1/ Frank Rich with his look at the week in politics......
Most weeks, New York Magazine writer-at-large Frank Rich speaks with contributor Alex Carp about the biggest stories in politics and culture. This week: Cruz's and Sanders's victories in Wisconsin, and anti-LGBT legislation in Mississippi and North Carolina.
Donald Trump was handily defeated by Ted Cruz in the Wisconsin primary last night. Can Cruz’s victory mainly be attributed to big spending by stop-Trump super-pacs and the Trump campaign’s recent calamities, or is Cruz connecting with voters?
I’d vote for the former. Trump has said that he could win elections even if he shot someone on Fifth Avenue. He came close to testing that theory by defending his campaign manager’s assault of a female reporter, taking multiple abortion stands, and adopting a policy on nukes that seems to have been gleaned from Dr. Strangelove. The #NeverTrump forces in Wisconsin, led by the state’s powerful local conservative-talk-show stars, capitalized on every blunder. But the notion that there’s a mass movement within the national GOP for Cruz either among Republican potentates or within the grassroots is a fantasy. Cruz appeals to the hard-core right and Evangelicals and that’s it. This is likely to become more evident than ever as the primary moves on to New York and Pennsylvania.
I’d vote for the former. Trump has said that he could win elections even if he shot someone on Fifth Avenue. He came close to testing that theory by defending his campaign manager’s assault of a female reporter, taking multiple abortion stands, and adopting a policy on nukes that seems to have been gleaned from Dr. Strangelove. The #NeverTrump forces in Wisconsin, led by the state’s powerful local conservative-talk-show stars, capitalized on every blunder. But the notion that there’s a mass movement within the national GOP for Cruz either among Republican potentates or within the grassroots is a fantasy. Cruz appeals to the hard-core right and Evangelicals and that’s it. This is likely to become more evident than ever as the primary moves on to New York and Pennsylvania.
2/ A pretty good Bill Maher "New Rules", where he tells the GOP to "punt!"
Bill Maher ended his show tonight with a blunt message to Republicans: “You’re going to lose this election! You are! You’re gonna lose with either Trump or Cruz, so just punt!”
He said they just need to accept that Hillary Clinton will beat either of their candidates, but suggested that’s probably the best outcome they could hope for anyway.
Why? Because, Maher said, “you’re great at being obstructionist assholes when you’re out of office.”
3/ Matt Taibbi with a story about my favorite columnist Paul Krugman and how he is wrong about Bernie.....Krugman has been [I think unfairly] down on Bernie's economic plans, but it's clear he is part of the Democratic elites that are scared shitless Bernie might actually win the nomination.....
Taibbi is very insightful as always....
JP Morgan Chase ended up saddled with a $13 billion settlement after it admitted to making "serious misrepresentations" to mortgage investorsPaul Krugman wrote an op-ed in the New York Times today called "Sanders Over the Edge." He's been doing a lot of shovel work for the Hillary Clinton campaign lately, which is his right of course. The piece eventually devolves into a criticism of the character of Bernie Sanders, but it's his take on the causes of the '08 crash that really raises an eyebrow.
By way of making a criticism of the oft-repeated Sanders charge that the big banks need to be broken up, Krugman argues that banks were not "at the heart of the crisis."
This is Krugman's assessment of who was responsible:
"Predatory lending was largely carried out by smaller, non-Wall Street institutions like Countrywide Financial; the crisis itself was centered not on big banks but on 'shadow banks' like Lehman Brothers that weren't necessarily that big."
Forget about the Sanders-Clinton race, because it's irrelevant to the issue. Krugman is just wrong about this.
4/ I have never seen a better takedown of a complete asshole than Elizabeth Warren nailing this former Fed official in a wonderful Senate hearing - six minutes of tough, smart questioning that we never see any more.....
Amazing.....
Sometimes, Republicans in Congress decide to do their jobs.
On Tuesday, Senate Republicans on the Banking Committee decided to finally hold a hearing to “assess the effects of consumer finance regulations”– little more than another attempt to rail against Wall Street regulation like the Dodd-Frank law. Ostensibly, the hearing would have granted Republicans the opportunity to shed their “do nothing” image while simultaneously continuing to espouse their mantra of deregulation. Too bad Elizabeth Warren also showed up for her day job on Tuesday, completely eviscerating the Republicans’ main witness and destroying their tired talking points.
“Of all the people who might be called on,” Warren said of Republicans’ lead witness Leonard Chanin, former Deputy Director of the Division of Consumer and Community Affairs at the Federal Reserve Board, “I am surprised that my Republican colleagues would chose a witness who might have one of the worst track records in history on this issue.”
5/ Timothy Egan from the Times with a very good column on we are truly two Americas - one moving forward, one rolling back towards the past......and it's the South that will suffer the consequences, i.e. Floriduh...........
Inside the ancient town hall of Siena, Italy, the walls hold a series of magnificent 14th-century frescoes showing the effects of good government and bad. One side depicts a prosperous city-state, where justice and tolerance prevail in the Tuscan countryside. The other is ruled by a horned, fanged figure, the streets deserted and scary.
We saw our own version of this allegory with the two Americas this week — one going backward, the other stepping into tomorrow. We saw a retreat to bigotry in states dooming themselves to decline. And in other states, we saw a way for people to get around a do-nothing Congress controlled by Know-Nothing throwbacks.
6/ Another excellent John Oliver focus piece on how Congress is obsessed with fundraising......for survival. One of his longer ones at 21 minutes, but very good.....
What do members of Congress spend most of their day doing? It's not necessarily making laws, research, committee work, or talking to everyday constituents. Instead, as much as two-thirds of their time — and typically about 25 to 50 percent — goes to congressional fundraising.
In a long, revealing segment on Sunday's Last Week Tonight, John Oliver detailed the arduous process of fundraising in Congress, explaining how we got to a point where candidates for the House and Senate raised $1.7 billion in the 2014 election cycle.
Why is this such a problem? Sen. Chris Murphy explained, in a video played by Oliver: "For a Senate race, I'm not calling anybody who doesn't have the chance of giving me at least $1,000. … So you got to imagine that the people I'm calling are folks that are making half a million to a million dollars, and they have fundamentally different problems than everybody else."
7/ This is an insightful article about how the disaster that has befallen the Republican Party has come about.....and it's the right wing media and the GOP in an unholy alliance that has caused the choices coming down to Trump or Cruz.....
An intelligent, informative story for anyone interested in our politics.....
Bill O'Reilly, Sean Hannity (Credit: Fox News)
The Republican Party is in a pickle.
The Party itself despises its own two leading presidential candidates, Donald Trump and Ted Cruz. This is a remarkable oddity just in itself. But there is good reason for it. Both of these candidates are so extreme and disastrous that they will almost certainly never be able to win a national election for the Republican Party.
But much worse, if and when one of these candidates does become the Republican Party’s nominee, the GOP could very well be torn asunder into factions. This could devastate the party for years or even decades to come.
The Republicans, however, have no one to blame but themselves. This is a crisis of their own creation. And it didn’t just happen overnight.
The Republican Party has been fomenting anger and discontent in the base of its own party for years. The mechanism through which this hate has been disseminated has been the network of extremist media of right-wing talk radio and the Fox News Channel, which is essentially talk radio transposed onto television.
8/ Tom Tomorrow with three excellent Trump cartoons.....one better than the next......
9/ For fans of TwisterNederland fails only......about 29 minutes of mayhem, drunks and accidents, but too many stupid clips of idiots falling through the ice.....however there are quite a few where you know they ended up in hospital....
Twister Nederland is back with yet another cringeworthy FAIL compilation, this time capturing the biggest bloopers from the last six months.
You can actually learn a lot from this nearly 29-minute video. For instance, stay away from any and all jumps, don’t run down escalators, forget about “flaming” shots and DEFINITELY don’t jump across a frozen stream.
Also worth noting: whoever was in the white car might just be the luckiest person alive.
10/ A new website with a most interesting story about people with "real" superpowers.....makes you think......the gentleman below had a Vice News doc done on his ability to withstand cold.....
Whether they are savants who can paint a masterpiece blindfolded in seconds, geniuses who can calculate numbers only a computer could, or regular people who can remember every single detail of their lives down to the date and time, humans with special abilities seem to be abundant in society. But special abilities go far beyond what many savants are doing today, and science has been studying these abilities for decades, despite the fact that the results are not always emphasized by mainstream academia. Below are a few of many examples that will make you stop and question what you think you know.
11/ A test for our DDD readers......how Conservative/Liberal are you?
Curious to see where your views fall along the political spectrum? You might call yourself a Republican or Democrat by default – but take this quiz to find out what your true colors are!
12/ If you haven't seen the video of Rick Scott getting yelled at in a Starbucks, you have to click on it below.....it's wonderful....then read this column from Fred Grimm in the Miami Herald explaining who the woman is.....
Really interesting.....
What did you expect? Civility? In 2016?
Rick Scott stopped at a Gainesville Starbucks Tuesday evening and happened across Cara Jennings. It was not what the governor would call a serendipitous moment. More like: Of all the coffee joints in all the towns in all the world ....
It would have been like Lord Voldemort popping into his favorite pub and finding Harry Potter at the bar. There was Jennings, a semi-famous leftie hell raiser and a former city commissioner from Lake Worth. And never a meek soul. She seized her opportunity and loudly, laying into the guv for cutting funding to Planned Parenthood, for refusing to expand Medicaid, for not facilitating Obamacare.
But it was her use of a magic word that elevated the confrontation to national news. She called the governor an a-----e.
The 45 second video....
13/ And the follow up.....our lowlife pestilent piece of dogshit Governor has released an attack ad against Carla Jennings.....think about this - a sitting Governor attacks a constituent who dared to speak up against him.....it's exactly like Trump.....
If I ever see this scumbag out in public I'll be yelling at him too......
The new ad from Scott’s PAC, “Let’s Get To Work,” calls Jennings “a terribly rude woman,” a “latte liberal” and someone who “clearly has a problem.” It defends Scott’s record on job creation, arguing that “almost everybody” has a job “except those who are sitting around coffee shops, demanding public assistance, surfing the Internet and cursing at customers who come in.”
.........................
“I’ve never heard of a governor of the entire state of Florida putting out a video like this in response to a constituent,” she said. “It’s pretty much unheard of. But if you’re someone in Florida and you live here and you live under Rick Scott’s policies, it’s not that shocking.”
14/ Movie Review - "Midnight Special".....sounds really good.....
Readers afflicted with extreme spoiler sensitivity may want to cover their ears and start humming right now, since even the vaguest, most careful description of Jeff Nichols’s “Midnight Special” risks giving away some important surprises. This is a film that generates much of its suspense through genre sleight of hand. If I even try to tell you what kind of movie it is — crime story, road picture, science-fiction allegory, religious prophecy — I might be telling you something you’d rather not know just yet.
The music that plays over the end credits gives the trickiness a final flourish. It’s an updated cover of the song (most famously recorded by Lead Belly) that inspired the title. You may well wonder what that old, defiant prison ballad has to do with what you just saw. I have some thoughts on the subject. The Midnight Special in the song is, strictly speaking, a train, but it’s also a symbol of redemption, one of many that decorate the many-colored garment of American folklore.
15/ Do you get Showtime? Are you interested in politics?
You absolutely have to watch "The Circus"....Sunday nights on Showtime at 8pm.....1/2 an hour..........
SHOWTIME
JANUARY 17, 2016 | 10:09PM PT
Showtime and Bloomberg Politics have combined to attempt a near-real-time dive into the 2016 presidential campaign, “The Circus: Inside the Greatest Political Show on Earth.” But the half-hour that premiered on Jan. 17 looks mostly like a title in search of a series, offering insider access, true, but little that goes beyond the endless election analysis that one can find strewn across cable news, including the program that “Game Change” authors Mark Halperin and John Heilemann host for Bloomberg and MSNBC. So chalk this up as a respectable but ultimately rather tired attempt to lure rubes inside the tent.
Halperin and Heilemann team up with political strategist Mark McKinnon, and they certainly enjoy up-close-and-personal encounters with the candidates, following Ted Cruz and Bernie Sanders as they barnstorm across Iowa in advance of its caucuses. “Evangelicals can smell real evangelicals,” McKinnon muses about Cruz’s ability to peddle himself to that important constituency.
Todays video - Mississippi's new [satirical] tourism video from Funny or Die......low key and amusing.....one minute.....
Todays Six Affairs joke.....
The First Affair
A married man was having an affair with his secretary. One day, their passions overcame them and they took off for her house, where they made passionate love all afternoon. Exhausted from the wild sex, they fell asleep, awakening around 8:00pm.
As the man threw on his clothes, he told the woman to take his shoes outside and rub them through the grass and dirt. Mystified, she nonetheless complied. He slipped into his shoes and drove home.
"Where have you been?" demanded his wife when he entered the house.
A married man was having an affair with his secretary. One day, their passions overcame them and they took off for her house, where they made passionate love all afternoon. Exhausted from the wild sex, they fell asleep, awakening around 8:00pm.
As the man threw on his clothes, he told the woman to take his shoes outside and rub them through the grass and dirt. Mystified, she nonetheless complied. He slipped into his shoes and drove home.
"Where have you been?" demanded his wife when he entered the house.
"Darling, I can't lie to you. I've been having an affair with my secretary and we've been having sex all afternoon. I fell asleep and didn't wake up until eight o'clock."
The wife glanced down at his shoes and said, "You lying bastard! You've been playing golf!".
The Second Affair
There was a middle-aged couple that had two stunningly beautiful teenage daughters. The couple decided to try one last time for the son they always wanted. After months of trying, the wife finally got pregnant and sure enough, delivered a healthy baby boy nine months later.
The joyful father rushed into the nursery to see his new son. He took one look and was horrified to see the ugliest child he had ever seen. He went to his wife and told her! there was no way he could be the father of that child.
"Look at the two beautiful daughters I fathered!" Then he gave her a stern look and asked, "Have you been fooling around on me?"
The wife glanced down at his shoes and said, "You lying bastard! You've been playing golf!".
The Second Affair
There was a middle-aged couple that had two stunningly beautiful teenage daughters. The couple decided to try one last time for the son they always wanted. After months of trying, the wife finally got pregnant and sure enough, delivered a healthy baby boy nine months later.
The joyful father rushed into the nursery to see his new son. He took one look and was horrified to see the ugliest child he had ever seen. He went to his wife and told her! there was no way he could be the father of that child.
"Look at the two beautiful daughters I fathered!" Then he gave her a stern look and asked, "Have you been fooling around on me?"
The wife just smiled sweetly and said, "Not this time!"
The Third Affair
A mortician was working late one night. It was his job to examine the dead bodies before they were sent off to be buried or cremated. As he examined the body of Mr. Schwartz, who was about to be cremated, he made an amazing discovery. Schwartz had the longest private part he had ever seen!
"I'm sorry, Mr. Schwartz", said the mortician, "but I can't send you off to be cremated with a tremendously huge private part like this. It has to be saved for posterity."
With that, the coroner used his tools to remove the dead man's scaling. He stuffed his prize into a briefcase and took it home. The first person he showed it to was his wife.
"I have something to show you that you won't believe," he said, and opened up his briefcase.
The Third Affair
A mortician was working late one night. It was his job to examine the dead bodies before they were sent off to be buried or cremated. As he examined the body of Mr. Schwartz, who was about to be cremated, he made an amazing discovery. Schwartz had the longest private part he had ever seen!
"I'm sorry, Mr. Schwartz", said the mortician, "but I can't send you off to be cremated with a tremendously huge private part like this. It has to be saved for posterity."
With that, the coroner used his tools to remove the dead man's scaling. He stuffed his prize into a briefcase and took it home. The first person he showed it to was his wife.
"I have something to show you that you won't believe," he said, and opened up his briefcase.
"Oh my God!" the wife screamed, "Schwartz is dead!"
The Fourth Affair
A woman was in bed with her lover when she heard her husband opening the front door.
"Hurry," she said, "stand in the corner." Then she quickly rubbed baby oil all over him and then dusted him with talcum powder.
The Fourth Affair
A woman was in bed with her lover when she heard her husband opening the front door.
"Hurry," she said, "stand in the corner." Then she quickly rubbed baby oil all over him and then dusted him with talcum powder.
"Don't move until I tell you to," she whispered. "Just pretend you're a statue."
"What's this, honey?" the husband inquired as he entered the room.
"Oh, it's a statue," she replied nonchalantly.
"The Smiths bought one for their bedroom. I liked it so much, I got one for us too."
No more was said about the statue, not even later when they went to sleep.
"What's this, honey?" the husband inquired as he entered the room.
"Oh, it's a statue," she replied nonchalantly.
"The Smiths bought one for their bedroom. I liked it so much, I got one for us too."
No more was said about the statue, not even later when they went to sleep.
Around two in the morning, the husband got out of bed, went to the kitchen and returned a while later with a sandwich and a glass of milk.
"Here, he said to the statue, eat something.. I stood like an idiot at the Smiths for three days and nobody offered me as much as a glass of water."
The Fifth Affair
A man walks into a night club one night. He goes up to the bar and asks for a beer. "Certainly, Sir, that'll be 1 cent."
"One Cent?", exclaimed the man. So the man glances over at the menu and asks, "Could I have a nice juicy T-bone steak, with chips, peas and a fried egg?"
"Here, he said to the statue, eat something.. I stood like an idiot at the Smiths for three days and nobody offered me as much as a glass of water."
The Fifth Affair
A man walks into a night club one night. He goes up to the bar and asks for a beer. "Certainly, Sir, that'll be 1 cent."
"One Cent?", exclaimed the man. So the man glances over at the menu and asks, "Could I have a nice juicy T-bone steak, with chips, peas and a fried egg?"
"Certainly Sir," replies the barman, "but that comes to real money."
"How much money?" inquires the man."4 cents," the bartender replied.
"Four Cents?", exclaimed the man. "Where's the guy who owns this place?"
The bartender replied, "Upstairs, with my wife."
"How much money?" inquires the man."4 cents," the bartender replied.
"Four Cents?", exclaimed the man. "Where's the guy who owns this place?"
The bartender replied, "Upstairs, with my wife."
The man says, "What's he doing upstairs with your wife?"
The bartender replied, "The same thing as I'm doing to his business."
The Sixth Affair
Jake was dying. His wife,! Becky, was maintaining a candlelight vigil by his side.
The Sixth Affair
Jake was dying. His wife,! Becky, was maintaining a candlelight vigil by his side.
She held his fragile hand, tears running down her face. Her praying roused him from his slumber. He looked up and his pale lips began to move slightly. "Becky my darling," he whispered.
"Hush my love," she said. "Rest, don't talk."
He was insistent. "Becky," he said in his tired voice, "I have something that I must confess."
He was insistent. "Becky," he said in his tired voice, "I have something that I must confess."
"There's nothing to confess," replied the weeping Becky, "everything's all right, go to sleep."
'No, no. I must die in peace, Becky. I ... I slept with your sister, your best friend, her best friend and your mother!"
"I know, my sweet one" whispered Becky, "that's why I poisoned you."
'No, no. I must die in peace, Becky. I ... I slept with your sister, your best friend, her best friend and your mother!"
"I know, my sweet one" whispered Becky, "that's why I poisoned you."
Todays animated joke.....
A couple on an African Safari witnessed a small antelope being chased
down by a cheetah. While the kill was about to happen before their eyes,
the husband casually remarked, “I’ll bet the antelope gets away.” The wife
answered, “If that antelope survives this one, I’ll give you sex every day
for the rest of your life.”
down by a cheetah. While the kill was about to happen before their eyes,
the husband casually remarked, “I’ll bet the antelope gets away.” The wife
answered, “If that antelope survives this one, I’ll give you sex every day
for the rest of your life.”
Todays Windows joke
Dear Technical Support,
Last year I upgraded from Boyfriend 5.0 to Husband 1.0 and noticed a distinct slow down in overall system performance — particularly in the flower and jewelry applications, which operated flawlessly under Boyfriend 5.0. The new program also began making unexpected changes to the accounting modules.
In addition, Husband 1.0 uninstalled many other valuable programs, such as Romance 9.5 and Personal Attention 6.5 and then installed undesirable programs such as NFL 5.0, NBA 3.0, and Golf Clubs 4.1.
Conversation 8.0 no longer runs, and Housecleaning 2.6 simply crashes the system. I’ve tried running Nagging 5.3 to fix these problems, but to no avail.
What can I do?
Signed,
Desperate
——————————————————–
Dear Desperate:
First keep in mind, Boyfriend 5.0 is an Entertainment Package, while Husband 1.0 is an Operating System.
Please enter the command: ” C:/ I THOUGHT YOU LOVED ME” and try to download Tears 6.2 and don’t forget to install the Guilt 3.0 update.
If that application works as designed, Husband 1.0 should then automatically run the applications Jewelry 2.0 and Flowers 3.5. But remember, overuse of the above application can cause Husband 1.0 to default to Grumpy Silence 2.5, Happy Hour 7.0 or Beer 6.1.
Beer 6.1 is a very bad program that will download the Snoring Loudly Beta.
Whatever you do, DO NOT install Mother-in-law 1.0 (it runs a virus in the background that will eventually seize control of all your system resources).
Also, do not attempt to reinstall the Boyfriend 5.0 program. These are unsupported applications and will crash Husband 1.0.
In summary, Husband 1.0 is a great program, but it does have limited memory and cannot learn new applications quickly.
You might consider buying additional software to improve memory and performance. We recommend Food 3.0 and Hot Lingerie 7.7.
Good Luck,
Tech Support
Tech Support
Dear Tech Support:
Last year I upgraded from Girlfriend 7.0 to Wife 1.0 and noticed that the new program began running unexpected child processing that took up a lot of space and valuable resources.
In addition, Wife 1.0 installs itself into all other programs and launches during system initialization, where it monitors all other system activity. Applications such as PokerNight 10.3, Drunken Boys Night 2.5 and Monday Night football 5.0 no longer run, crashing the system whenever selected.
I cannot seem to keep Wife 1.0 in the background while attempting to run some of my other favorite applications. I am thinking about going back to Girlfriend 7.0, but un-install does not work on this program.
Can you help me please?
Thanks,
Joe
——————————————————–
Dear Joe:
Dear Joe:
This is a very common problem men complain about but is mostly due to a primary misconception. Many people upgrade from Girlfriend 7.0 to Wife 1.0 with the idea that Wife 1.0 is merely a “UTILITIES & ENTERTAINMENT” program. Wife 1.0 is an OPERATING SYSTEM and designed by its creator to run everything.
It is unlikely you would be able to purge Wife 1.0 and still convert back to Girlfriend 7.0. Hidden operating files within your system would cause Girlfriend 7.0 to emulate Wife 1.0 so nothing is gained.
It is impossible to un-install, delete, or purge the program files from the system once installed. You cannot go back to Girlfriend 7.0 because Wife 1.0 is not designed to do this. Some have tried to install Girlfriend 8.0 or Wife 2.0 but end up with more problems than the original system.
I recommend you keep Wife 1.0 and just deal with the situation. Having Wife 1.0 installed myself, I might also suggest you read the entire section regarding General Partnership Faults (GPFs). You must assume all responsibility for faults and problems that might occur, regardless of their cause. The best course of action will be to enter the command C:\APOLOGIZE. The system will run smoothly as long as you take the blame for all the GPFs.
Wife 1.0 is a great program, but very high maintenance. Consider buying additional software to improve the performance of Wife 1.0. I recommend Flowers 2.1, Jewelry 2.2, and Chocolates 5.0.
Do not, under any circumstances, install Secretary With Short Skirt 3.3. This is not a supported application for Wife 1.0 and is likely to cause irreversible damage to the operating system.
Best of luck,
Tech Support
Tech Support
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