Recent Comments

1. about 12 hours ago on Prickly City

   https://www.nytimes.com/1985/04/19/us/reagan-likens-nazi-war-dead-to-concentration-camp-victims.html

2. about 18 hours ago on Prickly City

   “…currently the most engaged…”

   And you appear to be having trouble with basic English….

3. about 19 hours ago on Heart of the City

   First panel -

   https://www.gocomics.com/heartofthecity/2021/04/15

4. about 19 hours ago on Prickly City

   Oh, joy….

   In addition to the Deficit, the concern about the Debt Ceiling may be making a comeback….

   ~

   Senate Republicans on Wednesday signaled they might oppose any future increase to the debt ceiling unless Congress also couples it with comparable federal spending cuts, raising the specter of a political showdown between GOP leaders and the White House this summer.

   Republican lawmakers staked their position after a private gathering to consider the conference’s operating rules this session, issuing what GOP leaders described later as an important yet symbolic statement in response to the large-scale spending increases proposed by President Biden in recent months.

   ✁

   The debt ceiling is the maximum amount the U.S. government is allowed borrow to meet its financial obligations.

   Congress previously agreed to suspend the limit through July 2021, at which point the Treasury Department has only a few months of “extraordinary measures” it can take before lawmakers must either raise the amount — or face the unprecedented consequences of default.

   Republicans raised hardly any complaints about the debt ceiling during the Trump administration, voting frequently to increase it without requiring any spending cuts in return.

   Over that period, the federal debt increased by roughly $7 trillion as Trump pushed for large levels of military spending and slashed taxes for U.S. corporations.

   But Republicans quickly revived their calls for austerity once Biden entered the White House, much as they had done in the past when Democrats took control in Washington.

   The spending concerns also contributed to GOP lawmakers’ unanimous opposition to Biden’s $1.9 trillion coronavirus relief plan earlier this year, on top of the party’s more recent apprehension about the White House’s roughly $2 trillion stimulus package.

   ~

   https://www.washingtonpost.com/us-policy/2021/04/21/senate-republicans-debt-ceiling/

5. about 19 hours ago on Prickly City

   Ahhh…

   Going to the ‘Both sides are bad…’ trope…

   However, it is the Right Wing, that is currently the most engaged in domestic terrorism.

   ~

   Elizabeth Neumann resigned from the Department of Homeland Security in 2020. She says the Trump administration ignored the threat — and fanned the flames — of violent domestic extremism.

   ✁

   Some of the Q followers were disillusioned that the prophecy about Trump remaining president didn’t come true. So in that sense, the insurrection was a failure. Are there ways in which it was a success for the far right?

   ELIZABETH NEUMANN: Thanks for having me, Terry. And unfortunately, yes, it was viewed as a success for white supremacists, for anti-government extremists and, quite frankly, probably, many of our enemies overseas.

   They saw it as a success in that we have such societal discord that we can’t seem to find, even post-January 6, the ability to come together on a basic thing like a commission to study domestic terrorism in our country and what happened on January 6.

   So we are very fractured as a nation at this point, very polarized. And that plays into our enemies’ hands.

   ~

   https://www.npr.org/2021/03/25/981164240/capitol-siege-has-been-a-success-for-recruiting-extremists-former-dhs-staffer-sa
6. about 20 hours ago on Prickly City

   “Ignore what they say and pay close attention to what they do.”

   That sums up better than anything else…

   …exactly why Carmen is having trouble voting for Republicans…

7. about 21 hours ago on Prickly City

   Well, the GOP presidents have been a little vague in their loyalties since 1968.

   Richard Nixon colluded with the S. Vietnamese to delay peace talks (actual treason during a time of war.) LBJ knew about it and felt that confidence of the USA was more important.

   Of course, we will never know if Ford’s pardon of Nixon was Quid pro quo for the VP job.

   You know, after GOP VP Spiro Agnew resigned in disgrace due to allegations of conspiracy, bribery, extortion and tax fraud.

   Ronald Reagan presided over the Iran / Contra affair. Col. North got immunity and then took 100% the blame, even though a mere Marine Lieutenant Colonel could not have done it all on his own.

   Bush the Elder correctly called Reagan’s ‘Supply Side Economics’ as ’Voodoo Economics’. Then he joined the team as VP.

   Bush the Lesser is an unindicted war criminal for his war of choice against Iraq. And his admin outed CIA agent Valerie Plame over something her husband wrote.

   Also, Bush the Lesser ignored the warnings of Osama Bin Laden about to attack the US. Put $2 Trillion of the two wars off the books, and presided over the military’s loss of Billions in cash in Iraq.

   Trump’s Covid (lack of) response has crippled the U.S. economy and over a half million are dead…

   You better believe the Dems are “saying the same things about..”

   They have every reason to do so….

8. about 21 hours ago on Prickly City

   .

   What’s worse is the fact that I know that question 4 of 14…

   …doesn’t actually have a ‘correct’ answer provided.

   .

   Mike Lindell of MyPillow fame “Launched a new social media platform…”

   …which has yet to actually work…

   You really can’t say something ‘launched’ when it failed to take off…

9. about 22 hours ago on Prickly City

   “…claimed the jury was intimidated into the guilty verdict…”

   Yeah…

   The sequestered jury…

   .

   (Former guy appointed) US District Court Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil: “Fox persuasively argues […] that given Mr. Carlson’s reputation, any reasonable viewer “arrive[s] with an appropriate amount of skepticism” about the statements he makes.”

   ~

   Judge dismissed two jurors, sent 12 to be sequestered and begin deliberating Monday afternoon

   Prosecutor Steve Schleicher delivered two-hour closing argument

   Defense attorney Eric Nelson went more than two and a half hours, judge had to interrupt for lunch

   Prosecutor Jerry Blackwell delivered the state’s rebuttal: ‘There can be no excuse for police abuse’

   Cahill denied defense motion for mistrial but said Congresswoman Waters’ comments could be grounds for appeal

   ~

   https://www.khou.com/article/news/local/george-floyd/derek-chauvin-trial-day-17-george-floyd-death/89-bd0e0aa9-01bb-4d3d-bdce-59e4e48605a5

10. about 22 hours ago on Prickly City

    In 1969, Tricky Dick prepared an anti-poverty plan that would have provided a family of four — in which no adult earned any income through employment — $11,000 a year in today’s money, courtesy of Uncle Sam.

    The proposal enjoyed support from then-Representative George H.W. Bush and Nixon adviser Donald Rumsfeld.

    ✁

    Conservatives never much liked demand-side economics.

    Beyond its concrete material implications (if consumer spending fuels growth, you need to make sure ordinary consumers get a significant share of national income, whether through high wages or fiscal transfers),

    …the theory contradicted the morality tale that reactionary capitalists had long told themselves and the public to reconcile predation with prestige:

    The agent of prosperity was not the spendthrift consumer, hedonistically pursuing short-term gratification by gobbling up precious resources and thereby earning his place in the purgatory of wage labor;

    …it was the saver, whose self-denial supplied the capital stock that society required to increase its productivity, thereby earning him a place at the summit of the social order. ✁

    ✁

    Republicans have therefore spent the past four decades disdaining the very concept of fiscal stimulus and insisting that the true “job creator” is not the quotidian consumer but the heroic entrepreneur (and/or private-equity executive).

    Of course, in practice, “supply-side economics” looked a lot like “regressive demand-side stimulus.”

    The Reagan recovery was born of giant tax cuts and deficit-financed military spending, not a surge in productivity growth induced by high business investment.

    Still, Republicans would never admit that their economic model was just the New Deal Democrats’ old one, except with more labor exploitation and slower growth.

    ~

    https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2020/12/covid-stimulus-checks-mnuchin-free-money-creates-jobs.html