Matt Taibbi focuses on one piece of Hillary's platform - Wall Street reform, and finds it the usual bullshit.....
Hillary Clinton has been pushing an idea that banks aren't at the root of financial instability.
A hard rain's a-gonna fallPool/Getty Images
Since the surprise surge in Senator Bernie Sanders’ poll numbers this year, many people have long attempted to figure out an apt comparison for the self-described Democratic-Socialist. One of those celebrities has undoubtedly been Larry David, and apparently Lorne Michaels and the NBC powers-at-be have been listening.
Illustration by Javier Jaén
The inaugural Democratic debate Tuesday night was a strange show. It felt like two different programs.
One was a screwball comedy starring red-faced ex-Marine Jim Webb and retired Keebler elf Lincoln Chafee, whose Rhode Island roots highlighted the Farrelly brothers feel of his performance. The latter's "I voted to repeal the Glass-Steagall Act because it was my first day at school" moment was the closest thing I've seen to a politician dissolving into his component elements on live television.
The other drama was serious and highly charged argument between two extremes on the political campaigning spectrum, pitting the unapologetic idealist Bernie Sanders against the master strategist Hillary Clinton. (Martin O'Malley seemed like an irrelevant spectator to both narratives.)
One of the most revealing exchanges in the Clinton-Sanders tilt involved the question of Wall Street corruption. Sanders has always been a passionate crusader against Wall Street perfidy, but Hillary's take on the subject was fascinating.
Asked about it Tuesday night, she gave an answer that to me sums up her candidacy and the conundrum of the modern Democratic Party in general. She seemed to hit a lot of correct notes, while at the same time over-thinking and over-nuancing a question where a few simple unequivocal answers would probably have won everyone over
Canadians are voting today, so John Oliver gives us a primer on what's at stake, and the candidates involved.....quite a good 15 minutes, and of course very amusing..........
Americans do not typically think of Canada as a particularly riveting political subject; journalist Michael Kinsley once joked that the most boring headline imaginable would be "worthwhile Canadian initiative." But this year's Canadian federal election, for which voting is today, is both important and, if you've been following its twists and turns, pretty interesting.
John Oliver on Sunday broadcast a brief retelling of the election that captured well both why it matters and why it's been so compelling to follow. This being John Oliver, it's quite entertaining as well. And, naturally, it ends with a righteous rant — taking down Prime Minister Stephen Harper for his fearmongering rhetoric toward Muslims.
The full attention of the media and therefore most of us is focused on the Presidential race for both parties, but as this excellent story says that's only the tip of the iceberg, and the Democrats are in big trouble for many of the other races....
This is so true......this should be essential reading for Democrats....
A hard rain's a-gonna fallPool/Getty Images
The Democratic Party is in much greater peril than its leaders or supporters recognize, and it has no plan to save itself.
Yes, Barack Obama is taking a victory lap in his seventh year in office. Yes, Republicans can't find a credible candidate to so much as run for speaker of the House. Yes, the GOP presidential field is led by a megalomaniacal reality TV star. All this is true — but rather than lay the foundation for enduring Democratic success, all it's done is breed a wrongheaded atmosphere of complacence.
The presidency is extremely important, of course. But there are also thousands of critically important offices all the way down the ballot. And the vast majority — 70 percent of state legislatures, more than 60 percent of governors, 55 percent of attorneys general and secretaries of state — are in Republicans hands. And, of course, Republicans control both chambers of Congress. Indeed, even the House infighting reflects, in some ways, the health of the GOP coalition. Republicans are confident they won't lose power in the House and are hungry for a vigorous argument about how best to use the power they have.
You may have heard that taxing the rich won't solve our problems, but as this analysis from the Times shows - it will. The whining that it won't comes from the apologists for the rich, meaning most of the corporate media....
Ber
nie Sanders and Hillary Clinton have both said they would support raising taxes on rich but all the Republican tax proposals call for cutting taxes on the wealthiest Americans.
When it comes to paying taxes, most Americans think the wealthy do not pay their fair share.
There is a sharp divide, however, between Republicans and Democrats when it comes to taxing the rich, who provide most of the cash for political campaigns.
All the Republican tax proposals, in fact, cut taxes for the wealthiest Americans. Democrats, on the other hand, are prepared to raise taxes at the top, though they have not been very specific about how they would do so.
“Right now, the wealthy pay too little,” Hillary Rodham Clinton said at this week’s Democratic debate in Las Vegas, “and the middle class pays too much.”
But what could a tax-the-rich plan actually achieve? As it turns out, quite a lot, experts say. Given the gains that have flowed to those at the tip of the income pyramid in recent decades, several economists have been making the case that the government could raise large amounts of revenue exclusively from this small group, while still allowing them to take home a majority of their income.
It is “absurd” to argue that most wealth at the top is already highly taxed or that there isn’t much more revenue to be had by raising taxes on the 1 percent, says the economist Joseph E. Stiglitz, winner of the Nobel in economic science, who has written extensively about inequality. “The only upside of the concentration of the wealth at the top is that they have more money to pay in taxes,” he said.
Did you watch the Democratic debate? If you did you will appreciate the excellent humor in this cold open from SNL......a wonderful eight minutes, with Larry David as Bernie, and Kate McKinnon as Hillary and a surprise guest as Jim Webb.....
Since the surprise surge in Senator Bernie Sanders’ poll numbers this year, many people have long attempted to figure out an apt comparison for the self-described Democratic-Socialist. One of those celebrities has undoubtedly been Larry David, and apparently Lorne Michaels and the NBC powers-at-be have been listening.
The crowd-favorite David was revealed on Saturday night’s SNL cold open playing Sanders, moments after frequent SNL host Alec Baldwin appeared to play Democratic candidate Jim Webb.
As expected, Kate McKinnon played Secretary Hillary Clinton as the opening sketch predictably poked fun at Tuesday night’s CNN Democratic debate hosted by Anderson Cooper. McKinnon’s Clinton angrily declares, “…But this year I thought I got to be the cool black guy,” when discussing her 2008 collapse while trying to earn the party nomination for President.
I'm sure this story from the Times caused a meltdown in the White House - whatever you read, saw on TV or watched the movie "Zero Dark Thirty" about the raid that took out Bin Laden isn't quite the full story, so says Jonathan Mahler in an interview with Seymour Hersch, the veteran investigative journalist.
It's a long article but the case for the official story of the raid being bullshit is pretty convincing......a really interesting read......
But I hear you cry "the gub'mint wouldn't lie to us, would they? Not Obama"......
The official narrative of the hunt for and killing of bin Laden at first seemed like a clear portrait, but in effect it was more like a composite sketch from multiple perspectives: the Pentagon, the White House and the C.I.A. And when you studied that sketch a little more closely, not everything looked quite right. Almost immediately, the administration had to correct some of the most significant details of the raid. Bin Laden had not been ‘‘engaged in a firefight,’’ as the deputy national-security adviser, John Brennan, initially told reporters; he’d been unarmed. Nor had he used one of his wives as a human shield. The president and his senior advisers hadn’t been watching a ‘‘live feed’’ of the raid in the Situation Room; the operation had not been captured on helmet-cams. But there were also some more unsettling questions about how the whole story had been constructed. Schmidle acknowledged after his article was published that he had never actually spoken with any of the 23 SEALs. Some details of Bissonnette’s account of the raid contradicted those of another ex-SEAL, Robert O’Neill, who claimed in Esquire and on Fox News to have fired the fatal bullet. Public officials with security clearances told reporters that the torture scenes that were so realistically depicted in ‘‘Zero Dark Thirty’’ had not in fact played any role in helping us find bin Laden.
Then there was the sheer improbability of the story, which asked us to believe that Obama sent 23 SEALs on a seemingly suicidal mission, invading Pakistani air space without air or ground cover, fast-roping into a compound that, if it even contained bin Laden, by all rights should have been heavily guarded. And according to the official line, all of this was done without any sort of cooperation or even assurances from the Pakistani military or intelligence service. How likely was that? Abbottabad is basically a garrison town; the conspicuously large bin Laden compound — three stories, encircled by an 18-foot-high concrete wall topped with barbed wire — was less than two miles from Pakistan’s equivalent of West Point. And what about the local police? Were they really unaware that an enormous American helicopter had crash-landed in their neighborhood? And why were we learning so much about a covert raid by a secret special-operations unit in the first place?
American history is filled with war stories that subsequently unraveled.
Great column from Carl Hiaasen, which starts with John Boehner and then gets to Jeb, and he fillets him like a fish.....
Some people are already waxing nostalgic about Rep. John Boehner, who has resigned as the Speaker of the House and leaving Congress.
Testy and stiff, the hard-drinking Ohio Republican wasn’t exactly a beloved fixture on the national scene. Sniffling over the pope helped soften Boehner’s image, but the main thing that’s made him more likable is the fact he’ll be gone soon.
It’s a strange American phenomenon. No matter how low they get in the polls, politicians start becoming more popular the minute they leave office.
Blamed for high gas prices and the Iran hostage crisis, Jimmy Carter got booted from the White House after four years. Today he is cheered wherever he goes. This is partly because of the charitable work he’s done since leaving government, and partly because Americans have a soft spot for the politically departed.
Saddled with Ronald Reagan’s sputtering economy, George H.W. Bush also lost the presidency after one anemic term. He’s never been more popular than he is today.
Same for Bill Clinton who, despite his impeachment saga, draws crowds like a rock star. Even George W. Bush, the brains behind the disastrous U.S. occupation of Iraq, is more fondly regarded now than during his last few years in the Oval Office.
Which brings us to his younger brother, Jeb, whose popularity has been creeping in the wrong direction ever since he announced his candidacy for president.
A mind-bending new Quinnipiac University poll shows Jeb running fourth among Republicans in Florida, behind Donald Trump, Ben Carson and Marco Rubio.
One of my favorite videos is the beautiful Katy Perry and Jodi DiPiazza at a benefit concert for autistic children.....there is a 3 minute bio of Jodi, then a live performance of Perry's huge hit "Firework" with Jodi on the piano.....really lovely, and got a standing O from the audience.....
Todays police joke
Police work can be entertaining as well as dangerous.Recently, a female Sheriff's Deputy arrested Patrick Lawrence, a 22 year old white male, who was fornicating with a pumpkin in the middle of a field at night.The next day, at the Gwinnett County (GA) courthouse, Lawrence was charged with lewd and lascivious behavior, public indecency and public intoxication. The suspect explained that he was passing a pumpkin patch on his way home from a drinking session when he decided to stop.
'You know how a pumpkin is soft and squishy inside, and there was no one around for miles, or at least I thought there was no one around,' he stated.Lawrence went on to say that he pulled over to the side of the road, picked out a pumpkin that he felt was appropriate to his purpose, cut a hole in it and proceeded to satisfy his pressing need. 'Guess I was really into it, y'know?' he commented with evident embarrassment.In the process of doing the deed, Lawrence failed to notice an approaching sheriff's car and was unaware of his audience until Deputy Brenda Taylor approached him.'It was an unusual situation, that's for sure,' said Deputy Taylor. 'I walked up to Lawrence and he's just humping away at this pumpkin.'Deputy Taylor went on to describe what happened when she approached Lawrence ... 'I said excuse me sir, but do you realize that you're having sex with a pumpkin?’He froze and was clearly very surprised that I was there, and then he looked me straight in the face and said, 'A pumpkin? Shit ... Is it midnight already?'”The court (and the judge) could not contain their laughter. Lawrence was found guilty only of public intoxication, fined $10.00 and sent on his way.The Washington Post wrote an article describing this as "The best come-back line ever."
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