January 21, 2016

When I see stuff like this, it helps make the case for why she shouldn't be president

She has very flawed ethics and loyalty. Of late, the lies seem to be coming at us daily.

January 21, 2016

Sadly, it's just more dishonesty from Hillary that's becoming too routine in this campaign

But she's been deceiving her entire career. She didn't score high in the untrustworthy polls for nothing!!

This one is particularly ugly because she kicked Bernie in the nuts for helping her husband keep the government open. That's stooping pretty low to score political points.

January 20, 2016

Allegation: "Proof that Ted Cruz did not become a US citizen at birth"

I put the "allegation" in front of the title because I do not regard the article as "proof".

Having said that, maybe the article or parts of it have merit. I don't know for sure. It didn't strike me as totally bonkers but I'm not a constitutional law expert nor up on the laws on both sides of the border. I'm tossing it out there for interest/discussion - not to smear Cruz as a Canadian like a birther. It raises some points I was unaware of and I'm curious to what others might have to say about it. Ignoring that I don't care for Cruz as a candidate, it might be a really interesting or complicated legal case if and when this stuff gets mixed in.

http://www.examiner.com/article/proof-that-ted-cruz-did-not-become-a-us-citizen-at-birth

According to the Canadian Citizenship Act of 1946, also referred to as the "Act of 1947" because of its effective date, Canada did not allow dual citizenship.
...
In order for Ted Cruz to have "become" a US citizen at birth in 1970, his mother would have had to retain exclusive citizenship to the US and filed a CRBA (Consular Report of Birth Abroad) to "obtain" exclusive US citizenship at the time for her son Ted and renounced his automatic "naturally acquired" Canadian citizenship. The process in itself is considered a very abbreviated form of "naturalization", thereby making such persons born outside of the OFFICIAL territories of the United States absolutely ineligible to become President of these United States in at least this one circumstance alone. Given that Canadian law did not allow dual citizenship at the time, then IF his mother filed a CRBA in 1970, his Canadian citizenship would likely have needed to be renounced before a new US citizenship could be granted.

Ted's Father has publicly admitted he became a Canadian citizen in 1968. If his mother's first husband with surname of "Wilson" was also a Canadian citizen (unconfirmed), she would have become a citizen before his father. Even if her first husband was not Canadian, according to Canadian law, she would still have automatically become a Canadian citizen in 1969 after having a Canadian spouse (Ted's Father) and residing in Canada for 1 year. This information substantiates the reports claiming that both of his parents appeared on the Canadian voter's rolls. There is now an unconfirmed claim that someone has supposedly verified that they indeed both voted in the October of 1972 federal Canadian election.

If both of Ted's parents became exclusive citizens of Canada by 1969, then even if his mother tried to file a CRBA, she would not have been able to confer US citizenship to her son as she was no longer a US citizen herself. Even if she somehow retained US citizenship, Ted could not have been granted dual citizenship as it was against Canadian law. The only thing that is certain is that Ted Cruz automatically became a Canadian citizen the instant he was born on Canadian soil and that fact is absolutely irrefutable. Likewise, the release of his mother's birth certificate certainly settles absolutely nothing.

there's more - I can't quote more without breaking the site rules.

I do not agree with everything in the article.

An important point the article doesn't address is jurisdiction. Canada has it's laws on citizenship. And the US has it's laws on citizenship. Canada's laws on citizenship are not going to have jurisdiction in the US and vice-versa. So Canada might think Ted was a Canadian at birth and maybe the US thinks Ted was natural born for all I know. On that basis, ignoring that important point maybe some of the article is quite suspect.

Maybe someone will nuke this thing out of hand. Please - no shooting the messenger themselves - shoot the messenger's facts or ideas.

January 19, 2016

Watchdog: Clinton's server had classified material beyond 'top secret'

Source: Politico

...
In a copy of the Jan. 14 correspondence obtained by POLITICO, Intelligence Community Inspector General I. Charles McCullough III told both the Senate Intelligence and Senate Foreign Relations committees that intelligence agencies found messages relating to what are known as “special access programs,” or SAP. That’s an even more restricted subcategory of sensitive compartmented information, or SCI, top secret national security information derived from sensitive intelligence sources.

“To date, I have received two sworn declarations from one [intelligence community agency],” the letter reads. “These declarations cover several dozen emails containing classified information determined by the [intelligence community agency] to be at the confidential, secret, and top secret/sap levels. According to the declarant, these documents contain information derived from classified [intelligence community agency]sources.”
...
The letter suggests that the universe of highly sensitive documents that passed through Clinton’s unsecured server goes beyond what was previously known. During the Clinton email release process, State has designated more than 1,300 of Clinton's emails at the “confidential” level or beyond, though Clinton and State say none were marked classified at the time. Six of those have been flagged as “secret,” a step below “top secret.”
...
The FBI, meanwhile, is still investigating whether Clinton’s server put national security at risk and whether top State staffers sent around classified information via unclassified means, which is in many cases illegal.

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2016/01/hillary-clinton-email-server-top-secret-217985

---

I do not think this is going away any time soon folks.

NBC and Mediaite have also picked up the story along with the right wing media.

January 19, 2016

Sanders 91% favorable 7% unfavorable

Holy sh*t!! That's flirting with unreal.

It climbs from June 66% favorable 11% unfavorable to the above.

Likewise, in June 35% Sanders, 43% Clinton flips to 60% Sanders 33% Clinton

"Which candidate is the least honest?" In June, Clinton leads handily with 28%. Today Clinton leads handily with 55%. Only 2% think Bernie is the least honest steadily over that time.

No wonder the Clinton campaign is scared. They'd already be seeing that in their internal polling.

I'm so happy for Bernie and his supporters. Win or lose, they should be proud of results like that given where they started and given what they've been up against (a DNC Clinton basically owns)

January 19, 2016

Sounding like a broken record

How many Canadians (or citizens of universal healthcare countries) die because they do not have health insurance coverage? 0 - it's universal, single payer in Canada

How many Americans die because they do not have health insurance coverage? currently, about 30,000 per year (over 664,000 since 2001- to put some perspective on that 419,000 Americans died because of World War II - this 664,000 is a seismic number of American people dead because of this needless BS policy)

Life expectancy? Canada top 10. US about 35th or so (US pays the most but gets ripped off for it when it comes to living a long time happily ever after).

And yes, there's no deductible with single payer in Canada. They pay the whole tab. Small ambulance fees ($50?) or doctors letter ($100) are a few of the extras but there are not many.

But the US pays close to twice as much as everyone else. And the GOP claim they're smart at business. When you're paying roughly $5,000 more per person ($20,000 more per family of four) than any other country, then jobs get more scarce because the US worker is that much more expensive, aren't they.

The US health insurance companies have f**ked the US and it's citizens in so many ways for decades including having a hand in contributing big campaign donations to politicians so that Americans can keep dying needlessly while they line their pockets with American money. They need to go away forever.

January 19, 2016

It's much more than merely Hillary criticism

The United States goes to extraordinary measures and financial commitment to protect their people against terrorists

Meanwhile, since 9/11, the United States lets 664,700 die due to a lack of medical care because most of those people could not afford it and the United States could afford it for them or find another way to deliver it (like most developed nations).

That Hillary chooses to carry that on and Bernie does not is a point but not the biggest point. Yet it is a point I note no Hillary supporter credibly refuting because it does expose Hillary's uncaring, shortsightedness in her policy.

The key or much bigger point is to work towards stopping these people from dying. If you ask the American people "could you give a handout to these poor people?", the GOP in particular and others will not support that or do so enthusiastically. But if you frame the pitch for assistance in the way I've tried (or maybe some have a better idea), asking Americans to help other Americans who will otherwise die should help gain more support for the policy because that's really what is at stake. And I believe most Americans would park their political bias to save another American's life. It's a better way to sell the idea.

Hillary thinks single payer is too hard. If you want to be small minded and wrap your mind around the notion that this is all about Hillary, that's your prerogative. Arguing as has been typically done is a key part of the reason the argument hasn't been won. Arguing for it as I did above or maybe some have a better idea, helps get more folks on side to make it easier because it brings home the point that it's a life or death situation for too many Americans. I could care less about Hillary. She's a pimple on the arse of progress. Since 2007 and before, I'm much more concerned with and sick of these people dying needlessly.

As I alluded to above, but more specifically: another way folks can help is by going down the ticket and helping get people elected to help take back the House and Senate so that it can support real universal/single payer. Or maybe at the state level for 2020 census and elimination of some gerrymandering. Maybe they help by educating fellow Americans (which is the primary reason for the thread to pass on that idea or way of thinking about it). It's not all about Hillary. She's only one American life. It's much much bigger than that. It's trying to solve a problem.

January 19, 2016

One thing that kind of talk reinforces is that Sanders has them pretty nervous.

That puts a good dent into their spin about electability. How electable is Hillary if she can't beat Bernie having started out with a very big advantage?

It's a very damaging thing to discuss for Clinton because a number of folks polled are supporting Hillary because they didn't think Bernie could win. Andrea's chatter is going to make more folks sit up and notice Bernie.

And Hillary does not poll as well against the GOP as Bernie so that may be part of what they're weighing.

Hillary had a good lead in Nevada but I strongly suspect that will have tightened up - and some have suggested that including Andrea today.

Andrea also said in an interview on Morning Joe that folks are really surprised at how developed Sanders team is in South Carolina. She was kind of suggesting he's preparing to make that a much tighter race. Hillary was miles ahead in that one.

If she loses the first four (which I doubt), trying to parachute a candidate in is going to be tough. Don't the states have deadlines for getting on the ballot?

As well, two weeks after South Carolina, 53% of the delegates up for grabs in this primary will be gone. To jump in after South Carolina is too late. It's really too late to jump in now as Joe Biden said a couple of months ago.

It's politics. Anything can happen. But my guess is things are starting to unravel faster for Hillary.

January 19, 2016

If ISIS kidnapped 44,313 Americans to kill them every year, would America

sit on it's hands and do nothing?
No way.

Would it be easy to rescue them?
Probably not. In fact, it might be very difficult and cost a lot of money and very sadly, wonderful American military lives. But I know, as sure as the sun rises, America would fight it's heart out to save every last one of those fellow Americans.

America lost around 3,100 Americans to terrorism on it's soil between 2001 and 2015.

Currently, about 30 million Americans don't have healthcare coverage. Roughly 0.1% of them or 30,000 are going to die in 2016 because they don't have healthcare coverage. That's a fact:
http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2009/09/new-study-finds-45000-deaths-annually-linked-to-lack-of-health-coverage/
Here's a good estimation of how many folks died each year since 9/11 because they didn't have healthcare coverage:
2001 41,200
2002 43,600
2003 45,000
2004 45,800
2005 46,600
2006 47,000
2007 45,700
2008 46,300
2009 49,000
2010 49,900
2011 48,600
2012 48,000
2013 42,000
2014 33,000
2015 33,000
==========================================================
Roughly 664,700 Americans have died since 9/11 because they didn't have healthcare coverage.
That works out to 44,313 Americans dying per year on average.

That's a lot more Americans dying than the 3,100 Americans lost on it's soil to terrorism since 2001.

Americans spent trillions to avenge 3,100 lost to terrorism but there's a lot Americans and politicians who wouldn't chip in a dime to save the lives of 664,700 Americans lost to a lack of healthcare coverage. That fact astounds me.

On a side note, nobody talks about jobs related to this. Single payer substantially reduces healthcare costs. That means that after implementing it, Americans will not be as expensive to employ. Americans will take home more pay but the overall cost to do an hour of work will trend towards less over time - attracting employment because Americans improved their cost effectiveness. The only real loser is the health insurance industry.

Obamacare only solved part of the problem saving about 15,000 to 18,000 or so lives per year. It didn't solve the problem for the 30,000 others who will die in 2016 and each year after because they didn't have healthcare coverage.

Getting single payer (or even universal) is really hard - probably as hard as fighting ISIS. Politically, it's even harder than fighting ISIS because politically, America loves going to war to kill it's enemies.

ISIS sympathizers killed 14 in California not long ago. Media coverage was non stop and the country was outraged and collectively wounded by the tragedy as they should. That was minor compared to the media coverage on 9/11 when we lost 3063. But for 15 years, by comparison, we've been collectively pretty silent on the 664,700 lost since 9/11 and the 30,000 that won't be with us by the end of this year because they didn't have healthcare coverage.

To have this going on for so long, it seems over the top for me to say it but it strikes me like political genocide. Because we don't get to see these 664,700 people without healthcare die on the evening news, we kind of overlooked the 664,700 Americans who died on our watch since 9/11. I guess they don't seem to matter as much or something. Somehow jumping out of the burning World Trade center is more meaningful than quietly dying in an alley somewhere. I don't understand why. This haunts me. Both deaths are equally tragic. It really bothers me to the extent, I'm for the first time repeating a post, trying to refine a message that will get through.

Maybe some of it is our fear of terrorists. We don't want that stuff happening to us so yeah, let the US military might take care of them. Those who have healthcare coverage do not have to fear dying because they don't have healthcare coverage. I guess selfishly, those folks don't have to worry about the others who will die without healthcare coverage. I have healthcare coverage. But I simply cannot be one of those who can look the other way - like Hillary.

A lot of us are very, very thankful to the members of the military who did their duty by fighting terrorists to keep Americans safe and in doing so, won our everlasting respect and eternal gratitude for their courage and in some cases their ultimate sacrifice. As citizens, like the members of our military, I think we also have a civic duty to look after each other. I do not see why that duty does not extend to fighting to see the end of Americans dying without healthcare. Heavy odds are, you knew some of the 664,700 who died without healthcare. And maybe you'll know some of the 30,000 who are going to die this year or in future years.

Even though it's very tough, Bernie is willing to fight for all 30,000 who are going to die this year because they do not have healthcare coverage. And Hillary isn't - she's going for the easier 'save a few thousand while the rest die because it's too hard for me and the country to save all of them'. Under the life and death circumstances, which Hillary has to be acquainted with, I think that's astounding bullshit - a dereliction of duty. We owe it to our fellow citizens to try to save their lives.

Why do we get so upset about the 14 in California lost to terrorism and not the 664,700 lost to a lack of healthcare? Why is that so hard for Americans to figure out? WHY!!! Because it's not on the news? Maybe civic duty is protesting to get it on the news. Or getting behind Bernie. Or rallying others to get out and vote. The one thing I'm sure of is that we have not done enough collectively and I think that is a national disgrace.

I'm sorry for sounding like a broken record on this as I've chatted some about the above in prior posts. It upsets me. It just doesn't make any sense. I'll never ever understand it or accept it. Please look into your hearts, help however you can and elect people who will solve this.

Thanks for reading.

January 18, 2016

If ISIS kidnapped 30,000 Americans to kill them, would America sit on it's hands and do nothing?

No way.

Would it be easy to rescue them? Probably not. In fact, it might be very difficult and cost a lot of money and wonderful American military lives. But I know, as sure as the sun rises, America would fight it's heart out to save those fellow Americans.

30 million Americans don't have healthcare coverage. 0.1% of them or 30,000 are going to die in 2016 because of that. Getting single payer is really hard - probably as hard as fighting ISIS. Politically, it's even harder than fighting ISIS.

ISIS sympathizers killed 14 in California. Media and the country got bent out of shape as they should. But we're collectively pretty silent on the 30,000 that won't be with us next year.

To have this going on for so long, it seems over the top for me to say it but it strikes me like political genocide. Because we don't get to see these people die on the evening news, they don't seem to matter as much. But it bothers me.

Even though it's very tough, Bernie is willing to fight for all 30,000 who are going to die this year because they do not have healthcare coverage. And Hillary isn't - she's going for the easier "save a few thousand while the rest die because it's too hard for me".

Why do we get so upset about the 14 and not the 30,000? WHY!!!

I'm sorry for sounding like a broken record on this. It upsets me. It just doesn't make any sense. I'll never understand it or accept it.