-leader/

What do Muammar Gaddafi, Napoleon Bonaparte, Saddam Hussein and Donald Trump have in common? A lot, actually.

According to a number of top U.S. psychologists, like Harvard professor and researcher Howard Gardener, Donald Trump is a “textbook” narcissist. In fact, he fits the profile so well that clinical psychologist George Simon told Vanity Fair, “He’s so classic that I’m archiving video clips of him to use in workshops.” This puts Trump in the same category as a number of infamous dictators like Muammar Gaddafi, Napoleon Bonaparte, and Saddam Hussein. And although there are narcissists out there who entertain us, innovate, or create great art, when a narcissist is given immense power over people’s lives, they can behave much differently. As the 2016 presidential election grows nearer we must ask ourselves, if elected president would Donald Trump act on the behalf of the will of the people, or would he behave more like a dictator—silencing any dissenting voices, perpetually refusing to compromise, and being oppressive to certain groups? To answer that, we should ask a little bit more about what makes a narcissist tick, and how they tend to behave when given free rein.

(snip)

The position of President of the United States is one that requires great empathy, a certain amount of humility,......
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This , of course, disqualifies any republican from Office

January 18, 2016

Great night in South Carolina for Bernie Sanders could be a turning point in the 2016 race

http://www.rawstory.com/2016/01/great-night-in-south-carolina-for-bernie-sanders-could-be-a-turning-point-in-the-2016-race/

The gloves are off in the Democratic race, and it’s now abundantly clear that Bernie Sanders can throw a punch.

he gloves are off in the Democratic race, and it’s now abundantly clear that Bernie Sanders can throw a punch.

On Sunday night the Democratic presidential candidates met for their final debate before the Iowa caucuses. Hillary Clinton entered the debate with a 25-point lead in the national polls, a big fundraising advantage and a virtual monopoly on major endorsements.

But Clinton knows from personal experience that no lead is safe until the voting starts. In the 2008 presidential race she squandered an even bigger lead over Barack Obama.

Could history repeat itself in 2016? That question haunts the Clinton campaign team, particularly now that Sanders leads Clinton in New Hampshire and trails her by just two points in the latest Iowa poll.

Sunday night’s debate will only add to Clinton’s worries. Sanders skillfully fended off Clinton’s attacks and emerged from the debate stronger than ever.

Clinton attacks backfired

January 16, 2016

Have WE been Sold OUT? The Chart That Explains Everything

I'm not an economic genius or even wonk so I don't know if he's correct or not. But I found this interesting.
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http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/01/15/the-chart-that-explains-everything/

Why is the economy barely growing after seven years of zero rates and easy money? Why are wages and incomes sagging when stock and bond prices have gone through the roof? Why are stocks experiencing such extreme volatility when the Fed increased rates by a mere quarter of a percent?

It’s the policy, stupid. And here’s the chart that explains exactly what the policy is.
(snip)

What the chart shows is that the vast increase in the monetary base didn’t impact lending or trigger the credit expansion the Fed had predicted. In other words, the Fed’s madcap pump-priming experiment (aka– QE) failed to stimulate growth or put the economy back on the path to recovery. For all practical purposes, the policy was a flop.
(snip)

Basic economic theory suggests that when private sector can’t spend, then the government must spend to offset deflationary pressures and prevent a major slump. Cutting the deficits removes vital fiscal stimulus from the economy. It’s like applying leeches to a patient with flu symptoms thinking that the blood-loss will hasten his recovery. It’s madness, and yet this is what Obama and the Congress have been doing for the last six years. They’ve kept their hands wrapped firmly around the economy’s neck trying to make sure the patient stays in a permanent state of narcosis.

That’s the goal, to suffocate the economy in order to reward the thieving vipers on Wall Street. And Obama and the Congress are every bit as guilty as the Fed.

January 14, 2016

Hillary Clinton's Absurd Bernie Smear: Why Attacking Him From the Left on Healthcare Makes Literally

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/hillary-clintons-absurd-bernie-smear-why-attacking-him-left-healthcare-makes

The Democratic front-runner is starting to feel the Bern, and in desperation she's picking entirely the wrong fight.

After years of the right wing trying one scheme after another to take away Obamacare, it jars the senses to watch Democratic presidential front-runner Hillary Clinton accuse her primary rival, Bernie Sanders, of wanting to take away Obamacare.

Sanders, she now insists, would do so from the left by instituting a program — single-payer healthcare — that would be more progressive than the Affordable Care Act. Yet this possibility is portrayed in the starkest of terms. It’s as if the Clinton campaign saw a house burning down and told the fire department to put it out by setting the house next door on fire to suck up all the oxygen feeding the flames.

The attack is predicated on a bill that Sanders introduced in the Senate in 2013 that would have set up national single-payer. The bill would have required each state to set up its own single-payer program. A federal board would oversee these state programs and take charge of any that don’t meet whatever requirements it lays out. All federal programs – Medicare, Medicaid, SCHIP – would have been folded into these state-run ones.

January 14, 2016

Netflix Founder Drops $100 Million to Join Billionaire Crusade to Privatize Our Public Schools

Just be aware when you pay your NEXFLIX bill you are supporting rightwingnuts trying to Privatize our schools.

http://www.alternet.org/education/netflix-founder-drops-100-join-billionaire-crusade-privatize-our-public-schools

The purses of the privatization movement are bursting with cash.

There’s more evidence that the push to privatize traditional public schools across America is a pet project of Silicon Valley’s billionaire boy’s club.

On Tuesday, Netflix founder and CEO Reed Hastings announced on Facebook that he was creating a $100 million foundation to fund education, which mostly means bankrolling the charter school industry.

“I’m thrilled to announce that I’m funding a new $100m philanthropic fund for education, creatively named the Hastings Fund, through the Silicon Valley Community Foundation,” he wrote. “Neerav Kingsland is the CEO of this fund, and will donate these funds in the best way possible for kids’ education.

January 14, 2016

Sanders' Millennial Surge Puts Him Ahead of Clinton

http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/sanders-millennial-surge-puts-him-ahead-clinton

Millennials want to see a Sanders vs. Trump matchup.

The latest Rock The Vote/USA Today poll outlines the political leanings of the millennial generation, 18- to 35-year-olds. If the Democratic primary were held today, Sanders has an 11-point lead over Clinton, with young voters supporting Sanders at 46 percent and Clinton at 35 percent.

A Pew Research Survey that came out early last year outlined the tipping point for the millennial generation, which eclipsed baby boomers in the number of voters. This will be the first presidential election since millennials became a political force to be reckoned with. OurTime.org, a youth empowerment organization (not to be confused with OurTime.com, the dating service), has worked since 2011 to register over 350,000 young voters during the last election using its online voter registration tool. "We've known from the beginning that this generation would be a powerful voting block," Johanna Berkson, OurTime's board chair told AlterNet. "That's why we've worked to consistently engage them on the issues critical to them. And once they realize how much progress can be made when they vote for candidates who fight for these issues, they will begin to vote more consistently."

January 13, 2016

Bernie Sanders could do the impossible: Why Hillary Clinton’s “electability” argument has fallen apa

http://www.salon.com/2016/01/12/bernie_sanders_could_do_the_impossible_why_hillary_clinton_is_no_longer_an_inevitability/

The nominating convention is still months away, but Sanders has already come farther than anyone ever expected

Bernie Sanders’s presidential campaign has excited progressives and socialists alike in a way that’s unparalleled in modern American history. So far, however, Hillary Clinton has been able to draw substantial support from people who are sympathetic to Sanders’s views and his record, but believe that Clinton is the most electable candidate in the general election against what is sure to be an ultraconservative goblin. However, as polls over the past couple of months have shown, Sanders is showing signs that he’s every bit as a electable as Clinton — and when matched up against certain Republican candidates, he’s polling even better than she is.

In Sanders’s neighboring state of New Hampshire, he has exploded to a 14 point lead over Clinton in the latest Monmouth University poll. New Hampshire is a complicated state politically, a libertarian-leaning bastion in liberal New England, but Sanders fits the role of a rough, charismatic party outsider that New Hampshirites have a history of supporting, so it’s not such a surprise that Sanders is wooing them this time around.

(Sanders, by the way, leads every Republican he was matched up against in New Hampshire by double digits.)

What’s a bit more surprising is the ground Sanders is gaining in Iowa. The latest Quinnipac poll found that Sanders now leads Clinton by 5 percent in the earliest primary state, whose caucus is on February 1. If Sanders is able to beat Clinton there, it’ll give him a decisive victory in the two earliest states in the country (which also happen to be swing states).

And don’t underestimate the importance of Iowa: Barack Obama’s victory there in January 2008 solidified him as a serious threat to Clinton.

January 13, 2016

Bernie's Insurgent Campaign Is Starting to Make the Corporate Democrats Panic

by Thom Hartmann

http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/bernies-insurgent-campaign-starting-make-corporate-democrats-panic


If Sanders can pull off a two-state sweep of the early primaries, that would completely change the dynamic of the race.


Now, considering the fact that Bernie Sanders does better than Hillary Clinton in a hypothetical matchup with Republican frontrunner Donald Trump, you'd think the establishment Democrats would be thrilled with these developments. You'd think the people who talk so much about "electability" and how important it is, would be overjoyed that Bernie Sanders, a popular and electable candidate, is moving toward the Democratic nomination.

Apparently not.

Instead of celebrating the rise of a new star, establishment Democrats are freaking out about the possibility of Bernie Sanders winning both Iowa and New Hampshire. Case in point: former Tennessee congressman Harold Ford, Jr., who on MSNBC agreed with Joe Scarborough that establishment Dems could recruit John Kerry or Joe Biden to run if Bernie sweeps both early primary states.

Pretty weird, right?

January 11, 2016

WHY THE HELL DOSEN'T BERNIE HAVE SECRET SERVICE PROTECTION YET?

Fucking Trump has it and he doesn't have a chance of being elected.

January 9, 2016

Bernie Sander's Plan to Tame Wall Street Riles Team Clinton

http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/01/07/bernie-sanders-plan-tame-wall-street-riles-team-clinton

Millions of Americans saw “The Big Short” over the holidays. The blockbuster movie, based on the book by Michael Lewis, is a primer on how the crookedness and fraud rampant in the U.S. financial system brought down the global economy in 2008.

If you left the theatre with steam coming out of your ears, you might want to take a look at the Wall Street reform plan just fielded by presidential candidate Bernie Sanders.

Rather than relying on regulators to do a better job of policing the massive financial services sector, Sanders downsizes and leashes the largest players on Wall Street and overhauls the Federal Reserve in an effort to put America’s central bank to work for working families.

“Greed is not good,” Sanders said...(snip)

Clinton Campaign Preemptively Strikes Back

Before the plan was even released, the Clinton campaign was worried.....

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Corporatists should be worried. Regardless of which side of the aisle they park their butts